Slashdot Mirror
Rackspace Shuts Down Quran-Burning Church's Sites
theodp writes "In response to a complaint, Rackspace has shut down the websites of the Dove World Outreach Center, a small 50-member church which has received national and international criticism for a planned book burning of the Quran on the anniversary of the 9-11 attacks. The center 'violated the hate-speech provision of our acceptable-use policy,' explained Rackspace spokesman Dan Goodgame. 'This is not a constitutional issue. This is a contract issue,' said Goodgame, who added he did not know how long it had hosted the church's sites. Not quite the same thing, but would Kurt Westergaard's cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad also violate Rackspace's AUP? How about Christopher Hitchens' Slate articles? Could articles from one-time Rackspace poster child The Onion pass muster?"
awesome, it's nice to see a company with a bit of a spine, freedom of speech is one thing, but no-one has to provide a stage.
- tensions in our lives that are attacking our minds, unite themselves together to make our consciousness blind - op'ivy
Really though, bigots, use Linode. They don't have a policy like this.
Sooner or later you get into the question, do people have the right to dislike other groups of people?
To all the people claiming that this violates this church's right to free speech, please inform me of how this is a government action. Because that is what is protected under the First Amendment. Hell, it's the first three words of the fucking amendment...
"Freedom of speech" only applies to Government's interference in forms of speech. Rackspace is a private company and can do as they please.
Political Correctness has replaced both freedom of religion AND freedom of speech in this country. We've become a nation of cowards.
SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
The first amendment prohibits the government from suppressing speech, not Rackspace.
<xml><I><am><so><damn>Web 2.0</damn></so></am></I></xml>
Welcome to the difference between the western world, and the Islamic world.
Western world: "I may disagree with what you have to say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it."
Islamic world: "Die for insulting our moon god!"
I suppose we should add "...unless some backwards 7th century scumwad threatens to carbomb us" to the Western side though.
Seriously though, this is getting ridiculous. As Christopher Hitchens pointed out a couple columns ago, " As Western Europe has already found to its cost, local Muslim leaders have a habit, once they feel strong enough, of making demands of the most intolerant kind. Sometimes it will be calls for censorship of anything "offensive" to Islam. Sometimes it will be demands for sexual segregation in schools and swimming pools. The script is becoming a very familiar one. And those who make such demands are of course usually quite careful to avoid any association with violence. They merely hint that, if their demands are not taken seriously, there just might be a teeny smidgeon of violence from some other unnamed quarter ..."
Feisal Rauf, Muslim Brotherhood member, Hamas stooge, etc... has just gone down the line of every other Imam before him in this regard. If you didn't think his whole big speech last night wasn't simply threatening violence if he doesn't get his way, then you're not thinking clearly.
I could also offer a nicely formatted treatise comparing Mohammed point-by-point to scum like Warren Jeffs and L. Ron Hubbard and David Koresh as well, but that'll keep for another day.
is for all these groups going out of their way to condemn this idiotic church but no condemn the threatened response of adherents of Islam. If one little piss ant church in America can cause so many Muslims unglued.
Frankly, while I find the idea of burning any book abhorrent I think that spitting in the face of these radicals of Islam is more important than not. Either bring your religion to 21st century and join the rest of us or shut the hell up.
So, yeah a small town church with a ego maniac at its helm is burning a book, it is no excuse by any RATIONAL people to react with violence.
* Winners compare their achievements to their goals, losers compare theirs to that of others.
I don't agree. Instead of a compromise, isn't this more like encouraging people to take more provocative actions so they'd get their way?
My postings are informational and does not constitute legal advice. Act on it at your risk.
Individuals have no requirement to respect the "free speech" of others, nor do owners of private property have to put up with anything they don't like. Free speech means the government can't lock you in jail for protesting or publishing against government policies and it doesn't guarantee that anyone else even has to listen. Is the government locking him up? No. Did the government raid Rackspace and seize the server? No.
The book burning is barely a real political statement, its not an artistic performance, and its certainly not warranted. It's some groaty, pissed-off redneck reminiscent of the side-character Skeeter in South Park -- the guy who hangs out in the bar going "we don't take kindly to your kind around here." In this case its "hey, intolerant Muslims! we don't take kindly to your kind around here!" Just because he has a legal right to proceed with his moronic plan, the irony of which, I'm sure, is probably much too subtle to have an impression on him, doesn't mean that, you, I, Rackspace, or anyone else has to facilitate his stupidity.
Actually, this is the part that ticks me off the most about America: thinking that freedom of speech means you can swear at the neighbour's birthday party, or that some company has to carry your drivel.
In reality it's strictly about your relationship with Congress. The actual text of the first amendment reads: "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances." Basically Congress can make no law forbidding you to be a bigotted douchebag, but a company is not forced to carry your packets anyway. A private company can't violate your freedom of speech, because in respect to them you had none whatsoever in the first place.
In fact, if government forced a company to carry someone's drivel, they'd be essentially violating that company's freedom of press. It would be the government telling them what to print and/or distribute.
And possibly freedom of association too (in forcing them to be associated with some particular asshole or the views thereof), although that one isn't explicitly guaranteed in the USA anyway, only freedom of assembly is.
A polar bear is a cartesian bear after a coordinate transform.
Tell me, how is book burning representative for that quote popularly attributed to Voltaire now again?
Since when does free (hate) speech outweigh freedom of religion. To be free from persecution. Burning the Koran/Quran is a form of intimidation, much like burning crosses in peoples front yards.
- tensions in our lives that are attacking our minds, unite themselves together to make our consciousness blind - op'ivy
While the submitter makes it sound like they disagree with Rackspace's decision (head boggle...), I would like to say good. Good for them. Freedom of speech does not mean that everyone must listen to you. Freedom of speech does not mean every company must assist you in delivering a message they disagree with. Freedom of speech means the government can't shut you down because they don't like your message. I, as an individual, can shut you off. Companies that disagree with you have no requirement to broadcast your message.
Good for Rackspace. They did the right thing.
And, to the church I say this - you're hateful fucks. I hope you find out that your God isn't quite so accepting of hateful actions like that.
So, some backwoods yokel can make threats of religious violence in Florida and affect the outcome of a local zoning issue in New York County (Manhattan)? Sounds like terrorism to me, dude.
I'm not sure what's sadder. A backwoods pastor trying to provoke a reaction by book burning or the international media giving the idiot so much free airtime and so many free column inches. I bet the guy has never felt so important. If I were a cynical sort, I would think the media is devoting so much time to this subject purely to provoke a reaction from certain groups in order to have something explosive to report and moralise on. After all, nothing sells newspapers like violence and bloodshed...
----------------------------------- My Other Sig Is Hilarious -----------------------------------
...how does a tolerant society deal with intolerance?
There are many inconsistent and hypocritical ways of answering this question. I'm not sure there are any good answers.
This "church" is doing to tolerance what Gödel did to mathematics -- showing its internal contradictions.
Reading a book from cover to cover should be a prerequisite to burning it.
Need to quote my own sig for those that have them turned off: (quote is sig was made intentionally shorter to fit the size limit. Here is the full one) "Freedom in the United States of America is no longer the ability to do what you want. It is the ability to stop others from doing what THEY want." - A. Anderson
"Freedom in the USA is not the ability to do what you want. It is the ability to stop others from doing what THEY want"
If you can explain to me how burning someone else's holy book qualifies as satire or parody then I'll accept the equivalence with Westergaard's case.
This situation is closer to a company like Rackspace choosing not to host the KKK's web site. Doesn't exactly make Rackspace a paragon of free speech, but there no shortage of service providers out there who are willing to host the site... most at a premium that covers the inevitable hack attacks.
Moderating "-1, Disagree" is simple censorship. Have the guts to post your opinion.
My own personal guess is that there's two reasons for this move:
1) The cost of containing damage from activist and/or religious hackers is higher than the income brought in by the offending site.
2) The loss of income from muslim clients is greater than the income brought in by the offending site.
Let's be clear - you have a freedom of speech in the US. And a freedom of religion. But you can't make Putnam Books publish to get your message out there.
(1) The constitution is binding on the *government*, not private parties. Rackspace may deny service to anyone, just as Dove World Outrage Center may.
(2) There's a legal and moral distinction between being insulting or derogatory speech (Westergaard, Onion) and inciting violence (Dove).
(3) "Clear and present danger" is a recognized exception to free speech. Don't yell fire in a crowded theatre, etc. The *predictable* result of Dove's action is a sharply increased risk of retaliatory attacks killing US soldiers.
IMO any of these three reasons alone is sufficient to say that Rackspace's action is no affront to free speech. In combination, they're sufficient for me to say that anyone who protests Rackspace's actions more than Dove's is exhibiting a lack of understanding and/or perspective so serious that it's the domain of psychiatry rather than philosophy. I say that as a card-carrying monthly-dues-paying ACLU member, by the way. The actual advancement of civil liberties is only harmed by such ridiculous positions.
Slashdot - News for Herds. Stuff that Splatters.
The worst thing about this is that Rev. Terry Jones has sullied the good name of Terry Jones, the ex-Python member.
My postings are informational and does not constitute legal advice. Act on it at your risk.
You're the first I've seen making any reference to "intimidation," which is entirely subjective. How are they being intimidating?
This isn't criticism. This is trolling, and all it will achieve is angering muslims who didn't have anything to do with 9/11 and help those who did.
Which is what the USA is all about. You can say what you like as long as you can afford to pay for creation and distribution and someone will take your money. Otherwise you are effectively silenced.
Blar.
Burning crosses carried with it a bodily threat. Burning the Koran is merely a rejection of a religion. Roughly equivalent of burning a flag. Shouldn't all you flag burning communists be supporting this? The mainstream wouldn't blink at burning the bible -- been there, done that.
Rackspace is, of course, free to terminate services with anyone they see fit. I'd say it's probably a bad idea to get into the game of judging the quality of content when you have that much content, however. Someone can be offended by almost anything. And this is what it is about, a group is feeling offended, not threatened.
t
The Hebrews committed genocide at the behest of their god several times. You really gotta check out the old testament some time.
Blar.
If burning your own copy of a book is "religious violence," to the point of being terrorism, then we have no free speech rights whatsoever, do we?
