Plato and art censorship (fwd)

[Udut, Kenneth]

Georges,

This is an interesting line of thought.

In the United States, there are certain
topics that, Yes, you are free to publish,
but, Yes, you may be imprisoned for.
[perhaps not directly, but if you are
writing, for example, on the side of
child molesters, you are free to publish
this, but you will also most likely
find yourself in prison - for on some
topics, an accusation of guilt is
as good as being guilty, and being
associated with certain groups, or
ideologies, such as anti Jewish
sentiments, will leave you at the
very least a 'marked man' and at the
worst, imprisoned for "hate crime".

[which is something I have never
understood - when you hate someone
or something, you would have to
consider the someone or something
as on an equal level or more
powerful than you, no?  But most
of these 'hate crimes' come from
one who considers their victims as
'less than human"...  But perhaps
my thinking is wrong here.]

"Freedom of speech" often means
"Freedom to hang yourself by your
own noose".  Let the 'wrong' ideas
slip forth from your pen, and you,
too, can find yourself in prison.

Censorship may well be a better thing,
and a more progressive thing.

At least then, the lines are clearly drawn,
and the punishments to be meted out are
understood.

Otherwise, a culture will live
under the assumption that, "All
is permissible", when in reality,
only things within certain
boundaries are permissible.

[which is okay, to draw lines -
but they should at least be clear,
and understood.  Otherwise, the laws
are "at the whim of the king", or
judge, or police, or whoever.]

But this is speculation on my part.
It's easy to understand the evil
in one's backyard, but the greener
grass in the neighbor's backyard
that seems so much better, may
well be far worse...


--
-- Kenneth.Udut at SPCORP.COM
--


|-----Original Message-----
|From: Adassovsky Georges [mailto:gadassov at wanadoo.fr]
|Sent: Tuesday, November 23, 1999 1:18 PM
|To: SEELANGS at CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU
|Subject: Re: Plato and art censorship (fwd)
|
|
|About censorship, since some opinions have been expressed, on
|the list and
|privately, I am asking myself some questions.
|What is better, for an author, to be censored prior to
|publishing, or to be
|prosecuted after?
|For example, right now, it is illegal in France to publish antisemitic
|ideas, and some authors have been condemned.
|So a judge is facing a text, and he must tell if this text is
|antisemitic
|or not. It is exactly the same work as a censor.
|When Radishchev published his "voyage..", there was no
|censorship in Russia
|(1790). he was condemned to 10 years of bannishment in
|Siberia. Maybe he
|would have prefered to have been censored?
|After that Ekaterina installed censorship, may be she thought it was a
|progress?