But I think I do:
The Supreme Court struck down a federal law Tuesday aimed at banning videos that show graphic violence against animals, saying it violates the right to free speech.
The justices, voting 8-1, threw out the criminal conviction of Robert Stevens of Pittsville, Va., who was sentenced to three years in prison for videos he made about pit bull fights.
***But Roberts said the law could be read to allow the prosecution of the producers of films about hunting. And he scoffed at the administration’s assurances that it would only apply the law to depictions of extreme cruelty. “But the First Amendment protects against the government,” Roberts said. “We would not uphold an unconstitutional statute merely because the government promised to use it responsibly.”
Personally, I think people who abuse animals should be slowly beaten to death over a period of weeks with a sock filled with quarters, but I agree with Roberts.
Jack Newhouse
I wholeheartedly agree, on both counts.
Remember November
yes, unfortunately it covers the douchenozzles as well. That’s the price we have to pay. Making a video document of it is not so much the same as coordinating such an event.
akaoni
So how does the law which was struck down differ from anti-child pornography statutes?
Omnes Omnibus
Being a 1st Amendment absolutist has a price. I agree that assholes have a right to promulgate their ideas, but that right does not make them any less assholish.
Pigs & Spiders
Yup, this is pretty cut and dried.
There’s probably very little that can legislatively be done about this sort of thing.
Bastards.
Kevin Phillips Bong
I’m starting a video production company selling footage of these degenerates being mutilated by their own animals. At least I know they’ll be legal.
liberty60(Veteran, Great War of Yankee Aggression)
Now if this thinking could be applied to warrantless wiretapping, imprisonment without charges, and waterboarding, we might get somewhere.
Brian J
@liberty60(Veteran, Great War of Yankee Aggression):
And if I had better looks, more money, lots of prospects, and more athletic skill, I could be LeBron James, Rafael Nadal, or Christiano Ronaldo. After all, we’re all around the same age, and besides those things, we’re very similar.
Swellsman
Right — and that is the thing about being a grown-up, responsible American: the recognition that we can’t have everything, and sometimes we need to make choices about what we value most.
Most people, I’m sure, value being able to punish people who abuse animals. I don’t have a problem with that.
And most people, I’m sure, also value the First Amendment’s Freedom of Speech clause. Again, no problem.
But where these two value conflict, one of them has to be set aside in favor of the other, more important — and, by the way, the only Constitutionally protected — value. These are tough things to do, but grown ups know they have to be done.
This is why the ACLU, which deplores racial discrimination, will also advocate in favor of the KKK being able to hold a rally. This is why lawyers, who despire terrorism, will advocate on behalf of accused terrorists and require the gov’t to prove its case against the accused. This is why responsible people, who don’t like to part with their money, will actually pay their taxes because they think it is more important to have a functioning infrastructure, court system, school system, defense dept., etc. etc. etc. than that they be ablel to keep each and every cent that passes into their hands.
That is the fundamental problem I have with conservatives these days. They can never seem to wrap their heads around the concept that being a grown-up means you don’t get to pick and choose your principles depending on the circumstances and the outcome you want to see. To paraphrase Jon Stewart, if you abandon your principles when they are inconvenient then they’re not really principles . . . they’re suggestions.
Elisabeth
At least the videos can be used as evidence at a criminal trial for animal cruelty. Be careful what you wish for, Mr. Stevens.
General Egali Tarian Stuck
First Amendment fanatic here, so agree.
TonyDogs
@Elisabeth:
Absolutely. That’s the only real solace here.
Omnes Omnibus
@akaoni: With the dog fights, the dogfighting is point, the behavior that is made illegal. With child porn, the taking and possessing of the pictures is the point of the activity. Without cameras, you would still have dogfights, but you would not have child porn.
Also, if I am filming dogfights to show how horrific they are in order to stop the practice, I could be punished under this law. There is no realistic possibility of that situation with child porn.
These are just a quick couple of observations on the topic. First Amendment jurisprudence goes deeply into just this issue.
Mnemosyne
Ironically, this statute could probably have been used against groups like HSUS that expose animal cruelty on factory farms — after all, if the mere promulgation of the images is a crime in itself, what’s to stop an overzealous prosecutor from forcing them to take down the images that are hurting the business of said prosecutor’s campaign donors?
