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thejeff wrote:


So Freedom of Speech shouldn't apply to corporations.
Which means there would be no freedom of speech when it comes to publishing a book, airing a documentary, or pretty much any other form of mass communication. The government could censor it all.

How did you make that leap?


Also, to conflate Citizen Pres Man and Citizen Duck's arguments:

If law enforcement were trying to maintain access to the bridge for emergency vehicles, stopping the march in order to arrest protesters seems pretty counterintuitive.

Regardless, this incident can't be why Zuccoti Park was cleared since it happened roughly two months before.


meatrace wrote:
pres man wrote:

They are in the car lanes. Seriously, you are blocking all the car lanes and you don't think that is a problem. "As far as I know, blocking all the car lanes is not illegal." Really?

Edit: Also there was a pedestrian walk that the protest got off of to block the traffic lanes.

Again, from what I've heard, the pedestrians were walking on that pedestrian walk. They got off the ped walk when the police ordered them to, then used the fact that they were no longer on the ped walk as an excuse to arrest them.

I've heard that as well, the proof I've seen is pretty weak, so you'll understand if I'm a bit skeptical.

Also, if the protesters goal was to get over the bridge and the lanes had been blocked, why not back up to the pedestrian walkway and cross there? Instead of having a confrontation with the cops. That is unless the confrontation is exactly what they want. Once the cops blocked the lane, the "march" became more of a "sit in".

@GoldenOpal: I honestly don't know all of New York's traffic laws, but I would find it incredibly hard to believe that it is legal for pedestrians to block the lanes of traffic, when there is a walk way available and they don't have a permit for doing so (like a parade would have).


Usagi Yojimbo wrote:
Darkwing Duck wrote:
TOZ wrote:
Darkwing Duck wrote:


The next step in your plan is for someone to end up dead because emergency vehicles were impeded by the crowd.
Now there's a huge leap of logic. Nice jump check.
Yes, you're right. Deliberately block the flow of emergency vehicles and, miraculously, there's no chance that anyone will get hurt as a result.

Wait, what? They went from possibly blocking a hypothetical ambulance that was driving

off-road through a park to "deliberately block(ing) the flow of emergency vehicles"?

Do you believe that this is happening, has happened somewhere or that there are plans to do so? If so, what is that belief based on?

No one was ever at 'hypothetical ambulance that was driving off-road through a park'.


GoldenOpal wrote:
A.P.P.L.E. wrote:
BigNorseWolf wrote:

Apple:

Theres a few problems with relying on the people we elect to shut off free speech, allegedly on our behalf

1) 51% of the population does not have the right to use the police to tell 49% of the population to shut up. The ability to express your opinion is a right of the individual, and cannot be suppressed by other individuals, even if there are more of them.

2) Government is hardly an accurate expression of the will of the majority, given how often politicians lie and how various interest groups corrupt the process.

3) The first thing any politician does with the ability to declare speech inflamatory is to stop people from saying bad things about them. Even the true stuff. ESPECIALLY the true stuff, gaining himself an unfair advantage in the next election.

Again, I'm not arguing for no free speech protection, I'm arguing for no absolute free speech protection, such as the first amendment. France, Germany, Britain, Australia, and Canada all get along just fine with having general free speech protection that still allows inflammatory public behavior to be outlawed.
And America gets along just fine (relative to these other countries) with the first amendment and for quite awhile now.

No, we really, really don't.

Quote:

Please explain how a mayor being shouted down for being a hypocritical, self serving douche brings our country down?

Let's start with the fact that they interrupted a solemn ceremony to do so. Let's continue with the fact that the mayor never did anything wrong in the first place.


BigNorseWolf wrote:
APPLE wrote:
Again, I'm not arguing for no free speech protection, I'm arguing for no absolute free speech protection, such as the first amendment.
And who are you going to give the power to outlaw speech to?

And this is exactly what I was just talking to Smarnil about. In the inflammatory speech rather than campaign financing arena, but still the same thing.

The only possible alternative to absolute (which isn't really absolute) free speech is the outlawing of any speech politicians don't like.

Do the European countries which lack our absolutist free speech guarantees really have less robust public debate than we do?


