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Prevailing Against Michigan Censorship
mcneight writes: "In yet another battle for our rights online, the ACLU and 9 other plaintiffs have recently won a permanent injunction against enforcement of Michigan Public Act 33 of 1999 (The Child Online Protection Act). As the name suggests, it is net censorship with a pro-child happy face plastered on the front of it. Fortunately, the courts found it violated both the First and Fourteenth Amendments (protection of interstate commerce, in case you were wondering). Much greater detail is offered by the lead plaintiff in this case, Cyberspace Communications, Inc."
First off, what are your 3 year old and 5 year old doing surfing the Internet? Aren't they a little young for that?
Secondly, what are they doing surfing the Internet unsupervised?
Come on! In the "land of the free", you want to censor the Internet, but leave the gory bits of the Bible alone? (There's a lot of sex and violence in the bible, but that's not the point.) In both cases, either an adult should provide some guidance (interpretation or rules). There's no excuse for you to abandon your parental responsibilities, and expect the rest of us, or the 'state' in general to perform them for you.
Get with the program, and take some personal responsibility.
Put down that chisel! There is _not_ either an eleventh commandment that sayeth, "Sucks to be you"! ;)
Ham on wry, if I'm any judge ;)
Moreover, I strongly believe that most childrens can stand a lot more than their parents believe.
Stephan
I mean, if it's such a bad word, why couldn't you just decide that it isn't. Poof, one less evil in the world
You could decide that some words have different meanings. The problem, however, is not the action itself, but the impression it leaves on the individual that says the word, and those who hear it.
The impression on the one who says it, is the feeling of freedom to do as one wishes. Although the irreligious may say this is the greatest thing -- freedom -- the religious will argue by either saying that full freedom is immoral or that true freedom is having control. Either way is is up to the indivdual to do as they please, and at the same time, to recognize and respect others' (rights to have other) beliefs and rights as well.
There are also those who hear it. Generally, one does not know the relgious and moral beliefs of others, and as such, one needs to be very careful with what they force others to hear. Thus, the Michigan law upholds individual feeedom.
We cannot outlaw everything that might offend somebody. But the when a belief is widely held, the legislature may put force behind liberty with laws. Offensive language is such a thing. It offends a good deal of people.
Why the law only protects women and children I do not know. Personally, I think it discriminates against those of the masculine gender.
---
ticks = jiffies;
while (ticks == jiffies);
ticks = jiffies;
Have you read my journal today?
And for those suggesting that we strip the offfensive connotations from the word--that particular word is chosen *because of*, not in spite of, it's connotations. Something else would take its place.
hawk
...
> the Monica Lewinsky fiasco,
err, here problem wasn't what was coming *out* of her mouth . . .
[*duck*]
hawk
I'm pretty sure that was a jab at the censhorship types who seem to argue that our children will be forced to listen to any bad words in music if we don't censor the music, not a suggestion that we actually force them to.
The enemies of Democracy are
"Fuck" has the connotation it has because of our culture. Yes, I know culture is a very ambiguous word, and one us in the West may have a hard time grasping, but that's why. You were raised to think it was bad as was I, and, well, that's simplisticly what culture is.
Not that this means that there's a good reason for "fuck" to be somehow worse than any of the other fifty thousand expressions that mean the same thing.
As far as religion, there is nothing in my religion that says that "fuck" is bad. Taking God's name in vain isn't good, but that makes sense if you believe in the bloke, doesn't it?
The enemies of Democracy are
Many Americans get seduced by the mythology which surrounds their particular political bias. One such is that [republicans/democracts] support more free speech than [democrats/republicans], that [liberal/conservatives] uphold basic freedoms while [conservatives/liberals] are actively attacking every freedom except [one that isn't important to you].
The truth is that both parties are actively attacking virtually every freedom, whether it is the Republicans' War on Drugs virtually destroying the fourth amendment (but it's for our children!) or the Democrats destroying our freedom of speech (you can't say the n-word!). Or, for that matter, the Democrats destroying the fourth amendment (raiding and seizing the property of white supremescists because of the racists' asinine political beliefs) or the Republicans decimating our basic freedom of speech (the obscenity laws and laws restricting speech on the internet).
Both parties, and people of both liberal and conservative stripes, are equally guilty of trying to, and often succeeding in, abridging the constitution for the advancement of their own political and/or social agenda. The same BTW is true of the Libertarians, who would have the constitution stop at the borders of anyone's private property.
Until we couch our arguments firmly in the domain of freedom vs. restriction and constitutionality vs. unconstitutionality we will all be missing the point, and will continue to elect people to political office who trample all over the constitution whenever it suits them. This is unacceptable, and it is time we as voters began making that clear to candidates of all parties, conservative, moderate, and liberal alike.
The Future of Human Evolution: Autonomy
Why do we have to have "net" laws???
there are countless laws already on the books that cover most any crime.. (Pedophillia? got laws for that.... let's use em!) all the supposed "problems" that we have with the internet already have laws, and can be enforced if they tried. The problem is shutting down the lawbreakers. You can raid a business and shove the trashbag in jail.. you cant do that to a russian narcophillia website... Unless you hire a internet police force that has a nice group of leet hackers that take the site down... (Oh gawd, lawlessness, evil and all that other jazz.)
Face it, do you as a citizen have the right to break down your neighbors door, ransack the house, and take what you think is bad? well the police do, so let's use that same analogy/tool to the net... Hackercops.... DDOS'ing the bad guys into submission...
Ok it sounds funny..... but something has to be done to give the current laws that work some bite in cyberspace..... (minuteman launches that target IP addresses???)
Dont censor, but give law enforcement the tools they need to uphold the law, otherwise we'll start having countries "unplug" from the net to protect the citizens. (Now we open more cans of worms... where does Country's law X override what is a protected freedom in Country Y?)
