The Limits of Free Speech

Message Bookmarked
Bookmark Removed
Not all messages are displayed: show all messages (248 of them)
Ally, like you have a fucking LEG to stand on, dissing me for my "self promotion". As I said over there, it's a case of "Hello, Pot, my name is Kettle, you're looking black today."

Kate the Saint, Thursday, 9 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-three years ago) link

Have to say that the general conclusion — that this is a PUB and I am one of the BAR- STAFF — is far more upsetting and/or offensive to me than anything anyone has EVER said to ANYONE ELSE EVER.

mark s, Thursday, 9 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-three years ago) link

Kate, two words: shut up.

You said yourself that you thought better of doing it, because you knew it would rub certain people the wrong way. Me, personally - I don't give a shit what you post. Post about your band and that other godawful band you used to talk about so much on the mailing list all you want, I can personally ignore it quite well. I mean, I only read the Lollies thread because it was brought up here, to be honest. I don't personally like you using the mailing list or the message board as promotion for your band. Other people don't mind. I have no problem with you doing it, because I just don't read it.

The point is, I agree with Momus in that if you're going to open yourself up for it by posting incessantly about your band and effectively spamming the board - WHETHER I CARE PERSONALLY ABOUT IT OR NOT - then you can't get offended when you get flamed, and neither should anyone else.

However, as mark just said - this is a bar, he is the bouncer, if you don't like this bar, go, and in the end that is my opinion, and being as I find Momus to be the world's most offensive person, I'm glad I don't agree with him in the end result.

Kate, for someone who has been rather smug about how smart she is on several intelligence-related past threads and how stupid everyone else is, you don't really comprehend that well once you take something to be even the vaguest personal insult. And, yes, THAT is a personal insult, unlike the self-promotion comment.

Ally, Thursday, 9 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-three years ago) link

I'll have a Waggledance shandy please, Mark

Madchen, Thursday, 9 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-three years ago) link

Could Hanle y please defuse the situation by chipping in with an inane comment?

Nick, Thursday, 9 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-three years ago) link

I don't like the idea of this pub. They appear to let the manky door staff serve behind the bar.

Tim, Thursday, 9 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-three years ago) link

Good god, someone is touchy. Is is PMS, darling? Or are you just upset that I came back from my self imposed exile and deflected critical attention that you could have been basking in?

We all talk about our jobs, our social lives, our friends- these things affect our worlds and our worldviews. If I talk about the Lollies a lot (and, as Sterling pointed out, I really don't think that I talk about them half as much as Momus talks about himself) is it because they ARE my job, my social life and my friends.

It *IS* hypocritical of you to have a go at me for my "self promotion", Ally, considering you are unable to post on a single thread without bringing your life, your job, your social life into it. So spare me the childish d**mp*tr*ol-esque rants. Please.

Kate the Saint, Thursday, 9 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-three years ago) link

No, I'm not at all upset you came back from your dramatic exile, it's just that you've come back just as touchy as ever to anyone saying anything that could even remotely be put as an insult or slight towards you.

Like I JUST FUCKING SAID, for those of us who can't comprehend simple English, I have no problem with you talking about your little band. It's great, it's fantastic. I don't necessarily agree with someone using a message board as someplace to post their own tour dates, but THAT'S WHY I DIDN'T READ THE BLASTED THREAD. Simple, yes, no, maybe?

Momus talks about himself ten times more than anyone I can possibly think of ever encountering in my life and every single post of his starts off with some ridiculous tale about people in Japan mobbing him or some awful song of his, and is being completely hypocritical for slamming you, yes, but regardless the point still stands: if you're going to self-promote your music, then you're going to have to put up with childish people getting an attitude about it and flaming you.

Or, what, has it become against ILE/ILM rules to disagree with you, luv? Saying that I don't like you promoting your band and don't read those threads is hardly the same as "having a go at you" and quite frankly I'm tired of every fucking comment that you perceive as negative towards you being taken as "having a go at you". You want to start a PMS war (very mannish of you, btw), here goes: go take a goddamned Midol and call us in the morning.

And that is all I'm going to say on this thread, I'm not reading it anymore because quite frankly it's useless. I basically agree that the post against Kate should've been deleted on the grounds that this isn't a free speech institution but more like a club, and she goes off the handle? Fuck it, I can't be bothered - unlike some people, I know when to stop and just ignore the situation, so feel free to get in the last word, like you always have to (cf. doompatrol).