The people who make and distribute these are despicable assholes, but the videos are better used as evidence against them when they’re put on trial for animal cruelty than trying to police who’s watching the videos.
General Egali Tarian Stuck
@Elisabeth: Yes, poetic justice. Receive a get out of jail free card, only to draw another go to jail, do not pass go one.
aimai
This is actually something that the conservative christians have really been on about for a long time–that is, in a market economy with wide latitude for self expression, well, “anything goes” and there’s no real corrective in, for example, public outrage or public rejection. Because there are many publics, and lots of people who will support even the most disgusting things with their pocketbooks and their eyeballs.
And they aren’t wrong. That is, “community standards” don’t mean anything when communities are disaggregated on the internet and people are free to spend their money as they like. Its one of the reasons that conservative christians are often also, basically, drawn to the fantasy of the rural, rejectionist, home schooling, survivalist mindset. Because they can’t keep lots of stuff out of their homes without government aid, and they don’t feel they can depend on a government that even handidly applies the laws about free speech.
I’m not saying I’m pro right wing culture wars. I’m just saying that our free market, modern, liberal and principled attitude towards free speech and consumption of crap means that there are going to be tons of mini markets for pretty horrible stuff. And all we can do is avert our eyes. There’s no workable social mechanism for registering disgust or rejecting this stuff.
aimai
Paris
Dog fights and animal crulety is A-okay. Just don’t show videos of high tech soldiers blowing away third worlders safely from the confines of a helicopter one mile away. That would be rude and unpatriotic.
Polish the Guillotines
Apropos of this ruling, one of this year’s Goldman award winners is Costa Rican, Randall Arauz, who one for his work on exposing the shark-finning industry. He and his associates did it using undercover video of the shark-finning practices on the fishing vessels.
So, good for the Supremes.
Edward G. Talbot
I’ll certainly add my agreement with the ruling. I do not, however, agree that it is quite as cut and dried as some say. I agree with @Omnes Omnibus about the distinction between this and child porn, but ultimately both come down to weighing one right or rights versus others. I don’t believe that banning these videos will have enough of a positive impact to outweigh the infringement of the first amendment, but I certainly recognize that one could make the opposite case.
tc
Pennsylvania should just have a “Son of Sam” type of law that prevents someone convicted of a felony from profiting from their crime. It’s simple and it’s constitutional.
Bob K
I always like to ask my self. What would Lord Murdock do?
Is man inherently evil? – Or just Nature’s biggest mistake?
Soylent Green is PEOPLE (Soul Less perhaps, but vaguely
humanoid and tasty with Au Jus gravy and a nice baguette.)
slag
What about kiddie p0rn? Same rules?
Edit: Honestly, I’m just hoping to see the new tagline. Still haven’t.
LarsThorwald
I agree with the decision, not just because I am a free speech absolutist, but because I have, like, 70 hours of videos on VHS of some hookers dancing on li’l baby chicks with golf shoes. Kidding! Jesus!
Final comment:
I am having an ongoing debate with a friend who disagrees with my belief, thus: that in a world of roughly 3 billion men, there are at least a few who get off on the oddest thing you can imagine. Movies of men licking ping pong balls? There’s a perv for that. Sketches in charcoal of monkeys riding on the backs of donkeys? Somewhere, in the world, there is someone who would assault the glove over that. It’s true.
My friend refuses to believe me because that means that there is a man — or more likely men — who get incredibly sexually satisfied from seeing naked elbows on women, and if that is the case, then it is the equivalent of women, between, say, May and August, simply walking around topless. And that disturbs him because that means there is someone else out there happier than him.
This has been the rambling of a lunatic.
Osprey
What confuses me is that the man making these videos is partaking in an illegal activity. How is it any different if you’re making a video of a murder, a rape, or an armed robbery? Videos of illegal activity made for entertainment purposes should be illegal (if they already aren’t).
Hunting is legal (well, as long as you’re abiding by hunting regulations), dog fighting and animal abuse is not. That’s like saying it’s ok to videotape a rape and sell it for entertainment because ‘it’s just sex’.
