Flag desecration, and how about it?

[Bardeaux]

Of course the right to burn it should be there, but why go there in the first place? .

To ensure that the right is still there? To demonstrate extreme dissent (if that were the case)?

.. in which case I don't have much sympathy if a brick comes hurtling in your direction.

In which case I'll be walking free with a sore face while an emotionally unchecked individual is behind bars for aggravated assault.

Do you have more sympathy for EDL members being smacked in the face with bricks during their rallies?

 

[Deleted member 210577]

To ensure that the right is still there? To demonstrate extreme dissent (if that were the case)?

First part you know is nonsense.. we would know if it were made illegal in this day and age. Second part.. how is burning cloth extreme dissent? The people you're protesting against or unhappy with couldn't care less if you burned cloth, the only people it will affect are citizens with a sense of national pride.

Do you have more sympathy for EDL members being smacked in the face with bricks during their rallies?

If they haven't done anything wrong, then yes. Funny you throwing out the EDL thing. Real funny ¬_¬

 

[alasdairm]

how is burning cloth extreme dissent?

if it's not dissent, why are you so butt-hurt about people doing it?

because it's not just a piece of cloth. indeed, the most symbolically important piece of cloth. right?

and symbols are important. right?

because the stars and stripes is a symbol of freedom. right?

and the u.s.a. cares about freedom. right?

like the freedom to burn the symbol itself. (right?)

alasdair

 

[Bardeaux]

First part you know is nonsense.. we would know if it were made illegal in this day and age.

It was only confirmed legal within my lifetime (late 20s). Which isn't the point. A burning flag gets attention. Again, it's a test, a temperature check.

Second part.. how is burning cloth extreme dissent?

It isn't. It's a demonstration or expression of dissent, it is the official flag of a nation state, mind you.

The people you're protesting against or unhappy with couldn't care less if you burned cloth, the only people it will affect are citizens with a sense of national pride.

Or people who share the same dissatisfaction. If it's not dangerous to the state, why has it always been illegal and why does it remain illegal in the most repressive countries on Earth?

If they haven't done anything wrong, then yes. Funny you throwing out the EDL thing. Real funny ¬_¬

It wasn't a joke. Rallying people against muslims in the UK is offensive to muslims and many non-muslims. You don't feel this is wrong. Do flag burners believe what they're doing is wrong?

Just because you can hold rallies to demonize entire ethnicities or religions, why even go there?

Seriously though, do I agree with the EDL? Absolutely not. Do I think they have a right to assemble and speak openly to the public? Absolutely.

 

[alasdairm]

ss, nutty

do you think this is offensive:

that is, of course, a member of the westboro baptist church who believe that soldiers deserve to die because it's god punishing america or being tolerant of the gays. the don't just stand on any old street corner doing this - the show up at the funerals of dead soldiers to tell their families that their sons and daughters deserve to die because got hates fags.

what do you think?

alasdair

 

[nuttynutskin]

do you think this is offensive:

Is that an actual question? Of course I do, and it's absolutely sickening how they brainwash their children into the cult. I'm well aware of the WBC (which the actual Baptist church rightfully condemns). The problem with the WBC is that they come from a family of lawyers so they know what they can and can't get away with legally. I don't know what's gone on recently with them, but if I remember correctly they did pass some law that they had to be a certain distance from the funerals. I don't understand how what they're doing isn't considered hate speech tho. And if it were up to me, well I don't think that really needs clarification. Call me crazy but somehow I don't think that soldiers gave their lives with the intention that these morons could theoretically shit on their graves.

I do remember this. Bikers to the rescue...

 

[Bardeaux]

I don't understand how what they're doing isn't considered hate speech tho.

It's been ruled as (legal) hate speech as recently as 2011. They weren't directly threatening anyone or inciting violence, so the courts allowed them to continue.

 

[JessFR]

And rightly so IMO.

As far as I'm concerned the Westboro Baptist church is perhaps the definition of a necessary evil. Their message sickens me too, but there are only a few of them and will die out on their own via attrition, and they can't protest within a relatively wide radius of a funeral.

But their activities have reaffirmed the entire first amendment and shown to the world that society does not HAVE to censor those they don't like. I agree freedom of speech has limitations. You can't for example incite the country or the world to form a mob to commit violence to people, but they don't do that.

They have an abhorrent message, but it's delivered in a completely nonviolent way. They test the limits of free speech, I'm just glad that the group that has done that in recent years are de facto pacifists, allowing this to remain a matter of the first amendment.

A hate crime that required only words absent of any call for vigilantism or for people to physically harm other people would be at least in part unconstitutional. And even if you agree that it should be a crime, which I strongly disagree with. The answer is not having congress pretend the constitution doesn't exist.

 

[Deleted member 210577]

if it's not dissent, why are you so butt-hurt about people doing it?

because it's not just a piece of cloth. indeed, the most symbolically important piece of cloth. right?

and symbols are important. right?

because the stars and stripes is a symbol of freedom. right?

and the u.s.a. cares about freedom. right?

like the freedom to burn the symbol itself. (right?)

Christ man do you even read my posts? If someone burns the flag I won't be personally offended but I understand why people do get upset by it. (Page 1)

As I've tried to say a few times now I just do not see how it is a productive act beyond just pissing off your neighbours and other citizens, ie the people you should be convincing to join your cause and change whatever it is that's fucked up/whoever is fucking things up in government. Instead of dividing, come together and do something productive.. get it?

