Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.2 9/18/84; site amdahl.UUCP Path: utzoo!linus!decvax!decwrl!sun!amdahl!gam From: gam@amdahl.UUCP (Gordon A. Moffett) Newsgroups: net.news,net.legal Subject: Re: Freedom of speech and the net Message-ID: <475@amdahl.UUCP> Date: Thu, 8-Nov-84 13:34:05 EST Article-I.D.: amdahl.475 Posted: Thu Nov 8 13:34:05 1984 Date-Received: Sat, 10-Nov-84 05:09:22 EST References: <201@looking.UUCP> <7@cmu-cs-k.ARPA> <> <1842@nsc.UUCP> Organization: Amdahl Corp, Sunnyvale CA Lines: 24 Keywords: US Constitution Xref: sun net.news:2132 net.legal:1066 > In article <7@cmu-cs-k.ARPA> tim@cmu-cs-k.ARPA (Tim Maroney) writes: > > To sum up: If everyone at your site has the right to post, except you, and > this decision was made on the basis of unpopular opinions in your postings, > your civil rights have been violated. Now that the US Constitution has been distributed over the entire Usenet you have no excuse for not reading it. The First Amendment says: "*CONGRESS* shall make no law ... abridging the freedom of speech." (emphasis mine). If someone else abridges your freedom of speech (and this happens all the time) your civil rights are not being violated -- UNLESS this abrigement is executed by some government entity, federal or otherwise. By convention, using political means to silence another's use of a medium (such as Usenet), is considered a violation of *ETHICS*, which I take just as seriously as a constitutional violation. This is what happens on Usenet. It is not, then, illegal -- merely despicable. -- Gordon A. Moffett ...!{ihnp4,hplabs,amd,nsc}!amdahl!gam [ This is just me talking. ]