Common Sense with Paul Jacob

09/12/2023

Civilization is to groups what intelligence is to individuals. It is a means of combining the intelligence of many to achieve ongoing group adaptation.

Octavia E. Butler, The Parable of the Sower (1993), Chapter 10.

https://thisiscommonsense.org/2023/12/09/octavia-e-butler/

08/12/2023

In T.H. White's classic story, the wizard Merlyn transforms The Wart (young Arthur) into a variety of animals, and in one of the most memorable of sequences, an ant in an ant colony. There The Wart learns of the nature of totalitarianism, with the colony's slogan: EVERYTHING NOT FORBIDDEN IS COMPULSORY.

https://thisiscommonsense.org/2023/12/08/dystopian-slogan-2/

08/12/2023

COURT HALTS IMPRISONMENT FOR SPEECH

Left-wing enemies of right-wing freedom of speech, specifically the freedom of speech of Douglass Mackey, recently got their way when U.S. District Judge Ann Donnelly sentenced him to seven months in prison.

But now, a month after sentencing, another court has said wait a minute.

As I reported in October, Mackey was convicted for actions in 2016 that nobody could have known would later be treated as crimes. The FBI had arrested him shortly after Joe Biden became president in January 2021 — as if waiting for a favorable political climate for an obviously partisan action.

According to selectively prosecuting U.S. Attorney Breon Peace, Mackey threatened democracy and sought to “deprive people of their constitutional right to vote.”

What attempted deprivation of voting rights? Did Mackey lock people in their homes so that they could not go out to vote? Steal ballots? Glare and scream at people walking toward a voting site?

No, all that this obvious opponent of Hillary Clinton did was publish satirical posts telling Hillary voters to vote by text, much easier that way. Obnoxious, maybe; or silly. But the posts had no power to hypnotize or derange anyone or, for that matter, prevent anyone from double-checking with an election office or Google. And prosecutors brought in no voters who claimed to have been fooled by the obvious jest — which arguably was satire, a jape upon Mackey’s political opponents.

There’s no there there. Nevertheless, Mackey’s liberty has been at risk at least since 2018, when his legal name behind his pseudonymous social media presence was revealed.

It’s still at risk. But the Second Circuit Court of Appeals has blocked Mackey’s seven-month imprisonment until his appeal can be decided and the free-speech issues properly adjudicated.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
December 8, 2023

Categories crime and punishment First Amendment rights judiciary Court Halts Imprisonment for Speech Post author By Redactor Post date December 8, 2023 No Comments on Court Halts Imprisonment for Speech Left-wing enemies of right-wing freedom of speech, specifically the freedom of speech of Douglass...

08/12/2023

Dystopian slogan from Aldous Huxley's BRAVE NEW WORLD.

https://thisiscommonsense.org/2023/12/07/dystopian-slogan/

07/12/2023

SIKH FREEDOM FIRST

If I get gunned down in a hail of bullets . . . well . . . who done it?

The genocidal Chinese Communist Party, furious at my new website, StoptheChinazis.org?

Perhaps. But what about the regime of Prime Minister Narendra Modi in India?

I’m a member of the Punjab Referendum Commission, an international group advising and monitoring the non-governmental referendums being organized among the worldwide Sikh diaspora by U.S.-based Sikhs for Justice. Recently, I stood at the entrance of a Sikh temple in Surrey, British Columbia, outside Vancouver, where Canadian intelligence agencies say agents of Modi’s government assassinated Sikh leader and Canadian citizen Hardeep Singh Nijjar, back in June, spraying him with 30 bullets.

Then, last week, U.S. prosecutors indicted an Indian national for, according to The Wall Street Journal, “working with an Indian government officer to pay a purported hitman $100,000 . . . to murder a prominent advocate” on U.S. soil.

“The court filing did not name the victim,” The Washington Post reported, “but senior Biden administration officials say the target was Gurpatwant Singh Pannun, general counsel for the New York-based Sikhs for Justice. . . .”

