Make no mistake about it, Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor’s comment regarding the ability of a “wise Latina woman” to render a better judgment than a white male (which was not a one-time, off-the-cuff remark) is met with knowing smirks and snickers by those that travel in her ideological circles. It would not be considered a controversial statement on any college campus where “patriarchy” is considered a socio-political pathology comparable with fascism, racism, sexism, etc. Such indoctrination is not confined to women’s studies curricula; it is standard fare in (often required) undergraduate social science courses. Thus it comes as no surprise when President Obama initially dismissed criticism of her remarks as “nonsense.” To him, and all similarly educated “progressives,” it is just that.

The identity politics crowd views the concept of blind justice as a quaint artifact of an unenlightened era, as opposed to the evolved concept of a malleable standard of justice (the “living Constitution”) that empathizes with the social condition and feelings of the litigant. They consider affirmative action, feminist jurisprudence, etc., as progressive, representing a higher truth that trumps the obsolete, patriarchal thinking of the “white-male power structure.”

According to Sotomayor, the rule of woman is a superior legal mode whose time has come. They are wrong. Far from being progressive, identity-sensitive jurisprudence is literally regressive, as in harkening back to an earlier, unenlightened time when kings and oligarchs ruled by fiat, like King Solomon, the Politburo of the U.S.S.R, or today’s Iranian Ayatollahs.

Establishing equal justice for everyone, be they serfs or kings, represented a triumph of political thought, as did the presumption of innocence, due process, habeas corpus, freedom of speech, and other milestones that are part of a precious heritage of western civilization extending back through the centuries to the ancient Greeks.

Many who have not had course to find themselves unwittingly involved in civil litigation would be surprised to discover that these precious rights are now under wholesale assault from the left. The expression of opinions that run contrary to the canons of political correctness is not only constrained everywhere from the college campus to beauty pageants, it is firmly on track to becoming criminally actionable (“hate speech”). Men accused of gender crimes like “domestic abuse” are presumed guilty and have to prove their innocence in courts that are little more than feminist tribunals. Due process is also nowhere to be found for men accused in these Kafkaesque courtrooms. Such men are routinely stripped of their children, thrown out of their homes, slapped with extortionary child support orders and often jailed with no more than a hearsay assertion by an angry wife or girlfriend that she is afraid.

Thanks to the racial discrimination euphemistically called “affirmative action” that afflicts law and public policy nationwide, individuals who happen to belong to the wrong class: white males, are discriminated against in employment and school admission policies. The white firefighters vying for promotion in New Haven were blatantly discriminated against as a result of affirmative action policies at the Fire Department, duly affirmed by Sotomayor’s ruling. How ironic that Sotomayor’s own appalling appellate court decision in Ricci v. DeStefano will be heard by the Supreme Court this term. The high court may have been poised to finally abolish affirmative action. If she is confirmed, will she recuse herself?

The present grassroots anti-courts movement is unlike previous cycles of popular agitation against the third branch of government. This time it is borne by a groundswell of righteous outrage at the selective denial of our precious constitutionally guaranteed civil and human rights. It is not just the individual litigants who suffer when justice is administered by courts steeped in victim-feminism, identity politics and affirmative action. Confidence in the legal system entire is undermined when, under the color of law, constitutionally guaranteed civil rights are subverted to promote a self-righteous and flawed vision of political correctness.

That these injustices proliferate in virtual media silence is another scandal that will no doubt continue unabated with people like Sotomayor and other Obama appointees-to-be administering their brand of “progressive” justice.

# # #

Introductory remarks by John Hollwitz, Vice President for Academic Affairs, Fordham University:

Why is it that I’m so pleased at being able to introduce Dr. Paul Levinson for tonight’s keynote address, a talk on the flouting of the First Amendment, an issue of considerable moment in our public lives in the United States and indeed the world? The great pleasure I take in this opportunity comes from four or five different things: First, Dr. Levinson is a teacher of distinction at Fordham and the head of our largest undergraduate unit, the chair of the Department of Communication and Media Studies. Dr. Levinson has indeed crossed to the “dark side” and entered the world of administration with great integrity, vision, and leadership.

My pleasure also comes from the fact that Dr. Levinson is a scholar of renown. His books include Cellphone: The Story of the World’s Most Mobile Medium; Realspace; Digital McLuhan; and The Soft Edge: A Natural History and Future of the Information Revolution. It’s true, too, that his work has been translated into Chinese, Japanese, and six other languages, and it’s true that he’s a renown author of fiction, including among his works The Silk Code; Borrowed Tides; The Consciousness Plague; and The Pixel Eye. It’s true that he appears regularly on Fox, CBS, NBC, ABC, CNN, CBC, NPR, the BBC. He is regularly quoted in the nation’s leading newspapers, and — in a moment which is preserved in Fordham lore and more importantly on digital media in Fordham’s library — may have been the only person in the country to have gotten the last word and the last laugh on the “O’Reilly Factor” in one of its most memorable episodes. All of these contribute to my great pleasure in introducing Dr. Levinson to you this evening.

Paul Levinson:
Well, thank you, John. And apropos of your comment about the dark side, I knew there was still good in you someplace. Well, I was driving down to the convention today and I realized I was driving about 62 or 63 miles an hour on the West Side Drive, and as some of you may know the speed limit there is 50 miles an hour, so I hope there are no police officers in the audience. Actually it’s a good thing that there weren’t any police officers in cars or on motorcycles or anywhere near where I was this afternoon because if they had seen me driving even a few miles too fast, they could have pulled me over and given me a summons and the way traffic courts work-at least in New York City-I think you’re guilty until proven innocent.

But you might be wondering what this has to do with the First Amendment. Well, it struck me as an interesting irony that a person who drives just a few miles over the posted speed limit can be found guilty and pay a hefty fine, but our government is systematically violating the supreme law of the land — which is what our Constitution is — when the FCC, for example, fines television networks and radio stations over seven million dollars, which it did last year. Even though the First Amendment says “Congress shall make no law abridging freedom of speech or of the press.” It strikes me as ironic that the federal government can and does do that with impunity all the time, and that’s what I want to explore with you in a little more detail this evening.

If I had a couple of months we could explore other ways in which our government systematically defies the law of the land. For example, there’s a provision in the Constitution that governs declarations of war and yet World War II was the last time our country went to war with a Declaration of War by a joint session of Congress as called for in the Constitution. Or I could talk to you about double jeopardy, which is not permitted in the Constitution and yet people who are found not guilty in the criminal court are often retried in civil court. And it doesn’t matter that I think O.J. is one of those because it doesn’t matter if the people are guilty or innocent. I think that what matters is that the government is violating the law.

But tonight let’s just look at the First Amendment, and let’s begin on Page One in our country. This would be back in the 1780s, a few years after the successful revolution. There were two schools of thought back then about what the relationship between government and what we would today call media — what was then just called the press — should be. One school of thought was presented by John Adams. I think Neil Postman would have liked John Adams. I don’t know if in fact he did; I never talked to him about that. But John Adams was not a fan of the media. In fact John Adams was no fan of people. He distrusted people. The time he spent in France traumatized him and led him to believe that if people are unchecked, if people are not controlled, then their animal instincts will come to the fore and what happened in France with blood running in the streets and heads rolling and all those terrible things might happen right here in the United States.

So John Adams wanted the press to support a strong central government. The other point of view was one that Thomas Jefferson presented. This was a point of view that actually didn’t originate with Jefferson. John Milton a few years before had said that truth and falsity should battle it out in the public arena and let the people decide which is the better presentation, and according to Jefferson and his colleagues James Monroe and James Madison, what you therefore needed was a strong press that was a watchdog on the central government. Because if you have a central government without a press, Jefferson was afraid that that government would actually do the same bad things that Adams was concerned about in France. And so this was the debate at the dawn of the new Constitution, which was adopted in 1789. The compromise that was struck between the people who agreed with John Adams and the people who agreed with Thomas Jefferson was that it would be a strong Constitution with a strong central government, but there would be a “Bill of Rights” that would guarantee freedom of various sorts for the American people — freedom that the government, restricted by these rights, would not be able to abridge.

There were twelve amendments that were originally proposed. Only ten were ratified. Freedom of speech and of the press was not the Tenth, the Ninth, the Eighth; it wasn’t even the Second Amendment. It was the First Amendment to the Constitution. First as in foremost, and first as in most important. This amendment protected freedom of religion, freedom of the people to peaceably assemble and petition the government for redress of grievances, and it protected freedom of speech and the press.

This amendment and the other nine amendments were ratified in 1791. In 1796 John Adams became the second President of the United States. In 1798 Congress passed the Sedition Act. This was seven years after the First Amendment had been adopted, and the Sedition Act amazingly said anyone who was critical of the government, disrespectful of the government, disrespectful of the President could be found guilty of violating this act and could be fined thousands of dollars and sentenced to years in prison. As a matter of fact, this was coupled with something called the Alien Act, which wasn’t about aliens in outer space, it was about aliens in different countries and coupled together, a person that published materials critical of the government could have been tried for treason and executed. Seven years after the adoption of the First Amendment.

To give you an idea of how bad things were then: shortly after the Alien and Sedition Acts were passed, John Adams was traveling from Philadelphia, which was then the capital of the United States, back to his home in Braintree, Massachusetts. (Great name, isn’t it?) Anyway, he happened to be traveling through Newark, New Jersey, and Newark, New Jersey was pretty much then what it is now. It wasn’t exactly a teeming cultural citadel. People there liked to drink a lot; there’s nothing wrong with that. They were actually trying to be respectful of the President, and in those days when the President would pass through town, the towns would fire cannons as a sign of respect for the President. But somehow these people in Newark were a little behind the eight-ball, and John Adams had passed through town — he was gone — and they started firing the cannons. (Sounds like what we do in the Communication Department sometimes.) Anyway, somebody in the town mumbled, “Why are they firing the cannons now? John Adams is gone. They’re firing the cannons at his ass,” and that is a direct quote. “They’re firing the cannons at his ass.”

Well, a friend of his, a town drunkard by the name of Luther Baldwin, basically responded, “I wish they’d fire the cannons through John Adams’s ass.” Well, unfortunately for Baldwin, there were a few people standing by who were known as Federalists, that is people who supported John Adams’s party and they promptly called over some constables and had Baldwin arrested for being disrespectful and threatening of the President. I guess disrespectful because he uttered the word “ass”; threatening because of what he said about the cannonball. A few days later — to show you how absurd things were back in 1798 — a New York newspaper by the name of The New York Argus published an editorial. Now The New York Argus was run by Jeffersonians; they were against what John Adams was doing, so in their editorial they said, “You know this is really absurd. They arrest this drunk in Newark because he said he wanted to fire a cannonball at John Adams’s ass — how can that possibly be considered a danger? Why, the ass of John Adams is far too disgusting a target for anyone to look at long enough to fire a cannonball at it!” And guess what? The Feds came after The New York Argus because they were being disrespectful of the President.

