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Nazis find their way to Brookline Village
By adamg on Sat, 03/09/2019 - 5:50pm
A sticker from one of those Nazi cosplayer groups showed up in Brookline Village today. State Rep. Tommy Vitolo (D-Brookline), says: Not in my town:
Free speech doesn’t entitle anyone to lamp posts. If I see any of these hateful postings, I’m going to rip them down. I encourage you to do the same.
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Comments
And yet you've linked to a
And yet you've linked to a photo of the sticker thus giving it way more eyeballs then it would ever get on a lamp post.
I'm through with that shit
In my journalism career, which now stretches way back, I've covered too many stories of Boston-area Jews or other minorities not doing anything about hatred hurled at them for fear of offending their Christian neighbors (or not knowing where to turn in the case of a refugee family) and the result is always the same: It just gets worse and worse until something really horrible happens (in one case, a temple's entire sukkah being torn down, in another, a family came home to find their pet canary, in its cage, thrown into the pool to go along with some other destruction in their home).
So, yeah, no more. Yes, it's just a stupid sticker or flier. But that's how it starts. Better people know that there are actual Nazis walking around out there now than just sitting back and waiting until a whole bunch of them show up and try to start trouble.
That's exactly how it starts
It starts with stickers, flyers, suggestions on the street, someone making a snide remark on the T, looking the other way...
And this is how it should be handled
Private citizens pulling this crap down.
The government should only be involved if they are pulling all flyers/stickers etc. Down. Otherwise you get the government determining what is acceptable speech. There are limits of course, but from what I've seen and heard, nothing posted goes outside the extremely liberal bounds of protected American speech.
Really strange that you feel the need to goto bat for Nazis
I mean stop beating around the bush, these aren't people that are having debates about fiscal policy, they literally believe certain members of our society shouldn't exist and post this garbage to terrorize those people.
Their speech is owed no protections and your own choice of words here is very disturbing.
Nobody's going to bat for
Nobody's going to bat for Nazis. I fucking hate Nazis. I bet Stevil does, too. But the government going around pulling objectionable speech off of lampposts is actual fascism.
Leave it to the people, who do not have to tolerate hate speech, to do the dirty work, rather than our government, which is Constitutionally obliged to tolerate objectionable speech.
They use their speech to terrorize
The First Amendment does not project speech calling for violence upon a person or group.
Everyone should fight speech like this, you seem to want to defend its right to exist, which is going to bat for them even if you claim to object to their speech.
Cite please?
I'd love to see a supreme court or appellate court decision or two that supports the assertion you're making here. For my side, I'd suggest Brandenburg v Ohio.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brandenburg_v._Ohio
Not sure if the basic Wiki of that goes in depth enough,
But, my reading of it is in the facts the person charged "stopped short of urging upon others that it is their duty or their interest to resist the law," and therefore wasn't convicted of anything. That is, they didn't incite violence based on the test. But what Spin's getting at is that urging to "resist the law" (assault, battery, or some other unlawful behavior). Again, without having more examples of the law to cite, it's unclear what passes the "imminence" or "likelihood" parts of the test. I'm not entirely convinced that they don't have a point, or that this is a closed case of protected speech. But, IANAL, of course.
Actually you are wrong
Unless you care to ignore the US constitution and centuries of legal precedent, then you'd be right.
Nobody is defending what they say. Only their right to say it as long as it doesn't cross certain legal limits. If you can't identify the limit they have crossed, you can't make such a statement.
In the meantime, people of good will are free to rwar this crap down and I encourage everyone to do so.
What if the government takes down all political themed messages.
And leaves up the "lost dog" photos? That is almost community service 101.
Yawn, getting tired of this cowardly excuse
They literally believe certain members of our society shouldn't exist and post this garbage to terrorize those people. Full stop.
That crap doesn't belong in our community. Members of our community have spoken up against this hate speech and addressed it. Its really strange and telling that you object to that.
Tired of people supporting 1st amendment only if it's covenient
What was on the sign that violates the first amendment? If you can't state that by quoting verbatim, then you have no case.
