What are consequences (the lack of freedom on the USA)

[Christopher A. Williams]

On Thu, 2003-10-09 at 04:48, DAVID BALAZIC wrote:
> From: "shrek-m at gmx.de" <shrek-m at gmx.de>
> 
> >Andre Verheij wrote:
> >
> >>I think this person should be banned from the mailing list. 
> >>
> >
> >i agree!
> 
> But there is no censorship. There is freedom of speech.
> 
> This is a good occasion to show whether you respect
> human rights and your own constitution or whether you are
> just a bunch of hypocrites.

Obviously, you do not understand what Freedom of Speech means in the US.
I can easily argue this person's statement is *not* protected speech for
some important reasons like, for example, this list is not really a
public forum and Red Hat Software is not the US government.

Free Speech does not mean you have the right to say whatever you want
whenever you want to. It guarantees only that you have the right to
express yourself in a public, and relevant fashion without fear of
retaliation from the *government*.

Perhaps if you studied US federal laws and the US Constitution, you
would understand this. But I don't blame you because many people not
from the USA, some quite well educated, don't really understand US Free
Speech either. For that matter, many people IN the USA don't understand
this, but we won't go there.

However, Red Hat would be fully within their legal rights to ban this
person, or anyone else, from this list for such statements. Frankly I
think they should. Free Speech simply does not apply here. Get over it.
If his nose were to really get put in a crink over being banned, he
would then have the option to resort to the US Court system. But he
would most likely lose.

And can we PLEASE, PLEASE talk about something relevant to Fedora on
this list? This is getting pretty old...

Chris

--
====================================
"If you get to thinkin' you're a person of some influence,
try orderin' someone else's dog around."
--Cowboy Wisdom