I am encouraged that most people here do not fall for the "I believe in free speech but…" con.

PERICLES,

For ONCE we are in total agreement.

HAGANAH BET

If a Jew hater legally acquires, a Torah scroll and chooses to piss on it while dressed in Nazi regalia then yes. But not in a public space. He can hire a hall, sell tickets to the event and perform before consenting adults.

This would be perfectly legal in the US.

You ask if I consider "HATE SPEECH" beyond the pale.

What is hate speech? I don’t want a legalistic definition. I want to know what you consider to be hate speech.

About the only thing I would consider "beyond the pale" is actual incitement to violence NARROWLY DEFINED. I usually put it like this:

PERMITTED: Jews are filthy, slimy and untrustworthy.

FORBIDDEN: Kill the Jews.

Sometimes you have borderline cases. The following hadith was quoted on the front page of the website of the Muslim Students Association (MSA) at the University of Southern California (USC).

“Abu Huraira reported Allah’s Messenger (may peace be upon him) as saying: The last hour would not come unless the Muslims will fight against the Jews and the Muslims would kill them until the Jews would hide themselves behind a stone or a tree and a stone or a tree would say: Muslim, or the servant of Allah, there is a Jew behind me; come and kill him….”

IS THIS INCITEMENT TO VIOLENCE?

USC compelled the MSA to remove this hadith from the front page. However it and similar ones can still be found in compendia of sacred Muslim texts – eg Sahih Bukhari 4.52.176 and 177.

http://www.usc.edu/dept/MSA/fundamentals/hadithsunnah/bukhari/052.sbt.html

My own view is that USC should NOT have compelled the MSA to remove this hadith.

IF IT'S WHAT THEY BELIEVE THEY SHOULD BE ALLOWED TO SAY IT.

If these ahadith are not part of Muslim belief let Islamic "scholars" tell the USC MSA to remove it.

I'd be interested in seeing a PissBoazy, but I don't think I'd bother paying much to see it. It would have to be a very cheap pisstake.

Steel, CGI of kiddie porn may be therapeutic or they may be a stepping stone to the real thing. I can go out to my car and do 100 in a 60 zone, having fun fulfilling my need for speed and harming no-one. But on the chance that I harm self or others that law exists. Censoring CGI of child pornography is a no brainer, even if next to impossible to achieve. The taboo should not be breached.

Boaz, your Piss InsiderTrading gave me a chuckle which became a laugh when Bugsy created the masterwork PissBoazy. Very funny.

How come no-one else has brought up the fact that we are all getting our knickers in a knot? The article is entitled "I believe in free speech but..." and then goes on to give examples of freedom of expression. A totally different question.

However, as Kofi Annan said in Istanbul "We must safeguard our freedom of expression while working to prevent it being used to spread hatred or inflict humiliation........Rights carry with them responsibilities and should be excercised with sensitivity....". (13/11/06) I reckon that if you don't get that, then you don't deserve the Right.

Dear Steven,

I've been reading the posts on this thread
with interest. It seems that freedom of
speech to many is an important ideal however,
the reality is often very different.

David Irving was not allowed into Australia.
He's a Holocaust denialist.

The Zionist Lobby attempted to stop
Hanan Ashrawi from receiving the Sydney
Peace Prize.

The black American personality, "Snoop Dog"
was also considered
"undesirable."

It seems that we are reluctant to allow those
we disagree with to speak in the community.

So the question of free speech must go back to
its intention. The intention must be constructive,
not to do harm.

Which brings me back to your four questions Steven.
After a re-think, the answer is no.
And, I guess that places me in the "I believe in
free speech but..." genre.

But that's allright by me.

Freedom of speech should not be an excuse to harm
others.

I must thanks palimpsest for the gratuitous insult. In case he didn't notice, I was responding to Steven's question. Several subsequent posters, including Steven, agreed with the general point that computer-generated images depicting 'kiddie-porn' should not be illegal if there are no minors involved in their production.

My speculation that "they might even be therapeutic" was an attempt to think outside the square, and at least one other poster indicated that the possibility might have some merit. Frankly, I don't know - but I do know that prohibiting anything immediately creates a black market for it, and something as easily produced and reproduced as computer graphics would likely be more easily monitored and controlled if it's legal.

palimpsest simply asserts that "Censoring CGI of child pornography is a no brainer, even if next to impossible to achieve". Why is it a no-brainer? How do analogies with speeding cars and serial killers elucidate a debate about freedom of expression? What evidence does palimpsest have that viewing fictional graphics hurts anybody?

Hysterical prat.