Joining the ACLU? 259
X86Daddy writes "I'm currently a member of the EFF. I agree with everything they do. I'd like to further help protect liberty and freedom, and the ACLU advertises that they exist for that purpose. The ACLU is an organization well known for controversy. I've heard many opinions for and against it, and even a few citations of evidence. I've read their positions on their website, and although I strongly disagree with some of what they believe, I support the majority of their positions. I've also read some of their court filings, in search of more evidence of what they really do. I'm still undecided. I've even sent them an unanswered e-mail about the percentages of money spent on their main positions. So, I ask the Slashdot audience, what information do you have about the ACLU? I'm interested in facts about how they spend their efforts with regards to all of their efforts, electronic-related or not."
The organization has an obvious slant (Score:4, Informative)
Re:The organization has an obvious slant (Score:2)
1) People act like ideological consistency is equivalent to saintliness. Is it really so extraordinary to have a basic sense of principle at the expense of convenience?
2) As you note, while the ACLU supports the most massively expansive interpretation of the First Amendment, the Fourth Amendment and that mysterious bit of
Re:The organization has an obvious slant (Score:4, Interesting)
Robin Williams
Of course the organization has an obvious slant, its stated goals are to protect what it views as the civil liberties of all Americans. When you're defending what you view as freedom you tend to get a little loony... see RMS for another example.
Unfortunately, somewhere along the way they certainly did forget about the second amendment. I read an article by an ACLU member pointing out that a great number of members disagree with the organization on the second amendment. He also pointed out that, while the groups stated position is that "the right to bear arms" is a "group right" (you know to let people keep a well regulated militia), the ACLU is not nearly as active in second amendment law as it is in other areas.
I joined the organization a few years back at the same time I joined the NRA. I figure I'll pay the ACLU to take loony positions on amendments 1 and 3-10, and I'll pay the NRA to take loony positions on number 2. Those loony positions will be shot down in courts and legislatures, but perhaps we will still have some rights a few years down the road.
When the government wants to go right, pull hard from the left. When the government wants to go left (yeah that's gonna happen), pull hard from the right.
Re:The organization has an obvious slant (Score:4, Insightful)
To quote them:
"If indeed the Second Amendment provides an absolute, constitutional protection for the right to bear arms in order to preserve the power of the people to resist government tyranny, then it must allow individuals to possess bazookas, torpedoes, SCUD missiles and even nuclear warheads, for they, like handguns, rifles and M-16s, are arms. Moreover, it is hard to imagine any serious resistance to the military without such arms. Yet few, if any, would argue that the Second Amendment gives individuals the unlimited right to own any weapons they please. But as soon as we allow governmental regulation of any weapons, we have broken the dam of Constitutional protection. Once that dam is broken, we are not talking about whether the government can constitutionally restrict arms, but rather what constitutes a reasonable restriction."
For what it's worth, I happen to agree with them.
Re:The organization has an obvious slant (Score:3, Insightful)
"If indeed the First Amendment provides an absolute, constitutional protection for the right to free speech, then it must allow individuals to possess child pornography and to shout 'fire' in a crowded theater, for they, like letters to the Editor, are speech. Yet few, if any, would argue that the First Amendment gives individuals the unlimited right to any speech they please. But as soon as we allow government
Re:The organization has an obvious slant (Score:3, Interesting)
1. When the government provides it for free, the marginal cost to the consumer becomes zero. Therefore, people consume more than they otherwise would. If your gas were free, you'd drive more.
2. As people consume more, demand exceeds supply, and prices increase.
3. Government responds to this problem in one of two ways:
a. Paying the higher and higher prices. Everyone pays more, but since the amount they pay is only affected negligibly by how much they consume, this is no incentive f
ACLU apply their standards *very* unevenly (Score:3, Troll)
The classic example is the "right" to abort, which the ACLU promote. If you kill a baby after (s)he is born, it's murder. A week before (s)he is born, it's not. Why not? If (s)he were born 20 weeks premature, killing him/her a week later (ie, 18 weeks earlier than if (s)he'd been aborted a week before term) is also unquestionably murder. Ridiculous, is
Re:ACLU apply their standards *very* unevenly (Score:2)
While the abortion issue is a tough one and one of the ones that I don't totally agree with the ACLU about, I don't follow your "proof" here at all. In fact, I see a clear distinction that could be used, and that is that before birth, the fetus is dependent on the mother to sustain its life, and after birth it is l
Re:ACLU apply their standards *very* unevenly (Score:3, Insightful)
> , in practice, the mom usually takes care of
> the baby after birth, too!)
