...C
C H R I S T I N A S I U N O ' C O N N E L L | HTMARCOM Steering Committee
|
tell all the truth but tell it slant |
success in circuit lies - Emily Dickinson | coco@gold.mv.net
---------- Forwarded message ----------
>
>Posted-Date: Mon, 11 Dec 1995 03:35:33 -0500
>From: Mike Godwin <mnemonic@well.com>
>
>
>Listen. Take a moment now and listen. (Sound of ripping paper.) That 's
>the sound of what the United States Congress has been doing to the
>Constitution in the last few months, all in the name of protecting our
>children.
>
>But do they really care about our children? I doubt it.
>
>What they care about, for the most part, is being *seen* as pro-family and
>pro-children. And since the religious right has seized much of the high
>ground of pro-children-and-family rhetoric, guess who they're afraid of.
>
>Were their votes grounded in an intelligent appraisal of the technology
>and functions of the Net? Were they based on knowledge and reflection? The
>short answer to these questions is "No." The votes of Senators and
>Representatives were driven, for the most part, by fear and ignorance.
>
>Last Thursday I was sworn in as a member of the state bar of California.
>This is the third jurisdiction I'm admitted to practice in, but it was
>only the first time I'd ever attended one of the group swearing-in
>ceremonies. Like all the other new admittees, I echoed the words of the
>attorney at the front of the auditorium. In unison, we all swore to
>dedicate ourselves to upholding the United States Constitution.
>
>This oath is not terribly different in wording or philosophy from that
>taken by each member of the United States House of Representatives, or
>each member of the United States Senate, or the Governor of any state, or
>the President of the United States. We have all sworn to uphold the
>Constitution.
>
>Part of the Constitution is the First Amendment. And whenever you think
>about the First Amendment, the first thing you should remember is that it
>was designed by the Framers of the Constitution to protect offensive
>speech and offensive speakers. After all, no one ever tries to ban the
>other kind.
>
>And this was what I was thinking about as I stood in that auditorium and
>took my oath -- that I was once again swearing to uphold the First
>Amendment and the Constitution of which it is a part.
>
>But where are all the Representatives and Senators who have sworn to
>uphold the First Amendment, I asked myself? Now that we face the greatest
>attack on the freedom of speech of the common man that this nation has
>ever seen, where are the other defenders of the Constitution? Are they
>educating themselve about the new medium of the Net? Have they read a word
>of Howard Rheingold's book on virtual communities? Have they logged in
>themselves? Have they surfed the Web? Have made a friend on the Net? Or
>are they satisfied with doing something that doesn't require any online
>time at all -- passing bad laws?
>
>One senator from my state, Dianne Feinstein, is ready to ban information
>from the Net that is legal in every library -- perhaps because she's under
>the impression that it costs nothing to create the fiction that she's
>preventing another Oklahoma City. But it does cost something -- it costs
>us the freedom that our forefathers shed their blood to bequeath to us.
>Here's the sound of what Senator Feinstein is ready to do to the First
>Amendment. (Sound of ripping paper.)
>
>And what about Senator Jim Exon from Nebraska? Is it any surprise that
>Senator Exon gets all nervous and antsy when interviewers ask him whether
>he personally has logged on? Is it any surprise that, for Senator Exon,
>the Net is just another place to make an obscene phone call? Here's the
>sound of what Senator Exon is ready to do to the First Amendment. (Sound
>of ripping paper.)
>
>And the issue of shutting down free speech on the Net is hardly one that
>divides liberals and conservatives. Here's the sound of what Rep. Pat
>Schroeder, a liberal Democrat, and Senator Orrin Hatch, a conservative
>Republican, have already voted to do to the First Amendment. (Sound of
>ripping paper.)
>
>You may wonder, by the way, why I'm using the sound effect of ripping
>paper to symbolize what Congress is about to do to online speech, which
>involves no paper at all. The answer, of course, is that most of Senators
>and Representatives who voted for imprisoning the Net in a new censorship
>regime don't know enough to find the Delete key. You'd think that if
>they're going to legislate in cyberspace, they'd at least learn to use
>computers themselves, so that the sound we hear as our freedoms are
>whisked away would be the click of a keyboard or a mouse. But no.
>
>We may also hear, of course, the occasional voice of someone to whom the
>Constitution still has meaning. Sen. Patrick Leahy of Vermont and Speaker
>of the House Newt Gingrich have gone on record as opposing any broad ban
>of "indecency" on the Net. Which goes to show you: the cause of freedom of
>speech is not a partisan issue either.
>
>For the most part, the issue is one of ignorance of the Constitution and
>what it protects. The First Amendment, so the courts tell us, does not
>protect "obscenity" -- and the word "obscenity" has a special legal
>meaning. It doesn't mean profane language. It doesn't mean Playboy
>magazine. According to the Supreme Court, it has something to with
>community standards, with "prurient interest," and with a lack of any
>"serious" literary, artistic, scientific, or political value. What is the
>sound of obscenity? I'm not sure, but I'm told that if you dial up a
>certain 900 number you just might hear some of it.
