4 ms·

Where I grew up, websites used to be blocked by my government because of blasphemy and morality reasons. Criticism of Islam, pro secularism, and yes also porn.

Where I grew up, websites used to be blocked by my government because of blasphemy and morality reasons. Criticism of Islam, pro secularism, and yes also porn. I used kazaa to get "God delusion" and "satanic verses", books that would have gotten me into serious trouble. Please don't let that happen in America. Making up hate or blasphemy reasons is very easy.

refurb 9y ago
This is the challenge. It's easy to argue speech you don't like is "encouraging violence" and should be censored. However, you create a path for the next person to use the same argument to censor other speech. Maybe they'll be riots over the next war involving the US and it'll be for "the good of society, to prevent violence" and it'll get censored as well.
randomstudent 9y ago
Not saying that I agree, but some people say that the best way of making sure what you describe doesn't happen to America is by stopping the Nazis right now. Yes, you loose the high ground of supporting absolute free speech but supposedly you gain a more restricted form of free speech that is more likely to stand the test of time.
- devmunchies 9y ago
  This is assuming that there is some nazi uprising, but the thing is, there aren't any powerful nazi groups in the US. There is no point in wasting your time in "stopping the Nazis". Everyone keeps shouting about nazis but its such a small threat, and is only gaining traction because people are obsessed.
0xcde4c3db 9y ago
In case anyone is unfamiliar, a major thing to understand about The Satanic Verses is that it isn't even some kind of anti-Islam screed, just a historical fantasy novel that uses the history and lore of Islam as a framing device, much like several of Dan Brown's novels do with Christianity (though Rushdie is apparently a much better writer). Anyway, we've had this sort of thing in America, but we've probably largely forgotten the history (Lady Chatterly's Lover, Fanny Hill, and so on) and haven't really paid attention to the small-scale occurrences that are still ongoing (e.g. public school libraries are often pressured to remove "controversial" books).
eli_gottlieb 9y ago
Nobody is trying to give the government power to censor. Everyone is saying that private companies have no moral obligation to materially support neo-Nazis. Yes, there are concerns about concentrated, oligopolistic markets, but those are solved by breaking up the major players -- not by legislating some requirement of fair service for literal swastika-waving, Roman-saluting Nazis. People are not entitled to claim freedom of speech for posting Nazi trash on their own private website, and then claim freedom of speech from other private entities refusing to do business with them. Everyone has a negative right to express Nazi views. Nobody has a positive entitlement to demand material resources from private actors to express Nazi views. The disgusting thing here is that, for many years, if we on the Left pushed for a universal basic income, or for single-payer health-care, we would have the difference between positive and negative freedoms kindly explained to us by the political center and Right. Now a bunch of (again) literal Nazis have a sad, and that we have to quietly listen to the center and Right tell us there's no more distinction, that Nazis have a positive entitlement to be Nazis? It's completely disingenuous! Or should the Communist Party file a lawsuit to demand a stipend from tech companies for spreading communism?
- ZoeZoeBee 9y ago
  In a bit of irony The Communist Party is illegal in the US. Communist Control Act, 50 U.S. Code § 841 >The Congress finds and declares that the Communist Party of the United States, although purportedly a political party, is in fact an instrumentality of a conspiracy to overthrow the Government of the United States. It constitutes an authoritarian dictatorship within a republic, demanding for itself the rights and privileges accorded to political parties, but denying to all others the liberties guaranteed by the Constitution. https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/50/841 https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/50/841
  - eli_gottlieb 9y ago
    That's actually more-or-less my point. All this high-minded talk about Freedom of Speech isn't all that high-minded at all. Somehow it always leaves aside the fact that the Left is always repressed with state power and vigilante violence, and the Right (at least, the non-Nazi Right) always gets to switch out philosophies like a damned shell game to justify whatever it wants. If we stand for the "right" of Nazis to compel private actors to do business with them (and holy shit does that violate the typical libertarian-capitalist positions of the American Right!), why don't we stand for the actual right of Communists, revolutionary socialists, democratic socialists, and anarchists to operate openly at all?
morgante 9y ago
If the government had forced this domain to be taken down, then I would be outraged. I don't think private companies have an obligation to support hateful websites.

