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[Creaca]

Right or Wrong, he'll very likely become a martyr, doing more for his message than anything he sketches or plays at a university.

[Jackrabbit]

I'm pretty sure most people are just going to see him as an ass after this. I certainly do.

[Footkerchief]

It should indeed. But it was painfully obvious they'd find this offensive, so why show it to them? To provoke a reaction? I don't get his reasoning.

Rights are like muscles.  They work better when exercised regularly.

To be honest, I see little difference between the "What did this guy expect" sentiment in this thread, and people telling a rape victim that dressing like that was asking for it.

[Jackrabbit]

The socially acceptable way to exercise your muscles is at a gym, not by flicking someone off to make a point.

[Footkerchief]

The socially acceptable way to exercise your muscles is at a gym, not by flicking someone off to make a point.

That implies that there's a socially acceptable place for the exercise of free speech rights, such as the display of offensive media.  Where is that place, if not a university in friggin' Sweden?  Do socially unacceptable behaviors mitigate the fact that actual crimes were committed in response?

[Aqizzar]

Rights are like ropes.  They work better when you don't tie them to things they can't hold.

You don't hear people comparing the "asking for it" retort with the classic "shouting FIRE in a crowded theater".  We do not govern with single statements, legally or morally.  I'm all in favor of the people making asses of themselves however they want (in accordance with local pornography laws).  You had just better be prepared to deal with the consequences, including the casual disdain of people who think your method is ineffective and disgusting.

[Creaca]

And just to clarify. He was doing a lecture on free speech at Swedish University, the pictures in the video where not his, but done by an Iranian artist named Sooreh Hera. Frankly, if you have a lecture on free speech, and someone isn't offended, you did something wrong, or you didn't fully demonstrate the point.

Again, where the serious problem started is decided to release

Spoiler: this (click to show/hide)

 

and a few other sketches portraying a dog with Muhammad's head. He was given a bounty and had about 100,000 dollars placed on his head. With a 50,000 dollar bonus if his throat was slit open. He didn't take this sketch to the nearest mosque and wave it in everyones face. It was part of a small art convention in Sweden with the theme "The Dog in Art".

This is a case of religious extremists censoring the world. I guess the point I'm trying to make is even if someone is pushing the buttons of crazy dangerous people out there, intentionally or not. We shouldn't just stand by, these assholes need to be taken care of.

Hate to prove Godwin's Law true, but if the Nazi party was alive and well today, and they threatened terrorist actions against anyone who portrayed the Aryan Race as being equal to or lesser than the other races, would this debate still be so mixed?

[Aqizzar]

What debate is mixed here?  Somebody, probably the guy who showed it to an audience and not the guy who made it, is going to be threatened, maybe be harmed, because he pissed off a lot of irrational people.  I'm certainly not defending that state of affairs, and I doubt anyone else is.  It's stating the reality of the situation.  I do think the people doing the threatening are more irrational and dickfaced than the two guys in question, but denouncing them doesn't make them go away.  Action does, and we're not talking about action, because that's a can of worms no one wants to touch.

And for the record, you can absolutely give a lecture on free speech without going out of your way to offend someone in the audience.  It's called reserve.  Just because you have the legal right to offend people, doesn't mean you must to make a point.

[Creaca]

Agree to disagree then, I feel that anything less than offensive to everyone in the audience, and it isn't a real lecture on free speech. Reserve has a time and place, and a full demonstration of Free Speech isn't that place.

Also I'm absolutely for action, one of the reasons I'm supporting what Lars did is because the sooner this Can of Worms is busted open the better.

Edit: And Footkerchief makes an excellent point. This guy could sell toilet paper depicting an orgy between Buddha, Shiva, Moses, Jesus, Muhammad, and Jehovah. It's still his right by law to do so in his native country. If he dies it sets the very dangerous precedent of terrorist organizations half a world away being able to ignore and invalidate laws and rights of governments.

[Footkerchief]

What debate is mixed here?  Somebody, probably the guy who showed it to an audience and not the guy who made it, is going to be threatened, maybe be harmed, because he pissed off a lot of irrational people.  I'm certainly not defending that state of affairs, and I doubt anyone else is.  It's stating the reality of the situation.

A lot of the statements in this thread go well beyond "stating the reality of the situation" to condemning the guy for his social transgression.  Or were those words ("asshole," "ass," etc.) not meant to condemn?  For what purpose are these condemnations entering the discussion?

You don't hear people comparing the "asking for it" retort with the classic "shouting FIRE in a crowded theater".  We do not govern with single statements, legally or morally.

