Israel has arrested and then given two days of house arrest for a rather bizarre form of expression: defecating on flags, including Israel’s flag. I cannot say that I am eager to attend a showing of the Natali Cohen Vaxberg’s scatological creations, but the sentencing clearly violates free speech protections that many of us believe are a core human right. Warning: foul language is contained in the story below.
In the United States, the destruction of the flag is a protected form of free speech. In Texas v. Johnson, 491 U.S. 397 (1989), the Supreme Court voted 5-4 that flag burning was protected speech under the First Amendment to the United States Constitution. It is considered one of the core cases defining free speech in the United States. Brennan was joined by Marshall, Blackmun, Scalia, and Kennedy (Kennedy wrote a concurrence).
Cohen Vaxberg posted a video showing her defecating on an Israeli flag while she played Israel’s national anthem. In another video entitled “Shit Instead of Blood,” Cohen Vaxberg is pictured defecating on flags from around the world, including that of the Palestinian Authority. Cohen Vaxberg is described as a left-wing activist and artist.
It is a truly disgusting form of expression. However, the anger that it produced reinforces the view that this is not only a form of artistic expression but political expression. The Israeli court not only sentenced her to home confinement but banned her from using the Internet for 30 days. The Tel Aviv police insisted that her videos causes “damage to symbols of the state.”
It is always hard to criticize such punishments (even short sentences) in the face of such obnoxious and truly disgusting forms of expression. However, free speech is not needed to protect popular speech. We pay a price for the guarantee of free speech. That price is people like Cohen Vaxberg. By maintaing a bright line rule, we protect much more valuable forms of speech and avoid the dangers of allowing the government to draw lines between valuable and valueless speech. The slippery slope problem (a troubling image given this case I admit) has proven a real and consistent threat to free speech. We gain far more than we lose in protecting the very small number of flag burners or desecrators in this country.
Tyger, I agree.
What I mean is that the State itself increasingly views our rights as state-bestowed, ignoring the Founders.
I agree with everything you just wrote, Pogo, except that government bestows rights. What we call “rights” exist as the default condition. Government tries to limit them, and the Constitution was meant to limit what the government can do. Most sheeple are so brain-washed, they believe the government is what gives them the right or permission to do anything. They have it backwards. People decided to form a government to protect their freedoms, and then wrote the Constitution and the Bill of Rights to limit what the government could take away.
Tyger, America as founded abided by the concept of negative and natural rights.
Since Woodrow Wilson, that belief has slowly eroded.
We now live in a socialist state with positive rights bestowed by the government.
Speech is seen only as one of the less important rights, somewhere well behind welfare, snail darters, global warming and gay marriage.
Paul, that’s correct. Wild animals don’t have to contend with governments, so they don’t need to have a document that enumerates their protected rights. Unfortunately, they do have to contend with humans limiting their natural space, eliminating their habitats and food sources, and in many other ways threatening their existence. Whatever human term you wish to use, “right”, “need”, or any other word, the concept is the same, whether for people or for animals. Doing whatever is required for an individual’s continued existence transcends the use of government to limit and control the human species.
An enumerated law IS a positive law.
And Paul, an enumerated right IS a positive right.
Again, what is a positive right? And if you have a positive right can you have a negative right?
Paul, a “right” is a human concept, one that is actually inapplicable in Nature. A wild animal has the “right” to hunt, roam freely, establish a territory, breed, and do anything else necessary to secure its survival simply because it exists. It doesn’t need permission of any government, animal or human, to do so.
The “social contract” is an idea or conceptual invention of people who wish to legitimize their use of government to control others. I never signed any such document, literally or figuratively, and I don’t blindly accept its restrictions. To do what is required to get along in any social environment is reasonable, but to openly accede control over my life to others is not.
Pogo, the government doesn’t “bestow” anything. Governments only restrict freedoms and rights that already exist naturally. The US government was created to protect the People’s freedoms, but “in actual practice” it seldom performs this function. It’s a polarity issue. Most of the population thinks that government grants rights and gives permissions. It’s the opposite. Rights exist as the default condition, and permissions (to do business, as a “privilege”, for example) are political inventions created to control. They are not necessary and often not desirable in reality. Government is a tool for limitation, and it only gives to someone what it has taken from someone else.
