[Rictor]

Originally posted by karajorma


Rictor I'm going to put up posters around the town where you live with your picture on and a sign saying that you're a pedophile.

Lets see how long you keep defending my right to say anything I want after that happens.

If that means that no one will ever be censored again, I'm game.

Look at the comparative pros/cons. Lets take the two extremes, total freedom of speech, or total censorship. This is simply to establish which side is "better", and therefore, to which side one should lean if a conflict comes up.

Total freedom of speech:
Anyone can say anything. Many people, across the spectrum, will use this to slander anyone they want. Unsubstantiated rumours and outright lies will no doubt be circulated, whether it is in the office or on the floors of Congress. However, it is reasonable to assume that most of the high profile cases, those which recieve significant media attention, will be those involving powerful people. Politicians, businessmen, celebrities and so forth. Given that powerful people tend to have more resources at their disposale that the average Joe, they will almost certainly be able to get their version of the story out, to some degree at least. What the the In-tar-net and all, no one side is likely to dominate the media, though it is always a possibility. For anyone who is not able to disprove the allegation, and suffers immensely because of it, tough luck. If people are really as petty and vengeful as some of you think, then this would be misused to a great extent, and pretty soon, things like "He had sex with my daughter" or "He stole my chicken" would lose any sembelance of authethenticit, on account of being used to often. Crying wolf, so to speak.

Total censorship:
Anyone who speaks ill of another person, especially someone in a position of power, is a potential candidate for a libel suit. And since we all know that lawyers make all the difference, those with the hightest-priced lawyers will usually win. Even if the allegation is factually true, the case could be made that the allegation portrayed those facts in a needlessly negative light. Absolute power corrupts absolutely, so more or less by definition, the people commiting the greatest crimes and the ones most worthy of media attention will be the best defended from any negative remarks against them. I think we can all think of at least a few cases where powerful people have been protected from rightful exposure because of libel laws and fancy lawyers.

Thats in the realm of private life. Publicly, the government could censor any media it wants, by accusing them of things like inciting a riot, inciting violence, hatespeech, rascism, revealing classified information, lending "material support" to terrorists and so forth. All of these have been used by the US government in the past few years, I'm not making it up as I go along. Against private citizens, against media outlets (al Jazeera comes to mind) and against whistle-blowers. These accusations are broad enough and vague enough to be misused quite freely, and I for one do not trust the government not to do so, given their past record.

I would rather err on the side of freedom of expression, I don't know about the rest of you.

[Flipside]

If it's free speech then he is allowed to say what he likes, personally though I think it's free 'I'm going to jump on the Anti-War bandwagon for cash', which is pretty dispicable to feed off of other peoples 'fame'.

[Lonestar]

If this song Spoke of Saddam Husseins problems as a leader we wouldnt be talking about this. Just because he speaks of your Leader, and some stars people get their panties in a bunch.

Enough said.....

[Rictor]

And thats the sad thing. When you say "anti-war" names like Sean Penn, Tim Robbins and apprently, Jadakiss come to mind, for your average Jow Blow anyway. Now, I may be setting myself of for a bit of libel lawsuit here ( ), but I would venture to guess that these people know **** all about anything even resembeling antiwar politics. Why don't people know who Chomsky is, who Robert Fisk is, who Patrick Cockburn is, who Justin Raimondo is?

How many people will respond to "Why do you hate Bush" with "He invaded Iraq for their oil, and got American soldiers killed". But ask them anything beyond the scope of a Jay Leno joke, or a Susan Sarandon interview, and they'll give you a blank stare. At times, I'm ashamed to count myself among the antiwar crowd, due to the sheer stupidity of some of its members. But then I remember that for all their faults, they 100x better informed that the average Bush/Limbaugh/O'Reilly supporter, and that calmks me down a bit.

[aldo_14]

Originally posted by Rictor
And thats the sad thing. When you say "anti-war" names like Sean Penn, Tim Robbins and apprently, Jadakiss come to mind, for your average Jow Blow anyway. Now, I may be setting myself of for a bit of libel lawsuit here ( ), but I would venture to guess that these people know **** all about anything even resembeling antiwar politics. Why don't people know who Chomsky is, who Robert Fisk is, who Patrick Cockburn is, who Justin Raimondo is?