I say allow anything on the net.... cracking is legal, and DOS attacks are expected... It'll all sort out in the end or and up like the CB band.
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
No. It's called haveus corpus (have the body, presumably dead) which means in order for you to be prosecuted of a felony charge those prosecuting you need to not only have intent but the actual evidense of your illegal action. A murder case without a body is not a murder case. Because your volumes have specific names doesn't mean crap in court. However if you're running around trading said encrypted volumes with other people and you're suspected of commiting a crime you can be arrested and the encryption keys may be subpoenaed in order for the prosecutors to see if you're guilty of the crime they're charging you with. This itself in unlikely because authorities need a warrant to monitor your communications and make anything they find admisible in court. If all they have is an encrypted volume named kiddie porn with no other evidense to show a judge they're most likely not going to be able to get a warrant. Getting charges to stick when dealing with evidence collected in secret is very tricky for any group of law enforcement. Thats why you always hire an attourney with a good pre-trial record. A good one can get a majority of evidense thrown out of court which destroys the prosecution's case.
I'm a loner Dottie, a Rebel.
First off, I don't see why the culture of the 'net shouldn't belong to those who were there first. In any other sort of society, cultural parameters are defined by the first people on the scene. I venture to say that never has a influx of newcomers so quickly wrenched a society away from its original norms of behavior.
Second, I don't mind sharing the 'net, but I mind when people move in and think they can take it over. The early-adopter scientific community was always happy to share with newcomers and explain how things are done, but the new folks didn't want any part of the existing culture, and they are now trying to force the old guard to submit to their new narrow-minded mold. The 'net wasn't for kids, it still mostly isn't, and adults are the people getting hurt in this attempt to rewrite the rules.
Gentrification's OK sometimes, until they tell you that you can't park your truck on the street any more. At that point it's not sharing any more; it's a land grab.
Caution: contents may be quarrelsome and meticulous!
Your right to not believe: Americans United for Separation of Church and
But filtering software for adults isn't needed, and even where and when filtering software might be a good idea, it shouldn't be done by the state and it shouldn't be implemented in a way that makes the 'net kid-friendly even for adults.. Making things kid-friendly for kids is a parent's job.
Caution: contents may be quarrelsome and meticulous!
Your right to not believe: Americans United for Separation of Church and
This isn't directed at you personally, but more as a general question: when did the Internet become expected to be a big kid-friendly space, full of rounded corners, cushiony floor mats, easy-to-grip building blocks, and nonthreatening ideas? The 'net was originally a batchelor pad for scientists - they did work over it, and they had fun over it, often fairly adult fun. Almost from the start the biggest electronic business on the 'net has been pornography and other adult-themed content that you can't get as easily in Real Life.
I'm always a little surprised that the newer, more easily-offended netizens react in this way. You've essentially moved into someone else's neighborhood, and now you're going to make the clean it up whether they like it like that or not? It seems like there's a strong streak of moral superiority and just plain yuppiehood involved here, one that residents of San Francisco, or any other area where the cheap historic districts are attracting new money at a record rate, will recognize.
Put plainly: where did you get the idea that the 'net was kid-friendly, that it was somehow going to become kid-friendly once you got on board, or that it was ever kid-friendly to begin with? Maybe you got online thinking that it was like the town square, but the 'net is really a bunch of twisty little passages (all alike) through the world's biggest library - you never know what you'll find in there. I'm sorry if AOL or Earthlink fooled you on that one, but you should really take that up with them, and leave the rest of us to our porn.
Caution: contents may be quarrelsome and meticulous!
Your right to not believe: Americans United for Separation of Church and
Well, what I really want to know, is if the word fuck is considered so bad, isn't it easier to just drop the connotations of the word from your brain than to try to make everyone else stop saying it? I mean, if it's such a bad word, why couldn't you just decide that it isn't. Poof, one less evil in the world. Of course, it isn't that easy, and I guess some people are lazy enough to try to make everyone else change, rather than changing themselves. I wonder if it's a genuine laziness, or that egocentric view that makes people believe that they themselves are the right ones, and everyone else is wrong.
I guess this solution doesn't account for perhaps a religious belief that that exact permutation of letters is morally wrong, but I'm not prepared to argue against that. I speak from the point of view of agnosticism.
--Xantho
Don't slander the religeons with saying that they are all out to steal your rights away.
The problem is the organizations that they support do act in that way. Most of the individual religious people that I meet are slightly more decent than average. I don't think that it's religion that does it, I think that it's a selection process. But by the same mark, most of the religious leaders that I have encountered are more skilled than average in manipulating people, esp. via the use of guilt. And they tend, on the average, to be more power hungry and controlling than the members of their congregations. And more conservative. (Also older.) And more likely to be choosen as spokesman.
Now from this selection of ministers, the ones most likely to rise in the church organization are the ones that are most interested in power. The others devote more of their time to other pursuits.
So when the spokesman of a hierarchy speaks, you are getting a viewpoint much more "conservative" than is the average for that organization. You are also getting speech from someone who has practiced for many years with using the pulpit to control how people act and think (remember, he's more interested in power than average). And he has influence over a block of votes, so politicians will be more likely to say things and preform actions to please him.
Etc.
I distrust all hierarchies. The more power they have, and the longer they have existed, the more I distrust them. (This is a default. It can be varied up and down by the actions of the group. But if I haven't been paying attention, this is my default belief, and the above are the reasons why.)
The churches have periodically acted to lower my degree of trust in them. They have rarely acted to raise it. And they are supported by the religious individuals, that we both agree are well intentioned.
Caution: Now approaching the (technological) singularity.
I think we've pushed this "anyone can grow up to be president" thing too far.
Yeah. They're against censorship, and in favor of protecting the rights of those without enough money to hire lawyers.
Caution: Now approaching the (technological) singularity.
