Posted on 06/27/2011 7:44:41 AM PDT by Hojczyk
Characterizing someone’s argument as weak is not a personal insult. Insinuating, or outright saying that they are incapable of understanding English is.
You conveniently neglect to mention that the majority opinion that I mentioned included Justices Scalia and Alito - two solidly conservative justices. Citing the agreement of parties with whom you disagree on other decisions as proof of the incorrectness of THIS decision is faulty reasoning. I’m sure the judges on the Ninth Circuit also agree that humans require oxygen to live. Does their agreement with me on that point make it invalid as well?
But you are right on one point, which is that I am perpetuating the argument by continuing to reply to your (increasingly shrill) posts :)
You characterized me as being over-emotional because of my weak argument. Making me the subject rather than the issue is a personal attack. Mischaracterizing me as over-emotional is also a personal attack. Accusing me of attacking you while you attack me is hypocrisy. If you’re going to complain about how people are treating you, you should be careful about your own conduct as well.
Glad we can at least agree though that your strategy of citing those who agree with you on this decision as evidence that you are right is faulty reasoning. (I cited others who agreed with you only as a method of showing how wrong your approach was.) I’m hoping you can stick to the issues as we continue to discuss this issue that you will no longer discuss with me.
Here’s someone else that, like me, doesn’t seem to understand that this case has nothing to do with giving First Amendment rights to minors:
Note the second paragraph:
“The decision is being widely reported as 7-2, which is true enough on the merits of this law. But looking closer, the decision is really 5-4 when it comes to the question of whether the First Amendment categorically protects the sale of video games to minors.”
Looks like you may not have the support of Alito and Scalia after all....
You say “our strategy of citing those who agree with you on this decision as evidence that you are right is faulty reasoning”. What I said, in fact, was that you can’t use the fact that someone you disagree with on many points agrees with a decision as supporting evidence that a decision is *invalid*. You can, however, use that someone whose reasoning and past decisions you find sound agrees with a decision as supporting data towards the decision being *valid*. This is very basic logic. Would it help you if I expressed it in mathematical notation?
Regarding my comment about you being overly-emotional on this point, it was not meant as an insult, but rather an observation - one that I hoped would have the effect of leading you to some personal introspection. My thought was that that it might give you pause in your hurling of personal insults and unfounded insinuations about other people’s character and/or intellect, and generally tone down the discussion. I can see now that it had the opposite effect, and that is unfortunate.
From Scalia’s majority opinion:
“California’s legislation straddles the fence between (1)addressing a serious social problem and (2) helping con-cerned parents control their children. Both ends arelegitimate, but when they affect First Amendment rightsthey must be pursued by means that are neither seriouslyunderinclusive nor seriously overinclusive. See Church ofLukumi Babalu Aye, Inc. v. Hialeah, 508 U. S. 520, 546(1993). As a means of protecting children from portrayalsof violence, the legislation is seriously underinclusive, notonly because it excludes portrayals other than videogames, but also because it permits a parental or avuncular veto. And as a means of assisting concerned parents it isseriously overinclusive because it abridges the FirstAmendment rights of young people whose parents (andaunts and uncles) think violent video games are a harm-less pastime.”
Right there in plain English. The California law is flawed because it interferes with the “First Amendment rights of young people”. Not the First Amendment rights of parents to access and expose their children to content that they approve of. The First Amendment rights of the child.
Since you insist on continuing to make me the topic of your posts instead of the issue (and mischaracterizations of me to boot), I am now done with you. And unlike you, I mean it.
If you wish to discuss the decision, please do so. Perhaps I will respond if I see anything worth responding to. But I’ve stated my case, and posted quotes from the decision being discussed as evidence. You haven’t been able to stop talking about me for the past few times you’ve posted. As I care little about what you think of me or the mischaracterizations you’ve made of me, I’ll refrain from commenting on them further.
Good day.
I see that you have moved on to liberal debating tactic #2 - mischaracterize your opponents argument, and then proceed to refute it.
My argument is that this ruling has absolutely no baring on your ability to control what video games your kids purchase - as a responsible parent, that is still 100% within your control.
