[Godstud]

I wasn't the one calling people Nazis because they disagreed with me. You're as ignorant as they are about freedom of speech, and the limitations. Freedom of speech is never absolute, and implying such is childish fantasy.

Their arguments about hate speech being used against Nazis was a distraction and deflection. @Victoribus Spolia Now you're playing along with their pathetic trolling. Lame.

[One Degree]

@Godstud
Sometimes if people are ‘dog piling’ you it is because they see your position is not valid. They are simply trying to find other ways to demonstrate that to you.

[Godstud]

You made up the absurd suggestion that Nazis are victims of hate speech. I don't have to argue such a ridiculous argument, because it's invalid. You have no evidence that such even exists.

Then you started calling me a Nazi because I would not play along with your absurd fantasy scenario. I'm not the one with the problem. They are being trolls, along with you. That's all.

[Victoribus Spolia]

Freedom of speech is never absolute, and implying such is childish fantasy.

The limitation was on direct threats of violence.

why there should be more was the point of bringing up the hypothetical scenarios you are refusing to discuss. I asked you several questions and you refused to answer ALL of them.

If you really want to have a civil debate, lets start there.

Their arguments about hate speech being used against Nazis was a distraction and deflection. @Victoribus Spolia Now you're playing along with their pathetic trolling. Dumb.

No, i'm not. I am asking you to engage with me. If you agree to be civil and calm, I will ask you some questions for you to answer, all you have to do is agree to actually answer them and you will have proven me wrong in my claim that you are being dismissive and angry.

put your money where your mouth is.

I'm game if you are.

I'll ask you five questions to start off, involving important hypotheticals, on the nature of limiting free speech and the dynamics of state power.

This isn't trolling, this is sincere.

You up for the challenge ol' chap?

[Godstud]

After all the trolling, lies, and fantasy "whatifs", I'm going to have to pass on your "offer.". I'm tired of being called a Nazi simply because I agree with Canadian Hate Speech laws, which are amongst the most liberal in the world.

Feel free to engage the Hate Speech lovers in this thread. I am sure they will engage you in a most "civil" way.

[Victoribus Spolia]

After all the trolling, lies, and fantasy "whatifs", I'm going to have to pass on your "offer.". I'm tired of being called a Nazi simply because I agree with Canadian Hate Speech laws, which are amongst the most liberal in the world.

Feel free to engage the Hate Speech lovers in this thread. I am sure they will engage you in a most "civil" way.

Well that settles it then I suppose.

Adios.

[One Degree]

@Godstud
Perhaps you are the victim of the myth that an ideology must be flawless to be acceptable. You therefore defend it’s flaws with dishonesty. We are flawed humans and there is no reason we should not be honest and say for example, “I believe in treating people equally, but some are too opposed to my views for me to accept them in my society.” This is simply honesty imo and not something people should be ashamed of or have to defend.
You do not accept Nazis. I don’t accept transgenders. I will take your Nazis and you take my transgenders then everyone should be happy.

[Drlee]

I think our laws and those of Germany, are - were polar opposites

I am referring to current German laws banning all things Nazi. I also believe they have robust anti-hate laws.

Sadly, i agree, but note, America has anti hate laws. If I understand them correctly, hate laws can be attached to other laws to extend the punishment, the argument being actions of this ilk doesn't just affect the individual (s) but the whole community. We don't know what's being mailed. Is it notes or posters?

We do have anti-hate laws that exacerbate the punishment for certain crimes and modify the jurisdiction so the Feds can investigate. We do not have hate-speech laws. It is a subtle difference. The supposition is that once one assaults another person (for example) then it is not speech but action. So you could say we have anti hate action laws.

This is a great thread. I wish we had more like this.

Now I am going to side with Godstud for a moment.

We should not be so quick to discount his argument about hate speech being delivered by a Crown Corporation. (Essentially the government.) That is not a bad point. The decision hinges on what you consider to be the places where free speech is exercised.