Sad part is you know this has a lot more to do than dog fighting-people do some really sick, sadistic shit to animals for fun. I’m sorry, but if you’re videotaping an illegal act for any purpose other than to help authorities arrest and prosecute the criminals, you should be charged with accessory to whatever act is being committed. Period.
comrade scott's agenda of rage
And film it since it’s now protected speech.
If that’s too graphic, then I’m all for the Chinese approach: quick bullet to the back of the head and make the family of the executed asshole pay for the cost of the bullet.
And this from an anti-death penalty person.
liberty60(Veteran, Great War of Yankee Aggression)
@aimai:
Which is why back when I was a conservative, I had hoped that the inherent contradiction between unfettered capitalism and a moral social order would lead to a ethical framework that saw limits and regulation of the market as the only vehicle by which moral principles could be promulgated and enforced. We could have a moral order that allowed freedom, the best of both worlds.
Unfortunately, with the current Stalinist Palin/ Beck framework, we get Taliban-esque moral strictures with gangster-style rapacious capitalism, the worst of both worlds.
El Cid
Michael Vick can have a new side-career — America’s Best Animal Torture Videos host!
liberty60(Veteran, Great War of Yankee Aggression)
If you are going to post this, you should at least have the decency to provide links.
I don’t have all day to spend Googling.
Keith
Scalia might. I recall a recent ruling where he argued that certain warrant issues (or some other kind of court oversight) was no longer necessary because cops today aren’t as corrupt as they used to be.
Legalize
Bullshit. This isn’t a speech issue. Animal abuse is illegal in most, if not all jurisdictions in the United States. Video taping this shit and selling it aides and abets the illegality. The shit-stains who video tape and sell this material should be held jointly and severally liable along with the twats who actively engage in the cruelty.
Brian J
@liberty60(Veteran, Great War of Yankee Aggression):
I think the current incarnation of Republicanism, to the extent that it is represented by goons like Palin, is just the worst. Not only do people like that want to tell you how to live your life and control your body, but they want a government where corporations rule things and make lives miserable for anyone who isn’t rich.
Lurking Canadian
How is it any different if you’re making a video of a murder, a rape, or an armed robbery? Videos of illegal activity made for entertainment purposes should be illegal (if they already aren’t).
I’ve never been able to understand how hard core porn is legal when prostitution isn’t. Somehow, if a guy walks up to a woman and says, “I’d like to pay you to have sex with me”, he has committed a crime, but if he says, “I’d like to pay you to have sex with this guy while I film it”, that’s OK. That strike anybody else as strange?
Persia
@Elisabeth: One of my concerns about the law was that it’d be used against the dirty hippies who taped exposes, honestly. I know the government promised they wouldn’t but I don’t buy it in the age of wiretapping.
ken
And look who was the dissent: Alito. Sam “animal rights” Alito.
In dissent, Justice Samuel Alito said the harm animals suffer in dogfights is enough to sustain the law.
Alito said the ruling probably will spur new crush videos because it has ”the practical effect of legalizing the sale of such videos.”
Omnes Omnibus
@Lurking Canadian: The theory is that one is a performance while the other is a sex act performed for money.
Comrade Dread
@liberty60(Veteran, Great War of Yankee Aggression):
That’s crazy hippie secret Muslim talk, there, buddy. I’ll be sure to report it to my superiors after I pull your book reading list from the soshalist library you Reds support.
Chad N Freude
I hope that some day an attorney in a case before the Court quotes this in his/her argument.
Osprey
@Lurking Canadian:
I have to quote George Carlin.
‘Selling is legal. Fucking is legal. Why isn’t SELLING FUCKING LEGAL?’
rob!
Dog-fighting is illegal everywhere, is it not? Hunting is not illegal, so I don’t understand why you can’t make a legal distinction about videos showing either of those things.
Legalize
Alito is exactly right in this case. The Court just green-lit a legitimate market for snuff films.
Omnes Omnibus
@Legalize: Where would you draw the line on this?
