Yes, the use in incitation to violence; not the words themselves.
You can march the streets screaming that you want all cops killed. AND NOTHING HAPPENS. Because nothing SHOULD happen. <span style="line-height:1.4em;">If you actively go out and kill cops, however...</span>
The only distinction you make there is between people following up on what you say or not. With the amount of followup attacks that have been mounting in past instances, law enforcement is actually prosecuting people without there being actual violence.
That guy was convicted of producing porn involving human bodily waste, which not a lot of people know is against the law. They probably go more lightly on possession of certain types of extreme porn but it's illegal nonetheless.
Of course they can. What kind of nonsense is that? It’s not the fault or responsibility of the speaker that the listener is offended.
It depends on what has been said and where. If a major newspaper wilfully published something that was anti-semitic then there would probably be a bigger outcry than a teenager calling someone a racial epithet on Youtube. Prosecutions are judged on individual cases. You have the right to offend people until the law decides you've gone too far and they prosecute you. The past convictions for hateful rhetoric are evidence that you don't have complete freedom to say what you want. It's easy to think you do because you never choose to put it to the test.
That’s diversity. “Multiculturalism” as a concept is evil. You’re saying that yourself; you can’t lump all cultures together. The VARIETY of food and music is diversity. Trying to combine them creates inedible mush, unlistenable noise, etc.
The word multiculturalism has been misused but it means the same as diversity. You're talking about the suppression of individual cultures in order to respect them all. That's an effect of how people implement multiculturalism/diversity but the idea of multiple cultures co-existing in close proximity is not an evil concept at all.
As I said before, anti-Semitism laws in France result from the fifty million deaths of WW2. The existing laws forbids incitement to racial hate (against Jews in the case of Dieudonné, but it could be applied to any kind of other racist ideas). The is no French law against mockery , or blasphemy. Therefore, the two notions should be distinguished.
Of course Dieudonné tried to use the excuse of mockery or humor, but he was condemned. Radical islamists (Christians, too) have also tried to get Charlie Hebdo condemned (many times) by virtue of the same laws. They were always unsuccessful, because justice considered it was mockery, not incitement to racial hate. I defend unlimited right to mockery, not to racial hate. Words have a meaning, it is important !
There's no well-defined distinction between hatred and mockery. You can mock a person to the point of suicide.
France did have a law against blasphemy and currently is limited to a small region:
"French Islamists are suing the satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo for blasphemy after it published a front cover carrying the slogan "The Koran is crap, it doesn't stop bullets".
Taking advantage of the existence of the crime of "blasphemy" uniquely available in the Alsace-Moselle region - it no longer exists in the rest of French common law – The League of Judicial Defence of Muslims (LDJM), led by the former lawyer Karim Achoui, has brought the case against Charlie Hebdo to the Criminal Court in Alsace-Moselle's capital, Strasbourg.
Alsace-Moselle was annexed by Germany in 1871 and 1940-45 and retained part of the old German code when it returned to France.
One complication is that the Alsatian blasphemy law does not recognise Islam, covering only Catholicism, three forms of Protestantism and Judaism. This test case will decide whether the law can be widened to include Islam."
I think in general people do try to give satirical and comedic contexts special privilege, which annoys certain news channels because they don't get the same treatment but if you write a hateful message in an article and take that same message but put it beside a drawing, the context doesn't always change the meaning. It's fortunate that modern Western laws are becoming less restrictive and less reverential towards religion but you can't say that's evidence that we have completely free speech, we only have as much as the recent governments have allowed to be free and it's not unrestricted. The level of restriction they have now is not universally agreed and it could be changed to be more or less restrictive with a different government, which is obviously what Islamists would want to do.
Should a person be allowed to publish a manual on how to abuse children without being caught or a manual on how to construct bombs from household materials (like Anders Breivik did) or how to 3D print weapons in countries with strict gun laws, would you say these fall under free speech or not? Whether yes or no, why would you decide it and who has the authority to decide?
Here's a few things that have cropped up concerning the Hebdo attack:
That Muslim preacher is clearly exercising his freedom of speech to further promote the idea that this kind of violence is an acceptable response. There has been a firebombing at a paper that republished the cartoons:
I don't think that passive Muslims deserve to be condemned along with extremists but the Muslim community could certainly make more impact on the problem as Rupert Murdoch was alluding to. The media could help too by making the stories of Muslims condemning the attacks and helping more prominent. People give meaning to words by association and when the media is inundated with articles linking terrorism and Islam then that's all people hear.
But should governments go as far as to suppress the freedom of speech of the Muslim clerics spreading hateful messages by treating them as inciting hatred and violence? Maybe even go as far as banning the texts that promote jihadism under propaganda laws? The laws restricting propaganda would need to be put back first:
For your information, Christ was born at the birth of Christ. ????
Matthew 5:17 - 5:19
17"Do not think that I came to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I did not come to abolish but to fulfill. 18"For truly I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not the smallest letter or stroke shall pass from the Law until all is accomplished.19"Whoever then annuls one of the least of these commandments, and teaches others to do the same, shall be called least in the kingdom of heaven; but whoever keeps and teaches them, he shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven.…
17"Do not think that I came to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I did not come to abolish but to fulfill. 18"For truly I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not the smallest letter or stroke shall pass from the Law until all is accomplished.19"Whoever then annuls one of the least of these commandments, and teaches others to do the same, shall be called least in the kingdom of heaven; but whoever keeps and teaches them, he shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven.…
Wait, so does this mean that Christians have to keep the Old Testament? Because I'm pretty sure it says somewhere else that they don't
That’s diversity. “Multiculturalism” as a concept is evil. You’re saying that yourself; you can’t lump all cultures together. The VARIETY of food and music is diversity. Trying to combine them creates inedible mush, unlistenable noise, etc.
The word multiculturalism has been misused but it means the same as diversity. You're talking about the suppression of individual cultures in order to respect them all. That's an effect of how people implement multiculturalism/diversity but the idea of multiple cultures co-existing in close proximity is not an evil concept at all.
