Awful French Court Case re: Free Speech

[HDPM]

Check out this story. web page (http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/entertainment/2349879.stm) This really makes you wake up and take notice of Americans' freedom of speech. While France is a lefty bureaucracy and really weird politically, I thought they were freer than this article indicates. This is very scary that you can be jailed for saying Islam is a stupid religion. It is good the guy was acquitted, but awful he was tried in the first place. I mean if you can't criticize religions, what can you criticize? Also, why couldn't he say he thought Muslims were idiots? I understand given France's track record they might want to ban calls to genocide, but come on.

[Boris]

The French have a huge guilt complex about the holocaust. There is a feeling that maybe they rolled over for Hitler in order to save their own ass. Also, there is a ton of racism in France against Arabs so maybe the thought police are a bit over sensitive to anything that might be deemed a racial slur. Based on my experience in the country, I would say that Arabs in France are treated worse than Blacks in the US. My observations are based on having spent alot of time in France and having conversations with French WWII veterans.

[Clarkmeister]

[brad]

i got news for you, here in america we're very close to that already, although punishment is not (yet) meted out in the courts here.

by the way, ive got a whole new strategy for dealing with bureaucrats - when they start yelling at me (which is common when i deal with them, although i never raise my voice) im simply going to say something like, you know, i realize your obviously anti-semitic, i mean its been going on for thousands of years and i dont expect it to just stop right away, but you know, if we could just stick to the issue here ...

heh. they really have no defense to that.

[andyfox]

The article said he was cleared of "race hate," but didn't say what law he was accused of breaking. It would be interesting to know the wording of the law.

My thoughts about the French are roughly equivalent to those of Robin Williams.

[Jimbo]

Brad,

Would you please outline your justification for this statement? "i got news for you, here in america we're very close to that already, although punishment is not (yet) meted out in the courts here."

Seems to me we are very far away from such a comparison.

Jimbo

[brad]

well what can i say? i guess it was a good idea for the US to supply north korea with all that nuclear stuff. look at the good use they put it to.

[brad]

hate crime. hate speech. etc.