Category Archives: Free Speech

CHARLOTTE, N.C., May 31 (UPI) -- A North Carolina blogger says the state violated his freedom of speech when it restricted what advice he could give on his diet blog.

Steve Cooksey, 50, filed a lawsuit in U.S. District Court in Charlotte this week, claiming the state of North Carolina violated his First Amendment rights to free speech by putting limits on what he can say on his blog, The Charlotte Observer reported.

Cooksey started his blog, "Diabetes Warrior," to share his experience and offer advice on weight loss and keeping diabetes under control the way he did, by eating a low-carbohydrate, meat-and-vegetables diet.

In January, the North Carolina Board of Dietetics/Nutrition received a complaint that Cooksey was providing "nutrition care services" without a license.

The board then sent Cooksey copies of 19 pages from his 3-year-old blog with comments from the board pointing out the differences between describing his own experience and telling someone else what to do.

"In the first scenario, you are just sharing your opinion; in the second you are advising," the board's note said. "Counseling/advising requires a license."

In April, the board notified Cooksey he was in "substantial compliance," and the investigation was closed, but the blogger was already searching for a lawyer at that point.

"There's so many people who do what I do. Why single me out?" Cooksey asked Wednesday at a news conference in Charlotte.

Cooksey's lawyer said the blogger is not seeking monetary compensation and just wants to be allowed to reinstate the question-and-answer portion of his blog, in which the blogger gives out advice.

"When a government agency tells you, even in an educational capacity, that you're violating a criminal law to speak, the natural reaction is that you're going to stop speaking," said Paul Sherman, a lawyer with the Institute for Justice in Arlington, Va. "There simply is no bright light between 'nutrition care services' and the sort of ordinary advice that Steve wants to be able to share and that millions of Americans share every day."

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Blogger files lawsuit over free speech

Illustration by http://www.fizzzbzzzz.com

Whats the opposite of free speech? If you answered, totalitarian censorship, you are right -- and you are old.

In the Internet age, censorship is all about allowing partial, temporary free speech, then shutting it down once enough has been said. The innovator, as usual these days when it comes to nondemocratic governance, is China, where the leading microblog site, Sina Weibo, unveiled its modified censorship model this week.

Users get 80 points. Monitors will take away points for violations. These include the censors old favorite, criticizing the government. You can also lose points for spreading rumor (which I thought was the whole point of the Internet) or promoting cults (a provision apparently aimed at the banned spiritual movement Falun Gong). The monitors will also scour your comments for puns or other circumlocutions used to avoid censorship in the past. If you run out of points, youre cut off.

If free speech is so threatening, why dont the powers- that-be in China just shut down the microblogs altogether? Part of the answer is that with 324 million users, Sina Weibo has become too big to fail, or at least too much a part of normal Chinese life to be eliminated. But the deeper reason to keep the masses microblogging is that the Chinese government reaps important gains from it. This is not your fathers Communist Party. Nor your grandfathers. Chinas leadership is engaged in a complicated, risky process of trying to gain some of the advantages of democratic government without the disadvantage of putting itself up for direct election. Free speech is a crucial part of the experiment.

A major benefit of allowing people to complain on the Web is that it allows society to blow off steam. This is a venerable value of free speech, recognized by U.S. Supreme Court Justice William O. Douglas in a famous dissent in 1951, responding to the courts choice to uphold the conviction of 11 American Communists for teaching subversive ideas. The airing of ideas releases pressures which otherwise might become destructive, Douglas wrote. If such release is beneficial in a democracy, its doubly so in a place where there is no robust public sphere.

Another advantage of limited free speech is that it allows the government to gather information about public concerns. Chinese authorities cant rely on ordinary polling data, because pollsters in China cant operate freely, lest they learn of serious opposition to the government. And its impossible to spy on 1.3 billion people all the time. The microblogs serve as the abstract and brief chronicles of the time, as Hamlet called the theater.

