Re: guns and ideas

Brian D Williams (talon57@well.com)
Fri, 26 Dec 1997 08:36:10 -0800 (PST)


From: John K Clark <johnkc@well.com> writes:

>Brian D Williams thinks censorship is moral,

Brian D Williams thinks no such thing, Brian D Williams is
provoking discussion by playing Devils advocate.

>If you believe that if your children see a picture of 2 people
>fucking or even seeing the word "fuck" will ruin them for life
>then it's your responsibility to stop them from seeing it, not
>mine. Personally I don't think the matter is important so I won't
>lift a finger to help you, but they're your kids so I won't try to
>stop you either, however if you use that tired old excuse to limit
>my freedom I will fight you with everything I have, including
>violence if I think I could get away with it.

I don't believe any such thing, (see above) I'm quite pissed to
have my life limited in such a way, and I'll just ignore your
threat.

>>Besides with over 20,000 gun laws in this country, which in my
>>opinion is quite an effective ban, whats wrong with one little
>>law striking at the source.

>For one thing, such a law has nothing to do with guns, it has to
>do with speech and the inability of government to convince people
>to do what they want. The only solution these gangsters can think
>of is to use force to stop citizens from hearing the other side of
>the argument.

It has everything to do with gun violence, which is a learned
behavior. The gangsters you refer to, are in my opinion, the major
television and cable networks which have written policys against
running anything which might put gun ownership or use in anything
except a negative role.

>Encryption is just Mathematics and a cryptograph program like PGP
>is not an object, it's a sequence of bits. If you can't even stop
>objects from entering the nation how on earth are you going to
>stop bits, bits that can be duplicated endlessly at virtually no
>cost, bits that can be easily and very effectively hidden with
>encryption, bits that can make use of the new communication
>channels that open up daily to every part of the planet?

I've been on cypherpunks since it was founded, have used PGP since
it was created, have autographed copies of both of Schneier's
book's on the subject, and now the truth can be told, was one of
the many people who distributed it ahem .... widely. The major
networks are not encrypted to the curb, much less the home, so your
argument fails completely.

>>Some cable companies as well as TV stations already have
>>voluntary anti-gun policies.

>A cable company with a anti-gun policy? A cable company without
>CNN, NBC, ABC, CBS, FOX, HBO? A cable company that volunteers for
>bankruptcy? I think not.

As someone else already pointed out CNN has a written policy to
this effect, as does CBS, the others you mentioned are rumored to
as well. Don't believe it? try running an NRA commercial during
prime time.....


>>What it might do is put an end to "Hollywood Hippocricy" i.e.
>>Sylvester Stallones conscientious objector status during the
>>vietnam war only to make million's playing a big gun shooting war
>>hero later.

>The man is not a war hero, the man is an actor and that's a
>perfectly honorable profession. He showed intelligence in getting
>out of the Vietnam war, more intelligence than most. When it's a
>question of survival, when a bunch of goons want your labor and
>try to enslave you so you can perform a very dangerous,
>unpleasant, and pointless job for them 12 thousand miles away, you
>do what you have to do to remain free. I wouldn't have held it
>against him if he shot off his big toe to prevent it, or bribed
>someone, or pretended to be insane, or showed up at the recruiting
>office in a strapless evening gown.

I'm not questioning his choice about the Vietnam War, I've always
thought the draft was wrong, and such things are a matter of one's
own choice. I got in considerable trouble for supporting that
position when I was in the USMC. I had a two star general tell me
"unofficially" to cease and desist. By the way I was in Boot Camp
during the fall of Saigon, I enlisted and was 17 years old at the
time.

You choose to call what he did after "a perfectly honorable
profession" (acting), I call it hypocrisy.

Brian
Member Extropy Institute
Cypherpunk