If you don't know where you are going, you will wind up somewhere else.
There's a big difference between burning a cross in front of some person's yard and burning a cross in your own yard...
The Koran is just a book, let it burn. In fact, throw in some bibles while you're at it.
Yes there is. Fear. Cowardice. Very few are left with the spine to stand up and say that Islam is NOT above criticism. Even show a picture of Muhammad and television networks run away, newspapers cower in fear, the citizens of the most powerful country in the world turn into a bunch of scared children--unwilling to make even the most token effort to defend one of the defining principles of the Constitution that founded modern democracy. People who would have no problem with someone burning a flag or Bible become apologists for repression in the name of religion. And they don't do it because of "respecting religion." Let's be honest. They do it because they're COWARDS.
SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
He didn't mention the First Amendment. He mentioned freedom of speech. The First Amendment is the codified protection against government intrusion on that particular freedom. It doesn't apply to private actions.
But that doesn't mean that private actions can't limit freedom of speech. This private action decidedly does - it's a decision to limit expression based on its content. The fact that this ISP has both the legal right (assuming the contract is in order) and, to many, the moral right to do this does not mean that the decision does not limit free speech.
We accept limits on freedoms all the time, because we have to balance the rights of some against the rights of others. In this case, the two rights at issue are freedom of contract and freedom of speech. I suspect that the former supersedes the latter for most people in this case because: (1) contracts are voluntarily entered into; (2) there are other web-hosting alternatives available to the church. I suspect that were the second factor not present - say in the event of a monopoly or oligarchy of web hosting providers who all restricted particular content - quite a few people might consider restricting freedom of contract to prohibit certain types of content-based restrictions in web hosting service agreements.
The question isn't whether this limits freedom of speech. The question is whether this is a proper limitation on freedom of speech. A follow on question would be, if this is improper, should it be allowed under the law.
As does the Bible, and pretty much any book providing social guidance written from that era of history.
Slavery? Approved. Beating your disrespectful wife? Approved. Killing your children for being disrespectful to your customs? Required.
If you are going to make an issue of things said in the Qu'ran, you should give equal opportunity to the (equally offensive) parts of the Bible.
And then remind yourself that there are equally as many fundamentalist Christians as there are Fundamentalist Muslims, and they are nearly as dangerous today, and arguably vastly more dangerous historically. (And because of the political games played in the US, arguably are vastly more impactful on the day-to-day lives of Americans...)
And lastly, you should remind yourself that the vast majority of theists of all persuasions use their faith to improve their own lives, and don't treat their core religious books as pure, unadulterated fact, don't push their beliefs on others and don't advocate killing "infidels" or abortion doctors.
When most people talk about free speech, they're talking about the principle of free speech, not the legal right. Rackspace, as an American company, should endorse the principle of free speech. Once there's widespread apathy towards free speech in the public, it's a matter of time before legal free speech is also whittled away.
Since enabling a non-violent rejection of someone else's point of view is the entire point of both free speech and freedom of religion. Seriously, what do you think free speech/religion/press/assembly is for if not expressing viewpoints that someone else finds grossly offensive?
Moderating "-1, Disagree" is simple censorship. Have the guts to post your opinion.
For those of us who are a bit more conservative in our Christianity (many here may call me a fundie - the pastor burning the books would probably call me a lefty, so there you go...), this book burning issue is sad not because of the intolerance and idiocy that it shows, but because it serves no Gospel purpose. It will push Muslims away from Christianity (as well as Western values in general - many non-western Muslims link nationality and religion together). It does nothing to fulfill the Great Commission - the idea that Christ commanded us to go into the world and preach the Gospel (man is a sinner in need of a Saviour, provided by Christ's death on the Cross). It just does the opposite.
Burning qurans to upset islamists is like burning bibles to upset the WBC.
Except for the fact that all the WBC ever does is show up with signs and stage a protest. They don't show up with grenade launchers, sharp knives, bombs, and guns. WBC is a significantly less harmful bag of nuts than radical islam. And what these radical muslims have discovered is that threats work to make people in the west roll over so they can get their way, or to strike the right amount of fear in them to make them willing to have full body scans to get on an airplane and give up their rights in the name of terrorism.
Reply to That ||
Just because he has a legal right to proceed with his moronic plan, the irony of which, I'm sure, is probably much too subtle to have an impression on him, doesn't mean that, you, I, Rackspace, or anyone else has to facilitate his stupidity.
Maybe we need laws to ensure that companies providing public services can't discriminate based on how those services are used in terms of speech. It's a public question after all... we already have laws that limit free will in private companies, like anti-discrimination laws. Seems like we could fold certain protected speech under anti-discrimination in fact. I wonder if Rackspace is hosting a site that is offensive to Christians, and refusing to host sites offensive to Muslims. That's close to discrimination based on religion, which I believe is protected.
There's no question of rights or freedom here. This is about a guy being an absolute asshole and other people telling him that he should stop being an asshole.
One time I threw a brick at a duck.
The leader of the free world came down from on high and told this guy to stop. The day after Obama speaks they pull his site down. Now if they had pulled it down immediately after this guy started talking about koran burning that would have indeed been all Rackspace and totally within their own rights to serve whomever they please. But once the POTUS comes down on the guy I'm sure Rackspace though "IRS(FCC,CIA,NSA,FTC etc) Audit time, this guy has got to go.". They obviously want to save their own skin not just from the political fallout but more from any retaliation from an openly hostile government.
Whether or not you agree with the guy you must admit that the government has no right to speak negatively about what this guy is doing, without giving equal feigned outrage at the burning of our flag, bible, constitution etc... Strange he[POTUS] only speak up now. Whatever happened to equal protection? If you say burning the koran is bad, why not through in the bible and the flag too.
But of course Christians and patriots don't go all jihad on people, so really the government is even more pathetic than first thought. Not only are they stopping out this guys rights to free speech but they are doing so at the behest of foreign invaders whom we are at war with. If the government isn't going to protect the rights of its citizens from foreign invaders what the hell good is it?
The chain of events is undeniable:
Obama speaks out publicly against this guy's speech > Rackspace takes him down.
If that's not government suppression of free speech rights - what is? How far does the government have to go in condemning what you say before you call it an infringement? When do you say "enough bad mouthing this guy just because of how he feels about Islam."
http://news.google.com/news/more?pz=1&cf=all&ned=us&topic=h&ncl=d1QWPuXxsUx51TMtOVUme7-2SzXLM
There are many hosting companies that for example prohibit porn. Is that suppressing free speech too?
Strictly speaking, you're correct - that is the current state of affairs; but SHOULD it be?
In a world where so much of the technology we use for communications are owned by private third parties and provided essentially free to the end user, or only leased by the user (rather than purchased); I find myself more and more bothered by the idea that we're protected from our government stifling free speech without being protected from government sized corporations doing the same thing, practically speaking. I really do wonder if it should be permissible for a private contract to sign away freedoms that are otherwise constitutionally protected.
Doesn't this state of affairs de facto circumvent the spirit of the first amendment, if obviously not its strict wording? After all, the idea of leasing a communications medium would probably never have occurred to the authors of the amendment.
Shouldn't the very protections that save these companies from liability simply by saying "we're not responsible for content" also protect the people who ARE responsible for the content from meddling by the same company?
No. I keep seeing this repeated, but it's absolutely not true. Constitutionally-protected free speech only applies to the government's interference in forms of speech. Free speech refers to lack of any interference. If a lynchmob attacks the idiot ranting on street corner, he is not able to exercise free speech. If someone can not publish a book critical of Islam because an Ayatollah will put a fatwa on him and someone will kill him if he does, then it's not free speech.
That Voltaire quote that everyone trots out says that he would 'defend to the death your right to say it' not that he would 'defend to your death the right for the government not to interfere with you.'
The entire point of free speech is to allow people to say unpopular things. Personally, I think that burning Muslim and Jewish[1] books is a pretty idiotic statement to make, outclassed in stupidity only by the Muslims threatening violence if he does it. Burning books harms no one - it is simply an expression of an opinion. He has just as much of a right to do it as I have to call him an asshat for doing it.
When it comes to Rackspace, the situation is more difficult. As a private company, they have the legal right to refuse to provide a service, but what happens if everyone does? It is not possible to publish information on the web without using some privately owned infrastructure. Does this mean that it's okay to stifle free speech on the Internet, as long as it's done via corporate collusion rather than government mandate? In the US, the legal answer is yes.
Of course, it's also within the rights of Rackspace's customers to decide to move elsewhere. If I did business with them, this would cause me to notify them that I was leaving at the end of the contract period. My hosting provider will object if I use their service to do anything illegal, but beyond that places no additional restrictions. I would be very nervous about using a provider that would pull your account because your posted material that was in some way objectionable to some arbitrary group.
[1] Yes, he's also burning the Talmud, but apparently we only care that he's burning the Qur'an. Oddly enough, he's not burning any books from non-Abrahamic religions.
I am TheRaven on Soylent News
"When most people talk about free speech, they're talking about the principle of free speech, not the legal right."
Right... except you're not guaranteed the principle of free speech by anything. Also, even if the principle of free speach has any backing, Rackspace is not obliged to broadcast it for you. Their version of free speech is to not be required to echo your speech.
And, like in Europe, hate speech laws are mainly used for political purposes, mostly these laws legislate certain parts of the political spectrum out of (legal) existence. Exactly what you'd want to avoid at all costs.
Whilst I agree that burning the Koran is probably not the smartest of moves, precisely because it will lead to violence, I do take issue with the double standards here.
We have for example countries like Malasia, Indonesia, and Afghanistan complaining about how someone burning the Koran is offence and insisting the US government step in to stop it, but where are these country's governments when people in these countries burn western flags, or effigies of foreign people? or even Christian bibles? or the star of David?
So I'll admit I'm not really sure what stance to take here, on one hand I agree that this pastor is clearly a little Hitler, but on the other, I'm concerned that no one is taking a step back and saying, well hang on, a lot of muslims burn sacred symbols from other religions and important symbols of other cultures, so are they now going to stop doing so if we stop this book burning?
