4 ms·
When has freedom ever meant violating the rights of others?
by GHFigs 15y ago
When has freedom ever meant violating the rights of others?
- yaix 15y agoIf you are an US American, you may want to go to your nearest Indian reserve and ask them.
- pyre 15y agoHear, hear! They were even kicking Native Americans off of reservations during the Kennedy Administration!
- burgerbrain 15y agoTraditionally, the united states restricts freedom of speech legally in a few fairly well defined cases. In all of them, due process is involved. These domain seizures are such a disturbing issue because there is no due process. They don't even attempt to pretend like it exists. Since when has freedom ever meant violating the rights of others indeed.
- pyre 15y agoEven worse, the seizures don't seem to be the result of ICE investigations so much as some industry (RIAA, MPAA, etc) person gives ICE a list of sites, ICE does some mild amount of confirmation, and then sends it off to a judge. I remember that a number of the rap blogs taken down in the first round, were claiming that the artists themselves (or their PR people) sent the music to them. Now maybe the industry person that told ICE about that site "just didn't know" that the music was legal, but isn't that the point of investigations and due process?
- GHFigs 15y agoThese domain seizures are such a disturbing issue because there is no due process. I agree. What I reject is the entirely different idea expressed in the previous post, to the effect that violating other people's rights is an essential component of the Internet being free.
- burgerbrain 15y agoThe previous post is explicitly referring to a situation that involves gross abuse of rights. Rights far more important than any "right" to copyright protection. And yes, I am suggesting with a straight face that some rights are more important than others.
- GHFigs 15y agoThe previous post is explicitly referring to a situation that involves gross abuse of rights. Which I said nothing about in mine. One might speculate that I omitted such reference because I found no particular fault with what was said about it. I might even agree that domain seizures have various bad properties. If pressed, I might even acknowledge that my objection stems from the same root assumption that people have rights and that having those rights violated is not cool, merely taken to the potentially heretical length that it remains not cool even when it's not a government doing it. Alternately, one might conclude that because the banner I wave is not purest White that I must be the vanguard of an approaching army of Black, crusading enemy of freedom and probably no fun at parties.
- burgerbrain 15y agoOr, I could just take your refusal to clarify your thoughts as confirmation that you're just here to troll, and never actually intended to make a well thought out point.
- GHFigs 15y agoPlease accept my inclination to never post on this subject on HN again as a sign that I was not trolling. It is always exhausting to try to explain what is to me a fairly intuitive and moderate point to an audience that seems quite devoted to misinterpreting it as another salvo in a battle I have no interest in fighting. I am just deeply tired of doing it reflexively out of some weird sense of obligation that you or I or someone will be the better for it when experience tells me in <h1><blink> that boiling replies are never going to simmer down. I have no obligation to explain anything to you, nor you to me. Let's leave it at that.
- nate_meurer 15y ago"right" is an odd word to apply to the ever-expanding American notion of copyright. A legal right it may be, but your use of the word seems to be aimed higher. When I see a statement like this, I read, "when has freedom ever meant disregard for the temporary government-granted monopoly over the distribution rights to creative works created by others". A much more accurate phrasing which doesn't beg the question.
- GHFigs 15y agoLegal rights aren't rights?
- nate_meurer 15y agoI'm not sure what you're asking. Perhaps you meant to ask, "legal rights aren't human rights?" Or maybe, "legal rights aren't inalienable?" Don't let me put words in your mouth, but your vague use of the word "right" in a discussion of a widely acknowledged inalienable right -- freedom of expression -- begs the question.
- GHFigs 15y agoThe entirety of your previous post was putting words in my mouth, and now you're doing it again by suggesting interpretations of what I wrote instead of what I actually wrote. No, thank you.
- burgerbrain 15y agoHow about you provide a clarification in that case?
- GHFigs 15y agoThe easier and healthier option is to just avoid commenting on intellectual property issues on Hacker News in the future.
- 15y ago