His point exactly. A 2 day old baby won't survive if left on its own either, but that doesn't mean we should kill it.
> we need to make that distinction
> somewhere [...] Pre-conception is hopeless
Of course.
> we understand that moment well biologically
> and know it to be really just cells dividing
Hm. Doesn't "just cells dividing" apply to every other moment of
Re:The organization has an obvious slant (Score:3, Informative)
Bullshit (Score:4, Insightful)
You could read it before you infer that it says something it does not say.
Re:Bullshit (Score:2)
Re:Bullshit (Score:3, Insightful)
Also, if you do decide that the right is personal, you have to admid that it is as applicable to tactical nuclear weapons as to hunting rifles.
Re:Bullshit (Score:2)
Re:Bullshit (Score:5, Interesting)
nuclear weapons are not 'arms' [guncite.com]:
It is an individual right [constitution.org]:
Re:Bullshit (Score:3, Interesting)
Well, if we're going to take a time machine back to interpret this wording, what do we do about hand-held weapon
Re:Bullshit (Score:3, Insightful)
The US Constitution is about *individual* rights (Score:2)
In this case, the ACLU is clearly spouting nonsense. The Constitution speaks only to individuals, not states, so why force this one Amendment to do otherwise? You might stop to ask why the ACLU wants to warp the interpretation like this.
Bullshit Squared (Score:2)
The intent of this ammendment was not to place power in the hands of state governments, but to ensure that congress could not do what had been done in e.g. Ireland, and forbid ordinary citizens from bearing arms, thereby eliminati
Re:Obvious if you're looking for it (Score:3, Insightful)
Technically correct, but not as right as you think you are. There's no doubt that it is centrally applicable to militias, but just because it's centrally applicable to militias does not mean that it's a collectively-held right. In all the reading on Second Amendment law that I've done, both pro- and con-, I have yet to find any respectable journal which has given the slightest shred of credibility to the collectivist interpretation.
Looking at Supreme Cou
Money (Score:2)
While an email may not be an adequate investigation, I believe that seeing where the money goes is a great idea and that you should follow up some more before giving them your money. You might be amazed at how many organizations you would not care to give to based on where the money goes. Even "highly respected" groups like the United Way become highly suspect when you examine the financials.
OH, SURE, you want info for yourself (Score:2)
Maybe by posting a question somewhere....? Like, I don't know... HERE?
They're rather (Score:5, Interesting)
The ACLU tends to be fanatical on matters of speech, even when most people would not necessarily be on their side. The case that Bill O'Reiley likes to rail against is where they have helped defend [mergemag.org] the North American Man-Boy Love Association (NAMBLA) [mergemag.org]... they really do believe that everybody has the right to say anything, no matter what it is and what might be done with that information.
They have also been famous in defending (and winning) the right of groups like the Ku Klux Klan [skepticfiles.org] and fascist Nazi-praising groups [ku.edu] to march. Again, for them it's a bright line: no matter how vile the speech, the speaker has the right to say it.
They have also been very active in challenging the Bush Administration's position [nyclu.org] that they are able to keep suspected terrorists incommunicado for as long as they like.
I wouldn't necessarily want to live in a world where the ACLU positions always ended up prevailaing. I do, however, believe that they are a very necessary counterbalance to those interests that would drag us back to the bad old days of McCarthyism (I would ask Ann Coulter, "Have you no shame, Madame?") and other reactionary movements.
On September 11th, I sent money to two groups: the Red Cross and the ACLU.
No... they... (Score:2)
don't [aclu.org]
Re:No... they... (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:No... they... (Score:2)
Re:No... they... (Score:2)
Wrong on two counts. (Score:2)
Secondly, they litigate against (as here) groups that are using their freedom of speech to incite criminal acts. I don't mind the ACLU doing that at all, but it's the pinnacle of hypocrisy for them to also defend other groups who use their own freedom of speech to incite criminal acts.
