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pitcrawler
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Location: Oklahoma, USA
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 Posted: Fri Apr 13, 2012 6:18 pm Post subject: |
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| aidanjt wrote: | | juniper wrote: | | they were fired from their jobs. they didn't have their legs broken by their bosses. different. |
I haven't seen the government going around breaking legs, either. |
Fatally injecting someone with deadly poison counts as breaking legs, right? Legs are part of thew body after all. |
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BoneKracker
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| Posted: Fri Apr 13, 2012 7:42 pm Post subject: |
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| Yamakuzure wrote: | | BoneKracker wrote: | | Yamakuzure wrote: | | Is it really "freedom of speech" if you solicit racism or praise a cruel dictator in public? - just a thought... |
Of course. Do you really want to live in a society where all objectionable speech is Verbotten? We can also have little robots follow people around and administer a painful shock to the anus if they deviate from Newspeak.
More to the point, whose definition of objectionable are you going to use? The minute you start allowing to the state to control expression (other than punishing libel, slander, fraud and incitement to commit actual crimes), you destroy the people's single-most important means of bringing about change or preventing abuses of power. Germans are among those one would expect to have learned this lesson dearly.
If you give up free speech, you have given away the cornerstone of all your rights. Free speech must be protected. People are made to live with the consequences of objectionable speech in other ways (loss of business, loss of reputation, social ostracization, and so on). |
First: I never wrote anything about "Giving up free speech". I just have problems with people hiding behind "Freedom of speech" to allow themselves to hurt others. In other words: Would it be okay if the KKK advertised their cause in the New York Times because of "Freedom of Speech"? Would it be morally in order to allow fascists to solicit the holocaust on TV? Is it okay to attack human dignity with whatever you like to say? |
It should be legal, yes. Whether it's "okay" is another story. It's not "okay" to fart in an elevator either, but I've never heard of anyone being arrested or sent to jail for it.
| Yamakuzure wrote: | As Prenj wrote: ... and there is common sense
And here in Germany article one of our constitutional law says: "Human dignity is inviolable." ...and "Freedom of speech" does _not_ negate that.
Side note: It is "verboten" with one 't', but nice try, though!  |
You guys have got it backward. It is freedom of expression that should be inviolable. If you sacrifice freedom of expression, you have no way to protect human dignity or anything else. There is no right or privilege more important than freedom of expression; it is the very cornerstone of democracy.
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juniper
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| Posted: Fri Apr 13, 2012 7:59 pm Post subject: |
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| aidanjt wrote: | | juniper wrote: | | they were fired from their jobs. they didn't have their legs broken by their bosses. different. |
I haven't seen the government going around breaking legs, either. And yet freedom of speech is still very important. Speech protection is still very important, especially in a fascism heavy place like the US where the people depend on their employers for shelter, food, healthcare, and so on because their government doesn't care much for their general welfare. |
no, but a place that doesn't respect freedom of speech in the govt sense can have people arrested, incarcerated etc.
Those people in the story can keep saying whatever they are saying until they are blue in the face. They can blog it, buy a car with a megaphone etc etc. but nobody is obligated to give them a platform to say it. |
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BoneKracker
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| Posted: Fri Apr 13, 2012 10:31 pm Post subject: |
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| juniper wrote: | | aidanjt wrote: | | juniper wrote: | | they were fired from their jobs. they didn't have their legs broken by their bosses. different. |
I haven't seen the government going around breaking legs, either. And yet freedom of speech is still very important. Speech protection is still very important, especially in a fascism heavy place like the US where the people depend on their employers for shelter, food, healthcare, and so on because their government doesn't care much for their general welfare. |
no, but a place that doesn't respect freedom of speech in the govt sense can have people arrested, incarcerated etc.
Those people in the story can keep saying whatever they are saying until they are blue in the face. They can blog it, buy a car with a megaphone etc etc. but nobody is obligated to give them a platform to say it. |
And, nobody is obligated not to tell them to shut the fuck up, to boycott their employer's products, to refuse them services, have protests against them, and so on.
