From: Steve Schear <azur@netcom.com>
Date: Fri, 27 Jun 1997 00:29:11 +0800
To: "Mark M." <cypherpunks@Algebra.COM
Subject: Re: Bomb Making Info to be Illegal
In-Reply-To: <v03102803afd74b50dcd5@[10.0.2.15]>
Message-ID: <v0310280bafd83fcea0f8@[10.0.2.15]>
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At 9:13 PM -0400 6/25/97, Mark M. wrote:
>-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
>
>Steve wrote:
>
>> What's not clear to me, and I wish someone would explain, is how the SC
>> managed to find pornography not similarly protected speech.  Arms and
>> munitions can be as arousing for some (e.g., Dr. Strangelove) as sex is for
>> others.
>
>It appears that Roth v. United States was the first case before that the
>U.S. SC decided that "obscenity" was not protected by the 1st Amendment.
>The reasoning was that while offensive, unorthodox, or hateful ideas
>are protected by the 1st, they, unlike pornography, have at least *some*
>redeeming social value.  The court noted that laws enacted after the
>ratification of the U.S. Constitution banned several different kinds of
>speech, including profanity, blasphemy, and libel.  It's a very common
>tactic for the courts to refer to post-ratification laws to support
>limits on Constitutional rights.

I can't see that anyone, including the courts, should use redeeming social
value as a yardstick.  This term has all the hateful aspects of one group's
mores being used to limit the freedom of their neighbor in the privacy of
their home and thoughts.  After all, one man's ceiling is another man's
floor.

What if we create religion who's practice requires use and possesion of
child porn?  Wonder how the SC would rule, given its rulings allowing use
of peyote by certain native American tribes and against the Mormons on the
issue of bigemy.

I think resistance to such limitations should go beyond legal avenues.

--Steve


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