From: mcb@foucault.postmodern.com (Michael C. Berch)
Newsgroups: news.admin,alt.censorship
Subject: Re: "Computers graphic when it comes to porn"
Date: 26 Aug 92 22:29:17 GMT
Followup-To: alt.censorship
Organization: Postmodern Consulting, San Francisco, California USA

I have been asked by several people to move this discussion to
alt.censorship; therefore followups are directed there.  --MCB

In the referenced article clewis@ferret.ocunix.on.ca (Chris Lewis) writes:
> [...]
> Absolute freedom of speech is a myth.  The United States certainly doesn't
> have it.  While the first amendment appears to provide it, the Supreme
> Court has consistently ruled in favour of a balancing act between free
> speech and other rights.  We can see this in the fact that the US still
> has obscenity legislation (see Carl's postings) that can result in
> criminal charges or banning, incitement legislation (ditto) or
> more mundane things like publication bans on the identities of
> rape victims and sometimes juries.
> 
> Canada has the very same types of laws, plus constitutional guarantees
> of free speech too.  One difference being that the balancing act is
> explicitly mentioned in the constitution.

Understood.  But if the ideal is minimal interference with freedom of
expression, I think the U.S. is far ahead of most countries.  Not even
nearly perfect, but better than most.  What I do object to, besides
censorship attempts from both the right and the left, is the hypocrisy
of those who wave the (U.S.) flag and talk about the "American Way of
Life" and our cherished freedoms and all that and then support or vote
for politicans who restrict these rights.

> The other more critical difference is the level of harm necessary.
> Canada chose the route of "reasonable person", juries, studies, and
> simply watching the USA - a case study in almost unrestricted free
> speech.  In the US, you have to have bodies stacked up over the rooftops
> before they'll notice.  
> [and ...]
> People keep harping on "universal right to free speech".  The "freedom
> of speech" you keep talking about is freedom of speech without responsibility,
> freedom of speech bedamned with the body count.

Really?  I guess I must have missed all those horrible victims of free
expression.  Where are they?  Most of the victims of violent crime are
related to the government's so-called War on Drugs, the "New
Prohibition".  The government is spending vast resources on trying to
reduce the supply of drugs, thus driving the price up and greatly increasing 
the profit potential.  Is it any wonder that young members of the
underclass, who have no hope of making it in normal society, decide to
fight over that profit pool with automatic weapons?

> That isn't universal.  It's purely an American invention - and the
> Americans don't even have it.  They just think they do.  Canada as a
> whole has rejected it.  As have most other western countries.
> 
> If you want to tell us how to run our country, I suggest you clean up your
> own problems *first*, then we might listen.  Like reducing your violent
> crime rate by a factor of four - then you'll be at least in the same
> ballpark as everybody else.

See above.  Decriminalize drugs (you would probably not agree to that
because it might "harm" someone) and then let's take a look at the
violent crime rate.

> >> In case you missed it, Canada is not only a democracy, but these laws
> >> enjoy the overwhelming support of the entire country.
> >
> >Yeah, right.  Perhaps you've forgotten, but exclusion of Jews enjoyed
> >the overwhelming support of the German people in the 1930s.
> 
> So now you're calling Canada fascist.  By tradition, comparing something
> to Hitler or Nazi Germany usually ends the discussion.  Not.

Perhaps the Nazi-baiting was of overkill, but it's the best
example of tyranny of the majority that I know of.  Just because
something is overwhelmingly popular does not make it right, nor is it
a reason for suppression of a minority's rights.  

> On the other hand, with a Keegstra or Zundel law, *maybe*, just *maybe*
> Germany wouldn't have ended up as it did.

So you would approve the suppression of political speech because you
disagree with its content...with the justification that it might
"harm" someone.  I think at least part of the problem is that you (who support
censorship) don't seem to be able to draw the line between expression
and action -- that expression of unpopular views (no matter how
offensive or hurtful) is NOT the same as permitting violations of
others' rights as a follow-on to that expression.  

> >> And why should I, or anybody else bust their butt to "save" crap like
> >> this?  Crap who's only legacy is oppression, misery or even death [ie:
> >> Keegstra or Zundel].
> 
> >Because free expression is inherent in the nature of a free society;
> >if Keegstra's and Zundel's words are suppressed because people
> >disagree with them or find them threatening, whose words will be next?
> 
> Do you have any idea at all what the laws they were charged with require
> for conviction?  Neither law outlaws "offensive" speech.  Neither law
> outlaws speech that is merely "disagreed" with.
> 
> Zundel's law was "knowingly spreading false news intended to incite
> hatred towards an identifiable group".  They didn't really even have
> to establish the "knowingly" and "false" part, because he did his own
> photograph faking, but they did anyways.

You can try to couch it in whatever palatable language you choose,
whether legalistic, academic, or psychological, but it's still
suppression based on offensiveness and disagreement.  I think the idea
of "false news" is particularly odious, since it sets up the
government as the arbiter of Official Truth.  I don't think I would
trust any government -- American, Canadian, or whomever -- to decide
matters of historicity.  (The assassination of John F. Kennedy is a
good example of this.)

> Keegstra was charged with a simpler "inciting hatred" law.  Well,
> he certainly did - turned many years worth of high school students
> into full blown nazis.  That is not minor harm.  That is going to
> take *many* years to repair.
> 
> >I think Keegstra and Zundel are scum -- but even scum should have the
> >right of free expression.  By denying the Holocaust they defend and
> >attempt to exonerate people who participated in the murder of my
> >relatives (I am a Jew of Eastern European ancestry).  Yet I would not
> >silence them, because I do not want to live in a society that
> >suppresses the free exchange of ideas.
> 
> Neither Zundel nor Keegstra were really trying to exonerate anybody.
> That was just a byproduct of their real intent - to incite violence
> against jews, to oppress them and to kill them.
> 
> You still defend them?

I defend their right to expression, yes.  Without reservation.  Their
purposes and motives are irrelevant.  And just as strongly I believe
in the right of self-defense against racist/anti-semitic violence.
So long as the Nazis stick to words (including peaceable assembly,
etc.), they're protected.  "Oppressing" [by force or coercion] or
"killing" are obviously not protected, and IF and ONLY IF free
expresion turns to violations of others' rights, the illegal acts should
be stopped.

--
Michael C. Berch  
mcb@postmodern.com