I think we've pushed this "anyone can grow up to be president" thing too far.
I dislike all censorship based laws. Without noteable exception. Laws should be based on measurable damage or benefit, and should be so formed that it is possible to determine whether they are performing their function. If they aren't, then they should be repealled. Period.
Pre-existance doesn't give them any more basis for existance than non-existance. What it should provide is a track record, and that is what should be used to justify them. When a law is so written that a track record in terms of benefit and damage is impossible to determine, then that law is automatically a bad law. And the damage must be quantifiable. No hand waving allowed. If seeing sex is bad (the postulate), then the postulate must be demonstrated. If you claim it as an axiom, then you must say so, explicitly, e.g.:
No possible evidence exists that permits me to derive this in either the positive or negative dimensions, but I assert that:
>
Unfortunately our legal practices derive from the rhetoric tricks taught by Cicero and the rules of the Trial by Combat. These don't have much to do with reason, truth, justice, or any of that.
But if I can't justify a law to myself, then I think it a bad law. Censorship laws that I have examined have all been bad laws. And I don't generally accept their proposed postulates (to the extent that I can determine them).
Sometimes I seriously consider that the main reason for such laws is to allow the authorities to "crack down on" violations that are likely to be taking place among people that they disapprove of for other reasons. It seems more believable than most justifications.
Then I remember that the Emperor Agustus forbade anyone but the imperial family to dress in purple, except that Senators were allowed to wear a toga with a one inch stripe of purple around the bottom. And I attribute it to a self-decieving desire to assert authority. (Augustus proclaimed this as a part of his attempts to restore traditional Roman respect for authority and family values. Look it up.)
Caution: Now approaching the (technological) singularity.
I think we've pushed this "anyone can grow up to be president" thing too far.
It would be very nice to charge them with malfeasance. Unfortunately, I don't think that it would be legal, but a state DA should be able to charge a Federal Legislator with malfeasance if a law that he passed was ruled unconstitutional.
OTOH, the delay between the passage and the final ruling is usually so long that the author is probably already dead.
Caution: Now approaching the (technological) singularity.
I think we've pushed this "anyone can grow up to be president" thing too far.
I once ran across a quote "Hard cases make bad law."
I don't have the foggiest idea how I would respond to that mess.
On the one hand, I feel that they are being overly sensitive, since the computers aren't aimed at them.
OTOH, a library should be able to choose what it carries. Libraries don't generally carry much erotic literature, I don't see why they should be coerced into carrying erotic web pages.
OTOH, people should not be forced to choose between their job and sexual harassment. (Though I do dispute that sexual harassment has been argued.)
OTOH...
Hopefully the details will clear up the situation. Otherwise it's a matter of what to do about rude customers.
Caution: Now approaching the (technological) singularity.
I think we've pushed this "anyone can grow up to be president" thing too far.
Good arguments. Never seem to carry much weight, but still good arguments.
The interesting thing is that until around the 1930's most kids were raised on a farm, and if they were interested they say sex, between animals, anyway. Until around the 1830's most families all slept in one room. The kids and the parents. The kids saw sex whether they were interested or not. So sex isn't the problem.
Take it from the top. The net is kid friendly. It just isn't moralist friendly. The only thing about the net that isn't kid friendly is that it interferes with proper exercise. Otherwise it's a lot more kid friendly than most city streets. (A kid is quite unlikely to get run over, beaten up, etc.) But that isn't what moralists worry about. They almost approve of people getting into car accidents, beaten up, even killed, though they don't say so. It give's them another excuse to rant and rave. And plot to take power. (If they weren't about getting power, I wouldn't care if they wanted to rant and rave.)
Caution: Now approaching the (technological) singularity.
I think we've pushed this "anyone can grow up to be president" thing too far.
No, gender is social, sex is biological.
However, your point about s/sex/gender/g being bad is correct.
rark!
Check out:
l dren/index.html
http://www.salon.com/books/feature/2001/06/11/chi
Salon takes a look at the "protecting the children" mantra in the age of censorship. Very informative.
"The Sage treasures Unity and measures all things by it" - Lao Tzu
My point? A few people stopped it. "Eternal vigilance *is* the price of liberty", folks. Sometimes there's just no substitute for showing up and raising hell.(You'll be happily suprised at the amount of covert support you'll find.)
P.S. Hooray for GREX: community-built, community-supported, and community-utilized computing resources!!!
DNA is a Turing machine. You, however, being dynamic and emergent, are not.
A thorough investigation of the Bible will reveal that there is no prohibition against these words, especially in English.
You're right - but the (mis?)conception that the "Seven Dirty Words" are bad doesn't come from the bible - it comes from Queen Victoria..
You remember her, right? The Ultra-Prude that decided that dogs had to wear skirts, and that piano legs had to be covered because they were too suggestive?
Since most North American was founded by the British, they're saddled with this legacy.. the problem is that they're so far away from the rest of Europe (who generally isn't saddled with such backwards concepts) that they aren't influenced by the more free societies.. (unlike in Britain, where the concept of sex being "dirty" has softened since Vickie's rule.)
Disclaimer: I am a British Citizen, and I fully support the Monarchy (and I even like some of them!)
Let me tell yo a story, friend, and you tell me what you think. When I was 5, I had a sister who was 7, almost 8, when she was raped multiple times and then killed by this psycho who was executed in 1996. You know what I asked myself when I was a kid, and never got an answer to? "Why did God take away my sister?" I didn't care about the guy who did it, I just wanted my sister back. She hadn't done anything to anyone. She was just a kid. But God didn't stop her from being brutally raped and murdered. Where was He?
The usual line is "God works in mysterious ways", or "It's all a part of God's grand plan," or (the one I hate(d) the most) "She's in heaven now." Well, m'friend, that is simply not good enough. *Nothing* can justify the brutality visited upon my sister. Nothing. God just stood passively by while my sister was raped for over THREE HOURS and you are going to try and tell me a) He exists, and b) is a loving God? BULLSHIT!
