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[ChairmanPoo]

I don't think both things are comparable. In one you're making a group of people think they're in immediate danger. It's fight or flight instinct. In the other, however, we have a bunch of thugs who somehow manage to turn on a computer, get angry, and THEN decide to violently riot. Even if it's predictable that these people will react like that, I don't think it either justifies their actions, or that appeasing them is a good idea. Following this rule of thumb the ones to blame in honor killings would be the victims. After all, they should have known their aggresors would react like they did, and stuck to tradition.

[kaijyuu]

Err, when tossing blame for things, you draw the line at the person or people who are being unreasonable, not after them.

Panicking when thinking there's a fire in the theatre is not unreasonable.
Going into a murderous violent mob over an insult is unreasonable.


You'd have to argue the guy was being manipulative and malicious in making that movie for any blame at all to be reasonably levied at him.

To me the limits on freedom of speech have to do with malice. If you say something not to fix a problem, or to correct someone, or anything like that, but rather just to offend or harm, then we've got a problem.

Offensive speech is protected speech in America. The limit on libel/slander/defamation is that it must be an intentionally false claim made to the public and it causes measurable financial damage to the victim. It is also a civil issue, not a criminal one.

I'm not talking just things you can get arrested/fined/sued over. Punishments that fit the crime after all; being an asshole is very much a problem, but not something you can be arrested for.

For lesser offensive malice filled stuff (like say, being an internet tough guy), that is still Bad (tm), but not a crime. Such a person just deserves being called out for being a douchebag and nothing more. They only have a "right" to say it in as much as a government won't come down on their ass. They don't have a "right" to say it without people getting rightfully indignant at them.

[Leafsnail]

Given how full of shit the movie appears to be, and the consequences from it, I think this could qualify. Part of the reasoning behind the "fire" thing is that a reasonable person could predict what would happen, based on human nature.

I think a reasonable person could have predicted that certain portions of the Muslim world would lose their collective shit over something like this. Arguing that the filmmaker isn't at fault because devout Muslims should just "shrug it off" is like saying that people stampeding out of the theater should have exited calmly or even noticed that there was no smoke, so it's their fault.

There isn't an equivalence.  There is a widely recognised and useful social convention that you say "fire!" if you see an actual fire.  There is no social convention to attack unrelated people if someone criticises your religion, and if there were that convention would be the problem.

In less free countries, you can be charged with libel or slander even in the claim is truthful and the person is sufficiently powerful.

Yeah, there are some pretty terrible libel laws in the UK.  It's a difficult law to manage but without it I think that sufficiently powerful people can perform completely baseless character assassinations on their opponents via the media.

[RedKing]

Fire is a physical threat. Insulting Islam is criticism and can't kill you unless psycho Islamists decide they want to go on a rampage because of it. Fire cannot think. Islamists can.

That last part's debatable. 

I don't think it's easy for the non-religious/atheists among B12 to wrap your heads around how seriously many people in the world take their religious beliefs. And while that seems foolish/silly/idiotic to you, it doesn't change the fact that those beliefs (and the defense thereof) remain a supremely powerful motivator for their actions. And this isn't just Muslims or right-wing Christians. It's the same adherence to belief that leads people like Thich Quang Duc to immolate themselves in the name of peace.

[Leafsnail]

If people are sufficiently stuck in their beliefs that they literally cannot stop themselves from performing violent actions then it's even more important that we are allowed to criticise them.

[MetalSlimeHunt]

Fire is a physical threat. Insulting Islam is criticism and can't kill you unless psycho Islamists decide they want to go on a rampage because of it. Fire cannot think. Islamists can.

That last part's debatable. 

I don't think it's easy for the non-religious/atheists among B12 to wrap your heads around how seriously many people in the world take their religious beliefs. And while that seems foolish/silly/idiotic to you, it doesn't change the fact that those beliefs (and the defense thereof) remain a supremely powerful motivator for their actions. And this isn't just Muslims or right-wing Christians. It's the same adherence to belief that leads people like Thich Quang Duc to immolate themselves in the name of peace.

