Re: Re: Freedom to Spew

(I took Pete off because I'm not sure he's interested in our side 
discussing.)

--On Wednesday, March 21, 2001 10:52 AM -0600 Dave Rolsky 
<[email protected]> wrote:

> On Tue, 20 Mar 2001, Bijan Parsia wrote:
>
>> > Nor is it terribly defensible
>>
>> Defensible in what sense? AFAICT, it's legally a-ok. I don't think
>> Horowitz's taking out an ad in school papers is terribly defensible, nor
>> do I think that soft money contributions are *at all* defensible, but
>> they're totally legal.
>
> I meant defensible morally, ethically, as well as tactically.

I thought so, but I mean to suggest (as you can gather from some other 
posts) that it might not be so morally *condemable*. Speeding is illegal. 
It may be (minory) immoral (if just by the general rule that we have some 
moral obligation to obey reasonable laws). But it's also trivial, most of 
the time.

Part of the problem is that our *reactions* partially determine the 
significance of the consquences and of the actions. So part of the status 
(tactical *and* moral) depends on what we *decide* about it.

That makes things a touch sticky.

>> > A much better reaction would be to go find all the papers and insert a
>> > rejoinder to the offensive speech.
>>
>> Vandalism. (Seriously! Some people did this.)
>
> In what way would inserting a piece of paper inside a newspaper be
> vandalism?

Eh, *I* don't think it is. But I don't think taking the papers was theft 
either and like to smash buddas, so what do *I* know? :)

>  Vandalism is defined as "Willful or malicious destruction of
> public or private property."  There is certainly no destruction going on.

I believe that chalking buildings, for example, is classed as vandalism 
(via "defacing") even though not permanent. After all, permanance is a 
matter of degree (as the sand blasters outside attest :)). And, as one 
might point out, you can get much the same effect by putting the inserts 
*beside* the paper. What if I penciled in easily erasable comments 
"Horowitz is a booby" in all the papers? Is that relevantly similar to the 
inserts? What if i used post-it inserts?

What if I *took* all the papers. Spent a couple of hours defacing them 
(e.g., filling out the crossword puzzle) and *put them back*? I *took* 
them, which made them mine, which I'm allowed to deface, and then put them 
back.

That might be littering! :)

It might be crass, but it might be funny, done right. It certainly seems 
legal. I'm not clear that it's very immoral, if immoral at all.

> It seems that if this provokes a reaction where the 'inserters' are called
> vandals, then they've achieved the moral high ground (something Horowitz
> seems to desperately want), thus achieving a victory.

Horowitz wants the *publicity* high ground, not the *moral* high ground 
(i.e, the appearance, not the reality). Frankly, once you start calling the 
protesters thieves I think you've lost the moral high ground.

>> Yeah, but couple this with the other point that Horowitz is *trying* to
>> provoke. People are people. They are provokable. It's important to note
>> that. I don't think *hectoring* people is going to bring them to calm.
>>
>> It's a case of do as you preach.
>
> How would putting in an insert be hectoring?

Sorry, you missed context (because it's elliptical). The hectoring is what 
Rosenthal was doing, which is what I'm against. Calling them thieves and 
thugs and brown shirts is hectoring. Encouraging them to help you do 
inserts isn't (necessarily) hectoring, but a good and reasonable reaction.

>  Horowitz was given a forum
> to spew his vile trash.  People object to it and add their own resposne to
> that forum.  If that response (the insert) is calm and well-reasoned, I
> don't see how this could be construed badly.

See above.

>> Err, *what* it suggests may be arrogant, but is the way they suggest it
>> arrogant? What if they think (however wrongly) that common consent is
>> with them?
>
> If common consent is with the burners then I guess I wouldn't have much to
> argue about.

Remember I was not after whether it *was* common consent, but whether the 
protesters were *arrogant* (in the censorious mode). So here, it's only 
what they *believe* that's relevant to determining their *attitude* (though 
their *actions* may arrogate in objectionable ways).

>  I'm not sure what constitutes common consent though.  A
> majority?  Super-majority?  90% of campus?

I doubt people think clearly that way. I also doubt that the protester 
thought that their action would stop Horowitz's article from being read. So 
*what is it that they're trying to do*?

>> in an unique way. Is it ok for me to buy up all the copies of his books
>> and make a bonefire while chanting "Horowitz is a pig?" It's certainly
>> legal. It prevents everyone else from reading the book. Doesn't that
>> expose something *troubling* about our "freedom of speech"?
>
> I hardly equate legal with moral/ethical (and I don't think you do
> either).

No way! But they do interact (see the speeding example).

>  Whether its legal or not is irrelevant.

Not at all. If it's legal, then there's something really really wrong with 
criminalizing them, or calling them thieves, and *espeically* invoking 
state/university power against them. Indeed, I think invoking state 
power/criminal statues againts  certain *illegal* activities is morally 
wrong.

>  Frankly, I don't feel
> to strongly about the morality of buying and burning all his books.  I do
> think it would be ineffective and counter-productive.

Yep. At least, absent a larger strategy. Of course, the interesting 
question is how *we* (leftists) respond to the fact of the "stealing". 
Rosenthal isn't the way, IMHO.

(Also, i would still encourage newspaper editors not to publish such stuff.)

>  As you pointed out,
> this burning incident has only served to give his argument a wider
> readership.  I wouldn't have read it myself had you not posted your
> original argument.

Heh! I wouldn't have read it but for Rosenthal! :) (Actually, I probably 
would have, *eventually*.)

>> >  I would find it rather offensive that someone else thinks I
>> > shouldn't be allowed to read it and judge for myself and this would
>> > predispose me to think negatively of them, making it more difficult for
>> > them to get their message across to me.
>>
>> Then you don't like editors? Or teachers? Or reviewers? There's some
>> points of disanalogy of course, but *some* sort of subtlty is required in
>> your argument.
>
> There's a huge disanalogy in that with the case of
> editors/teachers/reviewers I have chosen to accept their guidance and if
> I don't want it I'm free not read their books/magazines/reviews or attend
> their classes.

Yep. Well, sorta. Required courses, economic need, etc. We designate 
certain situations as non-coercive or with no barriers when *de facto* they 
have oodles. Remember, there's always salon.com. Again, I take the act as a 
strong statment that 1) Horowitz's ad is horrible and 2) it's not 
appropriate for a school paper to publish. Why is either offensive?

[snip]
> At this point I'd be happy to summarize my point like this:
>
> Burning the papers is ethically objectionable,

I'm into figuring out exactly *how* and *why* and *to what degree*.

> but not nearly as
> objectionable as Horowitz himself.  Given this, the biggest problem with
> burning the papers is that they lead to people on the left talking about
> what the paper-burners did, rather than how to work against Horowitz's
> vileness.

well, and to Horowitz propoganda.

> So really I think the problem is more tactical than anything else.

Consequential, I'd say. I.e., the problem is due to the results.

> Burning the papers distracts from the real goal, which is to show
> Horowitz's racist evil for what it is.

I think we're largely in agreement. I'll add that it's worth *not* falling 
into Horowitz's trap (the way Rosenthal did, I charitably assume). The 
protesters maybe made that *harder*, but we should apply what we'd like 
*them* to have thought to ourselves: react as smart as we can with our eyes 
on the real goal.

Cheers,
Bijan.