Bob K
@aimai:
English Civil War – 1641–1651
Puritans – Roundheads – Supported Parliament
Cavaliers – Royalists – Supported King
King Charles beheaded in 1649
2 years for dust to settle down.
And they all lived unhappily ever after.
jonas
@Osprey: As I understand it, this guy was reproducing videos of dogfights in Japan and other countries where it’s currently legal. That was the crux of the case: he hadn’t actually participated in the dogfights; they were legal dogfights in that jurisdiction. Was selling the footage protected free speech? The Roberts court says it is. Now, since I’m not a laywer, can someone explain why that doesn’t also allow someone to go to a country where it’s not expressly illegal to film porn with a 14 year old and then sell the footage here?
Omnes Omnibus
@Bob K:I am missing your point.
aimai
Legalize @40 is wrong. This isn’t creating a “legitimate market” of snuff films–porn of all kinds is totally in the eye of the beholder and the manufacture and sale of films about real world events are, largely, legal already.
If people get off on the torturing and killing of animals what is to prevent Tysons or some hotdog manufacturer from making a film of “how your food is made” and selling it right now? Nothing. Running a slaughter house is legal and filming it–which you might be doing anyways for industrial work issues–and selling it is also perfectly legal. In fact, I’m surprised they don’t. Armour’s, famous for selling “everything but the squeal” would certainly do it if the general awfulness of the entire procedure wouldn’t potentially harm their main business which remains the selling of the meat. But I assure you that if they can make money off a sideline of selling “killed animal” videos, they would. And what would make it illegal?
aimai
FormerSwingVoter
Okay, I get it – these videos are protected under free speech laws.
However, can’t they then use these same videos as evidence to press dogfighting charges? Since its illegal?
I mean, if someone shows a tape of themselves doing something illegal, they typically aren’t arrested because of the taping – they’re arrested for the illegal act that they created irrefutable evidence of.
Or am I missing something?
Helmut
Roberts’ argument by analogy is disingenuous. Videos of hunting show images of legal activity. Videos of animal cruelty show images of illegal activity, the majority of US states having decided that animal cruelty and neglect can be prosecuted as felonies.
Obviously, existing law doesn’t consider non-human animals to possess the same rights as human beings, but Roberts’ argument does raise the question: should videos of human torture be considered free speech?
“Absolutism” on free speech is an overly simplistic view anyway. There are powerful moral and legal arguments limiting some forms of speech – libel, incitement, obscenity, sedition, etc. These forms of unprotected speech are well-established by the US Supreme Court, which has traditionally understood them to turn on content neutrality.
Why? Because just as with some other forms of human action (murder and theft, to use two obvious examples), some restrictions on individual liberty allow all to maintain their own liberties as equals in this respect. As J.S. Mill argued, the limit of individual liberty – the point at which government or society can and should legitimately restrict action – is harm. The concept of harm may be parsed as impingement on others’ liberties and rights. In other words, the limit of my freedom is when I frustrate yours. This is pretty basic to modern law and morality.
What qualifies as harmful speech (as opposed to offensive speech, for example) is a notoriously thorny issue. But it’s nonsensical to talk of “absolute” freedom unless the term is rather heavily qualified. In that case, however, we’re no longer talking about absolutes.
Ash Can
@Osprey:
I’m thinking the same thing. It seems to me that there are laws compelling witnesses of a crime to report those crimes to the authorities. If these videos aren’t turned over to the police rather than used for entertainment purposes, how is the maker of the video not liable as some sort of accessory to a crime?
ETA @ jonas #43: Thanks for the explanation. That helps, a little.
aimai
@43,
I am not a lawyer but as I understand it the legality or otherwise of porn imagery isn’t predicated on the laws of the jurisdiction in which it originates, but the laws of the jurisdiction in which it is consumed. You can’t prosecute the makers of the porn in the country where its legal, if it is, but you can prosecute the consumer who consumes it in a country where it is illegal.
The swedes are dealing with this problem all the time because they have quite strict laws against pedophilia and prostitution and swedish men are always turning up in Thailand for sex tourism.
People get prosecuted, of course, for crimes committed in other jurisdictions all the time. Ireland tried to prosecute women *for years* for getting abortions in England and I think they were successful.