It is impossible to promote all cultures equally without demeaning all of them equally.
Multiculturalism is like saying that we should promote Timmy's recording of Twinkle Twinkle little star aged 2 just as much as Bach's B minor Mass, because, y'know, like, equality, man, diversity, man.
The promotion of multiculturalism fosters mediocrity and resentment, and is an abhorrent, twisted fantasy of liberals that needs to be extinguished forever.
Banning contraceptives is part of the beliefs. They also include abstinence, monogamy.
When the beliefs are shared in places like Africa or in schools, it's imposing that belief on others and when it has known destructive effects such as furthering the prevalence of AIDS or teen pregnancy then it's harmful:
[VIDEO]
Surely the harm it causes contradicts the other parts of religious text that say to care for others. Some religious people believe that these harmful outcomes are delivered by God:
"it seems more than coincidence that the AIDS epidemic surfaced just at the time in history when homosexuality, sexual license and drug use had attained the widest use and highest degree of general social aceptance in all known history. There is obviously a cause-and-effect relation, whether or not it is a direct judgment from God.
The latter should at least be considered as a contingent possibility in light of the many Biblical examples of plagues sent by God in judgment on sins."
"For the Christian, abortion is not an option. Even though it is legally available, God does not condone it. Yes, pregnancy is hard and uncomfortable and the thought of childbirth might be scary, but these are all natural processes which God designed."
It makes no sense. God loves you but he wants you to suffer where it's unnecessary. The reality is that it's people who want other people to suffer for not believing the same things they do.
Saying someone is going to hell is not the same as murder.
They're clearly not the same actions but it's the same thought process of expecting capital punishments for minor misdeeds. Some Islamists are dishing out judgements in the present rather than leaving it up to Allah to decide. Christians seem to want the same kind of punishment for other actions (including by default) but are more expectant that God will be the one to do it. The expectation is the same: believe what I say or you will suffer immensely; if not now, in the after-life.
Freedom of speech is just that. That's the speech that has to be protected. You can't please everyone and someone will always be offended. Of course there are some limits but that's because it could affect safety of others.
That's not a decisive statement. The debate is over what the limits are. Everybody starts with everything being ok but gradually it gets cut back to some form of restriction, which by definition is not free speech. The very idea of having libel/defamation laws mean you can't say what you want about people. This is like the telecoms companies with unlimited bandwidth; it's unlimited with restrictions.
Truly free speech is consequence-free speech and we don't have that, never have, never will.
your anti-religion sentiment offends me but I will fight for your right to express it
Would you still fight for that right if you weren't so sure I was going to hell? There's a documentary following a more extreme branch of the Christian religion and some of the people are perfectly passive with the sins being committed but they repeat over and over that it's because hell is the destination:
[VIDEO]
Now these people are dismissed as not representative of their religion but that's the case with Muslim extremists.
It is impossible to promote all cultures equally without demeaning all of them equally.
They don't have to be promoted equally, just tolerated where it makes sense - jihadism being an example that shouldn't be tolerated. Having a singular culture is simply not possible.
Multiculturalism is like saying that we should promote Timmy's recording of Twinkle Twinkle little star aged 2 just as much as Bach's B minor Mass, because, y'know, like, equality, man, diversity, man.
Nice liberal impression but having cultures co-exist doesn't mean everybody has to partake in each one, it's about being respectful towards them. You don't for example have to celebrate Jewish or Hindu events yourself but just respect that they exist and don't suggest deporting the people to keep their culture out.
Banning contraceptives is part of the beliefs. They also include abstinence, monogamy.
When the beliefs are shared in places like Africa or in schools, it's imposing that belief on others and when it has known destructive effects such as furthering the prevalence of AIDS or teen pregnancy then it's harmful:
[VIDEO]
Surely the harm it causes contradicts the other parts of religious text that say to care for others. Some religious people believe that these harmful outcomes are delivered by God:
"it seems more than coincidence that the AIDS epidemic surfaced just at the time in history when homosexuality, sexual license and drug use had attained the widest use and highest degree of general social aceptance in all known history. There is obviously a cause-and-effect relation, whether or not it is a direct judgment from God.
The latter should at least be considered as a contingent possibility in light of the many Biblical examples of plagues sent by God in judgment on sins."
"For the Christian, abortion is not an option. Even though it is legally available, God does not condone it. Yes, pregnancy is hard and uncomfortable and the thought of childbirth might be scary, but these are all natural processes which God designed."
It makes no sense. God loves you but he wants you to suffer where it's unnecessary. The reality is that it's people who want other people to suffer for not believing the same things they do.
Saying someone is going to hell is not the same as murder.
They're clearly not the same actions but it's the same thought process of expecting capital punishments for minor misdeeds. Some Islamists are dishing out judgements in the present rather than leaving it up to Allah to decide. Christians seem to want the same kind of punishment for other actions (including by default) but are more expectant that God will be the one to do it. The expectation is the same: believe what I say or you will suffer immensely; if not now, in the after-life.
Freedom of speech is just that. That's the speech that has to be protected. You can't please everyone and someone will always be offended. Of course there are some limits but that's because it could affect safety of others.
That's not a decisive statement. The debate is over what the limits are. Everybody starts with everything being ok but gradually it gets cut back to some form of restriction, which by definition is not free speech. The very idea of having libel/defamation laws mean you can't say what you want about people. This is like the telecoms companies with unlimited bandwidth; it's unlimited with restrictions.
Truly free speech is consequence-free speech and we don't have that, never have, never will.
your anti-religion sentiment offends me but I will fight for your right to express it
Would you still fight for that right if you weren't so sure I was going to hell? There's a documentary following a more extreme branch of the Christian religion and some of the people are perfectly passive with the sins being committed but they repeat over and over that it's because hell is the destination:
[VIDEO]
Now these people are dismissed as not representative of their religion but that's the case with Muslim extremists.
It is impossible to promote all cultures equally without demeaning all of them equally.
They don't have to be promoted equally, just tolerated where it makes sense - jihadism being an example that shouldn't be tolerated. Having a singular culture is simply not possible.
