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1996-03-11
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[Prev|Next|Index], 22 February 1996, xanadu@well.com, San Francisco,
California, USA
To talk, perchance to dream.
I wish I had more time to write about this issue - to create
something fancy that would impress the most jaded. I wish that I
did not have to do anything at all. But while it is necessary
that we dream of an ideal world, it is as necessary, more, to act
in the one we have.
Winston Churchill said "Democracy is the worst form of government
except for all the others". Indeed there are problems aplenty
with the concept and practice of democracy. And while humans are
humans and they congregate in large groups, there will never be a
perfect government. But here's the key: to improve on this
situation, on any situation involving more than a single
individual, freedom of speech is absolutely, positively,
unequivocally necessary.
It is a concept rarely recognized throughout most of the
sentience of Homo Sapiens. To be able to express yourself and not
be punished merely for this expression. How novel. How radical.
Yet how utterly important in the quest to realize dreams.
Fuck
Free expression. To say what you want, and allow others to do the
same. No matter what they are saying - agree, disagree, don't
care; the point is not to condone what they say, but that they
can say it in the first place. And others can respond back that
they agree, disagree, don't care - without governmental reprisal.
I suspect this preaches to the choir, and other preachers are
much more eloquent. But if it happens you are not, and you
disagree, you can always tell me. You're allowed. Think what
happens when you are not allowed.
This can be a scary world, and it is getting more complex all the
time. Now, much more so than in 1776, it is of the utmost
necessity that human beings - you and I - are able to speak
freely towards one another - the first step towards making our
dreams reality.
Let's talk.
Dexter K. Chow
Postscript: You may or may not know of a Chinese rocket launch
failure (Long March) that happened last week. "Official" reports
first said there were "a few casualties". Apparently it is now
officially acknowledged that ~400 are dead. Eyewitness reports
from americans who were there put the death toll in the thousands
- literally truckloads of bodies that are not officially
acknowledged. Censorship leads to this. For the sake of the
unrealized dreams in all of us, don't let it happen here.