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Originally Posted by The_Jazz
RB - The use of the "*" or an auditory "beep" negates your argument. It is possible to discuss the use of the word without naming the word itself. Hairs are split. The slippery slope is oiled.
It seems that you are arguing that this became a story because people got offended. If so, that seems to be incredibly self-evident. It was intended to offend. If not, the word wouldn't have been used. Your mythical *they* includes the entirety of the population that is not the editor. Clearly you and I have no problem with the word - we've used it freely in this thread. Your *they* subset, however, does not end with us. *They* have the right to protect themselves from what they think is unwarranted use. While *they* all knows what the word is, it is possible to dicuss it's use without actually using it.
Whether or not this paper is major media smells of a red herring. They publish their paper for students, some of whom are minors and some of whom are most certainly local high schoolers. It is also sold without proof of ID. Either this is media or not, which makes them responsible to the community standards. Like it or not, they must abide by that. The courts have always upheld that test.
No one's speech was reduced here. It was said. Advertisers pulled their money. The paper suffered for it. Exactly where does the First Amendment really come in to play here? No where that I can see.
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I really don't think this is the state of the law. I'd like to know, I'm not claiming I do. But when you are referring to rights not to hear something over the public airwaves, that is a different animal than print media. And in so far as decency laws are concerned, I *believe* they apply to publications rather than print news sources. And I *think* that our courts have differentiated between classes of speech and afforded a number of tests of constitutionality of suppressing them. Political speech and in particular, print news, has traditionally fallen under the most protected speech.
Which begs the question?
What kind of right is a "right" if methods to suppress are sloughed off as consequences?
How does losing one's job or wages *not* constitute censorship?
Perhaps we should start at "What is censorship?"
I think that if someone wanted to have a "proper" response to this piece it would have been to ignore it or enjoy it. Of course corporations are *fully* within their rights and even may have an expectation to react and pull their ads. They are, after all, responsible to a different party altogether: the consumer.
But what should *not* happen are people making excuses for what shall and shall not formally be considered censorship, when the responses are specifically and solely intended to suppress the speech. Those responses are what I imagine the editorial intended to bring out in order to highlight the ludicrous response of tazering things we don't want to hear (or the people who voice them).
It wasn't brilliant expression by any means, but I don't think it needed to be to test the point they wanted made. They basically took a nonsense word, one loaded with symbolism in this country, and placed it next to the president's name.
What if they had wrote "Hang Bush"?
EDIT: BoR, at first blush that second case *does* appear to violate their 2nd amendment rights. So *I* wouldn't agree to what I think your unspoken premise is. That said, I've already pointed out different classes of speech (eg, political, religious, commercial) have been protected at different levels. So I'd think gun laws (on campus, in courthouses, public spaces) follow the same trend. From my understanding, the Supremes have always balanced what they feel the "value" of the right against the potential "harm" it could produce. So we end up with valid (or at least reasonable?) limitations on gun toting and reasonable limitations on scaring the shit out of people in crowded theaters.