Ally, Thursday, 9 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-three years ago) link

In a lot of pubs, you'd be asked to take this outside. Then we'll all go to the window and watch you brawl in the street, while we're nice and warm inside with our waggledance shandies.

Mind you this can be a dodgy old boozer at times

cabbage, Thursday, 9 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-three years ago) link

(Blimey. Glad I'm not on-staff in THIS pub. Where's the landlord when you need him?)

mark s, Thursday, 9 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-three years ago) link

Whoa, who's the one who's flown off the handle?

Kate the Saint, Thursday, 9 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-three years ago) link

Time gentlemen please!

Emma, Thursday, 9 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-three years ago) link

Fantastic I've made it just in time for happy hour.

Martin, Thursday, 9 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-three years ago) link

That was better than Eastenders.

scott, Thursday, 9 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-three years ago) link

I HAVE NEVER INCASED MY LEGS IN MOLTEN FRUITCAKE UNTIL I SEEN YER DADDY WRINLKE UP!

Mike Hanle y, Thursday, 9 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-three years ago) link

I'd love to know if someone can explain to me where *that* particular bit of overreaction came from...

Mike has won, and I'm off to get some coffee.

Kate the Saint, Thursday, 9 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-three years ago) link

Of course free speech has limits, becasue everything does.

Mike Hanle y, Thursday, 9 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-three years ago) link

So, Strange Fruit! This Saturday! I'll be DJing, Fonda 500 and Idiot Son are playing. Doors open at 8pm, it's £4 to get in and £3 with a flyer. Brilliant bands and top tunes all night for just a few pence more than a pint.

Who's coming?

Er, I'll get me coat...

Paul Strange, Thursday, 9 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-three years ago) link

Hello, it's the world's most obnoxious and self-promoting vaudeville villain here again to make another irritating comment.

Isn't Strange Fruit, the label, named after 'Stange Fruit', the song about lynching?

Isn't lynching the most extreme form of censorship known to man?

Don't the white-ass rednecks who lynch sit round in bars drinking Southern Comfort and relying on their faithful barstaff to remove any black people who have the temerity to even think about coming in and ordering a drink?

But that's okay, isn't it, because the owners of those bars call the shots, and there are always black bars where the black folks can go and drink with people who think like them, no?

Momus, Thursday, 9 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-three years ago) link

The current holder of the Olympic Gold Medal has just broken the current world record for jumping to conclusions...

Kate the Saint, Thursday, 9 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-three years ago) link

Don't the white-ass rednecks who lynch sit round in bars drinking Southern Comfort and relying on their faithful barstaff to remove any black people who have the temerity to even think about coming in and ordering a drink?

No. They drink Bud Light or Miller Light.

Do I have to be the Token Black Guy again and point out that this particular line of logic is deeply insulting and trivializing to anyone who has actually had to endure racism?

Dan Perry, Thursday, 9 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-three years ago) link

there are always black bars where the black folks can go and drink with people who think like them, no?

This analogy strikes me as fatuous. Seems to trivialise race hate and segregation.

Nick, Thursday, 9 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-three years ago) link

Well, not sure if the Strange Fruit label condones lynching, but it's a safe bet it was named after the protest song made so famous by Billie Holliday. Did I spell that right.

We've never had to lynch anyone at Strange Fruit. Not yet, anyway. And the Strange Fruit club, surprisingly, isn't named after the record label. We took the name from a northern soul compilation one of the original founders owned which featured lots of tracks which, although they didn't really fit together very well, sounded really good. Which is kind of what we're about. Other names, which we never used but nearly did, include 'Bitterscene' and 'Pull The Wires...'

But anyway... we're just an organisation who try to put on clubs and gigs and ensure that bands get a fair deal. Unless we don't like them. In which case we lynch them.

Paul Strange, Thursday, 9 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-three years ago) link

Why are Airport Girl and Captain Soul still alive, then?

Kate the Saint, Thursday, 9 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-three years ago) link

Nicholas, whoa! Where did THAT come from? I think you just went postal.

Dan, I reckon the redneck posse are on Coors.

suzy, Thursday, 9 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-three years ago) link

Momus (if it is you and not someone trolling): does it not at all occur to you that the free-market approach you are taking on this topic is EXACTLY THE OPPOSITE to the position you have taken in your FreakyTrigger interview, and elsewhere?

mark s, Thursday, 9 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-three years ago) link

Mark, it really is Nick, and boy is he tweaked.

suzy, Thursday, 9 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-three years ago) link

Suzy is, of course, ABSOLUETLY CORRECT. I feel so small inside...