Multiculturalism is like saying that we should promote Timmy's recording of Twinkle Twinkle little star aged 2 just as much as Bach's B minor Mass, because, y'know, like, equality, man, diversity, man.
Nice liberal impression but having cultures co-exist doesn't mean everybody has to partake in each one, it's about being respectful towards them. You don't for example have to celebrate Jewish or Hindu events yourself but just respect that they exist and don't suggest deporting the people to keep their culture out.
Whether this world was created or evolved, there is still only one law: Survival of the fittest.
Organized religions were established as a result of this singular law. Us against them.
In time of plenty it is much easier to convince oneself that peace prevails, but the planet is just three missed meals away from total anarchy.
The islamist extremists are striking the west because the west has plenty and they do not. They become disillusioned that they are fighting for their religion when in fact they are fighting for survival.
Glad to see you are breathing!
I disagree with your viewpoint, however. Perhaps we can get this thread to 1,000 posts.
My viewpoint is that religion is only useful to the point that it provides survival for the members of the congregation. If the security of the establishment fails, and it always does, it will be every man for himself. History is full of examples where the institution fails yet the people survive. Eventually, I see all religion falling by the wayside because it will no longer provide survival for the members. Science is our only hope for survival.
When a catastrophic worldwide life threatening event happens, only science will have a chance to save humanity. You can pray for intervention from your god, but historically the odds are against you. I would suggest that it would be better to put your faith in science rather than any religion. I can foresee all religions fading away beginning with the middle eastern based sects and eventually all of them with perhaps the exception of Buddhism as the last remaining religion, because it does not deify any idol or prophet per se. As Buddha said, if any doctrine does not sound reasonable or logical, do not believe it. I believe none of the traditional biblical doctrines because they are completely illogical. The bible is in conflict with science. I'm going with science. Not as a religion but as a reasonable system of living.
Whether this world was created or evolved, there is still only one law: Survival of the fittest.
Organized religions were established as a result of this singular law. Us against them.
In time of plenty it is much easier to convince oneself that peace prevails, but the planet is just three missed meals away from total anarchy.
The islamist extremists are striking the west because the west has plenty and they do not. They become disillusioned that they are fighting for their religion when in fact they are fighting for survival.
Glad to see you are breathing!
I disagree with your viewpoint, however. Perhaps we can get this thread to 1,000 posts.
My viewpoint is that religion is only useful to the point that it provides survival for the members of the congregation. If the security of the establishment fails, and it always does, it will be every man for himself. History is full of examples where the institution fails yet the people survive. Eventually, I see all religion falling by the wayside because it will no longer provide survival for the members. Science is our only hope for survival.
When a catastrophic worldwide life threatening event happens, only science will have a chance to save humanity. You can pray for intervention from your god, but historically the odds are against you. I would suggest that it would be better to put your faith in science rather than any religion. I can foresee all religions fading away beginning with the middle eastern based sects and eventually all of them with perhaps the exception of Buddhism as the last remaining religion, because it does not deify any idol or prophet per se. As Buddha said, if any doctrine does not sound reasonable or logical, do not believe it. I believe none of the traditional biblical doctrines because they are completely illogical. The bible is in conflict with science. I'm going with science. Not as a religion but as a reasonable system of living.
When the beliefs are shared in places like Africa or in schools, it's imposing that belief on others and when it has known destructive effects such as furthering the prevalence of AIDS or teen pregnancy then it's harmful:
"For the Christian, abortion is not an option. Even though it is legally available, God does not condone it. Yes, pregnancy is hard and uncomfortable and the thought of childbirth might be scary, but these are all natural processes which God designed."
It makes no sense. God loves you but he wants you to suffer where it's unnecessary. The reality is that it's people who want other people to suffer for not believing the same things they do.
That's not a decisive statement. The debate is over what the limits are. Everybody starts with everything being ok but gradually it gets cut back to some form of restriction, which by definition is not free speech. The very idea of having libel/defamation laws mean you can't say what you want about people. This is like the telecoms companies with unlimited bandwidth; it's unlimited with restrictions.
Truly free speech is consequence-free speech and we don't have that, never have, never will.
Would you still fight for that right if you weren't so sure I was going to hell? There's a documentary following a more extreme branch of the Christian religion and some of the people are perfectly passive with the sins being committed but they repeat over and over that it's because hell is the destination:
.
1. Again, you conveniently ignore the abstinence belief. You wanna stop the spread of STDs, abstinence is 100% effective.
2. Pregnancy isn't a disease. If you choose to have sex, that could be an outcome. And you think it's God's punishment to woman? What about the death sentence to the unborn child? It's a life.
3. There's a limit to every freedom you have. You can't incite violence. You can't risk the safety of others. You can't defame.
4. I don't think I said you're going to hell. But even if you were, you're not there now. So you still have a right to be offensive.
There's a limit to every freedom you have. You can't incite violence. You can't risk the safety of others. You can't defame.
That's what I'm saying, people have limited freedom. You'll often hear people in Western societies say that we can say things in the West because we have freedom of speech when what they should say is we have freer or less restrictive speech, which isn't the same thing.
You can say anything you want, except anything deemed overly hateful, libellous, defamatory, inciteful, racist, sexist or obscene. The exceptions in the last part negate the use of 'anything you want'.
Some people would then say you still have a right to say it meaning you have the opportunity as though Eastern cultures somehow manage to constantly interrupt you before you can say anything bad. The problem is always consequences, not a lack of opportunity.
There was a BBC news reporter who mentioned to a Jewish person who was talking about being targeted that Palestinians have also suffered at the hands of Jews:
If only he lived in a Western democracy where they promote freedom of speech. See the highest ranked comments at the bottom of the news article: "Freedom of speech, only when it suits", "The irony of attacks on freedom of speech seem to have gone completely over some people's heads!".
Eventually, I see all religion falling by the wayside because it will no longer provide survival for the members. Science is our only hope for survival.
I think religion will remain as long as science can't explain life, gravity, emotion and the origins of the universe among other things. People don't like unanswered questions and religion fills in the gaps. If science can overcome the larger issues, religion will fall away. 6 billion out of 7 billion people following a religion shows we have a while to go.
