
Leaked Internal Memo Reveals the ACLU Is Wavering on Free Speech - raleighm
http://reason.com/blog/2018/06/21/aclu-leaked-memo-free-speech
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c3534l
If the ACLU loses it's commitment to its principles in favor of it's politics,
it will eventually lose its credibility and mark the end of the ACLU as a
defender of rights, rather than a promoter of policy. This could mark the end
of the ACLU as we know it.

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berbec
If this become policy, the ACLU will have become a shell of its former self.
Part of our bill of rights is the right to say repugnant things. I have said
it before - society should shun you for you beliefs and words, but government
must defend your right to say them.

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craftyguy
Seems like they cherry picked one sentence, out of context, to base an entire
article on. This is exactly what I would do if I were trying to chip away at
support for the ACLU; fire off an article stating they are backing away from a
core value, since most folks won't actually read the memo.

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mcmeowerson
Have you read the memo yourself? I don't disagree that the post may be
somewhat poorly presented, but it summarizes a large part of the memo in the
one sentence it cites. The section "The impact of the proposed speech and the
impact of its suppression" on pages 5 and 6 as well as the note on the bottom
of page 5 of the memo are exactly what the main post is pointing out.

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notacoward
Liberty comes in many forms. Why _should_ one particular right unconditionally
take precedence over others? If speech promotes oppression of others (e.g.
"put them in chains") should an organization devoted to liberty defend it?
It's _ridiculous_ to say that this represents an abandonment of principle. It
might be unwise because it makes their mission less clear than pure first-
amendment advocacy would be, or because of the effect it has on membership,
but a general principle of defending liberty would require _active opposition_
to anti-liberty speech. It makes me wonder about whether some of its critics
actually believe in liberty or something less noble.

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kthejoker2
If speech promotes oppression of others (e.g. "put them in chains") should an
organization devoted to liberty defend it?

How can you not see that the only answer to this is yes, unequivocally and
absolutely yes?

Because there is absolutely, 100% no way to define what speech "promotes
oppression" that isn't a slippery slope to thoughtcrime and totalitarianism.
Period.

The ACLU of Brandenberg v Ohio understood this.

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notacoward
You know that "slippery slope" is a fallacy, right? The slope you talk about
is no slipperier than the one that leads straight from talking about slavery
to actual slavery. The Trumpian "Period" doesn't change that.

Also, note that I mentioned opposition, not censorship. The ACLU has no power
to censor anyway. You're still free to spout whatever anti-liberty nonsense
you want. The ACLU is free to devote their finite resources to cases and
causes that don't have that complication. They're not your slaves, or any
other first-amendment absolutist's. As I said, liberty comes in many forms -
not just yours.

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kthejoker2
My comment was about an "organization devoted to liberty", not the ACLU. They
can of course do as they please, but they won't be able to call themselves
that any more.

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notacoward
They're not the American First Amendment Union. You want that, go start it
yourself. Their mandate is broader, often involving complex interactions of
different rights, and sometimes the rights that members of America's most
privileged group consider important do not seem that way to others.

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candiodari
Maybe it’s worth pointing out that the governments the other groups live under
are ... not just lacking in the free speech department...

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alphabettsy
This article does not contain the text of the memo, and seems to mostly build
on a WSJ opinion piece.

The blogger takes small parts and implies some substantial change or greater
meaning. It ends with talk about the “anti-speech left” so this can hardly be
considered a balanced source.

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rramdin
The stock photo of a Klansman really makes me sympathetic to their case

