Comment by dragonwriter | Hacker News Reader

Comment by dragonwriter | Hacker News Reader

Parent Full thread

> They used to be the ones defending the civil rights of everyone, no matter how heinous the defendant or extreme the situation

They still are.

> These days they seem to just repeat hyper-partisan viewpoints ad infintum

Their involvement against broad interpretation of the CFAA in Van Buren v. U.S. doesn't seem hyperpartisan.

Neither does their action in ACLU v. Clearview AI

Neither does Nashville Community Bail Fund v. Gentry

Nor it's involvement in Georgia v. Public.Resource.Org

Sure, right now one party is more actively using the power of government against the rights that the ACLU has always defended, which has a lot do with party ideology (which in both parties have shifted over time so that one aligns morr with and one more against ACLU's long-held positions than used to be the case) and a lot to do with control of the executive branch of government (both federally and in states), without which you can't usually take the kind of government actions that the ACLU defends against.

I've stopped donating to the ACLU after being a donor for many years because they have stopped being nonpartisan from what I can tell. This is not only in their cases but their public statements, and it's become very clear they no longer are friends of free speech.

> it's become very clear they no longer are friends of free speech.

Well, certainly they aren't a friend of the modern right-wing idea that “free speech” is a positive entitlement to compel other private actors to relay your speech, but they remain zealous defenders of the Constitutional right of free speech against encroachment by government, including against bipartisan assaults like the EARN IT Act.

https://www.aclu.org/news/by-issue/free-speech/

This memo[1] seems to assert that they would not be friends to free speech against encroachment by the government if the speech were speech they didn't like.

[1] http://online.wsj.com/public/resources/documents/20180621ACL...

> This memo[1] seems to assert that they would not be friends to free speech against encroachment by the government if the speech were speech they didn't like.

It explicitly says the opposite, but does indicate that they would not be able to legally represent people making such speech if the terms of such representation would restrict the ACLU from criticizing the viewpoint being advanced while defending the right to advance it: "While the ACLU vigorously defends the right to free speech of those who espouse views antithetical to our own, we also reserve our right to condemn those views. Our defense of free speech rests squarely on the proposition that speech deserves defending even if we, or others in the community, find it reprehensible. Accordingly, as a general matter we should be able to simultaneously defend a speaker’s right to speak and condemn their views, and we should seek to preserve that right through ethically appropriate representation agreements. [...] But we generally should not agree to represent people who will not agree to sign an ethically appropriate advance waiver of potential conflicts arising from our condemnation of their views."

I appreciate the correction, but I think it's noteworthy that they expect would-be defendants to waiver away the ACLU's disdain for them as a condition of representation.

Perhaps this is normal in the legal realm?

> Perhaps this is normal in the legal realm?

Yes, informing potential clients of, and conditioning representation on waiver of, a forseeable conflict of interest is generally mandatory for lawyers.

Framed as you have it, I would agree...but I always understood a conflict of interest to be one which might compel an attorney to violate your confidence, or fail to keep your confidences sacrosanct.

Publicly stating "we do not agree with the language of our clients" does not seem to me to rise anywhere near the level of that to require waiver.

That said, I take you as more informed on the subject than I, so again I thank you for the information.

It seems like people are confused about what non-partisan means. Non-partisan does not mean neutral on political issues. The ACLU has never been neutral on political issues, going back as long as they've existed [1]. Non-partisan means they pursue their vision of civil rights regardless of which party that brings them into conflict with. If they come info conflict with one party more than another, that doesn't make them partisan. It just means that their vision of civil liberties has been taken up more by one party than others.

[1] Just skim their wikipedia page: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Civil_Liberties_Union

Taking a look at their Twitter, I have a hard time seeing how their viewpoints are anything but hyper-partisan. They often have nothing whatsoever to do with defending civil liberties in a nonpartisan manner.

ACLU knows that they've been politicized externally. This messaging is a funding strategy, not necessarily related to their actual legal advocacy.

That doesn't seem to be the case.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Civil_Liberties_Union...

Can you provide a specific example of what you mean?

For example, they sent a lot of tweets yesterday about preferred pronouns and why you should use them in your personal and professional life. That's a quite controversial message in many circles, and it really has nothing to do with civil liberties, so an organization focused on civil liberties would want to stay neutral on it in order to best promote their core goals.

> That's a quite controversial message in many circles

If you think the ACLU has steered clear of controversy historically, you are not very familiar with their history.

> it really has nothing to do with civil liberties

How so? It is about someone's right to exist as themselves without discrimination and be treated equally to others. The ACLU has been involved in LGBT rights since at least the 70s.

Civil liberties are liberties that you have from the government. That is, things that the government ought to allow you to do. So debates over whether suchandsuch interpersonal practice is polite just aren't issues of civil liberties, even if the people discussing such practices have related civil rights concerns. (It'd make perfect sense, for example, if the ACLU said that you ought to be able to put whatever letter you'd like in the "gender" field of your driver's license.)

> Civil liberties are liberties that you have from the government. That is, things that the government ought to allow you to do.

What do you think the ACLU did in the 60s? Not fight segregation where it was legal?