Dan Perry, Thursday, 9 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-three years ago) link

Its true that the song Strange Fruit is about lynch. Nevertheless I would find it difficult to agree that merely because a song is about something, it is pro-something.

As far as I know Billie Holliday was never knowingly bigging up the lynch party. I agree with Hanle y.

Pete, Thursday, 9 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-three years ago) link

tweaked = angry?
tweaked = drunk?

mark s, Thursday, 9 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-three years ago) link

How is my position 'free market' exactly? Free speech is not the same as free market. I think I made that clear in the distinction between commerce and comment. I was against the 'free market' use of ILM as a place to sell tour tickets, and for the idea of ILM as a place to comment. I then thought that if ILM was to be opened up to be 'free market' in this way, at the very least moderators should allow comment as the price of the commercialism.

Very few people seem to have agreed. Apparently my mistake was in seeing ILM as being a mini-nation, with first amendment-style protection of free speech, when everyone else sees it as a bar. My point about lynching (and apologies if the sarcasm wasn't clearly signalled) was that the model of the bar as ideal civic space is not a very tempting one. Bars are feisty places policed by private security (invariably fascists). Being told that if you don't like it you can drink elsewhere is not a great comfort.

Yes, I am contradicting the point I made in my Freaky Trigger interview about how it would be pompous for Hispanics to 'represent' Chinese in their local radio stations in New York. But actually, the racial pluralism in the US often comes at a price, which is racial separatism. The Chinese and the Hispanics ignore each other completely. In Britain we at least try (less and less successfully, it seems) to get everyone in the same pub. If only on TV.

I still prefer the model of the nation to the model of the pub, because pubs only codify things like 'how to play darts' whereas nations try to codify things like freedom of speech. And I believe that harmony which exists only because you silence unharmonious elements is not worth having. As Milton said in 'Areopagitica', the virtue which is never tested by exposure to corruption is no virtue at all.

Momus, Thursday, 9 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-three years ago) link

The bar thing was a depressing analogy for me too.

suzy, Thursday, 9 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-three years ago) link

Momus: As the other Token Black Guy here, I take your point. But I think there's a giant distinction between the two things you're comparing, which is that in Mythical Klan Hangout, a person is unwelcome based on his/her very genetic makeup and existence as a human being, whereas in ILE Land, a single comment was expunged based on it having been deemed disruptive to the enjoyment of the whole. Your analogy will only be applicable when a person posts here for the first time and is immediately banned based on something like his IP address.

What seems to be bothering you is the idea that one person in particular is in a position to decide what constitutes Unacceptable Behaviour, which is a reasonable concern. But this being a fairly democratic place -- as evidenced by one post removal striking up such a lengthy debate -- I get the feeling that as soon as any moderator seems to be overstepping his jurisdiction, he'll be taken to task for it rather quickly. So in that sense, well done for bringing up the issue -- whether or not the removal was justified, I suppose it's useful to have someone playing devil's advocate in such situations.

Nitsuh, Thursday, 9 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-three years ago) link

Actually, the more I think about it, that analogy was absolutely ridiculous. What the hell, Momus? You're trying to equate ethnicity with behaviour.

Nitsuh, Thursday, 9 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-three years ago) link

The landlord returns...
Blimey, half five in the afternoon and I've missed all the action! How irritating. My opinion on this matter is simply that I view my job as a moderator as being a tool (ha ha) to keep the board running smoothly. By this I mean making the board easy to access and digest, which is why all my editing done thus far has been to remove posts which have contained huge JPGs or entire web pages cut-and-pasted, and to categorise the threads so people can find threads of interest to them quickly and easily. I do not wish to police the intellectual content of people's posts, because that is abhorrent to me. There are few things I hate more than the little dictators (not that I'm accusing anyone on IL* of being one) that plague the internet kicking people out of chat rooms and forums for voicing unpopular opinions. As for the thread in question, Kate surely must realise that she could get some flak for promoting her band, and I don't think it's up to me to protect her, she's quite capable of doing that herself. Same goes for all of you - if someone abuses you, abuse them back, or not if you see fit. I'll only step in if X's actions disrupt the board (if they post stuff that disrupts the board, ie flooding or monstrous cut-and-pastes) or they appear to only want to abuse for abuse's sake (D**mintroll).