My mouth’s suddenly a bit dry; I’ve been on the same stage as Mr. Pannun several times.

There’s a long history of political unrest and violence between Sikhs in the Punjab region and the central Indian government . . . leading today to roughly one-fourth of Sikhs living outside of India.

What can we do? Well, though I take no position on whether — YES or NO — the Punjab region should secede from India, I very much like that Sikhs for Justice is resorting to the opposite of violence — democracy — by asking Sikhs around the world to cast their vote.

If they dare.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
December 7, 2023

Categories crime and punishment initiative, referendum, and recall international affairs Sikh Freedom First Post author By Redactor Post date December 7, 2023 No Comments on Sikh Freedom First If I get gunned down in a hail of who done it The genocidal Chinese Communist Party, furious at my new webs...

06/12/2023

Listen, this whole system of yours could be on fire and I couldn’t even turn on the kitchen tap without filling out a twenty-seven B stroke six . . . bloody paperwork.

Harry Tuttle, a character in Brazil (1985)

https://thisiscommonsense.org/2023/12/06/archibald-harry-tuttle/

06/12/2023

THE GREAT DE-PLATFORMING?

“There is a certain amount of irony in seeing Republicans come to the floor proposing mandates on business,” said Senator Rand Paul (R-Ky.) in the U.S. Senate, yesterday. Kentucky’s junior senator objected “to Republicans picking winners and losers.”

At issue is a bill pushed by Senator Ted Cruz (R-Tx.), the AM For Every Vehicle Act. Automobile manufacturers are phasing out amplitude modulation (AM) on radio receivers, and Cruz objects primarily on two rationales:

1. emergency roadway communications rely upon AM frequencies, and
since conservatives dominate AM talk radio, the move looks suspiciously like a sneaky way to decrease conservative and Republican political influence.

2. “AM radio is where a lot of talk radio is found,” argues Cruz, “and talk radio is overwhelmingly conservative. And let’s be clear: Big business doesn’t like things that are overwhelmingly conservative.”

Technology and media change all the time, and as ostensible advocates for free markets, it’s no business of Republicans so much as to nudge the market in one direction or the other. Perhaps AM’s days are numbered.

Shed a tear and move on.

Cruz characterizes the issue as one of free speech. Paul expresses incredulity: “The debate over free speech, as listed in the First Amendment, is that government shall pass no law. It has nothing to do with forcing your manufacturer to have AM radio.”

It gets messier: electric car manufacturers say that the AM band interferes with their batteries, and the technology to shield the batteries is expensive. So Cruz’s law would forbid companies from charging more for this tech.

If you ask me, the batteries being harmed by AM radio indicates a glaring defect not in a radio platform but in the platform of electric cars.

So it’s great that Rand Paul’s amendment to undermine Cruz’s mandate would also nix the electric car tax credit.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
December 6, 2023

Categories national politics & policies regulation subsidy The Great De-Platforming? Post author By Redactor Post date December 6, 2023 No Comments on The Great De-Platforming? “There is a certain amount of irony in seeing Republicans come to the floor proposing mandates on business,” said Senat...

05/12/2023

“The fundamental maxim of free men is to live in love towards our actions, and to let live in the understanding of the other person’s will.”

—Rudolf Steiner, The Philosophy of Freedom: A Modern Philosophy of Life Developed by Scientific Methods (1916), Chapter Nine.

https://thisiscommonsense.org/2023/12/05/rudolf-steiner/

05/12/2023

STOP THIEVES!

In July, a King Soopers employee, Santino Burrola, was fired for filming shoplifters.

He even managed to get their license plate number; to do so, he had to peel off an aluminum-foil cover on the plate as the thieves began driving away.

Burrola helped police quickly capture one of the suspects. But Kroger, the parent company, fired him anyway. See, Burrola had violated the sacred kick-me-again Kroger policy that employees must never interfere with thefts in progress.