In this past election I received what could easily be called hate speech in the form of political advertising. There were terrible things asserted about aliens for sure and a great deal of racist dog-whistling on the part of the republicans. They were delivered by mail. What if the USPS refused to carry those solicitations? What of free speech then? Since the government owns the airwaves, what if they banned those advertisements there as well? What of free speech then?

It seems to me that the people have some reasonable expectation to not receive bad stuff in the mail. But this is where we get into trouble.

As I mentioned before, there are a great many people in both the US and Canada who feel that abortion is murder of a child. What worse "hate" crime could there be than that? So these people apply to the postal services to have advertising supporting a person's right to choose challenged. Both the US and Canada have laws making abortion essentially legal. But being a Nazi is legal too. It does not seem that these rulings are based upon supporting what is legal but rather what is considered good taste. Do people have the right not to be offended? Godstud is offended by Christianity. Should the Crown Post not be allowed to send him unsolicited Christian advertising?


Suppose I am pissed at Israel over Palestine and I accuse them of "Nazism" regarding their treatment of Palestine. What if I call them a "Nazi Jewish State"? Should that be banned? What if I favor Israel and I say, "The Jews of all people should have learned how to deal with people like the Palestinians". Should that be banned?

Do you see what I mean. Censorship (for that is what banning either would be) is dangerous. Pretty soon the content of acceptable speech becomes narrow and subject to the opinion of a committee.

So we are back to the Crown Corporation or USPS. Should they be in the business of deciding what is acceptable speech? I have to fall back to "no". As disgusting as it would be to receive that picture of a dead baby in the mail unsolicited, it is just a price we pay for advanced democracy. For that is what we aspire to be.

[One Degree]

Even though I agree with Drlee, the unaddressed bulk mail adds other dimensions. I am not allowed to refuse it. I told my mailman if it is not addressed to me then don’t put it in my box. He said he couldn’t do that. So they are denying us the right to refuse to be exposed to stuff we don’t want to see. We should be allowed to be removed as a recipient just like we can do somewhat with other media like our phones and email.

[Victoribus Spolia]

Mail boxes have this strange place in law where they are not regarded as private property in the same sense as your residence. If they were, unsolicited and unwanted mail would fall under "trespassing," as it is, they are a default means of public contact and therefore public access for advertising.

If you understand it through that prism, then you can see why the bulk mail question does not complicate as much as you think.

Your mail box is viewed as fundamentally no different than a public billboard or the ad-section of a newspaper, the restriction of speech rules in that domain.

If you disagree with that, than the issue of "public-access" and the right to send people mail, unsolicited, should be debated separately from the issue of free speech so as not to muddy the situation.

However, the debate in this forum was not whether private citizens should have the right not to get spammed with credit card advertisement and nazi recruitment posters. The subject under debate in this thread was whether or not there should be limitations on free-speech and a banning of "hate-speech."

These two issues are completely separate matters.

[One Degree]

I agree. I thought the other issue was done and decided to bring up this facet for discussion. We should ignore it if people have more to add to the original. I don’t.

Edit: @Victoribus Spolia
The mail box is my property. I bought it.

[Victoribus Spolia]

The mail box is my property. I bought it.

Its also part of the postal system, so this is a bit complicated. You can also have a box at the post-office itself and tampering with your mail falls under federal statute, not merely local (If i remember correctly).

This implies that this is a bit of gray area. All the more reason to keep it separate from the question of free-speech v. hate speech, because whether you come down against people being able to spam your mailbox or not has no necessary bearing on how you would come down on the question of whether hate speech should be a legal category or not.

[One Degree]

Its also part of the postal system, so this is a bit complicated. You can also have a box at the post-office itself and tampering with your mail falls under federal statute, not merely local (If i remember correctly).

This implies that this is a bit of gray area. All the more reason to keep it separate from the question of free-speech v. hate speech, because whether you come down against people being able to spam your mailbox or not has no necessary bearing on how you would come down on the question of whether hate speech should be a legal category or not.

You seem indecisive as to whether you want to argue this issue? I will drop it and swallow my rebuttal for now.

