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Neil Gaiman: Why defend freedom of icky speech?

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Re: Neil Gaiman: Why defend freedom of icky speech?

#101

Post by jaysonelliot »

_wp3r wrote: post #80
jaysonelliot wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Popular speech doesn't need defending. If you don't believe in the freedom of "unquestionably wrong" speech, then you don't believe in freedom of speech.

This is the same premise style argument in reverse. Save one child and such. Disagree with one part and your completely against. My statement is that freedom of any kind including speech is not black and white.

Except that it isn't.

You're suggesting that there's an absolute concept such as "wrong" speech, and that you're somehow capable of defining and legislating that.

Re: Neil Gaiman: Why defend freedom of icky speech?

#102

Post by tobylane »

"The Law is a huge blunt weapon that does not and will not make distinctions between what you find acceptable and what you don't. This is how the Law is made." Neil Garman

"I shall not today attempt further to define the kinds of material I understand to be embraced within that shorthand description ["hard-core pornography"]; and perhaps I could never succeed in intelligibly doing so. But I know it when I see it, and the motion picture involved in this case is not that. ”— Justice Potter Stewart, concurring opinion in Jacobellis v. Ohio 378 U.S. 184 (1964), regarding possible obscenity in The Lovers.

I call bullshit. I agree, defend freedom, but it's the same with terrorism, if not worse. There has to be intervention to judge it. Somehow that seems to be done better than say the software patent system. Terrorists are being held, or watched, by ways that shouldn't be legal, because what they did isn't illegal, just so very near. Immoral text/images, software patents and terrorists actions all have blurry lines we will take some time to sharpen.

Re: Neil Gaiman: Why defend freedom of icky speech?

#103

Post by sliverstorm »

waterhouse wrote: post #63
sliverstorm wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Speech is far from free, period. As it should be. All sorts of things that don't deserve to be protected by Freedom of Speech. For example, treason often takes the form of selling out your country with information- which is just Speech after all.

If it involves, say, a high-ranking general giving loads of top-secret military information to the enemy, it's likely that not giving away such information is part of his job description, and that he is in breach of contract. Now, the law might not like punishing breach of contract with long-term imprisonment (or whatever the penalty for treason is), but you could probably work something out--e.g. if he breaks contra…

I don't think this works. The Bill of Rights supersedes everything else. If we took a perfectly strict and literal interpretation of the First Amendment, that would overrule any disciplinary action directed at this high-ranking general, because his actions are protected by free speech.

If we were to apply it with no exceptions, there would be NO EXCEPTIONS, and no other laws, rules or agreements would be able to overrule it.

Re: Neil Gaiman: Why defend freedom of icky speech?

#104

Post by waterhouse »

sliverstorm wrote: post #103
waterhouse wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If it involves, say, a high-ranking general giving loads of top-secret military information to the enemy, it's likely that not giving away such information is part of his job description, and that he is in breach of contract. Now, the law might not like punishing breach of contract with long-term imprisonment (or whatever the penalty for treason is), but you could probably work something out--e.g. if he breaks contra…

I don't think this works. The Bill of Rights supersedes everything else. If we took a perfectly strict and literal interpretation of the First Amendment, that would overrule any disciplinary action directed at this high-ranking general, because his actions are protected by free speech. If we were to apply it with no exceptions, there would be NO EXCEPTIONS, and no other laws, rules or agreements would be able to over…

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.

If the U.S. military requires its generals (as a condition of their employment and their access to top-secret info) to not give away top-secret info, and it prosecutes those who break this agreement, this is clearly not Congress making any kind of law and therefore is not prohibited by the above, so in fact a perfectly strict and literal interpretation of the First Amendment would conclude that this is totally legitimate.

Re: Neil Gaiman: Why defend freedom of icky speech?

#105

Post by orc »

kwantam wrote: post #38

Gaiman does a reasonable job with this argument, but in my mind fails to address the most pernicious thought in the letter: The question, for me, is even if we only save ONE child from rape or attempted rape, or even just lots of uncomfortable hugs from Creepy Uncle Dave, is that not worth leaving a couple naked bodies out of a comic? This kind of argument comes up all the time in mostly unsupportable "save the child…

I like how you dismiss the argument as invalid. I want to read more about this kind of reasoning, and I found this site: http://www.logicalfallacies.info/

Re: Neil Gaiman: Why defend freedom of icky speech?

#106

Post by orc »

jwb119 wrote: post #28
mikeryan wrote: post #8

Its funny I had a similar argument with someone last week (2 weeks ago?) when the Westboro Baptist's won their supreme court case [1]. Speech is free, period. Once you try to put any restrictions on then the whole thing isn't even a slippery slope, its a frictionless cliff. [1] http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2011/03...

Not really. Speech is far from free, period. The law recognizes a wide variety of restrictions. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freedom_of_speech_in_the_United... for a few. For a view that "There is no such thing as free speech" see Stanley Fish, etc.. http://www.australianhumanitiesreview.org/archive/Issue-Febr...

I am disappointed by this: "Lesser protection of commercial speech"

I would like it to be illegal for a news organization or an advertisement to lie to or mislead the public.

If you survey 1000 doctors, and 4 say yes, you better not put "4 out of 5 doctors surveyed" in your ad.

Re: Neil Gaiman: Why defend freedom of icky speech?

#107

Post by vacri »

VladRussian wrote: post #17
mikeryan wrote: post #8

Its funny I had a similar argument with someone last week (2 weeks ago?) when the Westboro Baptist's won their supreme court case [1]. Speech is free, period. Once you try to put any restrictions on then the whole thing isn't even a slippery slope, its a frictionless cliff. [1] http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2011/03...

>Speech is free, period. There is situations when one fundamental right conflicts with another fundamental right. Your statement is that the fundamental right of free speech must always take precedence. I see how fundamental right of a child for the privacy of his/her body [ note: a child can't give an informed consent to waive the right ] can be given priority over somebody else's fundamental right for free speech.…

How does this relate to what Gaiman is talking about? How does the drawing of manga violate a child's privacy? There are no children involved, unless they're reading the manga, and the pictures aren't going to leap off the page and violate the child's physical privacy.
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