Yes they do. (Score:4, Informative)
I think you're missing a key distinction in their position: they supported both sides's right to voice their opinion; but they opposed ones side's use of extortion to try to silence the other. Specifically, when the leaders of one side "directed activists involved in that group...to use threats and acts of intimidation and extortion in their efforts to shut down" the other group, the ACLU said that this crossed the line from speach to action and thus was not protected.
Basically, someone is allowed to think my nose is too big, and even to say publically that they think it's too big, but they aren't allowed to wave a knife in my face to make their point.
-- MarkusQ
Re:Yes they do. (Score:2)
They've tried it again and again since, accusing anti-abortion website operators of murder and suing them under RICO as well.
If you look into it deep enough, and actually understand the laws they are suing these people under, you'd quickly realize that this is nothing more than a politically-motivated campaign to sile
Hmmm. (Score:2)
Sure, but they didn't sue the people who 'waved the knife'. They sued the people who encouraged them to 'wave the knife'. By that logic, Greenpeace would be the largest racketeer in the US.
Hmmm. I'll admit right off that I'm not familliar with the details of this case, but seems to me if someone was sending attackers of any form against their opponent they aren't just "speaking" anymore, and ought to be held accountable. There are quite a few parallels (hiring a hit man is illegal, as is inciting to
Re:No... they... (Score:2)
CHICAGO -- A jury here has found that leading antiabortion groups violated federal racketeering laws, designed to prosecute mobsters, by directing protesters to use extortion and threats of violence in attempts to shut down two abortion clinics, the Washington Post reports.
Extortion and threats of violence are not protected speech, though. If your point is that they only support protected speech, you're right. If your point is that they only support the left, you're wrong.
Re:No... they... (Score:3, Interesting)
The speech in question in this case is not 'threats and extortion'. The NOW didn't sue the people who threatened the child-killers. They sued the political organization that motivated the protests to begin with.
I'm sure if someone committed a crime in the name of the ACLU, and the ACLU got sued under Federal racketeering laws, they would be screaming 'freedom of speech'. In this case, though, they're screaming 'right to abortion'.
They aren't protecting politic
Re:No... they... (Score:2)
Extortion and threats of violence are not protected speech, though.
Neither were many of the types of speech which the ACLU defended, before the ACLU defended them.
If your point is that they only support protected speech, you're right.
Actually, you'd be wrong. The ACLU has lost free speech cases in the past. That means they were supporting unprotected speech.
Definitions... Discuss (Score:3, Funny)
Civil Rights- Rights granted by virtue of citizenship
Civil Liberties- Rights granted by virtue of legislative fiat
Re:Definitions... Discuss (Score:2)
Some people would argue (including the Founding Fathers), that Human Rights are granted by a Higher Power and not simply by the virtue of existence.
I'm not one of those people, but for a complete discussion, you must at least consider it.
Re:Definitions... Discuss (Score:2)
Since, under Natural Law, human existence is dependent upon a Higher Power, the common feature of both Natural and Human rights is existence, from whatever source derived.
I don't necessarily aim to present a historical depiction of the evolution of rights; rather a modern, self-consistent description of those rights.
Re:Definitions... Discuss (Score:3, Interesting)
Civil Rights- Rights granted by virtue of citizenship
Civil Liberties- Rights granted by virtue of legislative fiat
If you are suggesting that the "civil liberties" that the ACLU defends are arbitrary rights designated by a government body, you need to go back to POL101. Read some Locke and Hobbes as well.
According to people like Hobbes and Locke, freedom is the natural state of man. Governments, created by the people, impose certain res
Re:Definitions... Discuss (Score:2)
Be careful reading Locke, though. I've heard he's just some kid with delusions of grandeur.
Maybe a party would be better (Score:2)
Re:Maybe a party would be better (Score:2)
Re:Maybe a party would be better (Score:2)
Libertarians I've met are in favor of abolishing minimum wages.
This is correct. Why should the government get involved in the relationship between employers and employees? If an employer wants to get the level of employee that they get for $1/hr then they should be able to do so.
abolishing OSHA
This is correct. Again, the government shouldn't be involved in the employee/employer relationship. HOWEVER...
eliminating the right of workers to sue their employers
This is not correct
Re:Maybe a party would be better (Score:2)
If there were an airline that didn't check passengers for weapons as they boarded, then which ones do you think the bad guys would fly? Before 11/09/01 I would have glossed over this one, but now we know that an airline with lax security puts far more people at risk then just those on board. The problem I have with libertari
Re:Maybe a party would be better (Score:2)
The one where the passengers aren't permitted to have weapons. Seriously.
