Path: utzoo!utgpu!watmath!clyde!att!ucbvax!husc6!bloom-beacon!athena.mit.edu!sethg From: sethg@athena.mit.edu (Seth Gordon) Newsgroups: news.misc Subject: _Boston Herald_ article on JEDR/Templeton case Message-ID: <8304@bloom-beacon.MIT.EDU> Date: 5 Dec 88 00:13:56 GMT Sender: daemon@bloom-beacon.MIT.EDU Reply-To: sethg@athena.mit.edu (Seth Gordon) Organization: Thoughtcrime Associates: Miniluv Rm 101, London, Oceania Lines: 54 The _Boston Herald_ of 12/4/88, page 2, contains an article on the JEDR/Templeton case. JEDR, who has decided not to post to the net for a while, would like you all to know that it contains errors, and given some of the things it says, I agree. JEDR's comments: 1) The word "legal" in para. 2 should be "legitimate." 2) Para. 3: "Richmond... [is getting help from FBI et al. to] get a computer network called USENET either censored or off the air." He didn't call for either. "USENET has many valuable aspects & must be differentiated from one small part of it," he says (here, now, sitting next to me). He did not use the word "censorship" at any time. 3) Para. 8: "he turned on his computer on Nov. 8..." Wrong; he did not say that the "six million" joke, referred to in this paragraph, appeared on Nov. 8. 4) Numerous factual errors. JEDR is trying to clear this up with Herald management. My own comment: I am firmly astride the fence on this issue (were I Templeton, I wouldn't post racist jokes, but I suppose he has every right to), but I know JEDR personally, and I will vouch for his integrity. If he says he was misquoted, I believe him. The article also refers to his actions as "a one-man campaign." What are Nancy Gould and David Makowsky, chopped liver? Furthermore, mightn't the original print article, in the Kitchener _Waterloo-Record,_ have been prompted by a *Canadian,* not by the eevil Spirit of Richmond that doth corrode the grand anarchic traditions of the net? Furthermore, the _Boston Herald_ is (or, until very recently, was) owned by Rupert Murdoch, whose reputation for journalistic integrity, or lack thereof, is well-known. Whatever JEDR has done in the past, the story is clearly now on the wire, and how far it spreads is out of his control. JEDR's current position, I believe, is: he doesn't want to deprive anyone of their Constitutional rights, but Templeton et al. should use better judgement, like the editor of a newspaper would, to exclude overtly racist comments. Flames on Grand Issues of Free Speech and All That Bullshit go in /dev/null. Please. I doubt much of this "debate" has convinced anyone of anything. -- "Some people get results, I get consequences." --Jimmy Durante : bloom-beacon!athena.mit.edu!sethg / standard disclaimer : Seth Gordon / MIT Brnch., PO Box 53, Cambridge, MA 02139