What are the free speech limits on an offensive 9/11 build?

See, again, a subjective judgement. First off, what is an insignificant amount of time, effort, et al for you might be significant for another. Perhaps my infamous colleague has less free time than you? Were that the case, than a period of time or an amount of effort (etc etc) that you would consider insignificant as representing a small enough portion of your daily alloted gaming time to be ignored, might represent to my callipygian co-conspirator a significant amount of time, etc to someone whose available time is more truncated.

Subjective judgements and arguments are, by their very nature, very rarely valid in a discussion of interpersonal interaction.

Besides, you assume that my macrocephalic confederate has skills with scripting, construction, texturing, etc. that are equivalent enough with your own so that the same task would take you both an amount of time similar enough so as to be considered the same for all intents and purposes. Not having any knowledge of you personally, I dare not make that assumption myself.

And by 'Another Attempt' - pray tell, what other events authored by my good man Louis or, for that matter, myself, fall under this? Do you wish to see those, also abolished? Is that not nearer to prejudice than you feel comfortable with? By all means, please let me know exactly what Louis or myself have done in the past to offend you so, and be sure to dictate to us exactly what actions we should consider verboten for the future so as to avoid any further protestation and associated squabbling.

Also, you may be interested to know that 'Call a Spade a Spade' originated, etymologically speaking, as a phrase referencing persons who are currently labelled 'African American'. That may not have been your intent when using the phrase, and I would not be suprised if you were not even aware of its origin (but a moment's reflection should clue you in), but if I were to take offense at it, would that make your statement racist?

Answer that to yourself, and then ask yourself how similar that question is to this situation, and for that matter, all situations of subjective judgement vs. objective judgement.

I will answer the question. For the same reason that even in M sims, pornography cannot be openly displayed, it would at least have given some consideration to not have put this build out in the open where those who would obviously be offended and hurt by it would not unwittingly see it. Freedom of speech does come with responsibility - you cannot possibly be obtuse enough to not know that some people would find this extremely hurtful. Some consideration would have gone a long way toward mitigating this.

Please keep the personal attacks to a minimum. As you are no doubt aware, personal attacks are specifically noted in the Terms of Service as being unacceptable.

well whoop dee doo! a guy who supports using the death of many people says I am wasting his time.

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teh intarweb is serious business, so you better report me, you know, cuz you dont take teh intarweb seriously and all...

that's a lot of text and I didn't really read it all could you please post a summary for me thanks.

Hugs

Freedom of Speech comes with the responsibility to not cause injury - the classic example is shouting 'Fire!' in a crowded theater. Because the incident would invariably result in injury as everyone tries to evacuate the theater, the statement is considered unprotected by freedom of speech. Please be more careful with your arguments.

OK, so you'd see the build removed as your interpretation of a TOS violation, but you don't think you should be punished for breaking the TOS yourself? You can't obey only the rules you like. That's uncivilized.

I will gladly answer it - to call a spade a spade originated from the Greek phrase ta syka syka, te:n skaphe:n de skaphe:n onomasein, which means to call a fig a fig and a trough a trough - not to mix metaphors or call something what it isn't. It evolved into the phrase to call a spade a spade in the 1500s through a mistranslation of trough as spade. The spade racial slur you are referring to refers to the phrase "black as the Ace of Spades", and refers to the color of the card, not what the card is or is not.

talk of freedom of speech is irrelevant in a game.

That is not the only responsibility one has, and also, not the only definition of injury. Just because you can say something does not mean you should if you know it might bring about pain or trauma to someone. Physical harm is not the only kind of harm or injury. 9/11 was a very traumatic event for many people - exponentially so for those personally affected by the tragedy, myself included. That display had the exact same effect on me that it did Prokofy - to think it caused no harm is laughable. Please be careful with your counter arguments.

Derail!



I have to ask...


Has Teddy Kennedy ran his car over a bridge with a girl in it, while in SL? Also, does Teddy have a virtual drinking problems?



Back to your thread!

Very good, you've done your homework. You caught me using a shortcut - that was indeed its original use, but it (or more specifically, its translation) became revilatized before and during the American civil rights movement as a statement meaning 'Do not bother using a more conventionally-proper honorific to refer to those of African descent, they are not worth the mental energy'. The playing card adage is related, but not identical.

Check.

Chip I generally agree with you as well. I trying to work out why I get so upset about these sort of debates. None of this crap is worth getting upset about. I use SL as a creative tool - I hate restrictions on what I can and can't do.

I hate the mob raising that some seem to use the forums for. I hate it when people express political views that I find offensive (and I'm sure others find me equally offensive).

I'd actually like to have creative fun. I'd like the rest to go away.

I was trying to make hoodies (hooded tops) this evening as they're being demonised by the government. Anti-social behaviour wear could be fun.

1. i did not call for its removal, i questioned the mental state of people who find humor in it.

2. i did not break the TOS. from the forum guidelines: "please note language, such as "fraud, liar, cheater, griefer, troller, jerk, scam artist" etc is strongly discouraged, but will not be removed."

what i said didnt even approach this name calling which is allowed. Its hilarious and quite telling though that you are waxing sensitive now though, after defending that build.

pot? is that you pot?

