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From: Robin Miller <robin.miller@invalid.invalid>
Newsgroups: rec.arts.tv
Subject: Re: [OT] Teens face 10 years in prison for riding over pride flag on
 bicycles
Date: Sun, 23 Jun 2024 16:41:09 -0400
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Adam H. Kerman wrote:
> suzeeq  <suzeeq@imbris.com> wrote:
>> On 6/23/2024 11:27 AM, Adam H. Kerman wrote:
>>> Robin Miller <robin.miller@invalid.invalid> wrote:
>>>> Adam H. Kerman wrote:
>>>>> Rhino <no_offline_contact@example.com> wrote:
>>>
>>>>>> Leo Kearse, the presenter of this video, is correct: the rules of the
>>>>>> Alphabet Mafia have taken on the feel of blasphemy laws in the Muslim
>>>>>> countries. This is particularly evident in the horrendous overcharging
>>>>>> of three Spokane teens for riding over a local pride flag on bicycles:
>>>
>>>>>> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VtS-c4nPJtQ [`12 minutes]
>>>
>>>>> Overcharging? It wasn't even a crime to ride their bicyles in the first
>>>>> place!
>>>    
>>>>> I love how the video clip of the interview of the lesbian witness shows
>>>>> an automobile driving over the very same painted pavement as we see over
>>>>> her right shoulder. I didn't see the felony arrest.
>>>
>>>>> It appears that what we have here is a case of bullying children because
>>>>> that's what we can get away with.
>>>
>>>> Every day this NG is filled with examples of why it's become such a
>>>> cesspool.
>>>
>>>> Here is a news story and the police statement:
>>>
>>>>
>> https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/teens-arrested-after-scooters-leave-marks-on-pride-crosswalk/ar-BB1nSroe
>>>
>>>>
>> https://my.spokanecity.org/police/news/2024/06/06/multiple-arrests-make-after-downtown-pride-mural-is-vandalized/
>>>
>>>> This happened on June 5, 18 days ago, but is now being widely shared on
>>>> right-wing media. These kids were repeatedly riding over an area
>>>> described as a "street mural" in order to deface it. The area had
>>>> recently been repainted after someone else had intentionally damaged it
>>>> using a flammable liquid. The area, according to the police statement,
>>>> was "clearly marked to keep traffic away as it was just re-painted to
>>>> repair previous damage."
>>>
>>>> These kids should have been arrested if they were intentionally damaging
>>>> anything painted on the street as a street mural. And if it had been a
>>>> US flag I doubt anyone would be complaining.
>>>
>>>> While the kids were charged with 1st Degree Malicious Mischief, a class
>>>> B felony for which the maximum sentence is 10 years, of course they
>>>> would not receive anything like that even if they are convicted. They
>>>> would probably be put on probation.
>>>
>>> In advance of pride parades in Chicago and various suburbs, the parade
>>> routes are lined with decorations installed temporarily on municipal
>>> lightpoles. That can be done with permission in a way that enforcing
>>> laws against vandalism of the decorations as crimes doesn't violate equal
>>> protection of the right to free speech.
>>>
>>> I'm going to continue to disagree. This is a matter of government
>>> restrictions on free speech. The mural, an act of expression, is the free
>>> speech of the artists who painted it. They had permission. However, as it
>>> was painted on a driving surface of an open roadway in the public way,
>>> that permission cannot possibly prohibit someone else from driving over
>>> it, even if the way it was driven over defaced the mural.
>>>
>>> Free speech in the public way is a natural right, not a privilege that the
>>> city of Spokane may selectively grant to the artists precluding the free
>>> speech of those who disagree. It's also a civil right in the Constitution
>>> of the United States. Therefore, the criminal charges are a denial of
>>> equal protection of a civil right.
>>>
>>> As a secondary matter, a mural painted on a driving surface in the
>>> public way IS NOT a painted marking as a traffic control device based on
>>> the Manual of Uniform Traffic Control Devices, a standard published by
>>> FHwA as promulgated by AASHTO. Now, it doesn't have the force of law and
>>> I'm not sure of its status as a federal regulation (to the extent that
>>> the standard is adopted in a given state, it is a state regulation that
>>> local public works departments must implement), but it's always a
>>> defense to  citation of a traffic violation that signs and markings were
>>> knocked over, misplaced, installed incorrectly, or worn out that the
>>> driver had no notice of the condition being enforced.
>>>
>>> Similarly, the boys should be able to use the fact of the nonstandard
>>> pavement marking as a defense against the felony charge.
>>>
>>> All I saw in the video were traffic violations that would have been
>>> proper charges, not crimes to be charged.
>>>
>> Wouldn't it be a deliberate act of vandalism, though?
> 
> The artists don't have a property right in painting a driving surface of
> an open roadway in the public way. Without a property right, I don't see
> how it's vandalism. The guy who set fire to the mural certainly
> committed a criminal act, not vandalism of the mural but vandalism of
> the roadway surface.
> 


Burning a privately-owned flag is an act of expression. Burning a flag 
attached to a government building is a criminal act.

This mural was authorized by the governmental authorities and therefore 
became part of the roadway surface. Intentionally defacing the mural is 
therefore a criminal act.

--Robin