And like it or not - hate speech is not against the 1st amendment unless it is intended to provoke violence - plus it has to be on these signs to be relevant. Neither you nor anyone else gets to be the thought police.
I get it - these are horrible terrible people - I agree. But even horrible terrible people are entitled to their rights under the constitution.
Nazis terrorize and provoke violence on people
That is not protected speech and you know it. It should be shamed and chased out of town but here you are trying to carry water for them.
If you can't see that, then its because you are being a willfully ignorant troll.
Who's the troll?
Ain't the people wishing to kick Nazis out of the community
The people heming and hawing about muh freeze speech? It might be coded language but we see right through it.
He's not
There is no speech on the posted stickers, whatsoever, other than to name an organization that we all, collectively, find repugnant. But there is no incitement to violence, no actual hate on the sticker.
If you find the 1st amendment so objectionable, feel free to propose an amendment to have it stricken from the Bill of Rights. Then fly that up the flagpole and see who salutes.
More willful ignorance
Yeah Nazi's totally don't advocate for violence and murder of various members of our communities. Nope not all, never heard that before.
Go ahead, call them repugnant but stop just short of calling them what they really are. How brave of you.
The part you seem to be missing
is that advocating violence and murder is in fact protected speech.
There is a distinction between "advocating" and "inciting" and there is about 200 years of case law on this.
Question for you
Can you give an example of when anyone has ever directed hate speech at a group that you were a member of?
I'm just wondering if you've ever been on the receiving end of these behaviors that you've decided are ok.
Ooh Ooh
Jew ... check
Conservative Republican ... check
Immigrant ... check
White ... check
Male ... check
Heterosexual and cisgendered ... double check
Gun owner ... check
All of them at once, in Massachusetts ... you bet your ass.
Roman he said examples
Not the plot for your latest fan-fic.
You poor little bunny
Please point to the place on the doll where expectations of responsibility for your own behavior/self control and not getting automatic advantage for being a straight white male hurt you.
Well - let's see...
Anti-Catholic screeds from born again Christians in college (long before anything to do with the repugnant things exposed in the 21st century - and really more to do with Catholic religious teachings) and I was actually teased for being a Nazi in elementary school because I had a German name. Of course my father resorted to using his middle name Robert because you didn't want to be a 12 year old during WW II with a name like Otto - because of course all German born in the US are automatically evil Nazis.
And then there's my experience in Asia - mostly in Japan - where I was told all Americans were fat and lazy (but not me, because I wasn't fat back then and I kept Japanese salariman hours - go figure). Oh and of course as a white guy - there were certain places I wasn't allowed to live, and of course being white also made me mentally incapable of speaking Japanese - but they had to tell me that in Japanese because they didn't speak English. And of course my whiteness also made me physically incapable of using chopsticks.
And then we can start that because I'm a white male, that now automatically makes me a racist misogynist pig due to an accident of birth...
Shall I continue?
And exactly what behaviors are you asserting I am approving of - other than people are entitled to exercise their rights - even if the exercise of those rights offends us?
"And then we can start that because I'm a white male"
Oh lol you're really serious about the faux victim complex uh?
Interesting, on this thread you've doubled down on your asinine point that those Nazis aren't trying to provoke violence and terrorism with their garbage but then you go right into the MRA talking points about how you've been a victim of hate speech because you're a white male.
Wow honestly this has been quite the journey. You've gone from "hate speech is protected speech, those Nazis didn't say anything violent" to "someone teased me for being white, thats hate speech." The mental gymnastics here are Olympic-level.
You lack the mental capacity
To participate in meaningful discussion when you resort to making up things and attributing them to me and you also demonstrate a thorough ignorance of the first amendment.
Take a class in logic and constitutional law before furthering the demonstrations of your ignorance.
PS, i am nobody's victim. just stating facts.
"automatically makes me a racist misogynist pig"
Yeah ok, totally just stating facts.