That’s a funny story, but nonetheless it is extremely serious because seven years after the First Amendment becomes a supreme law of the land, it is sat upon and nearly suffocated by John Adams’s ass. I’m not talking about John Adams’s literal ass. I don’t know about you, but I think I’ll take The New York Argus’s word for it that that is far too disgusting a topic to even talk about. But the spoken word “ass” and the written word “ass” are what caused all the controversy — in other words, speech and press, the very two things that Congress should make no law abridging. Thomas Jefferson was so livid when he found out about that that he told his friends he was thinking of advising Virginia and some other states to secede from the new union. This would have been a civil war sixty years earlier and it would have destroyed our country. It was really a critical moment in which the whole future of the United States depended. The whole future hinged on that ass.

And you can imagine if you think of the great people in history, people like Socrates who was sentenced to death by the Athenian democracy because he wouldn’t shut up. The world’s first democracy kills what many people consider the greatest philosopher in history simply because he talked too much. Or John Milton, for instance. I mean, if they were looking in on this, they would be hoping that something could be done to stop this insanity in the United States. But if we’re looking at eternity, there were people on the other side as well. In the twentieth century, there were people like Adolf Hitler and his Minister for Popular Enlightenment, Joseph Goebbels, who got his Ph.D from the University of Heidelberg in 1922, and understood communications. Those folks would have been right there with John Adams hoping that the First Amendment was trampled and destroyed.

Jefferson, after thinking it over, decided to stay the course and in fact to run for President in the election of 1800 against John Adams, and in an interesting and fascinating event in history, Adams was not only defeated but Jefferson and Aaron Burr were pretty much neck-and-neck in the Electoral College (does that sound familiar?). It went to the House of Representatives and Thomas Jefferson became the third President of the United States. This saved the United States; it saved the First Amendment; and I think it saved freedom in the world.

Freedom of speech, freedom of thought, and freedom of the press never had a better friend than Thomas Jefferson. In the 1770s, Jefferson made a statement that has become pretty famous. He said, “were it left to me to decide whether we should have a government without newspapers, or newspapers without government, I should not hesitate a moment to prefer the latter.” And of course people have sarcastically commented, “But this was in the 1770s before Jefferson became President. How did he feel after he was in the White House?” The answer to that question is found in a letter Jefferson sent to Comte de Volney in 1802 in which Jefferson reiterated his view about the need for a strong, independent, vigorous press. He also admitted he had no illusions about the press. He knew the press publishes falsities, calumnies. They’re not much better than anything else you wrap yesterday’s fish in. But he said what a democratic society must do — and this is crucial — is safeguard the right of the press to print falsities because in doing that you safeguard the right of the press to print the truth.

So for the next hundred years we had a sort of golden age of freedom of the press in the United States. Andrew Jackson became President in 1828. He was a Jeffersonian. He extended democracy to what was called the “common man” in those days. Improvements in print technology led to more newspapers being printed. By the 1840s magazines were joining books and newspapers. That’s the media ecological aspect of this issue.

By the 1880s literacy in the United States was so high that it equaled for the first time the rates of literacy in the ancient city of Alexandria. That’s a pretty sobering thought, isn’t it? It took us that long to get up to where the ancient Alexandrians were. But you may know that ancient Alexandria and its library, which was reputed to have a copy of every book ever written — I was thinking of going back there in a time machine and giving them some of my books just to make their collection complete — was burned to the ground no fewer than three times.

So the 1880s seemed to many Americans to be a golden age for freedom of the press, and I should also mention that Abraham Lincoln, who also considered himself a Jeffersonian, with a few minor exceptions permitted the Northern press to be very critical of his conduct during the Civil War. So Lincoln favored freedom of the press. But just as the Library of Alexandria was burned to the ground, it would turn out that in the 20th century, the First Amendment while not being burned to the ground would meet very severe challenges.

So now we move on to Page Two. (Don’t worry, there are only three pages to this story.) Page Two: 1901. McKinley, President of the United States, is assassinated by some nutcase anarchist I think in the city of Buffalo. The only thing that makes sense about that is that it happened in Buffalo. Unlike Lincoln’s assassination, which was looked at by many Americans as just another last gasp of the Civil War, Americans had a hard time understanding McKinley’s assassination. Unfortunately the explanation that many people came up with is that these anarchists are being fed by the press. They’re reading all this material that’s inciting them to go on and do these horrible things. And so a distrust of the press began slowly permeating American society.

In the year 1915, a little known but very important Supreme Court decision came down in a case involving a company called Mutual Film. The justice who wrote that opinion, McKenna, a justice appointed by William Taft, said that motion pictures are not entitled to any First Amendment protections. They’re just another business. That’s almost a direct quote from that Supreme Court decision. Movies were just “a business, pure and simple.” They’re entitled to no more protection than say, a shoemaker, or today you might say a pizza place. This was very important because it established a very important distinction. It seemed to be saying that newspapers were entitled to First Amendment protections but other media were not. Unfortunately McKenna was unable to take any courses in the media ecology program, never had the benefit of Neil Postman’s education, because he was writing his opinions fifty years earlier.

But the really damaging blow to the First Amendment happened in 1919 with the “clear and present danger” decision. This involved a man named Shenck who was distributing anti-draft leaflets near a draft recruiting center during World War I. He was arrested, and the defense claimed First Amendment protection. The Supreme Court, under the influence of Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr., ruled 9-0 that Shenck was not entitled to the protection of the First Amendment, and that notwithstanding the First Amendment, Congress had not only a right but an obligation to prevent action which would lead to a “clear and present danger” to life, property, and they threw a couple of other things in there as well.

Ironically, Justice Holmes thought he was a champion of the First Amendment. He thought this was necessary — to use McLuhan’s metaphor — to throw a piece of juicy meat to the dogs that were about to beset the First Amendment. Who knows what he really thought, but he was dead wrong because what this then did was open up the floodgates. Rather than satisfying people who were against the First Amendment, it only emboldened them.

In the 1930s, the Federal Communications Act created the FCC — the Federal Communications Commission — and you can see right there the profound dichotomy of an already weakened First Amendment and the attempt to desperately hold onto some of it. Because in that act, it says on one hand, in one of the clauses, that the FCC has no right to and cannot censor radio, but it also says someplace else that the FCC is going to make sure there is no “obscenity” broadcast on the public airwaves. What is obscenity? No one ever defined it. In the years since, not only obscenity but “indecency” has been brought into the realm of what the FCC is supposed to regulate.

A few other highlights of the twentieth century before we get to Page Three. In the 1970s a man was riding down the Saw Mill River Parkway in Westchester with his son. His 15-year-old son. They’re listening to WBAI-FM radio. Some of you know it — it’s still the Pacifica radio station in New York. And on the radio that instant is George Carlin’s “seven dirty words” routine, and I’m happy to get to bring this up because it gives me a chance to say the word “ass” again. I was thinking of subtitling the talk “the ass of John Adams through history.” But anyway, what the “seven dirty words” business is all about are words, first of all, that you can say on the air because they are words with a double entendre. You can even say them on television. You can say, “He came down the mountain on his ass” — meaning on his donkey. But then there are certain words that I won’t mention here because who knows who might arrest me. But they’re words that are not double entendres; they’re single entendres and Carlin listed seven of them. Actually he later expanded his list to over a hundred — very creative guy.

Anyway this man in the car is listening to this and I don’t know how much he listened to and enjoyed or didn’t enjoy, but at some point he started going ballistic because his son is sitting next to him and oh my god, this is ruining his son’s life! Now I have a 21-year-old son and based on what he was saying at fifteen, he could teach George Carlin a few words, so I don’t know where this family grew up. But anyway, the man wrote to the FCC. The FCC picked up on it and sent a letter of censure. You know those two words — censure and censor — have always annoyed me. They actually mean different things but are related. A “censure” is a stringent criticism, not censoring but saying you really don’t like something, and actually the FCC not only censured WBAI, they warned them: if you ever broadcast George Carlin again, this routine in particular, we may not renew your license when it comes to license renewal time. Sure sounds like censor to me. And WBAI didn’t want to take that from the FCC. They took this all the way to the Supreme Court. In those days, Jimmy Carter was President and he ordered his lawyers to support WBAI, as did the American Civil Liberties Union. By the way, if you want to get Bill O’Reilly apoplectic, just say ACLU. Just a little tidbit for devotees of the show.

But the Supreme Court at this time was not the Supreme Court of the 1950s, which was appointed in part by Eisenhower. And all the great things the Supreme Court did back then — like Brown v. Board of Education — were the result of a Court which was quite different from the one that was making decisions in the late 1970s. And so that Court backed the FCC in a 5-4 decision, and said the FCC has every right to regulate this.

Last point of note in the 20th century: in 1996 the Clinton administration — or actually Congress, but Clinton signed it — put into effect the Communications Decency Act, which actually said that if there is any material on the Internet that is at all indecent and children have any access to it, then the people who posted the information can be fined and thrown into jail for two years. Pretty similar to what the Sedition Act was trying to do two centuries earlier. But fortunately in 1798 John Adams was President and he was succeeded by Jefferson in 1800, while in 1996, Clinton was President and was succeeded by George W. Bush in 2000, who has taken the country on a path very far from Jefferson’s. But again I want to emphasize: Bill Clinton was the one who signed into law the Communications Decency Act and allowed Attorney General Janet Reno to bring a person up on charges under it. So this is not a Republican versus Democrat issue. They’re both equal opportunity abusers of the First Amendment.

However, the one good thing — the little bright light — about this episode is that the Supreme Court when it heard the case did decide by a narrow margin that written material on the Net was close enough to the press that they couldn’t in good conscience find the Communications Decency Act constitutional. So freedom in this case had just a temporary setback. The enemies of the First Amendment had misunderstood the media. They didn’t realize and were in fact surprised that the Supreme Court would find that the Internet is something like a press.

Actually, I had a debate with Neil Postman almost two decades ago about what a computer was. Neil thought the computer was just another kind of television. My point of view was that it was really just another kind of book, and I think we were both right, but fortunately the Supreme Court took the book analogy as something to base their decision on.

Now we’re up to Page Three: the 21st century. I think it’s fair to say that September 11th changed everything. I don’t even have to say September 11th, 2001, just September 11th. It’s impossible to predict what the United States would have been, would have done, where we’d be now in our public discourse had September 11th not happened. We do know a few things. We do know George W. Bush became President before September eleventh. We do know that Al Gore won the popular vote. Since we don’t have much time, I won’t share with you my views about how George Bush did become President and what happened in Florida and what the Supreme Court did. But it is worth noting that clearly George W. Bush, whatever his strengths and weaknesses, is no Thomas Jefferson. If I were talking to George W. Bush right now, I would say to him, “I knew Thomas Jefferson. I worked with Thomas Jefferson — well, I did study him — and you’re no Thomas Jefferson.” (Bill Clinton’s middle name is Jefferson — but he was no Jefferson, either.)