refurb 9y ago

This is the challenge. It's easy to argue speech you don't like is "encouraging violence" and should be censored. However, you create a path for the next person to use the same argument to censor other speech. Maybe they'll be riots over the next war involving the US and it'll be for "the good of society, to prevent violence" and it'll get censored as well.

randomstudent 9y ago

Not saying that I agree, but some people say that the best way of making sure what you describe doesn't happen to America is by stopping the Nazis right now. Yes, you loose the high ground of supporting absolute free speech but supposedly you gain a more restricted form of free speech that is more likely to stand the test of time.

devmunchies 9y ago
This is assuming that there is some nazi uprising, but the thing is, there aren't any powerful nazi groups in the US. There is no point in wasting your time in "stopping the Nazis". Everyone keeps shouting about nazis but its such a small threat, and is only gaining traction because people are obsessed.

0xcde4c3db 9y ago

In case anyone is unfamiliar, a major thing to understand about The Satanic Verses is that it isn't even some kind of anti-Islam screed, just a historical fantasy novel that uses the history and lore of Islam as a framing device, much like several of Dan Brown's novels do with Christianity (though Rushdie is apparently a much better writer). Anyway, we've had this sort of thing in America, but we've probably largely forgotten the history (Lady Chatterly's Lover, Fanny Hill, and so on) and haven't really paid attention to the small-scale occurrences that are still ongoing (e.g. public school libraries are often pressured to remove "controversial" books).

eli_gottlieb 9y ago

Nobody is trying to give the government power to censor. Everyone is saying that private companies have no moral obligation to materially support neo-Nazis. Yes, there are concerns about concentrated, oligopolistic markets, but those are solved by breaking up the major players -- not by legislating some requirement of fair service for literal swastika-waving, Roman-saluting Nazis. People are not entitled to claim freedom of speech for posting Nazi trash on their own private website, and then claim freedom of speech from other private entities refusing to do business with them. Everyone has a negative right to express Nazi views. Nobody has a positive entitlement to demand material resources from private actors to express Nazi views. The disgusting thing here is that, for many years, if we on the Left pushed for a universal basic income, or for single-payer health-care, we would have the difference between positive and negative freedoms kindly explained to us by the political center and Right. Now a bunch of (again) literal Nazis have a sad, and that we have to quietly listen to the center and Right tell us there's no more distinction, that Nazis have a positive entitlement to be Nazis? It's completely disingenuous! Or should the Communist Party file a lawsuit to demand a stipend from tech companies for spreading communism?

ZoeZoeBee 9y ago
In a bit of irony The Communist Party is illegal in the US. Communist Control Act, 50 U.S. Code § 841 >The Congress finds and declares that the Communist Party of the United States, although purportedly a political party, is in fact an instrumentality of a conspiracy to overthrow the Government of the United States. It constitutes an authoritarian dictatorship within a republic, demanding for itself the rights and privileges accorded to political parties, but denying to all others the liberties guaranteed by the Constitution. https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/50/841 https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/50/841
- eli_gottlieb 9y ago
  That's actually more-or-less my point. All this high-minded talk about Freedom of Speech isn't all that high-minded at all. Somehow it always leaves aside the fact that the Left is always repressed with state power and vigilante violence, and the Right (at least, the non-Nazi Right) always gets to switch out philosophies like a damned shell game to justify whatever it wants. If we stand for the "right" of Nazis to compel private actors to do business with them (and holy shit does that violate the typical libertarian-capitalist positions of the American Right!), why don't we stand for the actual right of Communists, revolutionary socialists, democratic socialists, and anarchists to operate openly at all?

morgante 9y ago

If the government had forced this domain to be taken down, then I would be outraged. I don't think private companies have an obligation to support hateful websites.