Re: The 1st Amendment Apparently Doesn't Exist in New York Either

BTR1701 <atropos@mac.com> wrote:

Fresh off a New York judge illegally declaring that 1/10th of the Bill of
Rights has been repealed in her courtroom, the governor of New York has
announced she'll be policing 1st Amendment protected speech if she doesn't
like what you're saying.

New York Announces it Will Take Citizen Surveillance and Censorship to the
Next Level

Like the plot to a dystopian movie, New York will now monitor social media
writings, collect data, and use law enforcement to crack down on any
expression it deems to be hate speech.

The article is dated Friday, November 17, 2023.

New York Gov. Kathy Hochul (D) announced on Monday that the state will ramp up
surveillance efforts of social media accounts and that law enforcement will
take proactive measures, including contacting people on suspicion of using
"hate speech".

Hochul cited the rise in anti-Semitic activity in New York and especially New
York City, where the world's largest population of Jews outside of Israel
resides. Hochul also mentioned alleged "Islamophobic" incidents, which she
claimed were increasing and going under-reported.

Versus the previous governor who ignored dozens of VIOLENT incidents, in
the New York area and upstate. The worst during this period was the
Squirrel Hill massacre in 2018 but that was Pittsburgh.

The governor said she would also be increasing police presence, which she
stated has been focused on protecting potential targets including "synagogues
and yeshivas and mosques and any other place that could be susceptible to hate
crimes or violence".

As part of that, Hochul explained, "...we're very focused on the data we're
collecting from surveillance efforts-- what's being said on social media
platforms. And we have launched an effort to be able to counter some of the
negativity and reach out to people when we see hate speech being spoken about
on online platforms. Our media analysis, our social media analysis unit, has
ramped up its monitoring of sites to catch incitement to violence; direct
threats to others, and all this is in response to our desire, our strong
commitment, to ensure that not only do New Yorkers be safe, but they also feel
safe because personal security is about everything for them."

[What the hell is the gobbledygook in that last sentence? "Not only do New
Yorkers be safe"? "They also feel safe because personal security is about
everything for them"? Who's writing this crap? Cardi B?]

Heh

I'm sure there were lots of arrests of low-hanging fruit loud mouths to
not only do New Yorkers be safe but they'll completely miss the incitement
and conspiracy to a specific mass violence incident.

Last month, Hochul and New York City Mayor Eric Adams demanded that social
media platforms monitor speech and shut down "incitements to violence", with
Adams insisting, "These guys are experts. If they don't want to do their job
of policing themselves, I really believe it's time for the federal government
to step in."

Precrime!

The calls come as Europe ramps up censorship of alleged hate speech, including
pressuring X owner Elon Musk to censor the posts of online users.

The United States is the only country in the world with free speech as a
civil right.

Many European nations now have laws that have made the expression of religious
beliefs to be viewed as banned speech. This week Finnish Member of Parliament
(MP) Paivi Rasanen and a Lutheran bishop were acquitted after four years of
trials and investigations simply for sharing the biblical view on marriage and
sexuality.

Four years!

And in the U.K., an Army veteran will soon be tried for silently
praying for his deceased son outside of an abortion clinic.

How did this not cause a diplomatic incident? Stupid question, was his
son actually born or is he counting an incident of abortion?

[But notice these European countries  never arrest the Muslims who openly call
for the deaths of Jews and Americans.]

Those used to be considered threats and not free speech under specific
circumstances.

In the U.S., politicians have demanded Internet censorship and have even
engaged in it themselves. For example, the Supreme Court will soon hear
Missouri v. Biden, a case in which the federal government coerced social media
platforms to censor content it disagreed with-- even if the content was true.

Jonathan Turley, a constitutional law professor at George Washington
University and free speech advocate who has written extensively on the issues
of censorship and limitations on speech, has cautioned the U.S. against
adopting European censorship laws that allow governments to stop people from
saying things that governments oppose. Despite what many think, "hate speech",
which is subjective, is protected both by the Constitution and by Supreme
Court precedent.

The truth can be hateful. False speech may not be hateful but it can be
useless or said to lead others into false conclusions.

He wrote:

"There have been calls to ban hate speech for years. Even former journalist
and Obama State Department official Richard Stengel has insisted that while
"the 1st Amendment protects 'the thought that we hate'... it should not
protect hateful speech that can cause violence by one group against another.
In an age when everyone has a megaphone, that seems like a design flaw."

There were pamphlets circulated encouraging open revolution versus the
British leading to the war that founded this country.

Actually, it was not a design flaw but the very essence of the Framers' plan
for a free society.

Of course it's a design flaw. All hail George III!

The 1st Amendment does not distinguish between types of speech, clearly
stating: 'Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion,
or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech,
or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to
petition the government for a redress of grievances.'"

He cited Brandenburg v. Ohio, a 1969 case involving "violent speech", wherein
the Supreme Court struck down an Ohio law prohibiting public speech that was
deemed as promoting illegal conduct, specifically ruling for the right of the
Ku Klux Klan to speak out, even though it is a hateful organization."

The speech took place on private property. It actually could have been a
very narrow decision but it was a broadly expansive decision to protect
black civil rights leaders who might say something incendiary BUT NOT
incitement to unlawful activity from getting arrested for the violent or
destructive act of someone who had heard the speech.

That ruling led to National Socialist Party of America v. Village of Skokie in
1977, where the Court unanimously ruled that the city government could not
constitutionally deny a permit for the American Nazi Party to hold a march in
the city streets, even in a city populated heavily by Holocaust survivors.

Turley also noted that in the 2011 case of RAV v. City of St. Paul, the Court
struck down a ban on any symbol that 'arouses anger, alarm or resentment in
others on the basis of race, color, creed, religion or gender, and in Snyder
v. Phelps, also in 2011, the Court said that "the hateful protests of Westboro
Baptist Church were protected".

https://www.standingforfreedom.com/2023/11/new-york-announces-it-will-take-citizen-surveillance-and-censorship-to-the-next-level/?twclid=2-6oshw3g6bxsmwqt160vrgne5i