M.T.A. Amends Rules After Pro-Israel Ads Draw Controversy

Ugh

common sense is common sense. no two ways about it.

What utter nonsense.

In favor of supporting more speech to counter bad speech. You might try it some time

?4

atlas shrugs is Pam Geller's blog

Would that still fly?

I seriously doubt it.

The MTA is making changes to ensure your situation doesn't occur in the future.

I would consider the responsibility that chimes with their free speech rights not a de jure ban like that of the MTA but rather the residents of the city humiliating and shaming the bigots into pulling the ads.

As for inciting violence, hatred does NOT inherently incite violence unless with explicit threats or eliminationism.

"imminently incite or provoke violence or other immediate breach of the peace" is a pretty specific standard. Plaintiffs could argue that there's no record of anyone being assaulted by virtue of this add, so an equally incendiary ad has no greater likelihood.

Which is why I am skeptical of most arguments that right wing media incites violence but acknowledge that hatred is spread.

But the new guidelines give the right to minorities to censor the speech of others. Put the shoe on the other foot. Let's say the ads were extremely pro-Muslim or pro-Palestinian and people who sided with Christians or Israel were to demand that they be removed because the ads incited to violence.

This cycle would never end. Who is to decide whether an ad incites to violence or not? It's just words.

This seems like such a good solution until you think about what it really means.

The real solution is to put up ads encouraging tolerance on all sides. You cannot fight one extreme, hateful opinion about religion or ethnicity with another opposing but equally extreme, hateful opinion. And the First Amendment prohibits censoring speech based on its political content.

The people tearing the signs down need to cool it. They need to put up their own signs.

I'm not expressing this well, but I hope you will understand. This kind of censorship is more dangerous than the obnoxious signs themselves.

Talk about Sharia law. When we can't insult the Muslim religion (or the Jewish religion) or the Christian religion because we incite to violence then we are imposing religious law on ourselves.

This is a bad move. It goes in the wrong direction.

After you have to shut up then its who you worship then what you wear and it just keeps going.

are allies of the bad guys? And you thing others are using hyperbole?

It means tolerating things I disagree with, but it allows me to speak freely when other disagree with me. Its called freedom, you might try it some time.

I know more about rights to privacy and how to protect privacy than you have any clue...I actually do things to enhance it.

You blew the DU quota for hyperbole this month, but never fear, a new month starts soon.

1) MTA sells opinion/political ads
2) They were forced by the courts to carry these ads

You and Geller are birds of a feather, both irrational and knee jerk in your responses.

Free speech is a bed rock of US laws and character. Some can at times annoy us, but I would rather have the annoyance to preserve my right to speak out, even if it annoys TPTB.

who oppose funding PBS/NPR because those public broadcasters DARE criticize conservatism and religion, or who wanted to defund the National Endowment for the Arts over NEA funding blasphemous art.

Besides, do tax dollars even fund bus ads very much?

The subways are a public place and why put any signs up that are offensive to Muslims. People might choose to work for the common good rather than spend money on divisiveness.

MTA has since changed its policies in an attempt not to have to do that in the future.

In 1977 the supreme court ruled that neo Nazis had a first amendment right to march in a majority Jewish suburb of Chicago. I don't see how these bus ads are different. If white nationalist groups want to install billboards in the Bronx or Harlem, the city should let those ads be displayed...and let the racist groups embarrass themselves.

The wording I read made it sound like they would support a Hecklers Veto. I have a real problem with that. A better choice would be "Coexist" signs and the like.

Some here and elsewhere confuse supporting free speech, even disagreeable speech, with supporting what the speaker says. For those people, high school civics must have been really hard.

It's hard work to keep people sympathetic towards Zionism.One only has to see its cruel and devastating effects on the Palestinians. All the money the AIPAC spends on lobbing could be spent creating win win scenarios. If all had nice homes and careers and something constructive to do there might be less hostility.

Calling them 'pro-Israel' muddies the waters. It's as though a KKK ad was described as 'pro-American' or a BNP ad 'pro-British'.

For example, if the Pope starts encouraging Catholics to riot and throw bombs when they see insulting ads, the MTA will ban anti-Catholic ads because it could then be "reasonably foreseen" that anti-Catholic ads would "incite or provoke violence". If, however, Catholics simply roll their eyes and shrug their shoulders, then anti-Catholic ads would be permitted.

I'm not sure if we are setting up the right incentives here.

kind of like Gore v Bush.


Who'd a guessed it?