Nothing can justify a supposedly omnipotent being standing idly by during such a horrific event. Nothing. Not an eternal plan, not the return of Jesus to put forward the Kingdom of Heaven on earth, not anything. The *only* right thing to do in such a situation is to put a stop to it. No Bible verse will ever convince me otherwise. *Nothing will ever convince me that it was ok for God to let that happen.* I even heard this line in "Pitch Black" (of all things) that resonated: "Of course I believe in God. And I absolutely hate the fucker." Know why? Because He doesn't do jack shit.
Oh, and in case you're wondering, yes we did go to church every Sunday. A Baptist church. We were both baptized. That didn't seem to matter, either.
- Rev.I found this writeup over at E2 amusing: Jesus doesn't care if you say the word "fuck".
--Begin--
Many Christians seem to believe that saying four letter words is a sin that makes the baby Jesus cry. It is surreptitiously implied that the Third Commandment, which prohibits taking the Lord's name in vain, is the source of this.
When it is spelled out like this, it is easy to see the fallacy. The Lord's name is not "fuck", even in Hebrew. Nor is the Lord's name "shit" or any other of the so-called 'bad words' that are frowned upon by so many. A thorough investigation of the Bible will reveal that there is no prohibition against these words, especially in English.
Ephesians 4:29 says "Do not let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouths, but only what is helpful for building others up according to their needs, that it may benefit those who listen." This seems to apply to things such as gossip, the Monica Lewinsky fiasco, and most of the Southern Baptist Convention, but more weight is given to cuss words than these others.
This leads one to believe that the Christian aversion to four letter words is based more on a desire to be sanctimonious rather than truly Christ-like. Jesus loves people who say "fuck" just as much as those who do not.
--End--
Ok, full disclosure. I wrote it.
- Rev.The ACLU is hardly a main stream liberal orginisation. It gains lots of liberal support when it fight for civil rights, but it looses lots of liberal support when it fights for free speach. There are even some well known higher ups at the ACLU who are descidedly conservative. I think there is a book writen by one of them.
Anyway, the main stream Liberal philosophy has quite a lot of Marx which is totally orthogonal / irrelevent to the ACLU.
OTOH, many concervative ellected officials depend on the religious right soo much that they are pretty much required to hate the ACLU, so you might as well call the ACLU a Liberal orginisation in many states.
The Christian religion has been and still is the principal enemy of moral progress in the world. -- Bertrand Russell
I may not agree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it. -- Commonly attributed to Voltaire, never proven When you want to say the very best, say it with Voltaire :). Can't think of a better way to say it.
--
Remove the rocks to send email
On the whole, I find that I prefer Slashdot posts to twitter ones because I don't get limited to 140 chars before
I found something interesting in the preliminary injunction. The judge is drawing his conclusions:
Wow! There's a federal judge that seems to think the Constitution says that we should all be able to surf and e-mail anonymously! I'd like the Constitution to say that, but I don't think it does.
--Happy Premise #3: Even though I feel like I might ignite, I probably won't.
Here's what I would love to see:
A full listing of every legislator and executive who passed a law that was subsequently shot down as unconstitutional.
The US Government put in place certain 'checks and balances.' Between each branch of government, an interaction takes place to ensure that the original standards of the government are kept in force.
The President may Veto unsavory bills.
The Congress may block Presidential appointments.
The President may appoint Judges.
The Congress may amend the Constitution.
The Judiciary may strike down laws that do not pass the Constitution's guarantees.
Surely it is the job of the Judiciary to perform this very important task, but why do we have to rely on them so much? Is it too much to ask for legislators who know what is constitutional or not? Most of them are lawyers by practice, they should understand the issues.
I'd love to see a roster listing the authors of legislation, and the executive who signed them into law, next to each law that has been struck down.
Start with the federal laws, and then get down to state laws for each state. Put lawmakers on notice: you have taken an oath to defend the Constitution from enemies abroad and at home. We demand an end to the erosion of basic rights well-established by our nation's founders.
[
The story asserted, "Fortunately, the courts found it violated both the First and Fourteenth Amendments (protection of interstate commerce, in case you were wondering). No direct reference was given. But on the page referenced by the single link supplied, one may arrive here, where one can read, "Tarnow also agreed with the ACLU that Public Act 33 violates the Commerce clause of the Constitution because it would unjustly regulate interstate commerce and regulate conduct that occurs outside of Michigan."
So what's the problem? It's that the 14th Amendment has nothing whatsoever to to with interstate commerce! I think some Americans occasionally forget that there was an original document to which the Amendments applied, and that is where the "Commerce Clause" is to be found. Article 1, Section 8 explicitly grants the Congress the power "To regulate Commerce with foreign Nations, and among the several States, and with the Indian Tribes..." The 14th Amendment has mostly to do with mopping up after the Civil War, but the clause most applicable today enforces the equal protection of the laws to all citizens. It's an immensely important Amendment -- but it has nothing to do with this case.
No American who thinks this a minor or unimportant matter has any business prattling on about his "rights", when he plainly has either not read the document that protects them, has not understood it, or both.
And the brethren went away edified.
Great. Now I have the choice of getting adult pop-up spam EVERYWHERE I go because I identify myself to EVERYONE as over 18, or I don't sign up and I suddenly can't read reviews of video games that are rated M.
On a slightly different subject, why do they keep trying to place the law on the net side? Why don't they place it on the user side? Make it illegal for anyone under 18 to use the net? The only thing out there is porn anyway, right? And we like arresting children, right?