>
>But Congress isn't even trying to outlaw "obscenity" on the Net -- they're
>banning something called "indecency," which is a far broader, far vaguer
>concept. Unlike "obscenity," indecency is protected by the First
>Amendment, according to the Supreme Court. But that same Court has never
>defined the term, and Congress hasn't done so either.
>
>Still, we have some notion of what the sounds of indecency are. Thanks to
>George Carlin and a case involving Pacifica Radio, we know that sometimes
>indecency sounds like these seven words:
>
>"shit, piss, fuck, cunt, cocksucker, motherfucker and tits."
>
>Now, this isn't the politest language in the world -- on that point I
>agree with the Christian Coalition. But I must say, as the father of a
>little girl, that I lose no sleep over the prospect that Ariel will
>encounter any of these words on the Net -- she is certain to encounter
>them in the real world, no matter how or where she is raised. What causes
>me to wake up in the middle of the night, whiteknuckled in fear, is the
>prospect that, thanks to Senator Exon and the Christian Coalition, my
>little girl will never be able to speak freely on the Net, for fear that
>some bureaucrat somewhere doesn't think their language is polite enough --
>that it's "patently offensive" or "indecent."
>
>What is the sound of the indecent speech? Thanks to my friend Harvey
>Silverglate, a lawyer in Boston, we know part of the answer. Harvey wrote
>the following last week:
>
>'As a result of the FCC's ban on "broadcast indecency", Pacifica Radio has
>ceased its broadcasts each year, on the anniversary of the publication of
>Allen's Ginsberg's classic poem, "Howl", of a reading of Ginsberg's poem
>by the poet. Pacifica and Ginsberg and others have sued the FCC, and
>while they won a small modicum of relief in the Court of Appeals, they
>have petitioned the U S Supreme Court for review. The Supreme Court
>should act within the month. Meanwhile, high school kids read "Howl" in
>their English poetry anthologies, but it cannot be read on the radio!'
>
>What is that the FCC thought was indecent? Try the sound of these words:
>
>"I saw the best minds of my generation destroyed by madness, starving
>hysterical naked, /dragging themselves through the negro streets at dawn
>looking for an angry fix/angelheaded hipsters burning for the ancient
>heavenly connection to the starry dynamo in the machinery of night."
>
>And if they found Allen Ginsberg indecent, is there any doubt they'd come
>to the same opinion about James Joyce's ULYSSES, whose character Molly
>Bloom closes one of the most sexually charged monologues in the English
>language with this passage?
>
>"... and how he kissed me under the Moorish wall and I thought well as
>well him as another and then I asked him with my eyes to ask again yes and
>then asked would I yes to say yes my mountain flower and first I put my
>arms around him yes and drew him down to me so he could feel my breasts
>all perfume yes and his heart was going like mad and yes I said yes I will
>Yes."
>
>That's the sound of indecency for you. And it's a measure of the climate
>of fear created by Congress that America Online felt impelled to delete
>all user profiles that include the word "breast" in them -- much to the
>dismay of countless breast-cancer survivors. Now I ask you, don't be mad
>at America Online, whose management has already apologized for this gaffe
>-- be angry at Congress, whose crazy actions have created a world in which
>the word "breast" is something to be afraid of.
>
>Now at this point the proponents of this legislation will cavil -- they'll
>say "Look, we're not trying to ban artists or literary geniuses or
>brilliant comedians. We're just trying to protect our children."
>
>To which I have two answers:
>
>First, if you really want to protect our children, find a better way to do
>it than to force all of us who engage in public speech and expression to
>speak at the level of children. There are laws already on the books that
>prevent the exposure to children of obscene speech, and that prohibit
>child abuse -- before you start passing new laws, make sure you understand
>what the old laws do. It may be that no new legislation is required at
>all.
>
>Second, remember that freedom of expression isn't just for artists or
>literary geniuses or brilliant comedians. It's for all of us -- it
>provides a space for each citizen to find his own artistry, his own
>genius, his own comedy, and to share it with others. It also provides a
>space in which we can choose -- and sometimes must choose -- to say things
>that others might find "patently offensive." And the First Amendment
>protects that space most. Don't pass laws that undercut the very
>foundation of a free society -- the ability to speak freely, even when
>others are offended by what we have to say.
>
>I'm speaking now to you, Congress. If you pass a telecommunications bill
>with this "indecency" language in it, we will remember. And we will
>organize against you and vote you out.
>
>This isn't single-issue politics -- it's politics about the framework in
>which *all* issues are discussed, and in which even offensive thoughts
>are expressed. And you, Congress, are threatening to destroy the framework
>of freedom of speech on the Net, the first medium in the history of
>mankind that holds the promise of mass communications out to each
>individual citizen.
>
>At this point, Congress, I'm not afraid of sexual speech on the Net. And
>I'm not afraid that my little girl will encounter sexual speech on the
>Net. What scares me is what you will do to the First Amendment on the Net
>if we don't stop you. That's more of a perversion than any citizen of the
>United States should have to witness.
>
>And I'm telling you now, Representatives and Senators, we stand ready to
>stop you. Listen to us now, or soon you will be listening to this sound:
>(Sound of ripping paper.) That's the sound of what we will do to your
>political future if you forget the oaths you swore.
>
>Long live the First Amendment and the Constitution. And long live freedom
>of speech on the Net.
>