I don't like this guy, in fact, I don't really like any religion at all if I'm honest, I think it's all a waste of time and money, but I'm concerned that the battle for freedom of speech and expression has already been lost- if we have the whole world condemning this pastor, whilst a blind eye is turned to the burnings of various things by muslim protestors, than hasn't the rest of the world effectively been forced to yield to Islamic values, whilst Islam as a religion has yielded nothing in return?
It's a difficult problem for sure, largely because both sides are just as bad as each other.
He's just burning some books. Our soldiers are being attacked because they are occupying peoples' homes and supporting a new government they don't all accept. The argument that burning these books would put our soldiers in more danger is not only incorrect, but irrelevant as here we are...giving up our rights and freedoms because we fear the terrorists. Another victory for fundies.
Talk about gross oversimplification. Our soldiers are being attacked because the people they displaced from power want it back. Oh, by the way, the people we displaced from power are Islamic Extremists, who deny basic education to women, recruit children into their armies, and are all around bad guys. The "regular" people of Afghanistan are all too happy to be out from the thumb of the Taliban. Not that our actions have been overtly friendly with civilians as of late, but that's the cost of a guerrilla war.
ASCII tastes bad dude.
Binary it is then.
Slashdot moderation violates our founding ideals. You shouldn't use slashdot.
You make it sound as if 30% of the country is Patriots, 30% of the country is Tories and the rest are just apathetic.
Patriots still exist and are tolerated. That's still more that you can say for most places.
A Pirate and a Puritan look the same on a balance sheet.
This is not a question about rights. No one is denying this man has a right to do what he says he will do.
What we are saying is that he is a fucking lunatic for exercising this right. Yes it will act as a recruiting sergeant for the Taliban (who must be laughing their heads off about this). Yes it will be used by demagogues to whip up mobs to attack Christians in many countries. Yes it is really just fucking rude and unnecessary.
If we were talking about cartoons of Mohammed then I might agree with you - there is an important principle about parody there - but this guy has just picked the most offensive thing he could do to the world's 1.3 billion Muslims, and is then going ahead and doing it. Irrespective of any arguments from common sense, principled tolerance, or basic good manners.
Lunatic is too kind - it suggests he is not responsible for his actions. This man is a crazy evil shit.
This sig all sigs devours
You know, the thing you don't seem to understand is that I am unaware of any Christian groups that teach that it is possible to desecrate the Bible. According to a website on Islam: "In addition, when one is not reading or reciting from the Qur'an, it should be closed and stored a clean, respectable place. Nothing should be placed on top of it, nor should it ever be placed on the floor or in a bathroom."
From a Christian perspective, burning the Bible is in bad taste. From a Muslim perspective, burning the Quran (except as a means to dispose of a badly worn copy) is blasphemy. Actually , if Muslims had wanted to make this guy disappear as irrelevant (instead of apparently wanting to fan the flames of hostility) they would have praised him for understanding the proper way to dispose of the Quran.
The truth is that all men having power ought to be mistrusted. James Madison
Up to the point where it is considered hate speech which this clearly is.
Huh ? This is clearly not hate speech. It is criticism.
Is burning an American flag hate speech ?
Is burning a bible (something these idiots regularly do) ?
Is universal health care hate speech ?
Who gets to say what is hate speech ? Quite frankly, half the quran itself easily qualifies as hate speech itself, have you read it ? It's certainly a lot worse than book burning. The same could be said about the bible.
You must not ever have worked for a web hosting company or ISP before if you think its all about legal liability, because it isn't really. Part of it is civil liability. There have been cases where hosting companies of been successfully sued for providing hosting for knock-off louis vitton merchandise and/or pirated software.
Using "not our fault" doesn't fly when some email marketers skirt in and then start dropping tonnes of spam and get an entire /24 added to SpamHause, pissing off every other customer in the IP block who now can't send legitimate mail to most places.
The company I worked for hosted some particularly controversial content at one point, until the number of calls from the ADL and the constant DDoS attacks became too much, we kicked off the site in question and re-worked the TOS.
From the point of view of the host, its much less headache to kick this guy to the curb than deal with the non-legal fallout of complaints, bad press, hackers, DDoSers, etc.
Rackspace isn't the phone company. They're not a public utility. They don't have a monopoly on web hosting. This is more like a pub owner who constantly has to take down nasty fliers from a bulletin board finally just banning the jackass who posts them from the premises. He's free to try and find somewhere else to host is crap, and those hosts are free to tell him to beat it, too.
Chill the fuck out.
The church can still burn the Queran if it wants, it can still spread its message if it wants, and it can still say whatever it wants...just not on a Rackspace server.
How is this any different than being kicked out of a store for repeatedly saying kike or nigger? You're welcome to say it outside the store...just not in it.
Living With a Nerd
The first amendment applies to _government_ restrictions on speech. Extending the right to free speech to cover private companies would make spam filtering illegal, it would make forum moderation illegal, it would make filtering bad words in online chats illegal, etc...
The issue is more complex than both you and those simply saying, "the First Amendment only applies to government" are describing it. Private actors do not have a duty to facilitate the free speech of others. This principle is accepted by essentially everyone - I've yet to meet a person who thinks I should have to allow a sign on my front yard for a candidate I don't support.
The question is where the refusal of a private actor to facilitate speech crosses the line from perfectly reasonable (as in the yard-sign example) to violation of founding ideals. An explanation of why this instance crosses (or doesn't cross) that line holds much promise for enlightening discussion. A bald statement that doesn't even seem to acknowledge the complex nature of balancing rights does not. The freedom to contract can support a host of other freedoms, including the freedom not to support speech antithetical to one's ideals. That's not something to be hand-waved away with platitudes, but to be addressed with serious discussion that does not assert conclusions as starting premises.
Also, it absolutely does matter if it's legal. While that's not the end of the discussion, it certainly has a place in the discussion. For example, if it is legal, should it be made illegal? If it's not legal, should it be made legal?
These issues are complex. Blatant oversimplification - in either direction - doesn't help matters.
...you'd allow a web-hosting company whose CEO and Board of Directors was Pro-Life to shut down the accounts of any blogger who advocated for abortion rights?
...you'd allow Comcast to shut down the blog of anyone arguing for 'Net neutrality?
Yeah, I didn't think so...
If I'm missing something, feel free to "woosh" me. But...
Declining to distribute is not the same as suppressing. Rackspace is under no obligation to facilitate anyone in distributing their speech. They chose to selectively offer their services to people/organizations that agree to abide by the terms of their service, they define those terms in a service contract.
Walmart doesn't carry porn in their stores or online. Are they suppressing free speech? If you can honestly say yes, then I'm going to take some dirty photos of myself and mail them to you. By your reasoning if you fail to redistribute those then you are suppressing my free speech.
These guys are doing -nothing- of consequence. The Koran comes off of a web press in the tens of thousands, just like any other book these days. So all they are doing ultimately is making a bit more business for some printer. It isn't as though they are destroying some special, ancient Koran that has historical and cultural significance, they are just burning a mass produced book. If they can't see the futility of that, well then that makes them the retards.
Is it offensive? Probably but then when did anyone have the right not to be offended? I see offensive shit all the time out there, particularly against religions. South Park has been positively brutal to the Catholics, the Mormons, the Scientologists, etc. They have been some of the funniest episodes (the Mormon one kills me every time) but I'm sure they offended the hell out of a bunch of people. Tough. Nobody says you have the right to go through life and not be offended.
So these guys want to go offend Muslims. Big deal, who cares? Let them.
Tolerance means letting people do what they want, more or less. There has to be limits, you can't harm others, but there's no reason you can't offend them. Also real tolerance would be on the part of Muslims says "Ya knock yourselves out. Retards," and just ignoring the whole thing.
We host the Church of Scientology, so hosting this site was mildly tame compared to some of the customers we host. The media just so happens to be making a sensation out of this, and it will come across in our favor to drop them as a customer rather than to keep them and stand behind their free speech rights. There have been extreme cases wherein I will refuse to work for a customer because of my own ethical beliefs, and this would have been one of those times.
the whole idea behind the 1st Amendment is to protect and allow EXACTLY this kind of speech.
Yes. But it does _not_ protect your right to use somebody else's services to broadcast that speech. No different than banning spammers. Or giving a '-1: Troll' moderation.
Each philosophy (including all religions) thinks it is the right one.
Two or more cannot coexist in the same space.
People have the right to be intolerant... because without intolerance, they allow themselves to be assimilated.
RackSpace made a stupid error by getting involved in a political issue. Now people will expect more webhosts to do this, and they will waste many more hours trying to figure out what is and is not "hate speech."
Remember, if you're criticizing a majority (whites, Christians, Jews/Judaism, conservatives, men, heterosexuals) it's OK, but if you're criticizing a minority (African-Americans, Muslims/Islam, homosexuals, polyamorists) it's a "hate crime" (NewSpeak for unsanctioned thought).
Futurist Traditionalism
Western world: "I may disagree with what you have to say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it."
Islamic world: "Die for insulting our moon god!"
Christian world: "Die for insulting our sky god!"
"When Mighty Mouse falls victim of cocaine, the Devil's talcum powder, when directors with Mafia-sounding names make films about Jesus hanging out with whores just a stone's throw from that wholesome Universal Studios family tour, it is time for action. Unfortunately, conventional protests such as picketing and telephoned bomb threats do not seem to be working" Episcopal Bishop Paul Moore, New York
“Neither the label ‘fiction’ nor the First Amendment gives Universal the right to libel, slander and ridicule the most central figure in world history.” - Jerry Falwell
"Following the boycott and protests against The Last Temptation of Christ, no Hollywood movie studio has seriously considered making a film that challenges the gospel story of Jesus." - The Long Term Effects on Censorship as a Result of the Protest Against the Last Temptation of Christ
Does this kind of thing still happen in the Christian world? Hmm... Playboy in Portugal shut down for its ‘blasphemous’ Jesus photoshoot
Declining to distribute is not the same as suppressing.
How about blocking p2p ? Or refusing to carry competitor's voice signals ?
Do you agree AT&T is fully in their right to "refuse to carry" Skype signals ?
By your reasoning if you fail to redistribute those then you are suppressing my free speech.
The problem is, of course, that rackspace, isn't "refusing to distribute" it's blocking distribution.
If you wrote, say, a book on evolution, and I used force (as rackspace did) to prevent you from doing this, surely you'd agree I'm suppressing your free speech. The same is going on here.