But nonetheless, I think the decisive event was September 11th and it’s hard to estimate what direct impact that had. We can assess the Patriot Act and see that it tried to pry into people’s lives by getting records: what people buy at bookstores and check out of libraries, etc. But I don’t think that that has been by any means the most decisive incursion on the First Amendment. Instead, that has come for the most part from the FCC, which started out in the 21st century as actually not that unreasonable. In fact, Michael Powell was a Clinton appointee and at some point he said — he’s now the former FCC commissioner — it’s not fair that cable television has almost no FCC regulation because it’s not broadcasting over the public airways but going through private cables. It’s not fair that cable has no regulation or very little regulation and network television has all this regulation. So Michael Powell said we should equalize this in favor of cable. Let’s make radio and network television more like cable. That seems like a reasonable point of view.

But then something happened on television. Something that concerned another part of the anatomy. This happened during Super Bowl Halftime 2004: the breast that launched a million protests. Actually, not as many protests as people may think. As it turned out about fifty percent of the flood of protests the FCC received were generated by one group: the Parents Television Counsel headed by Brent Bozell. I’ve had the privilege of debating him on television. His debate style is a combination of grunts and scowls.

Here’s a clip for your viewing pleasure …

But clearly that incident on Superbowl Sunday, if we can believe Michael Powell, traumatized him and galvanized him. He said he was sitting there with his kids and he couldn’t believe what he saw — I guess there was no breast-feeding in his family — and this led him onto a campaign to crack down on indecency in television and radio. To give you an idea of just how far-fetched this has gone and what areas it has permeated (this will give me another chance to say “ass,” but I promise it’s the last time):

Last year, Fox — not Fox News, but the Fox the entertainment network, which is ultimately the same company — had a cartoon called Family Guy, which a few years earlier in the late 1990s had aired an episode with someone’s bare ass. In a cartoon. A cartoon figure’s bare backside. Well, Fox was so upset in 2004 — I guess they didn’t want to offend George Bush, their biggest patron, ya know, where would they be then? — that when Family Guy was brought back, they pixilated, in other words blurred out, the baby’s backside and the father’s backside, too. A cartoon baby’s backside! They went to the effort of pixilating it because they were afraid the FCC would take umbrage.

There have actually been more serious damages to free expression. Saving Private Ryan: many of the ABC affiliates who were supposed to air that movie last November on Veteran’s Day refrained because of the language in that movie. In other words, you’re supposed to have a realistic movie about World War II and about the incredible sacrifices and bravery of those people, but you can’t show how they actually spoke.

The fact is almost a day doesn’t go by when there isn’t a new thing that either the FCC or other parts of the government are doing in violation of the First Amendment. And the chilling effect is in some ways even worse than what the government is actually doing. And furthermore, predictably, what begins as a seemingly innocent campaign against indecency — all right, you don’t want that part of the body showing on television, what’s the political implication of that? — well, that doesn’t seem to have any political impact, but predictably that always segues in short order into political censorship.

This past summer the presidential campaign — among its other aspects — was probably one of the most dismal times in history for people calling for censorship on all sides. I became aware of it when people began saying they shouldn’t allow — “they” being the FCC, maybe the FTC, the Federal Trade Commission, who knows with the alphabet soup of government agencies — they shouldn’t allow ads for Fahrenheit 9/11 on television because they were anti-Bush ads under some interpretation of the McCain-Feingold legislation (I always get a headache when trying to understand that law).

But you know on the other side the Democrats were not much better. They were going insane over the Swift Boat ads. These were anti-Kerry ads. I remember I had dinner with a woman early in the summer who’s a pretty big ad exec, an old friend of mine, and she was saying to me, “I know it’s against the First Amendment, but can’t we do something to prevent those scurrilous ads from being on television?” And there was a petition given to the FEC, the Federal Election Commission, to prevent the Swift Boat anti-Kerry ads from being shown on television. So much for truth and falsity fighting it out in the arena of public discourse.

As a matter of fact, just in the last couple of days we have had a series of new lamentable developments, and some of these are not explicit violations of the First Amendment, but consider this: a federal district court ruled the other day that it’s perfectly fine for universities and colleges to censor their newspapers. Actually a few decades ago courts ruled that it was okay for high schools to censor their newspapers. Now I admit if somebody published an article in The Ram — the student newspaper on Fordham University’s Rose Hill campus where I teach — that was critical of me, absolutely burn it! No, I wouldn’t want that to happen because although no one likes to see unpleasant things written about them in their school’s publication, what kind of lesson does it give our college students and our high school students to say that the administrations can censor those publications? Technically they have a right because ultimately it’s a private matter. It’s not censorship of a public newspaper. But what it does is give the lesson of John Adams, the lesson that Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union later adopted. It is called the social responsibility theory of the press, which holds that the obligation of the press is to support those in charge, not criticize them.

By the way, I don’t mean to unfairly tarnish John Adams. He was no Nazi, no socialist totalitarian. He was a great American, but unfortunately he had a point of view that was picked up by these totalitarians of the twentieth century. And as Karl Popper showed in his book, The Open Society and its Enemies, published in 1945, people ranging from Plato to Hegel in a sense share the responsibility for providing the philosophies that the Nazis built upon.

Meanwhile, back to today: now the PBS, Public Broadcasting System, is under fire. There’s nothing unconstitutional about that per se, but it’s just an indication of what the people who want to dominate American discourse to the exclusion of contrary opinions are doing. They are claiming that the PBS is riddled with liberal, left-wing points of view. They’re constantly braying on about Bill Moyers. They must be suffering from some kind of serious amnesia because I thought William F. Buckley was on PBS for something like thirty years and last time I checked he was the father of the American conservative movement, so FOX News may not be fair and balanced, but PBS certainly has been to some extent.

Also, the House of Representatives today, just today (that’s what I like about giving this talk, I always have some new material to draw upon) passed a law, a constitutional amendment that would not allow desecration of the American flag. I have to admit when I first heard this, I almost had an ironic mixed feeling because at least they’re showing that the Constitution has to be respected. That’s not what the FCC is doing, which is just stomping on the First Amendment without even acknowledging that that’s a problem. But it shows in what direction America is going, and now we have to hope that the state legislatures don’t ratify that amendment because if we do have a constitutional amendment that makes it illegal to burn or desecrate the flag what will be next? Will it be illegal to criticize the flag? Will it be illegal to criticize the President? Will it be illegal to criticize the Republican Party? That’s what’s worrying here. People don’t like criticism and they seem totally ignorant of the Jeffersonian point of view, and what Jefferson said in the 1800s. There were severely critical things written about him in the press at that time, but he understood that that was the price that had to be paid for freedom.

So in the end — and this is the end of Page Three and then I’ll be delighted to answer your questions — in the year 2005, we stand at another crucial juncture regarding the history of the United States but also the history of the human species and freedom of expression and freedom of thought and freedom of the press, and it’s gonna be a very tough battle. At least fifty percent of Americans don’t seem to want that freedom. A survey of high school students last year showed a majority of them didn’t think the First Amendment was necessary and didn’t see why newspapers should be granted that kind of freedom. So at this media ecology convention and for the Media Ecology Association and the study of media ecology, which I think is fair to say has not been a very political discipline — it’s attempted, as Neil Postman so eloquently said, to understand the media and that’s extremely important, but just as Graduate Dean Nancy Busch said on Wednesday when she offered a challenge — I’d like to offer this challenge to media ecology students: become aware and politically active and begin to wield and use your media understanding to stand up to these political currents, because if we’re not careful we won’t have anything like the media we’ve had for the past century.

The full video of Dr. Levinson’s address can be viewed here: http://blip.tv/file/2040664

You can read more First Amendment commentary by Paul Levinson here: http://paullevinson.blogspot.com/search/label/First%20Amendment

This transcript republished on MensNewsDaily.com by kind permission of the author.

“We were surprised that WSYX agreed to air the program, and then decided to revisit its decision,” said AFA chairman Donald E. Wildmon. He said the station has said the general manager has not had an opportunity to view the program. Wildmon said he was informed that WSYX would make a decision about airing the program made next week.

He said “Speechless … Silencing the Christians” is a program about how the mainline media silences Christians by not allowing their voice to be heard.

Wildmon said he expects WSYX to air the program at 7 p.m., the time slot in which it was originally scheduled.

American Family Association is a pro-family advocacy organization with over 2.5 million online supporters.

Fred Drummond, director of the Scottish branch of the Evangelical Alliance, notes that this hatred is “not representative of Evangelical Christians in the UK.”

During an interview with BBC Radio 2 Attenborough was asked why he did not credit God in his shows, he replied saying how he always remembers a little child in East Africa with a worm burrowing through his eyeball. The worm cannot live in any other way. “I find that hard to reconcile with the notion of a divine and benevolent creator,” Attenborough said.

Attenborough had previously criticized schools for teaching creationism alongside evolution. He said it was “terrible” when the two were taught as equal, He added “Evolution is not a theory, it’s a fact, every bit as much as the historical fact that William the Conqueror landed in 1066.”

Attenborough joined the BBC in 1952 and created several series on the animal kingdom. His most recent documentary, a series about Charles Darwin and evolution, is due to be broadcast in the UK at the beginning of February.

• British broadcaster Sir David Attenborough receives hate mail from creationists
• “Attenborough ‘received hate mail’“. BBC News Online, January 27, 2009
• Craig Brown “Burn in Hell, Christians tell David Attenborough“. The Scotsman, January 27, 2009
• Russell Grigg “Sir David Attenborough: so much to live for; nothing to die for!“. Creation Ministries International, June 20, 2008

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Speaking of Israel is Speaking of the Middle East: Leette Eaton- White

I gave you my personal perspective of the current situation in Israel in a very pro-Israel way in my last article for HipHopRepublican.com. Now I will continue my Pro-Israel lean but now I am going to give more reasons why I feel this way. Get ready because we will enter into politics, and this article will pretty much sum up my opinion of the Middle East and our involvement there. There are several reasons that only the enemies of Israel can bring peace, and there are several why that will never happen and I am going to tell you how we are compromised by trying to deal with Israel’s enemies in the fashion we have for the whole of the 20^th century.

Number one: All of Israel’s enemies only want Israel and all Jews to not exist. Yes its really that simple. They want the state of Israel gone and the Jews gone with it. You can’t negotiate with that mentality. The USA and Israel have been trying desperately to negotiate for the sake of appearance and it has never and will never work in the long term. PERIOD. END OF STORY!

