Wednesday, April 04, 2007

Free Speech

I don't think Americans realize how good they have it. 99% of the time if they want to say it, an American can say it.

Our 1st Amendment cases are much of the time extreme compared to other countries:
In America if you burn your draft card on the steps of courthouse during a time of war, you might go to jail for a bit. In China, in a time of peace, you might get shot or run over by a tank.
In America nothing is sancrosanct when a comedian performs an act. In United Arab Emirates, the comedian has to provide a transcript of the act so that someone can edit it out.
In America we watch and laugh at a show that presents our President as a complete idiot (let's sidestep the obvious). And most recently, in Thailand they block an entire website for relatively weak mockery of a ruler.

I know many people are currently unhappy with a lot of American government policy, and hopefully that will change. But, it is helpful to remember sometimes how truly different the freedoms we take absolutely for granted are not even tasted by other people of the world.

1 comment:

Disseminated said...

You know who it sucks to be? Germans. Particularly Germans who like videogames.

The gov't culture is still so set in atonement mode that they legislate so much censorship against violent media.

Anyway, my point is, GOOD POINT! We really should be more aware of just how good we have it here, even compared to other "1st world" contries.