Okay, maybe I'm being a bit silly, but think about it. If it's too dangerous for ME to drive before I'm sixteen, laws are made restricing ME from driving -- a federal 5mph law isn't passed. If it's too dangerous for ME to base jump from a skyscraper, laws are made restricting ME from jumping off buildings -- laws requiring airbags around all buildings over 50 feet aren't passed.
But when it comes to 'net law, suddenly it's reversed! If it's dangerous for someone to use the net, there are laws applied to providers of net access, not to the users. Instead of restricting US net users under 18, (which is a minority compared to the rest of the 'net) they attempt to restrict/filter/whatever literally the rest of the world.
Just seems backwards.
J
Who moderates the meta-moderators?
Heaven forbid you actually have to BE a parent to your children and protect them yourself!
I live in MA, and its quite easy to buy a beer on sundays. Well, for some definition of beer, you have to go to a bar. Ive yet to find a bar that serves much other than piss water. (not that I have been to many bars around here)
When the closest thing to a real beer you can find is guiness... I supose your right, it is at least hard to find beer on sundays here...
-Steve
"I opened my eyes, and everything went dark again"
But certainly I don't want my kids whipping it out in front of their teacher and saying "suck my fat one" or something... that seems a bit over the line, since I don't want myself to do it either. But my kids should be able to say anything that I can say.
What can you say and what do you want to say? These are two separate issues, and you're obviously pro-censorship on children since you want to apply it on your own offspring. So you're really ambigous here. You can't be against censorship in one moment, and stamp down "unapproved" speech in the next.
- Steeltoe
http://www.debunkingskeptics.com/
"To renounce liberty is to renounce being a man." The greater liberal (as in liberal of the 18th and 19th centuries) argument: you have no right to restrain YOUR liberty with law because the law will affect future generations which may not want such restrictions and may not be able to repeal it while your generation is alive. Of course I guess when we allow populist idiots and demagogues to roam free Roussea's opening line in the social contract will be very much alive here in the US: "Man is born free and everywhere he is in chains."
--
Seems to me that there's no such thing as a conditional freedom. At the risk of sounding like I'm making a false either/or proposition, either speech is free -- whether or not we like what is said -- or it's not.
Well, if you think "the promise we made to ourselves" is a positive "freedom of speech", you're wrong. For the first 81 years of the republic, the 1st amendment prohibited only Federal abridgement of speech. States could, and did, pass such laws. In 1868, the 14th amendment was passed, and then the Bill of Rights applied to the States as well. The funny thing is, nobody knew that until 1925 when SCOTUS told New York they couldn't make Gitlow shut up because the 14th amendment incorporates all the other amendments. Now, this reasoning is faulty, because unlike the 2nd amendment which asserts a positive "right to bear arms", the 1st amendment still doesn't. An incorporation would mean that a State can't force Congress to create a speech-abridging law, but of course, that is absurd.
Those of us who are truly interested in our rights, online or otherwise, don't like this kind of legal hocus pocus. If the Constitution can be made to mean anything, then it means nothing. The question of whether or not there should be a right of free speech, or privacy, or protecting the children, or almost anything else, is a policy question, not a legal one. These issues are properly decided by legislators, not judges.
And don't get me started on the Commerce Clause.
Do they enforce it? Do they even try?
Convenience stores put up little signs that say "you must be 18 or older to buy cigarrettes". But if they just count on the sign to do the whole job and take everyone's word for it that they are complying, they still get in trouble. I would guess, under this law (which I actually went and read) that such a "click through" shield might form part of a legitamate good faith effort, but would not be sufficent, especially if the site had never made any effort to enforce the warning.
Random idea - state sets up a secure site where people enter their drivers license number or whatnot and get a "I can have porn" cookie put on their hard drive. State site is set up not to keep records of which license numbers it was looking up. Porn sites, which of course NEVER try to get accidental visitors or mislead anyone about their content, set it up so that anyone without the cookie who tries to enter their site gets dumped into the authorization site. Parents have to decide if they want to veiw porn and risk their kids seeing it or remove it from their house (just like the decision a parent can make about books or magazines.)
Kahuna Burger
...will work for Chick tracts...
Just for the record, if you read my entire post, I already said that:
Parents have to decide if they want to veiw porn and risk their kids seeing it or remove it from their house (just like the decision a parent can make about books or magazines.)
A responsible parent can already make the decision of whether to have porn in the house and potentially avalible to their children - except in the case of the internet/computer. People talk about "responisble parenting" as if any parent on the planet sits over a childs shoulder every minute to see if the books in the family room suddenly turned into Hustler, or the videos in the den suddenly and unexpectedly include Dilbert Does Denver. But when they try to assert the same ballance of control and independance on the computer that they give their children in every other learning/entertainment venue, suddenly they are bad, lazy parents.
Anyway, yeah, if dad wants to go to a porn site on the family computer, he may be risking little bobby seeing porn too - just like if dad brings home a penthouse and reads it in the den, he risks little bobby picking it up and reading it. But a suprising number of mature adult parents get by in life without looking at porn all the time, and I think dad can be counted on to make an adult decision - if you are willing to let it be a decision.
Kahuna Burger
...will work for Chick tracts...
So with that endorsement and knowing the general /. sense of perspective, I went and read the whole damn law (not that it was that long.) And it looked pretty good. There were specific exceptions carved out for the internet that seemd to aknowlege the lesser control site proprietors have over their traffic. For instance, while simple nudity is included in the original prohibitions, to get in trouble an internet server would have to provide obcinity (sp?) as defined (and presumedly legally upheld since its over 15 years old) in the MI laws. The overall law also does not penalize exposure to minors unless it was knowing, or if the proprietor showed reckless disregard in allowing minors access. Exceptions are made for health workers, schools AND LIBRARIANS.
As someone who is neither a puritan nor a libertarian, the law just looks like a reasonable attempt to bring internet providers into the same playing field as brick and mortar on this issue. If you oppose all those orriginal laws, just say so. But don't try to make this out as some evil and nefarious new thing.