Once the microblogs have conveyed what people are thinking, the government can respond to their concerns, as it did last summer after the Zhejiang train derailment when Premier Wen Jiabao made a special visit to the site in apparent reaction to public frustration with bureaucratic silence and denials. Responding to public opinion is the hallmark of accountable government. Without elections to provide oversight, Chinas leaders need every opportunity they can get to demonstrate that they respond to peoples concerns. Seen this way, limited free speech, followed by government action, is an important part of how the Chinese Communist Party seeks to sustain its legitimacy.

The party is utterly aware that free speech could help bring the government down. That is why it is experimenting with freedom in moderation, and using quasi-private entities like Sina Weibo as its proxies. Chinas leaders are trying to gain the advantages of free speech without paying its full price. First Amendment absolutists will probably raise their eyebrows at this. After all, Americans have been raised to believe that free speech has a life of its own; that truth is great and shall prevail.

Yet there is an extraordinary precedent for Chinas censorship model: the history of free speech in England and the U.S. before the modern era. When it was drafted, the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution didnt contemplate the radical freedom Americans now enjoy. Its language, drawn from English precedents, was aimed essentially at prohibiting what is called prior restraint: government censorship of books and newspapers before they could be published. As with the Sina Weibo rules, once you had spoken or written, you could still be punished for what you had freely said. You were accountable under the crime of seditious libel.

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China’s Blog Censorship Rules Have U.S. Parallels

ITALY

GROUP C

The Juventus goalkeeper intimated earlier this week that it is only natural that teams will sometimes agree on a draw if a point suits both sides, a view which was not well received in light of the ongoing investigation into match-fixing within the Italian game.

Buffon, though, declined the opportunity to hit back during a press conference at Coverciano on Wednesday, but did declare that he was standing by his comments.

"I will not tell you what I'm thinking about the controversies that have arisen after my statement," he explained.

"I can only say that it has been the umpteenth confirmation that those who have a clear conscience are not free to express their thoughts.

"Criticism is also normal, but the right to express one's thoughts should always be preserved. Anyway, like I always have done, I take responsibility for my comments."

Buffon also responded to Italian Prime Minster Mario Monti's suggestion that football should be suspended for two to three years in light of the latest corruption scandal.

"I think that a suspension would mean penalising the majority of players who are without blame," the World Cup winner argued.

"The important thing is to make the right distinction between abnormal behaviour and criminal behaviour."

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Buffon defends right to free speech after controversial Scommessopoli comments

Kerek Wongsa / Reuters

Chiranuch Premchaiporn, a Thai website editor, leaves the Bangkok Criminal Court on May 30, 2012

In a much anticipated ruling that struck a chord of moderation in Thailands contentious battle over free speech, a Thai court on Wednesday convicted an Internet webmaster accused of violating the countrys lse-majestlaws, but suspended her sentence and imposed a small fine. The compromise ruling came as the international media turned its spotlight on Thailand with the arrival of global leaders in Bangkok for a meeting of the World Economic Forum on East Asia.

Chiranuch Premchaiporn, the webmaster of the Prachatai political website, was prosecuted under Thailands harsh lse-majestlaws for failing to delete fast enough comments posted by readers deemed offensive to the countrys constitutional monarchy. Her case had drawn the attention of Thai advocates of free speech and international human-rights groups, who were concerned the law is being used tostifle freedom of expression. The verdict came less than a month after an international outcry over thedeath in prisonof a 61-year-old retired truck driver convicted and sentenced to 20 years for sending text messages that threatened members of the royal family.

(MORE: Whats Behind Thailands Lse-Majest Crackdown?)

Chiranuch faced a possible 20 years in prison for 10 offensive comments left by readers. In handing down his verdict, judge Kampol Rungrat said that Chiranuch failed to delete one offensive comment for 20 days, and so sentenced her to one-year in prison, reduced to eight months, but suspended the sentence. He fined her 20,000 baht ($625), which she immediately paid with help from dozens of supporters who had flocked to the court in a show of solidarity.