Number two: We try to make good with various nations in the Middle East because of oil. We need oil, as our economy depends on it for various reasons and so, because the democrats have been blocking pro-drilling legislation in this country for about 35 years, we do our absolute best to play nice with those in the Middle East. There of course is a simple solution: we need to drill here where we have plenty of oil. Some estimates say we might have three times as much oil under American land and off American shores than the whole of Saudi Arabia, the number one exporter of oil in the world. We may have three times as much oil than Saudi Arabia!? Is that what you said Leette? Yep folks, that is what I said. The USA could be self sufficient in oil usage and the number one exporter in the world if only the Dems would allow us to drill where the vast amounts of oil are. And not only would our economy rebound but we would stop entangling ourselves in the dangerous game of dealing with enemies of Israel within the Middle East. PS: There are environmentally sound ways to drill for oil; that should silence any envirowackos.

Number three: The Plight of the Palestinians. Now no one in their right mind would dare say that the Palestinian people don’t suffer. They do. But they are not proactive in ending their own suffering. One way they could do that is by not democratically electing terrorist groups to lead them! Hello folks, if you don’t want people to be hostile to you stop electing people who want to commit genocide. DUH! If the suffering Palestinians really wanted prosperity and peace they wouldn’t have terrorists speak for them. The fact that they elect terrorist means they support the terrorism and the sanction the actions of said terrorists. They make it really hard to support their cause when they make moves like that. Who wants to help a “victim” that insists on fighting dirty?

Number four: Tactics of Hamas. Now this is really important. So often Islamic terrorists use their own homes and places of worship which makes seeking them out incredibly difficult and it compromises the safety of civilians. So when Israel strikes against Hamas often “innocent people” get a bomb in face too. And guess what… tough truth warning… that is the fault of Hamas; and further than that, its what they want. They want Israel to look as bad as possible. And nothing makes people angrier than hearing about children in the line of fire. The problem with these terrorist groups it that they hate the enemy more than they love their families. And that is apparent by the fact that they choose to hide behind the people they claim to be protecting. The tactics of the USA and Israel are very different. “The true soldier fights not because he hates what is in front of him, but because he loves what is behind him.”G.K.Chesterton. Very true indeed.

Number five: The Vast Terrorist Network Conspiracy. Simply put, all Islamic Terrorist groups have one thing in common: the destruction of Israel. They want nothing more than to obliterate it. So when possible they band together and help each other in their jihadist genocidal cause. Iran has flat out said they are helping to instigate in the ongoing conflict in Israel, including providing suicide bombers. They have about 70,000 Iranian student volunteers. WOW. They really hate Israel. That is impressive. 70,000 sent to kill, not to protect. This says a lot about their version of integrity folks. And lets be clear, any state that sponsors terrorism is an enemy of this country. And most of the middle east implicitly supports such action against Israel, some countries are just smarter, or more covert, about taking action or making moves against Israel and (by extension or directly) the US. Don’t forget this nifty little fact, the 9/11 hijackers were from Saudi Arabia- a country we rely on for oil. Note how we try not to ruffle their feathers, even though we know about the social involvement in The Vast Terrorist Network Conspiracy. After all we are blocked from getting our own oil. That’s a sad sorry state to be in; at the whims of terrorism and its means of profit.

Number six: World Opinion. We for some reason seem to have an investment about what other countries think of us. So we try in vain to do what everyone else wants us to do. But as my mom used to say to me, “Just ‘cause everyone else is doing it doesn’t mean you should”. The international community is obsessed with documents and treaties and bureaucratic bull. The UN wants to play nice with every serious threat instead of taking the threats on and its own corruption compounds its dangerously ineffective approach to world issues. Trying to impress leaders that do that is wrong and stupid. Yep I said STUPID. We put ourselves and others at risk by trying to negotiate with those who are hell bent on not negotiating. It doesn’t matter what everybody else thinks. The issues we face shouldn’t be about being popular. We should be more concerned with doing what is right.

Now as I said before and in my last article Israel’s enemies have the responsibility to end the violence. The problem is they don’t have the desire. Like my aunt says, “If Israel laid down its weapons, they would be destroyed. If Israel’s enemies laid down their weapons, there would be peace.”

]]> http://mensnewsdaily.com/2009/01/07/speaking-of-israel-is-to-speak-of-the-middle-east/feed/ 0 http://mensnewsdaily.com/2008/09/29/us-pastors-plan-to-defy-irs-tax-law-and-endorse-candidates/ http://mensnewsdaily.com/2008/09/29/us-pastors-plan-to-defy-irs-tax-law-and-endorse-candidates/#comments Mon, 29 Sep 2008 18:01:46 +0000 NewsWax http://mensnewsdaily.com/?p=82025 The Alliance Defense Fund has called on 35 pastors across the country to break IRS tax laws and endorse presidential candidates during sermons. The pastors will draw on Bible passages tomorrow in a protest organized by the group of conservative Christian lawyers.

The ADF launched the effort to protest a 50-year-old law which bans churches, religious groups, and non-profit groups that accept tax deductions from endorsing candidates. Erik Stanley, a legal adviser with the ADF, said the group would be sending copies of the sermons to the IRS and would be seeking a Supreme Court case. The law, he said, was unconstitutional because “being tax-exempt is part of freedom of religion; otherwise the government could tax churches out of existence.”

Minnesota reverend Gus Booth, who is participating in the protest, says he will be endorsing Senator McCain and has forbidden his congregation from voting for Senator Obama due to his position on abortion. He defended his actions, saying “I have a First Amendment right to say whatever I want to say.”

“Pulpit Freedom Sunday,” as the event is being called, has drawn criticism from both religious and secular groups.

A group of former IRS officials and pastors held a conference on September 8, submitting a complaint to the IRS and urging other ministers to preach against the endorsements. One of the participants, former director of the IRS Marcus Owens, says the group may be facing a loss of its own tax exempt status and compared it to teaching people how to cheat on taxes.

Americans United for Separation of Church and State and the IRS are monitoring the situation.

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His company recently sparked controversy after buying the rights to publish The Jewel of Medina, a work of fiction by Sherry Jones depicting the Muslim prophet Muhammad and his child bride, Aisha.

The bombing, which occurred in the early hours of Saturday morning, led to the evacuation of the £2.5 million property in Lonsdale Square. Three men, aged 22, 30 and 40, were arrested at 2:25am BST by armed officers, two in Lonsdale Square, and one after being stopped near Angel tube station.

Police comments suggested that the trio had been under surveillance, and that they had advance knowledge of the plot and simply waited for the arsonists to strike, before arresting them.

On Saturday, a woman was arrested for obstructing police during their searches of four addresses – two in Walthamstow, and two in Ilford and Forest Gate.

Speaking earlier this month, Mr Rynja said that “The Jewel of Medina has become an important barometer of our time. As an independent publishing company, we feel strongly that we should not be afraid of the consequences of debate.” Ms Jones commented that she did not intend for her novel to be offensive to Islam. She noted that she “[has] deliberately and consciously written respectfully about Islam and Muhammad.” She “envisaged that [her] book would be a bridge builder” between Islam and the western world.

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According to YouTube the 11 videos were removed by direct DMCA requests from Schaper. The videos have been reported to be of anti-Scientology protests, recorded by various members of the group Anonymous.

In early September, an entity named American Rights Counsel LLC — which has described itself as a ‘rights group’, but without provision of contact details — requested the removal from YouTube of over 4,000 anti-Scientology videos. Many of these videos consisted entirely of self-made content by anti-Scientology protesters; others were quite explicitly extracts from official Church of Scientology footage. Users had initially speculated that Schaper was responsible for these requests; no evidence, however, has been obtained to this effect, nor has official comment been obtained from American Rights Counsel.

When comment was requested further to these earlier removal requests, Schaper stated that he was a “… very strong advocate for the Church of Scientology, the religion of Scientology and a free speech advocate.” Schaper alleged that he had “…to this date no information about the American Rights Counsel” and “no connection, knowledge or involvement in this company [American Rights Counsel]“.

Wikinews contacted Schaper to find out why he made the new requests. According to him, the videos were not of protests against Scientology, but instead were videos of alleged hate-crimes and hate-speech, which were allegedly attacking Schaper personally.

“None of the videos are accounts of any protests. The videos in question have been produced by an YouTube (U.K.) user to directly attack me and my companies. I made the requests in accordance with YouTube’s terms and condition, after confirming directly with YouTube and the local ECTF office in Los Angeles, to remove material that infringes on my copyright. None of the videos removed by YouTube fall under the fair use guidelines or can be considered news-worthy. The content of the videos has been classified by law-enforcement as hate-speech and frivolous attack. The producers of these videos are based in the U.K. and local law-enforcement has been contacted by the FBI,” said Schaper to Wikinews.

When Wikinews asked Schaper if he was acting on behalf of the Church, Schaper denied any such involvement. He also stated that he was not attempting to remove videos critical of him, or the Church, but also emphasizes other videos still on YouTube that are “a personal attack against me and my beliefs.”

“Despite the fact that I am a Scientologist, none of the videos removed, where(sic) removed on behalf of the Church of Scientology or any organization associated with the church. In addition I like to point out that I have not removed any video, critical of me personally which does not violate my copyrights and I have no intention to do so,” said Schaper.

In addition, Wikinews invited Dr. Schaper to comment on the apparent discrepancy between his actions and his advocacy of free speech. Dr. Schaper feels that that the two stated aims are not in conflict, stating, “I believe the First Amendment but I also see how Anonymous tries to abuse these liberties. Not everything is protected under the free speech clause and laws have been enacted to protect each citizen from abuse.”

Schaper also stated that Anonymous is “breaking the law” by uploading material to YouTube which could be considered hate crimes. He also states that he would not mind a one-on-one conversation with some members of Anonymous, but “these guys don’t have the balls for a direct sit-down because they should get their facts straight.”

“Anonymous is overstating a case and claims that their abuse and online bullying would be protected under the First Amendment forgetting the fact that they indeed are breaking the laws,” added Schaper.

Schaper does not plan on enforcing the Church’s copyrights saying, “they can handle their own content” and that he “will continue to enforce my copyrights and seek full prosecution in cooperation with federal law-enforcement.”

Wikinews has contacted YouTube for a statement regarding this incident, but has yet to receive a response.

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The one page document, which Wikileaks confirms to be authentic, shows a list of individuals and passwords of those who have accounts on O’Reilly’s website, BillOReilly.com. The list, according to the document, contains at least 205 names, e-mail addresses, billing addresses and passwords of subscribers.

“The hack was a response to the pundit’s recent scurrilous attacks over the Sarah Palin’s email story–including on Wikileaks and other members of the press,” said Wikileaks in a statement on their website. According to the report, the security on O’Reilly’s website was “non existent”.