A.P.P.L.E. wrote:

1. Let's start with the fact that they interrupted a solemn ceremony to do so.

2. Let's continue with the fact that the mayor never did anything wrong in the first place.

1. That goes nowhere -- "You can't arrest me, officer, I'm engaged in a solemn ceremony in honor of the Universal Constipated Dodo God" doesn't free me from being arrested, nor should it. Ceremonies don't trump constitutional rights or legal obligations.

2. Opinion, not fact.


GoldenOpal wrote:


The police are the ones blocking the flow of travel.

People are peacefully traveling across the bridge. The police use violence to stop them from moving forward. The cops are blocking traffic. If pedestrians using the bridge is illegal, seems silly but fair enough. (not saying illegal = not right, that is another discussion)

But if the reason...

You should get your eyes checked. Take a look at that video, perhaps at 1:13, and you'll see people (not just cops) stretched across the street, blocking traffic. You can see the yellow dividing line in the lower left corner of the image which proves that the people were blocking the road.


Comrade Anklebiter wrote:

Also, to conflate Citizen Pres Man and Citizen Duck's arguments:

If law enforcement were trying to maintain access to the bridge for emergency vehicles, stopping the march in order to arrest protesters seems pretty counterintuitive.

Regardless, this incident can't be why Zuccoti Park was cleared since it happened roughly two months before.

*Chuckles*

I don't necessarily disagree. They could have also gotten a bunch of dump trucks and just pushed the protesters out of the way as well. Though I don't think that would be the best option either.

I don't think the cops made good choices that day (the group should never have been allowed to get on the bridge in the first place), but the protesters also made poor choices as well (we are getting to a protest so we will do a sit in on a busy bridge, are any bridges around new york not busy?).

EDIT: Besides I just posted the link because someone seemed to be claiming that the Occupy movement hasn't ever blocked traffic lanes. This was a situation that it did, intentionally or not.


Kirth Gersen wrote:
A.P.P.L.E. wrote:

1. Let's start with the fact that they interrupted a solemn ceremony to do so.

2. Let's continue with the fact that the mayor never did anything wrong in the first place.

1. That goes nowhere -- "You can't arrest me, officer, I'm engaged in a solemn ceremony in honor of the Universal Constipated Dodo God" doesn't free me from being arrested, nor should it. Ceremonies don't trump constitutional rights or legal obligations.

2. Opinion, not fact.

Interrupting a solemn ceremony for the people they claim to support is base hypocrisy at it's worst, and solidifies my opinion of OWS's methods. It's just as bad as WBO's behavior.


"APPLE wrote:
Again, I'm not arguing for no free speech protection, I'm arguing for no absolute free speech protection, such as the first amendment. France, Germany, Britain, Australia, and Canada all get along just fine with having general free speech protection that still allows inflammatory public behavior to be outlawed.

(sorry, the automated quote system seems to be f***ed up)

Well, it depends on your definition of "inflamatory" (behaviour ou speech). This word is way too vague.

If you mean by that "anything that could hurt anybody else sensibility", you are basically prohibiting free speech.

We do limit the propagation of fascist ideologies, for historical reasons (denying holocaust, glorifying war crimes, that sort of thing): once burnt... We do have limits on libel and slander. But almost everything else flies.

We can certainly chant all day under Palais Brognard's (our stock exchange) windows, hold meetings claiming that the government is rotten, or has been taken over by martians (if only...).

So, what "inflamatory" expression of free speech would you like to forbid? It would help us to understand exactly where you stand.


A.P.P.L.E. wrote:
Interrupting a solemn ceremony for the people they claim to support is base hypocrisy at it's worst, and solidifies my opinion of OWS's methods. It's just as bad as WBO's behavior.

I can agree that it's contemptible, and agree that I also disapprove... and still very strongly disagree that it should therefore be illegal. I don't care if someone does something that 99.99% of the world disapproves of -- if that act is legal and doesn't overtly cause harm, I might also disapprove, but I wouldn't prevent it.


Smarnil le couard wrote:
"APPLE wrote:
Again, I'm not arguing for no free speech protection, I'm arguing for no absolute free speech protection, such as the first amendment. France, Germany, Britain, Australia, and Canada all get along just fine with having general free speech protection that still allows inflammatory public behavior to be outlawed.

