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That was amazing. Thank you. Shocking what can happen when an organization abandons its principles and sells out. It didn't just simply stray or lose its way - it became the very thing it stood against. He talked about the media but you can see the same devolution in Big Tech. Apolitical idealistic principled platforms for free speech that have become partisan tools of censorship in a much more accelerated timeline. Sad.
I dunno, para, sometimes written texts without context can lead one astray. I'd personally trust the attorney who is known on these boards for defending those accused of possessing child pornography and who talks with members of the ACLU, but YMMV.
No. Not at all. Zow is a lawyer who has defended people who possess child pornography. On those charges. He's been up front about it in several threads. I choose not to belabor the point, because some people find that to be a negative, but a lot of lawyer-types and people who firmly believe in the Constitution and its guarantees think everybody has the right to counsel via the Sixth Amendment, regardless of the charges against them.
Woz's "confirmation" is far muddier than their actual statement IMO since there wasnt an article linked and their statement is clearly does not only "pertains to written stories about such behavior."
That's fine. YMMV, as I said. I trust him and his word as a lawyer more than a mission statement, especially when that mission statement is both a) somewhat vague and non-specific about pictorial and written works, and b) a fairly radical position for even the most ardent of civil libertarians to take regarding the matter. You just don't see that position advanced often. I'm not totally shutting out the possibility, but I'm skeptical of that.
Wait, you were expecting me to link an article?
Okay fair that’s true. It is a FAQ (which I’ve been referring to as an “article”).
Do you mind indicating where you got this? I’m linking below the FAQ I’m question. I’m tired as hell right now so I may be missing it but I don’t see that additional language.
Why not just fund another liberal legal monolith then? The ACLU cut its teeth on First Amendment issues. Now that it can no longer be reliably depended on to safeguard that, there isn't much that separates them from just another entity like I mentioned.
Could be possible if it was some spread out FAQ. I don’t know.
I don’t share your analysis on most of what you wrote here. I think you and others are making assumptions which aren’t true. I don’t believe the ACLU has fallen from grace.
I read the article. The arguments contained in it are nothing new. I’ve heard them all before. I don’t agree with them. I’m not sure that the ACLU was on the right side at Skokie and I agreed with them on Kavanagh.
This is really incorrect. They have always been about ALL civil liberties, not simply the 1st Amendment. In the 1940s they were practically the only group fighting for the rights of the interned Japanese Americans. When Trump attempted the Muslim travel ban, they were the attorneys fighting on the other side. Now they are fighting on the side of undocumented immigrants seeking refuge here.
I wouldn't say they've been big fans of the right to bear arms, if that's a civil liberty.
They've never been about the Second Amendment nor the Tenth, and I asked specifically about those when I interned there. I was met with a gruff answer that basically amounted to "we don't give a ####" about those, so this is really incorrect. I don't care if you give money there, you have clearly no idea about their history nor premise. Especially if you disagree about Skokie and agree with their position on Kavanaugh. Then you've admitted they're just a left-wing monolith, you just refuse to call it that.
For me, this was the ACLU's high water mark. I'm sure they've done lots of other good things too, and historically my views on civil liberties have aligned pretty closely (not perfectly of course) with theirs. But the Skokie was especially noteworthy because it was a nice, pure example of defending free speech even when the speech involved with unquestionably revolting. In other words, if you're looking for a costly signal that says "No, really, I support free expression as a matter of principle," I'm not sure that you could do better than Skokie.
I would suspect that they would tell you something such as that these both concern state rights, not individual rights. And thus are not civil liberties by definition.
1. I have no idea if they are fans of the Second Amendment or not. My viewpoint on this is that the Second Amendment has never been seriously threatened in this country (let’s be very clear: banning certain assault rifles, universal background checks, and even universal gun registration, none of those ideas are threats to the Second Amendment.) If and when there are ever serious threats to the Second, then we’ll see if the ACLU shows up.
1. See my above post on the 2nd Amendment; it is not and has never been under serious threat.
I'm glad you said that. I got on a fight on these very boards back in 2013 or 2014 saying that. I was called a liar by none other than Bottomfeeder Sports. I was relatively new here, and I remember it to this day. I was asked for proof, found it, and told it wasn't good enough because it never explicitly called him a communist at founding.timschochet said:
A void does not mean a recommendation of the most parroted for name's sake.
If they were really better, wouldn't they be coming from no perspective? Wasn't that the original poster's reason for this entire thread?
To your point and question, solely
History is important. Accuracy is important.
Indeed. I think when I was first on the board, the level of hostility to my sort of (what I hoped, anyway) intellectual right-wing positions was one of horror. Thinking right-wingers weren't so bold to say so, and certainly weren't articulate nor did they approach urbane, something I aspired to. Bringing a personal experience to bear (I was sitting at a desk in Pittsburgh reading one of the ACLU's own publications about how they were started by communists who later disavowed communism) was met with hostility and calls of "fraud," "liar," and "I don't believe anybody on the internet." It was disheartening at the time, and I still remember it because it caused great dissonance in what I was trying to put forth, which was earnest reactions and thoughts about deep problems. To be met with those sort of slights and dismissals? Well, yeah, I still remember. That's partially because I treat myself and hold myself out pretty earnestly, apparently especially for internet and social media discussions.
My post responding to this got deleted. It's a bad day for the logistics of the board. It keeps crashing.
I think we were talking past each other that day. I know that in at least one post my tone was less than excellent in that exchange, but my comments had nothing to do with the roots of the founders of the ACLU. But either way I apologize for the less than excellent comments I made.
