Still waiting for an answer…
Anyway, he may be an arsehole but he hasn’t murdered anyone! So yeah, calling for his death would be kind of wrong. Regardless not the question here, because these lyrics are concerned with all gay people and probably affect most negatively those in the Caribbean.
That is not what my response is supposed to imply at all. I can see the need and the point of freedom of speech, and I can see your point of view. However, from my point of view, the point of view of a young Indian, (not obviously) Muslim woman, living in Britain in the current political climate, I can see why laws against inticement to hatred because of race/sexual orientation are a good thing. They provide some degree of protection for minority groups, who would otherwise be living in very real fear of going out, being themselves, and generally enjoying the same rights and privileges of a normal civilised society that everyone else seems to enjoy.
When I was growing up, the Enticement to Hatred Laws were far less stringent than what they are, and I went to school in a predominantly white area, in fact I was the only Indian person in the school. From my own experience, the headteacher of my school was a racist bully, I saw his actions myself, and I was disgusted, and he made no bones about the fact that he wasn’t happy that there was a ‘Paki’ in his school, who was also reasonably intelligent and outshining the white kids. I hated school because of this one man, making racist remarks, constantly and systematically bullying me, and abusing his position because I was a different skin colour.
Even today, the BNP (British Nationalist Party - an extremely right wing fascist party) has gained a foothold in the town I grew up in, the one my parents still live in. The tensions its created are very real, very palpable – my parents have had attacks on themselves and their property, its happened at least once a month, and its increased since the BNP got themselves a seat on the town council; this is what happens when free speech of the type “kill gays”, “anyone who’s not ‘English’ get out of the country”, and the like are allowed to be said, unchecked, uncondemned, under the guise of free speech.
I would love to discuss this with you, I really would. I appreciate that my point of view is probably coloured by being part of a minority group, which does have a lot of hate speech (and hate actions) directed at it, but I would like to know why you believe that the right for a person to say anything they want, regardless of the effect it may have on another group of people, should be more sacred than the rights of a minority group to feel safe and secure in a supposedly tolerant society.
By the ‘pro-supression’ of speech standards I see in this thread, I guess Eminem has blood on his hands.
White man killed by teen who repeatedly listened to Eminem & D-12’s ‘Fight Music’
"…The type of shit that causes mass confusion
and drastic movement of people actin stupid…
…I come to every club with intention to do harm
With a prosthetic arm and smellin like Boone’s Farm
Hidin under tables as soon as I hear alarms
Paranoid thief that’ll steal from his own moms
Connivin Kon, Artis with a bomb
Strapped to my stomach screamin, “Let’s get it on!”…
…Push your baby carriage into the street, 'til it’s mince meat
Your mens been beat the minute I step onto your street
This is fight music!..
You know why my hands are so numb? (No)
Cause my grandmother sucked my dick and I didn’t cum (oh)
Smacked this whore for talkin crap (bitch)
So what if she’s handicapped, the bitch said Bizarre couldn’t rap
I fuckin hate you; I’ll take your drawers down and rape you…
I ain’t saying It’s my type of music - but I still don’t want to see it censored.
I don’t think you’re referring to me, but I can’t tell. By the standards I’m using - those of the US Supreme Court - Eminem’s speech is not incitement. Eminem is not exhorting his listeners to kill anyone. This is really the same boring old Suicide Solution thing.
I will absolutely defend the hypothetical band’s right to sing about any subject they want. If they’re stupid enough to record a song with the suggested lyrics, they’re free to do so.
Just like the Birmingham city council is free to pass a resolution condemning them and encouraging record stores not to stock their records. As long as they do not exercise their power against the band (by moving for a ban, for example) they are free to take an ethical stand against hate music and encourage others to do the same.
But the thing is, no one who hoped for any mainstream success would dare record such a song about blacks. It’s not acceptable. It is still acceptable to go for mainstream success with songs with anti-gay lyrics.
Wow. Just, wow. I can’t for the life of me remember ever seeing a longer leap to a conclusion, ever. You say that it’s all right to advocate the violent deaths of gay people who belong to a certain pressure group, I call you on it because it’s well, sort of evil, and I’ve made an implication about the death penalty? What drugs are you on exactly?
Is this the usual quality of the “debate” in GD? No wonder I have no use for it.
Moving this to GD was a shitty decision.
Exactly. Whereas the lyrics by Bounty Killer, Elephant Man et al, are advocating the murder of gays.
Right, just like they can’t arrest you for incitement to riot. Or fraud. Or conspiracy to commit a crime. Or threatening someone.
:rolleyes:
Speech in furtherance of a crime is illegal in pretty much all of the free world. Murder and assault are crimes. Get used to it.
Obviously not the ones you’re taking, to keep on saying that I’m advocating Tatchell’s death because he’s gay after I’ve told you that his being gay has nothing to do with it.
Well actually, I’m not keeping on saying it. I was recapping.
That you would advocate for his death at all is pretty fucked up, regardless.
A recap would not include a meatheaded misinterpretation that had already been corrected.
If I made a habit of it, I suppose it would, but I don’t. Tatchell is a special case; someone who everyone from homophobes to gays can hate with equal ferocity.
I never thought I’d enounter someone who actually thought it’s okay to call for someone’s murder if you don’t like what they’re saying.
Christ alive.
Have you actually heard what Tatchell is saying? I have.
It is in the United States.
“Freedoms of speech and press do not permit a State to forbid advocacy of the use of force or of law violation except where such advocacy is directed to inciting or producing imminent lawless action and is likely to incite or produce such action.” BRANDENBURG v. OHIO, 395 U.S. 444 (1969)
Saying “burn the fags” in a song is unlikely to actually produce any lawless action.
However, unless I’ve been asleep for a while, Brighton is not a part of the USA, but rather a part of the United Kingdom. Hence, we have our own laws and law-makers, which are different to the ones in the United States of America, and in the United Kingdom, of which Brighton is a part, inciting others to commit criminal acts is against the law.
There is a bit of history behind this. In Jamaica, homophobia and violence against gays is rampant. Homosexual acts are illegal, and 96% of the population are oposed to legalising them.
That’s a staggering number. The 4% opposed, I’m guessing, are homosexuals. The entire hetero population hates them. :eek:
Of course. But in this one area of freedom, The U.S is more free than Europe. “Congress shall make no law abridging the freedom of speech” is a pretty clear directive.
What he says is complete balls. The man’s a grade one wanker and cockmonger. This is true. What makes us better than those dancehall berks is that we don’t actually want him dead for his general all-round tossery.
Ignore him and he’ll go away. I find this works for all Labour party candidadtes.
Again, that depends on what each state interprets “freedom” as comprising. Shouting “Bomb!” on an aeroplane, or in this case advocating the murder of a minority, is literally “more free” perhaps, but one could argue that the consequences of such speech impugns the freedom of others by unnecessarily risking harm upon their person (from panic in the first instance and incited violence in the other). Is the anarchic violence of Somalia “more free” again?
Personally, I’d prefer the freedom of being able to walk down the street without being attacked for who I am.