That is absolutely not the right, not at all. Although I honestly don't give a crap about this particular issue, and would use whatever pronouns people prefer (as long as I don't forget them, as one sometimes does even with names), the civil right is free speech.

Claiming the right of not being offended by speech, to me, is a litmus test for an anti-civil-rights person/organization. Sure, if someone chooses to call everyone "you pitiful worm" it's their right to not associate with the caller, but they have no right whatsoever, and certainly not any kind of civil right, to be called anything else.

There’s more than one civil right, no?

Also your example is unrealistic and distorted - it’s not a useful hypothetical because no one is asking anyone to call them something insulting like that as their public form of address.

The fact that the example is an insult makes it different from “they/them”

See sibling response. The example illustrates the principle. My point is that it either has nothing to do with civil rights whatsoever (any, not just speech; if I'm wrong please elaborate), or it is slightly anti-civil-rights, in a way indicative to me of being much more anti-civil-rights than the tweets would let on.

What it is, though, even if it's the right thing to recommend, is partisan.

I haven't thought about this too much, but, words are power.

Is identifying someone by a racial slur a civil-rights issue?

Obviously it's not a black-and-white issue, and is complex, but yeah, fundamentally calling someone something they don't want to be called (and I don't mean "your hair is blue / don't tell me my hair is blue") can be a civil rights issue.

Words define our selves. There's a reason jargon is such a big deal in the corporate world - words have power.

Consider this - if it wasn't a civil rights issue, would there be so much discomfort and/or backlash around it? Would it even be a big deal at all if it didn't matter?

Again, I'm not saying it's straightforward - it's not.

But a quick google search says civil rights are "the rights of citizens to political and social freedom and equality."

So that's pretty complex and broad in and of itself.

I think it only looks complex because of halo effect/lack of clarity... you want to call it a civil right because it feels like a good thing. I am not saying it's not a good thing, but I am saying it's not a civil right. Like, it's good if everyone had affordable health care, but it's not a civil right.

There are also tons of issues that are not civil rights that have lots of backlash/noise around them (like healthcare).

In fact, in this case enforcement of any kind (outside of the private contract-based context like the office) would be quite obviously anti-civil-rights, which is a bummer with civil rights - sometimes, they inconvenience other people. Remember that being right and being wrong feels the same way. There are tons of people who would be very offended at you for all kinds of bogus reasons, like that you don't go to church, or are friendly with gay people, or whatever.

So yeah, if ACLU is about civil rights, it should focus on those. If it's going to pontificate that it's good to use certain pronouns, of for everyone to go to church, or whatever, then I'll take my money somewhere else :)

You have more than one civil right. It seems like people in this thread are taking civil rights to mean free speech and nothing else, but in fact you have many civil rights, and they may even come into conflict with each other at times.

The only way using preferred pronouns could be related to civil rights, though, is as a restriction of free speech. So, either ACLU is tweeting something partisan and unrelated to civil rights, or they are tweeting something that is evidence for them not being fully supportive of cornerstone civil rights (also, partisan).

So because one party has a problem with intolerance, promoting these things breaks the non-partisan label? Seems a bit like being non-partisan is an end in itself.

It's just a thing you have to do in order to effectively achieve non-partisan goals. An organization that picks a side on every political battle in the country won't be able to effectively focus on its core mission.

That suggests that an organizations value system should follow along with a moving target - the current mid-ground - rather than their own values. At some point one party may just sway too far to accept a middle ground.

Being non-partisan isn't about seeking out a middle ground and planting yourself there. It's about saying "you know, there's a lot of strongly held beliefs on this issue, and we're not the right organization to reconcile them".

It's the same principle as being a non-religious organization. If the ACLU went around telling people that accepting Jesus as your lord and savior is the most important liberty, I suspect you'd agree that's very strange - even though many devout Christians do hold that position and think it's important.

But if it's one part of those strongly held beliefs that are simply wrong because they range from intolerance to bigotry, there's nothing non-partisan to make a stand.

Example - white supremacy is not a “strongly held belief” to those who believe in universal human rights and equality.

My belief system makes white supremacy not some other, legitimate belief I oppose, but one that is beyond the pale because it threatens the core of my belief system (universal human rights and equality).

Since the (current) Republican Party is running on white supremacy ...

Maybe the ACLU really does believe it is a civil right.

Do border walls have anything to do with civil liberties? https://twitter.com/ACLU/status/1318242920416366593

Sure, they make two arguments: 1) Trump is redirecting funds that were intended by congress for totally different purposes [1]. Doing this is anti-democratic and therefore infringes on your right to determine government policy. 2) Trump is interfering with natural and culturally significant sites that people have a right to. Destroying cultural sites and altering land that was set aside as a national park for preservation for future generations are obviously civil liberties issues.

[1]: https://www.aclu.org/press-releases/aclu-comment-supreme-cou...

This is an informative cogent response and I was surprised to see it downvoted.

Yes, they do.

If nothing else the fact that you don’t seem to recognize the desire to build a huge wall as one big red authoritarian flag is concerning.

It’s like going on a date with someone who says he’s a nice guy but treats the waitress like shit.

And it’s not only Border Walls it’s Border Patrol / ICE. Which has literally been putting children in cages.

Plus as another poster said it’s not clear that the administration was building this wall in a legal fashion.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com