Agreed. Remind me never to use Rackspace. There's no such thing as "hate speech." It's a socio-political construct designed to limit Freedom of Speech. Yes, Rackspace may have a right to put such PC lingo in their contract but maybe not. This church may be doing something that is politically incorrect, unwise, and offensive to some people but it's their right. There's probably a lawsuit in there somewhere. It's early, I need coffee, but something about contracting away your rights seems fraught with legal problems.
Look at South Park. They have completely and totally slammed a number of religions, drug them through the mud. They had Catholic priests with little boys on leashes as sex slaves (attending a party for Satan), they had a whole episode mocking the Mormon beliefs complete with a brilliant song, they've slammed the Scientologists a couple times. None of these have faced any censorship. However they tried to show Mohammad. Not even insult him, just how his picture, and it got censored.
There is no explanation other than fear. It's clear Viacom has no problem with mocking religions in general. Why would they? Those episodes are popular. However for some reason Islam is off limits. The only reason is because they are scared. Muslims threaten violence at the drop of a hat, and they just don't want to be a target.
It it pure cowardice. We stand behind our freedoms... until someone says they'll hurt us, then we cave.
Rackspace is under no obligation to facilitate anyone in distributing their speech.
It is called 'discrimination'. If you withold your services from some people but not others on the basis of their beliefs / gender / race or, basically, anything other than their actions, then it is discrimination. I would guess that many of us (I do), don't consider burning the Koran to be a valid "action" for discriminating on such as using too much bandwidth would be. Where an action is merely a represenation of a belief rather than something that causes direct harm to another, we do not consider supression of that action to be any less of an act of discrimination than supression of speech. If you say: our shop will develop your photos of you wearing a yarmaluke, but not ones of you wearing a witch's hat, it's discrimination.
Aide-toi, le Ciel t'aidera - Jeanne D'Arc.
First, Free Speech only applies to the government laws. Read About It: Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech...
It does not apply to contract law!
Second, the Church is free to get their website hosted on a million other web hosting companies. They just need to read the terms of service beforehand.
--jeffk++
ipv6 is my vpn
It's a pity you couldn't manifest all of this moral outage when we were funding and arming those Islamic extremists to fight the Rooskies.
"I guess the moral of the story is, don't paint your airship with rocket fuel." -- Addison Bain
Yes, which is why Rackspace shutting the site down is not illegal, just a bad thing for society as a whole. Why do people assume "freedom of speech" is just about the law?
Quidnam Latine loqui modo coepi?
The most important part of freedom of speech is protecting the parts you like the least. Yes, that means things like hate, like trolling and so on. Freedom of speech must mean freedom of unpopular speech. If not, it has no meaning.
Too many people on /. seem to have this idea of "All he's doing is pissing off Muslims so it shouldn't happen!" Well yes, that's probably all he's doing. Still should be protected though. The less you agree with something the more concerned you should be with protecting the ability of someone to say it.
Pretty cool, so to bypass the constitution the government just needs to outsource!
That explains, so much.
"government has no right to speak negatively about what this guy is doing"
There is no "official" government view, the President has a viewpoint, the congress has its viewpoints,etc,etc,etc
The President of the United States has the same right as any other citizen to express his views, the fact that his views may have persuaded rackspace to yank the nutjobs
account is irrelevant as long the President took no official action to cause this. Auditing someone in retaliation for refusal to do what the president says is illegal and isnt necessary.
The bully pulpit of the presidency has been used many times and is completely within the Presidents perogative
...the government announced IDIOT, the International Determination of Islamic Offense Team. The team will be charged with analyzing any and all public actions with awareness factors above 0.5 Lohans (note: the Lohan has now superseded the Hilton as a media awareness unit of measurement by NIST, the National Institute of Standards and Technology), and determine at what level the Religion of Peace will be moved to violence.
The rough first cut ratings are:
G = General discontent and hate speech directed at the West
R = Rioting and demonstrations
B = Burning of American flags, French cars and other related items
M = Murder of Westerners and the members of other, less peaceful religions
T = Planned acts of terrorism
W = Planned acts of war
X = Global thermonuclear devastation
Z = Zombie hordes (The IDIOTs failed to fully explain this one. Inquiries are pending)
Me personally? Well, considering I was in middle school at the time...
Now if we're talking about "Me" as in Americans, that's something different. History is replete with mea culpa moments like that. In fact, two of the biggest threats to US interests were aided into power by America (Afghanistan and Iran). The same lens that we use to pick apart history can't see as well into the future. What's your solution?
ASCII tastes bad dude.
Binary it is then.
Not this ignorant shit again. You are confusing moderate Islam with extremist Islam. The two are not the same. It's not Islam that makes extremist Muslims crazy, but their extremism.
But Rackspace is already limited in how they can control the use of their resources. Would they be allowed to say "We don't allow websites about black people on OUR resources." No.
Actually, they could. It would be a terrible idea for business, but it would be perfectly legal. What they cannot do is refuse to hire black people, nor can they deliberately create a hostile working environment, or discriminate in pay or benefits.
Stylish sheet to fix many problems in Slashdot's D3: https://gist.github.com/801524
whoa there cowboy, network neutrality has NOTHING to do with free speech laws.
Network neutrality only means that a network operator should treat packets the same regardless of source, meaning no "preferred service" to YouTube or degraded service for break.com. The content of the packets, the actual speech part, plays no part at all in this. Rackspace is also not a network provider, they're a hosting service.
Some bring out the best in others, some the worst. Some bring out far more.
Uhm.
To the people who say 'Why doesn't the government condemn radical Islam?" , the fact is, we do.
The US Government, like all good government, speaks mostly through action rather than words in condemning radical Islam. Think about it.
-Supporting dictatorships in lieu of radical Islamic Groups (The US's support for Pakistan, and propping up the Shah of Iran)
-Supporting a dictatorship's war against a theocracy run by radical Muslims (Iran/Iraq War)
-Targetted killings of radical Islamicists in Iraq and Afghanistan
-Huge bounties on the heads of radical Islamicists (The hunt for Osama Bin Laden)
-Wholesale invasions of countries and the dissolution of governments that support radical Islam (Invasion of Afghanistan and the fight against the Taliban)
-Supporting moderate Muslim governments over radical ones (Visits to Egypt, funding for Pakistan and Iraq)
In fact, the American military's main goal over the past 9 years has been the suppression, destruction and dissolution of radical Islam over the years. Pretty much every armed force from the Army proper, to the CIA has been devoted to taking radical Islam to task.
***
Paster Terry Jones is acting like an asshat and ruining our work against radical Islam. THAT'S why we're condemning him.
When Muslims burn bibles, the Western world DOES get upset. Infact, we get so upset we make lists of the incidents and eventually take armed actions against groups that go too far. Obviously we hope that the local governments take care of things, but do you think that the US is so naive? We have diplomats and ambassadors all over the world busy 'nudging' governments whenever such actions occur.
Radical Islam taking action against blasphemers isn't a threat, it's a fact. We have armed men and women protecting us so we CAN do blasphemous acts safely. But doing them makes their job harder. It's just like you don't randomly provoke local gang-members or mafia-men: it's well within your rights to do, but is it SMART? No. Can the government protect you from retaliation? They'll TRY, but whether they'll succeed is a different matter.
Radical Muslims, like any radical members of a religion, are generally brainwashed ignorant thugs. Pastor Terry Jones is a radical Christian. Why should we treat him any differently? We should condemn his sentiments and desires, and make sure to take action in case things turn violent.
Network neutrality only means that a network operator should treat packets the same regardless of source,
Regardless of content too, obviously. And rackspace most definitely is a network provider too.
QFT. Crazy people always want their 15 minutes, he got his. Newsmakers want to make news, so they can sell ads.However, let me add that I have just returned from the Middle East, Dubai, and this guy was everywhere along with the New York Mosque. If you think it was overwhelming here, you have know idea. "Excuse me Mr. [redacted] but I just wanted to know if all Americans really hate Islam." -OR- "I don't understand why Americans hate us." -OR- "I used to believe in American ideals, but now I'm not so sure."
I didn't really know what was going on until I got back, but suffice it to say, all anyone wanted to talk about was why Americans preach one thing and do another. Arab TV seemed to be a 24hr America sitcom, news stories about what those crazy and wacky Americans are doing now. I probably said "Just you wait and see, I'll bet this guy will become untouchable and nobody will want anything to do with him except a few crazy followers," a hundred times that week.
Bottom line, Rackspace apparently felt this was a breach of contract so they declined to continue hosting/co-lo. They probably wanted an out, to protect their bottom line from the possibly many civil suits and canceled services by offended groups or persons, vs. keeping the bare-bones hosting plan this church probably had. This dude can sue them in court if he wants, but good luck buddy, you'll have a tough time proving Rackspace acted with difference towards you. All they have to do is show any number of other instances where they canceled plans for violating that part of their terms. This is like porn, you can't define it, but you know it when you see it.
I am so confused over this.
First up, Racksapce is a host, not an ISP. There are millions of web hosting companies out there, and a good number of them are known specifically for being ok with hosting anything you want. If rackspace says "nope, we disagree with your statements enough that we refuse to do business with you" it is THEM expressing their freedom of speech, not suppressing the church's.
If you wrote, say, a book on evolution, and I used force (as rackspace did) to prevent you from doing this, surely you'd agree I'm suppressing your free speech. The same is going on here.
No, your analogy doesn't work. A better analogy would be the church posting signs on one of those bulletin boards that some bars have for upcoming events and the bar taking it down as they don't think that it is appropriate and thus expressing their right to free speech by not broadcasting the church's message.
An argument could be made if an ISP starting blocking them, as they are subsidized by the government, and often there is no real choice in ISPs for many people. If their ISP drops them I would take issue with it. However, Rockspace isn't an ISP, they are a web host. There are options for web hosts, they aren't granted near monopoly status.
Hell, doesn't Google let you post just about anything, that doesn't break the law, on Blogger? (I honestly don't know, but I seem to remember that being the case)
Do Or Do Not, There Is No Spoon, There Is Only Zuul. Everything in the above post is probably opinion.