But there are gray areas as well. Any picture I took of my daughters dressed as normal American girls could well be considered pornographic in Saudi Arabia. Child marriages in countries where it is customary don’t automatically convert to child molestation when the individuals arrive in the US. And polygamous unions, too, are in a kind of gray area.
aimai
PTirebiter
@rob!: The court made the point that it was not ruling on the constitutionality of a law that made that distinction. They felt the current law was overly broad. I imagine we’ll quickly see a new bill introduced.
The Moar You Know
I agree with the Supremes on this ruling.
I agree with the laws that would prosecute me for beating the shit out of anyone who does this sort of thing.
If I ever meet anyone who does this sort of thing, I will beat the shit out of them and happily plead guilty to the assault charge.
Legalize
@Omnes Omnibus:
I don’t think there’s much of a new line to be drawn here. We already prohibit video-taping and selling things like underage persons engaged in sexual acts, and the like. I don’t see any negative consequences here. There’s no privacy issue. There’s no restriction of the right of people to petition their government or to criticize the government. There’s no national security concerns.
Bobby Thomson
It’s not even a close call, John. And it shows what an
assholeextremist Alito is when it comes to anything involving criminal prosecution.Elizabelle
@ken:
Yep. Sam Alito gets a brownie or milk bone point in my book, just for today, for the compassion for animals shown in [what I know of] his dissent.
Agree with Supremes’ decision. It’s up to legislatures to protect animals and other creatures.
Disturbing to hear of that “crush” fetish. (Meanwhile, defense lawyers could say “but you feed these creatures to snakes daily, and use them as lab animals.”) Pornography when you see it.
Anyhoo.
Omnes Omnibus
@aimai: The legality of the images can also depend on the laws in the country where the images were produced. Consider images of a 16 y/o filmed in the US, but consumed in Thailand (assuming the images would be legal there, an issue on which I have no knowledge). The producer of those images would criminally liable in the US no matter where the images were consumed.
Also, the US prosecutes a variety of acts that take place in foreing countries, for example, the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act which makes things like bribing someone in a foreign country illegal under US laws.
Legalize
I’m not sure I get your argument. What made such things illegal was the law that was struck down. Things are illegal because a statute passed by Congress or a state legislature say they are illegal. This isn’t the same thing as videotaping lawful enterprises and selling it. Porn is all fine and good until you have non-consensual acts performed upon unwilling participants or participants lacking capacity to give their consent, i.e. in the eyes of the law – children, and as a matter of fact – animals.
Omnes Omnibus
@Legalize: What about the example, given by several people above, of someone filming the abuse in order to publicize it and encourage people to demand stricter penalties and more stringent enforcement of laws against animal abuse? Should that person be subject to punishment?
Mike Kay
How is this speech?
200 years of case law says not all acts are protected speech.
You can’t say the 7 dirty words on broadcast radio or TV prior to 10 PM because the FCC will levy crippling fines.
You can’t burn a cross on a lawn.
The flag-burning case was decided 5-4 with Stevens voting in the minority, holding that the act of setting cloth on fire was not speech.
And it goes, on, and on, and on in various subjects.
So what’s next, overturning laws on kiddie-porn, gross-obscenity(cleveland steamer), and snuff films.
Anonymous At Work
1. I would favor using paddles or rackets covered in steel wool. It would hurt more than socks filled with loose change.
2. I am really curious about Alito’s dissent. A First Amendment rights case has a really high bar for the government to get over.
artem1s
it’s obvious from the comments that the problem is with how the law is written and the cases the prosecutor is choosing to pursue in that jurisdiction, not the common sense issue of whether doggie snuff films should, or shouldn’t be legal. The conversation was very similar during the prosecution case of Dennis Barry over the Mapplethorpe photos. Particularly the photos of nude children. I am sure there were bona fide incidences of pedophilia sex rings in Cincinnati at the time but the prosecutor was in on the movement to end government funding of the arts and Mapplethorpe was an easy target.
