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Where to draw the line is no simple matter though.
That is why there should be no line drawn. The theater case could have been decided with a favorable outcome not by banning that type of speech but by holding the false crier liable for the damage he caused rather than banning speech.
Most of the German people today weren't even alive during the Nazi reign and did not grow up with anti-Semitic and xenophobic culture.
and of course many alive at the time had nothing to do with the Nazi party, and perhaps opposed it. The concept that an entire nation is guilty of something is designed to control.
Children of immigrants to America learn how "we had slavery in this country" "We committed atrocities against American Indians". "We had Jim Crow laws" when it was the government at that time that was involved in those things not the collective "we" which includes the child learning this assigned guilt.
The immigrant child learning this in school had nothing to do with it, his parents if they came from say Syria in 2004,had nothing to do with it, nor did his grand parents or great grandparent have anything to do with it or perhaps weren't even aware of it in their lifetimes!
I would say that freedom of speech is largely an illusion in the United States. You are free to say anything that big government and big corporations approve and nothing else.
I'll paraphrase... You are free to say anything as long as it doesn't make the owners of this country uncomfortable.
Just like flag burning. It offends many, but it is the definition of freedom to say whatever the hell you want.
I assure you that I am at least as offended by the Bible as anyone else is offended by flag burning, and my reasons for being offended by the Bible are far more justified.
APOCALYPSEFUCKisShostikovitch says
This is what restored Germany to an honorable state
Ask the Poles and Romanians and Greeks if they think so.
I'm a Pole and I think so. My brother is a Pole and he married a German. So, yes. The Germany of today is not anything like Nazi Germany. And the typical German today is not like the typical German during WWII.
I'm basically a mutt: Italian, Irish, English, Polish, Lithuanian. And I'm hung like a black man.
I'll paraphrase... You are free to say anything as long as it doesn't make the owners of this country uncomfortable.
uncomfortable - interfering with profits or power.
Just like flag burning. It offends many, but it is the definition of freedom to say whatever the hell you want.
I assure you that I am at least as offended by the Bible as anyone else is offended by flag burning, and my reasons for being offended by the Bible are far more justified.
What I'm offended at is that our constitution states that we have rights, while our government simply ignores that portion when it's convenient for them. Now that's current, and offensive.
What offends me is that constitution gives us rights, while our own government instead of upholding those rights simply ignores them when it's convenient for them to subjugate us. That really irks me these days
The theater case could have been decided with a favorable outcome not by banning that type of speech but by holding the false crier liable for the damage he caused rather than banning speech.
This is stupid on so many levels, I wouldn't know where to start.
People get trample to death, and you're saying, "hey that's cool, as long as the family can sue the guy that caused it, that is if they can prove they caused it."
The story about yelling "fire" has little basis.
I believe the justice who created the anecdote as part of an opinion was repeating something he read in the papers which was later refuted.
Like the NASA space pen story, it's only peripherally anchored in reality.
The theater case could have been decided with a favorable outcome not by banning that type of speech but by holding the false crier liable for the damage he caused rather than banning speech.
I'm sympathetic to this sort of thinking, but this reasoning can also be used to legalize murder: just make the murderer liable for damages to the surviving relatives, and the civil courts will solve it.
This is stupid on so many levels, I wouldn't know where to start.
People get trample to death, and you're saying, "hey that's cool, as long as the family can sue the guy that caused it, that is if they can prove they caused it."
It means that people will have to realize that speech has consequences-even for practical jokers.
A criminal intent on causing a panic will say whatever he wants- a law against saying it won't stop him
I'm sympathetic to this sort of thinking, but this reasoning can also be used to legalize murder: just make the murderer liable for damages to the surviving relatives, and the civil courts will solve it.
that is a tricky one. Intuitively, that result would be a bad one.
The question that I have to think about more is does a free speech remedy have to be consistent with a murder remedy?
Initially, I think you can justify laws that appear to conflict in their philosophy because in the speech case you are trying to defend a right and balance it against a potential harm, whereas with murder there is no right to murder that you need to protect.
The government (from the point of few of the governed) has a far greater interest in protecting against murder than speech.
The story about yelling "fire" has little basis.
It's not an anecdote; it is a metaphor. That's obviously why you don't understand the metaphor. You think it's referring to a real-life situation, when it is actually illustrating a principle.
I believe the justice who created the anecdote as part of an opinion was repeating something he read in the papers which was later refuted.
First of all, I don't believe that. But even if that were the case, it is irrelevant. He was not relying on the factuality of the anecdote, but rather was giving a hypothetical example of speech that would not be protected under the First Amendment. The hypothetical is valid. Whether such an event actually occurred does not matter.
The theater case could have been decided with a favorable outcome not by banning that type of speech but by holding the false crier liable for the damage he caused rather than banning speech.
