The Left as being about putting collective rights and responsibilities ahead of individual rights and responsibilities, the right are the opposite, they put individual rights and responsibilities ahead of collective rights and responsibilities.
Libertarians focus on rights, authoritarians focus on responsibilities, in practice you cant have one without the other, its about finding a balance.
I expect most people in the Pirate Party are Libertarians, but only about collective rights, not individual rights.
We want individuals to have more control of their own lives, we dont want to empower individuals to have control over the collective society.
I dont think we should hide from our Libertarian side, but perhaps we do need to better articulate the difference between us and others.
Free Speech is what bigots, murderers, and and right wing pundits use to incite hate and violence to me and my kin. Free Speech is when men on the internet threaten and harass me. Free Speech is when a man sending a pull request to an open source project I founded calls me a bitch and a slut on github and other websites because I rejected his changes. Free Speech is when neonazis trawled through my facebook pics and found evidence of my illness and queerness and publically bullied me, and called their friends to do the same. Free Speech is the american politicians inciting violence against trans people, and the bathroom bombings inspired by their words. Free Speech is what drove one of my friends to a suicide attempt two years ago, when hundreds of anons on tumblr started harassing her with incitements to self harm and bullying, that pushed her over the edge of an already precarious mental health situation right after a breakup.
Free Speech is code for Legal Hate Speech in my community. Thatâs one hell of a phrase to be holding up as a virtue. This god damned week especially.
But I guess itâs hard to be sensitive to things like this when the party has nearly no diversity and nobody really knows what itâs like for free speech to be a weapon people use to beat you down and kill your kind. If thereâs some kind of speech you value thatâs being obstructed, be specific.
Free speech should not imply that people arent responsible for what they say.
All rights should come with responsibilities, what you describe is harassment, its destructive because of the persons intent to cause harm, and i expect there are laws against behaving like that. It should be more about intent than the words they use IMO.
But there are two sides to it, if we isolate the haters, they dont converse with those who have moderate views, they find each other, they reinforce each others narrow minded views, thats probably where people become radicalised.
Its better for people to talk about their hate than for them to bottle it up and then practice it in person.
No, thatâs a criminal offence in Australia. Section 474.17 of the Criminal Code (Cth) Act (Using a carriage service to menace, harass or cause offence).
This is also a criminal offence in Australia. Same section as above.
This is also a criminal offence in Australia. Same section as above.
Inciting violence is a criminal offence in the US and one of the very express limitations of the First Amendment in the US. Bathroom bombings are also a crime.
Criminal harassment is not free speech.
Then your community needs to stop perpetuating the lies that give the assholes the power in this broken world. Hate speech is hate speech, both legally and conceptually, and separate from the legal doctrine of free speech.
Free speech is referred to in the preamble of the UN Declaration of Human Rights, and Article 19 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, which refers to its by its proper name of âfreedom of expressionâ. It also makes it clear in paragraph 3 that limitations on freedom of expression are expressly permitted to protect the rights of others.
Free speech is the ability to speak on issues that the government would prefer that you didnât without fear of legal penalties. Active incitement to crime has never been considered a valid form of âfree speechâ anywhere in the Commonwealth.
Perhaps the issue is that law enforcement agencies do not enforce the law. This is a different issue entirely, but one that constantly gets conflated with any discussions around freedom of speech and freedom of expression.
@piecritic You donât get it, Mr Lets Change Our Name to Left Libertarian or whatever. Words have meaning. Words have emotional impact. Words can hurt. When nazis, biggots, and white terrorists use a word as a rallying cry, and that word gets associated more to their movement than anything else, using that word without tact or context breeds miscommunication at best, and alienation or even violence at worst.
I donât want to be associated with something that uses the same language as white terrorists. I donât want to occupy the same space as people who are attracted to those words. I donât want them to feel any familliarity in any space I exist.
I donât care about your dictionary definition. Language is fluid and evolving. When people say âfree speechâ it puts to mind abusers, for me. When people say âlibertarianâ it puts to my mind right wing extremeists who would rather I be dead and sometimes try to bring that about. Donât be that guy who goes around saying how the nazi emblem is a symbol for peace. Itâs fucking not. Things change.
The proposed name is âLibertarian Leftâ.
I said:[quote=âdavidb, post:14, topic:825â]
⌠the proposal to put Libertarianism at the forefront âŚ
[/quote]
Libertarian in front. At the forefront. Whoâs misleading who?