I would be interested in what, if any, precedence the prosecutor is trying to set and why. What’s the next political target? these cases don’t happen in a vacuum, there is usually and agenda. Is there a huge amount of these films being smuggled in to the US? Are they being downloaded through the internet? The head of Humane Society seems to think that the ruling will allow for a more narrowly written law that would pass muster. Maybe this is the goal?
Legalize
@Omnes Omnibus:
I think the distinction is the fact that in the former case the material is put into the stream of commerce and sold for profit, likely in an effort to aid and abet a crime (I agree that this could be a sticky question of fact, but no harder than establishing any other aiding and abetting question), for which a more than rational reason exists to regulate. In the latter case, the material it is made to make a political/legal point, and/or to petition their government to enact certain regulations – i.e., the very definition of protected speech.
Omnes Omnibus
@Mike Kay: Texas v. Johnson overturned the law banning flag burning.
Speech is broader than just words. Also, the particular law being overturned in this case was considered overly broad, that is, it would prevent or punish speech that IS covered.
Omnes Omnibus
@Legalize: OK, but both would be illegal under a law banning the filming of animal abuse. Do you prosecute both? What if the “good” filmers were an unpopular group, e.g., PETA, and some rightwing prosecutor seized on this law to go after them and shut them down?
Legalize
@Omnes Omnibus:
Both may be made “illegal” under the statute but the latter is facially unconstitutional. Taking the contrary position to its logical end, any activity that is otherwise protected speech, could be seized upon by a partisan prosecutor and prosecuted under the pretext of some sort of harm above and beyond the speech issue. Even if this is a speech issue, I don’t think it’s difficult to analogize it to scenarios that are not protected.
aimai
I don’t know why people are acting as though whistleblowers don’t get prosecuted all the time if one aspect of their actions is illegal or can be construed to be illegal. One of the early reformers of child prostitution was arrested and, I believe tried, for publicly purchasing a child to make the point of how easy it was to do so.
In addition, the line between “I did it to expose a problem” and “I pretended to do it to expose a problem but I did it and furthered the illegal act” is made to be broken.
To Omnes Omnibus up above my point in the example of a real Tysons or Armour selling animal snuff films masquerading as industrial tech films is that porn is in the eye of the beholder. In specific instance of the SOTUS case the question was whether a person can film and distribute photos of an illegal act. Alito and some others seem to think that permitting the sale of images of dog fights leads to animal snuff films–videos of torture and cruelty to animals. Dog fighting is only one form of torture and cruelty to animals, of course, and slaughterhouses and factory farms are actually probably more prevalent. My point is that if people want to access images of cruelty to animals and are willing to pay for it a market will exist because cruelty, like porn, is in the eye of the beholder. There are people who are going to get off on a lot of weird stuff. If its not illegal to start with the fact that it is gross or involves the death of animals doesn’t make it illegal. So Alito’s point, if it involves mere cruelty and death, is beside the point. Dog fights are just one part of a large number of behaviors that can be commoditized and marketed.
aimai
Omnes Omnibus
@Legalize:
And here we have a constitutionally overbroad statute. This is why the law in question was struck down.
Legalize
Let me make another analogy. It is not protected speech for me to communicate with my co-conspirators in the furtherance of a bank robbery. My communications with my co-conspirators could be called “overt acts” in furtherance of an agreement to facilitate an illegal scheme, or to aid and abet a scheme. Conspiracy and aiding and abetting do not require that the perpetrator actually factually commit the illegal act, i.e. the robbing of the bank, or in this case, the abuse of the animals. I don’t think it’s a stretch at all to adopt Alito’s position and find that all this does is facilitate unarguably criminal activity.
Legalize
@Omnes Omnibus:
Yes. This was the Court’s reasoning. However, the statute need only be struck down to the extent that it is unconstitutional.
Omnes Omnibus
@aimai: I missed the comment at 43 that prompted your reply. All is clear now.
burnspbesq
@Osprey:
Understand where you’re coming from, believe me. But your side lost, and the Court got it right.
Legalize @66 hits the nail on the head: if you can prove that the guy holding the camera was part of a conspiracy to commit dog-fighting, then nail him for conspiracy. If he used the mail or an instrumentality of interstate commerce in furtherance of the conspiracy, nail him for mail fraud or wire fraud. If he didn’t report the income he earned from selling dog-fight DVDs, nail him for income tax evasion. But you can’t touch the making or the distribution of the video itself.