Hey guess what, Rackspace has the RIGHT to freely associate with whoever they want! Rackspace is a business and is under NO obligation to be the fall guy for this idiot church. They can get hosted somewhere else, perhaps the same servers that host stormfront.org? Or better yet, all the internet tough guys on slashdot today can probably scrape together enough to put the church's site up on some ubuntu LAMP stack and host the site themselves? You think its vital that the book burning message gets out? Fine, host it yourself. Its not difficult from a technical standpoint and its not difficult from a monetary standpoint. But don't think your insipid bigotry is moral justification to tell Rackspace how to run its business.
What Rackspace is doing is legal. What you're doing is justifying hatespeech and using that justification to force a business to behave in ways it does not want to.
It is not called discrimination if you extend your services to someone on the condition that they not do specific things with your services, and then withhold your service when they break that agreement. For example, say there is a bulletin board in a school. Do they have the right to allow or disallow posting of things? Is it discrimination if a lurid and suggestive (but not pornographic) flyer is disallowed from being placed on the bulletin board in the school because they do not want to associate themselves with it? There's no direct harm. The flyer is "merely a representation of a belief". If you say that the school has the right to determine what is appropriate to be on the bulletin board because it is on school property, or any variation thereof, then you are being inconsistent. Essentially Rackspace is providing a bulletin board with only certain content deemed appropriate.
The Muslims have the right to religious freedom to build a mosque right near ground zero, no matter who it offends, but the American "Christians" don't have the right of free speech to burn a few books.
I do think the so called pastor is an asshole, but I thought that he had the right to be an asshole.
I'm an American. I love this country and the freedoms that we used to have.
but this guy has just picked the most offensive thing he could do to the world's 1.3 billion Muslims, and is then going ahead and doing it. Irrespective of any arguments from common sense, principled tolerance, or basic good manners.
If he weren't doing it as a part of his own fucked up insane religious agenda, I might even support him. Because yes, he's done what you say. And by doing so has proven just how stupidly easy a vast amount of people can be offended by something that by rights shouldn't be worthy even a three-liner in a local newspaper.
Doh, he burned a book.
Uh, what exactly is news about that at all? He can burn books all day long as I care. Does it matter which ones, except for the fact that glossy paper doesn't burn as good?
Assorted stuff I do sometimes: Lemuria.org
Rothbard's argument is relevant, but not sufficient. There's a huge difference between saying that we should consider this from a propertarian viewpoint and that we should consider it only from that viewpoint. Rothbard crosses that line by the time he uses the word "simply" in the second sentence of your quote. As one poster has already pointed out, this situation is complex, and oversimplifying doesn't give meaningful input.
How would Murray Rothbard's argument address any apparent conflict when property is held in common? Do I gain the right to shout fire in a crowded public venue funded from tax dollars? Your Rothbard quote is arguing that all public property is criminal, because all rights can only be sustained where there is private ownership. But, in the US, it took a whole series of special laws in every state's legal codes for theatre owners to gain the right to be treated as though a contract existed without actually having printed one and gained signatures. A right of implied contract exists only because of specialised laws (a privilege or private law, the very word privilege coming from the Latin roots 'Privus' (Private) + 'Lex' (law)) intended to protect theater owners.
Rothbard actually is arguing for the unlimited power of the government to create or destroy rights. How else can the right of contract support all these other rights, particularly when, in his own example, a contract doesn't exist physically, but exists only by government fiat. At the same time, he's arguing against himself, holding that same government fiat is insufficent to grant another right by any other means than through property rights. Since the real US constitution is most emphatically not about how the government grants rights, but how it must rather respect them, neither facet of his argument really sheds more light than heat.
Who is John Cabal?
Islamic world: "Die for insulting our moon god!"
Pro tip: Christians, Muslims, and Jews all have the same god.
when the trolls, from the christian world, or the muslim world, or the liberal world or the conservative world, are the ones driving the conversation
the vast majority of christians, muslims, liberals and conservatives are simply good people. but the ones who make the headlines and drive every subject of conversation are the same sort of people you see with a -1 rating on slashdot: the fucking useless trolls
i swear, international relations and domestic political commentary needs something like a slashdot rating system
let the trolls loose on slashdot, with no ratings to tell the difference between something you should read and something you should ignore, and what do you get?: a flooding out of a sane rational commons that anyone with good intent wants to be a part of. you drive good people away, you reward the most useless sort of asshole: the destruction of slashdot
likewise, when the lunatic asshole muslims and the lunatic asshole christians are the ones who set the news headlines aflame and drive the topic of discussion, you get the destruction of the whole fucking world: no civility, no understanding, empty useless seething emotions, until somebody sets off the powder keg. i weep for our children
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
"None are more hopelessly enslaved than those who falsely believe they are free." -- Goethe
This is just another case of people claiming to hold beliefs they have not taken the time to understand. It's like me claiming I'm a Democrat because my Daddy said we are Democrats. I am no Christian, but, as I understand it, if there were a Christ as traditionally defined, he would not be burning another's holy book, especially one in which he plays a role as a major prophet. Utterly stupid.
This is not a question about rights. No one is denying this man has a right to do what he says he will do.
What we are saying is that he is a fucking lunatic for exercising this right. Yes it will act as a recruiting sergeant for the Taliban (who must be laughing their heads off about this). Yes it will be used by demagogues to whip up mobs to attack Christians in many countries. Yes it is really just fucking rude and unnecessary.
If we were talking about cartoons of Mohammed then I might agree with you - there is an important principle about parody there - but this guy has just picked the most offensive thing he could do to the world's 1.3 billion Muslims, and is then going ahead and doing it. Irrespective of any arguments from common sense, principled tolerance, or basic good manners.
Lunatic is too kind - it suggests he is not responsible for his actions. This man is a crazy evil shit.
The ensuing violence will only proven his point about Islam being an intolerant, violent, and hateful religion.
False analogy. It's more like you demanding back a megaphone you rented me because you decide you don't like what I'm saying.
Property rights are an arrangement of convenience for deciding who can use a limited resource, such as a shirt. Thinking that actual human rights - such as the right to free speech - derive from them is completely delusional.
But then again, what else can you expect from a libertarian? The whole ideology is just a convoluted excuse for why you shouldn't have to pay taxes despite enjoying all the protections and conveniences of a society.
Forget magic. Any technology distinguishable from divine power is insufficiently advanced.
Murder? It's a book. A bunch of pieces of paper wrapped in a little cardboard (or stiffer paper), held together with glue and string. Nothing more. Burning it isn't akin to murder.
If you're objection relates to the destruction of the symbols, then it is the speech part you're objecting to.
There's no question of rights or freedom here. This is about a guy being an absolute asshole and other people telling him that he should stop being an asshole.
He is, of course, completely free to ignore them.
Don't you think at least one person thought even Ghandi was an asshole?
Doing what you believe is right isn't necessarily a popularity contest.
You would lose that bet. I would consider that no more hate speech than burning the US (or pick a country of your choice) flag. Or than most of the stereotyping of [ Republicans | Democrats ] that occurs on [ DailyKos | Free Republic ] . In other words, it's just an inarticulate and not very compelling expression of some benign opinion.
Although I dislike the use of the vague term "hate speech", I can see it applied to speech that calls for harming others. Such examples include speech by white supremacy groups calling for inflicting harms on "non-whites" and by Islamic fundamentalists calling for the destruction of the "west".
As far as I know (and, honestly, I've not been following it closely as all sides seem rather childish in this debate - why would I care what some small group of people want to burn in Florida or wherever it is), this "congregation" hasn't called for the destruction of followers of Islam or issued any other threats.
Burning wood or cloth fibers that you own isn't hateful. It may be stupid, it may be meaningless, it may be a waste of time, but for all I care you can burn an entire pallet full of On the Origin of Species - it won't change my belief in how life developed to its current form on Earth, I won't be insulted, I just don't care (except to the extent that presumably whoever is doing this as an expression of opinion is lacking some serious logical skills and I hope they recognize their disability and don't consider themselves qualified to vote, run for office, or serve on juries).
Why is there an "insightful" mod and why isn't it "-1"? If I wanted insight, I wouldn't be reading
No, its not. Network neutrality is about promoting free competition in online content businesses by prohibiting network access providers from leveraging their market power in the access area to stifle competition in content. Its about commerce, not expression.
It certainly is not about prohibiting content hosting companies (whether or not they also happen to be ISPs) from discriminating in the content they choose to host.
That is really what we have. Section 501c(3) of the Internal Revenue Code gives the details. http://www.irs.gov/publications/p557/ch03.html
Learning HOW to think is more important than learning WHAT to think.
You're the first I've seen making any reference to "intimidation," which is entirely subjective. How are they being intimidating?
In much the same way as Americans might feel if I started selling toilet paper with the US flag on it.
In and of itself, that would be insulting and disrespectful, but not intimidating. I don't know of any Americans that would feel intimidated by putting the US flag on toilet paper, or burning the flag, for that matter.
Hi there! I hear you want to use borrow a megaphone to spread your word more clearly to people around you. Ok, sure, but you can't use it to shout out religious hatred, ok? You can shout that out on your own, by all means, but not using my megaphone.
Hey, I heard you've been using my megaphone to shout out messages of religious hate. I'll be having that back now.
See? He can carry on screaming about burning the Quran all he wants. Just not on Rackspace's services.
Finally had enough. Come see us over at https://soylentnews.org/
Think of it as performance art. Bibles get burned all the time, often in Islamic states. Does that cause major diplomatic incidents? Flag burning? Christian street protests? Presidents getting involved? Does the Vatican or your minister down the street start pronouncing death sentences on people? But merely threatening to burn a Koran causes all of these things to happen: death threats, diplomatic incidents, massive street protests. And we're not talking about the actions of a few crazy extremists and terrorists here, we are talking about the actions of thousands of Muslim clerics and politicians and citizens in Islamic nations. Jones doesn't need to actually go through with the Koran burning, he has already made his point.
Mainstream Islam, as practiced in the major Islamic nations around the world, has an atrocious human rights record and needs to reform, just like the medieval Christian church needed to reform. And just look at what happened with Luther: he called the Pope the "anti-Christ", the Pope excommunicated him (which amounted to a fatwa), and a friendly state sheltered and protected him. Causing offense ("trolling") and conflict are an intrinsic part of reform and social change.
