Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!rutgers!usc!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!think!bbn!bbn.com!cosell
From: cosell@bbn.com (Bernie Cosell)
Newsgroups: news.newusers.questions
Subject: Re: What constitutes abuse ...
Message-ID: <50134@bbn.COM>
Date: 28 Dec 89 07:20:59 GMT
References: <7312@ficc.uu.net> <3507@harrier.ukc.ac.uk> <45062@bu-cs.BU.EDU> <1989Dec27.050047.2113@world.std.com>
Sender: news@bbn.COM
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bzs@world.std.com (Barry Shein) writes:

I hesitate to extend this already off-the-topic thread, but...

}Specifically, moderating a group is not censorship, it's not possible
}to "censor" someone by simply eliding their message.

What do you think that "censorship" is?  The only difference is who the
agent is and what the medium is.  Either you have the right to speak in
a public forum or you don't.  Usenet is, far as anyone can tell, pretty
much a public forum.  Certainly a group's moderator doesn't "own" the
newsgroup in the sense that the owner of a radio station does; I would
think it was more of a "public trust" on behalf of the usenet
community.  To the extent that usenet IS a useful, informative,
potentially influential medium [this is just a theoretical discussion,
right? :-)], we ought to have pretty free and equal access to express
our views.  There's no "other usenet" we can go buy time on to engage
in various similar sorts of discussion --- this is the sandbox we're
all playing in, and for all practical purposes it is the only game in
town.

I think that rather than putting "censor" in quotes, what you really
intended to do was something like capitalize it.  First off, there is
never a problem if you go along with the censors, either be they
tyrannical moderators or the police.  Things get interesting when you
try to evade the censors, and there, I agree, there is a difference ---
if you publish unpleasant things in the presence of
capital-C-censorship, the man will throw your ass in jail [or worse],
whereas on usenet if you forge an "Approved:" posting to get your voice
heard, you'll get flamed to death.  Clearly we're playing with
different stakes.  But notwithstanding, the principle is the
fundamentally the same --- someone has set themselves up as a
gatekeeper on your thoughts.

Editors editing for content, style, etc are fine --- that's their job,
mostly; editors editing for political correctness cross the line into
being lowercase-c-censors.


}It's editorializing perhaps, and perhaps it makes you angry as all
}get-out or is even ill-conceived.

Editorializing is when they do it to *their* words; it is
lowercase-c-censorship when they do it to *yours*.


}Denying you access to a particular medium is not censorship, denying
}you the right to express your thoughts in *any* media, a priori, is
}censorship. And that takes police powers.

This is just wrong analysis.  By your reasoning, to be denied ALL
forums except for a 20watt daytime only AM station in Fargo, ND is not
being censored.  If there is only one medium in question, "any" and "a
particular" are the *same*; and if it is a non-private medium it is
even more bothersome.  Who should have 'throttle control' over what is
said on usenet?  Is there a political correctness committee?  Are
newsgroups "awarded" to moderators to become their private forums [go
start your own newsgroup if you don't like being censored on *mine*]?
Is it OK for a sysadmin to sift through the postings of any or all of
the newsgroups and just arbitrarily pump out cancels for ones they
don't agree with?


But again, you're partly right --- we should remember that this is
"just usenet", and we're not talking about real capital-C-censorship.
But that doesn't make lowercase-c-censorship any the more palatable [or
welcome].

  /Bernie\