Omnes Omnibus
@Legalize: And we are back to my question of where do you draw the line. I am sure a new law, more narrowly tailored, will be passed very soon. It will be subject to another challenge.
Captain C
@LarsThorwald: This would be Rule 34: “If you can think of it, there’s porn of it,” and its corollary Rule 36: “If you can think of it, someone somewhere gets off on it.”
jorge
Just checking – would people here play a vid game that allows the player to “be” a cock in the cock fighting ring? Or perhaps a dog that fights other dogs? In 1st scenario, play would be similar to 1:1 2D mortal kombat style match ups, and take place in rings around the world – like in Dallas, Houston, Phoenix, Bangkok, Manilla, etc (spectators in stands). The fighting cock would be like a car in similar competition games – wins equal winning a purse that can be used on growth hormones, avian steroids, better talon blades and yes, you can even trick things out a bit with dye and make a punk-plummage fighter.
Dog scenario is a bit more free ranging, and still a work in progress – but basically would people here play to be a ghetto dog? you could fight other dogs (both in traditional pit fights and in open street free-for-all – LOTS OF BLOOD!), kill rats, cats, pigeons, attack people, screw other dogs, etc etc etc.
I know animal cruelty is bad – but what are thoughts on this? 5 to 10 yrs ago it seemed much more socially acceptable to play the role of something verboten in the gaming milieu – to be a Nazi Luftwaffe pilot for instance on PC, or to kill willy nilly like in in GTA – but now things are a little more locked down (Modern Warfare’s latest iteration has the airport scenario – but that’s an exception). Anyway – what are your thoughts? Does this cross a line?
WereBear
It was a tough call, but I have to agree with it. And I don’t agree with Scalia, (surprise surprise my record is still perfect.)
This is the whole point of 1st Amendment issues: the disgusting behavior is not protected, but discussion and representation of it is.
This would turn into a slippery pit wherein actual animal protection agencies could get in trouble trying to publicize, and stop, the behavior.
We can’t let it be up to an individual judge. Like Scalia.
Because they can let their individual prejudices override the law. Like Scalia.
Legalize
@Omnes Omnibus:
Well, obviously I’m stuck with the lone Alito in believing that no line was crossed here, and 8 other learned justices of all stripes are vexed by the speech issues. So I lose. But I hope you’re right that a more narrowly tailored law is passed and that it assuages the fears of the majority.
mobtown999
I agree with CJ Roberts in this case, which just caused me to throw up a little. However, the court only ruled that this law is overly broad. A better written law could easily deal with animal cruelty images.
Mike Kay
@burnspbesq:
what’s you position on people who download kiddie porn from a foreign server.
jorge
Also, please do not try dropping that “On Killing” bullshit by Gross as a response on how vid games desensitize the player. That book is whack and full of specious cause/correlation confusion.
The avg gamer’s age in US is a 35 y.o. male w/ job and education – games do not lead to violence, anymore than generations of boys playing with toy guns led to violence.
Common Sense
@Omnes Omnibus:
Seems like that all depends on one’s definition of a child, no?
There was an exception under the statute for films with “serious religious, political, scientific, educational, journalistic, historical or artistic value.”
Omnes Omnibus
@Mike Kay: Possession of the material would be illegal no matter where it was produced.
Mike Kay
@Omnes Omnibus: why is it illegal. why can someone posses snuff films, torture films, rape films, but can’t posses some photo of brooke shields intentionally showing off a boob in a calvin klein shoot in the Ukraine. how does the vaunted first amendment protect the first three, but not the later.
Martian Buddy
@Keith: That was Hudson v. Michigan, which contributed the phrase “new professionalism” to the lexicon of snark for describing police misconduct.
Omnes Omnibus
@Mike Kay: The first three are evidence of a crime, but not, in and of themselves, a crime. The child images are both. What the child porn laws are trying to prevent are the abuse of children by taking sexualized photos of them. By making possession of the photos a crime, legislators hope to prevent the abuse. With the other things, the photos were not the point of the activity. Although, snuff films, where the point of the killing was to film it, the logic of child porn holds, but I believe that true snuff films are also illegal in most jusrisdictions (I am relying on memory not research for that assertion). Eventually, it becomes definitional.
