Can you imagine what would happen to riot incidence if every officer had a huge picture of his wife and kids covering his riot shield?
OOOOOOoooooKKKkaaaayyyyy.
If your assumption going into this is that it’s the people v. the government, I think you’ve already gone to far.
Because it’s not along those lines. Adam and Eve had not declared independence from an oppressive magistrate by asserting their God given and unalienable rights as individuals.
Then the proper course of action when the fascists harrass you is to stand up and scream: “Come see the violence inherent in the system! Help, help, I’m being oppressed!”
If the fascists are harrassing people for demonstrating peacefully, the proper course of action would be to expose the fascists doing the harassment and get them fired or sent to jail, or at the very least held up to public ridicule. Yes, you might face some inconvenience when the fascists tap your phone or go through your garbage. But get real. There are tens of thousands (or more, I haven’t paid attention enough to know the real numbers) of protestors out there. You think the fascists are videotaping the demonstrations, using facial regognition software to identify them all, then lighting paper bags filled with dog poop on their doorsteps? You and all the Quaker grandmothers
We live in a democracy. The system works. And when it doesn’t work, isn’t it our job to scream and fight and protest and MAKE that motherfucker work? If we can’t be bothered to do that then we might as well put handcuffs on ourselves and save the fascists the trouble. Democracy only exists because everyone agrees that it exists. If we stop agreeing to democracy then our experiment in self-government is over. Pretending you live in a police state and acting as if you live in a police state brings the existance of that police state one step closer. Acting as if you live in a democracy and as if you expect the same actions from everyone else strengthens the existance of our democracy.
So are you going to stand up and make our government of the people, by the people and for the people exist, or are you going to run away and hide behind a mask?
Your keyboard is stuck.
When they knock on your door, who will speak for you?
Seriously, if you think I am deluded, then what’s the harm in letting me wear my mask, so long as I obey the law? Why do we need more laws that limit freedom?
The concern is that your fellow mask-wearers may not be as peaceably inclined as you are, and may use their anonymity to commit acts of violence and mayhem, secure in the knowledge that the malefactors are indistinguishable from the innocent protestors, Fear Itself.
I trust you are now at least persuaded of the law’s constitutionality, if not its wisdom.
So, are you folks suggesting that law-abiding protesters have nothing to fear from the police? No reason to worry that they might be labelled, targeted and arrested because of their participation in a peaceful protest?
Nobody. They’d have to ring the buzzer.
Statutes that regulate the wearing of masks in public advance a legitimate State interest. As the General Assembly of Georgia stated: “The law protects all, not only against actual physical violence, but also against threats and intimidations from any person or group of persons.The General Assembly cannot permit persons known or unknown, to issue either actual or implied threats, against other persons in the State.” As the Georgia Supreme Court stated: “”[p]ublic disguise is a particularly effective means of committing crimes of violence and intimidation. From the beginning of time the mask or hood has been the criminal’s dress. It conceals evidence, hinders apprehension and calms the criminal’s inward cowardly fear."
They went on: "The sponsor of the Anti-Mask Act, Judge Osgood Williams, testified that prior to the passage of the act, mask-wearing had helped to create a climate of fear that prevented Georgia citizens from exercising their civil rights. “Fear,” he said, “is one of the things that makes people run the other way, [puts] people in a position [so] that they won’t register to vote, they won’t take part in political activities…”
And: “The statute is intended to protect the citizens of Georgia from intimidation, violence, and actual and implied threats; it is also designed to assist law enforcement in apprehending criminals, and to restore confidence in law enforcement by removing any possible illusion of government complicity with masked vigilantes. The state’s interests furthered by the Anti-Mask Act lie at the very heart of the realm of legitimate governmental activity. Safeguarding the right of the people to exercise their civil rights and to be free from violence and intimidation is not only a compelling interest, it is the General Assembly’s affirmative constitutional duty.”
