[ExI] amendment I

[Adrian Tymes]

On Mon, Mar 23, 2020 at 7:40 AM William Flynn Wallace via extropy-chat <
extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote:

> How are we getting around the 1st amendment and the freedom to peacefully
> assemble?
>
> Just ignoring it?
>

For now, in practical terms?  For many of us, yeah.  We've got social media
and other tele-ways to express ourselves.

Large public gatherings aren't popular right now, which means any attempts
don't get that much attendance anyway, even without the government order.
TBH, most of the impact would be had just as well if the government merely
asked instead of ordered.

But there are documented cases of people getting infected (whether or not
they knew it), being aggressive about flouting the order, and infecting a
bunch of other folks.  This is not "unpopular speech", but "a form of
expression that inflicts physical danger on otherwise uninvolved people" -
also known as "shouting fire in a crowded theater" - which has long been
ruled not protected by the 1st Amendment.  So, where enforcement sticks to
those kinds of cases, it's actually legal.  The problem is when it strays
from that.
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