Nellcote
@aimai:
The Breitbart Line.
shep
But put a “Bongs for Jesus” T-shirt on one of the dogs…
S
I would suggest that people who abuse animals should be forced to clean out animal shelter floors with their tongue for a 5 years to life depending on the seriousness of the crime.
Mike Kay
@Omnes Omnibus:
This is how ridiculous and phoney the supreme court is. someone can download a snuff film of a teen. someone can download a torture film of a teen. someone can even download a rape film of a teen, as long as the nudity is pixleated, but janet jackson showing a boob with the nipple covered, as a teen or an adult, and government goes nutz.
you can’t say fuck on tee vee without being fined, yet you can host a show of animals being tortured. the supremes really have their priorities in order.
Mnemosyne
@Common Sense:
A judge in Oklahoma declared the Academy Award-winning film The Tin Drum to be child porn. That kind of clause isn’t a whole lot of protection.
Omnes Omnibus
@Mnemosyne: Bingo.
fucen tarmal
@LarsThorwald:
very well rambled.
in times of philosophical peril, i turn to the words of the great evan dando.
Why can’t you look after yourself and not down on me?
Do you have to try to piss me off ’cause I’m easy to please?
Nikolita
@Omnes Omnibus:
That’s what I was thinking. It boggles my mind how there’s no reasonable limits to free speech down there.
@Mike Kay:
This.
fasteddie9318
It would not surprise me at all if they fed this dissent to Alito to demonstrate that he and Roberts are not actually sharing the same brain.
AngusJackBootedThugOfMeat
I’m a cow and I support the decision. The law was a bad law despite its good intentions.
You can’t steer the process toward good law by upholding a bad law just because it was made with good intentions.
Lisa K.
I believe the underlying point of the ruling (and I could be wrong) was that the law was too broad, not that the depictions of animal cruelty were in and of themselves constitutional. It would not surprise me, at some point, to see this taken up again in Congress.
burnspbesq
@Mike Kay:
I’d like to surreptitiously put some malware on their computers that gives me a trail back to the server before erasing their entire hard drive. Then I’ll bust the guy running the server farm and get him to roll over on the people who actually made the video. They’re the ones who deserve to go away for a very long time.
SiubhanDuinne
@Omnes Omnibus:
Yes. This. It’s of no use whatsoever if we remove its protections from horrible vile piss-poor excuses for human beings. I consider myself a First Amendment absolutist, but it ain’t easy a lot of the time.
@AngusJackBootedThugOfMeat:
I see what you did there.
Thomas
I don’t see how these videos can be legal – they can’t be made without hurting animals, which is itself a crime. So filming someone else hurting animals has to be some kind of crime. Doesn’t it?
mclaren
Even if you can’t prosecute these scumbags for making the video, the video itself provides hard evidence of cruelty to animals, so you can still hurl these creeps’ asses into prison for animal cruelty using the video as evidence.
You just can’t prosecute ’em for making the video.
Lesley
People who abuse animals regardless of the reason, whether it’s for making movies, or “art” or purely for their own sadistic entertainment, should be prosecuted.
A documentarist working undercover filming abuses is another story.
Anyone who abuses a sentient creature needs some serious jail time. After all, serial killers get their start with animals.
CatStaff
I appreciate the care with which all the above arguments have been made, and I’m sure you’re all right.
I’m sorry, though. The fact that we even have to have this discussion makes me look forward to the end of the human race, and the sooner the better.
asiangrrlMN
@CatStaff: Ditto this. I am not a free speech absolutionist, especially when so much of our speech really isn’t free these days. I can’t talk about the constitutional merits of this ruling at all because I do not have a clear grasp on what is and isn’t constitutional, especially after the last eight years. All I know is that this is very disheartening to me. And, I agree with the question–if someone films child porn in say, Thailand (when it was legal. Do not know if it still is), and then brings it to America, the person who filmed the video is not committing a crime? I don’t get it. I really don’t.