Is censorship moral?

[Unknown Soldier]

It’s funny how you demand a yes/no answer from others witout being inclined to provide one yourself.

You're not paying attention. I answered two such questions in my post #3:

Should there be limits on public ethnic hate speech?

I'd say no because setting such limits can be worse than the hate speech.

I live on the edge of Chinatown and walk through. My neighbors in my buildng are Chinese. Should I be able to walk through my building and Chinatown mouthing Chinese hate speech?

In my opinion, yes.

No wonder I'm being targeted--I keep smashing everybody's arguments to smithereens!

 

[Shadowy Man]

I already defined it in post 8. So please answer my question. You are answering a different question.

What is "explicit graphic sexual content"?

Further dodging will be interpreted as an unwillingness to engage in good faith discussion.

I can't dodge what you don't post. A more charitable approach on your part is to assume you did not make yourself clear. I should emphasize that I did not intend this discussion to devolve into an argument about child pornography but about censorship in general.

Photographs of adults (persons over the age of 18) engaging in intercourse (penis into vagina) with children (persons under the age of 18).

Is that specific enough? That’s just one example of what might constitute “child pornography” for the sake of this so-called discussion.

Do I need to define “photograph”?

 

[Unknown Soldier]

If all censorship is immoral then the definition is immaterial. The fact that you are asking for a definition implies that there may be a line you can agree to.

Shad, I asked for a definition for child pornography not for censorship.

 

[Shadowy Man]

If all censorship is immoral then the definition is immaterial. The fact that you are asking for a definition implies that there may be a line you can agree to.

Shad, I asked for a definition for child pornography not for censorship.

And I gave it to you. If *all* censorship is immoral then there’s no definition of child pornography that would be moral to censor. So why bother asking? If you want to get a definition then perhaps there’s the possibility that it might be moral to censor something.

 

[Unknown Soldier]

I already defined it in post 8. So please answer my question. You are answering a different question.

What is "explicit graphic sexual content"?

Further dodging will be interpreted as an unwillingness to engage in good faith discussion.

I can't dodge what you don't post. A more charitable approach on your part is to assume you did not make yourself clear. I should emphasize that I did not intend this discussion to devolve into an argument about child pornography but about censorship in general.

Photographs of adults (persons over the age of 18) engaging in intercourse (penis into vagina) with children (persons under the age of 18).

Is that specific enough? That’s just one example of what might constitute “child pornography” for the sake of this so-called discussion.

Thank you for that clarification. Under that definition a photo of married couples having sexual intercourse would constitute child pornography because 41 US states allow child marriage. So I wouldn't say that such images are immoral while censoring them would clearly be immoral.

Do I need to define “photograph”?

Digital or film?

Anyway, let's please move on. Censorship--good or bad?

 

[TomC]

Anyway, let's please move on. Censorship--good or bad?

Depends.
Depends on the material. The context. The reason for dispersing. Depends on a bunch of things.

Next question.
Why does anybody think that "Censorship-good or bad?" is a reasonable question?

Tom

 

[steve_bank]

Musk has been called a free speech absolute-ist.

The question is what are the log term consequences. We see cosunces today with the free wheeling Internet.

The extreme libertarian insistst he or she owes nothing to the society in which they live, a fantasy of absolute individualism which does not exist.

Since the founding there has been a continuous dynamic between individual and collective rights. It can not be exclusively one side or the other.

If t you are too young to reemember, Larry Flynt and Hustler magazine published a cartoon mocking Jerry Falwell and his Christian Moral Majority movement. Falwell sued and it went to the Supreme Court. It ruled caricature and mockery of public and poitical figures were established principles and are protected speech. It is interesting to read the text of decison, it is online.

It is selfish to demand an absolute right to anything anywhere and any time regardless of how it affects people.

Without civil order civil rights evaporte and is the wild west. We are seeing it here in Seattle. In the interest of offending no one including criminals our prgessive politicans have allowed crime, violence, and drugs to get out of control.

Busness owners do not have a right to security, criminals have rigts.

 

[Unknown Soldier]

Anyway, let's please move on. Censorship--good or bad?

Depends.
Depends on the material. The context. The reason for dispersing. Depends on a bunch of things.

That's so vague that it doesn't constitute an answer.

Next question.
Why does anybody think that "Censorship-good or bad?" is a reasonable question?

Depends.

Depends on the material. The context. The reason for dispersing. Depends on a bunch of things.

 

[Shadowy Man]

T

I already defined it in post 8. So please answer my question. You are answering a different question.

What is "explicit graphic sexual content"?

Further dodging will be interpreted as an unwillingness to engage in good faith discussion.

I can't dodge what you don't post. A more charitable approach on your part is to assume you did not make yourself clear. I should emphasize that I did not intend this discussion to devolve into an argument about child pornography but about censorship in general.

Photographs of adults (persons over the age of 18) engaging in intercourse (penis into vagina) with children (persons under the age of 18).

Is that specific enough? That’s just one example of what might constitute “child pornography” for the sake of this so-called discussion.

Thank you for that clarification. Under that definition a photo of married couples having sexual intercourse would constitute child pornography because 41 US states allow child marriage. So I wouldn't say that such images are immoral while censoring them would clearly be immoral.

Do I need to define “photograph”?

Digital or film?

Anyway, let's please move on. Censorship--good or bad?