Tyger – animals don’t have ‘rights’ they have needs.
Paul, people got together and posited that free speech was a good thing and made it part of the Supreme Law of the Land, the Consitution. A natural right or implied right is useless without the enforcement of a law. Those types of rights can be taken away by governments that don’t defend the law that enabled that right.
Annie – I took a 2 semester 6 credit hour course in the history of the US Constitution. I probably know a great deal more about its history then you do.
I’m so impressed Paul.
It could be yanked by the government IF our form of government wasn’t a Representative Democracy, whose Constitution was built using the building block of Popular Soverignty. WE are the government….so far. However it seems that our representation has less clout since Citizens United which gives Plutocrats and Oligarghs the ability to buy the government they choose.
You are complaining about that , what about this :http://tribune.com.pk/story/786012/christian-couple-killed-for-desecrating-quran-in-pakistan-police/
If free Speech is a positive right bestowed by Constitution, it is not a natural right, and therefore only exists because the State feels we deserve it.
So not a right at all, as it can be yanked according to the mood of the State, like welfare payments or farm subsidies or corporate tax rebates.
Free Speech IS a positive right, bestowed on us by Constitution.
Annie – freedom of speech (which can be limited) is an enumerated right under the US Constitution. I have no idea what the hell a positive right is supposed to be.
I agree. The government does all sorts of things with our money that I don’t approve of. They give money to people and foreign governments that [IMO] do bad things with that money or just do wasteful things with that money. We should not be supporting what WE perceive as bad or evil behavior with taxpayers money. Agreed?
However, it is important to understand that what you consider a human rights violation aka retaliating against Hamas, may not be considered as such by the Israelis. They probably consider it self defense. If you are unwilling to see that they may feel this way, then you are not going to be able to understand their actions or be able to negotiate or deal with them.
Again…..this doesn’t mean that you need to agree with their actions…..only that you have the capacity to understand that they may view their actions in a completely different light than you do.
Can you do this? Do you have the capacity to put yourself in another person’s shoes?
Scolding them, threatening them and pointing fingers at what you view a human rights violation when they don’t see it that way is not going to create any sort of ability to negotiate or come to a consensus.
Jill, that’s interesting.
Since Hamas clearly and indisputably bombed Israel first, are they guilty of war crimes as well?
Or do your rules exempt Islam?
“Free speech is a natural right, a right that is often trampled on by people who want to control others with governments.”
Since enforcement depends on the whim of government, being ‘natural’ or endowed by the creator is unimportant in actual practice.
It helps to agree that free speech is the assumed baseline right, rather than a positive right bestowed by the government.
However, it remains a luxury afforded only those nations schooled in Western thought. Even among them, few practice it fully (see hate speech bans in Canada, the UK, and on US college campuses).
Paul, I must agree with you, it’s a solid concrete right under the First Amendment.
Tyger, I agree with you, free speech under is a right not a luxury. Amazing that some would think so. Did some forget there is a First Amendment?
Free speech is NOT a “luxury!” Free speech is a natural right, a right that is often trampled on by people who want to control others with governments. When the populace refuses to look at and examine the tyranny being imposed by governments, the protests by those who defend freedom and expose the injustices of political restrictions become more extreme. It’s an understandable and appropriate reaction to such acts of suppression. Staining a flag with blood would create a similar strong message, but it would be more difficult to produce without harm to the protestor, and using fecal matter depicts what governments are consistently doing to their citizens.
Tyger – there are no ‘natural rights’ except death. After that is it all part of the social compact and how well it is enforced.
Urinating or defecating in public, in our country, gets one arrested. If she did those things on a playground would that be an issue of exposure or free speech?
I think the world has gone crazy when publicly defecating (on ANYTHING) is considered a valid expression of “free speech”.
DBQ, I agree with you that we need to understand what other people and nations believe. It’s the only way to go.
My objection regards the USGinc. lying about supporting human rights in other nations or in our own. I resent those lies and that money which is used to support other repressive regimes while claiming we are a beacon of human rights in the world, one that only supports other beacons of human rights.
As i said, this woman should crap on!