“I’m not going to mention the website that posted this, but it’s one of those despicable, slimy, scummy websites. Everybody knows where this stuff is, OK, and they know the people who run the website, so why can’t they go there tonight to the guy’s house who runs it, put him in cuffs and take him down and book him?,” said O’Reilly on his show, The O’Reilly Factor, on September 18.

Wikileaks recently published documents from Palin’s hacked Yahoo.com e-mail account. The documents had shown that Palin had been conducting matters pertaining to the public or government of Alaska over her private e-mail account.

In an exclusive statement to Wikinews, Wikileaks stated that they will only publish the single page, but also claim to have several more. Wikileaks also states that they have already received “three letters” from staff members employed by O’Reilly “requesting” Wikileaks to remove the document, which Wikileaks refuses to do.

“We simply cannot [remove the information]. The system, as per policy, is designed so that files can not be taken down, once up,” said a Wikileaks spokesperson.

Wikileaks Summary (edited):

Wikileaks has been informed the hack was a response to the pundit’s recent … attacks over the Sarah Palin’s email story…. Hacktivists… took control of O’Reilly’s main site, BillOReilly.com. According to our source, the security protecting O’Reilly’s site and subscribers was “non-existent”.

The following image, submitted to Wikileaks and confirmed by Wikileaks staff, offers proof of the hack. The image… obtained from BillOreilly.com’s administrative interface, shows a detailed list — including passwords — of BillOreilly.com subscribers. Although Wikileaks has only released one page, it must be assumed that Bill O’Reilly’s entire subscriber list is, as of now, in the public domain.

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YouTube has restored the accounts and reposted the videos removed under the DMCA takedown notice.

In an exclusive interview with Wikinews the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) acknowledged that they “don’t know anything about” the Counsel and that any attempt to intentionally commit fraud by filing false DMCA requests, could lead to criminal charges.

“We don’t know anything about this group. However, if these DMCA notices were sent improperly, there could be legal remedies. The particulars would depend on the particulars of the situation,” Rebecca Jeschke, a spokeswoman for the EFF, told Wikinews.

The EFF first broke the story regarding the requests. YouTube received the notice all at once, in a single request. When Wikinews asked the EFF if they knew the names or links to the material in question, they stated that they do not know the names and that they have not seen the notice filed with YouTube.

According to Jeschk, the “EFF fights abuse of the DMCA. …” but did not state where the EFF heard about the request.

“We have not seen the notices, merely heard about them [and] we don’t know enough to know if the DMCA has been abused here. However, only copyright holders can issue DMCA takedowns,” Jeschke said.

The EFF is investigating the incident, and it is not yet known who or what was behind the DMCA request. Some have speculated that the Counsel is a front for Scientology operated by a Dr. Oliver Schaper. In an exclusive interview with Wikinews, Schaper denied any involvement with the DMCA requests and also denied having any knowledge whatsoever of the Counsel.

“As many other people, and even members of the Church of Scientology received information about a company that removed anti-Scientology content from YouTube, shit hit the fan and members of Anonymous went on a full attack on me. I still have to this date no information about the American Rights Counsel and I have no connection, knowledge or involvement in this company which I have been informed of does not even exists,” Schaper said.

Producer of XenuTV Mark Bunker defends Schaper and does not believe he is responsible. Bunker also believes that the Counsel is a fraud and called the DMCA requests a crime.

“I next did a Google search for American Rights Counsel LLC which brought up absolutely no results so clearly this was fraud from the beginning. I had never heard of Schaper before he was accused of this. I don’t know anything about him other than he contacted me and said he was not involved. I don’t know who was responsible. 4000 deletions in a matter of hours is a pretty major feat. It would be worth a subpoena to find out who committed this crime,” Bunker said.

Currently the EFF does not represent any of the users or groups who were effected by the mass take-down.

In a related story, TheStandard.com is reporting that YouTube has begun reposting the videos and restoring accounts that were removed as a result of the takedown notice:

YouTube has yet to comment on the issue, and many of the accounts and videos pulled over the weekend have now been restored after those affected filed counter claims. However, the guilty-until-proven innocent method of dealing with notices like this may have to be re-evaluated. While filing a false DMCA notice is a criminal offense, prosecution in these cases rarely comes about.

related:

‘Rights group’ tries to have 4,000 anti-Scientology videos removed from YouTube

Church of Scientology in France accused of fraud; ordered to stand trial

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According to the report, the charges come from an unnamed woman, who in 1998 purchased nearly US$30,000 worth of Scientology self-help material which allegedly included prescription drugs. After a few months passed, the woman said she felt like she was being scammed. Following several complaints from other unnamed individuals and an investigation, judge Jean-Christophe Hullin ordered at least two Scientology departments and the seven Scientologists to be put on trial for fraud and “illegally practicing as pharmacists.”

The Church released a statement following the order saying that they felt “stigmatized” by the French judicial system.

“The special treatment reserved for the Church of Scientology Celebrity Center raises questions about the equality of the justice system and the presumption of innocence,” the Church said in a statement to the press.

The AFP says the case is to be heard at an unknown date, and will also include an investigation by France’s association for prescription drugs. Olivier Morice, a lawyer representing the unnamed woman and others in the case against the Church, say the trial could begin as early as 2009.

On September 5, an alleged rights group called the American Rights Counsel LLC attempted to have at least 4,000 anti-Scientology videos removed from the video sharing website YouTube, filing a DMCA request. Upon further investigation, Wikinews found that most videos and clips were added to YouTube by the copyright holders of the material; as DMCA requests are for the purposes of requesting removal where service providers host material that infringe on the copyright of the complainant, the merit of these requests remain questionable. It was also discovered that the alleged rights group does not exist as a physical entity which started rumors from the internet and from one Scientology critic Mark Bunker, that the Church fraudulently submitted the DMCA requests.

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Within the past 24 hours, according to the EFF, the Counsel “sent out over 4000 DMCA takedown notices to YouTube, all making copyright infringement claims against videos with content critical of the Church of Scientology.” A DMCA notice, or Digital Millennium Copyright Act notice means an attempt to limit the use of copyrighted material that is often infringing on the rights of an alleged copyright.

Wikinews made attempts to contact American Rights Counsel LLC for comment on the take-down notices, but was unable to obtain contact details for the alleged organisation. One post on a YouTube discussion page related to the organization states that they “do not appear to exist outside of these claims on YouTube.” Wikinews contacted YouTube several times asking them if they have a process of verifying DMCA requests from individuals or entities claiming copyright infringement, but when they responded, they directed Wikinews to their terms of service saying, “item 8 addresses the DMCA and 8 B addresses counter-notice procedures.”

YouTube’s terms of use in regarding filing DMCA requests states that only “A physical or electronic signature of a person authorized to act on behalf of the owner of an exclusive right that is allegedly infringed” can make such claims. It also goes on to say, “Identification of the copyrighted work claimed to have been infringed, or, if multiple copyrighted works at a single online site are covered by a single notification, a representative list of such works at that site.”

The EFF says the videos attempting to be removed had shown clips from Anonymous protests of the Church and news footage from Australia and Germany which were critical of Scientology. Some videos were also messages from Anonymous to Scientology, and vice versa. Others were also video clips from a City Commission meeting in Clearwater, Florida. Accounts hosting the material were “suspended by YouTube in response to multiple allegations of copyright infringement.”

YouTube does, however, have a process for users that wish to file a counter-notice against a take-down under the DMCA. After the DMCA notices were sent, YouTube users began to revolt, by sending “DMCA counter-notices” to YouTube. The EFF states that the counter attack resulted in many of the accounts being reinstated and their videos restored.

One user claimed that he had shot and uploaded one of the videos that was taken down. “How can someone else file a claim against a video I MADE?,” said ShadowVsScientology, one of the YouTube users who had a video deleted. Since he owned the rights to the video, he alleges that the American Rights Counsel had no legal grounds to request the its removal.

A video posted on YouTube by a user called ‘Church0fScientology’, which was responsible for the original ‘Message to Scientology’ in January of 2008 created after the Church had a video of a Tom Cruise interview removed from the site, states that the organization responsible for the DMCA’s is does not exist and is run by a man named Dr. Oliver Schaper. They state that he “fronts” the organization for Scientology. It also calls Schaper’s actions “deceptive”. Schaper also had an account on YouTube which has since been suspended. Wikinews obtained a cached version of his account page in which he states to the group Anonymous, “I respect your efforts as long your efforts remain within the limits of the law and remain fair. Although I don’t censor the any postings, I would appreciate if any conversation could remain civil and insult free.” Schaper also states that he “will not censor because I strongly believe in the freedom of speech.” They accuse him of running and owning media companies that distribute gay pornography, something Schaper later admits, but only that it’s an “adult television network.” Homosexuality is not accepted within the Church of Scientology and is not tolerated. Scientology believes that homosexuality is a disease and can be cured.

A user named “Oschaper” has written articles on the the online open-sourced encyclopedia Wikipedia about Peephole TV and Volksmusik TV. Oliver Schaper is the founder of Peephole TV, and is also involved with Volksmusik TV. In an e-mail to Wikinews, Wikipedia user Oschaper claims that his first name is Olaf, and that he is “not related” to Oliver Schaper. “Olaf” writes: “My name is Olaf Schaper and I use the handle oschaper on Wikipedia. I’m not related to Oliver Schaper and we share only the last name … If you like to contact Oliver Schaper please see his companies website at www.acos.tv”. When asked how he managed to get an e-mail address with that last name, Olaf replied, “I got the email because my best friend works for his networks hence the creation of my postings on Wikipedia.”

Wikinews contacted Schaper for exclusive comments. Schaper replied saying that he is a “very strong advocate for the Church of Scientology, the religion of Scientology and a free speech advocate” and “I don’t need to go into details but I felt that my family and myself have been direct targets and in an attempt to control the situation, I started to track down and remove online links between me and my religion. This included postings made by HouseSpiderAnon on his videos, who publicly connected the dots and made them available to a larger audience.”

“I requested several times to have my information removed from his videos as I wanted no association with his work but he refused, even after I stated several times that he has the right to protest but that I would like to enforce my right of privacy. He refused and demanded documentation of the attacks, something I refused because it was not my attention to allow more documents to be available online in public hand,” added Schaper who also said he has been a victim of identity theft and now has the FBI involved in investigating his claim.

“Tustin PD [police department] has been on the case and now the FBI is involved as well. Social Security has been notified and we have seen about 200 attempts to use the SSN [social security number] for fake credit cards applications,” Schaper told Wikinews

Schaper admits that he contacted YouTube to have videos which contained images of him that were being used without permission and videos which “which violated [his] privacy removed.” Those requests made by Schaper were eventually accepted by YouTube but “videos that contained just a text messages directed against me or my church remained,” he added. He also admits to owning “several broadcasting companies, ACOS Broadcasting Corp. (eight mainstream television and two radio networks) & Media House Enterprises, Inc. (adult television network PEEPHOLE TV).”