The policy is like waving a flashing neon red ROB US MORE sign and, unfortunately, is common.

Fortunately, though, it’s not a policy that Michael Sullivan, operations manager of Roger’s Gardens in Orange County, California, had to worry about as he tried to figure out how to stop a months-long series of thefts of expensive shrubbery and other items from the Gardens.

Security cameras weren’t helping. They recorded the thief but were unable to capture his license plate, which could be used to track him down. He kept coming back to steal more.

Finally, Sullivan hit on the idea of hiding AirTags on things that the thief might grab. The stratagem paid off. Sullivan discovered the location of the evildoer and relayed the info to police.

They found a yard clogged with $8,000 in goods stolen from Roger’s Gardens.

The stolen goods have been returned to the Gardens; the thief has been arrested.

Hard? No. Wrong? No.

Thwarting thievery fends off barbarism. Doing it at low personal risk is good business.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
December 5, 2023

Categories crime and punishment property rights Stop Thieves! Post author By Redactor Post date December 5, 2023 No Comments on Stop Thieves! In July, a King Soopers employee, Santino Burrola, was fired for filming shoplifters. He even managed to get their license plate number; to do so, he had to p...

04/12/2023

How come all these other countries got better ‘Donald Trumps’ than we did?
Bridget Phetasy concluding her coverage of President Elect Javier of Argentina, on “Two Americas, One Cup,” the 130th episode of her podcast Dumpster Fire (December 3, 2023).

https://thisiscommonsense.org/2023/12/04/bridget-phetasy-javier/

04/12/2023

DIE, DISNEY, DIE! (Paul Jacob on putting down zombie companies that want to eat our brains)

Disney is taking big financial losses, after a series of bombs on the silver screen and on its own channel, including a billion on last year’s four film fiascos.

Why?

The company went super-woke. And could, therefore, go broke.

Or, says Patrick Ben David, become a “zombie company,” unable to make profits, kept alive only by low interest rates and the hope that Apple will buy it.

Nevertheless, Disney joined a group of major players pulling their advertising off Twitter, er, X.

Why?

Because X’s new owner, Elon Musk, favorably forwarded a tweet about anti-white racism that was said, by many, to be antisemitic.

It’s the rage, now, not only to support Hamas’s terrorism but to excoriate Israel, Zionism, and even Jews in general, yet it was Musk’s forwarded tweet about how Jewish intellectuals and organizations too often support anti-white rhetoric that panicked the big companies, including Bob Iger-headed Disney.

Andrew Ross Sorkin, in an on-stage New York Times interview, asked Mr. Musk to respond to all this. “I hope they stop,” Musk said. “Don’t advertise.”

Musk went on: “If somebody’s going to try to blackmail me, with advertising — blackmail me with money? — ‘go f**k yourself.’”

Then Musk repeated that command, using hand signals.

“Is that clear? I hope it is.” Smiling, he added, “Hey Bob . . . if you’re in the audience.”

Mr. Sorkin pressed X’s owner on the consequences.

“What this advertising boycott is going to do is kill the company,” said Musk, amidst his usual stutters. “And the whole world will know that those advertisers killed the company — and we will document it in great detail.”

“But those advertisers are going to say, ‘we didn’t kill the company.’”

“Oh, yeah? Tell it to Earth.”

Musk explained that both he and the boycotters will make their cases, “and we’ll see what the outcome is.”

The idea is to take the culture war outside educational institutions, the news media, and government bodies, and to shove it into boardrooms everywhere. It’s a great game of chicken, buck buck buck. And, unlike Gale Wynand in The Fountainhead, Musk appears more than willing to lose his investment in X just to prove the point.

An interesting place we’ve come to. The insider elites, and the ideological left, seek to advance woke ideology even if it ruins their own companies, such as Disney, and squelch free speech, even if it means betraying every last principle of American liberty.

