Unethical Speech and Hate Speech

There are many examples of unethical speech and hate speech throughout our nation’s history. Take the Ku Klux Klan for example, their white supremacy speeches led to a movement that many are trying to erase from their minds today.

To have hate speeches that turn into beliefs of hatred, that in turn caused many immoral killings, is completely unethical, and is a good example of hate speech. To have any organization that instills principles to be one color is right and another is wrong, is just an attempt to have power over the other, therefore, causing negative emotions to that group.

Negative emotions can make someone easily manipulated by another because negative emotions make one weak. Manipulation can help one lose their rational thought and project those negative emotions onto other people. Projections of negative emotions due to their fear can make a role of unethical supremacy or dominance.

Nudity as Art; Male vs. Female

After watching the film in class titled, "Dirty Pictures," our seminar group had a really awesome discussion. We covered topics such as the difference between male and female nudity and how it is viewed by society. Some argued that the nude female body is more accepted in society, such as breast feeding any time or place. Yet, others argued that the male nude body is more accepted, for they can walk around in public with their shirts off and women cannot. Societal norms vary from culture to culture. There are restaurants in Spain where women paint the menu of the day all over their bare bodies, including their breasts, arms, and stomach.

Also religions play a huge role in society on what is accepted as moral / ethical, and what is not. In our group we looked online at the picture of Virgin Mary with elephant dung on it. "Two weeks ago an art exhibit, titled "Sensation," which includes a depiction of the Virgin Mary stained with elephant dung, was planning to open in New York's Brooklyn Museum of Art. The exhibit would be closed to people under age 18 but Mayor Rudy Giuliani, realizing the Brooklyn Museum was funded to the tune of over 7 million dollars a year by NY taxpayers, saw things differently and the battle lines were drawn."

Positions on Pornography

In class this week we studied the different supporting and opposing positions on whether pornography should be regulated. While the opposing positions are very strong, I think I am more convinced by the Liberal Feminist position.

The chapter, "That Special Shimmer" in Outspoken, was very interesting and it portrayed the life of Annie Sprinkle. She is a captivating women and her story is fascinating. She labels herself as a feminist, lesbian, and a champion of sex. One of my favorite parts of the chapter, was when "Annie recast herself as an artist, she claimed the right to speak for herself and to choose her own sexual identity, an options not available to all women, or, as she points out, to her for most of her career."

The film that we watched in class on Tues on the Free Speech Movement was really moving. I have grown up near Berkeley and have spent a lot of time there. It is a beautiful city filled with a great history.

My favorite part of the film was when students were locked out of Sproul Hall, but they were so determined to protest that they climbed up on ropes to get into the second story windows. Another great part of the film was when students surrounded the police car and gave speeches standing on top of it.

After searching the web I found a really awesome site at http://www.fsm-a.org/ that has great links, photos, speeches, interviews, bibliographies, and other writings all connected to the Free Speech Movement.