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Prenj
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| Posted: Sat Apr 14, 2012 7:51 am Post subject: |
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| BoneKracker wrote: | | You guys have got it backward. It is freedom of expression that should be inviolable. If you sacrifice freedom of expression, you have no way to protect human dignity or anything else. There is no right or privilege more important than freedom of expression; it is the very cornerstone of democracy. |
Yes, from ideological perspective it is backward, from pragmatic it is right. My parents used to raise me more along the lines of being ideologically right, the way you are suggesting.
I went on living like that and got slammed really hard couple of times, where I know I excercised my "right", but got the perfectly legal rebuttal. Took me a while to accept the reality that living is sort of about surfing the whatever shit churns under your feet, and ending up where you want to, while being aware what is ideologically right, but also being aware you cannot go there in straight line, else you plunge into the shit. |
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BoneKracker
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| Posted: Sat Apr 14, 2012 6:34 pm Post subject: |
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| Prenj wrote: | | BoneKracker wrote: | | You guys have got it backward. It is freedom of expression that should be inviolable. If you sacrifice freedom of expression, you have no way to protect human dignity or anything else. There is no right or privilege more important than freedom of expression; it is the very cornerstone of democracy. |
Yes, from ideological perspective it is backward, from pragmatic it is right. My parents used to raise me more along the lines of being ideologically right, the way you are suggesting.
I went on living like that and got slammed really hard couple of times, where I know I excercised my "right", but got the perfectly legal rebuttal. Took me a while to accept the reality that living is sort of about surfing the whatever shit churns under your feet, and ending up where you want to, while being aware what is ideologically right, but also being aware you cannot go there in straight line, else you plunge into the shit. |
That's the old philosophical problem of confusing "ought" and "is". We should be free to discuss what "ought" to be, but one must always be mindful of what "is" (unless one doesn't mind being in jail).
It's one thing for me to sit here at my keyboard in the U.S. and post pictures of Muhammed fucking a donkey, while talking about how free speech must be sacrosanct. It would be unwise for me to march through Tahrir Square with that picture on a stick, shouting the same things.
We must live in the real world, but that should not keep us from understanding the ideal, and vice-versa.
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ppurka
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BoneKracker
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| Posted: Mon Apr 16, 2012 4:26 am Post subject: |
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That's pretty absurd. I don't see how that political cartoon could qualify as "outraging the modesty of a woman" (which I must interpret to mean "outrageously violating the modesty of a woman". Having people arbitrarily arrested for speaking out against government policy is exactly why freedom of expression must be protected, even if it means sometimes suffering assholes to be offensive.
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notageek
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| Posted: Mon Apr 16, 2012 5:01 am Post subject: |
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BK, you've just taken the side of a bonafide commie.
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BoneKracker
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| Posted: Mon Apr 16, 2012 5:22 am Post subject: |
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| notageek wrote: | | BK, let me appraise you that you've just taken the side of a bonafide commie. |
The guy who made the cartoon is a bona fide commie?
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notageek
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| Posted: Mon Apr 16, 2012 5:33 am Post subject: |
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Yes.
Background: The said lady just won a landslide election uprooting the Communist Party of India from the state after a 30+ year old rule, which saw the state pretty much ruined. The said cartoon in question is neither funny nor has objective criticism. Just vile communist propaganda.
For example, the cartoons generally drawn by the commies show her as "eating away state's industry" a witch etc. Although this cartoon wasn't about that, I couldn't find the said cartoon. Anyway, getting back to the point, how dare the commies complain about industrial decline under her rule, when she's bare even a year old as the head of this state? Did the communists do any better?
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BoneKracker
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| Posted: Mon Apr 16, 2012 5:58 am Post subject: |
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| notageek wrote: | Yes.
Background: The said lady just won a landslide election uprooting the Communist Party of India from the state after a 30+ year old rule, which saw the state pretty much ruined. The said cartoon in question is neither funny nor has objective criticism. Just vile communist propaganda.
For example, the cartoons generally drawn by the commies show her as "eating away state's industry" a witch etc. Although this cartoon wasn't about that, I couldn't find the said cartoon. Anyway, getting back to the point, how dare the commies complain about industrial decline under her rule, when she's bare even a year old as the head of this state? Did the communists do any better? |
So that justifies locking them up? A political cartoon?
