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SOPA 'shelved' until consensus is found

washingtonmonthly.com

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Re: SOPA 'shelved' until consensus is found

#41

Post by ctdonath »

jrmg wrote: post #11
microtonal wrote: post #5

Isn't this the point where 'the people' should not sit on their laurels, and launch a proposal to make a law that does exactly the opposite: protecting the digital rights of citizens? I am asking because (also in the EU) we are usually happy when some draconian law does not make it, but there's rarely an attempt to push for legislation that secures the rights of internet users.

What would your proposed law say? Congress can't make a law that says that it can't make a SOPA-like law in the future (or, at least, it would be meaningless, since future legislation could repeal it).

Perhaps "Whereas Congress finds the right to free speech includes the ability to discuss unpopular and disagreeable subjects, no person shall be prohibited by law from referencing objectionable/illegal material, including by providing mechanisms for automatic retrieval thereof."

At least a repeal would entail the difficulty of repealing opposing & established legislation. There are a lot of laws which would be enacted save for the outcry of repealing what is considered an established explicit right. This in contrast to an inability to reference an explicit manifestation of a claimed right in opposition to a trampling thereof. "You can't prohibit that!" is often overridden by "there's nothing that says we can't."

Re: SOPA 'shelved' until consensus is found

#42

Post by rimantas »

jules wrote: post #38
rbanffy wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> a general possibility to override unpopular laws. We have to be very careful with this. Sometimes a very popular law is exactly what you don't want. There are vast areas where a law mandating the teaching of creationist superstition in science classes would be immensely popular while a law forbidding it would be very unpopular.

Such is democracy, the least bad system we have. Overall it would probably lead to laws that are more in your interest, as opposed to in the interest of people who lobby for laws.

Democracy is not simply "the rule of majority".

Re: SOPA 'shelved' until consensus is found

#43

Post by davidw »

lhnz wrote: post #13
microtonal wrote: post #5

Isn't this the point where 'the people' should not sit on their laurels, and launch a proposal to make a law that does exactly the opposite: protecting the digital rights of citizens? I am asking because (also in the EU) we are usually happy when some draconian law does not make it, but there's rarely an attempt to push for legislation that secures the rights of internet users.

Reframe the blackout on the 18th into another blackout with a curated message calling for anti-censorship laws and asking the government to protect its citizen's freedom. Use strike-out lines on a concise, readable version of SOPA and below each line print the respective anti-censorship law which you wish to be created. This way you draw attention to how draconian SOPA was not by comparing it to similar laws in dicta…

Do you mean a 'curated' message as opposed to a computer-generated one?

I upvoted you because it's a good point but... beware the buzzwords.

Re: SOPA 'shelved' until consensus is found

#44

Post by mattwdelong »

DanielBMarkham wrote: post #29

I would urge extreme caution about reading too much into this article. I (I'm a political junkie) saw Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D) on TV yesterday. The message I got from his body language, nuance, and phrasing was something like "Obviously people who are elected from heavy technology areas are feeling a lot of heat. There's still a lot of support, though. Let's see if we can tweak this in such a way as to p…

What scares me most is the fact that everyone knows this tactic. Write an absurd policy, debate it, offer an alternative and jam it down citizens throats.

We know this, yet there is not much that can be done about it. Aside from the obvious, running for Senate and using your vote, what can be done to stop it? Someone with the right amount of money and enough motivation can pass just about anything, given enough time.

I think, instead of protesting SOPA (or the next bill), people need to devise a method or position themselves so that they're in the right places to protect the average Citizen from such policies. These bills will just keep coming. Screaming from the side line is no longer effective.

Re: SOPA 'shelved' until consensus is found

#45

Post by sgaither »

muuh-gnu wrote: post #16
jrmg wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What would your proposed law say? Congress can't make a law that says that it can't make a SOPA-like law in the future (or, at least, it would be meaningless, since future legislation could repeal it).