DG, Thursday, 9 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-three years ago) link

It may be that my attitude to commercial use of a bulletin board is an old-fashioned one going back to the early days of the web. Back in the early 90s the libertarian hippies chatting on The Well, and people like John Perry Barlow and the Electronic Freedom Foundation, made a big deal of keeping the web free of commerce.

Maybe kids today take spam for granted and don't hear alarm bells ringing when they see one moderator (Tom) protecting commercial activity while, not three inches downthread, another (Mark) fails to protect free speech.

I mean, really, was there really no-one else who got even the teensiest little bit worried by that particular scissors manoeuvre?

Momus, Thursday, 9 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-three years ago) link

You're proposing A Free Market of Ideas, and saying this polices itself best. It's IDENTICAL to the invisible hand theory of economics. The post I publicly announced I had deleted part of amounted — I felt — to a veiled physical threat by an obsessive with an agenda against another poster: I'm sorry if you regard that as a "pompous" thing to be concerned about. The jump from what I did to lynching is totally bonkers, frankly: that's why I a. assummed you were a troll b. assumed you were drunk. If someone can post on ILE or ILM, then they can moderate their own board on Greenspun (it's as easy as that): if their rules of acceptable behaviour differ from the general loose collective whatever here (whatever that is), or if they insist that a better ILM will work with different rules, then they can go and create their better ILM. I'm one of half a dozen people whose job it is to ensure that ILM remains a place where certain kinds of argument — the ones you lament the disappearance of elsewhere, Nick — are possible. OK, sometimes I make mistakes: maybe I made one here. I'm fairly sure I didn't: I think your over-the-top thrashing around on both boards kinda proves that. The closest you've come to an argument that's given me even momentary pause is when you noted in passing that removing something sight unseen makes people want to see it more, and invest it with a value it perhaps doesn't have. (Don't recall exactly how you put it: that's what I read into it...) Now that you've got onto racist lynch-mobs, I know you're off flying in Abstract Principle land. Maybe pubs and bars aren't the best analogy (and, hey, I wonder who said THAT first?): maybe it's more like when dad comes in from work and moans that mum hasn't got the dinner ready yet. In the version I like, mum throws the stew at dad and shouts "Cook it yer fucking self then..."

mark s, Thursday, 9 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-three years ago) link

Two issues:

For a start, I object to the assumption that I posted what I originally posted for the sole reason of "using ILM as a place to sell tour tickets". Clearly, Nick, you never actually *read* the original post, chosing instead to simply use it as a springboard for your own agenda.

We keep a press agency for promotion, and we have actually spend a great deal of the past 2 days talking to regional press. If you'd read the post more carefully, you'd have actually realised the intentions were something else:

I quote I thought this might be a good excuse to have regional meet-ups for those posters who don't live in London or Oxford. Here is a list of venues and dates that we will be playing. If anyone can think of pubs or cafes near said venues, please feel free to post suggestions on this thread. How is this more offensive than, say, Ned's request for meet-ups, or Ally's open invite NYC bar crawls, or even the ILE free jazz picnic?

Second, my trepidation at posting said post on ILM was not based on any notion that I should not post "self promotion" but because I realised that to post such a sort of thing was basically akin to painting a target on my back and declaring open season as flamebait for people such as d**mp*tr*l along the lines of whatever I imagine the deleted message to have been.

Imagine my surprise at the fact that two of the people who have most voiciferously expressed their disdain at my audacity at such open self promotion and "spamming" are the two people most commonly guilty of it! Hypocrisy in action!

I stand by my actions. The censorship was not mine, nor was it asked for by me. Although the bar analogy may have its faults, I still maintain the idea of ILM/E as a community, and not a nation at large.

Actions within communities IRL have consequences. Had Denis or whatever his name is actually said something offensive to me in person, I'd have either ignored him or punched him, depending on my blood alcohol content. How Momus gets from a community defending itself against disruptive and personally offensive behaviour to the sweeping statements on censorship that he's made is definitely an Olympic Gold Medal World Record in jumping to conclusions.

Kate the Saint, Thursday, 9 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-three years ago) link

I didn't mean to 'play the race card' with the Strange Fruit analogy, just point out that bars are not the most tolerant places, and that saying 'You can go to another board, or start one yourself' is not a helpful argument. It's separatism. It keeps those who think differently away.