How many people will respond to "Why do you hate Bush" with "He invaded Iraq for their oil, and got American soldiers killed". But ask them anything beyond the scope of a Jay Leno joke, or a Susan Sarandon interview, and they'll give you a blank stare. At times, I'm ashamed to count myself among the antiwar crowd, due to the sheer stupidity of some of its members. But then I remember that for all their faults, they 100x better informed that the average Bush/Limbaugh/O'Reilly supporter, and that calmks me down a bit.

you've got to ask - why don't we here of these people (Chomsky, Fisk, etc) in the UK?  Because have no idea who the hell they are.........

Maybe it's because they're not doing a good enough job making themselves heard?

[01010]

I know Chomsky.

[Rictor]

Originally posted by aldo_14


you've got to ask - why don't we here of these people (Chomsky, Fisk, etc) in the UK?  Because have no idea who the hell they are.........

Maybe it's because they're not doing a good enough job making themselves heard?

*ahem*

Robert Fisk and Patrick Cockburn are both British, the former is The Independen't star journalist, while the latter also worked for the Independent but now runs Counterpunch, a political newletter/website along with Jeffrey St.Clair, another Brit.


What I said was more of a statement regarding the general ignorance of a large part of the antiwar crowd, but here is a brief rundown of the specific names I mentioned (though they were chosen more or less at random).

Robert Fisk writes for the Independent, and his articles are widely reprinted elsewhere. War correspondant for several decades, his specialty is the MIddle-East. He has a book about the Lebanese civil war, called Pity The Nation. Oh and, John Malkovich once threatened to shoot him.

Noam Chomsky is the Godfather of the left, and has been a prominent ciritic of US foreign policy for something like 40 years. Proffesor of linguistics at MIT, he has written more books than I can recall. His writings are still, in my humble opinion, among the most intelligent and thought-out available. He is perhaps the best known antiwar voice in the world, I would have thought that you would atleast be familiar with him.

Justin Raimondo runs antiwar.com, and is, amazingly enough, not a lefitst. He comes from a libertarian background, working with Murray Rothbard (the father of modern libertarianism) before his death. He was actually part of a libertarian faction within the GOP at one point. Antwar.com is rated at around #40 on the Alexa ratings list for news websites, no small feat. They've been spreading the good word, so to speak, well before Bush's reign. They (antiwar) actually became prominent during the bombing of Serbia in '99, and are the single best source for antiwar news and views that I can think of.

Patrick Cockburn runs counterpunch.com along with Jeffrey St.Clair. Viewed by about 20 million people each month. He has, as I recall, around 5 books, most of them co-authored with St.Clair.

so, there you go...

[vyper]

[q]Noam Chomsky is the Godfather of the left,[/q]

His work really brought me into the real world, I think Chomsky should be required reading at all highschools in any western country.

[Tiara]

Originally posted by Rictor

Blue -  Everything is under control. Proper Christian values are being observed.

the day that the world and everyone in it upholds only proper Christian values is the day that I kill myself.

Seriously, what you call 'blue' i call 'pitch black'.

[Flipside]

I think using the term 'nigga' in a Rap song more than 3 times per verse is an offence punishable by flogging, but there you go

Sorry, never been a fan of Gangsta Rap or that ilk, it's kind of like the Punk Rock of Pop Music

[01010]

Originally posted by Flipside
Sorry, never been a fan of Gangsta Rap or that ilk, it's kind of like the Punk Rock of Pop Music

There is very little gangsta rap of merit, which is a damn shame because it puts a lot of people off all hiphop (I know a few people that think all black music is either crooning R Kelly style or the Nelly/50 Cent pile of bollocks). Hiphop rocks, Gangsta rap (for the most part) is a bag of wank pushed by record companies to sell to testosterone fuelled teenage boys because pop music doesn't cut it for them the way it does for women.

