joker, look at what the book contains tht i have shown above in bold.

thats not what the judge's decision indicates. there s no way you can defer that from the opinion.

__________________
And he said unto them, Ye will surely say unto me this proverb, Physician, heal thyself: whatsoever we have heard done in Capernaum, do also here in thy country.

And he said, Verily I say unto you, No prophet is accepted in his own country.

Now you're switching gears, to antidiscrimination laws.

Note that in this area of law, a mere utterance is usually not actionable; it must be part of a pattern of harassment or "creating a hostile workplace."

Most controversies revolve not around law but around *policies*, in which employers (or school principals) attempt to set rules for proper conduct in the workplace (or classroom). Agree or disagree, such entities have much broader discretion in such areas.

For instance, the story behind some of the examples in the book you referenced ("You Can't Say That! by David Bernstein):
http://hnn.us/blogs/entries/23625.html

The list of 80 words proposed to be banned? It was a list that the Oregon Newspaper Publisher's Association suggested its members not use in real estate advertisements. Whatever you may think of the wisdom of the list, it is a private sector group offering voluntary advice to its members.

In Denver, the book claims, the city allowed a Columbus Day Parade only if it made no reference to Columbus. The back story: The mayor was sick and tired of years of confrontations between marchers and American Indian protesters, and was looking for a way to defuse the problem. So in 2005 he suggested that the Italian-American group that organized the parade make it an Italian heritage celebration instead. Even if the book is taken at face value, the city was stupid but was not regulating speech through the law: they were simply abusing the power of their parade permitting process.

A teacher at a NYC Christian school was fired for getting pregnant out of wedlock. She sued and won a sex discrimination case. This is legislation, but how is it regulating speech or courtesy?

The fourth example is of speech codes on college campuses, which again do not involve the law.

__________________
Man up.

im not switching gears. im simply showing how being courteous to people can be contrued as being made a legality.


you know what...this entire time you have been arguing the semantics of the word "courteous" with really no proof at all for your justification. i have shown you time and time again how the word "courteous" could be construed to mean anything the judge thinks it should.

your problem is you are just scared to answer the original question.

and just for your edification -

__________________
And he said unto them, Ye will surely say unto me this proverb, Physician, heal thyself: whatsoever we have heard done in Capernaum, do also here in thy country.

And he said, Verily I say unto you, No prophet is accepted in his own country.

Freedom of speech does NOT mean "freedom of speech unless someone is offended." Nowhere in the constitution or declaration does anyone have a "right" to be offended. Also, nowhere does it say that anyone is "owed something" by being offended.

So Imus talks outta line. Take it up with his advertisers. I'm sick of everyone and his brother going around whining about being offended by something, and expecting something out of it.

My point is that "legality" usually has nothing to do with it.

No, you haven't. You keep citing nonlegal circumstances as examples of legal consequences. You cite decades-old rulings while ignoring the development of case law in the intervening 65 years.

Your original question was based on a flawed premise.

Now, if you want to ask a valid question, I'll answer it. How about "To those of you who support speech codes on campus or think hate speech should be banned, how do you justify that while also arguing that morality can't be legislated?"

That's a valid question. My answer would be that as a rule I do not support speech codes or hate-speech restrictions, so the question doesn't really apply to me.

But I'll give you a more satisfactory answer than that. The difference between "legislating morality" and various attempts to limit "hate speech" revolves around who is affected.

The law, as a rule, has no business interfering in private, consensual acts -- which is usually precisely what "legislating morality" does. Any such interference must be based on incontrovertible facts and a compelling state interest -- so compelling that it outweighs the heavy expectation of privacy that citizens have a right to. For instance, laws regarding homosexuality are almost always unjustified, in that the activity is private and there is no incontrovertible evidence that can be used to demonstrate a compelling state interest.

