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From: rlr@pyuxd.UUCP (Rich Rosen)
Newsgroups: net.flame
Subject: Re: Re: Pornography doesn't degrade women ...
Message-ID: <375@pyuxd.UUCP>
Date: Tue, 22-Jan-85 10:13:18 EST
Article-I.D.: pyuxd.375
Posted: Tue Jan 22 10:13:18 1985
Date-Received: Wed, 23-Jan-85 07:40:38 EST
References: <243@looking.UUCP> <11300010@smu.UUCP> <4560@cbscc.UUCP> <354@ahuta.UUCP> <671@utcsrgv.UUCP> <302@enmasse.UUCP>
Organization: Bell Communications Research, Piscataway N.J.
Lines: 35

>> *I*, at least, do not think that *totally* free speech is worth
>> another holocaust,
>>   The ability of the written and verbal media to inspire people to do things
>> that they would not normally consider is well known (eg Nazi Germany).
>> The potential cost of free speech could (and *has*) reached millions of
>> lives.  

> WHAT? FREE SPEECH IS RESPONSIBLE FOR THE HOLOCAUST???? 
> 	1. Nazi's used propoganda to support their regime,
> 	   which denied basic rights, and murdered millions of people.
> 	2. In a free society nazi propoganda could be published,
> 	   perhaps leading to the abolition of the free society.
> 	3. Therefore we shouldn't have a free society :-)
> 
> 	oh i understand, and i always thought that it was the total
> 	lack of free speech that allowed totaliarian regimes to
> 	perform the most brutal acts of repression and terror
> 	without fear that the populace would toss them out.

How true.  Think about that whenever you hear people proclaim how it's
necesary to restrict your freedom ("temporarily", they might say) in order
to preserve it.  And remember, when others *do* take advantage of freedom to
spew forth lies, propaganda, and unsubstantiated half-truths in an attempt to
move people to their way of thinking through persuasive manipulation, that
you have the same freedom to show the lies and manipulations for what they are.
They may seem obvious to you, and you may feel "it's hardly worth to show these
hooligans for what they are", but it IS worth it when there ARE people out
there gullible enough to believe what's being spewed.

Tyranny from those who make use of freedom to acheive their ends isn't caused
by having freedom.  It's caused by failing to use one's freedom in order to
defend freedom.
-- 
"Right now it's only a notion, but I'm hoping to turn it into an idea, and if
 I get enough money I can make it into a concept."       Rich Rosen pyuxd!rlr