If so, then I’ll recommend that activists be a little more nuanced in their language. I still hold that it’s entirely reasonable to criticize Citizens United, and corporate spending on SuperPACs and ads, which is the primary point of the criticism, while also praising corporations who use influence against discrimination.
Cite?
What does this even mean? How would this movement stop corporations from doing this? Are you saying that corporate letters and press releases would suddenly become illegal? I don’t understand how you’re getting from point A to point B – how would any of this stuff lead to “corporations no longer can write letters or issue press releases”? How would they be stopped from doing so?
Um, wait - your second sentence supports my point fully.
Unless you’re trying to say that corporations are bad whenever you dont’ like them, but are good when you do like them. And that would be, well, a very silly point.
They can’t possibly be “nuanced” without destroying their own argument. Either corporations have speech rights, or they don’t.
Already cited earlier. And again, I shouldn’t have to cite it. It should be common knowledge.
YES. That is what THEY are saying. They are saying that corporations have NO SPEECH RIGHTS, or at least that they shouldn’t have any speech rights. It’s very clear. And I cited it.
YES, it’s stupid and makes no sense. That’s what I’m saying.
Still don’t get it, even if corporations don’t have free speech rights. How does “no 1st amendment speech rights” lead to “can’t write letters or press releases”? How would this be stopped? If this movement succeeded, what would happen to a corporate letter or press release that goes out – what leads you to believe that these letters/press releases would be banned under such a scenario?
Then you’re reading it differently then me, since I don’t see anything about criticism of open and public advertisements.
I don’t get it. How does “no speech rights” = “can’t write letters and press releases”? What I don’t get is the leap that you’re making, not the leap that the activists are making. How would their policy outlaw writing press releases and letters?
If corporations had no First Amendment speech rights, the government could make a law making it a crime for a corporation to write a letter or press release.
I didn’t say I think they’d be banned. I said the government would have the power to ban them.
It’s wrong and unwise to give the government that power even if you think it wouldn’t use it (which is not a given).
Oh, come on! It’s about Citizens United which was about ads! The whole point is that they don’t like corporate ads. I’m sorry for the frustration, but you need to read up on this. They want to ban spending by corporations on political speech, period. I thought everyone understood that. That’s what all this Super PAC stuff is all about.
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Are you saying you don’t understand that letters and press releases are protected speech under the First Amendment?
Or are you saying that just because we take away a First Amendment protection, the government might still choose not to use it’s power?
If it’s the latter, ask yourself if you think we should abolish the entire Bill of Rights under the same presumption.
If it’s the former, I don’t know what to tell you.
Um, you realize I was mocking the poster for thinking such a ridiculous thing, right?
Because the liberals I’m referring to DON’T believe this. What they say is they want to ban ALL corporate speech. Nothing about “except when it’s good speech.”
Either speech rights exist, or they don’t. You cannot condition them on whether they are “used to do good things” with your definition of “good.” I’m surprised I have to explain that.
So what? What does this have to do with the movement? It’s about banning specific practices of corporations, not all speech of corporations. I see no reason to believe that the movement would favor such a government law banning letters and press releases (which seems beyond the realm of possibility).
I’m not sure if I believe that corporations should be protected by the first Amendment, but that doesn’t mean I wouldn’t oppose such a law that tried to ban letters or press releases.
Most of the criticism and language I’ve heard or read has been about fighting secret and nigh-unlimited spending, not open and small-scale advertisements. That’s what’s gotten people angry – not letters, press releases, or open and small ads.
Neither, really – I’m saying that it’s entirely consistent and reasonable to believe that the 1st amendment shouldn’t apply to corporations, while also believing that they should not be restricted in writing letters or press releases. How could this even be stopped? Would they be fined for any letters that went out? Would the guy putting it in the mailbox be arrested?
It doesn’t make sense to me – I don’t see a mechanism in which writing letters and press releases could possibly be restricted if this movement succeeded.
This is about protections for corporations, not people. I’m not sure if the Bill of Rights should apply to corporations, but that doesn’t mean that I support the government seizing property or quartering soldiers inside office buildings.
Where do they say that they want to “ban ALL corporate speech”? Your cite doesn’t say this at all. “Corporations shouldn’t have constitutional rights” is entirely different than “corporations should not be allowed any speech at all”.
It doesn’t matter. They want to remove ALL SPEECH RIGHTS of corporations. Period.
Would you agree to removal of all your speech rights with the assurance that the government probably will only actually take some of them?
That’s cool.
Then you aren’t paying attention.
The talk about secretive spending is prevailing because that’s all that’s left for them to do without violating the Constitution.
That is an absolutely illogical statement.
YES! Of course! That’s how it is done. When speech is not a right, you get in legal trouble for speaking. Why do I have to explain that?
Turn that statement on its head - can you possibly see a mechanism for a corporation to say the government can’t do it? If the First Amendment doesn’t apply to them, then what?
Yes it does. It means exactly that. If corporations have no rights, they have no rights. Period. You can’t have it both ways.
I’m sorry for the imprecise language, I didn’t expect to have to explain this in the first place.
Let’s start over.
In response to corporations using their speech rights to participate in politics, these people are trying to remove the right of speech for corporations.
It’s not a leap to say that they would want to ban all corporate speech about politics, including speech that doesn’t involve spending money, such as ads.
They may not want to ban all corporate speech - but they are calling for giving the government the power to do so.