There should be a way for the people to veto a law in a referendum, like in Switzerland. That way politicians would be more cautious passing laws which they know that the public probably won't like and probably will veto. The current US system only provides "checks and balances" between political parties, so when one party cracks up (meaning, gets bought by special interests and turns against the people) we only can…

That hasn't worked super well in California, from many accounts.

Re: SOPA 'shelved' until consensus is found

#46

Post by billswift »

ctdonath wrote: post #41
jrmg wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What would your proposed law say? Congress can't make a law that says that it can't make a SOPA-like law in the future (or, at least, it would be meaningless, since future legislation could repeal it).

Perhaps "Whereas Congress finds the right to free speech includes the ability to discuss unpopular and disagreeable subjects, no person shall be prohibited by law from referencing objectionable/illegal material, including by providing mechanisms for automatic retrieval thereof." At least a repeal would entail the difficulty of repealing opposing & established legislation. There are a lot of laws which would be enacte…

>At least a repeal would entail the difficulty of repealing opposing & established legislation.

Nonsense, they do that all the time. A large part of Obamacare and most other large bills modify existing law. New laws simply over-write previous laws.

Re: SOPA 'shelved' until consensus is found

#47

Post by mgkimsal »

While watching the MSNBC video yesterday, Cotton's repeated assertions that this only applied to 'foreign sites' bugged me. From the SOPA text:

--------------

    (a) Definition- For purposes of this section, a foreign Internet site or portion thereof is a `foreign infringing site' if--

        (1) the Internet site or portion thereof is a U.S.-directed site and is used by users in the United States;

        (2) the owner or operator of such Internet site is committing or facilitating the commission of criminal violations punishable under section 2318, 2319, 2319A, 2319B, or 2320, or chapter 90, of title 18, United States Code; and

        (3) the Internet site would, by reason of acts described in paragraph (1), be subject to seizure in the United States in an action brought by the Attorney General if such site were a domestic Internet site.
--------------

So, a foreign site can be 'u.s.-directed' and used by users in the US. Doesn't sound very 'foreign' to me at all. Sounds an awful lot like 'domestic'.

Yes, I'm sure there's legal interpretations of these words that I'm not aware of, but it sure as hell reads to me like when they say "foreign sites" they're not meaning 'foreign' in the sense that anyone in the US would reasonably understand.

Re: SOPA 'shelved' until consensus is found

#48

Post by Retric »

mattwdelong wrote: post #44
DanielBMarkham wrote: post #29

I would urge extreme caution about reading too much into this article. I (I'm a political junkie) saw Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D) on TV yesterday. The message I got from his body language, nuance, and phrasing was something like "Obviously people who are elected from heavy technology areas are feeling a lot of heat. There's still a lot of support, though. Let's see if we can tweak this in such a way as to p…

What scares me most is the fact that everyone knows this tactic. Write an absurd policy, debate it, offer an alternative and jam it down citizens throats. We know this, yet there is not much that can be done about it. Aside from the obvious, running for Senate and using your vote, what can be done to stop it? Someone with the right amount of money and enough motivation can pass just about anything, given enough time.…

The way to stop it is to create and fund long term organizations devoted to stopping it. We have Greenpeace and PITA we need Net Freedom.

Re: SOPA 'shelved' until consensus is found

#49

Post by mikecane »

rimantas wrote: post #42
jules wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Such is democracy, the least bad system we have. Overall it would probably lead to laws that are more in your interest, as opposed to in the interest of people who lobby for laws.

Democracy is not simply "the rule of majority".

Democracy is exactly that. Which is why our Founders gave us a democratic republic instead.

Re: SOPA 'shelved' until consensus is found

#50

Post by bulletsvshumans »

Retric wrote: post #48
mattwdelong wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What scares me most is the fact that everyone knows this tactic. Write an absurd policy, debate it, offer an alternative and jam it down citizens throats. We know this, yet there is not much that can be done about it. Aside from the obvious, running for Senate and using your vote, what can be done to stop it? Someone with the right amount of money and enough motivation can pass just about anything, given enough time.…

The way to stop it is to create and fund long term organizations devoted to stopping it. We have Greenpeace and PITA we need Net Freedom .

EFF?
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