[Victoribus Spolia]

You seem indecisive as to whether you want to argue this issue?

I am not interested in discussing it really, only because I am just going to default to my position of privatizing the post anyway, which would settle this whole specific case as stated in the OP anyway.

This thread was "about" free-speech and its alleged limitations, the case in Canada was merely a starting point for that conversation.

This was really my only point in regards to those choosing to focus-in on the "bulk-mail" specifics of the actual case.

Nothing more. Nothing less.

[Stormsmith]

I wonder what the mods are making of all this.

Okay, everyone hop into my Wayback Machine, set the date to any time prior to WWII. There was a change in thinking here in Canada, and I suspect it occurred in Europe and the US. Jews weren't well treated, because they killed Christ. After witnessing the horrors inflicted on Jews during WWII, we revisited this attitude, and added laws to inhibit antisemetism, and then widen it to include other communities. The result is a fairer, kinder but not perfect nation. Still, it's improving over time. These sub communities enjoy safer, wealthier lives.

We see censorship everyday. We have the mods reigning in the most agregous posts. We don't get to shout "Fire" in crowded theaters. If we could find ways to inhibit bullying of children on or off-line to the point of committing suicide, i'd support that too.

For those rattling on about Nazis if it pertains to an economical issue, fine, fair enough, but if they step over a well accepted line of fostering hate or discrimination they should face the consequences


Drlee: thank you for your thoughtful reply


ON JUNK MAIL. I suspect we could end it if we all wrote or stamped "return to sender" and reposted it

[noemon]

I wonder what the mods are making of all this.

For an informed opinion to be made the particulars of the case need to be presented. Unfortunately they are lacking from this thread and I lack the time to research them on my own.

[One Degree]

The problem is we don’t all agree with who should be censored. The larger the population you apply it to, the more people who will disagree.
The argument we are actually having is with those who refuse to admit it is censorship because it is part of their ideology they believe should be accepted universally. Admitting there is no place in the world where you will accept the existence of Nazis is to admit you don’t really believe in equality for all. Some posters can not bring themselves to admit to this contradiction in their ideology, so they pretend discrimination is not discrimination.

[Stormsmith]

Well, I gave you a couple of examples of stricter forms of censorship. And Godstud is correct. It isn't censorship in the fullest sense of the law, it's merely one and, as far as I know, only one service that is saying this stuff just isn't on.

Admitting there is no place in the world where you will accept the existence of Nazis is to admit you don’t really believe in equality for all. 

No. It's the Nazis who believed this, not us. I don't want Canada reverting to a country that's hostile to her own citizens, that won't hire them, that put them on the bottom of the list for university admission etc. Did you know that in the last year your hate crimes have risen a whopping 17%. Some people are correlating this rise with your president. If I had my way, i'd restrict the news from airing these remarks. They're aired, parents repeat them conversationally, and kids learn it. Presto! You've just helped you're country to regress.

[Albert]

Why do you believe censorship of ideas will prevent those ideas spreading anyways? It might hold back the distribution of them but nevertheless sooner or later they will resurface. In Canada like the rest of the western world progressive visionaries in government are fighting a losing game. This whole "new society" established post-WWII is held together by force and authoritarian measures. Perhaps these measures were meant to be temporary until it was hoped "evolution" of consciousness will happen by these progressive visionaries. But it has not. No "evolution" or progress will happen.

It is time people start realizing that, all these progressive projects are impractical and have not and will not succeed. In fact they have caused tremendous harm then any good.

[SolarCross]

Why do you believe censorship of ideas will prevent those ideas spreading anyways? It might hold back the distribution of them but nevertheless sooner or later they will resurface.

This is a good point. You need a really totalitarian regime to give censorship even a modest chance of success (even the USSR still had a black market in independant news) because the very act of censoring just makes the censored material that much more attractive to most people. If it is banned, it must be good, so goes the logic. In the DPRK people face the death penalty if caught watching foreign movies yet still dvds are smuggled in. If the DPRK can't ban wrongthink what chance has the People's Republic of KKKanada?