Ok. So it was recently pointed out to me that one of my all-time favorite social networks, Last.fm, was home to a number of neo-nazi groups, and were listing neo-nazi, white power, etc, oriented bands in their music catalog. What's a peace-loving, granola munching Skinny Puppy fan to do? My first reaction was that I didn't want to be associated with anything that gave a voice to this sort of hate-mongering, and I still feel very strongly about that. I decided I was going to vacate the premeses, with a quick note to my friends and a polite but disappointed email to the administrators of said network, and after a lot of flip-flopping and thinking it over, I started writing.
I expected to get a few replies, and was rather shocked at the amount of response I got. Everyone was very polite, and very kindly sorry to see me go, but the general opinion was pretty much unanimous- how can I say I support the right to free speech if I don't extend that to include nazis, even if they are completely retarded shitheads. Was I not contradicting myself? Well, it's a bit more complicated than that, but the short answer is: Yes, I was.
All of you are pretty much dead-on. Freedom of speech, freedom of expression, all the freedoms I purport to defend, are meaningless if I don't extend them to include everyone, even those who exploit that freedom in an effort to deprive others of it. I let my disgust get the better of me this time, and it nearly made a hypocrite of me, so thanks to all of you who pointed that out to me.
So my decision is this: I plan to keep my Last.fm account (which, to be perfectly honest I was REALLY loathe to delete). I also plan to write an email to Last.fm expressing my deep unhappiness at the presence of these hate-groups (for that is what they are), because expressing my opinion of things is MY right, too. My problem with these groups is that their belief system is oriented toward denying the basic human rights of others, based on misinformation, hatred and lies. Should anyone be able to say whatever they want, even if it's harmful to others, and without any basis in fact? I honestly don't know, and that's where I get into this gray area and start feeling like I'm contradicting myself. Right at the moment, I think I'm making the best choice, and feel like my earlier decision was hasty and not thought through enough.
So there you have it. Thanks to everyone who wrote back to me. Feel free to write again. What do you think now? Am I making the right decision? Or am I just a schizo? I'm thinking the latter, but at least I feel a little better. For now... :P
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1 comment:
Neo-Nazis have the right to say whatever they want (short of inciting violence), but last.fm is not the government and thus has the right to exclude whatever it wants from its site. Should they decide to exclude neo-Nazi music, the neo-Nazis would have the right to organize a boycott against last.fm (good luck with that).
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