You have no interest in having a logical discussion, you've moved the goal posts on your nazi apologia plenty of times to contradict yourself.
I have no interest in welcoming nazi speech, I don't care if you think their speech is protected, we will continue to chase them out of community, you can stand on the sidelines and support their perceived right to harass and terrorize. Congrats.
Quit while you're ahead
you've had three people show you that you don't understand the limits (and lack of limits) of the first amendment. you also misquote and put words in people's mouths that they clearly didn't say to make your point.
I will stand right there with you to protest the presence of these people in our community as I did last year when they came to Boston Common. I just don't want the government to do it until and unless they cross legal lines. Other than putting a flyer on a telephone pole, they have not crossed that line and you have repeatedly failed to show that they have.
Time to give up. You've lost this argument many times over.
That white privilege just oozing right now
Look its cute that you don't think these people are violent individuals that want to terrorize and murder members of our community. Thats the line bud.
Members of our community are quite literally protesting and ridiculing their speech, I see you here defending their right to do it and splitting hairs about whats crossing the line, adorable.
Why do you keep making the same stupid argument
In an argument you've already lost?
LOL Ok buddy
I hate to be the one that says "scoreboard" but you should really review this thread.
Oh and speaking of stupid arguments, I noticed you're post below about racism against white people, again adorable that you think thats a thing.
The fragile white male, on full display here.
Say hello to Trump 2.0
These are the attitudes that pushed white people to vote for him (not me, not ever). They are sick of people saying when white people (especially males) have a problem, it's their own damned fault.
You my friend are as bad as the Nazis with attitudes like that.
"as bad as the Nazis."
Snowflake, how do you even go outside?
And there it is!
Poe's Law rings true again!
I'm glad you've resort to this, it at least shows you've sorta admitted defeat :)
Also bonus points for another MRA talking point, love it!
tis but a scratch
He says as he's writhing on the ground in agony with no arms and no legs.
Suitable for framing
White guy sez he totally knows what it's like to be a minority target of hate speech because someone gave him a fork in Japan once.
Lulz.
White guy sez he totally
Can we put Stevil's post in the dictionary next to the definition of "White Privilege"?
Sure
because racism against white people isn't racism.
And you conveniently ignore the rest of the post.
Interestingly - I didn't experience racism when I lived in Singapore that I noticed - but I wouldn't want to be Indian or Malay in that society. It's somewhat closeted, but it's there - or maybe it isn't under your definition of ignoring everything you can't minimize?
You're missing an important distinction
You seem to be missing the distinction between, on the one hand, recognizing that hate speech is legally protected speech and, on the other hand, endorsing said hate speech.
Yeah but
His answer was totally worth it.
Like I said above
because in your world racism against white people isn't racism.
Anti catholic speech isn't in the same league with anti-semitism
It's not OK to say "paddy wagon" any more - but calling those with German heritage Nazis (even though there family has lived here since before WW II) is perfectly fine.
got it - you really want Trump to get re-elected.
me me! pick me!
IN the City of Boston, no one can post on public property, including on lamp posts.
https://www.boston.gov/departments/public-works/how-we-keep-boston-clean
Freedom of speech Adam
Freedom of speech Adam
Works both ways
As the rep says, it's his right to rip every last one of them down.
Also, please review the First Amendment (it's not hard - it's really short). The free-speech part refers to government action, not to what individuals might do (so since Mr. Vitolo is part of the government, I'm sure there are any number of individuals who are not who would be more than willing to step up and tear them down).
Ain't no governmental authority
stopping you from hanging posters with swastikas, anon. Just like there's no governmental authority (preemptively) stopping me from cramming them somewhere you'll need to get them surgically removed if I catch you hanging them. Isn't freedom of speech great?
Nobody has a Constitutional right to put stickers on lampposts
Not for Adolf Hitler, not for your band's next gig either. The owner of the lamppost gets to decide what, if any, speech is allowed on it.
However, I think communities
However, I think communities are better off if there are public bulletin boards (or poles that serve as such) in areas with pedestrian traffic.