Chiranuch told reporters the verdict was logical and reasonable, but said it will still have an impact on self-censorship. Sunai Phasuk, the Thailand representative of Human Rights Watch, concurred, saying the judges decision set a troubling and unacceptable precedent in that it requires intermediaries, such as Internet service providers and webmasters, to enforce censorship on behalf of the state. It creates a climate of fear, and damages Thailands attempts to position itself as a hub for information and communications technology in the region, he said.

(MORE: Thailand: Webmaster Case Tests Limits of Free Speech)

The ruling appears to conform to the ideas of 84-year-old King Bhumibol Adulyadej, who in a 2005 address to the nation said the lse-majest laws only brought problems for the monarchy and charges against violators should be dropped and those in prison released. However, since that time, and particularly following a 2006 military coup, the number of lse-majestcases filed has increased sharply, as have the penalties.

Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra has said her government will not change the law. Her position is regarded by many analysts as an attempt to smooth relations with ultraconservative elements in the military and the establishment who have questioned the loyalty to the monarchy of her political party and of her older brother Thaksin Shinawatra, the Prime Minister ousted in the coup. Thaksin lives abroad, having fled a conviction and two-year prison sentence for abuse of power.

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Thai Webmaster Gets Suspended Sentence in Free-Speech Case

29-05-2012 07:46 Can the government throw you in jail for offering advice on the Internet about what food people should buy at the grocery store? That is exactly the claim made by the North Carolina Board of Dietetics/Nutrition. In December 2011, diabetic blogger Steve Cooksey started a Dear Abby-style advice column on his popular blog (www.diabetes-warrior.net) to answer reader questions. One month later, the State Board informed Steve that he could not give readers advice on diet, whether for free or for compensation, because doing so constituted the unlicensed, and thus criminal, practice of dietetics. The State Board also told Steve that his private emails and telephone calls with readers and friends were illegal, as was his paid life-coaching service. The State Board went through Steve's writings with a red pen, indicating what he may and may not say without a government-issued license. But the First Amendment does not allow the government to ban people from sharing ordinary advice about diet, or scrub the Internet—from blogs to Facebook to Twitter—of speech the government does not like. North Carolina can no more force Steve to become a licensed dietitian than it could require Dear Abby to become a licensed psychologist. That is why on May 30, 2012, Steve Cooksey joined the Institute for Justice in filing a major free speech lawsuit against the State Board in the US District Court for the Western District of North Carolina, Charlotte Division. This lawsuit seeks to answer ...

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Caveman Blogger Fights for Free Speech and Internet Freedom - Video

JERUSALEM, May 29 (UPI) -- Bills now before the Israeli parliament that would outlaw the use of Nazi symbols and slogans violate freedom of speech, a legal adviser said Tuesday.

The legislation was introduced in the parliament or Knesset in response to demonstrations by ultra-Orthodox Jews, Ynetnews reported online. The ultra-Orthodox were protesting efforts to prevent the separation of women and men on public transportation and in other public places.

The four bills, which have received preliminary approval, would ban swastikas and Nazi slogans, the wearing of striped uniforms like those in World War II concentration camps and of yellow Stars of David like those Jews were required to wear in Nazi-run countries. Violators could face fines of up to $26,000 and six months in jail.

"Despite the bills' important goals, they severely violate political free speech, which is at the heart of freedom of expression," the legal adviser to the Constitution, Law and Justice Committee said. "The courts have repeatedly ruled that free speech under Israeli law extends to every expression, regardless of its influence."

Protesters used Nazi symbols to say that they feel they are being treated as Jews were by the Nazis.

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Does Nazi symbol ban violate free speech?

Mr Gove defended the British press in his evidence to the Leveson Inquiry.

He called for caution over regulations, which he warned could be worse than the disease. And he called free speech a precious liberty for journalists even if some people found it offensive.

At one point Lord Justice Leveson said: Mr Gove, I do not need to be told about the importance of freedom of speech. He asked if the Tory thought unacceptable behaviour should be tolerated due to the right to free speech.

Ex-Times journalist Mr Gove replied: I dont think any of us can accept that behaviour necessarily, but there are a variety of sanctions. Some of us believe that before the case for regulation is made, the case for liberty needs to be asserted as well.