I think most criminals are smart enough to realize that if weapons are permitted on airplanes then they have an increased chance of getting shot. The potential rewards of successfully sneaking a weapon through security are much greater when noone else on the airplane has any sort of meaningful wea
Re:Maybe a party would be better (Score:2)
ACLU Acts on Principles, Not Popular Perception (Score:5, Insightful)
They're really an admirable organization in being dedicated to principles of civil liberties.
This often takes them into positions that are strictly correct in terms of principle, but extremely unpopular in terms of practice.
They will defend the rights of Nazis and pornographers to free speech, for example.
And they will sue to exclude any possible mention of God, Ten Commandments in official government documents.
And the right to refrain from saying the Pledge of Allegiance.
All of this makes great fodder on talk shows, where people can emotionally vent about how ridiculous this is.
Some people like that emotional venting more than they like the fundamental principles of liberty. That's fine for them.
Personally, I take those liberties very seriously. They are special conditions of being an American that make our country unlike most others.
As soon as you concede that any of those rights can be abridged for any reason under any circumstance, then you open up a potential Pandora's box.
If someone can decide Nazis and pornographers belong to a special class of people for whom civil liberties do not apply, then you have to admit that someone will have the power to put you into a similar classification some day and to silence your opinion. Your opinion could be "hate-speak" or "obscene" by John Ashcroft and you could be jailed.
If you say that mixing religion with government is OK, then you admit that it would be just fine if ever a hypothetical Muslim majority in the United States should decree that the Koran and sharia law would be posted in all schools and to which everyone must memorize and adhere, rigth after one of the 5 prayer sessions during the day.
[One very good reason our founding fathers tried to separate church and state was based on centuries of bloody evidence in Europe. Recall that Catholics and Protestants killed each other viciously for a long time. Many nations today Muslim fundamentalist are going down the same road today with wars between Shia, Sunni, Muslim and Hindu or Christian. How many centuries it will take for those conflicts to prove the point our foudning fathers recognized in the late 18th century I don't know.]
It's not popular or always expedient to be principled, but it's more enduring.
Exactly. (Score:2)
Re:ACLU Acts on Principles, Not Popular Perception (Score:3, Interesting)
The "Seperation of Church and State" has no foundation in the constitution. This is the text of the first amendment:
Re:ACLU Acts on Principles, Not Popular Perception (Score:4, Interesting)
Actually, the ACLU has taken cases where school districts have prevented students from praying publicly. Rightly so, too, since the government has no place telling you when and how to pray.
Re:ACLU Acts on Principles, Not Popular Perception (Score:3, Interesting)
Please cite evidence as to when the ACLU has tried to stop someone from praying in school. What they try to stop is people in positions of authority from leading pray
Understand the clause in the 1st ammendment. (Score:3, Interesting)
I'm going to take the orignal poster's sentiment (or what I would presume is their take on this issue) and run with it.
Read the above quote a few times and let it sink in if you have the notion of "seperation of church and state" burried into your head.
Word #1: Congress
Congress is the legislative body of the United States of America. This is not your school board. This is written to prve
Founding Fathers were Deists, not Christians (Score:5, Informative)
Uh... no.
The "Founding Fathers," were generally Deists [www.des], not Christians. Deist beliefs are incompatible with Christianity. [deism.com] Deism, and the entire philosophy of Natural Rights, is an outgrowth of the Age of Reason that embraced a Creator that did not reveal itself by revelation but through its creation itself.
Let's look at what some of the best-known "founding fathers" said about Christianity, society, and Law:
My thoughts on them (Score:3, Insightful)
Some examples of my problems with them...
On the First Amendment, they will argue the "separation" part of freedom of religion till they are blue in the face, but completely ignore the "free exercise" part. I think the framers of the Constitution did a brilliant job of balancing these two concepts and to wildly expand on one by gutting the other detracts from what makes this amendment so great.
For a so-called civil liberties organization to actively pursue the anti-civil liberties side of the debate over the Second Amendment seriously undermines their credibility.