[karajorma]

Originally posted by Rictor
I would rather err on the side of freedom of expression, I don't know about the rest of you.

What a black and white world you live in Rictor.

[Nico]

Originally posted by Tiara

the day that the world and everyone in it upholds only proper Christian values is the day that I kill myself.

Seriously, what you call 'blue' i call 'pitch black'.

Yeah, or at least dull grey

[SadisticSid]

Originally posted by vyper
[q]Noam Chomsky is the Godfather of the left,[/q]

His work really brought me into the real world, I think Chomsky should be required reading at all highschools in any western country.

His groundbreaking work on linguistics (which greatly make up the foundations of natural language processing in computing) should be, at least. His political meanderings all reak of if-if-if idealist socialism to me though.

[aldo_14]

Originally posted by Rictor


*ahem*

Robert Fisk and Patrick Cockburn are both British, the former is The Independen't star journalist, while the latter also worked for the Independent but now runs Counterpunch, a political newletter/website along with Jeffrey St.Clair, another Brit.


What I said was more of a statement regarding the general ignorance of a large part of the antiwar crowd, but here is a brief rundown of the specific names I mentioned (though they were chosen more or less at random).

Robert Fisk writes for the Independent, and his articles are widely reprinted elsewhere. War correspondant for several decades, his specialty is the MIddle-East. He has a book about the Lebanese civil war, called Pity The Nation. Oh and, John Malkovich once threatened to shoot him.

Noam Chomsky is the Godfather of the left, and has been a prominent ciritic of US foreign policy for something like 40 years. Proffesor of linguistics at MIT, he has written more books than I can recall. His writings are still, in my humble opinion, among the most intelligent and thought-out available. He is perhaps the best known antiwar voice in the world, I would have thought that you would atleast be familiar with him.

Justin Raimondo runs antiwar.com, and is, amazingly enough, not a lefitst. He comes from a libertarian background, working with Murray Rothbard (the father of modern libertarianism) before his death. He was actually part of a libertarian faction within the GOP at one point. Antwar.com is rated at around #40 on the Alexa ratings list for news websites, no small feat. They've been spreading the good word, so to speak, well before Bush's reign. They (antiwar) actually became prominent during the bombing of Serbia in '99, and are the single best source for antiwar news and views that I can think of.

Patrick Cockburn runs counterpunch.com along with Jeffrey St.Clair. Viewed by about 20 million people each month. He has, as I recall, around 5 books, most of them co-authored with St.Clair.

so, there you go...

Indeed.  Albeit I've never read the Independent, cos it's effectively a foreign newspaper.  Sounds daft, but it's true.

[Rictor]

One
Two
Three
Four

Originally posted by karajorma
What a black and white world you live in Rictor.

And how's that? Maybe I'm just a bit slow on the uptake, but I don't see a great many other sides to it. Perhaps you couild enlighten me, cause one sentence just doesn't explain anything. All I said was that I would rather lean to one side, because for me, the benfit:drawback ratio is far greater than for the opposite viewpoint. Thats like saying, "I agree more strongly with what is generally regarded as the left than I do with what is generally regarded to as the right." Almost no one here is truly centrist, but I don't see anyone being accused of living in a black/white world..

Originally posted by SadisticSid


His groundbreaking work on linguistics (which greatly make up the foundations of natural language processing in computing) should be, at least. His political meanderings all reak of if-if-if idealist socialism to me though.

And what exactly is if-if-if idealist socialism? I can make a general guess, but mind defining the term? There's nothing wrong with being idealist, if you are reffering to ends and not means. ANd being socialist is also nothing necessarily negative, I consider myself to be more or a less a socialist.

[Rictor]

Originally posted by aldo_14


Indeed.  Albeit I've never read the Independent, cos it's effectively a foreign newspaper.  Sounds daft, but it's true.

Yeah, I hardly ever hear them say things like "cheerio old chap" or "God save the Queen".

But seriously, why do you see them as a foreign paper? If its regarding their political/whatever views, they're not that much different than The Guardian. And don't tell me the Guardian ain't British..