“I had the power to go fully against copyrighted material because we own or licensed large amounts of content. But it was not my responsibility to enforce all copyright violations on YouTube. In addition with the attacks on our servers, websites and infrastructure, no time would have been available to take on a fight,” added Schaper.

Schaper also denies any involvement with the alleged rights group and also states he was just notified that it doesn’t even exist.

“As many other people, and even members of the Church of Scientology received information about a company that removed anti-Scientology content from YouTube, shit hit the fan and members of Anonymous went on a full attack on me. I still have to this date no information about the American Rights Council and I have no connection, knowledge or involvement in this company which I have been informed of does not even exists,” Schaper told Wikinews.

Wikinews has also learned that a contributor on Wikipedia, claiming to be a member of Anonymous, has posted what is allegedly personal information of Schaper. The edit, made to the article Peephole TV states that he is a lawyer, employed with a firm on Ricklinger, Stadtweg in Hanover, Germany. It also stated that he is affiliated with the “Tustin Org” in California. In what seems to be a gathering of information on Schaper from other online sources, according to Enturbulation.org, the result of releasing the information has resulted in legal and physical threats from Schaper to someone, known as ‘HouseSpiderV2′ on Enturbulation, who has claimed to have released e-mail correspondents between him and Schaper.

“Don’t think I will not be able to track you down and serve you with papers. I would make the case so expensive for you that you would not be able to even fight this on your own funding as I have the money at my disposal,” allegedly states Schaper to ‘HouseSpiderV2′ in an e-mail. “You have 24 hours to remove the postings or I will start to make this a legal issue. That makes it simple,” he added.

Despite the claims that the Wikipedia contributor is Oliver Schaper, he claims to have never registered an account with Wikipedia. He also says he has never made any threats of physical harm to members of Anonymous.

“I had not the need to register an account with Wikipedia and after all this trouble will not get involved at all. There has never been any threat of violence against Housespideranon or any other member of Anonymous made by me,” Schaper told Wikinews.

Related:

Electronic Frontier Foundation
September 5th, 2008
Massive Takedown of Anti-Scientology Videos on YouTube
News Update by Eva Galperin

Over a period of twelve hours, between this Thursday night and Friday morning, American Rights Counsel LLC sent out over 4000 DMCA takedown notices to YouTube, all making copyright infringement claims against videos with content critical of the Church of Scientology. Clips included footage of Australian and German news reports about Scientology, A Message to Anonymous/Scientology , and footage from a Clearwater City Commission meeting. Many accounts were suspended by YouTube in response to multiple allegations of copyright infringement.

YouTube users responded with DMCA counter-notices. At this time, many of the suspended channels have been reinstated and many of the videos are back up. Whether or not American Rights Counsel, LLC represents the notoriously litigious Church of Scientology is unclear, but this would not be the first time that the Church of Scientology has used the DMCA to silence Scientology critics. The Church of Scientology DMCA complaints shut down the YouTube channel of critic Mark Bunker in June, 2008. Bunker’s account, XenuTV, was also among the channels shut down in this latest flurry of takedown notices.

Related Issues: DMCA, No Downtime for Free Speech Campaign

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Creative Commons Attribution 2.5

A backlash from global warming alarmists was to be expected. Someone was breaking their strangle-hold on telling the public what to believe. Someone was actually engaging them in public debate, without their permission or editorial control, and doing it well. In contrast to Al Gore’s “An Inconvenient Truth” (sic), The Great Global Warming Swindle featured interviews with real scientists and provided a more realistic analysis of data to back their claims. The alarmists’ claims that climate change is driven by human activity and that we’re headed for a major crisis were a fraud.

The alarmist camp filed 265 complaints with the UK regulatory agency for communications, Ofcom, plus a 176 page “group complaint” alleging 137 breaches (later reduced to 67) of the Ofcom code. Ofcom launched a 15 month investigation. In recent days, rumors have circulated that Ofcom would rule in favor of alarmists, “censuring” Channel 4, issuing a crushing blow to the further possibility of regulated media debate on the subject in the UK.

In their ruling however, Ofcom stated that Channel 4 was “on balance” and cleared it of “materially misleading the audience so as to cause harm or offence.”

The alarmists began the spin campaign immediately, accusing the regulator of letting the broadcaster off the hook “on a technicality.” Yes indeed, and a rather important technicality at that. People, including regulated broadcasters, have the right to disagree and to present evidence and argument even against the pseudo-religious rants of global warming alarmists. It’s a free speech thing. It makes no difference that the alarmists have invested heavily in their own propaganda campaign, gained the backing of influential politicians by promoting higher taxes, seated a committee at the UN, push their agenda with politically controlled research funding, secure corporate backing with legislative proposals that would increase profits at the expense of consumers, or that it seemed absolute control was within their grasp. In fact, those are all very strong reasons for open public debate.

Many of the blind followers in the alarmist camp will not understand any of the discussion that follows this ruling, including this opinion piece. The Great Global Warming Swindle is not a pseudo-bible for “deniers.” It was and still is, as Channel 4 claims, “a useful contribution to a timely debate.”

Those of us not aiming to secure control for the alarmist camp will, for example, possibly not pay much attention to some parts of Ofcom’s commentary. For example; Ofcom found that Sir David King, the government’s former chief scientist, had been misrepresented and that the Nobel prize-winning Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and Carl Wunsch, a professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, had been treated unfairly.

If individuals are treated unfairly in a broadcast, then let justice prevail. Individual justice is not unimportant. But let’s be fair and balanced ourselves. These rulings on individual fairness rest on the fact that the program did not provide the opportunity to respond, and that they misquoted. A complaint about stating the fact that the IPCC’s first report in 1990 falsely predicted “climatic disaster” was thrown out. Ofcom said, even without the opportunity for the IPCC to respond, this was “not unreasonable.” Of course it’s not unreasonable. Let me say it again: The Nobel prize-winning IPCC falsely predicted “climate disaster.” It’s an important fact that the public should know. This is what the debate is about. The IPCC was, and still is, wrong.

And what if the alarmists have a nitpick or two to rant about? It doesn’t decide the question that alarmists raise; whether humans are causing catastrophic global warming. It doesn’t settle the critical question answered in Ofcom’s ruling; whether British broadcasters are allowed to challenge global warming alarmist orthodoxy. The primary result of the ruling is extraordinarily important. The debate is allowed. Let’s get it on!

For those wishing to review Ofcom’s adjudication of the complaints: Ofcom Broadcast Bulletin, Issue number 114, 21 July 2008

The letter sent to Wikileaks demands that Wikileaks takes down the document immediately. In an exclusive statement given to Wikinews, however, Wikileaks said that “WikiLeaks will not remove the handbooks, which are of substantial interest to current and former Mormons. WikiLeaks will remain a place where people from around the world can safely reveal the truth.”

In another exclusive statement given to Wikinews, before the LDS incident, Wikileaks did say that if there was a substantial danger, Wikileaks would remove the documents from the site. “If aliens parked in orbit and said that they would obliterate the world if Wikileaks did not remove some document exposing them, would Wikileaks’ distributed file server operators remove the document in question? Of course, even though there is no mechanism to do this, everyone involved would work out how to .”

The letter notifying Wikileaks of the copyright infringement was sent by Berne S. Broadbent, president of Intellectual Reserve, which controls the intellectual property of the Mormon church.

On May 5, the Wikimedia Foundation received a copyright infringement claim from Intellectual Reserve. The infringement claim was addressed to Jimmy Wales, the designated agent of the Wikimedia Foundation, and requested that access to the link to Wikileaks be removed. Wikinews acted differently to Wikileaks after receiving the notice, as Wikinews took down the link soon after being made aware of the claim.

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– Mark Steyn on the Hugh Hewitt Show, June 5, 2008

Author and columnist Mark Steyn’s week-long trial for “hate speech” began in a British Columbia courtroom on June 2.

As previously reported in Pajamas Media, Steyn was accused of “flagrant Islamaphobia” after his bestselling book America Alone was excerpted in Canada’s oldest newsweekly magazine, Maclean’s, in 2006.

If found guilty by the British Columbia Human Rights Tribunal, Maclean’s could be ordered to stop publishing Steyn’s column, or other articles “likely” to expose Muslims to “hatred or contempt.” In other words, a magazine that’s been published for over a century in an ostensibly free Western nation will now be subject to state sanction and preemptive censorship. Canadian Human Rights Tribunals boast a 100% conviction rate on such “hate speech” cases, and have already handed down lifetime bans against the likes of Rev. Scott Boision. That Christian preacher is now forbidden for life from ever citing Bible verses regarding homosexuality in his sermons, or “in newspapers, by email, on the radio, in public speeches, or on the Internet.”

So Mark Steyn’s guilty verdict seems a fait accompli. As he predicted in May, his “career in Canada will be formally ended next month.”

Canada’s liberal mainstream media more or less shrugged. A veteran journalism professor condemned the “xenophobic” Steyn in an online forum for professional reporters, accusing Steyn of failing to express his opinions “in food [sic] faith,” then scolding prissily that “everyone must obey the law.”

With professors like that training journalists, it is no wonder that the state-run, taxpayer-funded CBC got the name of Steyn’s book wrong, their local reporters admitted they knew nothing about the case they’d been sent to cover, and rival outlet CTV published an amateurish, glorified book review in lieu of an objective, unbiased news report.

A couple of savvier columnists begged the Human Rights Commissions to come after them, to help boost their book sales.

The trial lasted five days, and Maclean’s own Andrew Coyne live blogged for, well, four and a half.

There will be no more live logging. As I left the courtroom for the lunch break [on Friday June 6], I was taken aside by a sheepish-looking court official, who said that he’d just learned that I had been “broadcasting” from inside the courtroom. So had I? Broadcasting, I said? I didn’t have a microphone, or a camera.

No, he explained: but live logging counts as broadcasting. It’s not the computer that’s the problem. You can type away on it all you want. If you step outside to send it, that’s okay, too. But if you send text from within the courtroom, that’s broadcasting.

Anyway, I gave him my solemn word that I would do no more broadcasting. What with the hearings being almost over and all. It seemed a fitting way to put a cap on the week.

Despite the national media’s general incompetence and indifference, many troubling or just plain bizarre developments during the trial made their way into the public record nevertheless:

• Steyn’s accusers called a deconstructionist Buffy the Vampire Slayer scholar as an expert witness.

• One of his accusers admitted under oath that he’d misrepresented his group’s initial demands to the media on numerous occasions.