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notageek
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| Posted: Mon Apr 16, 2012 6:02 am Post subject: |
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Probably not.
But I can't really sympathize with the communists, because they've done this before (locking up/ political violence etc) and now when they're at the receiving end, they're crying foul.
This issue should've been handled tactfully, unfortunately the woman here lacks tact. But she really wants to turn around the state and her efforts are not yielding results.
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BoneKracker
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| Posted: Mon Apr 16, 2012 6:20 am Post subject: |
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| notageek wrote: | Probably not.
But I can't really sympathize with the communists, because they've done this before (locking up/ political violence etc) and now when they're at the receiving end, they're crying foul.
This issue should've been handled tactfully, unfortunately the woman here lacks tact. But she really wants to turn around the state and her efforts are not yielding results. |
If she wants to give them a dose of their own medicine, she should just make them disappear. Or, put a huge dose of LSD in their tea right before a public event, have them hauled away in a straight jacket and committed to a psychiatric hospital, where they are kept drugged up for 20 years and then released with permanent psychosis.
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ppurka
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| Posted: Mon Apr 16, 2012 9:05 am Post subject: |
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| notageek wrote: | | BK, you've just taken the side of a bonafide commie. |
It is not clear that the arrested person is a communist. Even if he were, I don't see how this "outrages the modesty of a woman."
In fact, it is hard to gauge who is in the right and who is not. Especially when the political system is in such a mess.
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notageek
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| Posted: Mon Apr 16, 2012 9:24 am Post subject: |
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I'm sure you're aware, which state we're talking about here? West Bengal. 30+ years of commie rule. The university? Jadavpur University. If these don't ring a bell to you, then perhaps you don't know what you're talking about.
I have been to this University (not for my education) and know very well, how local politics work here. You're a party member first and a student later. You get a party card before you even get college/university i-card.
Here's a sample news article:
http://www.indianexpress.com/news/4-professors-of-jadavpur-university-in-poll/774382/
| Quote: | | While people from various walks of public life and institutions have plunged into the election fray, the highest number of contestants from one particular academic institution are from Jadavpur University. Four professors from the university are in the election fray, three of them represent the CPM and one the SUCI. |
CPM = Communist Party Marxist
SUCI = Socialist Unity Centre of India (Communist)
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juniper
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| Posted: Mon Apr 16, 2012 9:47 am Post subject: |
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| notageek wrote: | | BK, you've just taken the side of a bonafide commie. |
it doesn't matter. if you are for free speech, you are for free speech by those with whom you disagree. Commie, fascist or moderate, they all have the right. |
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notageek
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| Posted: Mon Apr 16, 2012 9:54 am Post subject: |
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Yeah, but everyone knows the commies have no credibility.
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BoneKracker
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| Posted: Mon Apr 16, 2012 10:14 am Post subject: |
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If they have no credibility, then there is even less reason to throw them in jail for some political cartoon.
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Oldthinkers unbellyfeel INGSOC.
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notageek
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| Posted: Mon Apr 16, 2012 10:15 am Post subject: |
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That, is the mistake she did. She should've played the victim. It's not like she lacks popular support but by doing this, she lost some.
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BoneKracker
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| Posted: Mon Apr 16, 2012 10:25 am Post subject: |
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Either that or just take them out with a drone. That seems to have zero political consequences. (If you can't afford a drone, some guy on a motorcycle with a sticky bomb works pretty good too.)
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notageek
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| Posted: Mon Apr 16, 2012 10:35 am Post subject: |
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Motor-cycle?
Back in the day, the armed wing of the commies (then and now known as the naxalites) used pipe-bombs. Enough to maim and sometimes kill opponents.
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BoneKracker
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| Posted: Mon Apr 16, 2012 11:02 am Post subject: |
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Pipe bombs were first used in the 1880s by labor movement radicals from Chicago (see Haymarket Square riot). The ends justify the means.
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Prenj
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notageek
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| Posted: Thu Apr 19, 2012 6:00 pm Post subject: |
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The woman made it to Time's 100 most influential people, list.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-india-17766153
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