I Would Like That Embroidered on a Pillow

If Americans must fear that their sexual expression will land them in prison, then America is a lie.

That's from a discussion about "offensive" porn between law professor Marc Randazza of the Legal Satyricon blog, and a colleague of his who starts out disagreeing with the First Amendment champion but then comes around and gives Randazza his due (well, almost). Powerful stuff.

Here's another embroidery candidate, but you're going to have to bring a pretty big pillow. It concerns a part of the fatally flawed Supreme Court test that says that in order for material to be obscene, it must appeal to a “shameful and morbid interest in nudity, sex, or excretion.”

I’m sure that if I lifted up the lid of your skull and placed a little window into the part of your mind where the stuff that turns you on lies, I’d find something that many people would call “shameful,” or “morbid." … I am not singling you out. I would bet that every person has something locked away there that would shock the rest of us.

Exactly right. And the more our legislators and sundry protectors find these parts in their own psyches, the harder they'll work to criminalize other people who harbor similar forbidden turn-ons. Haggard, Foley, Craig, Spitzer. Nuff said.

And a third reason why my hat's off to Randazza:

Moderate criticism away? Never! I learn more from one sentence from those who disagree with me than volumes from those who agree. So… fear not. Come by and criticize and challenge any time you like.

Would that it were that way at other blogs.

Case in point: roughly three weeks ago, I left two consecutive comments at John Cole's Balloon Juice. I very rarely comment on other people's blogs, but the subject was close to my heart (animal shelters and how "well" they function), and I thought I had a couple of interesting insights to share. My opinion might have been mildly critical of guest blogger (?) Michael D's post, brimming as his little essay was with wide-eyed wonder and self-congratulatory sentiments camouflaged as aw-shucks modesty. But my beef wasn't with him as much as with the armies of little Hitlers who seem to staff so many SPCAs and other shelters around the country. I saw both of my contributions appear in Balloon Juice's comments section, albeit flagged with the line "awaiting moderation."

The next day they were gone, never to be seen again.

The second one was particularly inoffensive, being nothing more than the friendly advice to read Salon's eye-opening article about the casual bigotry of far too many animal shelter staffers. But even the first comment contained nothing that should have gotten it deepsixed, I think, unless disagreeing with a fellow blogger is now a cardinal sin. Nobody sent me that memo.

I've e-mailed John Cole four or five times (always the same polite message) and those e-mails bounced right back. It could be that the Balloon Juice mail server is down, or something (three weeks and counting. Odd).

In any case, I don't like having my comments "moderated away," and if you're the same way, you're in luck. On this blog, that happens at most once or twice a year, in extremely egregious cases — although I frankly can't even remember the last time I deleted a comment that wasn't just spam.

Have at it.

Comments

[Peter Parker]

While not exactly the same thing, shortly after leaving one comment here last June, it disappeared. Actually, the whole post (along with the other comments), disappeared. The post was about a PEW survey and book banning, one called "And Screw That Whole First Amendment Thing." (It still comes up in Google -- as the only hit -- by searching for the title of the post, provided quotation marks are used around the title and only blogs are searched.)

I don't think any of us were egregious in our comments, but as I said, the whole thing disappeared, which is somewhat different than the scenario you describe. Like you, however, I was still a little disappointed to see what I thought was a moderately decent point sent into internet oblivion. I shed a tiny commenter tear.

[Rogier]

Peter:

I don't really recall what happened with that post and its comments. If it wasn't a technical fluke and I disappeared it, which is possible, it might be because it seemed upon reflection to be without much merit. It might have been logically unsound or stylistically embarrassing. I might have looked at the poor, miserable thing in horror and pity and decided to mercy-kill it.

I assure you the post wasn't sent to an early grave because your comments, or anyone else's, bothered me. THAT I would remember. If anything, one of the comments might have convinced me that I'd just totally flubbed it. If that's what it was, I'll try not to do either again -- the flubbing OR the deepsixing.

Cheers,

Rogier

[Kid Handsome]

Just seemed like an appropriate post for me to say how much I enjoy this site. Thanks for your hard work.

[Rogier]

Kid:

You're not just Handsome, you must also be really smart, and have impeccable taste.

;-)

[Rimfax]

Rogier,

I think that Spiderman's alter ego was making a joke. The search that he mentions returns nothing. You may need to clean the gunk off your irony board.

[Rogier]

Rimfax:

http://blogsearch.google.com/blogsearch?client=safari&rls=en-us&q=%22And+Screw+That+Whole+First+Amendment+THing%22&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&um=1&sa=N&tab=wb

I think my irony board's all right.

[Phelps]

That sort of "moderation" appears to be more the rule than the exception on the left side of the blogosphere. On the other hand, it is the epitome of weakness and poor taste on the conservative and libertarian sides.

I think that speaks volumes.

[Lee]

I'm an infrequent commentor at Balloon Juice (only slightly more frequent than here) but I read daily.

At Balloon Juice your first comment always gets moderated to make sure you are not a bot. After that there is no moderation.

Before you critize a blog about their policy you might want to actually you know...READ the blog and comments. John takes all kinds of comments.

If you cannot get a simple email to get to delivered (hint: if the email keeps bouncing back there might be something wrong on YOUR end) I doubt you'll take the time to research the comment policy (or habits) of a blog you want to post to.

[Rogier]

Lee:

Little hot under the collar, don't you think?

Messages to jcole@balloon-juice.com
(the link provided by the blog) were sent from two separate accounts, including from a friend's. The mail delivery subsystem

>> tried to deliver your message, but it was rejected by the recipient domain. The error that the other server returned was: 550 550 .<<

Hardly "something wrong on [my] end" then, is there?

It may be true that "John takes all kinds of comments" but evidently not mine. Whether that's inadvertent or an easily-piqued moderator's way of deepsixing dissent, I have no way of knowing.

I've moved on to things that actually matter, but wanted to let you know I'm not quite as much of a technologically illiterate and ill-informed boob as you seem to think.

Thanks.