Kahuna Burger
...will work for Chick tracts...
Now THERE's an interesting argument. We can't say things because other people are being forced to listen to us. You should write some law.
First of all, people (even children) being "forced" to listen to something (I don't remember any chains or other restraining devices) shouldn't constitute reason to curb free speech. And more importantly, you haven't answered the more pressing question of what exactly is so wrong with these words that they must be silenced.
icqqm [ICQ:11952102]
Words only carry the power we give them. I've always thought it would be better to choose not to be shocked and/or offended by any word. Let the word stand on its own merit as a descriptor or component of a sentence.
If people would quit worrying about how a simple 4-letter word causes imagined pain, the words would succeed or fail based on their merit. As a result, you'd probably hear a lot less use of the word "fuck" since it's used mostly as an attention-getting device, but you'd probably hear "shit" used a lot more because it's easy to say and expresses the concept quite well.
Of course, people will always feel compelled to be offended by something. I just wish that the people who choose to dedicate their time and money to eliminating words would spend a little more time eliminating the dead cars from out in front of their trailers.
-------------------------------
Now my kids will be exposed to all of the filth the Internet has to offer.
Yes. And you will undoubtedly allow them to play unsupervised in traffic, too.
Slashdot is jumping the shark. I'm just driving the boat.
We'll throw a whole bunch at the wall. I don't expect any of it to stick, but my constituents see me doing something, and if any of it sticks, then so much the better because hey, what do I care about the constitution and citizen rights?
Which leads to the question: Was this a genuine (misguided) attempt to introduce legislation or a deliberate blatantly unconstitutional bill introduced by people who wanted to be seen to be acting, without actually have to deal with the moral and legal grey areas?
Athletic Scholarships to universities make as much sense as academic scholarships to sports teams.
(I'm afraid of losing Montgomery Airpark --Gaithersburg/GAI -- to the people who will move into the new development currently being built right under the runway flight path)
What kíd ever said, "When I grow up, I wanna be the guy who sits next to the pilot?"
woof.
woof.
Ah, For The Kids. Argumentum ad Fragmentum -- make your point by throwing emotional grenades. At least it failed this time around.
It never fails, though. When all else is failing to go your way, say you're doing it for the good of the children. Everyone wants to protect their children, right?
I wonder how much of the Republican party has crypto-fascist tendencies myself (see, I can do it too!). There is a definite coercive trend in daily life these days, and I can only hope a mainstream backlash is in the offing.
/Brian
Am I to understand that you allow a three and five year old to surf the net unsupervised?
Here's a concept for you.... it's called PARENTING. Why not do a little?
Surf WITH your kids. (I do about 8 hours a week with mine)
Don't get the legislature to stomp on the 1st amendment just because you won't spend time with the kiddles.
Congress shall make no law...abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press...
It doesn't say "unless someone says 'cunt' in a rap song or 'nigger' on a college campus or to prevent the access of www.blowme.com by five-year olds.
Take risks! Accept Responsibility! Help put a lawyer out of work!
MAB
Words do not carry with them an inherent moral or ethical value. Words are words are words (ad infinitum). Context is everything. What is considered appropriate or not is solely based on social mores and folkways. To many the word "girl" is as demeaning and deragotory as the word "cunt." Legislating the use of language outside of context is intractable and stupid. But it makes the conservative (well, puritan maybe) voters happy. Since they vote, they get what they want.
Our obsession with politically correct speech has led to things like the cessation of correct use of the word "sex." We now (incorrectly) use "gender" to discern sex. Nouns have gender, people have sex. (Except for the afformentioned puritans.)
I can't get to the information becuase of &**%^%&^% filtering software (Bess, that b---!)
Scott Plumlee
Dear Judge,
I wish to turn myself in. I am in possession of a circumvention device which is in violation of the Digital Millenium Copyright Act. As a human being, I was born with fingers. These devices, also known in some circles as digits, are capable of circumventing the Power Switch Content Protection measures that are installed on most computational devices, allowing me to gain access to information which I am not supposed to have.
I can no longer live with the guilt of knowing that I may someday break the law. Please, for the love of God, lock me up somewhere so that I won't hurt anyone or myself.
Insincerely,
Junior J. Junior III
You see? You see? Your stupid minds! Stupid! Stupid!
I knew someone named Phuc once, which he insisted was pronounced "folk", but after 18 years of dealing with the problems related to being named Phuc, he decided to "americanize" his name and begin going by Trent.
microsoftword.mp3 - it doesn't care that they're not words...
I find this doubly amusing becasue the most anticipated web launch of voyeruistic porn in the history of the internet was not the fake virgins who were going to deflower each other on camera, but Ken Starr's detailed report on Bill Clinton's sex life. It was published on the internet the moment it was available after a party line vote, republicans in favor of publishing it, democrats against. It may be just ascii, but it's potent- I certainly learned a thing or two about Altoids and cigars!
:)
I'll be at least over the hypocrisy issue once the folks who voted to publish the Starr report on the internet turn themselves in to the authorities. Then I'll start fighting to get them out on the grounds that they unconstitutionally imprisoned themselves
Bryguy
microsoftword.mp3 - it doesn't care that they're not words...
I remember discussing sex with my playmates (no pun intended) as early as five years old. By the time I was six, it was a raging discussion. The concept that children are traumatized by the very idea of sex is just bizarre to me. Do we suddenly become qualified to deal with it at age 13 years, 3 months and 6 days? I think that as children, the kids in our neighborhood were especially inclined to discuss sex with each other, because they knew they couldn't discuss it with their parents.
that being said, not all people believe in free speech. those who don't probably shouldn't join...
George Bush is on record as saying 'There should be limits to freedom'.