 

[Deleted member 210577]

ss, nutty

do you think this is offensive

It's sad for two reasons. They don't know what God really wants or thinks and yet proclaim to have his word, and then forcing children to take up that line of thought on behalf of their adult confusion.

Doing that on any random street corner I would just think it's sad and probably not have much sympathy for the adults who get into trouble. To me they wouldn't appear much different than a guy holding a "the end is nigh" sign..

At a funeral procession though, that's pretty offensive.

 

[alasdairm]

do you (plural) defend their right to say it under the first amendment?

alasdair

 

[Deleted member 210577]

do you (plural) defend their right to say it under the first amendment?

On the street corner and funeral procession, yes. However I wouldn't be averse to police turning a blind eye whilst someone roughs them up a bit in the funeral instance.. not because of what they're saying, just the fact they're being socially obnoxious. There's a time and place for voicing your opinion, and doing it at a funeral procession isn't one of them.

 

[alasdairm]

On the street corner and funeral procession, yes...doing it at a funeral procession isn't one of them.

your answer makes no sense. so they should be able to do it at a funeral but not at a funeral...

also, you believe they should be free to express their opinion but they should be beat up for doing so and the police should be complicit in that assault?

the whole thing about freedom of expression is that you don't get beat up or thrown in jail just for expressing an opinion.

alasdair

 

[JessFR]

Also, the Westboro Baptist church feeds on this stuff. Cop looks the other way, they get hurt, they sue the police department. They film everything in their pickets for that reason. They'll sue the guy who punches them too. And then when they win, wanna know where their damages money goes? To more picketing. Plus, they're effectively pacifists, you gonna beat on pacifists? What happened to feeling bad for their children, how do you think there kids will feel seeing their parents assaulted? It'll just more strongly commit them to their warped beliefs.

 

[alasdairm]

what happened to defending the right to express an opinion regardless of how offensive one person or another finds it?

i think their message is absolutely disgusting and thoroughly offensive but i think they should be free to express it.

if you're serious when you say freedom, you have to be able to embrace this idea and, if you refuse - or are unable - to, the you really are just paying lip service to the idea of freedom of expression.

alasdair

 

[JessFR]

alasdarirm, I've lived outside the us a long time now, and granted this has just been my experience, but what I've noticed is that the way at least some of the world feels about freedom can be very different to the American philosophy you and i believe in. I agree with you, but I doubt many Australians for example would agree with us. Not because they don't believe in freedom, but because to them, freedom is a balance between the right to free speech and the right not to be offended by hate speech. The terms I've heard and use are "positive" rights and "negative" rights. A positive right being a right where you have to take action to enforce, for example, preventing someone saying something offensive. And a negative right being say the right to free speech, which requires inaction.

The right to heath care for example would be a positive right, requiring someone to provide it.
The right to protest being a negative right, requiring only inaction from people.

American philosophy generally prioritizes negative rights over positive rights. Most of the bill of rights being negative rights, with a few exceptions, the right to a lawyer for example being a positive right. With little room for conflict. Since the right to not be offended doesn't exist in the bill of rights.

Australian philosophy in my experience, and likely some other countries, believes in conflicting rights including both the right to free speech and the right not to be offended. With a line being drawn far either from true free speech than it would be in the US. Also probably contributing is the lack of a solid and widely acknowledged list of what are definitely rights and what might not be.

I don't agree with it, but its where a lot of disagreement between Americans and some otherwise extremely similar cultures like the UK and Australia stems from. Even the word right, I would argue has a more strict unyielding meaning in American culture than in others.

Just my opinion.

 

[Deleted member 210577]

your answer makes no sense. so they should be able to do it at a funeral but not at a funeral...

also, you believe they should be free to express their opinion but they should be beat up for doing so and the police should be complicit in that assault?

the whole thing about freedom of expression is that you don't get beat up or thrown in jail just for expressing an opinion.

You asked whether I would defend their right to do what they're doing. I said yes to both situations. I also said there's a time and place, as in, it's not really socially appropriate to do what they're doing at someones funeral.. I think most people would understand that principle.. it doesn't need to be written down, it's just not appropriate. I wouldn't have sympathy if someone got angry and assaulted them.. and cops should have more important duties to attend to than protecting some inconsiderate moron ruining a families funeral. I'm talking about shouting at them and roughing them up a little bit, what back in the day would solve these kind of situations without need to resort to police or going too far and stabbing them or some stupid response like that.

If some dude comes up to me and my child and starts swearing all over the shop and being an obnoxious twat, I'm going to punch him if he doesn't respond to firm reason first. Express your freedom all you want, but there's a time and a place for it.

 

[JessFR]

Sounds like the police have very good cause to be at their protests to me, what with you saying you'd "rough them up".

That's your fault for wasting police resources, if people could control their anger better they could be off doing more productive work.

The Westboro Baptist church operates fully within the law and the law has already done the right thing and required their funeral pickets be a good distance away from where it would interfere with the funeral itself.

 

[StoneHappyMonday]

There is nothing peculiarly American about what Ali is saying. He's expressing philosophy along the lines of Voltaire, a Frenchman - "I do not agree with what you say but I'll defend to the death your right to say it".

The basic foundation stone of freedom of expression.

 

[JessFR]

True, but I'm only speaking in terms of the trends of modern cultures. Not the origins of the ideas.
I'm saying that as far as the broad cultural beliefs go, it's most associated as American and isn't I suspect the predominant belief in many other societies. I'm not saying it's of American origin in history. And I'm only speaking from what I've seen in the northeast US and Australia. I haven't lived anywhere else.