Snaggle Tooth

"a) Whoever transmits in interstate or foreign commerce any communication, with the intent to coerce, intimidate, harass, or cause substantial emotional distress to a person, using electronic means to support severe, repeated, and hostile behavior, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than two years, or both.

(b) As used in this section-

(1) the term ‘communication’ means the electronic transmission, between or among points specified by the user, of information of the user’s choosing, without change in the form or content of the information as sent and received;

(2) the term ‘electronic means’ means any equipment dependent on electrical power to access an information service, including email, instant messaging, blogs, websites, telephones, and text messages.’."

-- Bill [HR 1966], letting us know "It may become illegal to sound ‘mean’ to someone", courtesy of (someone I've overlooked for much too long:) Diddly's Weblog!!! (Sorry, dude,...)

Diddly adds that "Izzy Kalman thinks we should be worried":

"Not only is no one teaching Freedom of Speech anymore, that precious freedom is being slowly but surely killed. It is being murdered by the growing social movement that has successfully brainwashed virtually everyone into believing that the solution to human emotional misery is to create, by force of law, a society in which no one says anything anyone else finds offensive, in which there is no stigma, and in which there are no imbalances of power. There is not one social movement in the history of the world that has enjoyed such unanimous support as the anti-bully movement. Not one religious or political group has criticized it, despite its being contrary to the basic philosophies of most religions and political groups. Not one psychological organization has criticized it, despite the fact that it violates the principles of almost all major schools of psychology. Neither the American Civil Liberties Union nor any other rights-advocacy group has criticized it, despite the fact that anti-bully laws violate the most basic democratic right, Freedom of Speech. Even organizations that are dedicated to promoting Freedom of Speech have failed to criticize this anti-free-speech movement.

The number one tool of science is logical thinking. 2,400 years ago, Aristotle said, 'One thing no government can do, no matter how good it is, is to make its citizens morally virtous.' Simple logic will lead anyone with a basic understanding of human nature to realize that a society in which everyone is always nice to each other is impossible. It has never existed-and will never exist-because it can’t exist."

Diddly is also pissed knowing "John Mellancamp, much more famous than Izzy, thinks it would be great to make it illegal to say distressing things":

"I don’t think people fought and gave their lives so that some guy can sit in his bedroom and be mean. I don’t think that’s what freedom of speech is,” he continued. “Freedom of speech is really about assembly — for us to collectively have an idea. We want to get our point of view out so we can assemble and I can appoint you to be the spokesman. That’s freedom of speech — to be able to collectively speak for a sector of people. But somehow it’s turned into "I can be an asshole whenever I feel like, say whatever I like, be disrespectful to people and not be courteous." It’s not good for our society. Not being courteous is not really freedom of speech."

Finally, possibly putting his sweet ass in trouble, Diddly (bravely?) adds:

"Hey John – fuck you. 

Does that hurt your little pink feelings ?

That ain’t America, only for you not me, however big an asshole you may think me to be."

And, as a veteran of the United States military, and a dues-paying member of the VFW (Veterans of Foreign Wars) - something John Mellancamp probably can't claim - I must say, I couldn't agree more,...