The Pope has spoken about the attacks calling out deviant forms of religion:
"Rejection is an attitude we all share; it makes us see our neighbour not as a brother or sister to be accepted, but as unworthy of our attention, a rival, or someone to be bent to our will.
The personal dimension of rejection is inevitably accompanied by a social dimension, a culture of rejection which severs the deepest and most authentic human bonds, leading to the breakdown of society and spawning violence and death. We see painful evidence of this in the events reported daily in the news, not least the tragic slayings which took place in Paris a few days ago. Other people “are no longer regarded as beings of equal dignity, as brothers or sisters sharing a common humanity, but rather as objects...
Religious fundamentalism, even before it eliminates human beings by perpetrating horrendous killings, eliminates God himself, turning him into a mere ideological pretext."
Religious fundamentalism doesn't eliminate God, the danger is in considering God a very active and vengeful, real entity, which is part of his own religion. The part about rejection is similar to the idea of survival being a driving force but it's ideological survival as well as physical.
Christians may get on board with what he's saying but I doubt all of them will agree with the part further down:
"A change of attitude is needed on our part, moving from indifference and fear to genuine acceptance of others. This of course calls for “enacting adequate legislation to protect the rights of… citizens and to ensure the acceptance of immigrants”. This will also enable immigrants to return at some point to their own country and to contribute to its growth and development."
Immigration and acceptance is consistent with the view that fundamentalism should be diminished because it's isolation that fuels fundamentalism - you can't convert Muslims to Christianity if they aren't exposed to it. However, the terrorists in the Paris attack were French children of immigrants who then went to Yemen to be trained as fighters and allowed to return to France to commit their attack. The setup he promotes allowed the Paris attack to take place and has not resulted in peace.
The Pope also attacks legislation that benefits cohabitation over families (an indirect attack on homosexual couples):
"Then too, the family itself is not infrequently considered disposable, thanks to the spread of an individualistic and self-centred culture which severs human bonds and leads to a dramatic fall in birth rates, as well as legislation which benefits various forms of cohabitation rather than adequately supporting the family for the welfare of society as a whole."
This is a form of rejection like the kind he condemned. Acceptance is ok as long as you're following the same ideas. He spoke about changing legislation to suit his views of what leads to peace.
The trouble is, everyone is trying to change legislation to promote their own view of what is the most peaceful outcome. People who are more liberal think peace comes from being more accepting and more tolerant and yet France is one of the most tolerant countries and the Paris attack happened as a result of being lax on immigration. People who are more conservative think peace comes from being less tolerant and yet that's the mentality of the people who committed the attack.
Clearly being wholly liberal or conservative is not the solution, it has to be both. People have to be tolerant of good ideas and cultures and intolerant of bad ones just as people are tolerant of good uses of free speech and intolerant of bad uses of it. But this just gets back to the age old problem of how to decide between right and wrong.
How do you choose which parts of a religion to follow or which religion and which to condemn? Can you choose these independently of the bias inherent in your upbringing? When people talk about peace, it's never a universal peace, the goal is peace according to their own level of comfort, free from personal persecution and attack. We all judge things according to our own experience. We abhor conflict in the West when 12 people are killed but ignore conflict in the East where thousands are killed.
If we block immigration and deport people where we decide that they're harmful, that justifies doing it everywhere. Blocking and deporting Muslims for the potential of violence can justify blocking and deporting any immigrant for the potential of economic harm or an increase in crime. Do we distinguish between a religion and a culture? Saudi Arabia beheads people by law, should we block all people who willingly abide under an intolerant system of law yet adhere to no religion such as Saudi Arabian atheists? They've even been made illegal:
Conflict arises from people putting their own interests ahead of the interests of others, which is a trait that is inherent in every living thing. If we fight against this inherent self-interest / survival instinct, it creates a weakness that can be exploited by people who promote it e.g:
Tolerant Person A: I will tolerate your ideas, your immigration, your rights and strive for peace, I come unarmed
Intolerant Person B: Thanks, I don't tolerate your ideas and your tolerance now allows me to kill you easily
This goes for economic issues too e.g communist countries and liberal people trend towards poverty whereas capitalist and self-interested people trend towards wealth because the motivation drives the outcome. That might lead people to consider that intolerance and greed are the ways forward for a successful society but if you look at the most economically and socially progressive countries in the world, they are ones that maintain a healthy balance between freedom and law and capitalism and welfare.
Having a balance inevitably diminishes one side or the other - too much freedom diminishes the power of the law, too restrictive laws diminish people's freedom. Mandating that religious people be tolerant of others diminishes their religious beliefs:
"Section 9 of the Marriage (Same Sex Couples) Act 2013, which comes into effect next year, grants anyone in a civil partnership the ability to convert that partnership into a “marriage.” But the law contains measures specifically to preclude unwilling churches from being forced to participate."
All these cases involve religion and the easy answer is that religion is the problem but it's broader than that and encompasses things that aren't grouped under a religious banner. Communism, dictatorships, Nazism, deviant sexual attractions are not religions but considered to various degrees bad ideas that people similarly adhere to. People all have in common the ability to make rational decisions and we all have an aversion to harm. The dangerous element of religion is establishing harm outside of a rational context. You can't prove rationally that God isn't offended by something nor that punishment or reward doesn't await you in the after-life. Real-world harm can be witnessed and rationalized and so those bad ideas can be dealt with.
We can't make irrational religions go away in the same way we can't make irrational culture go away, the best that can be done is to try to change how people process information through education. That requires allowing, even encouraging those people into a progressive society with conditions. The conditions must include that these people aren't given the opportunity to corrupt their way of processing information through their education. Western societies are trying to do this by suppressing religious teaching in public schools but there can't be tolerance of private religious schools and the bad ideas in religion have to be explicitly countered. The Muslims on the following page clearly understand that the notion of murder in response to cartoons is a bad idea so there needs to be more of the education they received:
You can say anything you want, except anything deemed overly hateful, libellous, defamatory, inciteful, racist, sexist or obscene.