• Websites that linked to the “offending” Maclean’s article — including U.S.-based sites like Free Republic and Catholic Answers — were proof of Steyn’s contagious “Islamophobia.” This led another Catholic website to ask: “Catholicism: A Hate Crime in Canada?” (A particular point of pride for this writer was one accuser’s testimony that my blog, FiveFeetOfFury.com, had been a particular source of “heat” he’d “felt” since he’d filed his complaint against Steyn.)

• Unable to refute Steyn’s statistics and facts, or to deny that the portions of the article they found most offensive were in fact chilling quotations made by radical Muslims themselves, Steyn’s accusers condemned his “tone,” use of “sarcasm,” and reliance upon “subtle intellectual arguments.”

Not a few bloggers noted ruefully that the last day of Steyn’s trial coincided with the anniversary of D-Day, and wondered what the Canadian men who’d died on Juno Beach would make of their nation today.

As for the outcome: no one knows when the Tribunal will issue its decision. As Andrew Coyne told National Review:

My hope is that it will go to appeal — in other words, I’m hoping that we lose this at the hearing level and that we appeal it to a proper court of law, as opposed to these quasi-judicial tribunals, and at that proper court of law that we make the constitutional argument that this is an infringement of our charter rights to freedom of the press. I believe that’s what we’ll do if we lose the case.

Steyn agrees. Echoing many of his supporters, he told reporters:

We want to lose so we can take it to a real court and if necessary up to the Supreme Court of Canada and we can get the ancient liberties of free-born Canadian citizens that have been taken away from them by tribunals like this.

We want those ancient civil liberties restored.

Musing on his surreal circumstances, Steyn wrote in what may be one of his last columns for Maclean’s:

By the way, I see I’ve been nominated for a National Magazine Award, to be handed out later this month. By then, Mr. Joseph [the complainants’ lawyer] will have succeeded in getting the B.C. troika effectively to ban me from Maclean’s and from all Canadian journalism. An impressive achievement. My book was a No. 1 bestseller in Canada, and the new paperback edition was at No. 4 the other day, and President Bush, Vice President Cheney, Governor Mitt Romney, Senator Joe Lieberman, Senator Jon Kyl, and (at last count) six European prime ministers have either recommended the book or called me in to discuss its themes.

But in Canada it’s a hate crime.

Kathy Shaidle blogs at Five Feet of Fury. She is co-author of a forthcoming book on Canada’s Human Rights Commissions.

“I think we can say with a reasonable degree of confidence that it was a suicide attack,” said Tariq Pervez, the director-general of the Pakistani Federal Investigation Agency (FIA).

The bomb forced the closure of the Danish embassy, as well as those of Norway and the Netherlands, which were nearby.

While no group has claimed responsibility, the Danish national security intelligence agency PET has concluded that al-Qaeda was behind the attack. “Extremists can be inspired by the attack in Pakistan,” said PET’s director, Jakob Scharf in a statement.

“We are just trying to find any clue, any evidence,” Pakistani investigator Muhammad Mustafa said to the Associated Press. “You know yesterday it was panic here. Usually we miss important things in panic.”

“Samples have been sent to the laboratory to determine what type of explosive was used,” said Mohammad Ashraf Shah, who is in charge of the investigation. Investigators have found that the car with the bomb was a Toyota Corolla, which bore diplomatic license plates.

“One can of course only condemn it, it’s terrible that terrorists commit such acts,” said Per Stig Møller, the Foreign Minister of Denmark, on TV 2 television.

“It was to be expected that they would do something,” said Ikram Sehgal to Reuters, referring to Ayman al-Zawahiri’s recent video encouraging attacks against Denmark over the Jyllands-Posten Muhammad cartoons controversy.

“I urge and incite every Muslim who can harm Denmark to do so in support of the prophet, God’s peace and prayers be upon him, and in defense of his honorable stature,” Ayman al-Zawahri said in a video which became public on April 21.

“This attack was not linked to any event in the country or the region, rather it was part of widespread outrage throughout the Islamic world against publishing blasphemous caricatures,” a local official told Daily Times, adding that it would not affect Pakistani negotiations with “local” Taliban, which is considered separate from the Taliban in Afghanistan.

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According to the newspaper, all three were subjected to electric shock, asphyxiated with plastic bags, and beaten several times.

The next morning, they were released by their captors under threat of death if made any denounces. Prior to that, however, the reporter managed to send text and photos to the newsroom, by email from a wireless computer.

The kidnapping and torture happened on May 14 to 15, but the news organization decided to postpone its printing for safety reasons. The heads of police and public security in the state government, however, had been immediately informed. The story was only printed today, as the denounce came to public, after officials assured the primary investigations had begun and those held responsible were already identified.

The identities and whereabouts of the news workers are being kept under secret.

According to the story as it was printed, the kidnappers insisted they were not criminals, but policemen who were acting “ahead of justice”. They are said to govern the community under a “reign of terror”, by imposing curfews, banning funk parties, and charging dwellers and small business for “protection”.

The same militiamen also have a scheme to elect politicians committed with them, by making lists of voters who live in each favela, with name and electoral registry number for each one, and barring other candidates from campaigning within the neighborhood. Connection with Christian (Neo-Pentecostalist) churches were also cited.

The case brought calls for defense on press freedom and safety for reporters by journalists and civil rights entities in Brazil.

“At the moment when journalists are doing their job in a favela, to take information to society, and they are brutally tortured, it puts democracy under jeopardy”, José Carlos Torves, board member of National Federation of Journalists (FENAJ), said.

“For the Brazilian Press Association (ABI), besides the uncomfortable solidarity we think we must offer to these fellows, there is also the need to claim from authorities, from the State, the strict investigation of such facts”, demanded the chairman of such entity, Maurício Azêdo.

The board of O Dia said they will be taking this case to the annual congress of the World Association of Newspapers, held this week in Sweden.

Low-income communities in Rio de Janeiro are generally ruled by bands of drug lords since mid-1970s, a situation which has continuously deteriorating since then. Heavily armed drug dealers have taken control in most favelas of Brazil’s second largest city, where their power often overrules that of the government.

In reaction, over the last several years such ‘militias’ have been formed to counter these mafias. Groups of former police officers, firemen, private security agents and civil servants vow to fight drug traffic, but impose the same kind of violent methods against the local population.

“It’s worrying to know, according to these professionals account, that there would be police officers involved. This is really serious. It’s unacceptable”, said Wadih Damous, from the Brazilian Bar of Lawyers (OAB).

Organized crime in Rio is known for extreme violence and cruelty. On June 2nd, 2002, a reporter for TV Globo (the main broadcaster in Brazil) was also kidnapped and killed while working on a story about sex exploitation of children in another favela. According to the police, Tim Lopes was taken by drug dealers, tortured, burned alive, then had his body quartered. He was 52 years old. The killers, known as Elias Maluco and Ratinho, were later arrested and sentenced to more than 30 years in prison.

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Individuals from the group Anonymous have held monthly international protests against the Church of Scientology since February, as part of the anti-Scientology movement Project Chanology. The Project Chanology movement began when the Church of Scientology attempted to get a leaked Scientology promotional video featuring Tom Cruise removed from websites YouTube and Gawker.com.

Members of Anonymous were motivated by the actions of the Church of Scientology, and bombarded Scientology websites and were successful in taking some of them down. Anonymous later changed tactics towards legal measures, and held international protests against Scientology on February 10, March 15, April 12, and most recently May 10. Localized protests have also been held in various cities in between the international protests.

The May 10 London protest took place near St Paul’s Cathedral at the Church of Scientology’s headquarters on Queen Victoria Street. The 15-year-old boy’s poster read: “Scientology is not a religion, it is a dangerous cult”. City of London Police approached the boy at the May 10 protest and cited section five of the Public Order Act 1986, which deals with “harassment, alarm or distress”. In response, the boy cited a 1984 judgment given by Mr. Justice Latey in the Family Division of the High Court of Justice of Her Majesty’s Courts of Justice of England and Wales, in which Latey called Scientology a “cult” and said it was “corrupt, sinister and dangerous”.

In the actual 1984 judgment made by Judge Latey, he stated: “Scientology is both immoral and socially obnoxious. [...] In my judgment it is corrupt, sinister and dangerous. [...] It is dangerous because it is out to capture people, especially children and impressionable young people, and indoctrinate and brainwash them so that they become the unquestioning captives and tools of the cult, withdrawn from ordinary thought, living and relationships with others.” The boy told fellow protesters he was not going to take the sign down, saying: “If I don’t take the word ‘cult’ down, here [holding up his sign], I will be either, I think, most likely arrested or [given] a summons. I am going to fight this and not take it down because I believe in freedom of speech, besides which I’m only fifteen.”

When the boy refused to take his sign down, City of London Police removed it, cited him with a court summons and informed him that the matter would be referred to the Crown Prosecution Service. The boy was the only protester who did not comply with the police requests to remove signs which referred to Scientology as a “cult”. According to The Guardian, a CPS spokesman stated that: “In consultation with the City of London police, we were asked whether the sign, which read ‘Scientology is not a religion it is a dangerous cult’, was abusive or insulting. Our advice is that it is not abusive or insulting and there is no offensiveness, as opposed to criticism, neither in the idea expressed nor in the mode of expression. No action will be taken against the individual.”

“The CPS review of the case includes advice on what action or behavior at a demonstration might be considered to be threatening, abusive or insulting. The force’s policing of future demonstrations will reflect this advice,” said a spokeswoman for the City of London Police in a statement in The Guardian.

Shami Chakrabarti, director of Liberty, voiced concerns about the actions of the City of London Police, as did James Welch, legal director of Liberty. Liberty represented the 15-year-old boy to the City of London Police. Chakrabarti told The Guardian Wednesday that Liberty is looking into the matter and may file a complaint with the Independent Police Complaints Commission if it is determined that the City of London Police has a policy on appropriate wording on protest signs which relate specifically to anti-Scientology protests. Freedom of speech campaigners may also call for a judicial review of the legality of the protest guidelines of the City of London Police.

“Curtailing people’s freedom of speech is a very serious issue and it’s important to know whether this is part of the force’s policy or a decision relating specifically to the Church of Scientology. There is the possibility of a complaint to the IPCC or a judicial review,” said Chakrabarti in a statement Wednesday in The Guardian. “Some people are very easily intimidated and will be put off exercising their right to free speech by the thought that they may face court action over it. We have to defend that right and show how wrong the police were in issuing this summons.”

Protesters in Scotland that routinely gather to protest against the Church of Scientology outside the Scientology center in South Bridge, Edinburgh contacted the City of Edinburgh Council in order to get the Council’s input on using the word “cult” on signs at anti-Scientology protests.