I was religious once. I know what it's like to be a lunatic far-right Christian. I know how seriously the Islamists take Islam, it is in the name after all.

But I don't care. If they want to live in the 12th century forever? Fine. If they want to protect the reputation of a warmongering child molester as the prophet of Allah? Fine. If they want to kill people over it? No. Screw them. The freedoms of the modern world are infinitely more important than protecting their extremist egos.

[nenjin]

I don't think you can compare fundamentalist Muslim reactionaries to people that kill themselves out of desperation.

If Muslims were committing suicide in droves because of the way the Prophet Muhammad is being treated, this entire conversation globally would have a different tone. But that's not what's happening. They're either killing other people, or killing other people while they kill themselves.

[RedKing]

I don't think you can compare fundamentalist Muslim reactionaries to people that kill themselves out of desperation.

I don't think you understand the whole Buddhist self-immolation thing if you think it's done out of desperation. Those monks weren't suicidal (well, not in the conventional sense).

Fire is a physical threat. Insulting Islam is criticism and can't kill you unless psycho Islamists decide they want to go on a rampage because of it. Fire cannot think. Islamists can.

That last part's debatable. 

I don't think it's easy for the non-religious/atheists among B12 to wrap your heads around how seriously many people in the world take their religious beliefs. And while that seems foolish/silly/idiotic to you, it doesn't change the fact that those beliefs (and the defense thereof) remain a supremely powerful motivator for their actions. And this isn't just Muslims or right-wing Christians. It's the same adherence to belief that leads people like Thich Quang Duc to immolate themselves in the name of peace.

I was religious once. I know what it's like to be a lunatic far-right Christian.

And your intense dislike for that past is bleeding over into an intense dislike for anybody who's deeply religious, methinks.

If they want to protect the reputation of a warmongering child molester as the prophet of Allah?

Okay, we're done here. Before this thread becomes too meta and starts creating its own jihadis.

[scriver]

You'd have to argue the guy was being manipulative and malicious in making that movie for any blame at all to be reasonably levied at him.

But he was. He filmed it under a completely different script, chanted it in secret, and when the movie failed to upset people he had it translated and re-released in the Muslim world.

[Leafsnail]

I don't think you understand the whole Buddhist self-immolation thing if you think it's done out of desperation. Those monks weren't suicidal (well, not in the conventional sense).

It's pretty different if you're not hurting other people though.

[MetalSlimeHunt]

And your intense dislike for that past is bleeding over into an intense dislike for anybody who's deeply religious, methinks.

So what? Religious extremists have brought no good to our world and are causing us problems to this very day.

If they want to protect the reputation of a warmongering child molester as the prophet of Allah?

Okay, we're done here. Before this thread becomes too meta and starts creating its own jihadis.

What? It isn't untrue. Mohammed conquered a large area of land and married a 9 year old. That's in the Qur'an. 

[nenjin]

I don't think you understand the whole Buddhist self-immolation thing if you think it's done out of desperation. Those monks weren't suicidal (well, not in the conventional sense).

Go ahead and correct me if you want but IIRC my history, they did it as a final act of desperation to draw attention to their oppression. They weren't suicidal, but they had no other recourse in their minds.

[SalmonGod]

If people are sufficiently stuck in their beliefs that they literally cannot stop themselves from performing violent actions then it's even more important that we are allowed to criticise them.

But like I said... there's a difference between criticism and provocation.

Do you disapprove when a forum mod bans a troll?  What's the difference?  It's a matter of good or bad faith.  If you don't discourage bad faith behavior, then everything gets torn apart in the name of freedom.  This is the anarchist saying this.  Like everything else, free speech is not a pure black & white issue.