In this instance, it evicted (and reprimanded) someone who was merely being bitchy in a way that wouldn't be out of place on the NME Angst page. I've now read a paraphrase of the offending post and it is completely tame. Only a paranoid dread of trolls could make it seem even remotely sinister.

Momus, Thursday, 9 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-three years ago) link

Let me note that these are actual questions, not an argument in a pro- moderation direction:

Momus: Since you're arguing principles here, I have a question for you: Is there any sort of speech you see as worthy of restriction? Start with yelling "fire" in a crowded theater, work your way up through in-person verbal abuse, and let me know where your line is.

Second: in terms of a moderated discussion -- as it's been explicit from the get-go that this is a moderated discussion -- do you see any value in restricting certain forms of speech for the specific purpose of making the discussion as a whole more valuable to those who are interested in it? For example, in a "town hall"-style political forum, would you advocate giving an incoherent drunk unlimited time to make comments that don't seem to have any bearing on the proceedings? And if not, what differentiates that situation from this one? In both cases, the purpose of the moderation is to make the discussion more concise and accessible and pleasant toward those who are actually invested in it.

Again: just questions.

Nitsuh, Thursday, 9 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-three years ago) link

I mean, really, was there really no-one else who got even the teensiest little bit worried by that particular scissors manoeuvre?

I was not worried because I trust the moderstors' judgement. If I didn't, I wouldn't post here.

I didn't mean to 'play the race card' with the Strange Fruit analogy, [...]

This statement worries me.

Dan Perry, Thursday, 9 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-three years ago) link

Just for the record, Momus requested a copy by email from me of said abusive post, promising he would not "in any circumstances repost it" — as I hadn't kept a copy, I did my best to recall it for him. I accept that what he's just done doesn't actually technically make him a liar, but it certainly makes him jerk of the day, as far as I'm concerned.

mark s, Thursday, 9 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-three years ago) link

"it's been explicit from the get-go that this is a moderated discussion"
It may have appeared that way, but it's not true - anyone can say what they like here.

DG, Thursday, 9 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-three years ago) link

I didn't mean to 'play the race card' with the Strange Fruit analogy.

Of course you didn't, Momus, and that's what makes it so uncharacteristically idiotic that you did. You groped for a dramatic example to shore up your point and settled on that one only through a willful disregard for the actual dynamics of the situation.

But so long as you've created the analogy, how about this: would you argue that the Cotton Club was morally obligated to interrupt a Billie Holiday performance to give equal time to a Klansman who had something he wanted to share with the audience?

And by the way, you might be stretching by equating the post in question with an individual's "point of view." I haven't seen the post, but the impression I get was that it contained no identifiable argument or point of view other than deliberate antagonism.

Nitsuh, Thursday, 9 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-three years ago) link

Oh, fuck it! Secrecy only breeds this sort of paranoiac atmosphere. Go ahead and paraphrase the offending post here, since I'm the person it was directed at. Honestly, it can't be any worse than a bad review from Gay Times now, can it? (Helen Love? Ouch!)

The misplaced furour that this "censorship" has brewed is probably about 100 times worse than any flamewar that could possibly have errupted over my so-called "spamming".

Kate the Saint, Thursday, 9 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-three years ago) link

Being that I havent actualy read teh offending post I can't comment. But I was a littel scared when some guy on ILM emailed me implying that he wanted to face me in person becasue I didn't agree with his views.Was it a threat? Some regulation is called for. But Again, I would have to read the original post to judge.

Mike Hanle y, Thursday, 9 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-three years ago) link

Nitsuh: Since you're arguing principles here, I have a question for you: Is there any sort of speech you see as worthy of restriction?

I actually totally agree with (moderator) DG's position above. Remove pointless, long cut and pastes, commercial spam, whatever clogs the board up with boring irrelevancies. On the Momus website I have a guest book, and twice this week I've removed posts which were obviously spam, people posting long lists of records for sale, or links to computer warehouses, placed by spider programs. I think vigilance against anonymous, time-wasting profiteers is valid. I don't think it's valid to, as DG said, 'edit intellectual content', and I think that to argue that the poster has a personal link to Kate is not a good justification for doing so. It's precisely the impersonal attention of callous marketeers which threatens netlife, not the daily rivalries and alliances of community.

Start with yelling "fire" in a crowded theater, work your way up through in-person verbal abuse, and let me know where your line is.

