In Hayden, Idaho, one family has a unique way of spreading the holiday cheer . . . or fear. A family has displayed a Klansman snowman with a dangling noose in front of their home and neighbors are calling for action to remove the offensive display.
The owner, named only as “Mark” is reportedly a white supremacist who displays both Aryan Nation and SS flags. He allegedly passed out bullets last Halloween. He insisted that he only handed out bullet casings . . . “and only did so after he ran out of candy.”
To make matters worse, Mark lives only 100 yards from an elementary school.
The case raises a long-standing dispute over the criminalization of hateful symbols. Police told Mark that he is in violation of a law prohibiting such hanging of nooses. The noose is gone now and the pointed hat has been knocked off. Leaving just a snowman.
However, what remains is a free speech question. Civil libertarians have long argued that such symbols cannot be criminalized under the First Amendment — despite rulings of the Supreme Court such as Black v. Virginia upholding prosecutions for such things as cross burnings as inherently threatening. Presumably, he was allowed to have the KKK snowman, but the noose itself would be the basis for a prosecution. From a free speech perspective, individuals have a right to be hateful and unpopular. The concern is that such prohibitions not only curtail free speech but place citizens on a slippery slope where various symbols can be categorized as hate speech or conveying a hateful message.
Source: KXLY
From one extreme to another:
Lindenhurst Threatens Arrest Over Christmas Display
Village Upset Over Holiday Spectacular, Featuring 32,000 Lights
December 3, 2010 5:27 PM
http://newyork.cbslocal.com/2010/12/03/lindenhurst-threatens-arrest-over-womans-christmas-display/
LK,
One lives to be of service. And right now I can think of few things of more service than explaining the value of justice to a society plagued with systemic criminal injustice like protecting war criminals and subsidizing Wall St. criminals.
I don’t like it but what ya gonna do about it…as you can see stupid gets elected…..
BIL and J. Brian Harris, the debate you have been having is astonishingly good. It’s a debate (in the formal sense of the word) that is reminiscent of a comparison between pacifism (a personal approach) and activism regarding the relevance and getting of justice in an organized society. While your approach Mr. Harris may be bound up in Asperger’s syndrome as much as political philosophy, I have heard arguments (In the classic sense of the word also.) similar to yours made as a matter of pure political philosophy. Thanks for sharing them as they are hardly commonplace or often contrasted against the activist model we embrace as a society.
While we have had many (100’s!) arguments debated on this blawg they universally come from an activist approach to the law and the politics that drive the law. I think this is a first in the 2+ years I’ve been reading the blawg. Thank you both, I’ve been greatly entertained intellectually by the views expressed and learned a couple of things. It’s a great primer on ‘justice in society’ 101.
Good stuff, Pete!!
Tootie-
Don’t be so Iscariotophobic!
FYI- All Klansmen are Jeezophiles. That’s why there is a cross on the front of their dirty sheets and a form fitting hood for their pointy heads.
“…other pagan…”
Good one Buddha.
UPDATE:
“Deputies were called by neighbors who were appalled by the pointy-headed snowman with two dark eyes.
. . .
Eliseuson could have been charged with creating a public nuisance. Idaho law defines such a nuisance as anything “offensive to the senses” or that interferes with the comfort of an entire neighborhood. Eliseuson removed the noose and toppled the snowman after he talked with officers.”
Source: AP
Gyges,
I left it my other pagan, er, pants.
tootie
trying to rewrite history now? klansmen are and always have been christian and only christian.
Buddha,
But it’s almost a pagan holiday that’s been… improved on, by Christianity.
Where’s your Christmas spirit?
Tootles,
I’m in a good mood too, but I’m going to view your comments like I do all of them: as theocratic drivel.
Because I can and they are.
Brian,
“I seek no combat, no conflict, and I seek to persuade no person about anything”
Then you are unlike much if not the majority of humanity. Not that that is a bad thing. That being said, this is the key to the flaw underpinning your argument – which I’ll get back to later in the post.
“I do have what I find to be a valid concern — said concern being the in-principle-preventable causes of human destructiveness”
That is a valid concern and one we share, however, it omits the fact that some human destructiveness is not preventable. In that case, you are left with the options of punishment of the destructive party and/or mitigation of their damages in an attempt to make the victim as whole as possible and keep them from seeking the self-help of vengeance. You might not be a vengeful person, but most people are when wronged or harmed. It’s our nature.
