From: payner@netcom.com (Rich Payne)
Subject: Re: Censorship (was : Re: Catharine MacKinnon, Playboy and feminist propaganda)
Organization: Netcom - Online Communication Services (408 241-9760 guest)
Date: Thu, 15 Oct 1992 00:18:54 GMT

In article <1992Oct13.161722.17240@panix.com> gcf@panix.com (Gordon Fitch) writes:
>gcf@panix.com (Gordon Fitch) writes:
>| >>In order to discuss whether someone is "for censorship"
>| >>or "against censorship" one has to define one's terms
>| >>a bit. ...
>
>payner@netcom.com (Rich Payne) points out that "libel" and
>"copyright" are usually not taken to mean censorship.
>
>mec6@quads.uchicago.edu (rini) points out that libel and
>copyright laws are indeed limits on freedom of expression.
>| As I've said before, I'm against censorship of pornography, but
>| I think Gordon has raised some points....  points I wish I 
>| refute...  but I dunno...  (?)
>
>My point was that yelling "censorship" and waving the flag
>is not intelligent discourse.  

Neither is your "DworkinMacKinnon gargoyle" gag, which you do
often. It is not even true, but you have not even bothered to
discuss it. You want -everyone- to stop using the word censorship,
not because it is without meaning, but because you have a problem
with it. So ignore it, and let those who wish to discuss it do so.


>                                   If we use censorship very
>broadly, to mean any limitation of freedom of expression, it
>has to include libel and copyright, both of which have
>been used by people who wanted to silence political
>opponents.  

Says you, and perhaps rini, but even together, you do not define
common usage, or make the word meaningless.


>                (The most notorious uses recently have been 
>SLAPP suits.)  I would prefer to use the word to mean only 
>overt, institutionalized filtering of expression, for 
>example military censorship or the work of internal review
>committees who screen network television programs.  

Once again, censorship takes place before distribution, libel
and copyright infringments only after. And someone must sue, it
is not automatic or government sponsored. If you do not sue for
copyright infringment of your material, noone else will. Libel
and copyright are both between 2 parties, although one might be
a group or a publisher. Censorship is the law against anyone
attempting to distribute censored materials, there is no need
for anyone to complain, it does not even matter.

Libel and copyright are not interchangable with censorship,
the differences are many, and the only similarity is what you
harp about.
 
>The issue of social repression of sexuality and sexual
>expression, as well as other forms of expression, is much
>more complicated than the issue of whether one sets up 
>boards of censorship.  It's quite possible to shut down
>or at least harass forms of expression without any 
>governmental intervention whatever; for example, the 
>fundamentalists who got _Playboy_ taken off the stands in 
>7-11 stores.  And it's naive to huff "censorship!" and omit
>the fact that people can be and often are hurt by legal,
>legitimate expression.  

How so? And while related, this is a different topic.

>                       Often, we have to decide to accept 
>some kind of social harm because the alternative is worse.  
>Or most of us think the alternative is worse.
>
>The issue just doesn't have the third-grade simplicity a lot
>of people have been handling it with.  

You mean like equating libel, copyright infringment and censorship
because of the only common point?

You mean like inventing a monster....

>                                         That doesn't bother
>the anti-feminists, because they don't care about it anyway;
>it's just one more tool.  But for the rest of us, 

I find it hard to believe that you speak for "the rest od us".
But I offer you the opportunity to prove it.

>                                                     it's a
>complex question that can't be subsumed into a single word
>shouted over the barricades at a supposed enemy.

Now this -is- getting amusing.

> )*(    Gordon Fitch    )*(    gcf@panix.com    )*(


Rich

payner@netcom.com




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