Not really… You have the right to hate and disagree.
Here’s an interesting take on the discussion. It eliminates the loopholes used to illegally prevent “hate” speech. I just prefer our existing verbiage and the removal of the therefore illegal restrictions on speech otherwise mentioned here.
Free speech is considered a basic requirement for freedom, for a modern, civilized society. I don't need to explain why free speech is important, yet I will before I move on.
Free speech is considered a right because it implies freedom of thought. Furthermore, it empowers ordinary citizens by allowing them to denounce corrupt leaders and it protects them from abuse. Free speech leads to a better informed, better educated and ultimately stronger society.
But what limits should be put on free speech? The seemingly obvious answer is none: How can you say you have free speech if there are things you can't say? Therefore, hate speech and blasphemy laws are antithetical to free speech as they can be abused to shut down opposition to corrupt powers.
Yet, anyone with an ounce of sense knows some things can objectively be very harmful to say. This is why we have slander and libel laws, as an example: You're not allowed to spread lies about a person or organization. But then, if you're not allowed to lie, what stops the powers that be from simply claiming that you are lying to shut down your right to free speech?
And that's not all. In wartime, crucial strategic information must be censored for the interest of the nation. Any information which is known to the public is information known to the enemy, thus it becomes necessary to restrict free speech. Yet, again, corrupt powers could abuse this to claim those who oppose them are helping the enemy to shut them down. We have quite a conundrum here. So, what constitutes acceptable free speech and what doesn't?
Ergo, it is my belief that "free speech" should be abandoned as a concept, as it is self-defeating. Instead, it should be replaced by three more specific rights:
1. The right to criticize.
2. The right to question.
3. The right to hate.
These three rights encompass everything which free speech aims to defend without the inconvenience of ambiguity which mere "free speech" offers. They provide the right to disagree with others and explain why you do, the right to question what you are told and the right to dislike someone or something. Meanwhile, libel and slander are still disallowed while censoring critical strategic information remains moral.
Comments
The only distinction you make there is between people following up on what you say or not. With the amount of followup attacks that have been mounting in past instances, law enforcement is actually prosecuting people without there being actual violence.
http://www.omaha.com/news/crime/suspect-arrested-after-bomb-threats-made-to-high-schools-via/article_8a0221d0-8291-11e4-91af-6bbea70b1403.html
http://www.today.com/money/students-arrested-expelled-making-violent-twitter-threats-790755
http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-ln-schools-closure-arrest-20150107-story.html
In the cases I mentioned, the people didn't commit any violence themselves, they were charged over their Facebook posts.
Not all pornography is obscene as far as the law is concerned and you can be arrested and put in prison for it:
http://www.fbi.gov/losangeles/press-releases/2013/ira-isaacs-sentenced-in-adult-obscenity-case
That guy was convicted of producing porn involving human bodily waste, which not a lot of people know is against the law. They probably go more lightly on possession of certain types of extreme porn but it's illegal nonetheless.
http://www.nerdsociety.com/man-arrested-possession-manga/
It depends on what has been said and where. If a major newspaper wilfully published something that was anti-semitic then there would probably be a bigger outcry than a teenager calling someone a racial epithet on Youtube. Prosecutions are judged on individual cases. You have the right to offend people until the law decides you've gone too far and they prosecute you. The past convictions for hateful rhetoric are evidence that you don't have complete freedom to say what you want. It's easy to think you do because you never choose to put it to the test.
The word multiculturalism has been misused but it means the same as diversity. You're talking about the suppression of individual cultures in order to respect them all. That's an effect of how people implement multiculturalism/diversity but the idea of multiple cultures co-existing in close proximity is not an evil concept at all.
There's no well-defined distinction between hatred and mockery. You can mock a person to the point of suicide.
France did have a law against blasphemy and currently is limited to a small region:
http://www.secularism.org.uk/news/2014/02/french-islamists-seek-to-use-blasphemy-law-to-silence-critics
"French Islamists are suing the satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo for blasphemy after it published a front cover carrying the slogan "The Koran is crap, it doesn't stop bullets".
Taking advantage of the existence of the crime of "blasphemy" uniquely available in the Alsace-Moselle region - it no longer exists in the rest of French common law – The League of Judicial Defence of Muslims (LDJM), led by the former lawyer Karim Achoui, has brought the case against Charlie Hebdo to the Criminal Court in Alsace-Moselle's capital, Strasbourg.
Alsace-Moselle was annexed by Germany in 1871 and 1940-45 and retained part of the old German code when it returned to France.
One complication is that the Alsatian blasphemy law does not recognise Islam, covering only Catholicism, three forms of Protestantism and Judaism. This test case will decide whether the law can be widened to include Islam."
I think in general people do try to give satirical and comedic contexts special privilege, which annoys certain news channels because they don't get the same treatment but if you write a hateful message in an article and take that same message but put it beside a drawing, the context doesn't always change the meaning. It's fortunate that modern Western laws are becoming less restrictive and less reverential towards religion but you can't say that's evidence that we have completely free speech, we only have as much as the recent governments have allowed to be free and it's not unrestricted. The level of restriction they have now is not universally agreed and it could be changed to be more or less restrictive with a different government, which is obviously what Islamists would want to do.
Should a person be allowed to publish a manual on how to abuse children without being caught or a manual on how to construct bombs from household materials (like Anders Breivik did) or how to 3D print weapons in countries with strict gun laws, would you say these fall under free speech or not? Whether yes or no, why would you decide it and who has the authority to decide?
