Author Topic: Congress lays a big roadblock to the WBC  (Read 8818 times)

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Offline m52nickerson

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Re: Congress lays a big roadblock to the WBC
« Reply #30 on: August 04, 2012, 11:47:07 am »
I think the point right now is that there is no legal right of mourning. If you want to grant that, then there's a much large implication to it than just telling the WBC to fuck off.

Your right, but maybe there should be that right to mourning, or at least the right to have a funeral and service without protesters. 
It is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing. ~Macbeth

Offline Mechtaur

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Re: Congress lays a big roadblock to the WBC
« Reply #31 on: August 04, 2012, 12:37:59 pm »

Quote
and I wouldn't be surprised if I found out that someone who was at one of the funerals did something regretful because of their words.

Words alone are never sufficient to provoke a reasonable person to violence. (Legally, anyway.) It does not matter what the circumstances are, as long as WBC sticks to words (and they do), anyone who attacks them is at fault as the initial aggressor.

I wasn't talking about someone becoming aggressive with the WBC, I was talking about the person committing suicide.

Offline Kit Walker

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Re: Congress lays a big roadblock to the WBC
« Reply #32 on: August 04, 2012, 01:47:40 pm »
I wasn't talking about someone becoming aggressive with the WBC, I was talking about the person committing suicide.

You can't curtail someone's free speech because someone somewhere might hear them and decide to commit suicide over it if they happen to be in a state of mind conducive to suicidal thoughts. As a matter of fact, the "someone somewhere might be spurred to violent action over it, maybe" school of restriction has not held up well a couple of times IIRC.
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Offline Old Viking

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Re: Congress lays a big roadblock to the WBC
« Reply #33 on: August 04, 2012, 07:19:58 pm »
Cheap political grandstanding intended to gain favor with the rubes.  It is the legal and moral equivalent of a law regulating disapproval of apple pie.  Civilized behavior is most often a matter of basic human decency.  The Phelpses are unfamiliar with such a concept.
I am an old man, and I've seen many problems, most of which never happened.

Offline Mechtaur

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Re: Congress lays a big roadblock to the WBC
« Reply #34 on: August 05, 2012, 12:34:39 am »
I wasn't talking about someone becoming aggressive with the WBC, I was talking about the person committing suicide.

You can't curtail someone's free speech because someone somewhere might hear them and decide to commit suicide over it if they happen to be in a state of mind conducive to suicidal thoughts. As a matter of fact, the "someone somewhere might be spurred to violent action over it, maybe" school of restriction has not held up well a couple of times IIRC.

By that logic, verbal bullying shouldn't be stopped.

Offline Kit Walker

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Re: Congress lays a big roadblock to the WBC
« Reply #35 on: August 05, 2012, 10:13:56 am »
By that logic, verbal bullying shouldn't be stopped

In what context to you mean? Because in the case of schools, the Supreme Court has ruled that they do have the right to curtail free speech that is actively disruptive to the purpose of the school (I.E, the safety and education of its students). Verbal bullying in a school context falls directly under that. However, that has everything to do with the fact that school administrators are acting in loco parentis (legalese for "in the place of a parent") over a group of minors. This would not apply to the wider world.

If you mean in the adult world, that too is a little complex. There is the Fighting Words Doctrine of limiting free speech, which the WBC has run up against before, has been generally held to narrowly apply to personal speech. So if a WBCer walked directly up to a grieving military family member and told them "your loved one is burning hell for supporting this fag enabling government", they could be arrested (pursuant to local ordinance) because those are words that could spur a reasonable person to punch you in the mouth. If they stand on a street corner outside a military funeral  with signs relaying a message to that effect, that's protected because that is a public example of speech. Incidentally, these limits were first defined during the sixties, over Flag Burning and a vest that said "Fuck The Draft".

