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It brings up an interesting question. I live in Israel where there are constant conflicts about what is OK to be shown in public, especially between the religi
by drorco 5y ago
It brings up an interesting question.
I live in Israel where there are constant conflicts about what is OK to be shown in public, especially between the religious and non-religious.
In Jerusalem for example, some ultra-orthodox often vandalize any kind of poster that shows a woman in it. They just tear-out/spray over the women on the poster. Some are ridiculous cases where they defaced a poster of an old woman who survived the holocaust:
https://www.timesofisrael.com/female-holocaust-survivors-portrait-defaced-for-3rd-time-at-jerusalem-exhibit/ https://www.timesofisrael.com/female-holocaust-survivors-por...
Even other groups could be pissed by posters that include things about women's hygiene or show models in swimsuits. In their eyes these are things they make a lot of effort to block from the eyes of their families, and having it in public breaches the culture and education they try to maintain. This is by itself interesting as public adverts can penetrate the most strict censorship that religious groups and cults maintain.
Seculars on the other hand can also be pissed about anti-abortion adverts, religious propaganda, scientology, etc. and ask for them to be banned.
As someone who's trying to be a "free-thinker" and tries to promote it, I think there's no point in hiding in a bubble, blocking yourself from seeing other ideas, even if they're crappy advertisements. All of this as long as the adverts/ideas fit within the aesthetics of the city they're in.
The risk of doing so is essentially losing free-thinking and some sort of communication with isolated social groups.
- b3morales 5y agoCan we make a distinction between postings for different purposes, though? For example, commercial, political, and public education. Do a Coca-cola billboard, a sign advocating a piece of legislation, and a poster about the local library all get the exact same level of deference?
- drorco 5y agoYes. There are laws in some countries for example that make the advertising of Tobacco illegal. That's a form of censorship people can say is reasonable, but it can also be a slippery slope towards harsher censorship around other things people might find harmful - the female body, sugar, gambling, abortion, meat, etc. The question is if you want to give the government such a broad spectrum to censor, in which they'd start judging whether or not a product might be deemed potentially harmful.