(sorry, the automated quote system seems to be f***ed up)

Well, it depends on your definition of "inflamatory" (behaviour ou speech). This word is way too vague.

If you mean by that "anything that could hurt anybody else sensibility", you are basically prohibiting free speech.

We do limit the propagation of fascist ideologies, for historical reasons (denying holocaust, glorifying war crimes, that sort of thing): once burnt... We do have limits on libel and slander. But almost everything else flies.

We can certainly chant all day under Palais Brognard's (our stock exchange) windows, hold meetings claiming that the government is rotten, or has been taken over by martians (if only...).

So, what "inflamatory" expression of free speech would you like to forbid? It would help us to understand exactly where you stand.

To start with, I'd like to forbid any protest at a funeral or vigil.


1 person marked this as a favorite.
A.P.P.L.E. wrote:
To start with, I'd like to forbid any protest at a funeral or vigil.

Why, in sociopolitical terms? (In other words, not just "because I think it's bad"). And what constitutes a "proper" vigil? If protestors show up outside my office, can I simply drop and do a Teebow, and it's now a vigil, and they have to all go away?


Comrade Anklebiter wrote:

Also, to conflate Citizen Pres Man and Citizen Duck's arguments:

If law enforcement were trying to maintain access to the bridge for emergency vehicles, stopping the march in order to arrest protesters seems pretty counterintuitive.
.

How do you think they should have cleared the road - with high pressure fire engine water jets?


A.P.P.L.E. wrote:
GoldenOpal wrote:
A.P.P.L.E. wrote:
BigNorseWolf wrote:

Apple:

Theres a few problems with relying on the people we elect to shut off free speech, allegedly on our behalf

1) 51% of the population does not have the right to use the police to tell 49% of the population to shut up. The ability to express your opinion is a right of the individual, and cannot be suppressed by other individuals, even if there are more of them.

2) Government is hardly an accurate expression of the will of the majority, given how often politicians lie and how various interest groups corrupt the process.

3) The first thing any politician does with the ability to declare speech inflamatory is to stop people from saying bad things about them. Even the true stuff. ESPECIALLY the true stuff, gaining himself an unfair advantage in the next election.

Again, I'm not arguing for no free speech protection, I'm arguing for no absolute free speech protection, such as the first amendment. France, Germany, Britain, Australia, and Canada all get along just fine with having general free speech protection that still allows inflammatory public behavior to be outlawed.
And America gets along just fine (relative to these other countries) with the first amendment and for quite awhile now.

No, we really, really don't.

Quote:

Please explain how a mayor being shouted down for being a hypocritical, self serving douche brings our country down?

Let's start with the fact that they interrupted a solemn ceremony to do so. Let's continue with the fact that the mayor never did anything wrong in the first place.

Please explain how these counties are so much better off.

-

He evicted homeless people from their shelter to make room for a ceremony to remember homeless people who died in large part from lack of shelter! Come on now.

If some attendees want a solemn ceremony, nothing wrong with that. But what they want has no bearing on others' right to not be solemn in a public space.

The basic thing you are missing is that a mayor doesn’t get to decide what rights citizens do or do not have. They are laid out in the bill of rights – the document he swore to uphold before becoming mayor.


Kirth Gersen wrote:
A.P.P.L.E. wrote:
To start with, I'd like to forbid any protest at a funeral or vigil.
Why, in sociopolitical terms? (In other words, not just "because I think it's bad").

I want it banned because of the immense emotional harm it causes to the bereaved.


1 person marked this as a favorite.
A.P.P.L.E. wrote:
I want it banned because of the immense emotional harm it causes to the bereaved.

Good deal. Next step -- what are the limits of "emotional harm" that supersede the Constitution? Putting me in prison would cause me infinitely more emotional harm than interrupting me at a funeral -- do I get exempt from it? The Church of Scientology claims that referring to them as a "cult" causes them immense emitional harm. Should that also be prohibited? If Dawkins says Christianity is a bunch of fables, that causes emotional harm, judging from the responses. When Bush Sr. said that atheists shouldn't be considered citizens, that caused an equal or greater amount of emotional harm, to a smaller group. How do we decide?


GoldenOpal wrote:
He evicted homeless people from their shelter to make room for a ceremony to remember homeless people who died in large part from lack of shelter! Come on now.