I disagree
about allowing crap posted on poles. It just gets destroyed and becomes garbage that no one takes responsibility for.
Public bulletin boards, sure - but make certain someone is there to take care of it so we don't have more garbage lining the sidewalks and streets.
Speechy keen
And posting about this flier on Universal Hub reflects Adam's rights of freedom of speech and freedom of the press, too.
Civil liberties are complex and compelling issues but I'm not sure how mindlessly crowing "freedom of speech" in response to a news report of an incident like this advances any constructive discussion.
Just more distortion and conflation of what "freedom of speech" means. Universal Hub is a great site, sure, but Adam isn't an elected governmental official making laws that infringe on this person's views.
Hate speech is not free
Hate speech is not free speech
Hate speech is absolutely free speech
The whole freedom-of-speech thing is not about freedom to say nice things that everyone agrees with, it's about freedom to express decidedly unpopular opinions.
freedom of speech
is about THE GOV not shutting down speech they disagree with, not protecting racist vandalists, BOB
when you defend violent rhetoric dont be surprised when it turns on you, either in the form of actual physical violence or the removal of your benefits which these guys support too, cuz they *totally* care about you and aren't using you
That's what the second amendment is for
To protect the first, and to protect against the possibility of its abuse. Follow along, eh?
Um, no
If that were the case then the NRA would have supported the Black Panthers when they armed themselves against police who were systematically "coon hunting" black people in LA.
So let me get this straight
NRA fails to live up to its stated principles...therefore the principles are invalid.
Let's see if anyone else might want to stand up for the right of armed self defense if the NRA should lapse?
Oh look, from today's New York Times:
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/09/opinion/sunday/gun-ownership-blacks.html
And I'll let slide the tacit assumption that the Black Panthers in 1960s California were all smiles and sunshine.
Lots of topic drift here
Just for the record, my position is:
Increasing government
I'm afraid I'm going to have to ask you to show your work here.
Sure....
Sure. I'll give you Pakistan, where saying things that piss the religious off is termed "blasphemy" and carries the death penalty. Or Russia, whose legislature just passed a law criminalizing criticism of the state. Or Thailand, where anything that could remotely be construed as criticizing the monarchy is a crime. Or Egypt, whose government is throwing journalists in jail. Or Turkey.
Shall I go on?
I hope police check security cams
How the person(s) who did this don't show up on someone's cam is almost inconcievable.
People, we just talked about this.
If you care about tolerance, you can't tolerate the totally intolerant, I know its a paradox and hard to wrap your head around at first, but please try. There is no need to show any respect to those who espouse discrimination and violence, they do not deserve "equal time". Stickers on light poles are vandalism. Not Art. Not Speech. We should all fight for their right to put the stickers on their own property, their RIGHT to speak their minds on Boston Common, to publish their views. But we should also try to shout them down, put up our own stickers on our own property, publish our own views and shine a bright light on these clowns. We've let this become normalized to the point that people don't even know how to respond. Ask a member of the Greatest Generation how THEY feel about Nazis and their recent emergence from their mother's basements and Obama-era bunkers. I bet they can't believe we're letting this happen again. Complacency, not voting, not being present and engaged is an insult to all who went before us and fought for our civil rights.
It's not even a paradox
This isn't a paradox, unless you also think "You say you love animals, but now you're upset about the lion eating your baby" is also a paradox.
Yes, despite the confusion of right-wing numbnuts on
the subject, anti-intolerance does not equal intolerance. In fact, anti-intolerance is the opposite of intolerance: look, it's right there in the word! Anti-. Intolerance. Get it?
And yet in every thread like this, some brain-dead wingnut chimes in, "Oh, the intolerant left and their hatred of Nazis!" Amazing such people can walk and breathe at the same time.
Or, to put it another way
"So much for the tolerant left!"
Brave Stevil
It's getting to the kids too
My colleague works in the Lynn schools. He caught a kid drawing swastikas on his desk, and sent the kid to the principal. The kid told him "It's the German flag."
