Posted on 12/18/2009 11:16:25 AM PST by a fool in paradise
A short-sleeved squabble ended suddenly Thursday when Town East Mall security raided a kiosk and seized a stash of T-shirts that had southeast Dallas business owners up in arms.
Half an hour after the raid, a half-dozen Pleasant Grove business owners gathered at the Southeast Dallas Chamber of Commerce and celebrated a medium-sized victory.
In the center of the room, draped across the back of a chair like a pelt, was one of the vanquished T-shirts:
"Welcome to Pleasant Grove," it read – below a silkscreen image of a man tossing a body into the trunk of an old Buick.
Like everyone in the room, Pleasant Grove pawnshop owner Joy Vosburg praised the Mesquite mall's quick action.
"It's fantastic," she said. "I don't think any city should be portrayed like that."
Vosburg had first spotted the T-shirts during a Monday evening shopping trip.
"It was horrible," she recalled. "I would have bought them just to get rid of them. But I didn't want to give them money."
...it perpetuates a violent stereotype of Pleasant Grove – a blue-collar neighborhood in the heart of southeastern Dallas – that the chamber has been working overtime to abolish.
In October, it kicked off a re-branding campaign, including "GroveFest" and "Hands Across the Grove," when residents linked hands along South Buckner Boulevard.
The chamber will even move out of its old digs above the Diaper Store in a neighborhood strip mall and into the brand-new Eastfield College branch up the road...
The clerk, who said she had not known about the warning, mostly ignored the raid. She stared serenely into her till as mall staff filled a cardboard box with the contraband...
Screws said the kiosk owner could pick up the confiscated shirts later but probably would have to pay a fine...
(Excerpt) Read more at dallasnews.com ...
They have called Greenspoint, “Gunspoint” since the early 80s when I moved to the Woodlands.
It is. The closest enclosed shopping mall is Northpark Center, 9.5 straight-line miles away and practically on another planet in terms of demographics.
Not the best neighborhood but not scary by any definition.
If I have reason to go there now I do not go unarmed.
Well-armed would be rather accurate.
From Amendment I of the US Constitution:
“Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech...”
The part about Congress is irrelevant to this. The words “the freedom of speech” are important. They indicate the independent pre-existence of the right to free speech.
From the Declaration Of Independence:
“...that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.— That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed...”
Arguably, Freedom of Speech is among the Rights Governments are instituted to secure therefore arguably the government (which includes Federal, State and Local levels) is (or should be) involved.
Now, please provide a similar position regarding your statement “it is instead a property rights issue” using similarly authoritative sources, and addressing property rights from both the “real property” and “personal property” aspects.
Also, please explain why government should not be involved in securing real and personal property rights.
Do you feel like you have the inalienable right to tell a guest in your house to shut his mouth if you are offended by what he's saying? This is the principle at stake here. In this case, substitute "tenant" for "guest", and "mall" for "house".
I want one of those
I see you are one of those people who don’t understand how people can contract their rights away.
And, clearly, someone who doesn’t believe in property rights.
>>Do you feel like you have the inalienable right to tell a guest in your house to shut his mouth if you are offended by what he’s saying? This is the principle at stake here. In this case, substitute “tenant” for “guest”, and “mall” for “house”.<<
This is going to be an uphill battle. When you get one of them “it is my God-given right under the Constitution” types, you know you are dealing with someone who doesn’t (and probably never will) understand what the USC is and how private interests relate (or don’t) to it.
Wrong, the part about Congress is the important part. Congress can’t abridge free speech, but PEOPLE can. Employers can tell their employees what they can’t say, malls can tells stores and patrons what they can’t say, homeowners can tell guests what they can’t say. This is because all of out relationships with everybody but our government are voluntary. If you don’t like your employer’s communication standards you can get another job, if you don’t like the mall’s rules you can take your business elsewhere, if you don’t like your friend’s household rules you can get better friends. But we don’t have a voluntary relationship with the government, and free speech is one of our primary tools for changing the government.
Life Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness does not include the violating rental agreements with the mall.
“Do you feel like you have the inalienable right to tell a guest in your house to shut his mouth if you are offended by what he’s saying?”
Feel? I’m not looking for feelings.
But in answer, I do “feel” I have the inalienable right to tell a guest in my house to shut his mouth if I am offended by what he’s saying.
I also “feel” a guest in my house has an inalienable right to say “Take your hand off my butt” if she’s offended by my placing it there, regardless of whether or not it offends me for her to say it.
Try again if you want to.
Try explaining why I have that inalienable right in my house and don’t just write “because of property rights”. That’s too vague, too subject to interpretation through “feelings”, and too unfounded as it stands.
"And, clearly..."
You say all that because on a discussion forum I put forth an argument (which I might be able to take the other side of) and asked for a position?
