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The Supreme Court has historically upheld the first amendment pretty well. You can't shout "fire" in a crowded theater and the like, it doesn't mean you can say

The Supreme Court has historically upheld the first amendment pretty well. You can't shout "fire" in a crowded theater and the like, it doesn't mean you can say anything by legal precedent, but you can say a lot. On a historical time scale, it seems like a steady stream of legislation get passed and completely struck down or neutered into irrelevance on first contact with the Supreme Court shortly after attempted enforcement. I guess the optics are good in taking money from entrenched interests and looking good to your constituents on passing stuff that the Supreme Court will neuter in less than a year. I just find it boggling that they don't even try to write legislation that will stand challenge.

jonhohle 3y ago
If that’s the state of things - taking money for personal interest to oppress the people that are suppose to be represented - perhaps we need an amendment to bar holding public office after attaching a name (authoring or sponsoring) to bills that get struck down as constitutional. I don’t know what the solution is, but there should be some teeth and personal accountability for shenanigans like this.
- pksebben 3y ago
  Yeah but like, how do you change the rules when the people who can make the rules are the ones who made the rules because they like it that way? Kinda feels like asking the king to ditch the crown because "yaknow, it's the right thing to do"
akerl_ 3y ago
At risk of nit picking: you can shout fire in a crowded theater. That was a metaphor used in a historic case that’s been pretty radically walked back given how bad of an opinion it was. https://www.popehat.com/2012/09/19/three-generations-of-a-hackneyed-apologia-for-censorship-are-enough/ https://www.popehat.com/2012/09/19/three-generations-of-a-ha... Is a good read on the topic.
- wodenokoto 3y ago
  I’m really surprised that it’s okay to shout fire in a crowded theater but not okay to hit the fire alarm. I also don’t understand why the author of parent link calls it “appeal to authority”. It’s one of the most concise, self-explanatory examples of free speech crossing the line between stating opinion and being an action.
  - wegfawefgawefg 3y ago
    People like to say strawman and appeal-to-authority but often don't notice its not the right situation. Very common on this website. Disagreeing here is often called strawmanning.
    - pessimizer 3y ago
      Often people deny something is an appeal to authority if it is an appeal to an authority they accept.
      - deleted 3y ago
        [deleted]
      - wegfawefgawefg 3y ago
        The thing is we dont know eachothers identities here. If the thread is about the right way to do something in gamedev and you tell me you used to work at Big Game Company, and the information you provide seems sound, it is truly evidence in favor of the value of your information. It need not be claimed explicitly "and they work on this there, therefore I also have valid experience there, and as such have experience in the domain" because we assume thats understood already. People throw around appeal to authority as if relationship or prior experience with any institution or association with any well known name could not be causal evidence. And just throw the term out if they see a title, like it erases the strength of a position by mere utterance. If somebody told me John Carmack said to use such and such spatial indexing structure for this case, it is good information. There is a sincere practicality here. Not just manipulation or weak rhetoric. A good place to use it would be when someone with illegitimate authority is called upon, or the surrounding information is so weak or even untrue that it contradicts the association with said qualified authority.
Pxtl 3y ago
Freedom of speech/expression does not protect defamation or similar misrepresentations of fact that harm people in any country I know of. Perjury, filing a false report, defamation, confidence-jobs, libel/slander/whatever, etc. Releasing faked content that imply that what's being presented is true events? Stuff that's clearly harmful to a person? That's already illegal everywhere, but also functionally impossible to actually enforce. Whack-a-mole lawsuits for every viral faked video of Mr Beast or Elon Musk will never work, unless the US gov't creates something equivalent to the DMCA (laws defining how content hosts should police what they host) for this kind of actionable disinformation. I imagine that in the US, works that are obvious satire or otherwise explicitly marked as satire will, as always, be protected by the Supreme Court. However, videos that simply use AI to fake events about real people? That will stand up, I think. IANAL. But it doesn't matter. We've already seen that the laws on defamation don't actually work if the disinfo is diffused instead of having a clear identifiable target with deep pockets. If Fox News posts a faked video of Greta Thunberg explaining her nefarious scheme to destroy the economy, I expect them to get sued again. But if such a video goes viral and ends up on every FWD from Grandma and every conservative facebook group and *chan? Nobody will face consequences. Stuff like that is already happening *now*, even without AI. Trivial stuff like faking newspaper articles and then posting them as a screenshot gets passed around on X and FB and various messaging tools. Look how many people 100% confidently believe the US election was stolen, or climate change is fake, or vaccines are a nefarious scheme for mind-control, or whatever.
- akerl_ 3y ago
  As a thought experiment: if I were to use AI to generate a video of a famous person describing how much they love green beans, and how they’ll do anything to get their hands on a can of delicious green beans, and I post it publicly have I committed a crime?
  - NoZebra120vClip 3y ago
    You mean like Steve Jobs' Apple Orchards? https://youtu.be/lm8cScTvvBo?si=7ItrpdnFPqgLLNxR https://youtu.be/lm8cScTvvBo?si=7ItrpdnFPqgLLNxR
snarfy 3y ago
Politicians that create laws that are later deemed unconstitutional need to be removed from office. Without any repercussions they'll just keep trying until they eventually slip one through.
- autoexec 3y ago
  That seems like a good way for the courts to get rid of political opponents whenever it's convenient. I think it'd be a lot less dangerous to just put a restriction on how soon something deemed unconstitutional can be proposed again. A cool down period isn't so bad, and ideally, if someone in congress keeps putting forward a bill nobody wants they'd be voted out of office by the people.
- akerl_ 3y ago
  I think your issue is less with politicians and more with the concept of checks and balances. A system where the executive and legislative branches are constantly at risk of dismissal at the decision of the judicial has massive problems. The government would be basically unable to attempt legislation for emerging situations, because there are often times where there just are not clear judicial standards for how the constitution applies.
- qingcharles 3y ago
  I don't know why there isn't some sort of legislative barrier that at least runs new laws through some body that can flag constitutional issues. Most legislators have law degrees, so you would have thought they are aware of the issues before they pass them. The worst ones are criminal laws that send people to prison for years only to be found unconstitutional much later down the road. (e.g. Chicago's gun ban)
  - Mountain_Skies 3y ago
    Quite often they know the law they're passing isn't constitutional but it's good campaign optics so they do it anyway. When it is overturned by the courts, voters generally get angry with the court for overturning the law rather than with their congress critter for passing it.