Hate speech, on the other hand, by definition affects others negatively. Done repeatedly and openly, it can create a "hostile environment" for students or workers or what have you that interferes with others' ability to work, learn or simply live their life. One can therefore justify restrictions on such speech as long as they are narrowly drawn.

The problem is that most codes and policies are anything but narrowly drawn. In turn, the difficulty in doing so is why hate speech isn't illegal, and is instead dealt with through private policies.

__________________
Man up.

i think you are off-based on intellectual integrity concerning this matter.

__________________
And he said unto them, Ye will surely say unto me this proverb, Physician, heal thyself: whatsoever we have heard done in Capernaum, do also here in thy country.

And he said, Verily I say unto you, No prophet is accepted in his own country.

Well it seems ray has nailed down the Con Law aspect of this thread pretty well. Being something of a Con Law nerd I wish I had gotten to this thread sooner. However, I want to address the original question in the post as the exact topic of the thread has changed a little.


I, generally speaking, think that morality cannot be legislated. It is only when one's actions affect others directly that actions should be legislated. And then it's a balance of rights, not of morality.

So, lets extrapolate that to common courtesy and legislation. If one were to try to legislate common courtesy, one would fail. Why? Because my right to free speech will trump almost any right you come up with (such as saying you don't want to be offended.) The rare example is your right to not be trampled to death in a crowded theater when someone yells fire.

I think the real error you are making, however, is a category error. Take Imus as an example. Nobody, or at least nobody I'd agree with, is suggesting that what he said be made illegal. It is, however, up to the station to regulate its content and advertisers to decide where they want their ads. This is just an example of the marketplace of ideas.

Even really nutty politically correct freaks are usually not advocating government legislation--they usually petition institutions (such as colleges or corporations) to self impose a code of discourse.

Another example. If an employee wants to talk politics by the water fountain using terms like "ragheads" or "camel jockeys," and the corporation fires him, that is not "legislating" common courtesy. Again, its the free marketplace of ideas. Freedom of speech is only in relation to the government. Nobody has to print your Op-Ed, nobody has to accept you to their college, nobody has to respect what you say.


Your anti PC stance almost suggests that one ought not to be held accountable for what they say. I understand thats a caricature of your position. The point is that other people are going to deny you a soap box if they don't like what you have to say, and there is nothing wrong with that, as long as the other people is not the government.

__________________
"I'm also not very analytical. You know I don't spend a lot of time thinking about myself, about why I do things." --June 4, 2003
Take a wild guess as to who this is by...

of course its a matter of morality. im not sure how you can argue it isn't.


please, when did i indicate or imply that as my stance in anything i said?

__________________
And he said unto them, Ye will surely say unto me this proverb, Physician, heal thyself: whatsoever we have heard done in Capernaum, do also here in thy country.

And he said, Verily I say unto you, No prophet is accepted in his own country.

The point is that even if it is a matter of morality, its not legislated as such. It is legislated based on balancing of rights. To understand why this is so read up on John Rawls' theory of public reason. (to paraphrase--If we disagree about what is moral then the discussion won't go anywhere. But if we frame our debate in terms of rights and procedures, we can get somewhere.)

As for your second statement, you implied it when you were complaining about political correctness. Either you were complaining about the government legislating speech, or you were complaining about other peoples' reaction to certain kinds of speech. I assumed it was the former, but since the government is NOT legislating "common courtesy" it SEEMS as if you are arguing the latter.

I suspect your position is the former, in which case (see my post above) you are making a category error when you say that morality and "common courtesy" are being legislated.

__________________
"I'm also not very analytical. You know I don't spend a lot of time thinking about myself, about why I do things." --June 4, 2003
Take a wild guess as to who this is by...

When have I ever mentioned, within this thread, that political correctness is involved as part of this discussion? I haven't.

__________________
And he said unto them, Ye will surely say unto me this proverb, Physician, heal thyself: whatsoever we have heard done in Capernaum, do also here in thy country.

And he said, Verily I say unto you, No prophet is accepted in his own country.