To his credit, my buddy told him "I don't need a history lesson from you, you're failing every class."
Not
freedom of speech you fucking wet diaper fuck. this is about power, there are more decent people than Nazis, so force them to shut the fuck up. they deserve to be silenced, and if breaking the law they deserve to be prosecuted. You can't go around threatening to kill, the president, you can't go around shouting sexual innuendo and minors or even adults for that matter, then you sure as fuck can't go around asking for millions of people to be exterminated. fuck nazis.
Don't let me catch you...
This is around the corner from where I grew up. I crossed this intersection almost every day on my way to school when I was a kid. I still live less than 2 miles away.
I find you putting this s(&t up in my old neighborhood, you're going to learn what a screaming banshee sounds like. Trust me, the police station which is just a few yards down the street is going to know that something is up and if you are lucky will get to you first.
Your hate is NOT ACCEPTABLE HERE!
Juicy
Anyone seen Jussie Smollett in the area?
Chicago is not Brookline
How is the Jussie Smollett case even relevant to this Brookline, Massachusetts incident?
Just admit you have a crush on Jussie and move on already.
All the Boston antifa crap
On the SWC is totally ok though right?
I'm 100% equal opportunity
Doesn't matter if it's a flyer for a tag sale, a political poster, or an ad for guitar lessons. You steal public property by posting it on a lamp post? I'm pulling it down.
Antifa
Because being against fascists is just as bad as being fascist?
Not sure I agree with your police work there, Lou.
how this term made it's way
how this term made it's way into the lexicon has always been a headscratcher to me. are people that use it as invective suggesting that being anti-facist is bad?
Street violence is bad
Thugs who yearn for street violence while masquerading as defenders of the weak is worse. Blackshirts telling me with a straight face that they're not blackshirts is not cool.
You've got to pay attention and be aware of who and what you're defending uncritically.
Mussolini could have garnered a lot of votes from Bostonians dismayed at the state of the MBTA. After all...he said he'd make the trains run on time, right?
That's why it's invective.
Roman...
...I don't know how to tell you this, but "blackshirt" is a term for Italian fascisti. It does not apply to every person wearing a black shirt.
Pay attention your own self, you disingenuous sockpuppet.
Oh my achy
breaky heart
lbb buddy,
thugs with bike locks and baseballs bats are different from Italian/German/Whatever fascists how exactly?
Oh I get it. They're totally different because they say that they're "anti" fascist. Now I see the error of my ways. Here I thought that beating the shit out of people for perceived political reasons was wrong, but since the people dishing out the beatings tell me they're the good guys, I must have been mistaken.
i'm very confused because the
i'm very confused because the words you wrote seem to make sense syntactically, yet i am certain that you are not intending to convey the meaning i'm understanding.
i cannot for the life of me see any way that you could possibly be addressing so-called antifa, or more broadly, *scare quotes* The Left *close scare quotes* in the United States.
Antifa =/= freedom fighters
The elected socialists like
The elected socialists like Ocasio-Cortez frighten me much more than a couple of idiots running around Brookline and posting hateful flyers on some utility poles.
Be honest
Is it her dancing or cooking live streams that scare you more?
More like the
Not knowing what a tax break is,
Saying with a straight face that the world will end in 12 years unless she's declared God-King,
And best of all...speaking at the Women's March post Farakhan-gate and jumping up to defend known anti-Semite Ilhan Omar after her latest outburst went a little more viral than intended.
Nearly all the Jew-hating is on the left these days. Whether in the imaginings of people who see Nazis on every streetcorner or out of the mouths of newly-elected Democrats.
If I were a little more Alex Jonesy in my temperament, I might even think Tommy Vittolo put that thing up himself so he could have something to grandstand against.
But I'm not that nutty. I'll just confine myself to reminding everyone that the Second Amendment is there for when the pogroms really might start coming to your street...to dissuade the keyboard commandos that paste up these signs away from turning words into deeds.
Umm.... Seriously?
