Columns: Free speech is our right, but it isn't always right

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LeoAffairs.com

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Local cops have been using a Web site called LeoAffairs.com to do what lots of work colleagues do - chat, grouse and gossip about the bosses.

The Web site has message boards for dozens of police agencies, and some recent talk on one dedicated to the Hillsborough Sheriff's Office sounded pretty useful: the merits of certain guns, 12-hour shifts, take-home cars.

But some past postings have been uglier. Writers using anonymous screen names have made allegations of affairs, womanizing and ineptitude. References have been made to "Davey the Boy Wonder," presumably the undeniably earnest Sheriff David Gee. More seriously, some messages on LeoAffairs.com have contained racist and homophobic language.