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Freedom of speech (conceptualization) is largely based upon the writing and public speaking accounts of Jefferson. And yes, I have read everything those other authors wrote and spoke about. Cherry picking statements is a weak way to argue because we can go back and forth with statements and never get anywhere. Do you not think I can find statements that support my ideas? Presenting them does not make an argument more or less legitimate, we must make sense of them within the framework of our generations society as our founders explicitly told us to.
Additionally, if you are going to cherry pick, be careful that you pick statements that can't be turned around on you such as:
Douglas: "The liberties of none are safe unless the liberties of all are protected."
These statement is actually one that encourages me down this path. We can not arrive at the conclusion until the individual or group has had the opportunity to speak. The opportunity to express their grievance. We must way the merits of the argument first. Isn't that the point of freedom of speech, that it climax to a better understanding?
Who's to say that holding up personal lives for public judgment isn't the denial of liberty until we debate the merits. Furthermore, who among us would deny anyone the right to file grievance, which is ultimately another version of freedom of speech. The debate about whether to increase penalties is the efforts of many to arrive at the essence of protecting liberty. Jefferson spent much time writing about how each generation must understand the foundations of these principles and decide what that means as their society changes around them. These are principles, not static statements with discrete definitions. They are phrases, freedom of speech, freedom of press, not-freedom (total), of speech (any expression).
As for you continued use of court decisions. I am aware of the history of the court decisions. This work is written from a criminological perspective within Sociology. We are not bound by the decisions of small bodies within the governmental structure, but work from the perspective of humans, groups, and society. My job is to shape arguments that are consistent with how society regulates people in the legal form, not to repeat the conclusions of our courts-who evolve over time.
Additionally, that logic is flawed and counter to your expressed views regarding the importance of free speech. Deferring to the conclusion of a small body as to the essence of our freedoms is the behavior that allows for dictatorships. Had we allowed court rulings to stop us in the past we would be a very different place. One I think you might not like. The basis for all legislation that establishes crime and sanctions is based upon harm to an individual, group, or society. It is also based upon maintaining order. Therefore, those are the principles I am restricted by. This does not mean that all such actions are criminal, however, I must beginning by pondering those issues. Next, I must explore issues of intent and/or negligence. After a number of other stages I must finish with degree's of scope and severity and way out cost/benefits.
We conceptualize, theorize, and conduct research on criminal behavior and crime. Legislatures use those arguments to form law. Courts determine constitutionality and specific cases based upon the language of the law. On the most simplistic of levels, thats the way it works. I teach students who go into all three area's and more because my discipline is the foundation for a number of control institutions. I am obligated to explore and evaluate the merits of a host of issues before legislature or courts begin to deal with them. For example, criminological research on computer crime began in the 1970's, well before many laws pertaining to computers. We had been documenting and warning legislatures, governmental, and NGO's as to the serious violations of privacy and security associated with increased use and capabilities. That is why, if you watch C-span, you will hear poli's debate the merits of establishing some regulation by referencing research that describes the aforementioned aspects of conceptualization. This keeps you safe. The more, outside the box thinking I do, the less issue's sneak up.
In terms of the first post, written stream of conscious, as a series of fragmented thoughts. I get fits of ideas that come on quickly and I must get them out or lose them. So, I might be missing a part of the puzzle and suddenly grasp it. When this happens I pretty much have to go to a computer and start typing. It won't make much sense to others, but I can recall and expand upon later. I post ideas in different place's at different stages to see what people are thinking and see what comes back. I normally do not post things in that form, but was stuck in a situation where I posted to retrieve at another location. When your getting kicked out of the library without a drive, you gotta do what you gotta do. Additionally, every once in while, someone has some interesting advice. Others who disagree assist by addressing points that society and groups will have problems with-points that will need heavy support. It is easy to get stuck in a conceptual bubble. I believe in constantly "double checking" myself so I don't leave out something that society values. Work done in efforts to finish is work whose conclusion will likely fall short.
And yes, I am a teacher, none of which should legitimize or de-legitimize my points. The narrative was to express the limitations that exist of speech.
As for personal cut-downs, I find it curious that you think you can measure a persons intelligence with little to go on. Are people that easy to understand? If I make a strong argument on one topic, am I a genius? If I fail on another, am I stupid? Or, is it that people who state your pre-existing ideas are smart? It is probably a mixture of all three and a couple more things. People like to hear and see themselves in others because it provides security and assurance of acceptability and desirability.
The discussions at DU are filled with personal accusations and insults. People usually defend such practices as being a legitimate side effect of passion. Passion to be the one deemed correct by the group, or passion about reaching a better understanding through discussion. If the latter, how well do insults and accusations encourage a rich discussion? I find that funny because, of course, there is no way to know who people really are. Maybe Im not a teacher. If I am a bus driver, does that mean anything? Isn't that the point of blogging, that arguments are merit-based?
On a lighter note, I was projecting the conversation yesterday while I was lecturing about crimes against humanity and dignity in my criminology class. Every once in a while, we would review the comments. My students made some interesting points about the comments to this blog as it relates to the issues we are discussing.