jonhohle 3y ago

If that’s the state of things - taking money for personal interest to oppress the people that are suppose to be represented - perhaps we need an amendment to bar holding public office after attaching a name (authoring or sponsoring) to bills that get struck down as constitutional. I don’t know what the solution is, but there should be some teeth and personal accountability for shenanigans like this.

pksebben 3y ago
Yeah but like, how do you change the rules when the people who can make the rules are the ones who made the rules because they like it that way? Kinda feels like asking the king to ditch the crown because "yaknow, it's the right thing to do"

akerl_ 3y ago

At risk of nit picking: you can shout fire in a crowded theater. That was a metaphor used in a historic case that’s been pretty radically walked back given how bad of an opinion it was. https://www.popehat.com/2012/09/19/three-generations-of-a-hackneyed-apologia-for-censorship-are-enough/ https://www.popehat.com/2012/09/19/three-generations-of-a-ha... Is a good read on the topic.

wodenokoto 3y ago
I’m really surprised that it’s okay to shout fire in a crowded theater but not okay to hit the fire alarm. I also don’t understand why the author of parent link calls it “appeal to authority”. It’s one of the most concise, self-explanatory examples of free speech crossing the line between stating opinion and being an action.
- wegfawefgawefg 3y ago
  People like to say strawman and appeal-to-authority but often don't notice its not the right situation. Very common on this website. Disagreeing here is often called strawmanning.
  - pessimizer 3y ago
    Often people deny something is an appeal to authority if it is an appeal to an authority they accept.
    - deleted 3y ago
      [deleted]
    - wegfawefgawefg 3y ago
      The thing is we dont know eachothers identities here. If the thread is about the right way to do something in gamedev and you tell me you used to work at Big Game Company, and the information you provide seems sound, it is truly evidence in favor of the value of your information. It need not be claimed explicitly "and they work on this there, therefore I also have valid experience there, and as such have experience in the domain" because we assume thats understood already. People throw around appeal to authority as if relationship or prior experience with any institution or association with any well known name could not be causal evidence. And just throw the term out if they see a title, like it erases the strength of a position by mere utterance. If somebody told me John Carmack said to use such and such spatial indexing structure for this case, it is good information. There is a sincere practicality here. Not just manipulation or weak rhetoric. A good place to use it would be when someone with illegitimate authority is called upon, or the surrounding information is so weak or even untrue that it contradicts the association with said qualified authority.