My point was that this is not just about spending money on corporate speech - it includes speech that involves little or no money, such as news releases. News releases COULD be banned under movetoamend’s proposal.
No, we cannot say whether the government would actually ban any speech, or what kinds, were this amendment to pass.
LOL – I wouldn’t agree with the government regulating my bodily emissions (or the personal biological emissions of other humans) – does that mean I’m a hypocrite for supporting environmental regulations on the emissions of corporations?
No idea what you’re saying here, except that you seem to be agreeing with me – the criticism is mostly about secretive and massive spending, not any and all spending and influence for any reason.
That’s cool.
What? So in Soviet Russia, people couldn’t talk? Letters were illegal? How did society function if communication was against the law?
I think I’ve read a science fiction story in which people couldn’t communicate, but that’s about the only time I’ve ever heard or seen it.
Talk about strange use of hyperbole…
Then people speak up and advocate for good laws – people whose rights are protected. Why would the Bill of Rights apply to corporations?
Maybe there’s a good argument that they do, but you haven’t presented it that I’ve seen. Suppose that corporations can now have their advertisements restricted by law – billboards must be smaller than X, advertisements must not air during the hours of y and z, etc. In fact, I’m pretty sure there are various restrictions on advertisements already in some localities.
“They have no rights” doesn’t = “ban all speech”. Where does that leap come from? Are you assuming that the government would make it illegal for corporations to use any form of communication? What makes you believe this is at all feasible or likely?
The government can regulate the environmental effects of corporate operations and actions in some circumstances. Does this mean that the government can mandate that corporations emit zero pollutants, including biological methane from their employees? I’m pretty sure that there’s no Bill of Rights protection for corporations from having their emissions regulated, and yet there seems to be zero danger of the government deeming that employee biological emissions are illegal.
So if “government can regulate emissions of corporations” doesn’t mean that a fear of “government bans corporate employee bio emissions” is reasonable, then why does “government can regulate corporate speech” mean that a fear that “government bans all corporate speech” would be reasonable?
If this stuff were to move forward, I see no more reason to be worried about the government banning all corporate speech than to be worried about the government banning all corporate employee biological emissions.
No, because we both know they aren’t the same thing. You are happy with the government regulating the tailpipe emissions of your car, right? That’s the proper analogy. Moving on…
Nope. The criticism is about all spending. The reason you aren’t aware is because, having lost that one in court, most have moved on to the only thing left - public disclosure.
Are you saying we should be happy with Soviet Russia’s standards of free speech?
Because the bill of rights protects SPEECH. The speaker doesn’t matter.
If only people have rights, then churches, non-profit groups, media companies, clubs, lobbying groups like the ACLU (which agrees with me by the way) or NAACP or NOW, etc. would also have no rights, including speech rights. Does that make sense?
None of them are based on the status of the speaker though.
It is feasible. It’s not likely. But the point is that it would give them the power to do so. It’s entirely within the realm of possibility that they would try to ban all speech about politics by corporations.
Even if you could make that comparison, as I’ve already shown is a bad one, there’s not constitutional right to emissions, so…
Would you agree to abolishing the First Amendment, even if you think the government probably wouldn’t ban your speech, or would only ban some of it? Yes or no?
Anyway, again, back to the point - if you complain about corporations using their speech, backed by their money, to influence public policy, you should be condemning it in Georgia instead of cheering it.
Good thing I did not say that, in reality you are the one ignoring the point, one has to see what the corporations are doing on a case by case basis, otherwise you only fall into generalization fallacies.
And that is once again indeed called a fallacy, look for “broad brush”
Neither are the government regulating corporate speech and restricting my speech. Moving on…
They’ve stopped talking about spending? I must be hearing voices, then, since I hear it all the time! Of course, it’s not all spending, when you dig down – it’s just the big ad buys and SuperPAC stuff and similar. Not every corporate dollar spent on any communications media.
No – I’m saying that there’s no reason to believe that corporations ceasing to be protected by the 1st amendment would lead to all corporate speech would be banned, any more than the lack of 1st amendment in other countries led to all private speech being banned.
That’s certainly one interpretation.
Absolutely, and that sounds like a big potential negative (though other such protections could be provided by law or amendment, comparable to the 1st amendment, but limiting certain types of spending in terms of political advertising). This is a much better argument, in my view, then any you’d previously made.
I’m not sure this is true, but I’ll move on since I don’t have a cite.
Again – “ban all speech about politics by corporations” – what does this mean, exactly? I don’t think this is feasible, since I don’t see how a mechanism could be done that doesn’t violate an individual’s rights. The President of the company can say whatever they want, in any form; so can any individual in the company. They just have to change the press releases and letters from “by the company” to “by Mr./Mrs. John/Jane Doe” or the equivalent, and pretend that they are just individuals talking about their own concerns.
This supports my point – there’s no constitutional right to emissions, and there’s no worry the government will regulate personal bodily emissions, because that’s ridiculous. Similarly ridiculous, in my opinion, is a concern that the government would ban corporations from sending letters or press releases, which would just be impossible anyway (since the company President can send any letters or press releases he/she wants, since their an individual protected by the 1st amendment).
We’re talking about corporations’ rights, not personal rights. Obviously my answer is “no”, but this has nothing to do with this issue, since we’re discussing whether these rights apply to corporations or not.
