Forgive me for this aside, but do you know where I can read more about trolling techniques (of the non-fishing variety)?
Except the "we" in your statement is defined totally arbitrarily. To you, "we" doesn't include the millions of people who listened to his music and like it. Why don't they get to draw this free speech line?
You really, really can't.
Well, US has a problem with obscenities for instance, which are erased from court records, even if everyone in attendance is an adult and should be able to handle some cuss words. I know US really buys into the "land of the free" meme, but like the parent post said - the line exists in every country, the question is - are the people free to move the line? People of Poland have decided that the atrocities of the holocaust were so great that denying them should be a crime - but the key word here is decided, as in - were free to do so. People of America have decided that the line lies elsewhere - but let's not kid ourselves, the line absolutely exists. You might not go to prison for voicing opinions, but there will be backlash for certain ones which would be absolutely fine in other countries. The fact that US ranks 45th in the list of countries ranked by the freedom of press should say something.
This is not a universal practice. In fact, I'm inclined to say it's rather rare.
A case that immediately comes to mind is Cohen v. California. It concluded that governments can't ban the use of the word "fuck" in public. The word is not censored in the opinion.
http://cdn.loc.gov/service/ll/usrep/usrep403/usrep403015/usr...
Also: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Constitution_is_not_a_suic....
If not, then what was the actual purpose of the law?
Yes, there are still facists in Poland - does that mean the law was pointless? Of course not.
And of course I don't think I have to point out that you can be a fascist and not deny holocaust, so this law wouldn't do anything in that case.
But ignoring that, you appear to be saying that it's significantly worse to deny the Holocaust, than to be a fascist, seeing how the law doesn't apply to fascists who "moved on with the times"?
"This guys is a bad hombre and so we should limit his freedom of speech" is clearly not objective. The line is very fuzzy, which is exactly the problem with it. Is the idea that we should limit the speech of all felons, even after they served their time? Or is it just sex offense felons? Or just rappers with face tattoos? Where does one propose we draw a line that can be objectively applied and would limit this guy's freedom of speech?
If you don't consider these "free speech", then you're already drawing a line.
That is obviously very different from saying "I don't like this person so we should limit their freedom of speech even though they're not deliberately misleading anyone".
The point is that you should be trying to establish policy that doesn't come back to bite you in the ass when the prevailing winds change. Saying that you're not allowed to say things that 1. you know aren't true and 2. damage others, is a fairly objective standard. "This guy is a felon so we should limit his speech, regardless of what he is saying" is not.
Would you pass a law that makes all lying illegal? Why not? Does speech have to directly damage someone? Financially, emotionally, what? What threshold of damage is punishable? Couldn't one argue that promoting communism "damages others"? The Secretary of Defense announcing a fake foreign invasion should probably be illegal, but a random drunk person claiming "the Chinese are invading" probably shouldn't be. So there's a line somewhere between those two people, where is it?
It's only perjury if you knowingly lie, which (when under oath) damages the integrity of the justice system. It's only libel if you tell a deliberate falsehood and it damages someone else directly. etc.
I thought Trójka is a public (and thus government sponsored and controlled) radio station, no?
* the previous known case of censorship is dated to 1984, on the same list with the same man behind the microphone. The band Maanam has been banned from public media so he played the drum intro of one of their songs ("To tylko tango") looped for the entire length of their hits on the list.
If that's false, then it's irrelevant. If it's true then the established response is to lock him in concrete box for 25 or more years. In neither case is censorship justified.
Don't you see the irony in this statement? Everyone is free to say what they want except what you or the government deem to be wrongthink. That does not sound like a free or open society to me.