Here's a few things that have cropped up concerning the Hebdo attack:
The family of one jihadist has condemned his actions:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2905346/Family-kosher-deli-jihadist-Amedy-Coulibaly-condemn-attacks-Paris-say-not-share-gunman-s-extreme-ideas.html
A Muslim store keeper helped the Jewish shoppers who were attacked:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2903829/Saved-hiding-FREEZER-Thirty-Jewish-shoppers-avoided-taken-hostage-kosher-deli-shutting-cold-storage-huddling-stay-warm.html
Rupert Murdoch has said to hold all Muslims accountable for their jihadist minority:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2904914/Anger-Rupert-Murdoch-says-Muslims-held-responsible-terror-attacks-France.html
A Muslim preacher in London has promoted the attacks and streamed his support online to thousands of followers:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2905075/Hate-preacher-backs-massacres-says-Britain-enemy-Islam.html
That Muslim preacher is clearly exercising his freedom of speech to further promote the idea that this kind of violence is an acceptable response. There has been a firebombing at a paper that republished the cartoons:
http://news.yahoo.com/arson-attack-german-paper-ran-charlie-hebdo-cartoons-065348454.html
I don't think that passive Muslims deserve to be condemned along with extremists but the Muslim community could certainly make more impact on the problem as Rupert Murdoch was alluding to. The media could help too by making the stories of Muslims condemning the attacks and helping more prominent. People give meaning to words by association and when the media is inundated with articles linking terrorism and Islam then that's all people hear.
But should governments go as far as to suppress the freedom of speech of the Muslim clerics spreading hateful messages by treating them as inciting hatred and violence? Maybe even go as far as banning the texts that promote jihadism under propaganda laws? The laws restricting propaganda would need to be put back first:
http://www.businessinsider.com/ndaa-legalizes-propaganda-2012-5
For your information, Christ was born at the birth of Christ. ????
Matthew 5:17 - 5:19
17"Do not think that I came to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I did not come to abolish but to fulfill. 18"For truly I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not the smallest letter or stroke shall pass from the Law until all is accomplished. 19"Whoever then annuls one of the least of these commandments, and teaches others to do the same, shall be called least in the kingdom of heaven; but whoever keeps and teaches them, he shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven.…
Matthew 5:17 - 5:19
17"Do not think that I came to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I did not come to abolish but to fulfill. 18"For truly I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not the smallest letter or stroke shall pass from the Law until all is accomplished. 19"Whoever then annuls one of the least of these commandments, and teaches others to do the same, shall be called least in the kingdom of heaven; but whoever keeps and teaches them, he shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven.…
Wait, so does this mean that Christians have to keep the Old Testament? Because I'm pretty sure it says somewhere else that they don't
That’s diversity. “Multiculturalism” as a concept is evil. You’re saying that yourself; you can’t lump all cultures together. The VARIETY of food and music is diversity. Trying to combine them creates inedible mush, unlistenable noise, etc.
The word multiculturalism has been misused but it means the same as diversity. You're talking about the suppression of individual cultures in order to respect them all. That's an effect of how people implement multiculturalism/diversity but the idea of multiple cultures co-existing in close proximity is not an evil concept at all.
It is impossible to promote all cultures equally without demeaning all of them equally.
Multiculturalism is like saying that we should promote Timmy's recording of Twinkle Twinkle little star aged 2 just as much as Bach's B minor Mass, because, y'know, like, equality, man, diversity, man.
The promotion of multiculturalism fosters mediocrity and resentment, and is an abhorrent, twisted fantasy of liberals that needs to be extinguished forever.
When the beliefs are shared in places like Africa or in schools, it's imposing that belief on others and when it has known destructive effects such as furthering the prevalence of AIDS or teen pregnancy then it's harmful:
[VIDEO]
Surely the harm it causes contradicts the other parts of religious text that say to care for others. Some religious people believe that these harmful outcomes are delivered by God:
http://christiananswers.net/q-eden/edn-f020.html
"it seems more than coincidence that the AIDS epidemic surfaced just at the time in history when homosexuality, sexual license and drug use had attained the widest use and highest degree of general social aceptance in all known history. There is obviously a cause-and-effect relation, whether or not it is a direct judgment from God.
The latter should at least be considered as a contingent possibility in light of the many Biblical examples of plagues sent by God in judgment on sins."
http://412teens.org/qna/how-should-a-Christian-teen-handle-unwanted-pregnancy.php
"For the Christian, abortion is not an option. Even though it is legally available, God does not condone it. Yes, pregnancy is hard and uncomfortable and the thought of childbirth might be scary, but these are all natural processes which God designed."
It makes no sense. God loves you but he wants you to suffer where it's unnecessary. The reality is that it's people who want other people to suffer for not believing the same things they do.
They're clearly not the same actions but it's the same thought process of expecting capital punishments for minor misdeeds. Some Islamists are dishing out judgements in the present rather than leaving it up to Allah to decide. Christians seem to want the same kind of punishment for other actions (including by default) but are more expectant that God will be the one to do it. The expectation is the same: believe what I say or you will suffer immensely; if not now, in the after-life.
That's not a decisive statement. The debate is over what the limits are. Everybody starts with everything being ok but gradually it gets cut back to some form of restriction, which by definition is not free speech. The very idea of having libel/defamation laws mean you can't say what you want about people. This is like the telecoms companies with unlimited bandwidth; it's unlimited with restrictions.
Truly free speech is consequence-free speech and we don't have that, never have, never will.
Would you still fight for that right if you weren't so sure I was going to hell? There's a documentary following a more extreme branch of the Christian religion and some of the people are perfectly passive with the sins being committed but they repeat over and over that it's because hell is the destination:
[VIDEO]
Now these people are dismissed as not representative of their religion but that's the case with Muslim extremists.
They don't have to be promoted equally, just tolerated where it makes sense - jihadism being an example that shouldn't be tolerated. Having a singular culture is simply not possible.
Nice liberal impression but having cultures co-exist doesn't mean everybody has to partake in each one, it's about being respectful towards them. You don't for example have to celebrate Jewish or Hindu events yourself but just respect that they exist and don't suggest deporting the people to keep their culture out.
I’m doing no such thing. That’s what multiculturalism is.
It does in the countries in which multiculturalism is foisted strongest.
You've got some nice quotes there.
I can see you're a closet Christian.
Come out! You know you want to. ????
Whether this world was created or evolved, there is still only one law: Survival of the fittest.
Organized religions were established as a result of this singular law. Us against them.
In time of plenty it is much easier to convince oneself that peace prevails, but the planet is just three missed meals away from total anarchy.
