The First Amendment:
"Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances."
Supreme court crushes law against animal cruelty videos and photos
Which one of the protections of the First Amendment covers Dog Fighting? Which one covers crushing small animals to death?
Free Speech you say? What then, do these activities say? If they "say" something, could the something not be said and not shown?
If a person where to release a book, video, podcast what have you extolling the virtues of watching two dogs maul each other to death I would not dream of trying to suppress such a publication. Likewise, I would not endeavor to suppress anyone from expressing the opinion that crushing small animals to death is a legitimate form of sexual arousal. It is the act of doing these things that is reprehensible and, in fact, criminal. We have existing laws against animal cruelty just as we have criminal laws against murder. Selling a video of someone being murdered is illegal, is it not? Why then should selling a video of someone committing an act of animal cruelty not be considered a criminal act?
I am not a vegetarian and I understand the concept of nature "red in tooth and claw" but this is willfully causing prolonged pain and suffering and exploiting that suffering for money. I don't see how this could have been the intention of the framers.
Enlighten me.
5 comments:
In reading more about the decision it seems like it is striking down a very poorly written law that could be used against things like hunting magazines. Theoretically, this should make it more likely for Congress to pass a law that is better targeted towards crush videos and dogfight videos.
However, I did not know that there was a market for videos of crushing small animals. WTF?
Theoretically. You know, CGI is so good these days, couldn't we just crush a CGI squirrel instead? I mean that prehistoric squirrel from Ice Age has it coming anyway.
Marge, I agree with you -- in theory. In theory, communism works. In theory.
Freedom of speech is somewhat of an American ideal or supposed pillar of American life such that restrictions on speech are rarely tolerated by the courts. You can debate if it's such a great thing, but at least they're pretty consistent. The idea is that if you don't like crush video, don't buy them, or better yet, speak about how bad they are and try to convict the people who make them using cruelty to animal laws.
Post a Comment