So, in this war with other people’s fortunes, take sides: die, Disney, die — before X, let’s hope.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
December 4, 2023

Categories ideological culture Internet controversy social media Die, Disney, Die! Post author By Redactor Post date December 4, 2023 No Comments on Die, Disney, Die! Disney is taking big financial losses, after a series of bombs on the silver screen and on its own channel, including a billion on la...

03/12/2023

Tucker Carlson, from just a few days ago, here makes a point. But the larger subject was not this. He makes his point in aid of trying to make sense of a bigger story. Guess the subject!

https://thisiscommonsense.org/2023/12/02/tucker-carlson-scare/

03/12/2023

There is no security of property, where a despotic authority can possess itself of the property of the subject against his consent. Neither is there such security, where the consent is merely nominal and delusive.

Jean-Baptiste Say, A Treatise On Political Economy (Fourth Edition) (1832), Chapter XIV.

https://thisiscommonsense.org/2023/12/03/jean-baptiste-say-property/

01/12/2023

The Ministry of Truth contained, it was said, three thousand rooms above ground level, and corresponding ramifications below. Scattered about London there were just three other buildings of similar appearance and size. So completely did they dwarf the surrounding architecture that from the roof of Victory Mansions you could see all four of them simultaneously. They were the homes of the four Ministries between which the entire apparatus of government was divided. The Ministry of Truth, which concerned itself with news, entertainment, education, and the fine arts. The Ministry of Peace, which concerned itself with war. The Ministry of Love, which maintained law and order. And the Ministry of Plenty, which was responsible for economic affairs. Their names, in Newspeak: Minitrue, Minipax, Miniluv, and Miniplenty.

The Ministry of Love was the really frightening one.

George Orwell, Nineteen Eighty-Four (1949), p. 6.

https://thisiscommonsense.org/2023/12/01/orwell-ministry-of-love/

01/12/2023

IF/WHY

“This is about accountability, and about transparency,” said Rep. Andy Ogles (R-Tenn), at yesterday’s House Oversight Committee’s bipartisan press conference on Unidentified Aerial Phenomena (UAP’s) — “about holding the Deep State to task for their refusal to declassify information that the American people need to know, that Congress needs to know.”

He paints the same picture of the UAP/UFO issue that has been rumored about for nearly 80 years: “Foreign objects are buzzing around in our airspace, and Joe Biden’s over 30 generals have not only been silent on the issue, but have yet to play ball with Congress.”

The tenor of the presser was summarized early by host Rep. Anna Paulina Luna (R-Fla.): “It is unacceptable that any mid-level, unelected bureaucrat staffers can tell members of Congress that we are not allowed to access information about UAP’s.”

Senator Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) has pushed a disclosure procedure on the order of The President John F. Kennedy Assassination Records Collection Act of 1992, but these representatives scorned that notion, arguing there remains too much secrecy surrounding the 1963 event in Dallas.

“So, whether it’s little green men, American technology, or worse — technology from the CCP — we need to know,” insists Rep. Ogles.

“I think the American people have a simple question,” Jared Moskowitz (D-Fla.) hazarded, “which is ‘if none of this exists, if this is all false, why, at every turn, are there people trying to stop the transparency and the disclosure? Why are folks who are in charge of committees, whether they are in the House or in the Senate, opposed to this disclosure?’ And it’s that point alone that piques the interest.”

Indeed it does.

It’s time for the people to find out.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
December 1, 2023

Categories Accountability government transparency national politics & policies If/Why Post author By Redactor Post date December 1, 2023 No Comments on If/Why “This is about accountability, and about transparency,” said Rep. Andy Ogles (R-Tenn), at yesterday’s House Oversight Committee’s bip...

30/11/2023

Um, as, uh, I think it was President Reagan said, “We’re from the Government; we’re here to help.”

