California Politics: Madame Senator, this is a morgue

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Leperflesh: May 17, 2007

snyprmag posted:

Whether people are a protected class or not is everything and it's very telling you think it has no bearing on the morality of the situation. Unless you have some argument that people don't chose to be nazi and can't help but be violent, then the big loving difference is transsexuals aren't inherently violent.

I'm talking about incitement to violence, and referencing a previous statement that self defense is an obvious exception. If we assume we're not discussing the use of violence as a last resort of defense against violence, then incitement to violence is both unethical and illegal irrespective of whether the target is a member of a protected class or not.

This goes to the heart of the question of when violence is acceptable. I personally do not believe that, absent all other considerations, violence against someone not a member of a protected class is somehow more OK than violence against someone who is a member of a protected class.

# ? Feb 4, 2017 01:49

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# ? May 22, 2024 06:35

snyprmag: Oct 9, 2005

It's not the they're not a member of a protected class, it's that the % of nazi's who aren't "nazis who are inciting people to violence" is zero.

# ? Feb 4, 2017 01:57

Leperflesh: May 17, 2007

Alright, maybe it was a poor example to use when explaining a position on the ethics of threatening violence? Although I doubt it's literally zero, I don't need to go down the path of making excuses for actual, card-carrying nazis or whatever.

Of course the people turning out in support of Milo mostly aren't literally nazis (especially Berkeley students), although characterizing them as such serves a rhetorical purpose. Until you go down the road you just went down: they support a bigot, so we can call all of them nazis, and nazis are 100% always inciting people to violence, and therefore it's totally OK to incite people to violence against them, and now we're attacking students with an opposing political view and discrediting our own when it turns out that no, they're not actual literal nazis and you just committed unprovoked assault and battery.

# ? Feb 4, 2017 02:05

snyprmag: Oct 9, 2005

I see your point but I think you're way too quick to assume there aren't nazis in Berkeley and to white wash white supremacists (which have done a poo poo ton of violence in our countries history, without being literal nazis) as 'political opponents.'
I'm not trying to say non-violent resistance isn't effective, but I'm not going to rag on black bloc or someone who gets amped enough to fight a white supremacist at a rally.

# ? Feb 4, 2017 02:23

Leperflesh: May 17, 2007

The specific people showing up to support the speaker can't be assumed to be Nazis unless they self-identify as Nazis and it's frankly really discouraging to hear people so casually use the term to just refer to anyone with ultra-conservative or bigoted viewpoints.

They're students. Student supporters. People. If they're supporting someone I find abhorrent, I can assume their reasons are bullshit, but I can't assume without at least some shred of evidence that they personally advocate violence to the point where physically attacking them is legitimately personal self-defense.

I really don't think I'm splitting hairs here or even taking some kind of bizarre, terribly hard to understand stance. "It's not ok to punch random strangers just because they support someone you think is evil" is a pretty normal Liberal viewpoint, I thought?

# ? Feb 4, 2017 02:30

Cup Runneth Over: Aug 8, 2009; She said life's
Too short to worry
Life's too long to wait
It's too short
Not to love everybody
Life's too long to hate

I agree, you should punch people because of their stated, documented beliefs, not their associations with or opinions of people.

# ? Feb 4, 2017 07:14

Dead Reckoning: Sep 13, 2011

Admiral Ray posted:

So, personally speaking, what he did to the trans student at UW-Milwaukee -- where he put a picture of her up on the screen and went on to criticize her appearance and denigrate trans folks -- well, that's plenty cause for me to want to physically harm him. That's no longer just an opinion of "Hey, trans* people are mentally ill!" That is incitement.

It isn't though. That isn't what the word "incitement" means in the context of free speech. Incitement is more than criticism, or denegration, or having opinions you don't like, or saying things you disagree with. Saying "trans people are mentally ill" is not the same thing as saying "we need to go out there right now and kick all the trans people off campus", even if saying the former emboldens people who believe the latter.

Cup Runneth Over posted:

There is a pretty loving big difference between a journalist and a private citizen, you dense motherfucker.