In too many stories I read in the news, they just seem to "get it wrong". For instance in the current debate over the California Recall, the ACLU wants a postponement until electronic voting machines are ready in all districts. Given that electronic voting really doesn't enhance the democratic process or voting security, this strikes me as an overly partisan move to buy embattled Mr. Davis more time. I would prefer an organization that raises issues for their own merit, not as some sort of political tactic.
In short, I would much rather there be a non-tech counterpart to the EFF... someone who doesn't just champion liberal civil liberties causes, or conservative civil liberties causes, or what have you, but consistently argues for freedom and liberty itself. While individual members no doublt have partisan leanings, keeping a pure message of "we support civil liberties, period" would better serve an organization than confounding the message with unrelated or contradictory positions for political sake.
Re:My thoughts on them (Score:3, Informative)
I would love to hear an instance of the ACLU cracking down on "free exercize" of religion. Really, I would. I don't claim to have followed every ACLU r
And the Sierra Club? (Score:3, Offtopic)
I've been a member of the Sierra Club for about 10 years, one of their few but not negligible Republican members. My membership is running out soon and I'm unlikely to renew.
As soon as George Bush was elected they started a relentless, hysterical campaign against him. (Or, realistically, to raise money by tossing around his name.) In fact, there are plenty of his environmental policies with which I disagree (ANWR drilling, for example) but the Sierra Club gleefully tossed around nonsense like the "Bush wants to add arsenic to drinking water!" story and has ignored or denigrated all the positive things he's done.
The same thing happenend with Newt Gingrich. He was an environmentalist, and a Sierra Club winner. But working with him was less lucrative than scaring the NPR crowd with his name.
The global warming stuff also is starting to grate on me. All the environmental groups have embraced the notion that any deviation from the party line must be denounced and ignored. I'm getting increasingly suspicious about the religious nature of their claims, which generate suspicion about the nature of all the rest of their scientific claims (e.g. how best to deal with forest fires).
The last straw for me was their opposing the war in Iraq. I give them money to reduce fuel consumption and to reduce our dependence on foreign oil. I do not give them money to promote a doctrinaire leftist national security policy.
Re:And the Sierra Club? (Score:2)
Re:And the Sierra Club? (Score:2)
Wars have all sort of environmental effects. Apart from Saddam's possible lighting of oil wells on fire, or the spilling of millions of gallons of oil into the Gulf, there is also much heavy metal contamination in the theatre of operations from depleted uranium and lead and lots of particulates greenhouse gasses and smog from all the planes and vehicles used.
The ACLU is about mechanism, not policy. (Score:5, Insightful)
Consider RICO. Its intent was to stop organized crime. Apparently it works pretty well at that. Unfortunately, it also works for corrupt police departments who just want to acquire stuff or fluff their budget. They go after someone who has something that they want, and looks dirty, but that they don't really know is dirty. They use a court order to confiscate things under the RICO statute. The person whose stuff has been confiscated has to sue to get it back, has to prove that they are not guilty. The cops don't have to prove anything.
Consider the Communications Decency Act and the Child Online Protection Act. CDA sounds like a great idea - protect kids from online porn. Unfortunately, it doesn't work - there's plenty of online porn that kids can access. Worse, it actually protects kids from information that they might need - if you're 15, and wondering if having sex with your boyfriend can get you pregnant the first time, now you can't get information about it. If you want to know what the risks are from AIDS and how to fight them, that information is not available to you. COPA has actually succeeded in bowdlerizing the internet as seen from public libraries (google "Thomas Bowdler" to find out where that word came from). Although this was supposedly intended to protect children, the result is that it's also "protecting" adults who access the Internet from public libraries.
So I'm a card-carrying member of the ACLU. Hm, actually, I think I let it lapse. Hm.
Re:The ACLU is about mechanism, not policy. (Score:3, Funny)
Why don't they just ask their parents? I'm sure their parents know whether a girl can get pregnant the first time she has sex. The information will probably be more credible then what one could turn up on the in
Re:The ACLU is about mechanism, not policy. (Score:2)
Re:The ACLU is about mechanism, not policy. (Score:2)
Tell me, why didn't you want to talk to your parents about sex?
-BrentSo send them less money! (Score:5, Interesting)
James
Re:So send them less money! (Score:2)
and your donation can be tax-deductible if you donate to the "ACLU Foundation" [aclu.org], instead of the ACLU:
"Gifts to the ACLU Foundation are fully tax-deductible to the donor; membership dues and gifts to the ACLU are not tax-deductible.
