From: uunet!infmx!robert@ncar.UCAR.EDU (Robert Coleman)
Newsgroups: soc.feminism
Subject: Re: Is the Constitution the Bible?
Date: 11 Dec 1992 21:56:56 GMT
Organization: Informix Software, Inc.
Distribution: world
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Originator: muffy@remarque.berkeley.edu

cortese@skid.ps.uci.edu (Janis Maria Cortese) writes:

>When I hear KKK members yelling about the 1st amendment, and think that
>it protects the NAACP also, I do not thereby assume that both are
>equally socially valuable.  The 1st amendment prevents anyone from
>keeping them from expressing themselves, but it does not put both of the
>groups on the same footing as far as merit goes.  To do that, you cannot
>just thump a document and say that "The Constitution says it; I believe
>it; that settles it" -- to paraphrase the fundie bumpersticker.  That is
>a lazy approach used by people who do not wish to get into the "messy"
>end of finding out what it's like when you open your front door and see
>a cross burning on your lawn.  

	I was pretty much with you...right up until I saw your example.

	Let me make some bold statements here.  Firstly, IMO 99.9999% of folks
on the net think this action requires some action, that there are crimes
involved.  Trespassing, arson, I'd bet you'd even get a majority consensus
that this action constitutes a threat.
	Not only would net.people be in virtual agreement about that, but our
legal system is in agreement about that; those charges or similar ones are
being brought to bear on the perpetrators.
	The net starts to skew into disagreement around the actual
constitutional question.  Is the fact that a burning cross is symbolic of
a particular belief set, thereby carrying a message, punishable?  Should we
allow this?  Is is socially redeemable?  Remove it from the context that
makes it a crime in so many other ways, the front lawn of someone else's house,
and we center on the constitutional question: is this a protected form of
free speech?
	Now, I had to do all this setup only because you placed the cross on
someone else's lawn, adding in extraneous elements of real, identifiable
and mutually agreeable crimes.  If we remove the cross from the "other persons"
lawn, we can talk about what you really seem to want to talk about; why do
we respond with "it's constitutionally protected", when you really want to
talk about the social advantages and disadvantages of burning crosses?

	Firstly, let me say that, IMO, the question is seldom phrased as
unambiguously as I stated it in the last line.  Theres a lot of blaming 
of folks for making assumptions about the directions of other people's 
statements, but I think a lot of the fault lies with the communicator; a 
careful communicator asks unambiguous questions.  Recently Lenore asked what 
people thought about whether women directing mentoring efforts mostly at 
other women.  She asked the question carefully and concisely, and not only 
has it been an interesting and unflaming discussion, but not one person, 
so far at least, has accused her of being interested in "legislating" it.
	She asked the question in such a way as to leave legislation ideas
completely out of it.  It can be done.
	Not to say that there aren't people who will kneejerk regardless; but
so far not one person has mentioned the possibility that the original poster 
was being ambiguous, and I think that should be accepted as a possibility.

	But on to the real question:

	I don't know about other folks, but I respond with "It's
constitutionally protected" *not* because I don't want to think about it,
but because *I already have*.  I agree *not* with the words in the
Constitution, but with the thinking of those who've put it there, and the 
answers historically given to those who have challenged it.  I make the
assumption, particularly on the net, that others already understand the 
thought behind those words, and therefore I can use the 1st Amendment as a
symbol for that thinking.  This is laziness on my part, I suppose, not the
laziness of thought that you're suggesting, but rather the laziness of not
wanting to have to explain and re-explain the concepts.

	Bold statement #2: the vast majority of the net see burning crosses
as social wrongs.  There are few, if any KKK sympathizers on the net, which
makes your question rather uninteresting (certainly, in the four or five years
I've been on the net, I've never seen anyone say that what the KKK do is
right, though my reading is limited to soc.men, soc.women, and soc.feminism
with occasional forays into other groups).  Is this a social wrong?  Sure.
I really think you'd get a large enough majority agreement to make the question
pointless.

	The question becomes interesting again when we ask the next question,
phrased in different ways: "Why, then, should we allow this?" or "Why don't
we disallow this, if it's obviously so wrong?"