The case in Michigan is the purest example of this, and the reason why it's important to fight for the rights of individual speech, even if those rights are held by someone who is a raving nutbar.
The Michigan COPA pretty firmly tried to put the kibosh on the internet sex thing. A national version, such as what John Ashcroft, that judgemental prick, is harping about would face the same fight. "Put internet sex-peddlers in prison, for the sake of the children".
Okay, so they outlaw internet porn or make it so difficult to get to that it might as well have been outlawed. What's next? Outlawing internet literature? How about all that nasty 'slash' fanfiction out there. That's pornographic, right? How about the vast amount of R and X rated Anime fanfiction? (Guilty!: http://www.furinkan.net/fanfic) We can use the first law as a precident to set the second to outlaw explicit text on the internet. Then, how about any kind of webpage that could even vaguely be construed as 'obscene'? That's a pretty broad category, which just about anyone could put any thought, image, or speech they didn't like into. It's also one we're allowing our congress to try to outlaw over and over again.
Personally, I'd rather deal with racism, sexism, and/or religious intolerance than lose my freedom of speech to speak out against them.
The next Slashdot story will be ready soon, but subscribers can beat the rush and slashdot the links early!
Join the ACLU: https://secure20.client-mail.com/aclulink/forms/jo in.shtml
Lawyers may grow on trees, but it costs at least $100 a day to go to the orchard.
The next Slashdot story will be ready soon, but subscribers can beat the rush and slashdot the links early!
Looks like the judge had a good grasp of the practicalities of the situation, and a sense of humor as well.
If you can't beat them, embrace and extend them.
Sorry to re-iterate a point made elsewhere - YOU LET YOUR THREE AND FIVE YEAR OLD KIDS SURF THE INTERNET!?!?
The internet was never a place for kids. It was a place for sharing information between academics. Then we geeks (and in some cases soon to be acadmemics) saw how cool it could be to share other kinds of information - music, views, news and inforation on unusual topics - things you wouldn't find elsewhere like technical info on various bits of computer hardware, satalites etc. Then it became this "hip" trendy new thing. AOL was created and found that the only way that they could market it successfully was to dupe people into thinking that it was a family centric area. Now what do we have? Thousands of terabytes of dross - you know what I mean - the thousands of web site devoted to Brittany Spears et al and gigabytes of duplicate and mundane information.
What makes this harder to swallow are the hoards of concerned citizens who signed up AOL and now think that they should have a say on how things are run. We also have armies of politicians who have heard that the net is a hot issue and therefore want to jump on the latest bandwagon to gain votes from the moral majority. Most of these politicians wouldn't know how to use a computer if the outcome of world war III depended on it.
If you don't want your children to come to harm on the internet then either don't let them use it (it's not a god-given right y'know)or else take it upon yourself to protect them - install a netnanny or surf with them. It is simply not fair (or right) to barge into a new place and decide that YOU want to start changing the rules to suit you.
Remember: Jesus was killed by the moral majority!
I'm so sick of the idea that everything in the world should be safe enough for a child to stumble over. Isn't that what supervision is for? to steer them around or away from things which aren't suitable. I don't let mine watch 18 rated films, read Clive Barker books or drink alcohol - doesn't mean that I shouldn't be able to do it.
The problem of filtering in libraries is huge - why must the subject matter that can be accessed via the pc be suitable for all ages? do they only stock books that 5 year olds can read as well? why don't they just hook up a few pc's with DK software for the kiddies and leave the other machines alone for us.
blazing a trail for mediocrity...
As a parent of a 5-year-old and a 3-year-old, I am very upset with this ruling.
I didn't father your children. I didn't encourage you to have them. So why should my library's Internet access be crippled? Don't want your kids seeing porn on the net? Then supervise them.
The Internet is not TV. If you children are seeing porn, it's almost certainly because they chose to see it. If you can't trust your little smut-hounds to stay away from the porn sites, don't let them on the net.
Or, better yet, grow up. There is no evidence whatsoever that seeing nudity will damage children. All over Europe, children see nudity on television, on billboards, and even at some beaches. They aren't truamatized by it. They don't need years of counseling. Your brand of puritanical censorship is probably much more harmful by making sex into something forbidden and "dirty."
Hi! This is the Sig, blatantly attached to the end of this comment.
Elementaly, social constraints on unacceptable speach are really pathetic Orwellian attempts to control ideas. As if there were no bad words there would be no bad thoughts, and without bad thoughts there are no bad deeds. The original poster of this thread must be commended on his choice of words. "Bleating", that perfects describes that actions of panicked sheep. He simplified the problem to one word. Telling too. But there are all manner of forbiden words, some of these conventions I even abide by. But when you look at a word and its origins the truth is almost too mundane to bother. But its the impact a word has in the moment we live we judge it by. A quick examination of racial slurs would show the truth in this. Does anyone take offence to the Spanish word for black? Or a corrupted for the latin word for black? Don't say those words around the wrong people. To some extent, theres good reason for that. Those words have an odd emotional componant which will color them for quite a while. One certainly cannot make the case that the emotional componant isn't at least somewhat justified, regaurdless of what real connection it has with the word. Is fukk more acceptable than fuck? What about the Vietnamise guy I know named Phuc? Does he have to change his name? For a long time I called him "Ummm...dude." (Turns out it's pronounced foo'k). It's all good, we're all big boys and girls. Of course our parents let us grow up to be something other than super-sized children....
--Jimmy has fancy plans; and pants to match.
You know, when I first heard of this case, I honestly thought it was a joke. Like an April fools thing. Maybe I've grown up in a more enlightened setting, or maybe I'm just an ignorant crude redneck, but I honestly don't get it. Why do otherwise intelligent adults (yes, this is often debatable :) get so worked up over a couple of words? Think the TBS version of The Breakfast Club. They must say 'flip you' a hundred times. I know what they mean, 8-year old kids know what they mean, hell.. my 92-year old Grandmother knows what they mean. And yet... putting the letters F U C K together as a word would do ... what exactly?