As I have said repeatedly, all this ruling does is to restrict the ability of the STATE to restrict access to video games.
Ahh, liberal debating tactic #3 - having lost the argument, you now storm off in a huff.
Are you sure you wouldn’t be more at home over at DailyKOS or DU?
“My argument is that this ruling has absolutely no baring on your ability to control what video games your kids purchase - as a responsible parent, that is still 100% within your control.”
At last, something offered up on the decision rather than a personal attack on me. Please provide evidence from the decision that supports this claim. I’ve cited passages from the decision and from the dissent that support my position. You have not refuted them or offered any evidence from those same sources.
As for your continuing insults and disrespect, I won’t address them. I believe they say more about you than they do about me. The only thing I will say is that I have no idea where you come off referring to me as “liberal”. In this instance, it is you who are completely aligned with the Left, my friend. As I pointed out previously, they are hailing this ruling as a great victory. I haven’t looked, but I bet the ACLU even has something positive to say about it.
Well, didn’t have to look to far to find that. Right on the ACLU’s web page. The top headline. ACLU hailing Supreme Court California decision. Here’s a comment from their press release:
“In addition, the Court struck down a California law prohibiting the sale of violent video games to minors in Brown v. Entertainment Merchants Association. Stressing that minors have First Amendment rights as well as adults, the Court rejected calls to treat violence like obscenity and carve out a new exception to the First Amendment for violent speech directed at children.”
Hhhhmmmmm. “Minors have First Amendment rights as well as adults.” Seems pretty clear to me.
The ACLU understands the implication of this ruling and they love it.
After reading all of your posts on this thread up to this point, it sounds to me like you want DEMOCRAT representation.
And considering that you give no reason at all for your opinion I should care why?
I suppose you also think that Clarence Thomas wants DEMOCRAT representation as well being that he dissented and basically agrees with my position as well.
I am a conservative and not a libertarian. In other words I believe in a REPRESENTATIVE Republic and not a form of anarchy whereas conservative traditional values are banned from being made into law by elites dictators in black robes.
If you believe that children have a Constitutional right to purchase violent video games from adults and all of the other radical Court decisions like their defense of child pornagraphy, a right to sodomy, a right to murder unborn babies, etc... then you are not a conservative but more likely a libertarian or a leftist.
Where do you draw the line at representation? What can’t your representitives do? What laws can they not enact on your behalf?
The line? For a State law to be struck down by the Supreme Court it should be that the law violates either the U.S. or the State’s Constitution which in the case of the CA law it did not. There is no Constitutional protection for children to purchase violent video games out in the market place or for adults to sell them to children. This is a very bad ruling by the Court.
The same type of laws outlawing certain products from being sold to minors already exist in the case of alcohol and pornography. This precedent by the Court opens up many paths for radical activists to seek futher limitations in the future on any community standards people may seek through their representatives in regards to children.
The ACLU is already known for fighting to establish rights for children that are not really rights. Even in my state they fought to claim that a child had the right to promote her lesbianism on her t-shirt in school.
In my opinion the agenda of the left with activist rulings such as this one is simple. If they can use children’s rights as a means of destroying the traditional family then they will.
I would not be suprised at all if we see a day very soon whereas the ACLU steps into a case whereas they defend a child in suing their parents because the parents do not support some pornographic expression of the child.
The left would love to use children’s sexuality as a means to diminish parental rights. This is exactly why the left-wing gay rights movement wants to be intertwined with the public schools. They want perversion to be a right and they want to extend that to children even.
With activist Court rulings such as this one and many others up to now the danger is great that they may have success incrementally through time if they are not opposed strong enough.
People must fight for their right to represeentation on traditional values.
I agree with you completely. It’s sad that there are some who would characterize themselves as being pro-traditional family who seem to be missing how the Left is going about achieving these ends.
You may be interested in this new thread on the topic.
I enjoyed your posts in this thread.
Sorry. I forgot to post the link. Here it is...
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/2741581/posts?page=9
You are so wrong. Do you want proof?
Don’t you have a video game to play or something?
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