I posted to a few mailing lists that I frequent a notice regarding the changes in my blogs content. Of course, in response some people feel compelled to take a fast “pot shot” at the US. Anyway, here is my reply to someone who mentioned that they were glad to be in “FBI free” Canada.
posted by soulhuntre to [email protected] on 10.25.2005 @ 12:22:00
I would still rather live where I am than any nation on earth. One of the things I am proudest of about my country is the mechanism we have to protect our freedoms. Yes, there will be swings, yes, there will be times that are troubled but they have always been defeated.
The United States has constantly moved forward, constantly become more free, more fair, more equal. We have defeated slavery, we have defeated segregation, we gave women the right to vote, we have defeated the efforts of McCarthy and made some progress against overly broad “Child Pornography” legislation. Even now, when things look bad we are already making progress (The Extreme Associates case is going much better than feared).
We have done so (except in one case) without civil war, without armed revolution and according to the principles of our founders as a democracy. No other nation can say as much.
The FBI is currently the spearhead of some idiocy it is true, but the FBI as a whole is far from an organization that is bad or evil. It certainly is not one I would care to live without. Almost to a man the FBI agents I have met (we train them in tactics on occasion) are absolutely committed to freedom and the rule of constitutionally compatible law. They care deeply about the rights of the citizenry and are well aware of the potential for harm their power could bring.
Let me be absolutely clear. This blip in the road will pass, I know it will pass because my nation has faced and defeated far worse challenges to our core concepts of freedom. I do not feel that I live in some insane police state, rather I live in one that self corrects itself constantly as it seeks an elusive and probably impossible perfect balance for itself.
As for Canada – well any nation that let Andrea Dworkin have that strong an effect on their censorship legislation has nothing to talk about in terms of freedom ๐