Miguel Cardona, Secretary of Education, Western Governors Association, Nov. 8, 2023.

https://thisiscommonsense.org/2023/11/30/miguel-cardona/

30/11/2023

THE CENSORSHIP INDUSTRIAL COMPLEX

“Many people insist that governments aren’t involved in censorship,” tweeted Michael Shellenberger on Tuesday, “but they are. And now, a whistleblower has come forward with an explosive new trove of documents, rivaling or exceeding the Twitter Files and Facebook Files in scale and importance.”

Because much of recent years’ censorship has occurred on corporate-owned-and-run social media platforms, like YouTube, Facebook and Twitter (now X), some have claimed “it’s not censorship” and, because private, is immune to legal prosecution. This quasi-libertarian argument was most vociferously marshaled by leftists and centrists, who’ve found in the libertarian “private property is sacred” ideal a handy excuse for the censorship they love.

They love it because of what they hate: Fox News, most specifically, and alternative media based on podcasting and vlogging platforms, more generally. These media outlets have bucked the foreign policy establishment as well as the new racism of Critical Race Theory, and official narratives about COVID.

So they must be squelched — as “disinformation.”

This is all made more clear in what Shellenberger calls “The CTIL Files.”

The leaked documents “describe the activities of an ‘anti-disinformation’ group called the Cyber Threat Intelligence League,” which “officially began as the volunteer project of data scientists and defense and intelligence veterans but whose tactics over time appear to have been absorbed into multiple official projects, including those of the Department of Homeland Security.’’

While government operatives and contractors organized, at first, to avoid constitutional and legislative limitations to conducting propaganda and psychological warfare against Americans, the plan was, from the beginning (says the source), “to become part of the federal government.”

In the end, “the military and intelligence agencies” got involved, along with “civil society organizations and commercial media.” Methods used include burner phones, plausible deniability, and “sock puppet accounts and other offensive techniques.”

You can watch today’s hearing (10:00 AM EST) of the Select Subcommittee on the Weaponization of the Federal Government, featuring Shellenberger, Rupa Subramanya, and Matt Taibbi.

Tell me what you think.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
November 30, 2023

Categories First Amendment rights general freedom government transparency The Censorship Industrial Complex Post author By Redactor Post date November 30, 2023 No Comments on The Censorship Industrial Complex “Many people insist that governments aren’t involved in censorship,” tweeted Michael ...

29/11/2023

In the end the Party would announce that two and two made five, and you would have to believe it. It was inevitable that they should make that claim sooner or later: the logic of their position demanded it. Not merely the validity of experience, but the very existence of external reality, was tacitly denied by their philosophy. The heresy of heresies was common sense. And what was terrifying was not that they would kill you for thinking otherwise, but that they might be right. For, after all, how do we know that two and two make four? Or that the force of gravity works? Or that the past is unchangeable? If both the past and the external world exist only in the mind, and if the mind itself is controllable what then?

George Orwell, Nineteen Eighty-Four (1949)

https://thisiscommonsense.org/2023/11/29/george-orwell-heresy/

29/11/2023

THE NOT-UNINTENDED CONSEQUENCES

When bad outcomes are obvious, we can no longer call them “unintended consequences,” can we?

Take the case of California’s double-barreled attack upon “fast food”: last year’s push through the legislature of Assembly Bill 102 and Assembly Bill 1228. These regulatory schemes would have introduced collective bargaining into fast food franchises and enforced much higher minimum wage rates.

The two laws sparked an industry backlash, in the form of ballot referendums to halt the regulatory onslaught, which Steven Greenhut writes about at Reason. “In September, Gov. Gavin Newsom announced a ‘truce,’” Greenhut explains. “The industry pulled its ballot measure and agreed to a $20 minimum wage. In return, Newsom and unions limited the power of the Fast Food Council and removed joint-liability provisions.”

The concession on hiking the legal wage minimum was agreed to, notice, by the fast food lobbyists. Not the workers.

