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billybrobby
Joined: 09 Dec 2004
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 Posted: Thu Oct 19, 2006 4:30 am Post subject: |
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| RACETRAITOR wrote: |
| billybrobby wrote: |
But I'm glad we can still have klan rallies and such in America. When I hear about Europe and their misguided hate-speech laws, I cringe. |
Not sure if you're being ironic here. I personally think certain people don't have a right to freedom in certain circumstances. We are more free if hate groups are outlawed. |
I'm dead serious. I don't think there is any real freedom in outlawing certain types of discourse and expression, no matter how repugnant. People have this facile idea that attacks on freedom always come from the right, so they're perfectly willing to send their freedom of expression down the river so long as it's for some lofty leftist ideal. Maybe the reason Americans don't usually fall for those kind of tricks is just because they are too right-wing, but I like to think that it's because they are vigilant about their freedom of speech. |
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coolsage
Joined: 28 Jan 2003
Location: The overcast afternoon of the soul
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| Posted: Thu Oct 19, 2006 9:14 am Post subject: Re: The most free country in the world! |
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| Satori wrote: |
| Hyeon Een wrote: |
Somewhere like the US or the UK feels a lot less 'free' to me than South Korea. Back home I can't buy beer in the store at 6am on a Sunday, I can't walk around with bottles of alcohol at night, I can't visit a red-light district with chicks advertising themselves in the window, I can't buy pirated DVDs on the streets, I can't open up a filthy foodcart on the streets to earn a living, I can't beat the hell out of someone just because I'm married to them, I can't....
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You think widespread prostitution, and thriving black market, and poor police protection from domestic violence equals a more free country huh. What about governmental blocking of internet sites, severe crack downs on labour movements, compulsory military service, a highly protected domestic market, draconian drug and immigration laws, a strong US military presense, a DMZ with a hostile unpredictable nuclear neighbour, a deeply conservative conformist culture with strong xenophobic tendencies? Is that free enough for ya? |
Nicely put. You've summed up the place in a nutshell. |
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RACETRAITOR
Joined: 24 Oct 2005
Location: Seoul, South Korea
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| Posted: Thu Oct 19, 2006 9:17 am Post subject: |
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| Satori wrote: |
| IF you want to have real freedom of speech, you have to let the scumbags speak too. Otherwise you get on the slipperly slope of deciding who is and who isn`t a scumbag... |
There's a grey area, but on either side of it it's black and white. Someone who sends nail bombs in the mail or blows up embassies does not have a right to free speech. |
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coolsage
Joined: 28 Jan 2003
Location: The overcast afternoon of the soul
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| Posted: Thu Oct 19, 2006 9:19 am Post subject: |
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| Perhaps Groucho Marx said it best: "Freedom does not give you the right to shout 'theater' in a crowded fire." |
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Corporal
Joined: 25 Jan 2003
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| Posted: Thu Oct 19, 2006 7:14 pm Post subject: |
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| Bottom of the barrel ESL teacher's dictionary, entry A. Freedom: being able to get drunk in public on Sunday mornings. |
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