32 students PLUS the 1st Amendment?
BOULDER, Colo. (AP) - A University of Colorado student was arrested after making comments that classmates deemed sympathetic toward the gunman blamed for killing 32 students and himself at Virginia Tech, authorities said.
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At Oregon's Lewis & Clark College, another student was detained by campus police Wednesday shortly before a vigil for the Virginia Tech victims when he was spotted wearing an ammunition belt. Portland police later determined that it was "a fashion accessory" made of spent ammunition, and said the man did not have a weapon. The belt was confiscated.
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Comments
Posted by: Andee
Posted on: April 19, 2007 02:13 AM
You might find the local take on the Lewis and Clark fiasco interesting:
http://community.livejournal.com/damnportlanders/9526741.html
Posted by: Jeffrey Quick
Posted on: April 19, 2007 08:25 AM
Oh, that's a riot, especially the "Glowing_Fish" comment. Not that I have his problem, you understand...
Posted by: adam
Posted on: April 20, 2007 11:27 AM
Personal Safety holds priority over personal opinion. If threats on people's lives can be spoken legally then what will stop bomb threats? Assasination threats? School Shooting threats?
However, if all he was stating was empathy, then I believe he was protected by his amendments.
Posted by: Jeffrey Quick
Posted on: April 20, 2007 01:49 PM
Since any opinion worth defending is probably threatening to somebody, your statement in practice means that freedom of speech does not exist. What threats were spoken here? The guy said he was angry enough to kill. La-di-dah, so am I sometimes. The difference between me and Cho is that I have a functioning moral code and sense of reality. Are we going to lock up anybody who says, "I could just kill that guy!"? Yes, given the times, he should have kept his mouth shut. But stupidity is not a crime.
Large portions of the American electorate say that they want to steal from me. Worse, they hide in little cubicles once every two years and put out a contract for somebody to do it for them. If we can lock up somebody who expresses the desire to kill, why can't we lock up somebody who expresses the desire to steal?