3 ms·

I think they mean to say trendy things to thoughtless people; we are not the intended audience.

smhinsey 17y ago
The article is not that great, but my reading is that they based their decision on the 11th provision of the Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen, which is confirmed by the contemporary French constitution. "The free communication of ideas and opinions is one of the most precious of the rights of man. Every citizen may, accordingly, speak, write, and print with freedom, but shall be responsible for such abuses of this freedom as shall be defined by law." I am no legal scholar, but it seems to me that the decision is essentially that while they can monitor and potentially even punish offenders, they cannot do so by simply terminating their access. I don't think this is trendy or thoughtless at all, even if my reading is totally wrong. I don't think the discussion of human rights can ever be trendy or thoughtless, regardless of the inspiration for the discussion. These conversations need to take place in the light of day and they need to happen as often as the world changes, which as we are all aware, happens every day.
- byrneseyeview 17y ago
  "A right to Internet access" != "Protection from your Internet access being terminated as a legal punishment." You can have the latter right without infringing on everyone else's property rights; the former gives you a prior claim to anyone's ownership of devices that can grant Internet access, which is a terrible idea. It's the same as understanding that freedom of the press doesn't give you the freedom to tell the NYT what to print on their front page tomorrow. I don't think the discussion of human rights can ever be trendy or thoughtless I don't understand. Just turning the discussion to human rights makes it non-trendy and non-thoughtless? I don't understand why. Human rights are abstractions we use to interact with each other; just like politeness, but backed by force.
  - smhinsey 17y ago
    I am not sure I follow your analogy. I think the key distinction here is that you are not being convicted of a crime prior to having your rights taken away. In the US, this would be analogous to losing the franchise, e.g., without being convicted of a crime. It is unclear to me that a similar bill that included an actual prosecution would be struck down on the same basis. To be honest your comment really rubbed me the wrong way because I believe it insinuates a degree of bad faith on the part of the decision makers that I feel is unwarranted. I don't really mean to say that every discussion is equally valuable, but rather that it serves no larger good to dismiss the conversations out of hand. If that wasn't your intention, I apologize. [edit: removed "not" from "it is not unclear" to me. whoops!]
    - pixcavator 17y ago
      How about this analogy: taking away your driving license? UPDATE: Just like using a bus instead of a car, you can access the internet from a library.
      - smhinsey 17y ago
        A driver's license is a privilege, at least in the US, whereas speech is a right. I don't know if things are different in the EU/France.
    - deleted 17y ago
      [deleted]
    - byrneseyeview 17y ago
      it serves no larger good to dismiss the conversations out of hand. Read any newspaper from more than a few years ago, and I think you'll see that most of it is quite trivial. And yet, that was the content judged newsworthy! I think it's clear that people vastly overestimate the importance of their own words and opinions. The person who decided that there is a "right" to Internet access has a similarly worthless opinion. I think Internet access is important, but creating new rights is an extremely bad idea. Every time you add another absolute, you create more cases that your rights-system can't cover.
gojomo 17y ago
"Trendy Things to Thoughtless People" would be a great name for a magazine. (Not necessarily a new magazine; I can think of many that fit the bill.)

The article is not that great, but my reading is that they based their decision on the 11th provision of the Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen, which is confirmed by the contemporary French constitution. "The free communication of ideas and opinions is one of the most precious of the rights of man. Every citizen may, accordingly, speak, write, and print with freedom, but shall be responsible for such abuses of this freedom as shall be defined by law." I am no legal scholar, but it seems to me that the decision is essentially that while they can monitor and potentially even punish offenders, they cannot do so by simply terminating their access. I don't think this is trendy or thoughtless at all, even if my reading is totally wrong. I don't think the discussion of human rights can ever be trendy or thoughtless, regardless of the inspiration for the discussion. These conversations need to take place in the light of day and they need to happen as often as the world changes, which as we are all aware, happens every day.

byrneseyeview 17y ago
"A right to Internet access" != "Protection from your Internet access being terminated as a legal punishment." You can have the latter right without infringing on everyone else's property rights; the former gives you a prior claim to anyone's ownership of devices that can grant Internet access, which is a terrible idea. It's the same as understanding that freedom of the press doesn't give you the freedom to tell the NYT what to print on their front page tomorrow. I don't think the discussion of human rights can ever be trendy or thoughtless I don't understand. Just turning the discussion to human rights makes it non-trendy and non-thoughtless? I don't understand why. Human rights are abstractions we use to interact with each other; just like politeness, but backed by force.
- smhinsey 17y ago
  I am not sure I follow your analogy. I think the key distinction here is that you are not being convicted of a crime prior to having your rights taken away. In the US, this would be analogous to losing the franchise, e.g., without being convicted of a crime. It is unclear to me that a similar bill that included an actual prosecution would be struck down on the same basis. To be honest your comment really rubbed me the wrong way because I believe it insinuates a degree of bad faith on the part of the decision makers that I feel is unwarranted. I don't really mean to say that every discussion is equally valuable, but rather that it serves no larger good to dismiss the conversations out of hand. If that wasn't your intention, I apologize. [edit: removed "not" from "it is not unclear" to me. whoops!]
  - pixcavator 17y ago
    How about this analogy: taking away your driving license? UPDATE: Just like using a bus instead of a car, you can access the internet from a library.
    - smhinsey 17y ago
      A driver's license is a privilege, at least in the US, whereas speech is a right. I don't know if things are different in the EU/France.
  - deleted 17y ago
    [deleted]
  - byrneseyeview 17y ago
    it serves no larger good to dismiss the conversations out of hand. Read any newspaper from more than a few years ago, and I think you'll see that most of it is quite trivial. And yet, that was the content judged newsworthy! I think it's clear that people vastly overestimate the importance of their own words and opinions. The person who decided that there is a "right" to Internet access has a similarly worthless opinion. I think Internet access is important, but creating new rights is an extremely bad idea. Every time you add another absolute, you create more cases that your rights-system can't cover.

gojomo 17y ago

"Trendy Things to Thoughtless People" would be a great name for a magazine. (Not necessarily a new magazine; I can think of many that fit the bill.)