That is not what happened. He made every effort to handle the issue peacefully. They were warned repeatedly what would happen next. They didn't listen.

Furthermore, they shouldn't have been living in the park. That park is city property, meaning it is there for the whole city, not just OWS, Not only was it not rightfully theirs to live in, letting them stay was a public health and safety issue.

As for the rest, I vehemently disagree. I don't think free speech should be a legal excuse for violating other people's rights to have a solemn ceremony.


Darkwing Duck wrote:
Comrade Anklebiter wrote:

Also, to conflate Citizen Pres Man and Citizen Duck's arguments:

If law enforcement were trying to maintain access to the bridge for emergency vehicles, stopping the march in order to arrest protesters seems pretty counterintuitive.
.

How do you think they should have cleared the road - with high pressure fire engine water jets?

Or you know... like... um... I don’t know... LET THEM PASS.

*durst off hands* “Wow that little problem took care of itself.”


Kirth Gersen wrote:
A.P.P.L.E. wrote:
I want it banned because of the immense emotional harm it causes to the bereaved.
Good deal. Next step -- what are the limits of "emotional harm" that supersede the Constitution? Putting me in prison would cause me infinitely more emotional harm than interrupting me at a funeral -- do I get exempt from it? The Church of Scientology claims that referring to them as a "cult" causes them immense emitional harm. Should that also be prohibited? If Dawkins says Christianity is a bunch of fables, that causes emotional harm, judging from the responses. When Bush Sr. said that atheists shouldn't be considered citizens, that caused an equal or greater amount of emotional harm, to a smaller group. How do we decide?

Nice strawman.

Liberty's Edge

TOZ wrote:
Comrade Anklebiter wrote:
A.P.P.L.E. wrote:
Comrade Anklebiter wrote:
A.P.P.L.E. wrote:

To be fair, he is a goblin.

Flamewar back on, you anti-goblin bigot!
That was a joke.
So was mine.
Both of you are pretty big jokes. :)

That's not true!

...Comrade Anklebiter is Small, check the Bestiary.


2 people marked this as a favorite.
A.P.P.L.E. wrote:
Nice strawman.

No strawman at all. You've cited "emotional harm" as sufficient cause to suspend Constitutional rights, and I asked what the limits are. Just because you haven't considered that problem doesn't in any way make it a strawman.


Darkwing Duck wrote:
thejeff wrote:


So Freedom of Speech shouldn't apply to corporations.
Which means there would be no freedom of speech when it comes to publishing a book, airing a documentary, or pretty much any other form of mass communication. The government could censor it all.
How did you make that leap?

That's actually what the Citizen's United case was about. Airing a political documentary, which was admittedly not much more than a long attack ad on Hilary Clinton, during election season. During Supreme Court arguments the government argued, based on the same campaign finance law, they could ban books as well.

More simply, corporations have Constitutional rights because they are treated as people. If they are not people, then that does not apply. What rights do they have?


APPLE wrote:
To start with, I'd like to forbid any protest at a funeral or vigil.

Well, such protests can be of bad taste, but flatly making them illegal could be way too much.

A little illustration : last year, our president went on some remote mountain to put flowers on a monument celebrating martyrs of the Resistance. He was greeted there by protesters who disrupted the official ceremony.

Seems bad, does it? But among the protesters there were actual resistants, who despite their years came to express their disagreement with a politician who use the Resistance aura for communication purpose, while dismantling the social welfare inherited from the Resistance political program.

Who was committing an act of bad taste there?

(I admit I didn't look up the details of the incident you are refering to, but it seems similar)


Darkwing Duck wrote:
How do you think they should have cleared the road - with high pressure fire engine water jets?

Again, I wasn't there. Second, it happened a couple of months ago and I smoke a lot of pot; therefore my memory of the event is a little hazy.

If I were in law enforcement (big if) and a bunch of protesters were marching across a bridge and I thought it was terrible that emergency vehicles couldn't get across, I'd probably wait until after they'd crossed the bridge to start arresting people.

EDIT: Damn golden ninja!


A.P.P.L.E. wrote:
GoldenOpal wrote:
He evicted homeless people from their shelter to make room for a ceremony to remember homeless people who died in large part from lack of shelter! Come on now.