The islamist extremists are striking the west because the west has plenty and they do not. They become disillusioned that they are fighting for their religion when in fact they are fighting for survival.
Glad to see you are breathing!
I disagree with your viewpoint, however. Perhaps we can get this thread to 1,000 posts.
My viewpoint is that religion is only useful to the point that it provides survival for the members of the congregation. If the security of the establishment fails, and it always does, it will be every man for himself. History is full of examples where the institution fails yet the people survive. Eventually, I see all religion falling by the wayside because it will no longer provide survival for the members. Science is our only hope for survival.
When a catastrophic worldwide life threatening event happens, only science will have a chance to save humanity. You can pray for intervention from your god, but historically the odds are against you. I would suggest that it would be better to put your faith in science rather than any religion. I can foresee all religions fading away beginning with the middle eastern based sects and eventually all of them with perhaps the exception of Buddhism as the last remaining religion, because it does not deify any idol or prophet per se. As Buddha said, if any doctrine does not sound reasonable or logical, do not believe it. I believe none of the traditional biblical doctrines because they are completely illogical. The bible is in conflict with science. I'm going with science. Not as a religion but as a reasonable system of living.
Where do you think science comes from?
Where do you think science comes from?
Science comes from scientists.
The laws of physics are things to be discovered. No one knows how the universe came to be.
Church of Christ, Scientist and Scientology are not what you think they are.
And where do the laws of physics come from?
I can only tell you where they do not come from: Bronze age scriptures.
Allah!
1. Again, you conveniently ignore the abstinence belief. You wanna stop the spread of STDs, abstinence is 100% effective.
2. Pregnancy isn't a disease. If you choose to have sex, that could be an outcome. And you think it's God's punishment to woman? What about the death sentence to the unborn child? It's a life.
3. There's a limit to every freedom you have. You can't incite violence. You can't risk the safety of others. You can't defame.
4. I don't think I said you're going to hell. But even if you were, you're not there now. So you still have a right to be offensive.
I think the Boston Marathon bombing could be considered serious. Three killed and a couple of hundred injured.
I think the Boston Marathon bombing could be considered serious. Three killed and a couple of hundred injured.
Anyone who doesn't consider that a serious attack is a few nuggets short of a happy meal.
That's what I'm saying, people have limited freedom. You'll often hear people in Western societies say that we can say things in the West because we have freedom of speech when what they should say is we have freer or less restrictive speech, which isn't the same thing.
You can say anything you want, except anything deemed overly hateful, libellous, defamatory, inciteful, racist, sexist or obscene. The exceptions in the last part negate the use of 'anything you want'.
Some people would then say you still have a right to say it meaning you have the opportunity as though Eastern cultures somehow manage to constantly interrupt you before you can say anything bad. The problem is always consequences, not a lack of opportunity.
There was a BBC news reporter who mentioned to a Jewish person who was talking about being targeted that Palestinians have also suffered at the hands of Jews:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2906539/Calls-BBC-reporter-resign-told-daughter-Holocaust-survivors-Paris-Palestinians-suffer-hugely-Jewish-hands-well.html
People are calling for his resignation (on twitter of course #WillcoxMustGo and change.org).
https://www.change.org/p/bbc-bbc-and-tim-willcox-apologize-for-insensitive-question-at-paris-march
If only he lived in a Western democracy where they promote freedom of speech. See the highest ranked comments at the bottom of the news article: "Freedom of speech, only when it suits", "The irony of attacks on freedom of speech seem to have gone completely over some people's heads!".
I think religion will remain as long as science can't explain life, gravity, emotion and the origins of the universe among other things. People don't like unanswered questions and religion fills in the gaps. If science can overcome the larger issues, religion will fall away. 6 billion out of 7 billion people following a religion shows we have a while to go.
The Pope has spoken about the attacks calling out deviant forms of religion:
http://news.yahoo.com/pope-slams-deviant-forms-religion-paris-attacks-101236613.html
http://www.catholicherald.co.uk/news/2015/01/12/full-text-the-popes-speech-to-the-diplomatic-corp/
"Rejection is an attitude we all share; it makes us see our neighbour not as a brother or sister to be accepted, but as unworthy of our attention, a rival, or someone to be bent to our will.
The personal dimension of rejection is inevitably accompanied by a social dimension, a culture of rejection which severs the deepest and most authentic human bonds, leading to the breakdown of society and spawning violence and death. We see painful evidence of this in the events reported daily in the news, not least the tragic slayings which took place in Paris a few days ago. Other people “are no longer regarded as beings of equal dignity, as brothers or sisters sharing a common humanity, but rather as objects...
Religious fundamentalism, even before it eliminates human beings by perpetrating horrendous killings, eliminates God himself, turning him into a mere ideological pretext."
Religious fundamentalism doesn't eliminate God, the danger is in considering God a very active and vengeful, real entity, which is part of his own religion. The part about rejection is similar to the idea of survival being a driving force but it's ideological survival as well as physical.
Christians may get on board with what he's saying but I doubt all of them will agree with the part further down:
"A change of attitude is needed on our part, moving from indifference and fear to genuine acceptance of others. This of course calls for “enacting adequate legislation to protect the rights of… citizens and to ensure the acceptance of immigrants”. This will also enable immigrants to return at some point to their own country and to contribute to its growth and development."
Immigration and acceptance is consistent with the view that fundamentalism should be diminished because it's isolation that fuels fundamentalism - you can't convert Muslims to Christianity if they aren't exposed to it. However, the terrorists in the Paris attack were French children of immigrants who then went to Yemen to be trained as fighters and allowed to return to France to commit their attack. The setup he promotes allowed the Paris attack to take place and has not resulted in peace.
The Pope also attacks legislation that benefits cohabitation over families (an indirect attack on homosexual couples):
"Then too, the family itself is not infrequently considered disposable, thanks to the spread of an individualistic and self-centred culture which severs human bonds and leads to a dramatic fall in birth rates, as well as legislation which benefits various forms of cohabitation rather than adequately supporting the family for the welfare of society as a whole."