Do you see any value in restricting certain forms of speech for the specific purpose of making the discussion as a whole more valuable to those who are interested in it?

The censored comment was on topic, entertaining in a rather vitriolic (I hesitate to say Ortonesque ;-) way, and even, I thought, rather affectionate to Kate. And I think the subsequent conversation has been rather exciting, don't you? It went from the Lollies to Milton.

Momus, Thursday, 9 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-three years ago) link

SOmtimes it seems like Momus comes into the living room just to sprinkle gasoline on the cozy fireplace. Which is of course, his job.

Mike Hanle y, Thursday, 9 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-three years ago) link

Since Kate requested it, and because ILE is a Professed Haven for Free Speech: “Fuck me it's a stadium tour!!!!Run for the hills pop acts The Lollies are coming. You are a fucking disgrace darling. The real question is will more than 5 people go to any of the venues you are shamelessly plugging. I will be there to heckle [something something forget forget]. Go write a fucking tune...”

Actually, I also think the subsequent discussion has been pretty good. Amazing, crappiness of the original "offending" post, veiled threat or no veiled threat... Hurrah for semi-censorship!!

mark s, Thursday, 9 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-three years ago) link

Did the tail just wank the dog?

Mike Hanle y, Thursday, 9 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-three years ago) link

Like, open carry? Do your thing. But limiting groups of people with guns should be like convenience stores limiting the number of middle school kids allowed in at a time.

Josh in Chicago, Friday, 18 August 2017 01:16 (seven years ago) link

The guns thing OTM, LBI. I watched that Vice doco and was staggered by all the AKs and pistols and knives this guy proudly weilded/pulled from his pants/boots. I mean fucking hell. And he said he had every intent to kill, if that was neccesary! How is that not threatening speech inciting violence???

Stoop Crone (Trayce), Friday, 18 August 2017 01:22 (seven years ago) link

If a bunch if ISIS supporters had marched thru campus waving ISIS flags and carrying torches and guns, how many milliseconds would it have taken before the troops were shooting/teargassing them to kingdom come? Why are nazis ok?

Stoop Crone (Trayce), Friday, 18 August 2017 01:23 (seven years ago) link

speaking of being allowed to kick kids out of your 7-11

https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2017/08/silicon-valleys-anti-nazi-purge-kicks-into-overdrive

I hope they keep this up.

As an ilxor, I am uncompromising (El Tomboto), Friday, 18 August 2017 01:26 (seven years ago) link

The alternative view:

https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2017/08/can-silicon-valley-disrupt-its-neo-nazi-problem

Whatever. These are private businesses. They are being intolerant of intolerance. That is not the same as refusing service to people because of their ethnicity or their religion.

As an ilxor, I am uncompromising (El Tomboto), Friday, 18 August 2017 01:34 (seven years ago) link

(or sexual orientation or etc.)

As an ilxor, I am uncompromising (El Tomboto), Friday, 18 August 2017 01:35 (seven years ago) link

yep I keep seeing the Paradox of Tolerance come up, which is a good thing

sleeve, Friday, 18 August 2017 01:35 (seven years ago) link

"speech inciting violence" has to meet very stringent requirements to be prosecuted - it has to be direct and imminent. afaik you can even say "all the jews must be killed" and that is protected speech in the US

Mordy, Friday, 18 August 2017 01:35 (seven years ago) link

yes - we covered that some last night on Free Speech and Creepy Liberalism

As an ilxor, I am uncompromising (El Tomboto), Friday, 18 August 2017 01:41 (seven years ago) link

xpost And my half argument on the other thread was, how does that freedom benefit society? More to the point, in societies that do not have that freedom, how are they hurt?

Josh in Chicago, Friday, 18 August 2017 01:45 (seven years ago) link

Though god knows in our POS country, if they outlawed armed nazi marches then there would be a push to outlaw BLM, and so on. Which goes back to that (new to me, but fascinating) paradox of tolerance. I'm worried we've gone too far down that "all opinions are valid" road to turn back. As we are seeing, there can be no victory if the default inevitably boils down to "both sides do it." It's no wonder we live in a divided country, since no one is allowed or able to be dismissed as wrong anymore.

Josh in Chicago, Friday, 18 August 2017 01:51 (seven years ago) link

that doesn't seem to be the case at present.