“It is my personal view that we already have the tyranny due process supposedly prevents, and we have that tyranny as a direct consequence of due process.”
Yes, we already do have tyranny that Due Process is supposed to prevent, but Due Process itself is not the causal factor. Due Process is just part of the safeguards against tyranny the Founding Fathers built in to the Constitution. It is supposed to work in conjunction with laws and enforcement in accord with the terms of the Constitution that are created by the Legislative, adjudicated by the Courts and enforced by the Executive in accord to the civil rights safeguards found in the Constitution like the Bill of Rights. The problem has been that Due Process has been usurped by the Executive for political purposes and allowed to do so by the Legislative and Judicial branches, all of whom have acted out of political and personal financial motivations instead of doing their sworn jobs to protect the Constitution from enemies foreign and domestic. They are sacrificing the rule of law to save themselves – a purely selfish and socipathic motivation. The three equal branches of government are supposed to act as checks and balances to prevent tyranny, but now they are all complicit in usurping the civil rights of American citizens to cover their personal crimes and the crimes of their campaign contributors in industry. Due Process isn’t the cause of tyranny. The tyranny is the result of Due Process being dismantled and/or circumvented.
“To the extent that the view of law is the conservative view and to the extent that the view of bioengineering is the progressive view”
The law is only conservative in that it is supposed to seek stability and treat all equally (equal protection). Actually the ideals found in the Declaration which inform the Constitution have their direct lineage in the English and French Enlightenments and are quite liberal. Since our legal foundations are philosophical, the application of bioengineering – no matter the progressiveness of the views in that field of science – is a misapplication. Even Sam Harris who argues that free will is an illusion created by our biology recognizes the need for legalism in ensuring the continuation of civilization. That being said, the conservatism that Muller speaks of is related to real differences in brain structure. Conservatives are simple, fearful and belligerent creatures. But the law itself is only a tool that they (mis)use to their own ends. In itself, the law here has conservative structures built on a base of philosophical liberalism, but it is neither and only functions in conservative and liberal manners as we the governed allow. All forms of government rule only at the consent of the governed. In the case of the U.S., our consent is now ignored for political reasons championed by conservative politicians, but that is a reflection of political failures corrupting the tool of law proper. It’s political problems, e.g. bad politicians not doing their jobs and corrupting the law, that are the problem, not the idea of law itself.
“My actual (individual-personal) human nature appears to starkly contradict long-established standards of human nature.”
As you are one with Asperger’s, I will stipulate this is a true statement.
“I abhor totalitarian despotic tyranny in any and every form that comes into my awareness.”
You and me both.
“I do not fight people, I do not retaliate when someone does me harm, regardless of the harm done.
My inner (real) life is beautifully simple. Whatever happens (when, where, how, why, and to whom it happens) is both necessary and sufficient, and, whatever does not happen (when, where, how, why, and to whom it does not happen) is both unnecessary and impossible. In so living, my espoused theories are in harmony with, and are contiguous with, my theories in use. For me to learn how to be kind, decent, and truthful, I have no need of laws which contradict one another so intensely that they form an unintelligible contradiction of themselves.”
And this is why in many ways, people with Asperger’s are superior to “normal” humans. Laws aren’t for punishing people like you. They are to protect you from those who would harm you for no other reason than they can. That may seem like an alien though process to you, but there are in fact people like that in the world. Lots of them. And far too many of them have gotten into positions of political power and usually by deceit.
As to laws being contradictory, that is the fault of the Legislature and their graft driven choices to act against the best interest of society and for their own personal gain instead. It also sometimes comes about by mistake or by the law not keeping pace with technology or social change, but usually it’s just simple corruption and bad drafting by the Legislature. A fault with the user, not the tool.
“Given my oft-replicated observation that no effort of will on my part permits me the actual capability of obeying “the law,” I find I am inextricably in contempt of all aspects of “the law” which I find impossible for me to obey. To obey “the law,” I find I must needs-be first both know and understand “the law” and to be capable of doing so in advance of the occurrence of any situation in which my not both knowing and understanding “the law” might lead to my acting in violation of “the law.””
