Posts by BenWilson
Last ←Newer Page 1 2 3 4 5 Older→ First
-
Is it? That looks like a guess. Regardless, I didn't say it didn't have a lot of caveats. That just indicates it’s a broad, complex notion that brings up many situations for qualifiers. The principal itself (sans whatever justified caveats there may be) is an important right that you (should) need strong justification to override. (Whereas, the right to wear “a particular item of clothing in a particular place” in itself might not be that high on the rights scale.)
(As an aside, I don’t see all the examples you used as direct “freedom of expression” caveats. Of the ones that are, most are clearly justified, and at least one is pretty much an anachronism.)
It's an opinion, rather than a guess, that freedom of expression is one of the rights that has the most exceptions. Those exceptions are usually caused by the fact that rights often conflict with other rights and resolution is needed, and freedom of expression gives way frequently to other rights and considerations. I gave a number of examples. There are plenty heaps more.
All that said, in this case, I personally don't think that wearing gang patches is a sensible 'expression' to override. However, now that it's happening, I am open to see the evidence that it could actually help. That way at least something useful might come from this particular round of Laws-induced-idiocy.
-
Which, um, leaves tax and secrecy.
Or it's a publicity stunt. Which is working. Which one would motivate Slater more? Publicity, avoiding 4/5 fuckall tax, or keeping a secret (which he has told everyone to look into)? As he's a full-time shit-stirrer, my money's on publicity. Perhaps Kate was going to Belize for a holiday anyway, wanted some practice at setting up a shonky international organization, and managed to find some completely lame use for it, which she appears to be dissociating from even now. Perhaps the invitation to the blogosphere to look into it is really just a lazy person's way of finding out what can be hidden in this manner. Perhaps perhaps perhaps.
-
I think the Belize thing is more likely a gimmick to give an air of mystery to something as pedestrian as Slater and CactusKate blogging together. Now it's an international mystery, rather than just a mystery why they bothered.
-
LOL their tag cloud has "Pinko" as the biggest word.
-
It would appear that "blocks" has a different meaning for headline writers than it has for myself.
Maybe it's a bad pun. Blocks could be like a 'block of land'. Try reading "Navy block's green-finger granny", and it's got a whole new meaning from one apostrophe. But it made you read the article, huh? Personally I skipped it on account of precognition that the article would bear small resemblance to the heading and it would most likely be a human interest story.
-
Who'da thunkit.
Most definitely not me. I read it waiting for a journalistic not even ow but it didn't come? WTF?
WTF indeed. I'm getting a whiff of a born-again-Maori.
-
Like I said, there's a great deal that can't be said. I'd appreciate readers who might know some of it not saying it here ...
Mum's the word. To be precise: Dumb's the word.
-
Sounds like a good show tonight. Most sporting of you to let Baldock see what he was in for beforehand - I'm willing to bet it made for a much more sensible discussion.
The suppression of many details in this case is very unfortunate - it could, after all, show what a jury is capable of finding reasonable. Without detail it sounds pretty unreasonable, but the devil is in the details. Protecting the kids takes priority, though.
The law is different now, though, and every abuse could be a new case. If Timaru Lady is still at it, she could be busted. She won't even have the referendum as an excuse, since that was limited to smacking.
-
As a human right, freedom of expression is not well down the list. It's right up top.
Not really. It's probably the one most subject to caveats of all. You can't, for instance, get away with slandering people, breaching various court infomation suppression orders, copying other people's work without permission, showing other people's trademarks without permission, make claims on all sorts of products without evidence, use obscene language in public, incite a riot, tell people inside information, etc, etc, etc. And those are just during peace time.
-
Breaching someone's human rights on the basis of who they associate with, not their behaviour in the instance, is the hallmark of facism not liberalism.
No arguments there. Just caveats. Human rights are slippery beasts, and the ban on patches is not a ban on association. It's a ban on wearing a particular item of clothing in a particular place. As a human right, that's well down the list. I still think it's a right, it's just quite a weak one.
Last ←Newer Page 1 … 857 858 859 860 861 … 1066 Older→ First