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From: suzeeq <suzeeq@imbris.com>
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 11:47:58 -0700
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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?