As an ilxor, I am uncompromising (El Tomboto), Friday, 18 August 2017 01:55 (seven years ago) link

You mean this current anti-Nazi (as if that needed to be a thing) push? Yeah, dickhead in chief is still getting a sizable minority (no ironic pun intended) of support, there are still "two sides" debates on TV, even if they are getting theatrically shut down. I'm glad to see people coming out anti-Nazi, which along with "anti-rape" shouldn't even have to be a position, but I am not hopeful. I think it's all part and parcel with our stubborn anti-intellectualism as a nation. We're getting dumber and more dangerous. We don't know our history. We don't know the world. We don't know logic, we devalue education and authority. And by "we" I am generalizing, but clearly "we" includes enough voters to destabilize nearly 250 years of democracy.

Josh in Chicago, Friday, 18 August 2017 02:03 (seven years ago) link

I do like seeing this:
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DHehmfOXsAA2uyD.jpg

Josh in Chicago, Friday, 18 August 2017 02:05 (seven years ago) link

Sorry, but I must now fisk your hyperbole

We're getting dumber and more dangerous.

demonstrably false, ahistorical statement

We don't know our history.

speak for yourself apparently

We don't know the world.

we are more worldly and well-travelled than any other Americans have ever been

We don't know logic, we devalue education and authority.

we are the most well-educated and scientifically savvy Americans that have ever existed

And by "we" I am generalizing, but clearly "we" includes enough voters to destabilize nearly 250 years of democracy.

only because of a stupid technicality invented 250 years ago by much nastier and more ignorant Americans than the ones we have today.

As an ilxor, I am uncompromising (El Tomboto), Friday, 18 August 2017 02:22 (seven years ago) link

I realize it is completely gauche and unfashionable to be optimistic in 2017, and I'm not trying to be, I'm just pointing out that those statements are incorrect

As an ilxor, I am uncompromising (El Tomboto), Friday, 18 August 2017 02:24 (seven years ago) link

that type of "we're the worst!" rhetoric is actually David Brooks' schtick

As an ilxor, I am uncompromising (El Tomboto), Friday, 18 August 2017 02:25 (seven years ago) link

I appreciate you optimism, and am wary of arguing with anyone fighting that particular good fight. Let's just say I agree with you, but only in the grand historical sense of progress. I think we're the worst because despite all the progress we have made there are still too many pulling us backwards *for no good reason*.

Anyway, David Brooks is really the worst, we can agree on that.

Josh in Chicago, Friday, 18 August 2017 02:36 (seven years ago) link

JiC burnin' for that constitutional convention to repeal #1

ice cream social justice (Dr Morbius), Friday, 18 August 2017 02:37 (seven years ago) link

No, I get that it serves an important purpose. But clearly it already has limits, or is not unlimited, the question is where we as a society want to set those limits. Which, yeah, slippery slope, but again, we already have *some* set limits on expression. So just as gun ownership in and of itself may not seem such a bad thing but carrying around an assault weapon does, free speech that does not allow Nazi flags (not to mention Nazi flags plus assault weapons) ... I don't know, what seems lost by allowing it seems worse than what would be lost by banning it, though I get how in the academic sense it opens us up to further erosion of liberties. To which I'd counter (mostly to myself), what is the value of liberty if armed mobs of intimidating hate groups are allowed to roam at will? That slippery slope slides both ways.

Plus, Morbs, you of all people know that that our rights are rippling illusions.

Josh in Chicago, Friday, 18 August 2017 03:48 (seven years ago) link

And man, if it was as simple as what I wanted or was "burnin' for," almost any limit on free speech would be way down the list of a million things that would supersede any such debate in the first place. Nazis marching in the fucking street, fuck that and fuck them.

I am firmly against the freedom of Nazis to express themselves.

Josh in Chicago, Friday, 18 August 2017 03:56 (seven years ago) link

On ACLU changing it's policy: https://www.wsj.com/articles/aclu-changes-policy-on-defending-hate-groups-protesting-with-firearms-1503010167

Frederik B, Friday, 18 August 2017 13:05 (seven years ago) link

But clearly it already has limits, or is not unlimited, the question is where we as a society want to set those limits.

Given that Citizens United and a host of other corporation friendly rulings are decided on Free Speech grounds these days, I don't know if "we as a society" even have a say in what's considered Constitutional.

President Keyes, Friday, 18 August 2017 13:34 (seven years ago) link

I think mark s was right to delete that post btw.