That is not what happened. He made every effort to handle the issue peacefully. They were warned repeatedly what would happen next. They didn't listen.

Furthermore, they shouldn't have been living in the park. That park is city property, meaning it is there for the whole city, not just OWS, Not only was it not rightfully theirs to live in, letting them stay was a public health and safety issue.

As for the rest, I vehemently disagree. I don't think free speech should be a legal excuse for violating other people's rights to have a solemn ceremony.

There is no right to have people act as you wish in a public space. That is what private property rights are for.

A mayor doesn’t get to decide what rights citizens do or do not have. They are laid out in the bill of rights – the document he swore to uphold before becoming mayor... Even if he warned them he was planning to.


GoldenOpal wrote:
Darkwing Duck wrote:
Comrade Anklebiter wrote:

Also, to conflate Citizen Pres Man and Citizen Duck's arguments:

If law enforcement were trying to maintain access to the bridge for emergency vehicles, stopping the march in order to arrest protesters seems pretty counterintuitive.
.

How do you think they should have cleared the road - with high pressure fire engine water jets?

Or you know... like... um... I don’t know... LET THEM PASS.

*durst off hands* “Wow that little problem took care of itself.”

Ignoring them wouldn't have gotten them out of the middle of the road.


Comrade Anklebiter wrote:
Darkwing Duck wrote:
How do you think they should have cleared the road - with high pressure fire engine water jets?

Again, I wasn't there. Second, it happened a couple of months ago and I smoke a lot of pot; therefore my memory of the event is a little hazy.

If I were in law enforcement (big if) and a bunch of protesters were marching across a bridge and I thought it was terrible that emergency vehicles couldn't get across, I'd probably wait until after they'd crossed the bridge to start arresting people.

So, cars get backed up waiting for these people to get out of the area they are never supposed to be in in the first place and then emergency vehicles which might show up have to wait for those cars to get out of the way, etc.


Darkwing Duck wrote:
GoldenOpal wrote:
Darkwing Duck wrote:
Comrade Anklebiter wrote:

Also, to conflate Citizen Pres Man and Citizen Duck's arguments:

If law enforcement were trying to maintain access to the bridge for emergency vehicles, stopping the march in order to arrest protesters seems pretty counterintuitive.
.

How do you think they should have cleared the road - with high pressure fire engine water jets?

Or you know... like... um... I don’t know... LET THEM PASS.

*durst off hands* “Wow that little problem took care of itself.”

Ignoring them wouldn't have gotten them out of the middle of the road.

And blocking them does?


Darkwing Duck wrote:
GoldenOpal wrote:
Darkwing Duck wrote:
Comrade Anklebiter wrote:

Also, to conflate Citizen Pres Man and Citizen Duck's arguments:

If law enforcement were trying to maintain access to the bridge for emergency vehicles, stopping the march in order to arrest protesters seems pretty counterintuitive.
.

How do you think they should have cleared the road - with high pressure fire engine water jets?

Or you know... like... um... I don’t know... LET THEM PASS.

*durst off hands* “Wow that little problem took care of itself.”

Ignoring them wouldn't have gotten them out of the middle of the road.

Stopping them to arrest them didn't, either.

But, whatever. By the magic of Darkwing Duck, it has been proven that I am totally in favor of people in ambulances dying so that protestors can rally.

EDIT: Fine, I'm done. You just say everything I've got to say, Comrade Opal.


Comrade Anklebiter wrote:


EDIT: Fine, I'm done. You just say everything I've got to say, Comrade Opal.

Aw, no Comrade. Now I feel bad.

It is not your fault. They are making it too easy. :P


Comrade Anklebiter wrote:
Darkwing Duck wrote:
GoldenOpal wrote:
Darkwing Duck wrote:
Comrade Anklebiter wrote:

Also, to conflate Citizen Pres Man and Citizen Duck's arguments:

If law enforcement were trying to maintain access to the bridge for emergency vehicles, stopping the march in order to arrest protesters seems pretty counterintuitive.
.

How do you think they should have cleared the road - with high pressure fire engine water jets?

Or you know... like... um... I don’t know... LET THEM PASS.

*durst off hands* “Wow that little problem took care of itself.”

Ignoring them wouldn't have gotten them out of the middle of the road.

Stopping them to arrest them didn't, either.

