Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!swrinde!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!caen!uflorida!mailer.cc.fsu.edu!fsu1.cc.fsu.edu!otto
From: otto@fsu1.cc.fsu.edu (John Otto)
Newsgroups: comp.admin.policy
Subject: Re: Canceling someone else's article
Message-ID: <1991Jun8.022726.10118@mailer.cc.fsu.edu>
Date: 8 Jun 91 02:32:41 GMT
References: <1991May29.222406.26060@herald.usask.ca> <48330@bcsaic.UUCP> <1991Jun1.022548.28381@zorch.SF-Bay.ORG>
Sender: news@mailer.cc.fsu.edu (Usenet News File Owner)
Reply-To: otto@fsu1.cc.fsu.edu
Organization: Florida State University
Lines: 64
News-Software: VAX/VMS VNEWS 1.3-4
Nntp-Posting-Host: fsu1.cc.fsu.edu

In article <1991Jun1.022548.28381@zorch.SF-Bay.ORG>, xanthian@zorch.SF-Bay.ORG (Kent Paul Dolan) writes...
>In article <48330@bcsaic.UUCP> snicoud@Boeing.com (Stephen L Nicoud) writes:
>In article <1991May29.222406.26060@herald.usask.ca> lowey@herald.usask.ca (Kevin Lowey) writes:

>> And how about the bus driver/owner who makes black
>> people sit in the back of the bus. Clearly it is
>> not *always* up to the owner's notion of what is
>> "improper". You cannot restrict the activities
>> based upon sex, race, religion, creed, etc...

>Flawed analogy; a city bus is a public accomodation
>within the scope of the law, either operated or
>licensed to operate by government entities to whom
>the anti-discrimination statutes apply. These same
>statutes don't tell me that if I operate a church
>school bus I have to provide service to other than
>the, perhaps tuition paying, students.

>I have a complete right to operate a private BBS for
>the benefit and use, only, of the KKK, the John
>Birch Society, the Bnai Brith Anti-Defamation
>League, the Freemasons, alt.activism participants
>(gag!) or people whose last name starts with "D"
>like mine. That is _not_ a public accomodation, it
>is not operated or licensed as one by a government
>entity. and the anti-discrimination laws should not
>be expected to apply.

That's just what the private restaurant owners said in the 1960s.

>No more am I required (nor is USENet required) to
>_fund_ your _access_ to free speech on the BBS or the
>net, that corresponds to your right to be safe from
>_laws_ _abridging_ free speech in a medium either
>free or voluntarily funded by other participants and
>provided for you.

Right.  We should all be paying for what we use.

>This means if "we" don't like you enough to toss you
>off the net and pull the plug on your feed, you have
>no _legal_ recourse; your only recourse is to
>correct the behavior problems that elicited such a
>severe response enough to gull some sucker into
>providing you a feed again, at probable risk to his
>own feed, since the net is rather long on memory and
>short on forgiveness.

This nonsense goes on?!?

>Similarly for a cancelled account; you have to find
>a new site that will give you one, you have no
>inherent right, and should have no expectation, to
>get the old one back by means of any legal process.

>Compare it to the case of newspapers, which are in
>no way obliged to publish your obscene and abusive
>letter to the editor (though if you shop around, one
>may), although the law is pretty strict in allowing
>you to fund your _own_ newspaper in which you can
>rave, within the limits of the libel laws, to your
>heart's content.

Right.  So, how do I fund my own network?  B-)}