Amos Yee : Atheist arrested twice for "intention to wound religious feelings"

[Lek]

Not everyone will agree with everything you say. Pushback doesn't necessarily indicate offense being taken.

I agree.

[The Grand Nudger]

No.  More like when you can't discuss your opinions in public because it may disturb someone.

Like when you really, really wanna use That Word™....?  I know, it's bullshit, right?  What do you mean no, I agreed with you.....the US is just like Singapore.  You hit the nail on the head man. If he comes over here he'll be disappointed, same shit, different continent.

[Lek]

No.  More like when you can't discuss your opinions in public because it may disturb someone.

Like when you really, really wanna use That Word™....?  I know, it's bullshit, right?  What do you mean no, I agreed with you.....the US is just like Singapore.  You hit the nail on the head man.  If he comes over here he'll be disappointed, same shit, different continent.

Right.

[The Grand Nudger]

I'm glad we're on the same page.  Too often you and I find ourselves at odds.

[BrianSoddingBoru4]

I agree with what you are saying, some people need to understand that Freedom of Speech means accepting that you will get offended.

Someone better tell Yee not to attend an American university because the situation in Singapore sounds very similar to the situation on college campuses here.  Maybe the college can create a safe space just for Yee or create one for all the other students on campus so he can't offend them to their faces.

Lek, do you not grasp the difference between personal offense and being arrested for expressing a divergent viewpoint? Theists (all brands, not just Christians) offend me on a more or less regular basis, and I'm delighted that I live in a country where they aren't jailed for doing it.

Try thinking things through.

Boru

[ProgrammingGodJordan]

Example:

US Federal prison:

99+ % "theists"
0.01% atheists

He may be a part of a low atheist prison statistic.

Thusly, perhaps expected 'news'.

[BrianSoddingBoru4]

Example:

US Federal prison:

99+ % "theists"
0.01% atheists

He may be a part of a low atheist prison statistic.

Thusly, old news.

You're off, in more ways than one. 1) Mr. Yee isn't a USian. 2) He isn't currently (as far as I can determine) in prison. 3) The percentage of self-declared atheists in the US federal prison system is 0.1%, not 0.01%.

https://thehumanist.com/commentary/nonbe...us-inmates

Unsurprisingly, at 0.10 percent, atheism still represents a tiny percentage of the religious identities of inmates in federal prison, though that number has risen slightly since 2013, when atheists made up 0.07 percent of the federal prison population.

I hope this helps you on your stupid fucking journey.

Boru

[Brian37]

Assholes like Trump and far too much of the GOP would point to this and say, "This is what we are fighting"..


BULLSHIT, first off it is a myth that liberals  as a majority want that level of political correctness. NO WE DONT, what causes those societies to have people arrested for blasphemy of religion, is not western liberal ideas, but conservatism. While the left in the west has the empathy for others, both left and right of any given religion, fear the questioning and blasphemy of religion. 

I have had liberal theists say "don't offend religion" but unfortunately that plays into the extreme political correctness of theocracies of Saudi Arabia and Iran whom will have you arrested or put to death for offending their religion.

Now, having said that, that DOES NOT justify the political demagoguery of our religious right here. Liberals have the empathy, and I love liberals for that. But even my fellow liberals need to understand the difference between protecting human rights, and the horrible idea of insisting on blasphemy laws. Human rights should be valued, religious freedom should be valued, common law should be valued, but claims as ideas should never be free from scrutiny or blasphemy. 

Liberals have the good intent of wanting civility, we should all want that. But protecting pluralism, isn't about never offending or getting offended, but how one responds in the face of those situations. Political demagoguery leads to more closed societies and authoritarianism, be it worship of an intolerant theocracy like Saudi Arabia, and even an intolerant worship of the state like North Korea.