In a statement in The Scotsman on Tuesday, an Edinburgh County official said: “I understand that some of the signs you use may display the word ‘cult’ and there is no objection to this.” The Scotsman reported that a representative for the Lothian and Borders Police said that the Scotland police force had “no issue” with the use of the word “cult” in a peaceful protest. A representative for Liberty spoke positively of the position taken by the City of Edinburgh Council. “The leadership shown by the City of Edinburgh Council’s decision to protect free speech is a positive step,” said Liberty media director Jen Corlew in a statement Tuesday in The Scotsman.

The City of London Police has faced controversy in the past for its close association with the Church of Scientology. When the City of London Scientology building opened in 2006, City of London Chief Superintendent Kevin Hurley praised Scientology in an appearance as guest speaker at the building’s opening ceremony. Ken Stewart, another of the City of London’s chief superintendents, has also appeared in a video praising Scientology. According to The Guardian over 20 officers for the City of London Police have accepted gifts from the Church of Scientology including tickets to film premieres, lunches and concerts at police premises.

Unlike the City of London Police, the Metropolitan Police Service (the territorial police force responsible for Greater London excluding the City of London) has not raised an issue with protesters using placards with similar wording at protests against Scientology, according to The Guardian and Londonist.

Film and television actor Jason Beghe visited a protest organized by members of Project Chanology on Thursday in New York, New York. Beghe joined Scientology in 1994, and gave US$1 million to the Church of Scientology over the course of his membership with the organization. He told Roger Friedman of FOX News that Scientology head David Miscavige called him “the poster boy for Scientology”. Beghe appeared in promotional videos for Scientology in 2005. In April 2008 he left Scientology, and contacted Scientology critic Andreas Heldal-Lund, who put him in touch with another critic Mark Bunker. Bunker arranged an interview with Beghe, which was uploaded to Bunker’s YouTube account on April 7. The posted video is a 3-minute portion of a larger 3-hour interview with Beghe about his criticism of Scientology. In the video Beghe states: “Scientology is destructive and a rip-off. … It’s very, very dangerous for your spiritual, psychological, mental, emotional health and evolution.”

Beghe participated in the May 10 international protests against the Church of Scientology, attending the protest in Los Angeles. He met with fellow Scientology critic and former Scientologist Lawrence Wollersheim and spoke with members of Project Chanology.

Approximately 50 people attended the Thursday protest outside the Church of Scientology of New York building on East 46th Street in New York City. Beghe met with individuals from the group Anonymous and expressed support for what they were doing. “What you guys are doing means so much to me, and so much to these people … It just kills me. It makes me want to cry. You don’t know what kind of good you’re doing,” said Beghe to the protesters.

After meeting with the protesters, Beghe walked across the street to the Church of Scientology building but was blocked from entering by three men standing outside the building. Beghe told The Village Voice that he believes these individuals were not Scientologists but hired private security guards. He said to the guards “I paid a million dollars, and I want to go in,” but was told to go back across the street. When he rejoined the protesters on the other side of the street he called the Church of Scientology asking to speak to the president of the Church of Scientology of New York, John Carmichael, but said “they hung up”. According to a blog post at The Village Voice website, Carmichael was caught on video at an anti-Scientology protest held in New York City on Monday telling a protester: “Let me tell you this: I smell pussy,” and then addressed an individual protester and said: “You in particular.” According to The Village Voice blog post, the incident occurred after protesters prevented Carmichael from capturing images of them and identifying them, by shining a flashlight at his camera.

Each of the Project Chanology international protests against Scientology has had a theme: the February protest called attention to the birthday of Lisa McPherson, who died under controversial circumstances while under the care of Scientology, the March protest was arranged to take place two days after Scientology founder L. Ron Hubbard’s birthday, the April protest highlighted the Church of Scientology’s disconnection policy, and the May protest highlighted the Scientology practice of “Fair Game” and took place one day after the anniversary of the publication of Hubbard’s book Dianetics: The Modern Science of Mental Health. Another international protest is planned for June 14, and will highlight the Church of Scientology’s elite “Sea Organization” or “Sea Org”.

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Creative Commons Attribution 2.5

Individuals from the group Anonymous have held monthly international protests against the Church of Scientology since February, as part of the anti-Scientology movement Project Chanology. The Project Chanology movement began when the Church of Scientology attempted to get a leaked Scientology promotional video featuring Tom Cruise removed from websites YouTube and Gawker.com.

Members of Anonymous were motivated by the actions of the Church of Scientology, and bombarded Scientology websites and were successful in taking some of them down. Anonymous later changed tactics towards legal measures, and held international protests against Scientology on February 10, March 15, April 12, and most recently May 10.

City of London Police approached the 15-year-old boy at the May 10 protest and cited section five of the Public Order Act 1986, which deals with “harassment, alarm or distress”. In response, the boy cited a 1984 judgment given by Mr. Justice Latey in the Family Division of the High Court of Justice of Her Majesty’s Courts of Justice of England and Wales, in which Latey called Scientology a “cult” and said it was “corrupt, sinister and dangerous”. In the actual 1984 judgment made by Judge Latey, he stated: “Scientology is both immoral and socially obnoxious. [...] In my judgment it is corrupt, sinister and dangerous. [...] It is dangerous because it is out to capture people, especially children and impressionable young people, and indoctrinate and brainwash them so that they become the unquestioning captives and tools of the cult, withdrawn from ordinary thought, living and relationships with others.” The boy told fellow protesters he was not going to take the sign down, saying: “If I don’t take the word ‘cult’ down, here [holding up his sign], I will be either, I think, most likely arrested or [given] a summons. I am going to fight this and not take it down because I believe in freedom of speech, besides which I’m only fifteen.”

When the boy refused to take his sign down, City of London Police removed it, cited him with a court summons and informed him that the matter would be referred to the Crown Prosecution Service. The boy was the only protester who did not comply with the police requests to remove signs which referred to Scientology as a “cult”. According to The Guardian, a CPS spokesman stated Friday that: “In consultation with the City of London police, we were asked whether the sign, which read ‘Scientology is not a religion it is a dangerous cult’, was abusive or insulting. Our advice is that it is not abusive or insulting and there is no offensiveness, as opposed to criticism, neither in the idea expressed nor in the mode of expression. No action will be taken against the individual.”

“The CPS review of the case includes advice on what action or behavior at a demonstration might be considered to be threatening, abusive or insulting. The force’s policing of future demonstrations will reflect this advice,” said a spokeswoman for the City of London Police in a statement in The Guardian.

The 15-year-old boy’s mother called the CPS decision a “victory for free speech”, saying: “We’re all incredibly proud of him. We advised him to take the placard down when we realized what was happening but he said ‘No, it’s my opinion and I have a right to express it’.”

The incident has generated significant interest on the Internet, from civil rights groups and anti-cult groups, and in the press. Shami Chakrabarti, director of Liberty, and Ian Haworth of the United Kingdom-based Cult Information Centre were highly critical of the actions of the City of London Police. George Pitcher of The Daily Telegraph called the actions of the City of London Police “a mockery of the law”. Other publications also criticized the actions of the police, compared the boy to past civil rights protesters, and analyzed how the characterization of “cult” applied to Scientology. The Guardian reported that human rights activists “were outraged” when reports of the actions of the City of London Police at the protest surfaced this week. Marina Hyde wrote in a comment piece in The Guardian that the City of London Police should spend a little less time “reaching for the collar of free-speaking children”. An article in The Guardian about the boy’s court summons hit the front page of the website Slashdot on Wednesday, and an article about the statement by CPS hit the site’s front page on Friday. The anti-Scientology website Enturbulation.org devoted its front page to the incident on Saturday.

BBC News reported that attorneys for Liberty represented the 15-year-old boy to the CPS. In media statements Friday, Liberty said it would continue its inquiry into the actions of the City of London Police. “The police may have ended their inquiries into this tawdry incident but rest assured that Liberty’s inquiry will continue. Democracy is all about clashing ideas and the police should protect peaceful protest, not stifle it,” said James Welch, legal director at Liberty. “Reason has prevailed in the case of the anti-Scientology protester”, wrote Welch in a comment piece in The Observer. According to The Press Association, Liberty’s inquiry may result in actions taken against the City of London Police.
Protesters and police in London at the April 12, 2008 Project Chanology international protest against Scientology Image: James Harrison.

The City of London Police has faced controversy in the past for its close association with the Church of Scientology. When the City of London Scientology building opened in 2006, City of London Chief Superintendent Kevin Hurley praised Scientology in an appearance as guest speaker at the building’s opening ceremony. Ken Stewart, another of the City of London’s chief superintendents, has also appeared in a video praising Scientology. According to The Guardian over 20 officers for the City of London Police have accepted gifts from the Church of Scientology including tickets to film premieres, lunches and concerts at police premises.

Unlike the City of London Police, the Metropolitan Police Service (the territorial police force responsible for Greater London excluding the City of London) has not raised an issue with protesters using placards with similar wording at protests against Scientology, according to The Guardian and Londonist.

Each of the Project Chanology international protests against Scientology has had a theme: the February protest called attention to the birthday of Lisa McPherson, who died under controversial circumstances while under the care of Scientology, the March protest was arranged to take place two days after Scientology founder L. Ron Hubbard’s birthday, the April protest highlighted the Church of Scientology’s disconnection policy, and the May protest highlighted the Scientology practice of “Fair Game” and took place one day after the anniversary of the publication of Hubbard’s book Dianetics: The Modern Science of Mental Health. Another international protest is planned for June 14, and will highlight the Church of Scientology’s elite “Sea Organization” or “Sea Org”.

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Creative Commons Attribution 2.5

The case Lennon v Premise Media was filed by Yoko Ono, Julian Lennon, Sean Lennon, and EMI Blackwood Music, Inc. against Premise Media, C&S Production, and Rocky Mountain Pictures in United States District Court for the Southern District of New York on April 23, 2008 alleging copyright infringement concerning John Lennon’s song “Imagine”. Premise is being represented by Anthony Falzone of the Fair Use Project.

EMI filed its own separate lawsuit against Premise in a New York state court alleging that Premise’s usage of the song is harming EMI’s ability to license “Imagine,” which has only been licensed in one film (The Killing Fields).

In court, Judge Richard Lowe, according to the Wall Street Journal, “seemed skeptical” about Falzone’s arguments. Lowe asked Falzone why the film’s producers did not read the lyrics to the song or flashed the lyrics on the screen. Lawyers also pointed out that Premise Media licensed all other music in the film except for Lennon’s song. At the end of the hearing Lowe “decided to stay the original TRO pending his ruling, which means that “Expelled,” currently playing in theaters around the country, cannot be reproduced or otherwise distributed.”

The judge promised a quick decision since the film will debut in Canada on June 6 and DVD rights must be finalized by the end of May for October distribution.

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