Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.2 9/5/84; site mnetor.UUCP Path: utzoo!utcs!mnetor!clewis From: clewis@mnetor.UUCP (Chris Lewis) Newsgroups: net.followup Subject: Re: Re: Europe leaves net.politics in disgust. (FLAME) Message-ID: <463@mnetor.UUCP> Date: Wed, 24-Apr-85 10:51:38 EST Article-I.D.: mnetor.463 Posted: Wed Apr 24 10:51:38 1985 Date-Received: Wed, 24-Apr-85 12:28:40 EST References: <451@mnetor.UUCP> <14@aquila.UUCP> Organization: Computer X (CANADA) Ltd., Toronto, Ontario, Canada Lines: 133 Chris Retterath flamed me upon a comment I made in net.followup. My primary comment is that he totally missed the point of my posting. My primary point is that the U.S. does not have "total free speech" either - and does not justify the "holier than thou" remarks that prompted my original posting. As a few examples of U.S. un-freedom-of-speech consider: 1) McCarthy 2) The GENUS II edition of Trivial Pursuit is banned in the U.S. for the question: How many months "gone" was Nancy Reagan when she walked down the isle? (answer: 2 or 3 (I expect a visit from the NSA/CIA any time now)) 3) The U.S. Government chooses to destabilize democratically elected governments of other countries just because the U.S. Government doesn't like their brand of politics. The original poster also forgot about such things as the libel/slander laws, and the laws about falsely yelling "fire". > Speak for yourself, Chris Lewis. Not all us Canadians are so paranoid > about the "south", nor are we all happy with the restrictions our government > places upon us. ... I'm not paranoid nor am I happy with the restrictions that our Government places upon us. For example, I am against the Canadian content regulations for TV and radio. My comment was, again, NOT implying that we are any better. Usually, I have a great deal of respect for U.S. policy - at least they (usually) have "good intentions". The U.S. has an enormous influence on us (and other parts of the world). Probably most of it good. But it doesn't prevent us from being selective. And we should be. > Sure the U.S. of A. has problems, but just think; do you think > a "Watergate"-like conspiracy could ever be UNCOVERED in this country??!! Yes. Several have (eg: the Gerda Munsinger(sp?) affair or RCMP barn-burning). Many times these have served to bring down governments. Fast. Far less trauma than the Watergate debacle. > Our governments have seen fit to classify almost everthing they do; the new > "freedom of information" act from Ottawa is so restrictive it might as well > not have been passed to raise our expectations! Many wouldn't exactly agree with this last assertion. > The Zundel case was > disgusting, to be sure, but I also find it distasteful that he will be going > to jail and/or deported for writing something that I am FORBIDDEN to READ!!! "Forbidden to read" - aw come on! There is no law that prevents me from reading his trash. Importation of it is not banned. Besides, if you had been following "can.politics" you'd find that I don't like the laws he was prosecuted under anyways. He should have been sued silly under civil libel/slander laws extended to protect groups. > There are many books that can not be imported into this "free" country; > Penthouse's distributor was CHARGED with distributing obscene material re: > an issue with simulated bondage photos; I don't agree with these laws either. I am a "free-speecher" and disagree with censorship of something that merely contains "sex", "violence" or "politically unpalatable viewpoints". However, I partially agree with the intent (as do most Canadian women I'm sure) where sufficiently virulent anti-somebody material (as many consider severe enough bondage depictions) offends that "somebody" a lot. > the federal government passed a law > (since rescinded after the National Citizen's Coalition publicized it and > a public outrow ensued) making it ILLEGAL for ANYONE other than registered > political parties to ADVERTISE POLITICAL OPINIONS DURING AN ELECTION!!! Right - it isn't in force is it? And the U.S. has religious groups attempting to buy TV networks to eliminate "biased reporting" and "targetting" politicians. The former cannot happen here because of the CRTC (probably the only thing the CRTC is any good for). > does he know that only 120 years ago slavery was abolished in America?? Yes. Relatively shortly before that Britain abolished it too (and, as far as I am aware, Canada never did have slavery per-se. We may have had some similar injustices (eg: the Japanese during WW II), but at least they were short-term and eventually, our Government has even gotten around to apologize (yes, I know, insufficient, but it's better than nothing and the question isn't over yet)) How come we don't have a native-origin KKK? > East Indians and Hispanics have formed visible communities in Toronto > in the last 2 years, and suddenly we find we're not really ready to point > fingers at others! To our shame, yes. However, at least it is neither "organized" nor an export. Again, I was objecting to the "holier than thou" attitude; I was not attempting to claim that we are any much better. If a Zundel clone started spewing substantial quantities of such stuff down net.politics we would cut it off too. Not because it is illegal here, but because we won't allow our voluntary donation of computer time/storage/bandwidth to the network be perverted in such a way. Nor do we want fingers pointed at us saying that we implicitly support such trash by forwarding it. I say "we" because I am absolutely certain that the majority of people at our site would agree (especially the management). Downstream sites' administrators and I discuss restricting newsgroups for various reasons. One of our downstream sites doesn't get all the newsgroups because of lack of storage at their site. Guess which ones were first to go? We have not yet found it neccessary to restrict any of the feed for "content" reasons. Not even Retterath's posting was close to sufficient :-). Then again, if a newsgroup got virulent enough (nothing I have yet seen has come close - but Keegstra's ranting certainly does), I would cut it off unilaterally. If a downstream site (or, more probably, individual) doesn't like it - tough - they can find another feed for that newsgroup. We are under no legal obligation to provide ANY feed. But we will provide feeds so that we can receive one ourselves. Zundel and Keegstra - are you on the net? Be warned - we'd cut you off! If anybody wants to respond, please lets move it over to net.flame or respond directly by mail. -- Chris Lewis, Computer X (CANADA) Ltd. UUCP: {allegra, linus, ihnp4}!utzoo!mnetor!clewis BELL: (416)-475-1300 ext. 321