[karajorma]

Originally posted by Rictor
And how's that? Maybe I'm just a bit slow on the uptake, but I don't see a great many other sides to it. Perhaps you couild enlighten me, cause one sentence just doesn't explain anything. All I said was that I would rather lean to one side, because for me, the benfit:drawback ratio is far greater than for the opposite viewpoint. Thats like saying, "I agree more strongly with what is generally regarded as the left than I do with what is generally regarded to as the right." Almost no one here is truly centrist, but I don't see anyone being accused of living in a black/white world..

Except that's not what you're saying Rictor.

What you're saying is equivalent of saying that we should enforce the policies of the extreme left wing cause if deviate even slightly from them we might end up carrying out policies of the far right.

I'm all for freedom of speech but I don't believe in absolute freedom. You don't have the right to incite a riot. You don't have the right to call some one a pedophile in the hope that a mob will kill him.

There is an enormous difference between that and saying that a politician is wrong.

You believe that Freedom of speech is so important that you're willing to accept the complete disaster that complete freedom would  cause.

The world isn't black & white. You can have freedom of political speech without giving up the right to arrest people who are basically calling for murder.

[Rictor]

Alright, I see where you're coming from. To me, the "incitiement to violence" is not the biggest issue. These charges have been leveled against media outlets and individuals for entirely political reasons (such as Al Jazeera), but I don't know how often they are applicable outside a war zone. If an Iraqi paper published an op/ed, saying something like "We must drive out the occupation forces", that could quite easily be interpreted as a call to kill Americans, and therefor illegal. There is also the trouble of measuring exactly what is a call to riot, and what isn't. There's no metric available, and my concern is that pretty much anything that is likely to happen at a protest or demonstration can be percieved as the start of a riot. For example, the street party that followed the Greek victory over here in Toronto could easily, easily have been called a riot if it were politically oriented. Lacking a clear set of rules and measures, legitimate demonstrations could be attacked and disbanded, on the grounds that they constitute a riot. This is exactly what happened a few years ago, at a demonstration to protest the G8 summit in Ottawa. Now, I'm not saying that this happens all the time, but often enough to cause me concern.

But my main beef is with libel laws. The principal is that any allegations which portray someone in a needlessly negative light, even if the allegations are completly true, are against the law. This leads to a fair bit of self censorship by the media, because no one wants to get sued. And it puts a damper on the "people have a right to know" concept. You keep mentioning the pedophile thing, but honestly, how often has a completely innocent person been lynched because someone accused him of being a pedo? The trouble is, how to distinguish betweenn important business/political figures, and ordinary citizens. The law must apply to everyone equally, which means the same aw that protects an innocent from nasty rumours could be used to protect a guilty party from explosure and media attention.

edit: this is interesting, even though it goes against what I'm saying, I gotta post it anyway:
http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1000576591

[karajorma]

Here's just a few examples

http://www.guardian.co.uk/child/story/0,7369,350587,00.html

Someone earlier quoted the example where a pediatric nurse got attacked because some moron didn't know what the term meant. In the UK we know exactly what sort of anarchy can result from poorly used Freedom of Speech. The News of the World's "Name and Shame" campaign was perfectly legal but look at the damage it did. Now imagine what would happen if there were no checks and balances and the newspaper could print anything it liked.

Yes there are cases where the police over reacted to legal demonstrations. The answer to that is to make the police responsible for the injuries they caused in their over reactions. Not to remove laws and cause anarchy.

If you have a problem with where the current balance between Freedom of Speech and censorship llies then I'll agree with you. I think that the UK and US have often been far too heavy handed. But to simply say we need to throw out the laws that prevent the chaos that would ensue if we didn't prevent incitement to riot etc is foolish.

Let me put it this way. How long do you think a marriage would last if both partners said everything they thought about the other one all the time?

Sure having a relationship where no one ever tells a lie or keeps a secret sounds great romantic notion on paper but it's a complete disaster if you actually try it.  

Your idea of freedom of speech is analogous to having a relationship without white lies. It wouldn't last past the first year.