Vakkotaur

That sign is on a few places in Minnesota. Part of Minnesota carry law specifies the size and wording of the sign for those who insist on denying others the right of self-defense and wish to publicly say "Take your business elsewhere, we prefer having unarmed victims here."

Even though I do not have a carry permit and thus do not carry, I do try to avoid rewarding such businesses with my patronage. Today things got ironic in a sad way. jmaynard and I went to a gun show which was held at the local VFW. Normally that show would have been held at the National Guard armory, but work is being done on that building. So the show is taking place at the VFW. And there is a sign that the VFW bans guns.

That's odd. Not just that a place holding a gun show bans the carrying of firearms, but that it's the VFW. VFW? Veterans of Foreign Wars - the folks who have fought for your, my, and others freedoms. Folks who know their way around firearms, and know that what they are: mere machines, inanimate objects. I wonder what the real story is. I suspect it's some clueless building owner or clueless insurance company that insists on that sign being there. I rather doubt the members of the VFW are the ones behind it being there. At least I hope not. I'd like to think well of them.

One of the responses to the publication and dissemination of the Danish newspaper's cartoons (and a few fakes, one of a modified photograph of a French Pig-Squealing Championship contestant) the Iranian newspaper Hamshahri is holding a contest for cartoons about the Holocaust. You can probably imagine the results already. The idea to claim that the free speech argument for publication of the Danish cartoons is a double standard.

The sad thing is that at several European countries have laws on the books that ban holocaust denial or revisionism. Thus Iran actually has a point. One would think that after WWII there would be an embracing of free speech in its entirety. Alas, that is not the case. The cause of the problem was misidentified and the wrong treatment applied. It's not just Nazi or fascist speech, bad as it may be, that is a problem, but censorship itself that is a problem. "Bad speech" cannot really be eliminated, but only driven underground, by such means. To really knock it out and more importantly, the bad ideas behind it, it needs to be dragged out into the open and exposed for what it is rather than hidden.

Denying the holocaust is distasteful, but should not be illegal. Let a fool look like a fool and point out his foolishness. That's better than making him the holder of a "secret the government doesn't want you to know" or some such nonsense. Some will still never be convinced or will continue to spout nonsense as trolls, but they will look silly when they have to explain away the newsreel footage, amongst other evidence. Maybe they ought to be called newsreel deniers. After all, how many "they faked the moon landing" folks does anyone take seriously?

The best response to Hamshahri's contest is to publish the results, as distasteful and distorted as they will likely be. The Jyllands-Posten editor who published the original twelve cartoons understands this and thus his reply: "My newspaper is trying to establish a contact with the Iranian newspaper, and we would run the cartoons the same day as they publish them."

Terry Pratchett, through the character of Sam Vimes, notes that all crime is theft. Burglary and theft and embezzlement are certainly theft. Kidnapping is theft of a person. Murder is theft of life. Other crimes are theft of privacy, from simple trespass all the way up (or rather down) to rape. Plagiarism is theft of ideas. It is worth asking then, when something is to be considered criminal, what it is that is being stolen. Not what might be stolen by error or abuse, but what is being stolen.

If one takes the time to examine the founding of the United States of America and its constitution, there was really only one crime, one theft, that had to be guarded against: the theft of individual liberty. What government can do is carefully limited. Some of what government is barred from doing is listed, but it is noted that the listed limitations are not necessarily all of the limitations. Where there is question, the answer is this: Do what maximizes individual liberty.

Looking at the issue of marriage for homosexuals, can anyone show anything being stolen? Despite cries from some religious folks that such a thing would harm heterosexual marriage, there is no evidence of how this could be. Would homosexuals suddenly start stealing wives or husbands? The idea is absurd. Perhaps it is meant as stealing from the pool of available men or women - yet by the very definition, the pool that gays and lesbians would take partners from is not the same as the pool of available heterosexual partners. As there is no theft, where is the crime? And, which way lies greater individual liberty?

Nobody has to like the idea for themselves, as many no doubt dislike the free choices of others. People disagree on who to vote for, on what church to attend, whether to attend one at all, what do with their money, and on and on. But that is the beauty of liberty: it doesn't matter what others believe. You choose whether to vote, and if you do, who to vote for. You choose whether to participate in any religion, and if you do, which religion. You choose how to spend, or save, your money. Already millions disagree with you about which way, if any, to vote, what religion, if any, to pay heed to, and the best thing to do with your money. But that's not a problem, unless they make their own choice to have heartburn over choices that are not theirs to make. So why shouldn't you be able to choose who to marry? Because it might piss someone off? What say should anyone not directly involved have in what is your choice? None at all.