Free speech, awesome as it is, also inevitably means stupid speech. Case in point: My brother, a freshman at UW-Stout, sent me this link to a video showing the protest-counterprotest clash between 10 members of the anti-gay WBC, “some crazy Baptist church” according to my bro, and a couple hundred Stout students around 7:30 a.m. Thursday. The University told the students not to counterprotest. They obviously did anyway and anti-gay protesters left after 15 minutes.

I’m told the WBC members are also planning to make an appearance at the funeral of one of the students who died in a recent off-campus housefire because they think that if you die in a fire, you had to have done something to deserve it. (You can see this on one of the posters in the video.) Sick stuff.

On a lighter note, though, my brother also informed me that he’ll be attending the “The Great Porn Debate” between Ron Jeremy and Craig Gross, a pastor. The two will be discussing the impact of porn on society today. Awesome.

Opinion article on a proposed bill in the Arizona state legislature that would make publishers and producers financially responsible if their more untoward releases could be “proven” to have influenced a crime.

There is just so much wrong with that concept, and the article does a good job explaining as much. However, the article draws a hard-line I am almost equally uncomfortable with:

But, ultimately, it is the perpetrator of violence who must be punished for what he did. Nichols’ bill mitigates that responsibility. Suddenly, the criminal is the victim: The music made him do it; the movie made him do it. Others are responsible. Not him.

Such a development is sick. A rapist is a rapist, not the victim of a rap video.

In the context of the proposed legislation, I totally agree. But that statement does not encourage the kind of discussion we ought to be having concerning personal vs. corporate responsibility today. Where does one leave off and the other begin?

“I had an abortion” t-shirt followup? “I was raped.” [via]

Ars Techinca’s article on just how China plans to deal with that pesky little point in it’s Olympic contract: allowing the press to report as they normally would. That, of course, requires unfettered Internet access - not China’s strong suit, to say the least.

I’ve been trying to come up with an interesting approach to discussing Juicy Campus on this blog. I wanted some way to express why the site is simultaneously awesome and horrifying.

Wouldn’t you know - Siva beat me to it. Check out his brief thoughts on Juicy Campus, privacy policy, and reputation management.

It’s Online Free Expression Day, presented by Reporters Without Borders. (And, in a cowardly move, not supported by UNESCO.)

Stop by their website and take part in the (totally awesome looking) cyber-demonstration. sd&if is headed over there right now. Look for us throwing out our support for imprisoned independent librarians in Cuba (you know, doing what the ALA doesn’t have the balls to do).

Then we’re gonna go see if Sarah Lacy wants to talk to us about it. We’ll talk back, Sarah! We promise!

Ars Technica: Wikileaks restraining order a failure, judge says.

Yeah, well. Welcome to the internet, sir.

Can you believe that, once the site was shut down, the documents in question popped up all over the web? Seriously! The AT article subheading puts it best:  On the internet, injunctions make you famous.

*Everyone, meet Taryn. Taryn, this is everyone. She is the newest member of the sd&if family and we are glad to have her on board! -Tony*

Apparently the government of Pakistan caused YouTube to go down around the world for several hours Sunday after ordering its domestic ISPs to block the site due to anti-Islamic movies. A routing error caused the block to affect Internet users outside of Pakistan. As a consequence, I had to wait a couple hours to watch these gems:

• Fred Armisen’s slightly disappointing impersonation of Barack Obama on SNL. (Amy Poehler is funnier as Hillary.)
• Reaction to Hillary Clinton’s “Shame on you!” press conference in Cincinnati.
• Last month’s Moldy Peaches performance on The View of “Anyone Else But You” from the Juno soundtrack.

NYT Opinion article on last week’s court-ordered shut down of Wikileaks.org.

From the article:

Federal District Court Judge Jeffrey White ordered Wikileaks’s domain name registrar to disable its Web address. That was akin to shutting down a newspaper because of objections to one article. The First Amendment requires the government to act only in the most dire circumstances when it regulates free expression.

Last week, we told you about President Bush’s failure to nominate any people whatsoever to the Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board.

In another sly move, President Bush makes sure that no one is responsible for monitoring government compliance with the Freedom of Information Act.

Thanks to Frenchic for dropping us the link!