Thank you for replying that you believe that censoring child pornography would cause more harm than the child pornography itself does. I now understand your position.

Both film and digital formats would still be considered photography.

And the question wasn’t about good or bad it was moral versus immoral.

 

[Unknown Soldier]

Thank you for replying that you believe that censoring child pornography would cause more harm than the child pornography itself does. I now understand your position.

That is correct.

And the question wasn’t about good or bad it was moral versus immoral.

Would you approve of censorship if you were censored? Would censoring you be moral or immoral?

 

[steve_bank]

The specifics o what to censor are not black and white, which is the issue.

The rprevailing sentiment on the left is if there is conflict get rid of any restrictions.

In Settle more blacks were stopped for not wearing bike helmets. The progessive city council solution, get rid of the bike helmet law.

Easy to resolve the speech issue, no limits...right?

 

[Shadowy Man]

Thank you for replying that you believe that censoring child pornography would cause more harm than the child pornography itself does. I now understand your position.

That is correct.

And the question wasn’t about good or bad it was moral versus immoral.

Would you approve of censorship if you were censored? Would censoring you be moral or immoral?

If I were censored for what?

 

[Unknown Soldier]

Would you approve of censorship if you were censored? Would censoring you be moral or immoral?

If I were censored for what?

If anything you've said or any image you've published was censored, then would that censoring be moral or immoral?

 

[Shadowy Man]

Would you approve of censorship if you were censored? Would censoring you be moral or immoral?

If I were censored for what?

If anything you've said or any image you've published was censored, then would that censoring be moral or immoral?

Not necessarily moral or immoral.

Unlike you, I don’t believe that *all* censorship is immoral.

 

[Unknown Soldier]

Would you approve of censorship if you were censored? Would censoring you be moral or immoral?

If I were censored for what?

If anything you've said or any image you've published was censored, then would that censoring be moral or immoral?

Not necessarily moral or immoral.

Unlike you, I don’t believe that *all* censorship is immoral.

OK, then you're saying that at least some censorship is immoral. Can you post an example of both kinds of censorship that you might endure?

 

[Shadowy Man]

Would you approve of censorship if you were censored? Would censoring you be moral or immoral?

If I were censored for what?

If anything you've said or any image you've published was censored, then would that censoring be moral or immoral?

Not necessarily moral or immoral.

Unlike you, I don’t believe that *all* censorship is immoral.

OK, then you're saying that at least some censorship is immoral. Can you post an example of both kinds of censorship that you might endure?

I’ve already listed one example of moral censorship. I suppose examples of immoral Censorship would be in a pluralistic society Like mine the censorship of religious texts simply because they are from a minority religion. Another would be the censoring of political speech simply because the governing party disagreed with it.

But admittedly I haven’t given a lot of thought to this area of philosophy.

 

[steve_bank]

I rember the Smothers Brothers TV show. They were censored and hounded off the air by the government for their comedy and satire of the VN war and political figures.

Lenny Bruce, George Carlin,the FCC, and WBAI.

Today it is all mainstream entertainment. There are few limits on speech and visual expression today. Hollywood and music thrive on extremes.

Seven dirty words - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

What people are complaining about are things like predatory adults trolling for minors to exploit, bullying, hate speech.

Part of Trump's defense is claiming his extorting people to attack the capitol is protected under free speech. Same with his claims of election fraud.

In the ntext of the British crwn and the revolution freedom of speech meant political speech unrestricted by a government.

 

[steve_bank]

Would you approve of censorship if you were censored? Would censoring you be moral or immoral?

If I were censored for what?

If anything you've said or any image you've published was censored, then would that censoring be moral or immoral?

What is morality? Another loaded contextual word.

The censorship issue today is about harm caused by social media that was unleashed on us.

The issue is social harm. If as you said you should be able to walk around Chinatiwn shouting racial slurs than you ae confuting morality with selfishness.

It is a Trump like argument. Anything that interferes with or limits my wants and desires is immoral. Anyone who oppses me policaly is immoral.

 

[Shadowy Man]

It seems the gist of the argument is that censorship is immoral because the person being censored doesn't like it. If that's not the argument being made then there's no point in asking a question like:

If anything you've said or any image you've published was censored, then would that censoring be moral or immoral?

I'm sure murderers don't think murder should be illegal. We've got politicians who lose elections who then believe that elections shouldn't count. So, I guess we are in a world where there's increasing precedent for this kind of thinking.

 

[pood]

It’s funny how you demand a yes/no answer from others witout being inclined to provide one yourself.

You're not paying attention. I answered two such questions in my post #3:

No, actually, per your normal slippery posting style, you did not asnwer the specific question, “should child pornography be censord?” Later, howeer, you seemed to agree that it should not be — your apparent claim is that it is more ”immoral” to censor child ponography, than it is to create it in the first place — an astoundingly sociopathic stance, imo.

Should there be limits on public ethnic hate speech?

I'd say no because setting such limits can be worse than the hate speech.

I live on the edge of Chinatown and walk through. My neighbors in my buildng are Chinese. Should I be able to walk through my building and Chinatown mouthing Chinese hate speech?

In my opinion, yes.

No wonder I'm being targeted--I keep smashing everybody's arguments to smithereens!

A persecution complex combined with a wildly overinflated estimation of one’s own abilities is always attractive in a. message-board discusant, and sure to win friends and influence people.