In addition to the legitimate governmental interest, the amount of infringement on constitutionally protected rights is de minimis. Paranoid feelings aside, the law only disallows the wearing of a mask in public. It doesn’t stop you from protesting, or from distributing literature, or signing up people for your cause. There are times, for example a toxic suit worn during an environmental protest or a Nixon mask while protesting Watergate, where the wearing of the mask has an expressive conduct beyond “I don’t want anybody to know who I am.” In those cases, I think I’d agree you should be allowed to wear a mask. But not to simply hide your identity.
As a hypothetical: given the exception for “masquerade party or like entertainment” that Hamlet cited earlier, what’s to stop me from simply holding a costume party on the afternoon of a protest? What prevents masked protesters from asserting that they are on their way to a party already in costume?
So it is a matter of prior restraint and the diminishing of the rights of all for the purpose of prosecuting the few. Gotcha.
I am persuaded that even courts entrusted with determining the law will make mistakes. Only through the vigilance of the populace will those mistake be rectified
Am I the only one that thinks you should be able to go out in public wearing whatever the heck you want, assuming it doesn’t explode or something?
That said, we have seen protesters be harrassed in the sixties. And you can bet the major organizers have hefty CIA files on them. I’ve known a few leaders that believe that thier organizations have been infilterated and that they may be in some kind of danger-of harrassment at the least- from the government. This may be paranoid, but it isn’t unheard of. And considering the increased surveillance and secrecy allowed by the Patriot Act, they may have good reason to want to hide their identities. We’ve heard whispers that many acts of protest can now be characterized as “terrorism”, and nobody, no matter how dedicated to the cause, wants to sit in Gitmo for three years with no charges and no trial.
We arn’t talking about protesting for lower taxes or something. We are talking about protesting the legitamacy and policies of the most powerful rulers on Earth- with secret agencies and intellegence capabilities we can only begin to imagine- which some believe shows signs of turning deeply sinister. Many protesters think something really really bad is afoot, and they may be in danger.
It’s not for you to decide if this is all unwarrented paranoia or not. The people in the masks clearly think it isn’t, and if they are right then they are doing a valuable service. If they are wrong, they are parading around in stupid masks…whats the big deal? If they commit crimes, we need to deal with it in the same way reasonable Democracies deal with crimes- after they are committed.
Cowgirl, did you read what I wrote? Yes of course protesters are sometimes harrassed by the cops. Is that a reason to wear a mask? Did Martin Luther King wear a mask?
What exactly is the purpose of a demonstration? It is a public display of support or opposition. If the cops harrass you, document it and complain, get the cops fired or sent to jail. Even if you can’t do that, you’ll at least embarass the cops so they’ll be more careful with the next batch of protesters.
I never said you wouldn’t have to struggle to maintain your rights. You probably won’t, other people have already done most of the work for you. But demanding perfect safety before you’ll express an opinion in public is cowardice. If the civil rights protesters thought like you we’d still have Jim Crow. Grow up and grow a backbone and stand up publicly for what you believe in, and if the cops don’t like it then you can make them stuff it. If you aren’t willing to stand up publicly how can you ever hope to achieve anything?
You aren’t going to be harrassed by the cops for protesting the Republican Convention. You know it, I know it, the American people know it. Pretending you’re scared to protest the Republican convention just makes you look like a wimp. If you’re too scared to protest publicly in the United States of America, then why not just stay home and let public policy be decided by your betters?
Did any of you actually read the article?
Doesn’t that change things, even for those that think wearing masks should be illegal?
By the way, laws against wearing masks or otherwise hiding your face are idiotic. Even the KKK should be allowed to wear their hoods. There is no legitimate reason to require everyone to show their faces in public, with a few exceptions, in my opinion. It should be the other way around – with a few exceptions, everyone should be able to hide his or her face if he so wishes.
By the way, I can’t resist:
Fezzik: Why do you wear a mask? Were you burned by acid, or something like that?
Westley: Oh no. It’s just they’re terribly comfortable. I think everyone will be wearing them in the future.
