EXAM 1 - Foundations Flashcards
“The Social Contract”
“man was born free, and everywhere he is in chains” (156)
1762 (France) - moral authority of kings and church, political power in general was being questioned
Rousseau’s belief is he’s living in an unjust society, rejects the idea of God’s plan
- Man becomes civilized by comparing to others (perfectibility)
- Only way society can be formed is by a pact/social contract
- When entering a political community of state you give up part of your freedom and submit to laws of the community
- No one gives up their freedom for other individuals BUT for the idea of an equal community
• GENERAL WILL -what is best for the state as a whole - Community protects individuals rights
Communitarian
- Human nature: communal
Humans are deeply embedded within communities
Source of culture, identity
Provides strength, order, prosperity
Change is possible: moral perfectibility
- Political rights: based on communal values, specific to each community
- Moral command: pursue collective good, suppress self-interest.
“On Liberty”
“No person is an entirely isolated being; it is impossible for a person to do anything seriously or permanently hurtful to himself, with-out mischief reaching at least to his near connections, and often far beyond them” (74)
1859
Views: utilitarianism, equality of women, agnosticism
You can do whatever you want as long as others aren’t harmed
“The only purpose for which power can be rightfully exercised over any member of a civilized community, against his will, is to prevent harm to others.”
3 basic principles of liberty:
Freedom of thought/speech
Freedom to pursue tastes
- Silencing an opinion is wrong even if false
• HUMAN INDIVIDUALITY - good for creativity, diversity and progress
-As soon as a persons conduct negatively effects another person society MUST become involved - Trade is a social act
- Schooling: a moral crime to bring child into world and not being able to provide
- Marriage
Individualist
-Human nature: independent and diverse
Pursuit of self-expression as source of culture, identity
Communities are not formed voluntarily and tend to repression
- Political rights: inherent, universal
- Moral command: allow pursuit of self-interest, so long as it doesn’t harm others
Political
motivated by a desire to affect societal norms/institutions/laws
• Focused on ideas and not objects
Censorship
imposition on speakers/writers
Stone: “Free Speech and National Security”
Tension between both
- Press freedom and secrecy
- the gov. can’t constitutionally punish individuals for criticizing the gov. officials or policies expect when their speech might threaten national security
- the gov. can have legitimate reasons to keep certain matters a secret
- When a secret comes out there are two parties: the leaker (having information) and the press (gets story and publishes)
If you prevent leaks from happening the publishers have nothing to report
Espionage Act of 1917
prohibited obtaining information, recording pictures, or copying descriptions of any information relating to the national defense with intent or reason to believe that the information may be used for the injury of the United States or to the advantage of any foreign nation.
Savage: “Assange Indicted under Espionage Act File”
Julian Assange was indicated counts of violating the Espionage Act for his role in obtaining and publishing secret military and diplomatic documents
Charged for crime “for encouraging sources to provide him truthful information and for publishing that information”
- Legal scholars believe that prosecuting people for acts of receiving and publishing information violates the first amendment
- Trump administration asserts that the charge doesn’t threaten freedom of press because he isn’t a journalist
-Chelsea Manning and Edward Snowden also were violating the Espionage Act
Weinrib: “Rethinking the Myth of the Modern First Amendment”
- Ratified in 1791 until the 1920’s not interpreted as forbidding the suppression of speech “regarding as threatening, blasphemous, antisocial, and even uncivil.”(50)
- labor movement 1920s, ACLU lawyers support free speech to overcome limits on strikes, organization
- States could past whatever laws they wanted to
- Conservatives, 1930s: business owners support free speech as legal strategy against New Deal Regulation
- Great Depression and president puts regulations on companies
- Nazi march in Skokie, IL
- “Unite the Right” (white supremacist rally) march in Charlottesville, VA
- ACLU is not going to defend large hate group protest
Jacobs: “The Emergence an Implications of American Hate Crime Jurisprudence”
HATE CRIME
HATE CRIME
- Must be connected to a non-speech crime
- Concerned with motive, not speech, Speech matters, but only as an indication of motive, not as a crime itself
- Every crime, like all human behavior, flows from a mixture of complex motivations that are hard to disentangle.
Jacobs’ Criticism I
- Are existing laws sufficient, e.g. with regard to cross burning? (415)
“Perhaps the key difference is between those who believe that the best path is one that emphasizes group rights and entitlements and those who believe that the best path is one that empha- sizes individual entitlements and rights.” (424)
Boland: “Is Free Speech Compatible with Human Dignity, Equality, and Democratic Government”
HATE SPEECH
Hate speech: speech criminalized for causing offense or impugning a group
Outside the West
- Laws enforced in many parts of the world
- Often a capital crime in Islamic countries (death penalty)
- Movement in United Nations to endorse prohibition of blasphemy mainly by Muslim countries
In the west
- Laws fell into disuse over the 20th century, never enforced
Arguments for prohibition
- Insult of someone’s religion is an insult to their group identity therefore is equivalent to hate speech. “Group defamation,” inciting hatred
Arguments for toleration
- Individual autonomy trumps community values
- Blasphemy is an insult to an idea, and ideas should always be challengeable. why not criminalize criticism of secular ideas, too?
- Islamophobia: hatred of Islam
- Muslim phobia: hatred of Muslims
Blasphemy
(no single definition)
- An offense against the sensibilities of religious believers
- An offense against God
- An offense against social order
Myers: “Chelsea Russell and the Depravity of PC”
Russell was convicted under the 2003 Communications Act – a 21st-century blasphemy law for posting ‘grossly offensive’ content on social media.
Greenwald: “In Europe, Hate Speech Laws Are Often Used to Suppress and Punish Left-Wing Viewpoints”
“censorship will weaken hateful groups and make them go away is completely backward. Nothing strengthens hate groups more than censoring them, as it turns them into free speech martyrs, feeds their sense of grievance, and forces them to seek out more destructive means of activism”
Herman and Chomsky: “Manufacturing Consent” (1988)
Five filters that when news becomes propaganda
- Limits on propaganda
- Dependence on advertising
- Supply of news
- Sensitivity to flak (criticism)
- Types- Politician criticism
- Public boycott
- Advertiser withdrawal
- Threat of flak deters controversial coverage
- Anticommunist ideology
- Demonstrate patriotism
- Avoid criticism of foreign policy
Taibbi: “Hate Inc.”
Ten Rules of Hate:
- There are only two ideas
- The two ideas are in permanent conflict
- Hate people, not institutions
- Everything Is someone’s else’s fault
a. We are morally superior, media makes us feel like we are right - Nothing is everyone’s fault
- Root, don’t think
- No switching teams
- The other side is literally Hitler
- In the fight against Hitler, everything is permitted
- Feel superior
- Herman and Chomsky: concerned about media subordination to the gov.
- Taibbi: concerned about media subordination to markets/consumers