Pxtl 3y ago

Freedom of speech/expression does not protect defamation or similar misrepresentations of fact that harm people in any country I know of. Perjury, filing a false report, defamation, confidence-jobs, libel/slander/whatever, etc. Releasing faked content that imply that what's being presented is true events? Stuff that's clearly harmful to a person? That's already illegal everywhere, but also functionally impossible to actually enforce. Whack-a-mole lawsuits for every viral faked video of Mr Beast or Elon Musk will never work, unless the US gov't creates something equivalent to the DMCA (laws defining how content hosts should police what they host) for this kind of actionable disinformation. I imagine that in the US, works that are obvious satire or otherwise explicitly marked as satire will, as always, be protected by the Supreme Court. However, videos that simply use AI to fake events about real people? That will stand up, I think. IANAL. But it doesn't matter. We've already seen that the laws on defamation don't actually work if the disinfo is diffused instead of having a clear identifiable target with deep pockets. If Fox News posts a faked video of Greta Thunberg explaining her nefarious scheme to destroy the economy, I expect them to get sued again. But if such a video goes viral and ends up on every FWD from Grandma and every conservative facebook group and *chan? Nobody will face consequences. Stuff like that is already happening *now*, even without AI. Trivial stuff like faking newspaper articles and then posting them as a screenshot gets passed around on X and FB and various messaging tools. Look how many people 100% confidently believe the US election was stolen, or climate change is fake, or vaccines are a nefarious scheme for mind-control, or whatever.

akerl_ 3y ago
As a thought experiment: if I were to use AI to generate a video of a famous person describing how much they love green beans, and how they’ll do anything to get their hands on a can of delicious green beans, and I post it publicly have I committed a crime?
- NoZebra120vClip 3y ago
  You mean like Steve Jobs' Apple Orchards? https://youtu.be/lm8cScTvvBo?si=7ItrpdnFPqgLLNxR https://youtu.be/lm8cScTvvBo?si=7ItrpdnFPqgLLNxR

snarfy 3y ago

Politicians that create laws that are later deemed unconstitutional need to be removed from office. Without any repercussions they'll just keep trying until they eventually slip one through.

autoexec 3y ago
That seems like a good way for the courts to get rid of political opponents whenever it's convenient. I think it'd be a lot less dangerous to just put a restriction on how soon something deemed unconstitutional can be proposed again. A cool down period isn't so bad, and ideally, if someone in congress keeps putting forward a bill nobody wants they'd be voted out of office by the people.
akerl_ 3y ago
I think your issue is less with politicians and more with the concept of checks and balances. A system where the executive and legislative branches are constantly at risk of dismissal at the decision of the judicial has massive problems. The government would be basically unable to attempt legislation for emerging situations, because there are often times where there just are not clear judicial standards for how the constitution applies.
qingcharles 3y ago
I don't know why there isn't some sort of legislative barrier that at least runs new laws through some body that can flag constitutional issues. Most legislators have law degrees, so you would have thought they are aware of the issues before they pass them. The worst ones are criminal laws that send people to prison for years only to be found unconstitutional much later down the road. (e.g. Chicago's gun ban)
- Mountain_Skies 3y ago
  Quite often they know the law they're passing isn't constitutional but it's good campaign optics so they do it anyway. When it is overturned by the courts, voters generally get angry with the court for overturning the law rather than with their congress critter for passing it.