Certainly. The most often cited example of this is you're not protected if you yell "Fire!" in a crowded area when there is no fire, as you're causing a dangerous situation to arise from your words.

Another example would be when your words are a deliberate attempt to elicit harm or damage against another individual. For example, if you say "Go get him boys," or "I'm not saying you should do something about her, but something's not right with her," and action occurs against that person because of those words, you're not protected.

Another, and more relevant, example would be where your opinion is now in direct conflict with another contract you have made with a person. Because for all intents and purposes, democratic citizenship is a contract between the individual and the nation, with established rights being a part of the contract. However, say you have a contract with a person which requires you to endorse X product or Y activity, but you say off to the side that you think X product is stupid, or you go and make a stupid comment about something when you're the main representation of Y activity. Both of those activities are now violating a contract you have made with another entity. Because of this, while you are still allowed to express this opinion, it's well within legal jurisdiction for the entity to call the contract into question, as you are no longer fulfilling your end of the contract. The other side of the contract has the exact same rights you do, and they have every right to participate in only contracts that they deem fair and fulfilled.


The most important part of understanding the limits of free speech is that free speech is limited to that which does not infringe of the rights of others. If you say deliberately harmful speech, or even if you say something that turns out to be harmful, you are not protected because of an overarching blanket of "free speech". Because he's in a contract with A&E which requires him to be the face of the program "Duck Dynasty", he's bound by the contract to maintain or build a following of the program. If he says something out of the program which impacts his ability to maintain his side of the contract, A&E is protected under law to cancel the contract. A&E has a reasonable fear that by him saying something that elicited such a large backlash, he will no longer be able to fulfill his end of the contract, therefore A&E has every right to cancel the contract.



And it would be nice if you didn't instantly make the conclusion I'm some sort of dictator who wants the populace to be ruled with an iron fist, as you would probably not like me to make the assumption that you're an anarchist Bible-thumper who believes everything should be legal because God hasn't said anything explicit about it. Both are way far off either ends of the political spectrum, and both are incredibly stupid ways of governing, let alone effective ways. I only state that rights have limits, because individual rights are extended to everyone, not just one person.