This is a perception problem on your part and related to the underlying flaw in your argument: a composition fallacy. You behave naturally as the just law would compel without any need of incentive. You just do it. Not all people are this way and in fact, some require incentive – including incentive in the form of coercion, to obey the law.
“When I asked, in 2007, an attorney my wife and I had used for aspects of “estate planning” to tell me how I can both know and understand “the law” sufficiently as to never, by choice, be in violation of any aspect of “the law,” the attorney commanded me to never contact him at work or at home ever again.”
Kind of a brutal response from the lawyer, but there is a legal maxim that made him unable to respond because of its form and his inability to bridge the communication gap with you: ignorance of the law is not an excuse for violating it. The law is vast and complex because human interactions are vast and complex, so much so that no single attorney knows it all much less a layman. Could it be simpler? In many ways, yes. Conversely and concurrently though, in many ways no. Comprehending the law like a gestalt as you suggest, no matter how bright you are in some given area, is not possible.
“If “the law” denies to me any way of choosing, as an act of conscientious will, to be perfectly and unfailingly law-abiding, what recourse do I have in accord with “the law” except unmitigated contempt?”
To realize that perfection is not attainable, but aspirational. Justice Learned Hand once said, “Law is the shadow of justice.” Law is a tool to maintain social order over anarchy, but it is a tool made by imperfect men and therefor will always be imperfect. Your recourse, rather than contempt for something that society uses to protect you from bad actors, would be to accept that imperfection while striving for the aspirational goal of as perfect a set of laws as possible.
“I do not “hate the law”; rather, I love the law with my being contempt of its biological abuses.”
But that comes from your frame of reference which is admittedly different from the majority of humanity. The law is abusive biologically in your case, but that is only because you act as a just person should without prompting. If everyone was like you? Not only would the world be a much better place, laws would largely be unnecessary.
“Accordingly, I live my life as though I have no rights under law, no constitutional rights, no rights of due or undue process.”
This is dangerous to you. Because you personally feel no need for the compulsion of law to act in a just manner, it does not follow that you should let others use or abuse the law to use or abuse you. Would you feel the same way about Due Process if circumstance, but not fact, made it look like you killed your wife and were arrested and tried for her murder? Or would you want Due Process to figure out that you were not responsible and possibly find out the identity of her true killer and bring them to justice?
Tootie,
I’m pretty sure Deborah was joking.
I think you might be pulling a No True Scotsman. Which since I’m in a good mood, I’m going to view as an incredibly subtle, clever, and funny joke.
Deborah:
The only person with a noose in the New Testament is Judas Iscariot, he hanged himself. And he was against Christ, not for Him.
Surely you don’t believe the old secular Christophobic myth that Klansmen are Christians.
Of course you don’t. You are not a simpleton.
John M. Hammer:
You wrote: “Hate speech is a form of terrorism.”
My response to that?
Stop your hate speech, please. Thank you.
Legal eagles and ivy league types especially have made a horrible mess about this matter such that even they are not satisfied with the results. Ergo the hand wringing about the alleged conflict between free speech and Idaho man
The Federal government has no authority in this matter because the First Amendment strictly forbids it. Congress shall not infringe on speech. Period. End of story. Only a moron at Harvard would be confused by this plain language.
The tenth amendment is in operation here, not the first.
If the demented Christophobic leftists would stop pretending the tenth amendment didn’t exist they would have a ready remedy for this situation. The tenth amendment would allow this city to outlaw the pro-Klan display.
In at nutshell cities and states have the right to outlaw such displays. They are not the federal congress, and so they have the power to do it.
This is also why Judge Moore’s statue was not a violation of the first amendment. The Judge was not congress. He paid for the monument. The people of Alabama wanted it. Enough said, the feds have no authority to interfere.
The frothing secular left has bamboozled an entire nation into believing a lie: that the first amendment applies to state and local governments.
They did this because they are Christophobic.
What better way to welcome the sweet Baby Jesus! Because nothing says Christmas more than a noose.
B.I.L.,
I seek no combat, no conflict, and I seek to persuade no person about anything; nonetheless, I do have what I find to be a valid concern — said concern being the in-principle-preventable causes of human destructiveness (such as happened recently in Marinette, Wisconsin, some 20 miles across the waters of Green Bay from where I live). A Google search for “Sam Hengel” or “Samuel Hengel” got me several Internet sites concerned with what happened across the bay.