3. i fell out of my chair when you called me uncivilized! have you ever thought about doing stand-up? that was RICH!

I am certain the event of the actual Teddy Kennedy driving his vehicle into the river was a traumatic event for at least two people as well (one of which, regrettably, fatally so), but as you can see right below you, it's fodder for amusement. It is a essential part of the human psychological makeup to recover from trauma, whether physical, emotional, or mental. It is a central part of te psychological makeup of many (if not most) people to laugh at things they once found traumatic - see also the phenomena of 'gallows humor' and the popularity of the phrase 'one day, we'll all look back on this and laugh'. Would you be offended if an avatar named Helen Keller ran around bumping into things (indicating blindness) and screaming HBGLHLBGHLGBHLBGHLBG all the time? Most people would find it tasteless, but not necessarily offensive. Do you find jokes about Custer's Last Stand offensive? (see also: 'Yes, madam, I assure you this painting is based on his last words. 'Holy COW, would you look at all those _______ Indians'.') That was a tragic and traumatic event, but it's fodder for humor. Do you find the movie 'Major League', for that matter, offensive because the logo of the baseball team in the movie (Cleveland Indians) is a caricature of a stereotypical 'Indian'? For that matter, do you find the term 'Indian' offensive vs. Native American or whatever? Do you find the film 'Life Is Beautiful' offensive for showing occasionally lighthearted events in the midst of the Holocaust? Do you see the common theme here?

At best, your argument could evolve to 'It is too soon to joke about this'. But really, who makes the jedgement of when it's 'soon enough'? Is there a date on a calendar somewhere? Is this calendar available at my local dispensary, or perhaps a commercial website? And most important, is that judgement objective, or subjective?

Now see, that's a well-reasoned response. Finally we can get somewhere.

I think that in mature sims, it should be okay to have pornography outside. They are, after all, mature. Perhaps a proviso that it has to be at least some minimum distance from any neighboring PG areas? I don't know, it's an interesting problem. Long ago, it WAS okay to have pornography outside in mature areas, but that was changed for some reason.

As far as the WTC effigy may offend people, I understand that, but I don't think that consideration overrides the basic tenets of free speech. It is inevitable that we will see things we don't agree with, things that we find hurtful. There are websites that are anti-__________ all over the Internet. I would not deny those sites the right of existence, even though personally I disagree with them. The reason is that my objections are based on internal, visceral, emotional reactions. I cannot, in good conscience, try to force other people to comply with these feelings, which are entirely subjective.

In order to respect expression of ideas, while protecting people from seeing things they don't want to, maybe some additional technology is in order. Perhaps a "xxx" sort of flag you could set on a parcel, and then you could have giant porn banners and WTCs and whatnot, and people would have to opt in if they wanted the plot to be visible. Some kind of visual motif (like the red "no entry" bars) could warn off the sensitive, but if they enter the parcel they see its contents. People like me would have "show xxx" turned on of course and wouldn't see any warning.

OK, again: objective vs. subjective. You are making a subjective judgement that the build is offensive, you are making a subjective judgement that your statements are not of a nature to be considered a personal attack, you are making a subjective judgement that I was attempting humor.

How would you react if an administrator made the subjective judgement that your statements WERE under the umbrella of 'personal attacks'? Would the fact that you feel they were not make the administrator's any less valid?

See, this is another good point on the free speech vs. unprotected speech argument. If I go to a website I don't like, oh well, I might get offended. But I recover from it. If I go to a website that contains, say, malignant code that exploits a vulnerability in my system, that causes me damage in some way (spyware, viri, etc.) One is free speech, the other is an irresponsible use of same to cause injury.

it doesnt matter if you think porn should be allowed outside in M zones, its not. Why? because some people find it offensive.

cris used the word "obtuse", and that was precisely why i didnt answer you, i felt you were being deliberately obtuse with your response to MY question. I think you knew perfectly well why I was asking, and now to cover your ass, youre suggesting porn be allowed outdoors in M zones. but, what about the fact that many M zones border PG zones?

I think that all of you are so wrapped up with trying to convince others of the rightness of your views that you remind me of people on a treadmill going nowhere. Sorry but I've been wanting to say that for a long time.

*Girds self for the attacks*

I'd say thats on the right track.

What about it? Under that reasoning, nothing currently allowed in mature sims should be allowed ever unless 1) it is in an opaque structure and (and this is the important one) 2) it is far enough away from a sim border that someone could not change their camera view in such a way that they would be able to see it, or render the object invisible in their client (easily done from the debug menu) so as to see the 'mature' activity going on from their PG sim.

Given that this distance is realistically only limited by the draw distance of your client (a setting which is wildly variable), this argument isn't particularly valid.

and your interpretation of my comments are subjective as well. lets ride the carousel all nite. wheeeeeeeeee!

you can post all the pseudo-intellectual psycho-babble you want about the grieving process, you are just parroting some psychologists SUBJECTIVE view on the issue.

that build does not help everyone heal, if indeed anyone. besides, your gang has already stated they placed it as a way to ridicule post 9/11 patriotic americans, which contradicts your "healing" excuse.

now, which is it?

social commentary?

humor?

healing?

maybe you can invent some more between now and your next post.

adult content, even in a M zone, has to be indoors.