Daniel_Rf, Friday, 18 August 2017 14:42 (seven years ago) link

lol

mark s, Friday, 18 August 2017 14:44 (seven years ago) link

On ACLU changing it's policy: https://www.wsj.com/articles/aclu-changes-policy-on-defending-hate-groups-protesting-with-firearms-1503010167

― Frederik B, Friday, August 18, 2017 2:05 PM (four hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

I'm not clear what this means in practice, would the ACLU refuse to offer practical support in getting permission for events going ahead if attendees are likely to be armed? or would they support events taking place, but rhetorically condemn them if attendees are armed, in which case is that a significant change from their current practice?

soref, Friday, 18 August 2017 17:23 (seven years ago) link

There's an interesting paragraph in this vox-explainer on the ACLU: https://www.vox.com/2017/8/20/16167870/aclu-hate-speech-nazis-charlottesville

But the ACLU has built its reputation, for decades, on the idea that there is no ideology so dangerous it doesn’t deserve vigorous First Amendment protections. “Going back to the organization’s founding in 1920,” says Strossen, “it was defending freedom of speech for anti-civil-libertarians, everybody from fascists to communists.” (This is something of a whitewash of the ACLU’s institutional history — like a lot of other establishment liberal organizations in the 1950s, it was too afraid of McCarthyism to defend Communists and even required members to abjure Communism in an oath — but it’s a decent account of its impact on the current state of free-speech law.)

Worth remembering when people say we need to defend principle even when they're benefiting nazis, so that they'll defend us when the tables are turned. When the table was turned, they were too cowardly to defend leftists.

Frederik B, Sunday, 20 August 2017 17:07 (seven years ago) link

all those ppl are dead i think

ice cream social justice (Dr Morbius), Sunday, 20 August 2017 17:11 (seven years ago) link

who else wants to water down the USA's free speech to Europe's level, besides Frederik and JiC?

ice cream social justice (Dr Morbius), Sunday, 20 August 2017 17:13 (seven years ago) link

Free speech but with irl sban system

jk rowling obituary thread (darraghmac), Sunday, 20 August 2017 17:18 (seven years ago) link

that they'll defend us when the tables are turned. When the table was turned, they were too cowardly to defend leftists.

who is "they" -- the ACLU?

the Rain Man of nationalism. (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Sunday, 20 August 2017 17:25 (seven years ago) link

'establishment liberal organizations'

Frederik B, Sunday, 20 August 2017 17:28 (seven years ago) link

Hey there ACLU

jk rowling obituary thread (darraghmac), Sunday, 20 August 2017 17:28 (seven years ago) link

So Fred, you believe that the ACLU et al. can only be trusted to defend right-wing causes, because they were complicit during the Second Red Scare, so to hell with everything?

As an ilxor, I am uncompromising (El Tomboto), Sunday, 20 August 2017 17:30 (seven years ago) link

no

Frederik B, Sunday, 20 August 2017 17:35 (seven years ago) link

To address the thread's OP: as a principle, I am against prior restraint of political speech, unless there is a clear prior demonstration of an intent to commit or incite civil violence.

In the case of groups like the KKK or neo-Nazis, they have sufficiently demonstrated such intent through almost all their prior actions and statements. When the very core of your political views embraces violence against minorities, subjection of minorities, exclusion of minorities and social rejection of minorities, then there's no reason to believe such speech is protected by the First Amendment. These groups should never be granted permits to hold rallies in support of these violent and abusive political positions.

A is for (Aimless), Sunday, 20 August 2017 17:37 (seven years ago) link

Fight for the ACLU to stay on your side, specifically to adjust to a post DC vs Heller reality. Don't sit back and think 'principles' without power will save anyone.

Frederik B, Sunday, 20 August 2017 17:39 (seven years ago) link

have you read the original ACLU statement? it brought up some very interesting points. their main point was that in supporting the freedom to march, it supports the bad and the good, that it is as much a nod of support towards the good guys as the bad guys, that it also protects the left's ability to counter protest by making these statements. another really good point they made was that a potential legal solution of giving the gov't the ability to declare what protests are violent in nature could really backfire when used in the wrong hands. look at who is currently in charge, do you really want to give Trump that power? anti-hate laws could be (and would be) abused to completely silence opposition.

AdamVania (Adam Bruneau), Sunday, 20 August 2017 20:42 (seven years ago) link


You must be logged in to post. Please either login here, or if you are not registered, you may register here.