I know words have meaning and can be used as weapons. This is why using them as such is a criminal offense. I also recognise that the meaning of words change. These strawman arguments have no place in this discussion.
So you are claiming that the legally recognised phrase of âfree speechâ now has no value because ignorant masses are misusing it. The same argument could therefore be put that file sharing = theft because the copyright industry has repeatedly stated this to be true. This is quite a weak argument.
By saying that you reject the core concepts of free expression simply because of terminology use, youâre basically giving up the fight. You are welcome to do so of course, but emotional bleating doesnât solve the underlying problems of harassment on the Internet. They will exist under any rallying cry, and abandoning hard-fought freedoms because some assholes are misusing an otherwise well understood legal term I think is extremely ill-advised.
Donât be that guy who goes around saying how the nazi emblem is a symbol for peace.
Donât say things like that to me. It is an extreme misrepresentation and entirely inappropriate. Advocating for a world where free expression thrives and harassers and inciters go to prison has always been my position.
I see you struggle with the premise that hyphenated words can often by styled in several ways. My apologies for attempting to have reasoned political discourse in a political party.
You keep saying weâre not diverse and that we appear to not be helping the cause you want us to represent, weâve given you evidence of instances to support the argument that we are, yet I canât see that youâve acknowledged it. The only thing Iâve seen you acknowledge is Brendan pointing out the true leanings of the Arts Party.
Would you be able to give us a better idea of what community you are apart of, that sees Free Speech as such a volatile concept? No delivery of context doesnât help to enrich the quality of the discussion, it just means more words will be thrown around with no one being given the ability to understandâŚ
Intransigence like yours is one of the reasons people like me are considering leaving the Party. Try to let go of your favourite word. It isnât worth what itâs about to cost.
Thatâs a real shame. Iâm sorry to see you go, just as the discussion began getting interesting. Perspectives such as yours which might be different from that of the majority are an asset. I hope you change your mind.
These two statements seem to directly contradict each other!
Plenty of projects rely on volunteers who are not âreliableâ in the traditional sense. It doesnât stop the projects from being successful. As a Free Software developer, you must be familiar with the concept and benefits of the âlong tailâ. Any contribution you are able to make today can be valuable, regardless of whether or not you can do the same again tomorrow.
Youâve been a victim. We get it.
But do you really believe you are the only person in the party with an experience like this? Not every PPAU member is one of your âunmemorable white malesâ (me, for example).
You shouldnât take the lack of diversity personally. Itâs just a reflection of IT (where the Pirate philosophy gets the most traction) more generally. And itâs also just another reason why we need more people like yourself to add your perspective to policy discussions.
As I said before, I hope you change your mind about resigning.
Although @bluebie has resigned, Iâve decided to reply regardless.
I have been a member of the Pirate Party for nearly five years. During that time I have contributed in various ways. Iâve written the bulk of the press releases since I joined, which in the past meant many late nights and early mornings. Iâve written or co-written almost every submission the party has made to public inquiries, including the 26-page response to the Copyright and the Digital Economy discussion paper. I was Deputy Secretary when the Pirate Party got registered. Iâve worked in the Policy Development Committee, being the principal author for soon-to-be-proposed replacement copyright policy.
There have been times when I havenât been able to contribute as much as Iâdâve liked. This usually coincided with exams, or increased study loads, and periods where I was simply burnt out as a result of using all my spare time on the Pirate Party. I believe in this party, and that we will be successful if we are realistic and persevere. We canât win the war over night, but so long as we win the battles that matter itâs only a matter of time.
Iâve not written all this to feather my cap â I donât need to, my track record speaks for itself. But what I think I have demonstrated personally is that one person can have enormous influence on the party if theyâre willing to get involved. Not everyone (and indeed, probably no one) can treat the Pirate Party like a full-time job. We are a party of volunteers, and that means effectively balancing the workload among members according to how much time they can and will devote.
Small contributions are always welcome. Even just letting people know that there is a public inquiry coming up or that there is a breaking news story the Pirate Party should comment on is incredibly useful. Of course, if you can bash out 300 words on a current story, it can be edited into a press release and issued to the media. Attend policy working groups if you can. Propose amendments to policies. Refer matters to the Policy Development Committee.
You donât have to run for the National Council, you donât have to be a candidate. But members canât allow other members to run the party without making any kind of contribution and then turn around and complain when they donât like the direction itâs taking. There are plenty of ways to contribute in a meaningful way. Your voice will always be heard if you get involved.