But, whatever. By the magic of Darkwing Duck, it has been proven that I am totally in favor of people in ambulances dying so that protestors can rally

EDIT: Fine, I'm done. You just say everything I've got to say, Comrade Opal.

Look at the video at 1:34. The cops ARE NOT stopping people in the middle of the road to arrest them. The cops are standing there. Unfortunately, so are the people - blocking the road.


GoldenOpal wrote:
A.P.P.L.E. wrote:
GoldenOpal wrote:
He evicted homeless people from their shelter to make room for a ceremony to remember homeless people who died in large part from lack of shelter! Come on now.

That is not what happened. He made every effort to handle the issue peacefully. They were warned repeatedly what would happen next. They didn't listen.

Furthermore, they shouldn't have been living in the park. That park is city property, meaning it is there for the whole city, not just OWS, Not only was it not rightfully theirs to live in, letting them stay was a public health and safety issue.

As for the rest, I vehemently disagree. I don't think free speech should be a legal excuse for violating other people's rights to have a solemn ceremony.

There is no right to have people act as you wish in a public space.

I disagree wholeheartedly. There is every right to regulate how public space gets used. That's why you can't yell f%~% in the middle of a city park.


Usagi Yojimbo wrote:
TOZ wrote:
Comrade Anklebiter wrote:
A.P.P.L.E. wrote:
Comrade Anklebiter wrote:
A.P.P.L.E. wrote:

To be fair, he is a goblin.

Flamewar back on, you anti-goblin bigot!
That was a joke.
So was mine.
Both of you are pretty big jokes. :)

That's not true!

...Comrade Anklebiter is Small, check the Bestiary.

I'm pretty big for a goblin...especially when I'm on my back!


2 people marked this as a favorite.
A.P.P.L.E. wrote:
GoldenOpal wrote:
He evicted homeless people from their shelter to make room for a ceremony to remember homeless people who died in large part from lack of shelter! Come on now.

That is not what happened. He made every effort to handle the issue peacefully. They were warned repeatedly what would happen next. They didn't listen.

Furthermore, they shouldn't have been living in the park. That park is city property, meaning it is there for the whole city, not just OWS, Not only was it not rightfully theirs to live in, letting them stay was a public health and safety issue.

As for the rest, I vehemently disagree. I don't think free speech should be a legal excuse for violating other people's rights to have a solemn ceremony.

In case you've missed it, actual homeless people have been living in and with most OWS encampments. And being fed and participating in them as well.

So when the mayor evicted OWS from the park, he also evicted the homeless living there as well. Even if it had been handled peacefully, they were still being kicked out. Which means the homeless staying there went where?

Sure, they shouldn't have been living in the park. Much like the homeless shouldn't be living on the streets. Kick them out. Move them along. Get them out of our sight. Where should they go?

And then mayor holds a solemn ceremony commemorating homeless people who've died. Isn't that nice.
It's easy to commemorate the dead. It gets you sympathy and votes and costs very little. What about helping the living?


Smarnil le couard wrote:
APPLE wrote:
To start with, I'd like to forbid any protest at a funeral or vigil.

Well, such protests can be of bad taste, but flatly making them illegal could be way too much.

A little illustration : last year, our president went on some remote mountain to put flowers on a monument celebrating martyrs of the Resistance. He was greeted there by protesters who disrupted the official ceremony.

Seems bad, does it? But among the protesters there were actual resistants, who despite their years came to express their disagreement with a politician who use the Resistance aura for communication purpose, while dismantling the social welfare inherited from the Resistance political program.

Who was committing an act of bad taste there?

(I admit I didn't look up the details of the incident you are refering to, but it seems similar)

The residents. They could have let him finish, then aired their grievances.


A.P.P.L.E. wrote:
There is every right to regulate how public space gets used. That's why you can't yell f~&! in the middle of a city park.

Sure you can -- people will take issue with it, but it's not illegal that I know of, unless you somehow generate enough of a sustained decibel level to violate noise ordinances.

See, if I claim the right to regulate public space based on someone being offended, or the action being inappropriate or gauche or disrespectful or unpatriotic, I could then claim that your denouncing of the 1st amendment is treasonous, and therefore oughtn't be allowed on the internet. Would you be willing to abide by that decision?