As for supposedly moderate Muslims, if they don't take the burning of the Koran by a redneck pastor in the middle of nowhere in stride, they aren't so moderate. Part of being moderate is that you realize that other people have different beliefs and simply don't respect your religion, and that that's OK.
Sigh. My father fought in Vietnam and his father in WWII. In each war, there were atrocities committed by both sides of the conflict. Does that make it right? Absolutely not. Does that make it unpalatable to Americans? You betcha. Soldiers of all persuasions are put into positions where they are the ultimate power in a given situation and sometimes, they give in to the urge to behave like animals. Wouldn't it be great if American soldiers were immune from that? Sadly, they aren't and our (America's) image is tainted.
ASCII tastes bad dude.
Binary it is then.
More accurate analogy - you are a megaphone rental company and one day someone walks in of a political / religious / ethnic / sexual persuasion that you don't like. You continue to hand out megaphones to everyone else, but tell this person they're not allowed to rent one from you.
More accurate, but still a poor analogy, because what you describe is illegal. As a business, you cannot discriminate on religious, racial or (now) sexual grounds.
Take it from someone who was part of an organization that successfully sued a billboard company, because they were clearly discriminating on one of these grounds.
What Rackspace is doing is not illegal, so it's a poor idea to compare it to your scenario.
A more accurate scenario would be for a megaphone company to refuse to rent out to someone who will use it to espouse views they consider inflammatory, or just plain don't like. As long as they have a clear policy on this, it's perfectly legal. They can, for example, refuse to rent out megaphones for the use of promoting soccer. Silly, perhaps, but frankly, it is simply not our business if they act that way.
Yes, freedom of speech is cool, but my property rights trounce your freedom of speech. I know you have something to say, but if you intend to use my property (megaphone, private server, etc) to do it, you're obligated to do it on my terms.
Beetle B.
I'm unaware of the part of the discussion where content has been specifically brought up, but that may be a failure of imagination. Who exactly is concerned that ISPs are analyzing packets for content regardless of their source?
Definitely? I could be wrong, but as far as I know Rackspace is a hosting provider and nothing more. Where do they provide ISP services? What type of network services do they provide?
Network neutrality ONLY concerns itself with getting packets from the server to the user, meaning the ISPs. The server and user themselves are not the focus of network neutrality.
Some bring out the best in others, some the worst. Some bring out far more.
Don't foget to bring Marshmallows!
I'll get the Graham crackers.
Now, who is going to bring the Hersheys?
This guy in Gainsville, with his mega-church of 50 members, is just an attention whore, plain and simple. But he's stirred up a nest of religious bigotry. I'm a Catholic and I lost a college roommate on 9/11, but I understand it wasn't all of Islam that caused the towers to collapse, it was a small group of crazy radicals. I have a friends who are Muslims, Jews, Hindus, Budhists and Native Americans and they are just like you and me, they just worship God in a different way. I vow to buy a Quran on 9/11 to protest this book burning. I've created a Facebook group to get the word out and have others buy one too. I figure we can buy more than he can burn. Please join the group and consider buying a Quran on 9/11.
citation needed.
Who are you to speak on behalf of the /. population?
This isn't criticism. This is trolling, and all it will achieve is angering muslims who didn't have anything to do with 9/11 and help those who did.
Well, if those angry Muslims exercise their free speech rights in retaliation, then we have started a discourse.
But that's not what you're worried about with 'angry muslims', is it? You're expecting violence. In short you're going as far as condoning the violence by suppressing the man's rights, because you're afraid of it.
Kinda puts the word 'terror' in 'terrorism', doesn't it?
So AT&T could simply refuse to interconnect with anyone hosting skype servers and that'd be okay with you ?
Somehow I doubt it.
And obviously it violated network neutrality when AT&T intentionally slowed down the sip protocol. Easy enough to do on today's network equipment, and this was obviously seen as a gross violation of net neutrality.
Second, you're much more likely to get in trouble by criticizing Christianity than Islam.
The mere threat of burning the Koran by some no-name redneck minister has caused major diplomatic incidents, mass protests, and death threats. Nothing like that happens when you burn bibles. And it's not the first time: look at the Mohammad cartoons or the Satanic Verses; again, diplomatic incidents, mass protests, death threats, and deaths.
A bunch of terrifyingly ignorant bigots are going to burn books for no reason other than to insult a large and diverse group of people.
Mainstream Islam is effectively represented by the Islamic nations around the world: Iran, Indonesia, Egypt, Pakistan, etc., not by the moderate Muslims in the US or Europe. Those nations have a horrendous human rights record, and their politicians and clerics justify their policies with Islam and the Koran. When people criticize Islam, that's what they criticize, and rightfully so. Furthermore, Islam itself rejects the notion that there can be diversity in its beliefs.
AT&T is a network service provider, and is therefore the focus of net neutrality. So no, that would not be alright with me.
Do you really not understand the difference between a network provider and a hosting provider? Rackspace is a HOSTING provider. They do not own the network. AT&T is a NETWORK provider. This is what we mean by NETWORK Neutrality.
Some bring out the best in others, some the worst. Some bring out far more.
And as Americans, doesn't Rackspace have the right to host the sites they want? What kind of double standard is that?
I fully support the Church's right to burn all the Qur'ans they want, but I also support Rackspace's right to choose what content they host.
Dilbert RSS feed
Also, if you didn't read the synopsis, it's pretty clear the author is against Rackspace shutting them down so your pro-censorship stance is not popular here.
Was this meant to be ironic? "Your position is unpopular, therefore you are wrong!". Only on slashdot can you find people that believe reading a 1/4 page synopsis gives them moral authority to pontificate on the subject. Do you realize that synopses exist to summarize more complex sources.
Are you serious?
Yes. This is my serious face.
Americans have the right to burn any book they want, this is true (Probably. I haven't researched it so there might be some weird conditions, but it sounds truthy). American businesses also have the right to refuse service to customers that violate contractual agreements. One of the terms the church agreed to was to not spread hate speech. Remember that this is what the discussion is about, not about how evil the Muslims are.
...but while we're here...
burning some bibles would be a significant upgrade from what muslims are usually known for burning.
Christians burn plenty of things too. Their hands are just as bloody as your strawman "evil muslim". You think Christians don't kill people?
But here's the thing, and this point is often beat to death but seems worth reiterating right now: The actions of a small branch of religious extremists do not reflect the views of the rest of the group. Holding all Muslims accountable for the actions of some crazies is as responsible as holding Christians accountable for burning crosses or molested choir boys or the crusades. Which is to say, it's dumb.
In his effort to look fearless he is acting reckless, and ends up looking pretty feckless. If he wasn't acting in a way that could get a lot of other people hurt, and people were actively threatening only him, then he would be brave. But since there are many people that could get hurt and he couldn't give two flips that makes him reckless. Our state had a campaign against reckless driving that focused on the roles that passengers can play in preventing accidents by holding bad drivers accountable and saying something when they act dangerously. Pretty similar idea here. I do hope that Government will not step in to stop this (freedoms are still important), but I also hope that private citizens and companies will not abet this nut, and that news will not cover him. Everyone has a right to free speech, but that doesn't mean that anyone else has to promote his dumb ass.
Wow.
RACKSPACE IS NOT AN ISP. How much more clear can I be? Rackspace is a HOSTING PROVIDER. THAT IS NOT THE SAME THING AS AN ISP.
AT&T IS AN ISP.
THEY'RE TWO DIFFERENT THINGS.
You claimed that Rackspace is also an ISP, but when I asked you to identify what ISP services they provide, you didn't answer. The reason for that is probably that they are not an ISP.
Some bring out the best in others, some the worst. Some bring out far more.
The website is being hosted by a private company--Rackspace--which has a vested interest in its own self image and no obligation to host a site on its privately owned servers unless it has a contractual obligation to do so. Doesn't matter what loophole they put in their contract, they could have put "if we decide we don't like your site we will take it down," if they wanted, and if this site is indeed in violation of their contract, however loopholey it feels, they have every right to take it down. Nobody has a right to have their site hosted on someone else's server.
That said, the media is making a non-story a story. This is one crazy guy with his 50 crazy friends burning some books. He isn't a spokesperson for any organization other than the 50 crazy friends. If the Pope or Billy Graham or Richard Dawkins or some political figure decided to do this, then it might have merit as a story, but as it stands this is a very tiny molehill being made into a really huge mountain.
Know that one? All it takes for evil men to triumph is for good men to do nothing.
All it takes for extreme Islam to triumph is for moderate Islam to do nothing.
And that is exactly what they are doing. NOTHING. And the longer they do nothing to stop the extremists among them, the harder it will become and the more the world will just get fed up.
Popularity of Geert Wilders and other anti-islam people is NOT due to racism, it is the average voter, the middle class, the ones who pay the taxes to become simply fed up. It isn't hate, it is tiredness. And hate makes evil men act. Tiredness makes good men not act. Hitler didn't come to power because a lot of Germans were evil but because a lot of Germans were tired of their current situation and wanted chance. Any chance, no matter how it came.
Instead of so-called moderate Muslims correcting their own extremists, they continue to provecate. Is this new building REALLY necessary? How come moderate Islam is more about protesting burnings of Koran's then about American flag burning by Muslims? Go to Iran, stop one of their many many flag burnings and THEN maybe I am willing to listen to your protests about someone burning the koran.
And this is another thing the average citizen is getting tired off. One rule for Muslims, one for everyone else. Apparently Muslims can insult and declare intifada's on everyone but if anyone dares protest, they are attacking Islam. Where is the Muslim moderate declaring that he will kill the religious leaders of Iran if they declare a single Jihad on anyone? Where is the Muslim who stands up against the extremist of his religion with words and actions that have MEANING?
Islam is not an extreme religion by itself, but it has problems dealing with its extremists. This is dangerous. It would be like US anti-abortion terrorists moving into Europe to spread their hate. Nobody cares if Americans blow up their own abortion clinucs, but keep the nutters to your own shores. Islam fails at this.
And democracy in the west ain't about being nice. It is about the majority dictating the minority. And you better do so, because we don't have a history of being nice against majorities that we hold accountable for something, rightly or wrongly.