This is because the ACLU engages in substantial legislative lobbying, which cannot by law, be supported by tax-deductible funds. The ACLU Foundation, on the other hand, conducts our litigation and communications efforts, and contributions to it are tax-deductible.
Many donors
Exponential decay. (Score:2)
It's actually a lot simpler than that. Either you approve of their ends (making sure the Bill of Rights covers everybody) and their means (litigating against abridgement of the Bill of Rights, no matter whose rights are being abridged), or you don't. If you do support their strategy, you're just going to have to live with the fact that Nazis, Pedophiles, and other unco
Re:Exponential decay. (Score:2)
Its still perference in charities,
Re:Exponential decay. (Score:2)
They aren't efficient with money (Score:3, Informative)
One tool that I've come to value in helping me decide what non-profit organizations to donate to and how much, has been the information put out by The American Institute of Philanthropy [charitywatch.org]. They publish a Charity Rating Guide that lists pretty much every non-profit org that you can think of along with information on such things such as how much cash they have in reserve and what percentage of donor's contributions actually goes towards programs and what percentage goes towards paying the costs of fund raising
Why I think the ACLU is a good thing. (Score:5, Interesting)
What I'd like to know is why every American doesn't support the ACLU. The general feeling by many people is that they're bad. I can't think of a good reason why you would hate an orginization who's sole purpose is to defend freedom from those who would take it away from us. I once had an NCO (while I was in the military) bash me for supporting the ACLU. I reminded him that he said "I do solemnly swear that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic." Of course the conversation went crazy from there (we were on a boring detail), but still... It's interesting to watch 'right wing' people bash the ACLU while calling the people who support them 'traitors' and whatnot. To me, not supporting the ACLU is treason against what our country stands for.
Re:Why I think the ACLU is a good thing. (Score:2)
Re:Why I think the ACLU is a good thing. (Score:2)
What I'd like to know is why every American doesn't support the ACLU.
Simple. The ACLU's policy on prayer [aclu.org] disagrees with all Americans who have even minimal religious beliefs. Their policy makes no sense: the Constitution guarantees the right to freely exercise religion in prison [aclu.org], but not on public school grounds?!
Re:Why I think the ACLU is a good thing. (Score:2)
"We do not need a school prayer amendment. Every child in the United States already has the right to pray in school on a voluntary basis -- it's called the First Amendment.
What's With the ACLU (Score:5, Insightful)
There was a case back in 88 that demonstrates the role of the ACLU in all its irony. If you remember that year, you probably remember Bush the First packing as many Hot Button Keywords into his presidential campaign speeches as possible. One really nasty example is that he repeatedly referred to his opponent as a "card-carrying member of the ACLU", terminology obviously meant to evoke left wing associations [uiuc.edu].
Now somewhere in the midwest (I think it was Ohio) a woman tried to put "Elect Bush" signs on her front lawn, only to be told she was violating local zoning ordinances. She placed a call to the local ACLU chapter -- and got a callback from the state chairman, who informed her that she had raised a vital free speech issue, and the state ACLU would back her and her Bush signs with everything it had!
Of course, that's not the biggest irony connected with the ACLU -- it doesn't come close to all those Nazi and White Supremicist bozos who turn to the ACLU for legal representation, which often comes in the form of Jewish or African-American lawyers! But it's all part of the same idea: that for the Constitution to work, its protections have to be extended to everybody: pedophiles, Nazis, and even people who attack the ACLU itself.
Which makes association with the ACLU pretty difficult: you have to accept that your dues are going to go to protect the legal rights of a lot of people you happen to despise.
I actually have no problem with this: I'm a Jewish American who happens to think that everybody should read The Turner Diaries [adl.org]. The more appalling an idea is, the more you need to bring it out in the open. Anyway, freedom of thought (including stupid thought) is the most fundamental of rights.
I do have a major issue with the ACLU. Not their rabid defense of the rights of despised minorities, but rather their assumption that litigation is the only way to do it. Lawyers do play an important role in protecting the rights of their clients. But the courts aren't always the best protector of personal liberties. As Dred Scott [wustl.edu] learned, they often give a high priority to maintaining the status quo. And even when they don't, having a social change mandated by a federal judge is no guarantee of the change actually happening. Any African American trying to find a place to live will tell you that!