This is a form of rejection like the kind he condemned. Acceptance is ok as long as you're following the same ideas. He spoke about changing legislation to suit his views of what leads to peace.
The trouble is, everyone is trying to change legislation to promote their own view of what is the most peaceful outcome. People who are more liberal think peace comes from being more accepting and more tolerant and yet France is one of the most tolerant countries and the Paris attack happened as a result of being lax on immigration. People who are more conservative think peace comes from being less tolerant and yet that's the mentality of the people who committed the attack.
Clearly being wholly liberal or conservative is not the solution, it has to be both. People have to be tolerant of good ideas and cultures and intolerant of bad ones just as people are tolerant of good uses of free speech and intolerant of bad uses of it. But this just gets back to the age old problem of how to decide between right and wrong.
How do you choose which parts of a religion to follow or which religion and which to condemn? Can you choose these independently of the bias inherent in your upbringing? When people talk about peace, it's never a universal peace, the goal is peace according to their own level of comfort, free from personal persecution and attack. We all judge things according to our own experience. We abhor conflict in the West when 12 people are killed but ignore conflict in the East where thousands are killed.
If we block immigration and deport people where we decide that they're harmful, that justifies doing it everywhere. Blocking and deporting Muslims for the potential of violence can justify blocking and deporting any immigrant for the potential of economic harm or an increase in crime. Do we distinguish between a religion and a culture? Saudi Arabia beheads people by law, should we block all people who willingly abide under an intolerant system of law yet adhere to no religion such as Saudi Arabian atheists? They've even been made illegal:
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-east/saudi-arabia-declares-all-atheists-are-terrorists-in-new-law-to-crack-down-on-political-dissidents-9228389.html
Conflict arises from people putting their own interests ahead of the interests of others, which is a trait that is inherent in every living thing. If we fight against this inherent self-interest / survival instinct, it creates a weakness that can be exploited by people who promote it e.g:
Tolerant Person A: I will tolerate your ideas, your immigration, your rights and strive for peace, I come unarmed
Intolerant Person B: Thanks, I don't tolerate your ideas and your tolerance now allows me to kill you easily
This goes for economic issues too e.g communist countries and liberal people trend towards poverty whereas capitalist and self-interested people trend towards wealth because the motivation drives the outcome. That might lead people to consider that intolerance and greed are the ways forward for a successful society but if you look at the most economically and socially progressive countries in the world, they are ones that maintain a healthy balance between freedom and law and capitalism and welfare.
Having a balance inevitably diminishes one side or the other - too much freedom diminishes the power of the law, too restrictive laws diminish people's freedom. Mandating that religious people be tolerant of others diminishes their religious beliefs:
https://www.lifesitenews.com/news/i-am-still-not-getting-what-i-want-gay-couple-suing-church-for-refusing-wed
"Section 9 of the Marriage (Same Sex Couples) Act 2013, which comes into effect next year, grants anyone in a civil partnership the ability to convert that partnership into a “marriage.” But the law contains measures specifically to preclude unwilling churches from being forced to participate."
All these cases involve religion and the easy answer is that religion is the problem but it's broader than that and encompasses things that aren't grouped under a religious banner. Communism, dictatorships, Nazism, deviant sexual attractions are not religions but considered to various degrees bad ideas that people similarly adhere to. People all have in common the ability to make rational decisions and we all have an aversion to harm. The dangerous element of religion is establishing harm outside of a rational context. You can't prove rationally that God isn't offended by something nor that punishment or reward doesn't await you in the after-life. Real-world harm can be witnessed and rationalized and so those bad ideas can be dealt with.
We can't make irrational religions go away in the same way we can't make irrational culture go away, the best that can be done is to try to change how people process information through education. That requires allowing, even encouraging those people into a progressive society with conditions. The conditions must include that these people aren't given the opportunity to corrupt their way of processing information through their education. Western societies are trying to do this by suppressing religious teaching in public schools but there can't be tolerance of private religious schools and the bad ideas in religion have to be explicitly countered. The Muslims on the following page clearly understand that the notion of murder in response to cartoons is a bad idea so there needs to be more of the education they received:
http://blogs.spectator.co.uk/coffeehouse/2015/01/not-in-our-name-muslims-respond-in-revulsion-to-charlie-hebdo-shooting/
Not really… You have the right to hate and disagree.
Here’s an interesting take on the discussion. It eliminates the loopholes used to illegally prevent “hate” speech. I just prefer our existing verbiage and the removal of the therefore illegal restrictions on speech otherwise mentioned here.
Free speech is considered a right because it implies freedom of thought. Furthermore, it empowers ordinary citizens by allowing them to denounce corrupt leaders and it protects them from abuse. Free speech leads to a better informed, better educated and ultimately stronger society.
But what limits should be put on free speech? The seemingly obvious answer is none: How can you say you have free speech if there are things you can't say? Therefore, hate speech and blasphemy laws are antithetical to free speech as they can be abused to shut down opposition to corrupt powers.
Yet, anyone with an ounce of sense knows some things can objectively be very harmful to say. This is why we have slander and libel laws, as an example: You're not allowed to spread lies about a person or organization. But then, if you're not allowed to lie, what stops the powers that be from simply claiming that you are lying to shut down your right to free speech?
And that's not all. In wartime, crucial strategic information must be censored for the interest of the nation. Any information which is known to the public is information known to the enemy, thus it becomes necessary to restrict free speech. Yet, again, corrupt powers could abuse this to claim those who oppose them are helping the enemy to shut them down. We have quite a conundrum here. So, what constitutes acceptable free speech and what doesn't?
Ergo, it is my belief that "free speech" should be abandoned as a concept, as it is self-defeating. Instead, it should be replaced by three more specific rights:
1. The right to criticize.
2. The right to question.
3. The right to hate.
These three rights encompass everything which free speech aims to defend without the inconvenience of ambiguity which mere "free speech" offers. They provide the right to disagree with others and explain why you do, the right to question what you are told and the right to dislike someone or something. Meanwhile, libel and slander are still disallowed while censoring critical strategic information remains moral.
What profit?