Darkwing Duck wrote:
Look at the video at 1:34. The cops ARE NOT stopping people in the middle of the road to arrest them. The cops are standing there. Unfortunately, so are the people - blocking the road.

I don't see how you can determine that when the video starts with a line of cops standing across the street and a bunch of protestors standing across the street. Unless they all live there, that's not how it started.

EDIT: I'm sorry, back up.

So, people are marching across the bridge, right?

The police have formed a wall to block them, right?

The police start arresting people, right?

If our main concern is clearing the bridge for possible emergency vehicular traffic, how does this help things?


Kirth Gersen wrote:
A.P.P.L.E. wrote:
There is every right to regulate how public space gets used. That's why you can't yell f~&! in the middle of a city park.

Sure you can -- people will take issue with it, but it's not illegal that I know of, unless you somehow generate enough of a sustained decibel level to violate noise ordinances.

See, if I claim the right to regulate public space based on me being offended, I could then claim that your denouncing of the 1st amendment is treasonous, and therefore oughtn't be allowed on the internet. Would you be willing to abide by that decision?

No, because as I already pointed out, I'm not against free speech protection, I'm against absolute free speech protection, and Paizo isn't public space. It's private and moderated by the Paizo staff, who allow a pretty fair level of free speech.


thejeff wrote:
A.P.P.L.E. wrote:
GoldenOpal wrote:
He evicted homeless people from their shelter to make room for a ceremony to remember homeless people who died in large part from lack of shelter! Come on now.

That is not what happened. He made every effort to handle the issue peacefully. They were warned repeatedly what would happen next. They didn't listen.

Furthermore, they shouldn't have been living in the park. That park is city property, meaning it is there for the whole city, not just OWS, Not only was it not rightfully theirs to live in, letting them stay was a public health and safety issue.

As for the rest, I vehemently disagree. I don't think free speech should be a legal excuse for violating other people's rights to have a solemn ceremony.

In case you've missed it, actual homeless people have been living in and with most OWS encampments. And being fed and participating in them as well.

So when the mayor evicted OWS from the park, he also evicted the homeless living there as well. Even if it had been handled peacefully, they were still being kicked out. Which means the homeless staying there went where?

Sure, they shouldn't have been living in the park. Much like the homeless shouldn't be living on the streets. Kick them out. Move them along. Get them out of our sight. Where should they go?

And then mayor holds a solemn ceremony commemorating homeless people who've died. Isn't that nice.
It's easy to commemorate the dead. It gets you sympathy and votes and costs very little. What about helping the living?

That's a tough question to answer. A lot of people use the park, so they couldn't live there, but where they should live? I can't easily say.


Kirth Gersen wrote:
A.P.P.L.E. wrote:
There is every right to regulate how public space gets used. That's why you can't yell f~&! in the middle of a city park.

Sure you can -- people will take issue with it, but it's not illegal that I know of, unless you somehow generate enough of a sustained decibel level to violate noise ordinances.

See, if I claim the right to regulate public space based on someone being offended, or the action being inappropriate or gauche or disrespectful or unpatriotic, I could then claim that your denouncing of the 1st amendment is treasonous, and therefore oughtn't be allowed on the internet. Would you be willing to abide by that decision?

The internet isn't public space, and as I said, I'm not against free speech protection, I'm against absolutist free speech protection. Political debate is allowed in all the countries I brought up as examples.


APPLE wrote:
The residents. They could have let him finish, then aired their grievances.

Resistants... :)

In this we disagree. Protesting something isn't the same thing as waiting patiently for it to end and then, when nobody listen anymore or cares, do your stuff.

In this case, the place was meant to honor THEM (the resistants/protesters). The whole point was that they felt that HE (the president) wasn't legitimate there, as his policies ran counter of the Resistance's ones.

It seems to me that your mayor wasn't very legitimate in honoring DEAD homeless people after having expelled LIVE ones just earlier.


I get the feeling that some people's idea of "blocking traffic" isn't exactly the same as mine or others. Some seem to be saying, "If they are moving forward at a rate of 0.0001 mph, then they are not blocking traffic." Fine, they are "impeding" traffic.

Should the cops have stopped them? Probably not. They probably should have worked to push the crowd into one lane and thus allowing traffic to flow past and arresting anyone that stepped out of the one lane.