An argument can be made, and indeed was made by Samuel Alito when the WBC faced the Supremes, that Phelps and Phriends' protest signs rise to the level of fighting words. The rest of the Court, the current and oft times split down lines of political ideology incarnation of the Supreme Court, disagreed.
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Offline Mechtaur

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Re: Congress lays a big roadblock to the WBC
« Reply #36 on: August 05, 2012, 11:24:56 am »
By that logic, verbal bullying shouldn't be stopped

In what context to you mean?

If you mean in the adult world, that too is a little complex. There is the Fighting Words Doctrine of limiting free speech, which the WBC has run up against before, has been generally held to narrowly apply to personal speech. So if a WBCer walked directly up to a grieving military family member and told them "your loved one is burning hell for supporting this fag enabling government", they could be arrested (pursuant to local ordinance) because those are words that could spur a reasonable person to punch you in the mouth. If they stand on a street corner outside a military funeral  with signs relaying a message to that effect, that's protected because that is a public example of speech. Incidentally, these limits were first defined during the sixties, over Flag Burning and a vest that said "Fuck The Draft".

An argument can be made, and indeed was made by Samuel Alito when the WBC faced the Supremes, that Phelps and Phriends' protest signs rise to the level of fighting words. The rest of the Court, the current and oft times split down lines of political ideology incarnation of the Supreme Court, disagreed.

The second part you did is what I meant. I still don't agree with the idea that distance should protect them when the message is still the same.

On another note, the part I bolded made me giggle for some reason.

Offline Kit Walker

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Re: Congress lays a big roadblock to the WBC
« Reply #37 on: August 05, 2012, 12:27:19 pm »
The second part you did is what I meant. I still don't agree with the idea that distance should protect them when the message is still the same.

On another note, the part I bolded made me giggle for some reason.

It's not distance, it's venue and scope. A face to face comment directed personally at you vs. general commentary on the metaphysical disposition of dead soldiers. The Supremes felt, and I agree, that the act of making a point (no matter how vile that point) in a public space for the public to view renders it impersonal enough to not count as fighting words. I think I'm making my point poorly, so here's a hypothetical: It's the difference between walking up to a U.S. soldier and saying "Hey pal, quit killing innocent civilians for me, ok?" and standing outside a West Point graduation with a sign saying "Quit Killing Civilians!". Both would be offensive to the people viewing them, but only one is a directly personal attack.

And thanks!

Incidentally, this podcast has a pair of reformed Phelps kids on it, talking at length about their family. I honestly can't remember when they come in, but it is damned fascinating stuff. One of them is the son of Shirley Phelps-Roper, family spokeswoman, if I recall correctly.
"Well believe me, Mike, I calculated the odds of this succeeding versus the odds I was doing something incredibly stupid... and I went ahead anyway." - Crow T. Robot

*Actual title from the Universal Life Church Monastery, the outfit that ordained me as a wedding officiant.

Offline Mechtaur

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Re: Congress lays a big roadblock to the WBC
« Reply #38 on: August 06, 2012, 12:59:43 am »
The second part you did is what I meant. I still don't agree with the idea that distance should protect them when the message is still the same.

On another note, the part I bolded made me giggle for some reason.

It's not distance, it's venue and scope. A face to face comment directed personally at you vs. general commentary on the metaphysical disposition of dead soldiers. The Supremes felt, and I agree, that the act of making a point (no matter how vile that point) in a public space for the public to view renders it impersonal enough to not count as fighting words. I think I'm making my point poorly, so here's a hypothetical: It's the difference between walking up to a U.S. soldier and saying "Hey pal, quit killing innocent civilians for me, ok?" and standing outside a West Point graduation with a sign saying "Quit Killing Civilians!". Both would be offensive to the people viewing them, but only one is a directly personal attack.

And thanks!

Incidentally, this podcast has a pair of reformed Phelps kids on it, talking at length about their family. I honestly can't remember when they come in, but it is damned fascinating stuff. One of them is the son of Shirley Phelps-Roper, family spokeswoman, if I recall correctly.

Fair enough, doesn't make them less scum of the earth.

Yeah, I've heard that podcast before. I'm pretty sure the only fascination I had with it was bile fascination though.