I fear this stuff could blow up one day, all because good men did nothing. Because I am tired of Muslims. I admit it. I don't even hate them. I just want them to disappear. For once to open the newspaper and not read about them. Just as I can go weeks without reading about Jews, Christians, Budhists, Atheists getting in the news related to their faith.
MMO Quests are like orgasms:
You may solo them, I prefer them in a group.
It's not blocking a thing. it's not saying "We're not going to allow the people who use us as an ISP to not be able to see your website" It's saying, 'we won't be party to you putting this on the internet, you can go do it with some other HOSTING SERVICE. To use an analogy, blocking them (and thus even coming close to the 'net neutrality' issues that people are touting) would be like putting up a wall around the protesters and saying that "we're not going to let anyone see your protest" while what they're actually doing is more like "We're not going to hold your sign for you"
Free Pie! The Pie is Also Evil!
Well, for starters, the church now needs a new hosting provider. They'll need to incur the costs of that migration. So here, at a minimum, we have one business causing costs for another business, because they don't like what they are saying, and only recently did they decide not to like it. Only after the federal government, including POTUS, told everyone, including Rackspace, what they thought should be done.
It isn't as if nothing at all has changed, is it?
I used to work for a hosting company a long time ago. Concerns raised about hosting a porn site had far less to do with any ethical argument and more with the real life probability that a fair amount of bandwidth would be required. Often where things break down is the negotiations between the client and the hosting company (as was in our case) when a potential client of such interest approaches the table; sometimes, they do not understand that abnormal nature of their request in relation to the engineered price ranges advertised. Most hosting companies are assuming each account might require X amount of bandwidth and price a product accordingly, then you have someone that is guaranteed to far exceed that X amount thinking they deserve the same price. The moment a porn site goes online on your network, you notice it quick. So they often have to pay much more, naturally. Which is good, because you wouldn't believe the kind of money made from some of the porn sites I've had to deal with in the past; so they are a reliable source of income.
Now, some hosting companies might not host them out of ethical reasons. But thinking business wise, I think it's mostly that such clients get immediately directed to a negotiations table rather than just punching in accounts and collecting 20 dollars a month. If it does happen in the latter, then it'll only be a month or two before their are dragged to the negotiations table for continued service as they are sucking up a ton of bandwidth.
For me, this is an issue of free speech. I learned from the KKK website that they have strong family values... well, that is good at least; not to mention I have great pride to voice my own opposition out of real knowledge instead of belief. It would be a shame that no alternative views are posted online because it's socially permitted to ban a site because it doesn't conform to the zeitgeist.
This isn't the first time something like this has happened, but I get annoyed every time it does happen. Where does it end? A fair argument can be made against media sites like Ogrish.com's even label them "shock sites" as to belittle their content. But those have real value, those show you the unedited unprocessed video footages of travesties that would never get through Fox/CNN/NBC/ABC/CBS/News Corp/AP or any other outlet. The footage shown on BBC seems edited for "PG", seeing the dead Thai protester who had his head obliterated by a sniper bullet... that can't be imagined, nor the feelings of seeing it be understood without having seen it, it can't be described in words with the same deliverance, and the situation and severity of the clash can never be driven home from seeing people who might as well be merely playing about overdubbed with serious words of this or that. Might make someone get off their ass, so to speak; someone is willing to die, something must be wrong for them to pay that price.
Anyways, I think RackSpace is out of line trying to determine what is acceptable content for their service. Hate Speech, Love Speech, Shock Content I don't care. I want it all. I feel society would be better off to have access to all of it, open to dispute, debate, scrutiny, criticism, absorption, admiration and appraisal.
The theory that Allah is actually the Sumerian Hubal is widely-rejected. The term "Al-Ilah", meaning "the worshipable" was widely used enough that using it as an etymological basis is shaky at best.
And if you believe that, you betray your lack of intelligence and education.
Apparently along with nearly all other students of Abrahamic religions.
Have you read the Rackspace AUP?
Really, I wouldn't want to be hosting them either. They're bound to be under some pretty significant DoS attacks just from the announcement. There can and will likely be violence that happens if they do their book burning event. There's no question, they are burning Qurans is very obviously to incite violence. What else are they doing it for? To save the environment? To get rid of Quran overstock? To destroy damaged Qurans from their library. No, they're trying to pick fights. Unfortunately, he's doing it from the relative safety of the US. He should go play his game in the middle east. He's taunting a fight that he's not prepared to win.
Muslim pastor burns a Bible, Christians do nothing. Which group is wrong here?
The values are simply put in different places. When it comes to mind control, end results are what count. Our great Christian Nation is working itself up into a lunatic froth over Iran as we speak, just as it did over Afghanistan and Iraq, using the very same lies and media contortions. And we're happily falling for it again. Clearly our populace has only the barest minimum capacity to learn from mistakes.
Basically, we just rationalize murder and resource theft using different tactics. While I'm sure it was considered, there are simply too many atheists in the West for a big, well-publicized bible burning to have the desired effect in motivating people into a nice profitable war. Though, bible-burning would certainly have an effect on a significant portion of the U.S., propaganda needs to capture the hearts and minds of as big a demographic as possible. There are just too many atheists in the West who would laugh at the "insult" and who would instead feel superior and perhaps even pity toward the East for using such a tactic. So the mind-control experts decided to use the whole terrorist line to get both the religious and non-religious involved in self-destructive behavior.
As I said, the end results are what count; murder and misery. That's the payoff for the dark side.
Getting caught up in the oh-so-enticing mind trap of comparing us to them is how they catch us and make us do insane things to each other.
-FL
Exactly, no one can keep you from being an asshole in America. But no one has to let you use their property or services to be an asshole either especially when there's a big NO ASSHOLES clause in your contract to use said services/property.
I fully support the Church's right to burn all the Qur'ans they want, but I also support Rackspace's right to choose what content they host.
If they choose which content they host, isn't that dangerously close to saying they SUPPORT content they host?
When modding "Informative", please make sure it both has a source and IS actually informative.
The GP was probably fantasizing. While a church doesn't need to file the official form to be tax exempt, if the IRS suspects they are violating the rules they'll investigate. There are really only two rules for churches: be sincere in your beliefs and don't violate U.S. laws or policies. That is, no virgin sacrifices, etc.
Specifically, that one reads:
That the practices and rituals associated with the organization's religious belief or creed are not illegal or contrary to clearly defined public policy.
There is a bit of leeway in that to allow the gov't to remove tax-exempt status from churches if they go too far against gov't policy. The first example that comes to mind is if the U.S. decided to seriously enforce immigration law, and a church -- as an organization -- was giving harbor to illegal immigrants, falsifying documents, or lying to federal agents, the IRS could revoke their charitable status and tax exemption. The thing is, what the pastor is doing isn't illegal or against U.S. Policy, thus the IRS can't legally touch his tax-exempt status. They could crawl up his ass with a microscope to see if anything ELSE might be illegal. http://www.smh.com.au/world/pastor-in-koran-furore-accused-of-using-slaves-20100909-153bf.html
On a parallel note, this is also what gives the gov't the power to regulate things like private association membership. (I.E. -- Gays in the Boy Scouts of America) If you take gov't funds, they have the legal right to meddle in your affairs. The key is to not take gov't money and be 100% private. Then you can go tell them to fuck off, and usually get away with it. That's how we still have a few private country clubs in the U.S. that don't allow blacks, jews or women. They're 100% private. Augusta National Country Club comes to mind first.
Learning HOW to think is more important than learning WHAT to think.
I would bet money that there would be death threats from someone
From some nutcases, yes. Not from mainstream Christian clerics or politicians. That's the difference.
Says who? There's a long road to making the point you want to.
No, not really. That's where most Muslims live, hence the inhabitants of those nations represent mainstream Islam. "Represent" is all I claimed; the causation is complex.
I see Christian nutjobs doing serious damage to the US, but I don't blame Christianity for it.
There are few self-identified Christian nations left, and the ones that exist generally have good human rights records. And secular nations with predominantly Christian populations (like the US and France) also have generally good human rights records (better than most predominantly Muslim nations).
When's the last time you heard of a major and highly-publicized protest where people were burning large numbers of Bibles just to piss off Christians?
Media don't pick up on Bible burnings because most Christians couldn't care less. There are hundreds of Bible burning videos on YouTube if you care, with no death threats that I could find. Marilyn Manson did it during a concert, and she has a lot more followers than Jones. Even real abuses against Christians in Islamic countries hardly get coverage because few people care.
I wonder if Rackspace is this high and mighty about kicking pro terrorist and islamic jihad websites off their servers?
Somehow I doubt it.
Hey, I can make up random shit, too! Let's try it:
---
I wonder if WCMI92 stopped raping little girls.
Somehow I doubt it.
---
See, wasn't that fun?
What does the size of the ISP have to do with it? The Constitution in this case is irrelevant. The Constitution is a list of limits on government, not ISPs. If you dont like their contract, use a different ISP. That said, I would like to know who gets to determine what is, or is not, "hate" speech. The whole concept of hate speech and hate crimes is bullshit IMO.
Does that make it unpalatable to Americans? You betcha.
That's not actually the biggest problem. The problem with crappy soldiers like that is:
1) You get the general population against you.
2) Genocide nowadays is not such a viable candidate if you need to trade with lots of other countries and their support. And the survivors will "never" forgive you, it'll take many generations.
they give in to the urge to behave like animals.
There's the problem, it's not a shortage of soldiers, it's too many bad soldiers. You CANNOT afford to keep shooting the wrong people/targets.
It takes very brave and professional soldiers to be careful to err on the safe side and not shoot people when their own lives are under threat.
You screw up, next thing you know an entire village is now against you. They may not say to your face, but they now want you out. Previously they might have been neutral. After your screw up, building bridges etc isn't going to win them so easily. You are foreigners, if both foreigners and locals are screwing up, most will prefer the locals.
Screw up enough times and you lose the entire country. I think the US has lost Afghanistan and it's just a matter of time. The morale of the Taliban is higher than that of the US soldiers. Their soldiers take their losses better, they believe in what they are doing, they have supplies and support, they now control most parts of Afghanistan even if not officially.
It's easier for the Taliban to not make mistakes, when in doubt just shoot the guys in the US uniform instead of some brown guy in a shalwar kameez.