There isn't though. The government doesn't license and register journalists, and there is no law or precedent that says, "'journalists' may do X, Y, and Z, but private citizens may not." The Supreme Court has repeatedly declined to give the institutional press greater protection from defamation charges than private citizens, and the 9th Circuit recently held in Obsidian v. Cox that, "As the Supreme Court has accurately warned, a First Amendment distinction between the institutional press and other speakers is unworkable: 'With the advent of the Internet and the decline of print and broadcast media ... the line between the media and others who wish to comment on political and social issues becomes far more blurred.' "

lancemantis posted:

Yeah the laws in the US wrt state secrets are pretty much structured so that everyone is always committing a crime, its just if they decide to prosecute you for it

It's been pretty well settled since N.Y. Times v. United States in 1971 (the Pentagon Papers case) that the government can't censor or prohibit the publication of material simply on the assertion of a national security interest. Can you provide an example since 1971 of anyone who was not a current or former government employee who was convicted of dissemination of classified material?

# ? Feb 4, 2017 20:35

Nodosaur: Dec 23, 2014

You are aware of what happens when trans people are forcibly outed, right?

# ? Feb 4, 2017 21:35

Dead Reckoning: Sep 13, 2011

TFRazorsaw posted:

You are aware of what happens when trans people are forcibly outed, right?

Yes I am, and being trans is hardly the only personal information that can be devastating if widely broadcast. However, I see these harms as being totally outweighed by the benefits of living in a society where the right to say something that is true, absent some preexisting professional relationship (like HIPPA), is uncontestably legal, no matter how embarrassing or harmful certain parties find it.

# ? Feb 4, 2017 23:26

Doc Hawkins: Jun 15, 2010; Dashing? But I'm not even moving!

Something that is true, like their religion, ethnic background, sexuality, party membership? How about where they live? Where they work? Their daily schedule and planned travel? Who can say I was lying when I just pointed out that the deceased was risking the violent wrath of the American people by following a foreign religion which, as we all know, threatens our very way of life? That target I printed over their face in those flyers was obviously metaphorical, and my support for a peaceful process of resettlement is a matter of public record.

# ? Feb 4, 2017 23:44

Cup Runneth Over: Aug 8, 2009; She said life's
Too short to worry
Life's too long to wait
It's too short
Not to love everybody
Life's too long to hate

Dead Reckoning posted:

Yes I am, and being trans is hardly the only personal information that can be devastating if widely broadcast. However, I see these harms as being totally outweighed by the benefits of living in a society where the right to say something that is true, absent some preexisting professional relationship (like HIPPA), is uncontestably legal, no matter how embarrassing or harmful certain parties find it.

What easy thing to say, as a person who will unquestionably almost never be the target of those harms.

Doc Hawkins posted:

Something that is true, like their religion, ethnic background, sexuality, party membership? How about where they live? Where they work? Their daily schedule and planned travel? Who can say I was lying when I just pointed out that the deceased was risking the violent wrath of the American people by following a foreign religion which, as we all know, threatens our very way of life? That target I printed over their face in those flyers was obviously metaphorical, and my support for a peaceful process of resettlement is a matter of public record.

You mean like doxxing, which is largely illegal (depending on the specific state/federal harassment/cyberstalking laws)? But my freedom of speech!

# ? Feb 5, 2017 00:29

Dead Reckoning: Sep 13, 2011

Doc Hawkins posted:

Something that is true, like their religion, ethnic background, sexuality, party membership? How about where they live? Where they work? Their daily schedule and planned travel?

As long as those facts are a matter of public record or in the public interest, (something I realize I implied but neglected to explicitly qualify in my last post,) then yes, I don't see the issue. If you talk about your upcoming trip to Fire Island on Facebook, you cannot reasonably object if other people disseminate or correlate that information. Similarly, if the heads of several major oil companies and various oil ministers were all staying at a Trump hotel in the UAE for a conference, that information could be reasonably considered in the public interest.