Forums are private areas of the internet.  Moderators can ban people to keep the forums how they like them to be, and users will move towards a forum with an atmosphere they like.  If someone is banned from a forum that doesn't mean they can't still say what they were saying - it just means they have to take it somewhere else.  Arresting people for "trolling" in real life would be completely different.

But there are parallels.  A troll is, by definition, someone who says things only for the sake of being disruptive.  They can and do completely tear apart communities if they are not dealt with in some way.  I've seen two forums die because the owner/moderator of a forum introduces someone who is their friend outside of that forum... and the guy turns out to be a total troll.  Moderator is normally a reasonable guy, but grants this one person friendship immunity.  Community devolves into bickering and everyone leaves. 

The same thing happens in meatspace communities, whether public or private.  If you want various people with extreme differences to be able to get along with each other, then pushing the buttons inherent in those differences has to be discouraged.  You can actively discourage button-pushing, or you can sit back and watch the shit hit the fan for the sake of ideological purity... the same sort of ideological purity that motivates religious radicals.

Freedom of speech exists because it is essential to the protection of other rights, and to prevent the marginalization of unpopular groups.  Not because trolling is ok.

Even if it's predictable that these people will react like that, I don't think it either justifies their actions, or that appeasing them is a good idea.

Yeah, the religious radicals are absolutely not justified in their violent behavior.  Nobody is saying this.  Nobody.  What I'm saying is that this doesn't automatically mean that the person who provoked them was justified in doing so. 

I'm also not saying anything about appeasing them.  Just because radical islam might be calling for the guy to be punished does not mean that is the only possible reason to punish him.  There's also the fact that he's a fucking asshole for what he did, and intentionally lit the spark that turned into a big fire.

I'm not talking just things you can get arrested/fined/sued over. Punishments that fit the crime after all; being an asshole is very much a problem, but not something you can be arrested for.

I do somewhat agree with this.  I don't know what sort of punishment fits this situation.  The problem is that yeah... his crime is basically being an asshole... but the manner in which he chose to be an asshole is significantly problematic to say the least.


Edit:  And MSH, it's perfectly understandable to dislike religious radicals.  However, your attitude suggests that it's to the point that you really want a fight over it... and not a personal one.  Everything you say reeks of "Let's get this party started."  That's not ok.  You can't drag the world into your personal convictions.  Go start fistfights with radical muslims on the street if you want.  Nobody's going to stop you.  Advocating the escalation of an international slug-fest... not going to stand for that one.

[Gantolandon]

Panicking when thinking there's a fire in the theatre is not unreasonable.

It is. The reasonable thing to do is to exit calmly and orderly, to prevent yourself and others from being trampled to death.

There are two problems here. One is the radical Muslims inability to understand the concept of trolling - and the fact that, when they rampage, they don't actually support their cause. They most probably view us as we view them - as a homogenous group called "Westerners", who hate their way of life and bomb Muslim countries out of sheer spite. I think that everyone can agree that this is not productive for anyone, except maybe armament manufacturers.

But another one is a dick who knows that and still decided to provoke them for shit and giggles. If this is protected by right to free speech, then seriously, up to this point I didn't understand this concept. I have always assumed this protects my right to express myself politely, but appears it's about being able to walk into a bar and call every patron an inbred cocksucker.

[kaijyuu]

Well if you walk into a bar with the intent to insult everyone in it, it doesn't matter how politely (or not) you express yourself. I don't think politeness really comes into play at all unless you're dealing with hypersensitive folk. And I guess we are, in this situation...

It is. The reasonable thing to do is to exit calmly and orderly, to prevent yourself and others from being trampled to death.

Touche. But it's not wholly unexpected that people panic, so the person inciting them is still far more at fault than those who are doing the trampling.


And as a pedantic and irrelevant side note, some of us here are cock suckers and enjoy the activity greatly It's a bit homophobic of an insult on the same level as "gay," though I do realize you didn't mean it that way (so I don't take offense or anything).