As those familiar with elementary economics understand, when the costs of an input (like labor) are increased, alternatives to those inputs will be sought. So we can expect more replacements of workers with automation — as we’ve seen all around the country in fast food, especially at McDonald’s — as well as higher prices.

Which, in a state sporting huge homelessness and unemployment problems, will only hobble the one industry that helps the poorest members of society both in terms of consumer products (inexpensive food) and entry-level jobs (at fast food joints).

Perhaps California’s Democrats know full well what they are doing. They push crazy policies not because the negative outcomes are “unintended” or unforeseeable.

You see, it’s not disastrous for them.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
November 29, 2023

Categories free trade & free markets political economy too much government The Not-Unintended Consequences Post author By Redactor Post date November 29, 2023 No Comments on The Not-Unintended Consequences When bad outcomes are obvious, we can no longer call them “unintended consequences,” can w...

28/11/2023

A very great deal more truth can become known than can be proven.

—Richard Feynman, “The Development of the Space-Time View of Quantum Electrodynamics,” Nobel Lecture (December 11, 1965).

https://thisiscommonsense.org/2023/11/28/richard-feynman-2/

28/11/2023

'HARDLY PEACE'

Xi Jinping’s “charm offensive” had hardly begun — punctuated by the standing ovation from a roomful of American CEOs even before the leader of this recognized genocidal regime offered his fervent desire for peace and friendship — when, over the weekend, as NBC News reported, “China Confronts U.S. Warship as Tension Grows Over Flashpoint.”

The Chinese People’s Liberation Army declared it had driven a U.S. destroyer away from the Paracel Islands, while the U.S. Navy simply said it conducted freedom of navigation exercises in international waters.

“China claims almost the entire South China Sea,” explained NBC, “including parts claimed by the Philippines, Vietnam, Indonesia, Malaysia and Brunei.” Even though the “Permanent Court of Arbitration in 2016 said China’s claims had no legal basis.”

Sounds like trouble.

“It is certainly not yet war in the South China Sea,” an Al-Jazeera article from years ago states, “but it’s hardly peace, either.”

Just days before that, as dictator Xi and Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese were finally talking about de-frosting relations, a Chinese warship used its sonar, injuring Australian divers.

“According to an announcement by Defence Minister Richard Marles, the incident occurred ‘in international waters inside of Japan’s exclusive economic zone,’” noted Australia’s ABC, “and despite the Chinese ship receiving multiple warnings that the personnel were operating below the surface.”

Of course, the Chinese navy, coast guard and militia vessels have been constantly harassing the Philippines, Vietnam, and other countries in the South China Sea, which is why these countries are increasingly looking for U.S. help.

And it provides us a clearer context for China’s fanciful claims and terrible threats against Taiwan.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
November 28, 2023

Categories international affairs ‘Hardly Peace’ Post author By Redactor Post date November 28, 2023 No Comments on ‘Hardly Peace’ Xi Jinping’s “charm offensive” had hardly begun — punctuated by the standing ovation from a roomful of American CEOs even before the leader of this recogn...

27/11/2023

The columns of figures set out in governmental economic plans express claims to economic powers that are only imaginary. But belief in such powers may be induced by carrying out with great emphasis some fairly extensive economic policies — which cause a certain amount of stress and strain — and pretending that you are thereby putting into effect your economic plan, with all its figures.

—Michael Polanyi, The Logic of Liberty: Reflections and Rejoinders (1951), p. 137.

https://thisiscommonsense.org/2023/11/27/m-polanyi/

27/11/2023

STUCK WITH IT

Poland told Pfizer to stick it elsewhere. Now Pfizer’s suing for failure to pay for all the jabs . . . that Poland didn’t use. Or take. Or even allow in the country.

Pfizer’s a big company, of course, but you know we’re not talking about Celebrex or Fentanyl Citrate or Sonata here. We’re talking about The Jab. The one developed with BioNTech and contracted for by governments around the world.

