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From: "Adam H. Kerman" <ahk@chinet.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 20:20:53 -0000 (UTC)
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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.