Seriously, bro?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n12sjwk9FBE
https://www.cnn.com/2018/10/28/us/pittsburgh-synagogue-shooting/index.html
In all seriousness...
... Jew-haters in government and enmeshed in leadership positions in institutions of civil society are a bigger threat than lone whackjobs.
The latter have little influence and are condemned and shamed. The former can do a lot of damage when they get free propaganda from sympathetic media. Ilhan Omar and Tamika Mallory and Linda Sarsour are telling everyone it's OK to hate on Jews so long as you're "morally right" to paraphrase AOC.
You've got a point there
And I'm sure it was only because you had to rush out for an important meeting that you left out people like Steve King, Jim Jordan, and, um, what's that other guy's name? Oh, yeah, Donald Trump.
Give it a rest guy
I remember when you were doing your damnedest to try to convince me it was Trump's fault that a Bernie Bro in Missouri and a kid in Israel were calling in bomb threats to JCCs along the East Coast.
I also remember when you tried to back up your point by linking an Atlantic article with the provocative title "Are Jews White?," written by a Jewish writer, and telling me it was evidence that "some people are questioning whether Jews are white."
Spare Me
You, the guy who claimed the synagogue shooting in Pittsburgh happened because the "American Jewish Community" doesn't want to carry guns wants to tell me who the "Real" anti-semites are.
Learn to code...I mean read
I didn't say it happened because they were unarmed, I said it was as bad as it was because they were unarmed. Same thing I said about Sutherland Springs.
What I did say beyond that was that it was foolish in light of such violence for American Jews to cling to their anti-gun ideology.
And I stand by all of what I said.
Oh, I read code
While the blood was still fresh on the ground, you specifically called out "The American Jewish community," as if they are some kind of monolith, for not carrying guns around everywhere they go. That, sir, reeks of antisemitism.
That sir, reeks of realism
If, as the lefties keep telling me, antisemitism is on the rise, then it's downright foolishness for us Semites to gather in large numbers without providing our own armed protection as allowed for by the Second Amendment to the United States Constitution for precisely tense times like these.
https://pjmedia.com/rogerlsimon/this-jewish-boy-is-going-to-buy-a-gun/
UHub readers can always count
UHub readers can always count on you for their daily portion of red herring.
now i know how you sleep at
now i know how you sleep at night. all that straw must make for a good bed.
Because the 14th district of New York is in Massachusetts now?
The Bronx in New York and Brookline, Massachusetts are two different places. AOC represents the 14th district of New York.
Stay mad, though. :)
Just like Steve King...
he represents some place a thousand miles away. Why you mad, bro?
Probly because he's a white nationalist
Not unlike your semi-literate self. Most people aren't cool with Nazis. Maybe you should stop and think real hard about why you keep defending them.
I keep telling you why
Because if they're allowed to talk, we all are. If they are not, then none of us are.
The ACLU used to take a similar position before they got all woke and shit.
Iowa isn't Massachusetts
Okay, let's say I share the same "fear" that Whatshisface does of AOC. I am fearful that her message of Scary Democratic Socialism™ might spread all over the world.
Randomly bringing up AOC only helps AOC and does the opposite of what you think it's doing. In this age of the "attention economy"...clicks, views, comments, retweets, hashtags are all a form of currency. Haters truly end up making the subject of their haterism more well-known and helps expand said subject's platform/agenda.
So randomly bringing up AOC on a U-Hub post that isn't relevant to her actually ends up helping her. You eager little marketer, you!
And again: this is Boston, not the Bronx (I note this as a Cardi B fan).
ACLU has received millions of
ACLU has received millions of dollars from the likes of Meryl Streep to fund the cases they take and send the work they do.
And Roman defends Nazis for free on Universal Hub, all while demonstrating a lack of comprehension of civil liberties.
Sir, I think you might be getting cucked* by Nazi scumbags.
* "cuck" is such a great word, haha
tagger law mass
It is against the law to post stickers. Before you rip them down take photos and forward them to the Brookline police as evidence they can use in prosecuting these clowns.
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