On the evening of June 29, 1953, Jimmy Duranty, age 15, murdered his neighbors, Grace and Sumner Harris. Sumner was the editor of The Door County Advocate; he and his wife were members of the church in Sturgeon Bay of which my dad was then the minister.
It is my personal view that we already have the tyranny due process supposedly prevents, and we have that tyranny as a direct consequence of due process.
I have never had the experience, seemingly nearly universal among people, of actually believing that I, or anyone else, ever did anything other than in the manner which existence both required and allowed. Thus, blame, fault, and guilt are, to me, only fictions of the form of delusions, and this is true for me regardless of how universal or ubiquitous such fictions are in practical terms.
On perusing my copy of Shipman’s Handbook of Common Law Pleading, Second Edition (public domain, because of copyright date of 1895), pages 177-8, “THE CAUSE AT ISSUE.” I observe, as best I can discern, that you may be arguing an issue in law, whereas I am arguing an issue in fact. If my discernment is in any way valid, methinks we shall not likely communicate meaningfully across the divide between law and fact.
To the extent that the view of law is the conservative view and to the extent that the view of bioengineering is the progressive view (if there be any such extent whatsoever), perhaps Herbert J. Muller, in “The Uses of the Past: Profiles of Former Societies” (A Mentor book, 1957 printing, copyright 1952, Oxford University Press), page 349 may (or may not?) be instructive:
“…Given science, we must expect more revolutionary developments, in both our conceptions of the universe and our operations on it. We cannot count on history to repeat itself.
(New paragraph) Hence I should stress first of all, in very general terms, our continued need of an adventurous spirit–of still more creative thought, bold, imaginative, experimental, self-reliant, critical of all ‘infallible’ authority. This stress may seem unnecessary in an age notorious for its skepticism and irreverence, and at a moment when revolutionaries are the apparent menace. Nevertheless these revolutionaries are much less bold and independent than they appear, what with their childish faith in guaranteed totalitarian solutions. Our conservatives are even less enterprising than they appear; the frequent violence of their tactics masks a fearful timidity and unimaginativeness in their basic strategy, when not in downright panic. And we all have to be wary of another contradiction in our heritage. While the spirit of adventure has been the genius of Western thought, at its heart has remained the venerable assumption of a static, finished world, in which truth is timeless, standards are absolute and fixed, and human nature is always and everywhere the same…”
My actual (individual-personal) human nature appears to starkly contradict long-established standards of human nature. I abhor totalitarian despotic tyranny in any and every form that comes into my awareness.
I do not fight people, I do not retaliate when someone does me harm, regardless of the harm done.
My inner (real) life is beautifully simple. Whatever happens (when, where, how, why, and to whom it happens) is both necessary and sufficient, and, whatever does not happen (when, where, how, why, and to whom it does not happen) is both unnecessary and impossible. In so living, my espoused theories are in harmony with, and are contiguous with, my theories in use. For me to learn how to be kind, decent, and truthful, I have no need of laws which contradict one another so intensely that they form an unintelligible contradiction of themselves.
Given my oft-replicated observation that no effort of will on my part permits me the actual capability of obeying “the law,” I find I am inextricably in contempt of all aspects of “the law” which I find impossible for me to obey. To obey “the law,” I find I must needs-be first both know and understand “the law” and to be capable of doing so in advance of the occurrence of any situation in which my not both knowing and understanding “the law” might lead to my acting in violation of “the law.”
When I asked, in 2007, an attorney my wife and I had used for aspects of “estate planning” to tell me how I can both know and understand “the law” sufficiently as to never, by choice, be in violation of any aspect of “the law,” the attorney commanded me to never contact him at work or at home ever again.
If “the law” denies to me any way of choosing, as an act of conscientious will, to be perfectly and unfailingly law-abiding, what recourse do I have in accord with “the law” except unmitigated contempt?
‘ “If the law supposes that,” said Mr. Bumble, squeezing his hat emphatically in both hands, “the law is…” ‘
I do not “hate the law”; rather, I love the law with my being contempt of its biological abuses. Accordingly, I live my life as though I have no rights under law, no constitutional rights, no rights of due or undue process.