[lbo-talk] Cuba petition

Nathan Newman nathanne at nathannewman.org
Mon Apr 14 04:13:31 PDT 2003


----- Original Message ----- From: BrownBingb at aol.com

-All so what? That's all part of free speech.


>CB: The idea is that freedom of speech is not absolute, and that
>in a socialist country one of the limitations on freedom of speech
>is a prohibition on organizing the restoration of capitalism. It is
>a hierarchy of values and laws. Where the principles of free
>speech and socialism are in conflict , the principle of socialism
>takes precedence.

So why shouldn't a capitalist state be justified in banning advocates of socialism by your logic?

You seem to have repeated the arguments of the McCarthyites. They always argued that you had free speech as long as you basically supported the system and only lost it when you advocated for fundamental change in the capitalist system.

And its extended logic internationally is that which justified Hungary 1956, Czechoslovakia 1968, Tianemen 1989, Iran 1954, Chile 1973, and any "liberation" of a country which someone else thought they needed help resisting an ideology foreign to their country.

This isn't a question of free speech versus socialism. It's democracy versus fake socialism, since socialism without democracy is nothing of the kind.

Which is why denouncing the Cuba repression is always timely, maybe more so now.

-- Nathan Newman



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