Well, the laws prohibiting perjury would prevent you from so asserting, if it weren’t so. And the finder of fact would be perfectly entitled to disregard your self-serving testimony about a coincidental costume party, if so inclined.
But if the finder of fact believed you, on the other hand, you’d have established a defense.
theR: I did read the article – apparently, there was some question as to the validity of the film permit.
Well, in my opinion, you’re wrong.
And since the legislatures in Virginia, New York City, and Georgia apparently agree with me, and since the courts have upheld these sorts of rules as generally constitutional, and since the OP concerns the New York ordinance, I’d say my opinion holds a bit more sway than yours.
- Rick
Not everyone is MLK. MLK was a great leader, and achieved a lot. But not all movements call for an MLK style leader. Civil rights was an idea whos time had come, and they were fighting to turn to the popular tide in to enough pressure to make the government listen. But the protesters here are protesting the legitamacy of the government itself. They are protesting a government that they believe is no longer playing fairly, and no longer answerable to reason. And since that government is the most powerful entity in the world, they believe that- like most resistances to oppressive governments- stronger tactics are needed. Passive resistance is a great tool, but it doesn’t work if one side isn’t answerable to the people or any other nation.
I do not think they are as worried about harrassment that goes on at the protest. I think they are worried about their house somehow burning down or their brake lines being cut a few months after. Documenting police misconduct only works if the system is currently working fairly. It does not work if the bad cops are in collusion with the government. These protesters believe the government has gone wrong- perhaps horribly so. They believe that our government may be going the way of some of the worst governments on Earth. Why would they expect their complaints about the police to be treated honestly?
We are already loosing right that we need to fight for. One of those rights is the right to check out a library book without the government knowing it. They arn’t demanding perfect safety, they are demanding the ability to continue on with their protest activities without risking major force by what they percieve as a potentially personally dangerous government that would not mind resorting to covert opperations to neutralize their potential enemies.
This isn’t the civil rights protest. To the protesters, this is more like the Spanish Civil War. They believe they are fighting truely sinister forces. Few people that spoke out pubically about the more evil governments of our time have lived to tell, and those that have spent a lot of time in prison.
When you believe your government has lost it’s sanity, it is time to give it all you’ve got. We’ve seen way too many evil oppressive governments in the last century to not make absolutly sure that is not the path ours go down. But if the protestor’s suspicions are right, these protective measures are definately called for. And I’m scared enough of my government to be thankful that these people are out there watching it and fighting it’s wrongs.
If by sway, you mean ham-fisted force. Mr. Gambino, Mr. Bonanno, and Mr. Luciano all agree with me, and since the whole neighborhood cooperates with us, and since your place of business is in Mr. Bonanno’s territory, I think you should put the money in my palm.
What exactly is a film permit? IT’S A CHANCE TO RESTRICT FREE SPEECH. Good God, I’m beginning to doubt anyone will ever get it.
You’ve demonstrated that they subjectively hold these beliefs. But are those beliefs objectively reasonable? Have there been cases of retaliatory harrassment of protestors?
From a constitutional point of view, you never had that right.
- Rick
Thank you. Nothing I could have said would have been more damning of those scribbles.
This isn’t a science experiment where we test our hyphothesis. This is a potentially dangerous government that protestors are hoping to preserve their ability to protest against. One of the great hallmarks of the worst governments is that nobody really saw it coming, and nobody protested enough at the early warning signs. And once power is secure, protesters rarely live to tell about it, and if they do it is after long jail terms. It doesn’t matter if you think it is objectively reasonable. It is concievable, it has happened plenty of times in the recent past, and clearly a portion of the population thinks it is a danger. These people are not just afraid of the government now, but where it may be headed. Every dictatorship had it’s first retaliations against protestors. And with the powers of the United States governments, it may happen this time and we may never even know about it.
Okay…scratch “right” and put in “freedom”. I’m still concerned about it.