What does this phrase means??  

hard to know precisely what they mean without the context, but I'd GUESS that it means:  "there is no such thing as the first amendment online - free speech is at the sole discretion of any individual site's administration"

I remember when head-fi tv first started a member from China asked for the videos to be made into pod-casts because he was not able to access youtube.  Clearly the concept of free speech did not apply in this instance for this member or for Jude cause the video was censored in China simply for being uploaded to youtube.  So basically free speech only exists on the internet where it exists in the real world.  

It most likely refers to the multiple jurisdictions out there. The First Amendment only applies to the United States and its possessions. It would not be applicable to sites hosted in other countries.

Sort of moot, though, since the First Amendment applies to acts of the United States government. A privately-owned website in the US is not subject to the First Amendment.

Yes, that includes Head-Fi. The TOS spells out the rules.

 

The 14th Amendment also extends the Bill of Rights to all other levels of government in the US.  It's been interpreted to include State government, Local governments, school boards, and anything else that can be considered "governance", even including political speech in the workplace.

 

But by any stretch, HeadFi is a private website and cannot really be called governance.

 

The 14th Amendment was ostensibly passed to grant freed slaves the same rights as other citizens.  It was not intended to grant any rights or protections to governmental entities.  It has to do with "equal protection".  

 

The B.O.R. simply proscribe actions by a governmental agency and ony apply to governmental entities That includes the First Amendment. Constitutional rights do not exist except in the context of governmental behavior. The way that the 14th amendment clarifies to whom the rest of the B.O.R. applies is by defining who is, and is not, a "person" under the Constitution.

 

Interestingly, the vast majority of the first 14th amendment cases were not brought by freed slaves, but by corporations asserting their rights as human beings.

 

Bottom line is that the First Amendment isn't a "local ordinance".  It is nothing.  It is moot.  It has no bearing whatsoever, just like it has no bearing whatsoever in any non-governmental realm.

Edited by sailorman - 7/26/11 at 12:28am

 

Fact is, the Supreme Court of the United States has consistently held the the Bill of Rights DOES apply to State, Local, and SubLocal entities, and has enforced it as such.  What the supreme court thinks likely holds more weight than some spurious argument you learned in history class.

 

 

Yes, the B.O.R. applies to governmental entities as an obligation. These entities must adhere to the B.O.R. in affording its protections to citizens.  The B.O.R. doesn't afford protections to, or impose obligations upon, private institutions because they are deemed to be forms of "governance". The B.O.R. only protects private institutions from government actions to the extent they are afforded the legal status of citizens, i.e. corporations.   The reason political speech is protected in the workplace, for example, is not because the workplace is a form of governance.   It is because of the nature of the speech has been deemed to be more important than other forms of speech.  Nonetheless, unlike gov't. entities, workplaces retain wide latitude in how they deal with political speech.  Additionally, unlike governmental entities of all description, workplaces are under no obligation to respect 4th Amendment rights, for example.  Neither are they obligated to respect freedom of non-political speech.  Any other constitutional protections or rights that workplaces are forced to grant are a result either of statutory law (discrimination based on religion or sex) or a pick-and-choose agenda of a judicially activist Supreme Court (2nd Amendment "rights" that workplaces, suddenly and with no legal foundation or precedent, must respect on their property).  I only wish that workplaces were considered a form of governance. If that were the case, they would have to be far more respectful of workers' rights than current standards demand they be.

 

The B.O.R. was designed and intended to protect people from abuse by government, not private entities.

The fact still remains that, with a very few narrowly constructed exceptions, none of the B.O.R. is applicable to private institutions, be it a workplace, a school, or this website.

People who complain that some business or school or website or restaurant is violating their constitutional rights, don't understand this.

The 14th Amendment has nothing to do with it, except to the extent that it delineates who is, or is not, entitled to equal protections under the B.O.R.

 

BTW, what the Supreme Court rules holds more weight than what the Constitution demands or what the law says.  

Unfortunately, we now have a Supreme Court, dominated by extremist ideologues, that has no respect for either.

But, suppose you tell me specifically, where my "spurious argument learned in history class" is spurious.

Here's a hint: my argument wasn't learned in history class at all.  

Just so you know, I'm well over 50 and not too vulnerable to the juvenile taunts that apparently are effective on the naive and impressionable college kids you may be used to talking to.

 

Edited by sailorman - 7/26/11 at 2:43pm

Your viewpoint is turning political, and head-fi is not the place for political discussions.  So I'm opting out of this discussion.

 

BTW, the only college kid I talk to on a regular basis is my daughter.

 

Yup, please keep politics off Head-Fi. I very much like legal discussions, but we have a bright line rule against political discussions here.

O.K. seeya.  Lord forbid that politics be brought into a discussion about the interpretation of that musical masterpiece, the U.S. Constitution.

Alright, you're new here.

At one time, politics were discussed at Head-Fi.

The problem was that the discussions turned contentious and angry. Then the politics started spilling over into other discussions and polarized a lot of stuff.

The point of this place is to discuss audio gear and music, not to kick around a particular party, president or political philosophy.

The simple - and very effective - solution was to ban poliical discussions. Everyone started getting along again (for the most part) and discussions went back to what they should be.

So that's why we don't discuss politics here. It's in the TOS you agreed to when you registered. If you haven't read the TOS, we don't allow discussions of religion or sex. We do not allow manufacturers to criticize competing products or hype their own.

I trust you understand the reasoning behind these policies.

O.K., no problem.  No politics.

 

I would like to clear one thing up and apologize for an incorrect statement I made some posts back.  It's not political, it's strictly legal and O.T.

 

I either stated, or agreed with the statement, that employers cannot discriminate on the basis of political speech. 

IOW, I was under the impression that one of the few private entities in which First Amendment protections applied was the workplace.

It was asserted that this is true because the courts have ruled that the workplace is a form of governance and I stated that the reason political speech was protected there was it's nature.

 

All of that is 100% wrong.  There is absolutely no federal prohibition on an employer firing you, or otherwise punishing you, for your political views or speech.  

In fact, employers can legally search for forum postings or blogs you have written and fire you for the views you expressed, political or othewise, even when you expressed them outside of the workplace.

 

Four States, NY, CA, SD & CO, and DC and a handful of cities, have their own local laws regarding this, but bottom line is that the First Amendment does not apply to private entities, including private workplaces, businesses, schools or websites.

 

That is pretty much the definitive answer to the question posed by the O.P..

 

It is also a reason to seriously consider the implications of a recent statement by Facebook marketing director, Randi Zuckerberg, who stated that anonymous internet access must be eliminated and that everyone should be forced to use their real names when posting.  But that discussion is better left to a new thread.

Edited by sailorman - 7/28/11 at 11:41am

Player 1: "I'M OLDER!"

Player 2: "NO I'M OLDER!"

Player 1: "NUH UH"

 

LOL.  I never said I was older.  He's older.  But because of both of our greatly mature viewpoints (sarcasm) it was necessary to point out that we're not kids.