Put your money where your heart is (Score:2, Insightful)
The ACLU is a great organization, but... (Score:2)
As for my personal opinion, I think you should make as large of a donation as possible, and join if you can. The ACLU is one of the few organizations out there which operates on the principles of freedom, not just the ones that they agree with. For example, the ACLU has defended Nazi's rig
Join and mold (Score:2)
Look ath the Libertarian Party also... (Score:2)
On the LP's web page there is also the "World's Smallest Political Quiz" [lp.org] which is basically a 10 question quiz which will help you know what political "area" you fall into.
why i joined (Score:4, Insightful)
"Oh, I wouldn't like that," she said. "I mean, we pray to God. I wouldn't want a prayer to a false god."
That's when I signed up for the ACLU. The thing that most pissed me off was the unthinkingness of it. I grew up in Buffalo, NY, which is overwhelmingly Catholic. If there were prayers in the public schools there, they would probably be Our Fathers and Hail Marys and calls for intercessions with saints -- all things that a good Southern Baptist like the girl being interviewed would find to be horrifying popery. The reason that governments (including school districts and their appointed representatives) shouldn't lead prayers is that by selecting certain prayers, they are declaring some gods to be false, just like our interviewee. And that is completely against the "no established religion" clause.
jf
I Am A Member. (Score:2)
The ACLU is one of the few organizations that you see, repeatedly in the news, and repeatedly winning cases. They really do make a difference, and that is why I am a member.
I suppose there are some issues where I don't totally agree with them -- but that's ok, because I don't expect them to succeed on every front. In that sense I think they are appropriate for even fairly moderate leftists like are found in great numbers on slashdot. Like RMS, they represent an important (and rational) extreme position tha
I'm an ex-member. Here's why. (Score:3, Insightful)
I gave them $50 or so. In return, I started receiving weekly "Oh no! Those wacky republicans are at it again! Give us more money!" letters.
The info wouldn't have been bad: it's good to be informed. What bothered me was the hysterical "Be afraid!" tone, the constant pleading for money (with that sleazy "but wait, there's more!" tone that comes with offers for time-shares), and the regular deulge of thick envelopes (with a pre-paid business reply envelope in each). I suspect that the entirety of my donation was spent on the weekly pleas for more money. I felt like I was supporting the post office and the envelope industry, not civil liberties.
Now, I drop more money to the EFF, and I make a point of writing my congressmen when I think I can argue the issue intelligently. It's not the broad-based defense of liberty that I'd prefer, but it's less annoying that donating to the ACLU.
ACLU fought against WWII Japanese internment (Score:3, Insightful)
check it out here [aichi-gakuin.ac.jp]
Give more $$$ to the EFF instead (Score:2)
ACLU does not live up to its principles. (Score:3, Insightful)
The only problem is, the ACLU doesn't see it that way. Ask the ACLU why they have not once, not ever, taken a pro-Second Amendment case and you'll get the same answer every time: "because we believe the Second Amendment is a guarantee of the state's right to equip a militia, not the individual's right to possess firearms."
It would be an admirable sentiment, were it not for one fact... not one reputable legal scholar in America takes that position. Alan Dershowitz, a very far-left liberal Democrat lawyer and legal professor, has given the best analysis of why no reputable law professor has embraced this position.
According to Dershowitz, the Second Amendment reads "the right of the people..." The very instant you say "the right of the people" actually means "the right of the state", then you've thrown the entire Bill of Rights out the window. If "the right of the people" actually means "the right of the state", then what does that mean for any of the rights we cherish? Suddenly, we no longer have any individual rights; they're all held collectively by the state, which becomes our guardian, able to exercise our liberties in our name while not permitting us those liberties for our own use.
It's really a very 1984 example of doublespeak.
There is not one Supreme Court case which supports the collectivist interpretation of the Bill of Rights, either as a whole or for one specific amendment. In the most recent Supreme Court Second Amendment case, Miller v US, the Supreme Court explicitly recognized the Second Amendment as an individual--not a collective--right.
For the ACLU to claim that the Second Amendment is correctly read as a collective right is... I can't figure it out.