As near as I can make out, it’s a breach of contract case.

But with a wrinkle.

Poland put a halt to pushing Pfizer’s COVID vaccine in April of 2022, and the people generally seem just fine with it, seeing as how they have a much, much lower rate of excess deaths now than does, say, Sweden, which pushed the vax for far longer.

But why couldn’t Poland simply stop usage of the jab?

After all, a customer shouldn’t be forced to take a medication, right?

Well, the contract was not between Pfizer and Poles individually — this is the modern, statist world, after all — or even collectively, corporately, through the state. The contract was between Pfizer and the European Union!

And elements were secret.

The Polish government, placed on the hook for the drug, was not allowed to see the whole contract.

Think of this as just one of the many ways that politicians who bash Big Pharma bent over backwards to give Big Pharma cushy, cushy deals.

But in court, how will those secret clauses play? I suspect that Pfizer’s prognosis may be negative.

Which would be a healthy outcome.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
November 27, 2023

Categories Accountability crime and punishment international affairs Stuck With It? Post author By Redactor Post date November 27, 2023 No Comments on Stuck With It? Poland told Pfizer to stick it elsewhere. Now Pfizer’s suing for failure to pay for all the jabs . . . that Poland didn’t use. Or ...

26/11/2023

In terms of political logic, I am a mistake, because what I have come to do is in fact stamp out the privileges of politicians.

Javier Milei, as quoted in Maximilan Heath, Reuters (November 20, 2023).

https://thisiscommonsense.org/2023/11/26/javier-milei/

26/11/2023

Some reflection on Milei's campaign.

https://thisiscommonsense.org/2023/11/26/watch-against-leftards-and-for-freedom-of-speech/

24/11/2023

Yet he who reigns within himself, and rules
Passions, Desires, and Fears, is more a King;
Which every wise and vertuous man attains:
And who attains not, ill aspires to rule
Cities of men, or head-strong Multitudes,
Subject himself to Anarchy within,
Or lawless passions in him which he serves.

John Milton, Paradise Regain’d (1671), Book II.

https://thisiscommonsense.org/2023/11/24/john-milton-reigns/

24/11/2023

National debt as of yesterday morning.*

24/11/2023

--Disagreeing With Päivi Räsänen--

In 2019, Finnish politician Päivi Räsänen cited the Bible in her Twitter account in order to express her views about s*x and Christianity.

“How does the doctrinal foundation of the Church fit in with shame and sin being raised as a matter of pride?” Räsänen asked (in Finnish). Her tweet included a link to an Instagram post displaying Romans 1:24-27, which refers to how males “did shameful things with males and thus received in their own persons the due penalty for their perversity.”

Whether you or I agree with Räsänen’s view that homos*xuality is per se immoral is irrelevant. What is not irrelevant is our support for freedom of speech and religious expression: she should surely not be prosecuted for expressing her opinion!

But Finnish police investigated her for the tweet. For good measure, they also included as a possible charge her 2004 publication of a pamphlet questioning same-s*x marriage and discussing related issues. She had published the pamphlet before it became illegal in Finland to express such opinions.

Now Räsänen and a Lutheran bishop being prosecuted for similar reasons have been acquitted.

This is a second acquittal. In 2022, the Helsinki District court ruled that it’s not the job of the court “to interpret biblical concepts.” A state prosecutor replied, “You can cite the Bible, but it is Räsänen’s interpretation and opinion about the Bible verses that are criminal.”

Politicians of Finland, don’t continue on this dark path. Revoke all laws that aim to jail people who disagree with you.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
November 24, 2023

Categories crime and punishment First Amendment rights general freedom Disagreeing With Päivi Räsänen Post author By Redactor Post date November 24, 2023 No Comments on Disagreeing With Päivi Räsänen In 2019, Finnish politician Päivi Räsänen cited the Bible in her Twitter account in order t...