Because they know that I have two visual disabilities as well as being a teacher, they were curious how people would feel if these comments where taken out of context and spread all over the news as a representation of DU members. We laughed about sending it to Bill-O (which I am not going to do) with an inflammatory sob story about the intolerant, hateful, liberal websites that tease people with disabilities. If you keep up with Bill-O, you know what a hard-on he gets from smearing liberal websites. Now, is that a newsworthy or accurate description of DU. Of course not. Will sponsors or society know that it is a distortion? Some will and some won't, there are lots of conservatives out there. Point being, if I did something like that and sponsors pulled out and this place disappeared, I think most would feel a great injustice. I think most would feel that it was not an accurate representation of the "truth". If names were exposed and people followed at home and at work, I think most would feel harassed. Of course, people would be powerless to defend themselves against a large and well funded smear machine. We all make poor decisions, are all worthy of such destructive responses and antagonistic behavior. Are peoples personal problems, no matter who they are, always subject to public disclosure and humiliation?
Once again, I have never argued for a law that restricts fox, cnn, and msnbc from saying anything. I argue that those who feel unjustly abused by purposefully slanted coverage get to defend themselves in court and that those penalties need to be increased. Increasing a penalty might be warranted because of the repeated coverage of the news cycle. The court determines whether penalties are deserved in each case and both parties can explore appeals or other options. Additionally, and more importantly, it is false advertising as well as a number of more serious infractions to present a network as news when it is not. Considering the average education level of citizens, their ability to decipher truth from fiction is questionable as evidenced by the strange ideas Fox News viewers hold. We have an obligation to protect the vulnerable from the intentional manipulation.
It is very dangerous to have a society in which "news" is not accurate or is really another thing all together. Society views that news items are either very accurate if not completely true. We can not have the news tell us widely misleading or completely false information. The argument that they get to say anything is completely bankrupt. What if they started reporting that fires or bombs were going off? We must determine what the limits are because news ethnics have been destroyed. If you read academic literature regarding journalistic ethics you will see the concern regarding the industry, which has become entertainment.
After deregulation by Regan, private ownership saturated the market with increasingly unreliable information, leading to mass ignorance of public affairs. This situation was created by conservative think-tanks who spent millions researching how to influence public opinion. Angered over the 1960's cultural revolution, corporate leaders and conservative poli's blamed the "liberal media" for a host of cultural and legislative changes as well as the declining support for the Vietnam war. Following the tet offensive, one of the most trusted news personalities, took his glasses off, looked deep into the camera, and expressed negative sentiments about the war. This was almost never done. Over the next few months support for the war declined rapidly. While angered, a small group of neo-cons saw a golden opportunity-change the news. They used the think-tanks to research the process of going from one form of informational exchange to another without detection by the masses. Their goal was to homogenize and opininate information and present it as news. When challenged, they justify certain noticeable changes as merely balancing the liberal media's influence. In actuality, they have used the cover of news to implant the republican party talking points into almost every aspect of public debate outside PBS coverage. They also used it to create a continued echo of nasty remarks about liberals and democrats.
Its not that people in all markets are told what to say (Fox does), they are just not hired. During the 80's and 90's almost all you heard about was "Free Market" and "Tax Cuts". Economist who had other ideas were largely shut out. Conventional wisdom among the public was that this combination would solve everything. We have suffered through a number of years of distorted debates. In the process wealth and income have become even more consolidated, stag/inflation, union's are on the decline, free-market international trade agreements have destabilized our internal market job/worker/consumption structure, and gays/blacks/mexican's have been blamed for just about every problem.
Society goes the way of its informational accuracy. Reliable informational resources (for the most part), usually mean a healthy debate and reasonably informed citizens. Unreliable informational resources (for the most part), isolates groups from each other and fragments debate. You see, we can not know about or discuss the finer points of complex public issues when we are listening to generally meaningless statements such as "big government/small government or celebrating the destruction of individuals and groups. My screen name, mentalslavery, is based upon the problems we have regarding decision making and free choices. News is not a car wreck to slow down for and gawk at.
What you recognize as freedom of speech/press is merely what happens when republicans and corporations get in bed for the rotating 30 year poli-power cycle of fuck the public.
Considering that all the major legislative accomplishments of republicans have been designed to increase the wealth of the wealthy and marginalize the middle class as well as increase levels of poverty; what has occurred since the 1960's is one of the largest political and corporate crimes in our nations history-outside of genocide and slavery. Of course, some might argue that this is not a crime, but what is more restrictive of free speech and press than this? How can we accept the one-party dominance of the news media not governmental restriction? They did not pass a law restricting free speech, they passed a series of laws that paved that way. We have about 30 years to enact legislation with an increased degree of success. Protecting the informational resources that the public counts on as the foundation of free speech and press is very important to preserve each generations ability to achieve liberty. The corpo-news is just one of the problems. We will loss power as the maturation cycle of different voting blocks disappear and surviving members views become more conservative. Then they get 30 years to try and fuck the average person again. This cycle is has been relatively stable since our independence, thus I believe it will occur again. The references Rove and other neo-cons made about "permanent majority" was an attempt to ease or stop the cycle as they knew their time might be running out. Each party tends to over-reach as these cycles approach.
Reading the works of two thinkers, Jefferson and Madison, will provide you a basic understanding of most of the main political division's in this country. Jefferson spends much time on peoples freedom and ability to debate as well as shape institutions that foster a higher standard of living for all, create equality as well as self-actualization among people. Madison spends much time on the development of commerce and limitations of government involvement. Basically, we have been talking about the same shit since the beginning.
Ps-some of the shit Jefferson writes is pretty funny-when in office he got the opposition to vote with him once and lamented; "what have I done to get those evil men to find agreement with me". He struggled with the challenges of discourse and freedom, decision making, and how best to protect people from oppression.
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