One of the hallmarks of authoritarianism is that you're obviously not allowed to publicly criticize your government; such speech would be wrong and bad and laws are quickly made to dispense with such potentially naughty things. Anyhoo, apropos of nothing let's see what's going on in the increasingly despotic realm of North Carolina.
After a video was posted on Facebook Friday showing a group of people following [Former Gov. Pat McCrory] during a trip to Washington, D.C., for inaugural weekend, chanting “Shame!” and calling him a bigot, Sen. Dan Bishop of Charlotte says he’ll introduce legislation to protect public officials.
The proposed legislation would “make it a crime to threaten, intimidate, or retaliate against a present or former North Carolina official in the course of, or on account of, the performance of his or her duties,” Bishop said.
Threaten? Sure, but threats of violence are already illegal. Retaliate against? It's unclear what that means, but using the common definition of the word it would appear to ban taking any action against a North Carolina Republican as a result of how they're doing their jobs, which would presumably include voting against them. Intimidate? What counts as intimidate?
Apparently, judging from Sen. Dan Bishop’s stated reasons for introducing the bill, shouting "Shame!" or calling a former elected Republican official a bigot counts as "intimidating" them, because Republicans are—what's that term that keeps being tossed around these days?—delicate freaking snowflakes who are perfectly fine legislating away the rights of their fellow Americans but who cannot bear the thought of having their fee-fees occasionally hurt in public as a consequence of those acts. So shouting hurtful things at a former Republican lawmaker will, according to the bill, be punishable by five years in prison.
Sen. Dan Bishop of Charlotte is, by the way, one of the vile little grubs that launched North Carolina's "bathroom bill," a bill that sent the whole state into an uproar, launched boycotts, and did absolutely nothing good for anyone. He calls the people shouting hurtful names at Pat McCrory "leftist rioters," and has a vested interest in new laws to protect North Carolina Republican bigots from being called hurtful names in public. Republican bigots need their safe zones, after all. The First Amendment is fine and good, but yelling hurtful things at a public official should be right out.