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From: mcgeer@ucbvax.ARPA (Rick McGeer)
Newsgroups: net.politics
Subject: Re: Could D. Black have legal problems?
Message-ID: <10477@ucbvax.ARPA>
Date: Fri, 27-Sep-85 02:11:23 EDT
Article-I.D.: ucbvax.10477
Posted: Fri Sep 27 02:11:23 1985
Date-Received: Sat, 28-Sep-85 07:35:40 EDT
References: <195@pyuxh.UUCP> <10451@ucbvax.ARPA> <773@cybvax0.UUCP>
Reply-To: mcgeer@ucbvax.UUCP (Rick McGeer)
Organization: University of California at Berkeley
Lines: 78

In article <773@cybvax0.UUCP> mrh@cybvax0.UUCP (Mike Huybensz) writes:
>In article <10451@ucbvax.ARPA> mcgeer@ucbvax.UUCP (Rick McGeer) writes:
>> I hope not.  Free speech is free speech, and while I think that what Black
>> has to say is about five degrees the other side of lunacy, he still has a
>> right to say it, lest you lose your right to speak.
>
>I agree that Black has a right under American law to say what he's saying.
>
>On the other hand, I think that freedom of speech is only one of several
>freedoms we try to maintain, and is occasionally in conflict with the
>others.  Thus Canada's hate laws negotiate the conflict between freedom
>of speech and other liberties.

I don't see the other liberties that are involved here.  No single individual
can reasonably claim to be injured by what Black and the nut in Toronto said:
people might claim psychological damage, and while I don't doubt that for a
minute, the appropriate place to hash that out is in the civil rather than
criminal courts.
>
>Let's look at some hypothetical analogies.  A racist leader says "I want that
>Jew/Nigger/whatever dead" to a crowd of his followers, expecting that his
>wishes will be carried out.  If the next day the subject is found dead,
>and the murderer claims he was obeying the leader, is the leader guilty
>of conspiracy?  Say he hasn't yet been obeyed: is he still guilty of
>conspiracy?  Suppose he says that he wants all of them dead: is he still
>guilty of conspiracy?

Even if they actively planned the murder, in California an overt act would
be required.  You'd have to buy the gun, or head for the suspect's house,
or something.  It would be interesting to see whether the courts would
convict the Nazi leader in the event of an overt act or a murder.  Presumably,
they'd look for evidence that the Nazi leader wanted his wishes carried out,
in which case he'd probably be hit with an accessory charge at the least.

There is a large gulf, however, between calling for the murder of some
individual and disputing the fact of the Holocaust.  However hurtful
discussions on the latter point are, it is nevertheless a valid historical
debate.  If your claim is that an overwhelming preponderance of evidence
exists on one side of this debate, that is true -- but there is also an
overwhelming body of evidence which says that George Washington was a man,
or that Harry Truman believed that there would be a million Japanese and
American casualties in an invasion of Japan, and yet there are people willing
to dispute either of these things, and we do not restrict them.

But Black is a racist, you say?  Prove it.  Very likely, I agree -- but one
can hold Black's views on the Holocaust and not be a racist.  True, I've never
met anyone who holds Black's views who's not a racist, but the conclusion
doesn't follow.


>
>The fact is that freedom of speech always has been constrained, and never
>has been absolute.  At the fringes of common exercise of free speech we
>will encounter cases where other liberties or practical matters constrain
>us.  Where we (the people, government, whatever) decide is up to us.
>I routinely prefer enlarging freedoms, but in the case of racial hatred,
>I could swing either way.  And personally, I'm glad to see racism actively
>combatted.
>-- 

Well, me too, to a point -- that is, I'm glad to see people calling racists
slime, but I'm not happy to see them go to jail.  Racism is merely one aspect
of hate -- but then, all forms of hate are equally valid.  Should Farrakan,
a man who hates whites in general and Jews in particular, be silenced?  How
about some of the truly man-hating feminists?  Or, for that matter, the
misogynists in porno magazines?  And while we're at it, how about those who
spread class hatred, such as the CWP.  The CWP used to claim that "racists
and fascists have no right to speak" -- bold claims for a group that
advocated the mass execution of the "rich" and, if memory serves correct,
called for the assasination of several US Presidents.  Then what about
newspapers and magazines that preach hatred for the United States, under the
thinly-veiled disguise of sticking up for obscure Marxist dictatorships?

The whatever in your piece  begs an awfully large question.  I'm not a very big
fan of "whatever" deciding what I get to read.  I'd sooner make my own choice,
thanks.  Somehow, I think that the Republic will survive it.

						Rick.