What I suspect is this: the ACLU has a lot of support from a lot of people who, while adamantly in favor of free speech and privacy and all manner of other things, are also staunchly in favor of the notion that nobody should have guns except the cops. And as a result of this, the ACLU has decided to cut the Second Amendment loose to fend for itself, on the theory that "it's better to lose one-tenth of the Bill of Rights than it is to piss off 95% of our contributors, and thus kill any good we can do for the nine-tenths that still remains."
Re:ACLU Wacked out (Score:3, Funny)
Re:ACLU Wacked out (Score:2)
I thought *everyone* liked pedophiles.
Re:ACLU Wacked out (Score:4, Interesting)
Is it illegal to write HOWTOs on how to rob a bank, or crack DeCSS? No. But actually doing the deed is. The only thing that makes NAMBLA different is that they're pedophiles.
I mean, everyone hates pedophiles... but they haven't actually done anything besides write stuff.
Re:ACLU Wacked out (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:ACLU Wacked out (Score:2)
Re:ACLU Wacked out (Score:2)
The only thing that makes NAMBLA different is that they're pedophiles.
Isn't that enough of a reason in itself?
BTW, they're also gay.
ACLU MOSTLY Wacked Out (Score:2, Interesting)
They do, in fact defend most of the constitution, get the word out about the U.S.A. Patriot Act and whatnot, but when it comes right down to it, they're all a bunch of lawyers.
Tort reform (putting caps on civil court awards) is something they argue tooth and nail against, even though civil claims are at fault for most of the rise in medical costs, and rates for various types of insuranc
Re:ACLU MOSTLY Wacked Out (Score:2)
True. But that's not the whole story. (Score:2)
Absolutely true. Either the Scouts have Deist overtones or Darrell Lambert can continue to be a member.
However, the ACLU will not defend the religious rights of Christians.
Case in point, a Christian woman (FOAF) put an advert in her local newspaper for a Christian housekeeper. The ACLU immediately took her to court over it. During the weeks between that and the hearing date, the woman ran an advert for a Buddhist
Re:True. But that's not the whole story. (Score:2)
Re:True. But that's not the whole story. (Score:2)
This, by the way, is what the "Founding Fathers" actually were (for the most part). A Deist is not somebody who believes in a god, a Deist is someone who believes in a specific type of God, which differs substantially from the Christian Jehovah / Jewish Yaweh / Muslim Allah.
Re:True. But that's not the whole story. (Score:3, Informative)
No, not at all. A Deist belief system does not allow for any kind of divine revelation, such as through prophets, messiahs, or holy texts. If the Scouts were De
Re:ACLU BARADA NIKTO (Score:2)
That's the only funny thing I could come up with on this.
Oh come on!
How about coming up with silly alternate meanings for the acronym?
Say... "Aardvark Council for the Legalisation of Unicorns"
or.... "Asphalt County Landfill University"
or.... "Airplanes Can't Land on Us"
or.... "A Clearly Litigous Unit"
or.... "Anyone Can Learn Urdu"
Wow. The fun just never stops, does it?
Re:ACLU BARADA NIKTO (Score:2)
That would've required some thought, and I always try to go for the easy laugh.
ACLU = A Clever Little Universe
Access Control List, Uhhh
Alabama's Career-Limiting University
Accelerated Coffee-Loving Unixian
After Cleavon Little's Ultimatum
A Cleft Little Uvula
A Cat-Loving Undine
After Caffeine Lives Unrest
There. Happy?
Re:Just when I start to think Slashdot has grasped (Score:2)
As for the "ACLU is an American thing, Slashdot's international" thing - I watch the BBC, which broadcasts all over the world. I don't bitch when they show something particularly British - they're a British organization. Don't bitch when Slashdot does something particularly American - it's an American organization.
Re:Just when I start to think Slashdot has grasped (Score:2)
Please remove head from sand (Score:2)
You're making two mistakes. You're treating the ACLU as a political organization, which it is not. It's about civil liberties. It used to be that you could sort of argue that the ACLU had a liberal-left agenda, since that was the background of most members. But even that argument no longer holds water [freerepublic.com].
Second, you're thinking that nerdworld has nothing to do with the "real" world. Tell that to somebody who's ge
Meh (Score:3, Insightful)
However, they are great about perverting the meanings of other parts, like the Second and Fourteenth Amendments.
Tim