Blasphemy laws are not a good thing. Fighting bigotry and hate and political demagoguery is fine, but it is a bad idea to use "never hurt anyone's feelings" as a blanket solution. Power shifts over long periods of time, so it is not a good idea to give government absolute power of censorship. Only common law in the idea of no calls to violence or acts of violence. If all 7 billion humans got to silence someone because we got offended, all of us could think of things we would rather not hear or read.

I agree with what you are saying, some people need to understand that Freedom of Speech means accepting that you will get offended.

Again, there is a huge difference between protecting offensive speech, and doing things like what Trump has done, which is not "telling it  like it is" but political demagoguery. Which is akin to shouting fire in a theater for no other reason than to stoke fear which needlessly pits neighbor against neighbor. It is basically selling bigotry and discrimination.

Blasphemy, "Bullshit, the Cubs did not win the Superbowl, only an idiot would would make that claim".
Demagoguery, "We have to ban all Cub fans"

But I cannot stress this enough, when it comes to TONE in a politician, it becomes very dangerous to talk like Trump. And for anyone reading this, it is NOT beating a dead horse, his talk has been going on for 5 years and for anyone who might claim, not you, but anyone who might claim I am over reacting, we do have a large number of his supporters who bought that political demagoguery in painting Obama as "other" and a large number who cant even accept the fact Hillary DID win the popular vote. Demagoguery does work. 

Legal, "The God of the bible is a tyrant". Offensive, but not "Ban all Christians who don't view him that way".
Political Demagoguery, "All Christians are evil".

Legal, "Atheists are stupid for not believing in God"
Political Demagoguery, "We should ban all atheists".

Legal, "The Koran has verses in it that can be used to justify violence".
Political Demagoguery, "Fear all Muslims".

Legal, "Israel does some really stupid shit"
Political Demagoguery, "Wipe Israel off the map".

I don't think these Onion wannabe websites, which are basically the social media version of the old newspaper print rags "Weekly World News" bat boy garbage, do enough to make it clear, that what they do is not real news, sure, that part is irresponsible, but even mind rot crap has to be protected but it should simply be better noted as "for entertainment purposes only".

Bannon and Breitbart used that Weekly World News motif not as a form of satire or over the top criticism, but deliberately blurred the line to stoke fear. Same can be said for assholes like Alex Jones and what should be the real name of his crap, "Infartwars". 

While offensive speech has to be protected, and blasphemy has to be protected, when it comes to politicians adding demagoguery to blur the line between real criticism of policy to gain a win, you are no longer a diplomat seeking solutions, but a dangerous bully. Private non politician's have much more  slack to raise an offensive tone, but politicians are there to protect media, not bully media.

[LastPoet]

I'm glad we're on the same page.  Too often you and I find ourselves at odds.

OT: I was reading this thread and... here Rhythm, have 2 pineapples. My offering to all those that change nicknames. You know what to do with them

[ProgrammingGodJordan]

Example:

US Federal prison:

99+ % "theists"
0.01% atheists

He may be a part of a low atheist prison statistic.

Thusly, old news.

You're off, in more ways than one.  1) Mr. Yee isn't a USian.  2) He isn't currently (as far as I can determine) in prison.  3) The percentage of self-declared atheists in the US federal prison system is 0.1%, not 0.01%.

https://thehumanist.com/commentary/nonbe...us-inmates

Unsurprisingly, at 0.10 percent, atheism still represents a tiny percentage of the religious identities of inmates in federal prison, though that number has risen slightly since 2013, when atheists made up 0.07 percent of the federal prison population.

I hope this helps you on your stupid fucking journey.

Boru

In other words, theists still compose 99+%, of us federal prison.

And, Yee may still be a part of a low athiestic prison statistic. (I had not priorly specified that Yee was particularly part of the us prison percentile, as I had noticed Singaporean descent)

However, I had made a prediction, based on priorly observed statistics, that the Singaporean scenario would probably be similar, and thusly I expressed that Yee "may be a part of a low prison statistic".