Still we don't know what really went down, most of the video is seriously edited or was not recorded until later. We don't know if some officer told people to get on the bridge. We don't know if the protesters were suppose to be in only one lane and instead spread out to block all the lanes (as crowds are wont to do). We don't know if the police told them to get back on the walkway and the protesters at that point started a sit in and only then did the police start to arrest them.


Comrade Anklebiter wrote:
Darkwing Duck wrote:
Look at the video at 1:34. The cops ARE NOT stopping people in the middle of the road to arrest them. The cops are standing there. Unfortunately, so are the people - blocking the road.
I don't see how you can determine that when the video starts with a line of cops standing across the street and a bunch of protestors standing across the street. Unless they all live there, that's not how it started.

We seem to be looking at different videos.

This is the video I'm looking at
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PfuJkpUQKaY
It starts off with everybody just standing there with six cops surrounded by a hundred or so people.


A.P.P.L.E. wrote:
I'm not against free speech protection, I'm against absolutist free speech protection.

You're still dodging the main issue, though. Who decides what isn't covered? How exactly is it decided? We've tried to illustrate that if you leave that decision solely to elected officials, then any speech disagreeing with them -- no matter how legitimate -- WILL get censored as "not covered." So you have to spell it out in advance, preferrably with some philosophically consistent rationale. You can't just play these things by ear.


Darkwing Duck wrote:
Comrade Anklebiter wrote:
Darkwing Duck wrote:
Look at the video at 1:34. The cops ARE NOT stopping people in the middle of the road to arrest them. The cops are standing there. Unfortunately, so are the people - blocking the road.
I don't see how you can determine that when the video starts with a line of cops standing across the street and a bunch of protestors standing across the street. Unless they all live there, that's not how it started.

We seem to be looking at different videos.

This is the video I'm looking at
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PfuJkpUQKaY
It starts off with everybody just standing there with six cops surrounded by a hundred or so people.

Sorry, see edit above.


Kirth Gersen wrote:
A.P.P.L.E. wrote:
I'm not against free speech protection, I'm against absolutist free speech protection.
You're still dodging the main issue, though. Who decides what isn't covered? How exactly is it decided? We've tried to illustrate that if you leave that decision solely to elected officials, then any speech disagreeing with them -- no matter how legitimate -- WILL get censored as "not covered." So you have to spell it out in advance, preferrably with some philosophically consistent rationale. You can't just play these things by ear.

You seem to have this view that politicians are out to screw us.


A.P.P.L.E. wrote:
You seem to have this view that politicians are out to screw us.

I feel that they're out to support themselves and their sponsors, and if we get screwed as a by-product, they're generally fine with that -- or at least will glibly rationalize it. This is based on experience and observation, from Nixon to Obama, and is generally true in history as well. It also fits general human nature.


A.P.P.L.E. wrote:
GoldenOpal wrote:
A.P.P.L.E. wrote:
GoldenOpal wrote:
He evicted homeless people from their shelter to make room for a ceremony to remember homeless people who died in large part from lack of shelter! Come on now.

That is not what happened. He made every effort to handle the issue peacefully. They were warned repeatedly what would happen next. They didn't listen.

Furthermore, they shouldn't have been living in the park. That park is city property, meaning it is there for the whole city, not just OWS, Not only was it not rightfully theirs to live in, letting them stay was a public health and safety issue.

As for the rest, I vehemently disagree. I don't think free speech should be a legal excuse for violating other people's rights to have a solemn ceremony.

There is no right to have people act as you wish in a public space.
I disagree wholeheartedly. There is every right to regulate how public space gets used. That's why you can't yell f%!~ in the middle of a city park.

You got me there. I should have added, “up to the point I infringe on your rights”. Which do not include disagreeing with you or yelling those disagreements or cursing or interrupting whatever ceremony you have planned.

Take note your rights are guaranteed by the same document as mine. If you remove my guarantee, you also remove your own.

Then we are both in the same boat we started in. Except that boat is adrift on deadly waters.

You really think someone with more money and power than you won’t come down on you, as you would on me?

You know, I doubt the mayor really wants a whole ceremony highlighting the city’s homelessness issue. Wonder what happens to your right to a solemn ceremony then?

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