My comparison to rape victims wasn't a frivolous one (I don't get the comparison to "shouting FIRE in a crowded theater").  In both cases:

Event 1: a person (A) expresses themselves in a way that's legal but offensive to a segment of society (B)
Event 2: a crime is committed against A
Event 3: another segment of society condemns Event 2, the crime
Event 4: B responds to Event 3 by condemning Event 1

[Deathworks]

Hi!

I am a normal liberal person, so my agenda is simply: You should be free to do as long as you are not hurting anyone.

Personally, I think that showing non-public people in a manner that both factually wrong and is bound to offend them is not alright - you may not be hurting their body, but you are insulting them and hurting their feelings. For instance, there were a lot of things people in Europe said about Jews until the Second World War. Those statements were incorrect and insulting, often used to instigate violence against that group. So, should freedom of speech really go to the point where you can preach that "Jews are child murderers." just to provide one of the worst examples?

This being said, even if I concede that insulting people is wrong, that does not justify a violent response. Of course, in the heat of passion, there may be insults returned verbally, which I could understand in that situation, but resorting to physical violence is definitely wrong. You can use physical force if you are physically attacked or threatened thus engaging in self- defense, but it has no place in any form of non-physical discourse.

Threatening the life of a person because of an insult is about as wrong as you can get in this area, so that really needs to be stopped in my opinion. Those who have used violence should be forced to face the consequences of such actions (in effect get confronted with the appropriate legal procedures) while the person(s) who have insulted other people should apologize. Even an unjustified physical attack does not justify the insult afterwards, just as the insult does not justify the physical attack.

That is the way I see these kind of things.

Deathworks

[Aqizzar]

[Reasonable questions]

My comparison to the "shouting fire" was to demonstrate that we do as a society carve out exceptions to "speech must always be free, no matter how recklessly employed", which is what I was getting at.  I'm not an expert.  I'm not well informed.  What I am is capable of idle commentary.  I don't know anything about Event 3, except the fact that it exists.  I can condemn Event 1 purely on person A's own merits, call him an ass and so forth, without it having anything to do with Event 3.

[Jackrabbit]

Well, since you're using big words and ideas now I'll just let you older, cleverer people continue the debate and hope to learn something.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Note: not sarcasm

[Footkerchief]

My comparison to the "shouting fire" was to demonstrate that we do as a society carve out exceptions to "speech must always be free, no matter how recklessly employed", which is what I was getting at.

Yes, but legal exceptions (fire in a crowded theater) and social exceptions are different territories, even if there are plenty of border disputes.

I don't know anything about Event 3, except the fact that it exists.  I can condemn Event 1 purely on person A's own merits, call him an ass and so forth, without it having anything to do with Event 3.

Nobody in this thread is condemning "Event 1 purely on person A's own merits."  Some people are ignoring Event 3, the condemnation of the crime, but they're definitely not ignoring Event 2, the crime itself.

"while there may be some argument on what is right and wrong, you gotta be an idiot to pull this stuff off"
"I'm not saying don't show it, but use some discretion."
"You have a right to do it, but you're a frigging idiot for even trying."
"I'm all for free speech but learning what is a good idea to say and what isn't is an important thing to learn."
"Freedom of speech is great, I love it, but it's not like it's going to keep you from being shot. Lars should have known better."

All of these statements juxtapose the speech with the crime, and this isn't coincidental.  If Lars Vilks had given the same lecture and no crimes were committed in response, the speech would have drawn much less condemnation.  Why?  Because then clearly it wouldn't have been the kind of irresponsible, reprehensible speech that provokes crimes.

(bedtime)

[RedKing]

I've got to side with Aqizzar here. I'm all for free speech, but there are also natural logical consequences you must be ready to suffer. If you're going to roll in fresh chum and then go wade with sharks, don't fucking act outraged when the sharks bite.

I think a not dissimilar analogy is the "protest" movements of the last decade or so in the US, which are a weak, emo imitation of the movements of the '60s. I remember reading some interviews with some college freshman who were wailing that the police had cordoned them off into "free speech zones", and as a result, they hadn't had anything to eat in SIX HOURS! Despite supporting their cause, I felt an incredible urge to slap these silly bints into another time zone. People in Bangkok and Tehran are protesting despite the very real threat of being *killed*, and we've got whiners who feel it's a human rights violation because they didn't get their lunchtime noms.
If you're going to protest against the establishment, don't expect them to make it convenient for you.
If you're going to commit civil disobedience, don't be surprised when you get arrested.
If you're going to gay-bait people that you know are homophobic, don't be surprised when they beat the shit out of you.

I think one thing that maybe is being missed here is that this is not exclusive to conservative Muslims. There are plenty of places in the United States (even on college campuses) where this could have happened with an audience of white males.

I'm not saying that the reaction is a good one, or even that the perpetrators shouldn't be punished for it, but to say that it was totally unexpected is either to be incredibly naive or incredibly disingenuous.