A7 says: Two Shinui Party MKs wish to enact legislation stipulating two years' imprisonment for anyone who calls to place public or private figures under excommunication.
For: Takes some of the bullying out of politics and theology; after all, a threat of excommunication is, substantially, blackmail.
Against: It's bullying, it's blackmail, but it falls short of actual violence, so why shouldn't this be protected speech? The concept of "free speech," remember, rests not on the idea that all thoughts are equally valid and equally good, but on the idea the human beings, as a group, are intelligent enough to choose between smart and stupid.
Moreover, as we have seen with Slifkin, bad bans, (like bad books) help us to discover, to confute, to forewarn, and to illustrate. Thanks to the ban against Slifkin, I know more about the world than I did three weeks ago.
DovBear decides: Against.
