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As a former USSR immigrant, I'll just leave this Soviet joke out there: An American tells a Russian that there's free speech in American; that anyone is free t

by strlen 13y ago

As a former USSR immigrant, I'll just leave this Soviet joke out there: An American tells a Russian that there's free speech in American; that anyone is free to just go infront of a government building and yell "American president is an idiot." The Russian responds that this is no big deal -- in Russia anyone is also free to go in front of a government building and yell "American president is an idiot." For the record, I strongly support the bill of rights (I also hold the fanatical and extremist belief that there's another integer between the integers 1 and 3...) and am very much opposed to the surveillance state, hounding of whistle blowers, cruel treatment of prisoners, war on drugs, and so forth. I also understand reasons for Snowden to travel to/through those states (he does not want to go to prison and no one else is willing to have him). However, I'll say this unequivocally: from a world-wide perspective, United States is far ahead of rest of the world (including many other liberal democracies) in terms of value put on civil liberties. Most countries are far more communitarian -- there are simply far more exceptions to free speech, privacy, etc... rights and (unlike in the US) many of those exceptions aren't even rooted in protection from a "clear and present danger." (Related: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/And_you_are_lynching_Negroes http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/And_you_are_lynching_Negroes )

Daishiman 13y ago
> However, I'll say this unequivocally: from a world-wide perspective, United State is far ahead of rest of the world (including many other liberal democracies) in terms of value put on civil liberties. I think you are categorically misinformed on this matter. I urge to look into the human rights legislations that have been enacted in many Latin American countries to see real progress in that area (and I say this as a person who opposes a large number of measures such governments have been taking).
rmc 13y ago
there are simply far more exceptions to free speech, privacy, etc Actually, in many ways I'd say that the EU has better privacy rights than the US. The Data Protection Directive covers a lot more privacy stuff than is covered by US law. You're right about "free speech", more things are legal to say in the USA than in EU countries, however that's (I think) at the expense of other human rights. If you give more free speech rights, you take away other rights (e.g. the free speech rights of the Westboro Baptist church to picket funerals takes away the right to privacy and happiness for the family who are burying a family member. The free speech rights to say "$PERSON has erectile disfunction" takes away the right to privacy of $PERSON, etc.). It all depends on how much you value some things. (How much do you value privacy, how much do you value free speech, how much do you value right to life of marginalized groups etc) (I'm using EU because I'm more familiar with it)

by strlen 13y ago

Daishiman 13y ago

> However, I'll say this unequivocally: from a world-wide perspective, United State is far ahead of rest of the world (including many other liberal democracies) in terms of value put on civil liberties. I think you are categorically misinformed on this matter. I urge to look into the human rights legislations that have been enacted in many Latin American countries to see real progress in that area (and I say this as a person who opposes a large number of measures such governments have been taking).

rmc 13y ago

there are simply far more exceptions to free speech, privacy, etc Actually, in many ways I'd say that the EU has better privacy rights than the US. The Data Protection Directive covers a lot more privacy stuff than is covered by US law. You're right about "free speech", more things are legal to say in the USA than in EU countries, however that's (I think) at the expense of other human rights. If you give more free speech rights, you take away other rights (e.g. the free speech rights of the Westboro Baptist church to picket funerals takes away the right to privacy and happiness for the family who are burying a family member. The free speech rights to say "$PERSON has erectile disfunction" takes away the right to privacy of $PERSON, etc.). It all depends on how much you value some things. (How much do you value privacy, how much do you value free speech, how much do you value right to life of marginalized groups etc) (I'm using EU because I'm more familiar with it)