Such wars are not easy to win. In my country (Malaysia) they moved many entire villages to new villages ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malayan_Emergency ). Foreigners did come in to fight and they did an overall good job, yes there were mistakes, but they were definitely not making trophies out of civilians.
The US can't fight it the way it fought Vietnam. They lost that war. They wouldn't have won. Soldiers in such wars cannot be trigger happy idiots. You need soldiers who would behave professionally.
I find the first line of your post hateful
Seriously? Not enjoying your first day on the Internet?
... when your government threw habeas corpuse under the bus.
The book burning is just a side show. The terrorists already won.
At least there are some bloggers on the right political spectrum like this libertarian who understand the actual issues.
Unfortunately these days something that shouldn't be a partisan issue at all is pretty much completely ignored. The right windbags seem to confuse torture with patriotism or sado-masochistic fun and the lefties shut miraculously up once Obama came into power. So now the policy has the blessing of the US federal appeals court.
Have fun living in a country where due process is not a right but a favor that your government can withdraw at any time.
"Land of the free" what a joke.
The problem is that Rackspace is essentially declaring here that they themselves do not support free speech, and they will apply their legal right to limit speech they don't like.
I don't see that as a problem. Rackspace has been open an honest about its policies against hate speech.
If a mormon group had 'violated the hate-speech provision of [their] acceptable-use policy,' I'd expect them to be cut off. If a kitten-cuddling group had 'violated the hate-speech provision of [their] acceptable-use policy,' I'd expect them to be cut off too.
You see my question to you is why are expressions of religious belief protected, e.g. you presumably agree that to ban the contents of the Koran would be wrong, but expressions such as this, are okay to ban? "Hate speech" is a political term and the thin end of a wedge. Accept that some opinions we don't like are acceptable to surpress and where will it end.
Aide-toi, le Ciel t'aidera - Jeanne D'Arc.
It is basic to Christianity that there is one true faith and that Christians will work to eliminate any faith other than Christianity.
You need to cite chapter and verse for me there, especially since Christ and his disciples were all Jewish and followed the Hebrew faith. Jews and Muslims worship the same God that Christians worship; they're by no means satanic at all.
And unlike Jews, Muslims consider Jesus a prophet. Jews consider him "a good Jewish boy who did well in his life", but they still worship the same God that Jesus (and you) worshiped.
His faith does NOT require or even allow him to ask his congregation to arm themselves! That is the antithesis of Christianity and decidedly anti-Christ. "Love those who hate you, do good to those who harm you" is the Christian way; that's Jesus' own words. When Peter picked up a sword to defend Jesus against the Roman Soldiers, Jesus rebuked him saying "those who live by the sword die by the sword." You are supposed to love the terrorists, strange as that may seem! Just as Jesus loved and prayed for the men who had beat and crucified him as he was hanging on the cross in agony.
This so-called "Christian" preacher is one of the wolves in sheep's clothing Jesus warned about. Beware of men like him; read the bible yourslef, especially what Christ himself said if you consider yourself a Christian.
And your attitude has, through the centuries, caused much evil in the world; the Crusades, for example, and the abuses by the Medevil Popes and Bishops that led to the reformation.
Free Martian Whores!
Gandi was an asshole.
Here is my favorite example, (there are many others)
He told others not to use 'western medicine' Many people died(Including his wife) because of that. When he was ill? he was all about using western medicine.
Yes, that chap was an asshole, and a religious extremist.
But hey, if he didn't lead if Indian Independence, India wouldn't have all the poverty and disease, so he's got that going for him.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
What's your solution?
Never get involved in a land war in Asia?
That is all.
Second, the Holocaust was not a Christian thing
I suggest you visit the Holocaust Museum in Berlin and become educated about the history of German anti-semitism. Germany has historically been a Christian nation, and the anti-semitic history of its Christian people has been well documented. Please don't try to rewrite history by pretending that religion was not involved. The Nazi propaganda newspaper Der Stürmer frequently invoked stories and images of supposed Jewish assaults and plots against Christians. There were numerous pro-Nazi Christian groups that wove Nazi propaganda into their theology (Rexists, etc.)
"Christianity, however, did play a critical role, not perhaps in motivating the top decision makers, but in making their commands comprehensible and tolerable to the rank-and-file - the people who actively carried out the measures against the Jews as well as those who passively condoned their implementation.... The old antisemitism had created a climate in which the 'new' antisemitism was, at the very least, acceptable to millions of Germans." - Catholics, Protestants and Christian Antisemitism in Nazi Germany
Some of the top Christian leaders actively supported the Holocaust:
"The duty of a Christian is to love himself first and to see that his needs are satisfied. Only then can he help his neighbor... Why should we not get rid of these parasites [Jews] who suck Rumanian Christian blood? It is logical and holy to react against them." - Patriarch Miron Cristea
I'm annoyed with Rackspace sucking up to religious zealots. I don't care what religion they're from. It's worth pulling the chain of each religion once in a while. It makes people think about whether religions should be taken seriously.
"Hate speech" may indeed be a political term, but last time I checked that hosting company is not in the political industry, it's in the hosting industry where (surprise surprise) legal contracts trump your opinions.
I haven't been arguing though, that the contracts are illegal. I've been arguing that the behaviour of Rackspace is wrong. Saying that they can get away with it is not a counter to that. The intent of your posts seems to be to establish that Rackspace are not obliged to listen to my opinions. That is orthogonal to whether they are in the right or not. If you are merely making the case that I can't force them to my will, then you've stated that twice and I've agreed and said that's not what I'm arguing and we can stop this here. If you're arguing that Rackspace's behaviour is right, then there is still far to go, I'm afraid.
As it is my opinion on this matter that you keep challenging, then you'll agree that whether or not Rackspace must legally listen to judgement on their behaviour isn't really germane to whether or not my opinion is valid.
Aide-toi, le Ciel t'aidera - Jeanne D'Arc.
Businesses refuse to business with other businesses all the time. Dell are more than happy to ditch Linux distro providers every time Microsoft click their fingers, and that involves real costs too (in terms of money and also freedom for the public). As long as they respect their written contracts, and provide a reasonable notice period to ensure a smooth transition, there isn't much you can do.
I run my own company, and one of the pleasures is that I don't have to work with people I decide I don't like. I really wouldn't appreciate being forced to.
Phillip.
Property for sale in Nice, France
Might I suggest actually READING a bible (or heck a Quran) sometime before spouting off like that?
Both books endorse violence, punishment, and death to those that violate their laws and customs many times within them. Simply because you like Christianity (most likely because you were raised within the church) and hate Islam (because it is foreign to you and you have not educated yourself) doesn't mean you can ignore the content of these books and pretend that the Bible is all love and daisies while the Quran is hate and flesh eating locusts. They both also have a lot of extremely positive stances on social issues, particularly when you consider that they were both written in human rights dark ages.
The fact of the matter is that neither Christians or Muslims follow the literal writings of their holy books and instead selectively pick components that support their moral stances. In truth the two books are fairly equivelent which shouldn't come as a surprise since they are Monotheistic tomes written in ancient times when there was a profound lack of understanding of the world and a general disrespect of people who are different.
The First Amendment, like the Fourth, Fifth, Ninth, or Tenth does not grant, and was never intended to grant, any rights. They were added to guarantee fundamental, unalienable human rights, generally accepted by those supporting and those opposing the Constitution as granted by or derived from “the laws of nature and of nature’s God.” The same argument that the Tenth Amendment was a legal nullity because it was “merely declaratory,” could be made, and exposed as fallacious and false by making, the same argument about the First Amendment. Of course, the Constitution deals only with governmental action, but, in this case, there was pressure to stop this demonstration, applied by General Petraeus as Commander of our war effort in Afghanistan, the Secretary of Defense, the White House, and many others influenced by them, so the governmental-private distinction Some smart and thoughtful conservatives, as well as liberals, on and off the Supreme Court, realized that laws against burning the American flag as a political protest, however repugnant the act, violated the intent of the First Amendment. The opinion failed to mention that the same law would also have criminalized the burring of the flag of North Vietnam with whom we were then at war, the subject of that protest, the Nazi flag, the red flag and hammer and sickle of Communism, etc. The same problem arises with many laws intended to protect other “venerated objects,” the damaging or destruction of which causes particular hurt and anger, beyond the economic value of the object, which laws would protect cemeteries and headstones, religious symbols, Bibles and Qurans, etc. Our law does recognize many instances of intentional infliction of severe emotional distress. Intriguingly, the opinion also appeared to overlook the fact that the flag burned in that case did not belong to the flag-burner, which raised another issue altogether. A retired Texas lawyer, I’m not up on the laws of Florida or wherever Rackspace is based, but a contractual provision against a customer of a web host, an ISP, a media outlet, a publishing company, a quick print shop, or a supplier of chicken feed using the service to promote anything likely to get the web host, etc., entangled, fairly or not, in someone else’s fight, would appear to be reasonable and valid. This could, however, certainly be abused. Microsoft, Google, etc. are big enough, and virtual natural monopolies, that their refusal to deal with someone who disagreed with them or their favored candidate for President could raise some very significant issues, but that’s not the case here. Now what I would want to know, in order to judge Rackspace’s action, might include who else, pushing whatever else, they are and are not willing to serve. Al Qaeda and some other violently militant Muslim terrorists, with whom, unlike “Islam,” we really are at war because they are at war with us. Child porn distributors. People and groups who promote hate and violence. Scandal sheets that habitually invade privacy or publish libelous lies under color of the public-figure rules. I would prefer not to do business with an ISP, a hosting company, a telecommunications company, etc., that don’t guard and take action against such abuses. There were clients I wouldn’t represent in their ongoing business activities when practicing law, though I had no ethical problem representing criminals in court after they got caught or charged, about which there are rules prescribing what defense lawyers may and may not do. I happen to agree with the prevailing view, across the religious and political spectrum, that this Quran-burning protest is wrong for several reasons. I can find nothing in Christian scripture or belief that sanctions it, and it can and will be used against us not only by our real enemies but by others in the Muslim world with whom our country is trying to conduct necessary relations. It could well incite deadly violence against Americans and harm our war effort. It also appears to be a publicity stunt.