Monday, June 11, 2007

Free Speech at Risk

What do the words and terms “family values,” “marriage,” and “natural family” have in common?  Well, if you reside in the State of California, which, unfortunately, falls under the cognizance of the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, utilizing the words and terms mentioned above in a flier, or in talking with an acquaintance, could possibly end up having you convicted of a “hate speech” crime because the homosexual community may find these words and terms offensive.

You think I’m kidding?  I’m not.

In the case of Good News Employee Association vs. Hicks, said court ruled that

Public employers are permitted to curtail employee speech as long as their “‘legitmate administrative interests’ outweigh the employee’s interest in freedom of speech.

The case actually had its origins some time ago, though this is the first I’ve heard about it.  The Washington Times is reporting on this story, today, in a piece titled Suit to decide workplace ‘hate speech.’ From the Times piece.

The dispute began in January 2003, when the two Oakland employees created a subgroup at their workplace called the “Good News Employee Association.” It was partly in response to a group of homosexual employees having formed their own group 10 months before and being given access to the city e-mail system. One e-mail, dated Oct. 11, 2002, invited city employees to participate in “National Coming-Out Day.”
When several employees asked whether such a posting was legitimate city business, they got an e-mail from City Council member Danny Wan, reminding them that a “celebration of the gay/lesbian culture and movement” was part of the city’s role to “celebrate diversity.”
In response, the Good News employees posted an introductory flier on the employee bulletin board Jan. 3.
It said: “Preserve Our Workplace With Integrity: Good News Employee Association is a forum for people of faith to express their views on the contemporary issues of the day.” It said it opposed “all views which seek to redefine the natural family and marriage,” which it defined as “a union of a man and a woman, according to California state law."

Well, I want to celebrate individuals’ right to free speech, which is part and parcel of “celebrate diversity,” and this case is not a cause for celebration, though it does almost make me cackle with manical laughter.

Posted by John Venlet on 06/11 at 04:58 PM
(0) Comments • (0) Trackbacks • Permalink

"Poisoned Love Affair," Indeed

Interesting piece on line at the New Statesman written by Robert Service.  Service’s piece was written more as a critique of a review which somewhat criticized his book Comrades!: A History of World Communism, which I must state I have not had the pleasure of reading, but none-the-less, it makes for an interesting read.  A couple of short excerpts.

Communism, like nuclear fuel, has a long afterlife. In country after country across Europe - from Russia to Albania - it has been discredited for its record in power.

And more importantly, this.

The point is that repression was not some aberrant phenomenon under communist rule around the world. It was ideologically condoned in advance; it proved also to be a practical necessity for the consolidation of communist states. Communists from the 1920s through to the 1940s were frank about this: they eulogised dictatorship. Subsequently, they avoided debate on the matter or else contended that they would break with the models provided by historical communist states. They never explained how they would introduce communism except by massive force. The ghosts of the victims of all those bloody purges cry out for us to reject the printed apologias for the communist past.

Service’s piece is titled Party politics.

Linked via Arts & Letters Daily.

Posted by John Venlet on 06/11 at 07:55 AM
(0) Comments • (0) Trackbacks • Permalink

Complicity for a Price

The amount of data that can be garnered from individuals’ internet activities, via large internet players like Google and Yahoo, is technologically amazing.

Here in America, we may feel somewhat insulated from the state’s prying eyes when they desire to see into individuals’ private internet activities, but that insulated feeling is probably unjustified.  In China, users of the internet, in all likelihood, do not feel this insulation, as Chinese individuals are subjected to the state’s prying eyes in their homes, while eating noodles on the street, while performing their jobs, in all aspects of their daily lives from birth to death.

Just what part do Google and Yahoo play in the repression of the Chinese and in the protection of individuals’ privacy?

Privacy International gives Google the worst possible privacy protection rating, and Yahoo is currently being sued by journalist Shi Tao, who has been jailed by the Chinese with the complicity of data received from Yahoo concerning Tao’s private internet activities.

While Google has successfully fought the state in U.S. courts, over the state’s desire to delve into data Google compiles while individuals surf the net, in China Google is more apt to rollover to accept the state’s belly rub if Chinese authorities desire to peer where they have no business peering, as Yahoo did in the case of Shi Tao.

What justification does Yahoo give for supplying the Chinese government with data utilized to imprison Tao?

However, Yahoo! added that companies operating in China must comply with Chinese law or risk having their employees face civil or criminal penalties.

Ah, the “law,” the beast that devours freedom.  So, because Chinese law decrees that internet companies like Yahoo and Google must crawl in bed and play nicey nice in order to do business, i.e. inform on individuals’ private internet activities at the behest of the state, will these companies do the same in the United States when the state finally gets around to imposing the same type of information sharing laws as a requirement to do business?

Yahoo can condemn the Chinese government all they want regarding the repression of Chinese freedom of speech on the internet, but when it comes to making a buck, whether in China or the U.S., what will the price of complicity be?

Yahoo Weighs in on Free Speech in China

Posted by John Venlet on 06/11 at 05:41 AM
(0) Comments • (0) Trackbacks • Permalink

No Kidding, Paris Hilton

It’s a sad commentary on our times when Paris Hilton’s self inflicted legal travails so consume the media it’s the lead story on every network, and the public laps it up like it’s the nectar of the gods.

Well, Paris Hilton finally said something that actually makes sense.

Get over it, says Paris Hilton

Posted by John Venlet on 06/11 at 05:25 AM
(0) Comments • (0) Trackbacks • Permalink

Over Stems and Seeds

Today, many police raids do not begin with a knock on the door, but rather with a door busting invasion of body armour suited coppers wielding machine guns, stun grenades, and whatever other high priced military grade weapons police departments can get their hands on courtesy of the Department of Homeland Insecurity.

The city of Grand Rapids, Michigan is not immune to this trend of police smash and grab raids in the name of so called “war on drugs,” and here’s a case where a couple who experienced such a raid first hand are fighting back, and oh so slowly beating back the unthinking goons who busted in their doors for stems and seeds.

Police swept through the Jansmas’ home in August 2003 and found marijuana—mostly stems and seeds, plastic baggies and a small scale.

The Jansmas were charged with hindering and opposing a police officer, drug possession and maintaining a drug house. Police later seized the home.

Just why did the cops target the Jansma’s home for a raid?

Police were led to the home after a group of teens were found smoking marijuana outside Alger Elementary School. The teens said they purchased the marijuana from one of the Jansmas’ sons.

So on the word of a “group of teens” smoking a bit of herb outside an elementary school, stupid in and of itself, the Jansma’s have their door kicked in, the Missus’ wrist and arm broken, and their home confiscated because their son sold a spliff to some teenagers who don’t have the sense to be discrete.

Of course the city of Grand Rapids, Michigan police department, and the city’s attorneys, “believe” their strong arm actions are justified, as so succinctly stated here.

Lawyers, representing the city in the couple’s 2005 civil rights lawsuit, say Jelte and Janine Jansma got what’s coming to people who bring drugs into neighborhoods.

The Jansmas have fought back against these over zealous tactics, and are slowly regaining a semblance of normality to their lives.  All charges have been dropped, they have regained their home from the state, and they have filed a $1 million dollar civil suit against Grand Rapids’ police department.

But all this occurred over a joint sold by the Jansma’s son, and stems and seeds.  Ridiculous.

Couple’s battle rages on vs. Grand Rapids

Posted by John Venlet on 06/11 at 04:33 AM
(2) Comments • (0) Trackbacks • Permalink
Page 1 of 1 pages