Mr Gove said proprietors and executives would from time to time attempt to influence ministers but that robust politicians would listen but not bend.

He described News Corp boss Rupert Murdoch as one of the most significant figures of the last 50 years, calling him a great man.

c.grant@the-sun.co.uk

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Gove: Free press is a precious liberty

A Thai court sentenced a local webmaster Wednesday to an eight-month suspended sentence for failing to act quickly enough to remove Internet posts deemed insulting to the country's royalty in a case widely seen as a test of freedom of expression in this Southeast Asian nation.

The ruling showed leniency toward Chiranuch Premchaiporn, who faced up to 20 years in prison for 10 comments posted on her Prachatai news website, but it still sends the message that Internet content in Thailand must be self-censored.

Chiranuch was the first to be prosecuted under Thailand's computer-crime laws, which were enacted in 2007 under an interim, unelected government that came to power after a coup a year earlier. The laws address hacking and other online offenses, but also bar the circulation of material deemed detrimental to national security, which includes defaming the monarchy.

Her case, which drew international attention, was inextricably linked to Thailand's fractious politics of recent years, as the country's traditional ruling class allying big business, the military and royalists has been desperately fighting to retain reverence for the monarchy and their influence over politics.

Most people still respect 84-year-old King Bhumibol Adulyadej, but the evident involvement of palace circles in supporting the 2006 military coup against elected Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra opened the royal institution to unprecedented criticism, much of which was circulated on the Internet.

Judge Kampol Rungrat said Wednesday that his guilty verdict was based on one particular post that was left on the Prachatai site for 20 days, which was deemed too long.

Chiranuch "did not perform her duty in a timely manner" and "allowed the inappropriate posting to be on the website for too long," the judge said.

Chiranuch was initially given a one-year suspended sentence that was immediately reduced to eight months. She also was fined 20,000 baht ($625), which she quickly paid with help from supporters and colleagues who handed her cash.

"I expected to be acquitted, but I found the judge's verdict logical and reasonable," a smiling Chiranuch told reporters. "However, I still think the verdict will have an impact on self-censorship."

Prachatai was founded by several respected journalists, senators and press freedom activists to serve as an independent, nonprofit, daily Internet newspaper. It has attracted an audience of critics of the status quo, especially on the now-defunct web board where the comments at issue in the court case were posted between April and November 2008.

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Thai Webmaster Sentenced in Free Speech Case

Mr Gove, who has been tipped as a future leader of the Conservatives, went further by making the case unashamedly for cautious regulation.

In a tense exchange, he set out his fear that any cure proposed by Lord Leveson may be worse than the disease. I am concerned about any prior restraint and on their exercising of freedom of speech, Mr Gove told the judge.

Lord Leveson replied: Mr Gove, I do not need to be told about the importance of freedom of speech, I really dont.

The judge said he was concerned that the Education Secretary was prepared to put up with unacceptable, albeit not necessarily criminal behaviour from journalists because of the right to freedom of speech.

Mr Gove said some cases of press misbehaviour were deplorable but argued that these could be punished under existing laws, such as defamation.

Freedom of speech doesnt mean anything unless some people are going to be offended some of the time, the minister said. Defending the rough-edged trade of journalism, the minister said it twas ever thus that reporters are unpopular. Politicians and journalists have always tended to be held in relatively low regard, he said.

Mr Gove was also upfront about his admiration for Rupert Murdoch, the owner of News International, which publishes the The Sun and The Times.

He described the media tycoon as one of the most impressive and significant figures of the last 50 years.

Mr Gove, a former leader writer at The Times, said Mr Murdoch had never tried to interfere in his editorials.

He said the newspaper owner was a great man, who had created jobs and attracted controversy because he is so successful.

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Leveson Inquiry risks undermining precious liberty of free speech, Michael Gove warns

28-05-2012 22:52 Do Ron Paul supporters hate free speech? They were hoodwinked!

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Do Ron Paul supporters hate free speech? They were hoodwinked! - Video