I've never in my life found a compelling argument over why 'we' label some words as 'bad', and not others. Beyond 'I was raised to think the f-word is bad', or religious reasons, I've never once heard of why.
Let's face it - we eventually realize that our parents aren't the supreme authority on the universe, and most people beyond the staunchest zealot tend to question at least some of the established religious dogma. Why precisely do we still have this fixation with our language?
Endless arguments over trivial contradictions in books written by ignorant savages to explain thunder in the dark.
If these 'newbies' you moan about are yuppies who move into your neighborhood and immediately start a campaign to gentrify the area, you are are a spoiled 2-year-old brat who refuses to share his toys.
That analogy doesn't work at all... maybe the 2-year-old who refuses to *give up* his toys. Or maybe the kid who lend out his favorite toy and when he got it back out half the parts were missing.
--
Convictions are more dangerous enemies of truth than lies.
Convictions are more dangerous enemies of truth than lies.
- Nietzsche
would it help if they selectively picked and chose only fuzzy happy cases??
guess what! that nativity scene was unconstitutional (build it off public property, then), and the nazis and kkk have a right to march where ever the hell they want (if they have a permit, which under constitutional protection they have a right to obtain...)
just because these cases leave a bitter tast in you mouth doesn't mean the ACLU is wrong. they have always worked on the principle that no one is going to pass a law saying "section 1a. everyone hereby loses their right to free speech" - free speech is eroded gradually. all cases that abridge freedom of expression are going to be targeted with equal energy.
i would actually think that this would be comforting, that they aren't subjective about what cases they take on...
that being said, not all people believe in free speech. those who don't probably shouldn't join...
A: None. The Universe spins the bulb, and the Zen master merely stays out of the way.
The concept of swearing being "bad" is just so, so arbitrary that it pisses me off. It's as if someone, a long time ago, thought "Hey, people are feeling too good about themselves... I think we need more rules to place on people's lives... what haven't we restricted yet? Hmm... Oh, I've got an idea: let's pretend that some words that you can form with our alphabet are bad and tell people that it's immoral to utter them! Hehe. Yeah, that oughta get 'em going for a while! Quick! Spread the word! In the name of morality!"
Stupid, stupid control freaks, controlling for the sake of it.
But certainly I don't want my kids whipping it out in front of their teacher and saying "suck my fat one" or something... that seems a bit over the line, since I don't want myself to do it either. But my kids should be able to say anything that I can say.
Music speeds up when you yawn, but does not change pitch.
Now my kids will be exposed to all of the filth the Internet has to offer.
Better that than "unrestricted censorship" in the future! Or, as Mike Godwin put it:
"I worry about my child and the Internet all the time, even though she's too young to have logged on yet. Here's what I worry about. I worry that 10 or 15 years from now, she will come to me and say 'Daddy, where were you when they took freedom of the press away from the Internet?'" --Mike Godwin, Electronic Frontier Foundation (from the FreeNet-Project's web page)
So steer clear of them. That's your right. But don't think for a minute that you have the right to shut them up simply because they make you uncomfortable.
I'm not defending murder and rape here. But there is an immesurable gulf between speech, no matter how hateful or incendiary, and an action like murder. Conflating the two is a manipulative move, and one that often works since most folks can't be bothered enough to realize that nobody who isn't seriously unhinged is going to go on a rape and murder spree simply because of some article they read in a NAMBLA magazine. Even if the article has pictures.
Your argument is a straw man that plays to people's fears and prejudices rather than tackling the substance of the freedom issue (specifically, it's a scare piece which preys on the prejudice that there are tons of big, bad, slavering queers out there who just can't wait to get their hands on some supple boy flesh to rape and kill). That's dangerous stuff there, bullshit to boot (since most child molesters are hetero, proportionally), and certainly not a rigorous enough approach to so vital a discussion.
I support NAMBLA's right to publish their magazine. I even support their right to advocate pedophilia. Let's go one up: I support some nutball's right to publish a site or magazine calling for the extermination of blacks and homosexuals. That doesn't make me a pedophile, racist, or homophobe. I have support these people, so that at the end of the day I know that I can speak my mind. Freedom of speech only really exists when we feel the urge to clamp down on what someone says, and we successfully resist that urge. It's far too easy to trumpet our love for liberty when we're not offended or scared.
It always struck me as strange that we Americans can justify neatly overthrowing one of our basic tenets of freedom simply by waving our hands and muttering something vauge about "protecting the children." Of all the tests of free speech, why do we fixate on one of the most pointless? Real free speech would demand that, should a neo-Nazi demagogue come along, we grit our teeth and support their right to talk. But let's ignore that thorny issue for awhile and focus on our children, who will surely be hellbound if they hear any cussin'.
Seems to me that there's no such thing as a conditional freedom. At the risk of sounding like I'm making a false either/or proposition, either speech is free -- whether or not we like what is said -- or it's not. Freedom is one of those places where there is no middle ground. Any restriction on freedom does it in.
That said, I think it's time that we Americans either live up to the promise we made ourselves, or we set aside our smug claims to freedom as just so much outdated, naive dreaming. I know which I prefer, even though it will mean protecting hate speech, corporate advertising (as long as we buy into the myth of corporate personhood), and yes, even forcing our children to listen to words we don't like.
This however does not mean much will change. In the Grand Rapids Public Library System (Grand Rapids is the second largest city in Michigan on the opposite side of the state to Detroit) the software blocking software was never installed. The library system said that it was censorship that they did not support.
What they did do is restrict anyone under 16 to use computers that were in view of a librarian or have a parent sign out the time.
In the end this overturned law is not going to help my life. The law itself had done nothing to change how I lived or surf in the library at all.