Why Americans Are Giant Hypocrites About Free Speech

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http://www.alternet.org/world/why-americans-are-giant-hypocrites-about-free-speech

Even under the relatively broad construction of freedom of speech we’re accustomed to in the United States, almost everyone up to and including Glenn Greenwald and the ACLU would agree that my right to say what I want has both legal and practical limits. I’m not allowed to make direct threats against the life of the president or other government officials, and I’m not allowed, as the conventional phrase puts it, to shout “Fire!” in a crowded theater. That sounds reasonable enough. But wait – as we have discovered this week, and as we discover over and over again, when it comes to restricting speech, the devil is in the details. What constitutes an unacceptable threat against the leadership class, and who is covered by this restriction? Does the owner of the theater (metaphorically speaking) get to determine whether or not my words have caused a panic? What if the theater is really on fire?

In the eyes of many American civil libertarians and journalists, France and other Western European nations committed a dangerous and self-destructive blunder this week with their widespread crackdown on speech perceived as condoning or supporting Islamic terrorism. Just days earlier, Paris had captured the world’s attention with a massive rally in response to the murderous attacks on Charlie Hebdo and a suburban supermarket. French citizens of many backgrounds, races and faiths had taken to the streets by the hundreds of thousands to demonstrate that the republican ideal, however tarnished and challenged, had not perished.

Now the French cops are rounding people up because of stuff they said, including a drunk driver who tried to talk tough after causing an accident and a notorious comedian who made a nasty joke on Facebook. To say this is ironic feels inadequate. To describe it as going from the sublime to the ridiculous comes closer, but fails to reveal the contradictory kinship between these events. As Greenwald noted earlier this week, it’s impossible to imagine Western media celebrities signing on to a #JeSuisDieudonné campaign, in solidarity with the confrontational French comic who has repeatedly been accused of violating France’s prohibitions on hate speech with anti-Zionist and/or anti-Semitic comments. (Dieudonné is also the pioneer of the “reverse Nazi salute,” meant to skirt or satirize the ban on the classic “Heil Hitler” gesture. Points for innovation, if nothing else.) Think Bill Maher is likely to take up his cause?

[Fred Sanders]

1. Isn't it obvious why the American media will not show ANY Hebdo cartoons at all related to religion?

Opinion:

If American mass media shows the Muslim hating cartoons they would have to show Christian and Jewish cartoons depicting vulgar and pornographic Catholic and Jewish religious icons in the most vicious and stereotypical ways.

Not all the Hebdo cartoons, hundreds and hundred over the yesrs, are brilliant satire. Some are just mean and meaningless for the sake of mean and meaningless, some are not, some are brilliant, some you don't even get.

No way, Jose. Not getting into that quagmire. They have a better way to get around that.

The American media and Americans in general would rather live with the hypocrisy of being free speech defenders while refusing to show the more controversial cartoons and hide behind the blanket of "editorial discretion".

The masses will buy that, they know, folks see the hypocrisy of the America media all the time.

And it preserves the American media as America's primary censors of information.

You think there is free speech in America like no other nation on Earth? You would think wrong.

Dictators in some nations would kill for the homogenous, controlled American media and its fear generating capacity. Fearful folks are controllable folks, did the Fearbola media con teach folks nothing about the American media? How about the media and the Iraq war? Apparently only a few.

And Bill Maher got it wrong as to what the Muslim comedy actor in France a few days ago, was charged with, it was for one Facebook post, "Je suis............", not his long history of anti-Semitism. Kind of a preemptive attack on hate speech, because that is something that can blow up real fast in France, they know that as taught by French history.

America and American media: "Je suis Hypocrites".

Saudi Arabia, Quatar, half the wolrd leaders at the fake leaders "March" in Paris..."Nous sommes hypocrites".

[PSPS]

4. You're making the mistake commonly made when this is discussed

"Freedom of speech" doesn't mean a private enterprise is compelled to "show" everything. All it means is that you're entitled to say whatever is on your mind. Nobody else is required to relay that message, whether it be a blog, a newspaper or a broadcast station.

For the same reason, this statement is wrong:

If American mass media shows the Muslim hating cartoons they would have to show Christian and Jewish cartoons depicting vulgar and pornographic Catholic and Jewish religious icons in the most vicious and stereotypical ways.

Mass media is private media. If I were a newspaper publisher, I would have completely unfettered control over its content. It would be, after all, my newspaper. Now, on the other hand, if you were to start your own newspaper and wanted to make different decisions about what was in it, that's fine. But your control stops there.

Broadcast stations used to be handled differently since they do use "public airwaves." That was called The Fairness Doctrine. The thinking was that, since the airwaves are limited in nature and "publicly-owned spaces," there must be equal access to all points of view. This was enacted in 1949 but Reagan's toady at the FCC rescinded it in 1987.

[Fred Sanders]

6. When the entire MSM and major publications ALL do the same I think my premise is on firm ground.

Otherwise it is an all private media company conspiracy, it could not be that..it is just general hypocrisy.

[PSPS]

8. Yes, I understand you do. I was just pointing out that it is a common mistake.

[marmar]

2. K&f***king R

It reached epidemic proportions last week.

[BlueJazz]

3. Seems to me that a large share of Americans are usually outraged about something.

I don't find that, in itself, troubling. Our sources of information have increased dramatically in the past few decades.
We have lots and lots of wonderful choices and chances to be upset about something.

I mean, look before the computer and Internet age. You usually were not bombarded with so many opinions ...both wise and silly. You read books, a newspaper and watched bland TV.
Now, the chance to be outraged is only limited by your ISP and Dish network.

[PSPS]

5. I call today's media "The Outrage Industry"

What most people call "the news" isn't really news at all. It's opinion. And, to keep viewers/listeners tuning in, you have to have controversy, so you must have something to create outrage -- the more "outrageous" the better. You have to be more outrageous than the other guy to keep your ratings up. That's the biggest market in media today. Hence, the "Outrage Industry."

[BlueJazz]

12. Yep..Your words ring oh-so true.

[oberliner]

7. Individuals are protected, but churches and their doctrines are not.

You can ridicule the prophet, but you cannot incite hatred toward his followers

Seems pretty straightforward.

[randome]

9. Americans are hypocrites because of what France is doing?

Not sure I get that. But Europe has always had more stringent laws about free speech than America.
[hr][font color="blue"][center]Birds are territorial creatures.
The lyrics to the songbird's melodious trill go something like this:
"Stay out of my territory or I'll PECK YOUR GODDAMNED EYES OUT!"[/center][/font][hr]

[Fred Sanders]

11. Dozens of folks in France were arrested for hate speech, where is America on denouncing that?

http://m.ibtimes.com/je-suis-charlie-backlash-france-hate-speech-arrests-highlight-double-standard-critics-1785188

[treestar]

10. It is not the speech, it is the action

Disturbing the peace, planning a killing.

There is no speech-alone we can be punished for.

I don't see why it's impossible to give us credit where credit is due. It's a form on USDS.