Once an unincorporated area of Dallas County, Pleasant Grove operated its own school district. Now the community is part of the city of Dallas and has been annexed by the Dallas Independent School District. City services such as public transit are available, and easy access to downtown Dallas increases the desirability of the neighborhood. Some the city's major attractions including museums, theaters, and restaurants are only minutes away. Housing options in the area vary and include single family homes and apartment complexes.
Well, maybe not (street description):
1. Pleasant Grove 101 up, 40 down love it hate it
buy pleasant grove mugs, tshirts and magnets Thoedest Mutha F**** Place In Dallas. Home of da freestylas, djs, hustlaz, and headbustaz Every Block you see at least 1 n**** gettin his ass whooped. and on st. augustine n****s dien left and right in daylight by daT MeSkin laTin LeGeNd Apr 18, 2005 share this
2. pleasant grove 92 up, 42 down love it hate it buy pleasant grove mugs, tshirts and magnets Pleasant Grove is, without a doubt, the "krunkest" place in the entire Dallas metroplex. Many people are familiar with the song "Oak Cliff, 'das my hood". Grove "rats" and Oak Cliff kids argue all the time about whos more "bawlin'". According to surveys and crime statistics based on the state of Texas, Pleasant Grove has 3 times as many murders as Oak Cliff, 12 times as many rapes, 5 times as many armed robberies, and is one of the leading problems in America as far as illegaly exported arms.
All information borrowed from google.com. Look up dallas county crime statistics. I'd post the link, but it wont let me.
I stay on Elam road. I walk around here and think, "If I wasn't strapped I'd be at home". I go to school in Oak Cliff and sometimes I walk around there. In Oak Cliff I think "God damn it's nice to walk around with nothing but fake gangsters and rich kids everywhere."
In Pleasant GRove news coverage has stopped depicting violent crimes in its articles because its old news. People die here everyday, it's nothin'. In Oak Cliff, some bitch gets stabbed and spends a night in the ICU and the whole f****' hood is now gangsta.
Y'all come over here, spend 30 minutes in my hood, then go home and be f****' glad this ain't the life you gotta live.
Thowin' it up fo' PG, East side n****, what it is... PLeasant Grove is the hardest motha****' city in da WORLD.
BTW- The Declaration of Independence is not a governing document.
>>You say all that because on a discussion forum I put forth an argument (which I might be able to take the other side of) and asked for a position?<<
Yes, it is a conclusion based on your post. If someone posts 1+1=3 it is perfectly logical to assume the person the poster does not know arithmetic.
Sorry, poor choice of words -- substitute "Do you believe you have...", or simply "Do you have...". Whatever it takes to get you to focus on my main point.
Try explaining why I have that inalienable right in my house and don’t just write “because of property rights”.
Ever heard of the "castle doctrine"? Within certain specific legal boundaries, a property owner has rights while on his property (e.g. order someone to leave, shoot at an intruder, refuse to let police in if they don't have a warrant) that he has no where else. Your right to order unwelcome visitors off of your property implies your right to regulate their speech as a condition of remaining on the property. If they want to continue in their offensive speech -- fine, but they should get off of my property first.
Property rights, of course, do not imply the right to commit criminal offenses on your property, so your sexual assault example is not really relevant to my point.
Back to the news article, the fact that the mall owner may end up fining the tenant implies that there was a provision in the lease contract granting the owner the right to exercise veto power over a tenant's decision to sell offensive merchandise. In this case, the tenant has two choices: either pay the fine or sue the owner. Nothing complicated here.
I was only using the quote as an argument that the Right to Free Speech is an independent, pre-existing right. It was not created by government or the Constitution. I could have and maybe should have left the “Congress” part out.
“Congress can’t abridge free speech, but PEOPLE can.”
Please provide some authoritative backup for your statement that “PEOPLE can”.
Consider that if I enter an employment contract or rental contract abridging my Right to Free Speech, the other party to the contract has not abridged my Right to Free Speech, but rather I have done so myself by entering the contract.
You've contributed nothing to the discussion. You've only come back with ad hominum.
I conclude you have nothing to contribute but just like to see your words in print.
Bye.
You are the one who said my conclusion about you was inaccurate. You neither defended your position nor added to the discussion.
My analogy was to assist you to understand my post. Clearly it was accurate and touched a nerve.
As far as the discussion goes, it has been pointed to you that a person can contract away their rights (an earlier contention I made which you did not address, probably because you didn’t understand it).
It is you that is dragging this thread down in your abject ignorance about the law and the USC.
Some one needs to photoshop a box of donuts on the handlebars!!!!!!!!
It might not be created by the government, but within our Constitution only the government is limited by the First.
If people can’t abridge speech then book companies have to publish everybody, newspapers can’t fire anybody, non-disclosure agreements can’t exist, and Democrats can put Obama signs in your front yard leaving you with no recourse.
You can look at it as you signing it away, but the effect is the same. Your employer can set the speech rules for you, that’s the effect. Reversing the active verb doesn’t change the situation.
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