You too? It wasn't a "case"; it is a hypothetical.
Also, I don't understand the distinction you are trying to make between "banning" and "holding the person liable". Those are the same thing, are they not? I mean, what you're saying is tantamount to saying, "Murder should not be banned; rather we should punish people for committing murder." A distinction without a difference. Once you institute any kind of penalty for an action, you are saying that action is illegal.
Maybe you guys are a little fixated on the one example. How about some other examples of non-protected speech:
"I'm hijacking this plane."
"This is a robbery. Everyone get down on the floor."
"I planted a bomb in the White House and it's going to go off at 5:00."
It's not an anecdote; it is a metaphor. That's obviously why you don't understand the metaphor. You think it's referring to a real-life situation, when it is actually illustrating a principle.
Yes, it's a metaphor, but I don't much care, because the metaphors and fictions become real in many minds, and give rise to the idea that such examples are not rare. For example, Scalia cited '24' in a torture opinion. We could say he did this because he is an idiot, but many, many people believe that if a situation can be acted out or described, it's real.
If we're going to ban murderous speech which can kill people, we should at least be aware of how rare or common such speech is.
"Dark side of the moon" has made many people believe there is a perpetually dark side of the moon; "Shouting fire in a crowded theater" leads to the conviction that we are ever at risk of homicidal pranksters who do this once or twice a month.
Maybe you guys are a little fixated on the one example. How about some other examples of non-protected speech:
"I'm hijacking this plane."
"This is a robbery. Everyone get down on the floor."
"I planted a bomb in the White House and it's going to go off at 5:00."
Uh, it was a metaphor, not an example.
"Shouting fire in a crowded theater" leads to the conviction that we are ever at risk of homicidal pranksters who do this once or twice a month.
Correct that is not the case- that is not a real and present threat that requires banning speech.
Correct that is not the case- that is not a real and present threat that requires banning speech.
You remind me of forrest gump.
A criminal intent on causing a panic will say whatever he wants- a law against saying it won't stop him
THe yelling fire in a crowded theater example isn't meant to be about that one specific example causing panic in that specific way.
It's meant as an example proving that there are exceptions to when free speech applies. And these exceptions are the cases when any reasonable person would deem a particular expression of speech to highly risk causing violence or injuries.
People are not free to do that. We don't have complete freedom to do whatever we fucking want.
IT's not that anyone is going to make laws about what people can and can not say. But if you tell a retarded kid to kill someone, and they do, you aren't going to be able to get out of trouble by invoking your first amendment rights. IF it's a fight, and you're a bystander and you yell, "pull out your knife and stab him!" you aren't going to be able to argue your freedom of speech rights.
People are not free to do that. We don't have complete freedom to do whatever we fucking want.
No rights are absolute, the courts use a balancing test that considers the individual's right vs the government's need to protect a compelling government interest.
THe yelling fire in a crowded theater example isn't meant to be about that one specific example causing panic in that specific way.
Why do I feel like we're wasting our time here? It's as though Smaulgld and Iosef are incapable of abstract thought.
Why do I feel like we're wasting our time here? It's as though Smaulgld and Iosef are incapable of abstract thought.
Iosef's comments are often meant to be art, so you never know. As for Smaulgld, I don't know what his point is, and I don't think he does either.
Iosef's comments are often meant to be art, so you never know.
If that's the intent, it's not very well done.
I agree Patrick. People have the right to say hateful things, and I have the right to block them. But not to limit their ability to say things.
Just like flag burning. It offends many, but it is the definition of freedom to say whatever the hell you want.
A minor point: burning is the military's official means of old flag disposal. Flags that have served for a year are burned, not tossed in the trash. Which means that the burners who do it as a political statement are just about as ignorant as the people who get all offended by it.
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The very essence of free speech is the freedom to say politically incorrect things.
Being free to say only things that are politically correct is no freedom at all.
The Wikipedia definition of hate speech is:
Italics mine. There are two big problems with legally prohibiting all such hate speech:
First, when we come to the point where mere disparagement is forbidden, we will have already murdered free speech in the name of an Islamic-like orthodoxy.
Second, the idea that certain individuals or groups are "protected", this means those individuals or groups are given greater rights than the rest of us, and that everyone else is a second-class citizen.
In America, our new unofficial Koran is that the following characteristics in minorities confer legally superiority to the rest of us and may not even be disparaged except under threat of being fired, fined, or even jailed:
"race, religion, gender, disability, or sexual orientation"
Though the First Amendment has not yet been official overturned, in reality, college campuses in particular routinely violate the first amendment via speech codes.
from https://www.aclu.org/free-speech/hate-speech-campus
Thank god for the ACLU. They have real integrity, and the balls to stand up for the rights of everyone and not just "protected" groups.