	Because, here, net.thought diverges.  The main divergence is right
along the thinking behind the 1st Amendment; it is a *greater* social good
to allow the *lesser* social evils of free speech for everyone, regardless
of their beliefs.  There's lots of reasons for this; just a few: 
	1) Suppression of speech has historically been abused to create a 
tyranny of the majority (examples as recently as McCarthy, but echoing back 
all through recorded history); 
	2)  Again, historically, we can see that that throughout history
there has been an understanding of what was socially "good", and that those
of us who live now can look at some of those concepts and shudder...from which
quickly follows the idea that it takes an incredible degree of Chutzpah for
us to assume that, although everyone in history thought they were "right",
we're the only ones who really are, or that the next generation won't have a
better, and different understanding than we do;
	3)  Historically, suppression doesn't really work anyway (i.e. the 
ideas just go underground, though of course individuals spouting the ideas
end up barbecued, one way or another);
	...with the corollary A) that if we let people say what they believe,
then we know which people believe what;
	...and the corollary B) that, again historically, suppressed ideas
emerge violently;
	4)  Any individuals ideas are suspect if that idea is the only idea 
that they have ever heard.  It's only by being exposed to the full range of
ideas that we have the information to assess, compare and contrast.

	In addition, though I've never heard this stated, the periods of
greatest repression were also the periods of greatest stagnation.  IMO, part 
of the reason that the US, at least, has changed socially so dramatically 
over the space of a few hundred years is that we have protected free speech,
more so towards the later century, and, surprise surprise, with greater social
change dynamics in the later century as well.  In order to grow even more,
we have to allow ideas, all ideas, ideas we hate as well as those we love,
to be heard, or we'll fall back into stagnation...which, in a way, makes
me the liberal and those who favor censorship to be the conservatives.

	So when I say "It's Constitutionally protected", I'm saying "For
reasons 1 through 4 plus corollaries plus ideas I'm *still* to lazy to write
down, I think the greater good is to let people burn crosses.  This does *not*
mean I agree that burning crosses is the right thing to do."

	Summations: "Are cross-burnings, in themselves, a socially positive 
act?" is an uninteresting question.  It's sort of like asking "Are serial 
killers doing socially positive work?"  Yeah, you'll get a few strange 
responses, but they will definitely be the anomolies.  The question just 
isn't worth asking, nor is the associated statement "I believe that
cross-burnings are wrong" worth saying.  Me too.  Now what?
	The question worth asking is "How does this socially negative action
fit into the framework of society", to which the answer "It's constitutionally
protected" covers either direction it can go from there; it's shorthand for
"It contributes to the greater good of society" as a direct answer, or 
"It should be protected (not censored)" if the question is really a "leading"
question.
	For your particular example, cross-burnings carry a concept, and
at least 3, 3a, 3b, and 4 above apply, as well as the supposition
thereafter.

	Incidentally, the thread about this particular incident that I
participated on in another group had as a title, near as I can remember,
"Supreme Court Protects Hate Speech"; for that thread, the constitutionality
*was* the issue.

>Those phrases should be remembered, as a means of insuring that we can
>express ourselves.  But, when it comes to discussing the actual merits
>of the forms, we cannot use the Constitution as an excuse to hide behind
>when we have to delve into some unpleasant, uncomfortable truths.  The
>1st amendment allows the argument to take place; it should not make up the
>entire argument. 

	It's a symbol for a whole philosophy.  I agree with the thoughts behind
it, and the belief of the writers of it's overall importance in society
demonstrated by their placing it in a document that makes it very difficult
to revoke.
	
	Oh, incidentally, the discussion you've suggested re: the possible
good or ill effect that pornography has on society has taken place on
soc.feminism within the last 6 months; the question of censorship came up
only in that we were comparing the supposed effects on societys that had
pornography (non-censored) and those that did not (censored).

Robert C.
-- 
----------------------------------------------
Disclaimer: My company has not yet seen fit to
	    elect me as spokesperson. Hmmpf.


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