SCOTUS Overturns Ant-Animal Cruelty Law

[JWBear]

Link

So now you can torture and kill as many animals as you like, and as long as you film it, it's legaly protected free speech! WTF?!

[JWBear]

(Could some kind moderator correct the thread title. It shound read "Anti-Animal", not "Ant-Animal". Thanks.)

[mousepod]

I'm not sure I understand the uproar. If I understand this correctly, it's still illegal to commit animal cruelty. Couldn't the videos be used as evidence anyway? I guess one could argue that the person holding the camera (and selling the videos) is an accessory to a crime, rather than having the act of filming and distributing the act be the crime in and of itself.

[Ghoulish Delight]

First of all:

So now you can torture and kill as many animals as you like, and as long as you film it, it's legaly protected free speech! WTF?!

No. If what is being filmed is illegal, those that are performing the illegal activity are still breaking the law. What is no longer illegal is the act of filming it.

I do think it's reasonable to put restrictions on filming illegal animal cruelty activity, especially in scenarios where the filming itself is part of the motivation for the illegal activity (as was mentioned during the hearings, there's a lot of cross over with child pornography laws).

However, I think I agree with this decision, based on the law as written.

Among other things, as written, the law would pretty much ban even a documentary, with the purpose of preventing further animal cruelty, from being produced. Or implicate someone filming illegal dog fights in a sting attempt. It was far too broad, covered things that are not illegal in all jurisdictions, and failed to be focused on those actually complicit in illegal animal cruelty. As written, if I film my permitted fishing trip, then show that film in a city where fishing is illegal, I'm breaking the law.

A new law will be written, hopefully one with more focus and more enforceability. But as much as I'd like to agree with the moral impetus behind the law that was struck down, if it went too far, it had to be struck down.

[scaeagles]

Agree with GD completely. Could be first time I have ever uttered those words.

[Gemini Cricket]

Sheesh! Can't a man club a baby seal in peace?


Here in Hawai'i the legislature is discussing shark-finning and trying to make it illegal for places to sell shark fin soup, dried shark fin etc. I'm against it. It's a terrible practice. But knowing the legislature here, they'll do nothing and just continue on with their dinglecheesery.

[scaeagles]

Being the horrible father that I am, I once took my then 6 year old daughter's stuffed baby harp seal she got at Sea World and put red yarn all over it and placed it next to a wiffle ball bat. She had recently watched a Nat Geo special in which the seal hunt was described and she was not amused.

[Alex]

It's a relatively simple opinion if anybody wants to read it.

I agree with the ruling that while the heart may have been in the correct place it is way overbroad in its language and makes illegal many things that shouldn't be. I think this is the quote at the gut of it:

...this Court will not uphold an unconstitutional statute merely because the Government promises to use it responsibly.

[JWBear]

But, what's to stop someone from filming himself killing an animal and then claiming that the act is free speech because he filmed it?

There has to be some limits to free speech. Some things go too far.

[Strangler Lewis]

While the First Amendment protects expressive conduct, you don't get to say that your bank robbery should be protected as an anarchic gesture. Such an argument would be rejected either under the compelling governmental interest test or, more than likely, the "duh" test.