Censorship (a load of crap or helpful)

[Spikeshade]

ok I feel like talking (seriously) about censorship and how wrong it is, and how unfair it is to the artists, and to the consumers, I mean yeah we can go and download the uncensored version of almost anything, movies, and music. I am also going to have a poll so people can vote on this topic.

I am working on this topic for my Public Policy Paper in US Hist. and Govt. so I would like some feed back, so I can have some idea how everyone feels on this issue.

 

[Seditious]

"A censor is a man who knows more than he thinks you ought to." - Laurence Peter

oppression, inequality, the occult is the perfect breeding ground for tyranny. that's about all I have to say on the matter right now.

 

[Under The Oak]

I think most people have enough common decency and respect to censor themselves when appropriate, like around young children or when they need to maintain some professionalism, such as in the workplace. However, government and political backed censorship is horrendous, especially considering that one religion usually always has more influence in certain governments, so censorship then gets attributed to whatever they may believe is sinful. Censorship should not even be an issue in a "free country".

 

[derek]

I think censorship has much further reaching arms than just the Arts. Artists have always found ways to thrive, any opposition just adds to the stimuli.

I'm not against Censorship in itself, only in its wrongful employment. It's a complex issue, not one to be dismissed as simply permissible or as wholly wrong. As such, I'm not going to vote in your poll. Furthermore, since it has no third option (such as "don't know", or "neither") it's pretty flawed.

Also, right and wrong are hugely incomparable to legal and illegal, in my experience. Keep that in mind.

 

[speed]

I think censorship has much further reaching arms than just the Arts. Artists have always found ways to thrive, any opposition just adds to the stimuli.

Indeed, moreover, the very power of most great art (lit, painting, etc) is in many ways due to censorship. The Russian writers, even Flaubert wrote under heavy censorship, and thus found ways to circumvent the system, and the writing itself became dearer, better, and more important to the average citizen. The Renaissance is the pefect example. ALmost all of the great artists of the 14-16th centuries could only paint religious scenes, subjects. And we can see the inspiration and circumvention of such greats as Caravaggio and Da Vinci in their paintings.

 

[Seditious]

Also, right and wrong are hugely incomparable to legal and illegal, in my experience. Keep that in mind.

I'd like to think that too, but I've had trouble finding it such.

We tend to want what we call immoral not to be legal (rape, slavery, abortion, etc.) and want to have laws against that which we see as moral overturned (e.g., sodomy, assisted suicide, etc.)

It's been said that today law holds our shared values more so than anything else (e.g., religion perhaps used to), and what are our moralities but our system of values...

Apparently they're not supposed to be so bound up, but as hard as I try I never seem to be able to find a proper separation. As much as you'd like to write on the matter i'd love to read.

 

[derek]

I'd like to think that too, but I've had trouble finding it such.

We tend to want what we call immoral not to be legal (rape, slavery, abortion, etc.) and want to have laws against that which we see as moral overturned (e.g., sodomy, assisted suicide, etc.)

It's been said that today law holds our shared values more so than anything else (e.g., religion perhaps used to), and what are our moralities but our system of values...

Apparently they're not supposed to be so bound up, but as hard as I try I never seem to be able to find a proper separation. As much as you'd like to write on the matter i'd love to read.

I can't say I'm particularly loquacious on this point, I'm afraid.

From simple thought processes and historical observation, I do believe Law and Justice arose from the tugging of our moral sense. Of course which direction those morals have been tugging has changed over time, and with that, quite rightly, Law and Justice. We are in a bizarre situation now where I feel that Law now does the tugging, and I find that not only wholly bizarre, but also quite worrying.

 

[speed]

You know, censorship is sort of a non-issue these days. It is done informally by the media, by ones employer, government, even ones family and school, each and every day, in every imaginable duplicitous but subtle way.

DO I need to go on? In effect, censorship has been all but abolished and replaced by far more informal and effective means of control and flow of specific information. Perhaps this was done because of these new media and technological innovations, or perhaps because formal censorship never worked that well in the first place--hell, it usually encouraged or encorages persons to seek out the officially censored material out of human curiousity.

 

[derek]

Quite true. Nonetheless, it is censorship, albeit it in a mutated guise, fitting of our age.

 

[speed]

Quite true. Nonetheless, it is censorship, albeit it in a mutated guise, fitting of our age.

It is amazing that all information and 99% of entertainment are essentially censored. Since Americans especially, dont read, and only a small percentage seek out alternative forms of news and entertainment (movies, music), the censorship is almost total.

 

[derek]

Yep, it's remarkable. Almost insane, when you consider it.

 

[speed]

We even have moderators on this board! I was one! You were too Derek. There's even a forum policy--I sort of helped draft it, or at least concurred with it--of what you can and cant post here.

In my defense, apart from one holocaust incident--where no post was deleted--and a long drawn out battle with judas 69, I dont think I limited any thoughts, and censored only stupidity. I think Nile and Justin S, have done a much better job.

And I find this perhaps the most free-thinking place on the web. Perhaps censorship is necessary.

 

[Blowtus]

I think censorship is necessary in some forms. Speed's example of moderation is an easy one - without such moderation many forums would end up cesspits of spam, flame wars, and rubbish, of no interest to what would have previously been a large portion of the userbase. Censorship at it's best, removes elements that degrade (where 'degrade' is attempted to be judged by the communitys standards) the community as a whole far more substantially than they add to it. At it's worst it is a tool for the control of the thoughts and actions of the majority, in the interest of the censors.

Thus I think it can be both good and bad, and needs to be balanced carefully.

 

[Seditious]

We are in a bizarre situation now where I feel that Law now does the tugging, and I find that not only wholly bizarre, but also quite worrying.

personally I see that as a good thing. pluralism is at least a good first step away from strict dogmaticism, even if it is in fact no more right.

 

[derek]

We even have moderators on this board! I was one! You were too Derek. There's even a forum policy--I sort of helped draft it, or at least concurred with it--of what you can and cant post here.

In my defense, apart from one holocaust incident--where no post was deleted--and a long drawn out battle with judas 69, I dont think I limited any thoughts, and censored only stupidity. I think Nile and Justin S, have done a much better job.

And I find this perhaps the most free-thinking place on the web. Perhaps censorship is necessary.

Quite. I like to think of us as (kindred) renegade spirits, too vitriolic, yet immersed in Romanticism, to be moderators. Not of sober enough minds, so to speak.

 

[speed]

Quite. I like to think of us as (kindred) renegade spirits, too vitriolic, yet immersed in Romanticism, to be moderators. Not of sober enough minds, so to speak.

I think classical humanism, not romanticism. But Im rarely sober.

 

[derek]

Are "classical humanists" ever?

 

[speed]

Are "classical humanists" ever?

Never!

 

[Freanan]

I think that censorship of ideas is certainly a bad idea. Bad ideas can be disproved and censoring them instead puts the censorer into worse light then the censored.

I might, maybe, feel positively towards a different kind of censorship: Censorship of bad argumentation and discussion.

 

[entanglement]

I believe censorship limits the receiver in not just that person's reach to the object, but reachability on a more psychological level also. Without censorship, without the distinction of right/wrong and the imposition of actions based on those distinctions, it would all be a matter of 'choice', hence satisfying the concept of utter 'freedom'.