Good news for all you sadists out there! The Supreme Court, in an 8-1 decision, has ruled that it’s OK to make videos of animal cruelty. No, we’re not kidding, although, to be fair, there are extenuating circumstances, as those legalese people say. The justices overturned a federal law that banned videos showing graphic violence against animals, saying the law violates the right to free speech. The law was originally passed in 1999 to stop Internet sales of “crush videos.” Those films appeal to a fringe sexual fetish, and feature women who crush to death small animals by stomping on them, usually while wearing high heels. In the case in question, the law was used to convict a Virginia man of making and selling videos of illegal pit bull fights.
We are normally First Amendment “fundamentalists,” but this case is a real challenge. How do you say it’s OK to make money by killing animals for the entertainment of others? The whole idea is so morally grotesque, it boggles the mind — as do the many twists and turns of legal thought. The Supreme Court ruled, in a specifically limited decision, that the law was too vague. We can see their point, considering that a law to ban crush videos was used for another purpose, namely to nail a guy for making pit bull fighting videos. Justices said that the way the law is worded makes it possible to ban videos of people hunting legally. Granted, a substantial number of folks consider the sport of hunting another form of animal cruelty, but until the sport is criminalized, the creation of hunting videos will be legal, too.
The Supreme Court decision leaves open the possibility of rewriting the law to be more specific. We suggest specifically banning the production of videos of “illegal acts of animal cruelty.” That way, the crushers and the pit bull jerks can be dealt with immediately, and if at some time in the future, hunting animals for sport is banned (which certainly won’t happen in the U.S. anytime soon), that activity would automatically be included in the video ban law. In any case, we hope the feds rewrite the law soon; turning a profit from the suffering of animals should be illegal, and that would include selling videos of that suffering to whatever sick bastard would buy them.
This article appears in Apr 20-26, 2010.
As usual Grooms reaches too far. The act of hurting animals will still be against the law. The video themselves should not be against the law. What if someone films someone being cruel to animals so they can turn the bad people into the police. Do we put the good person in jail for making the film?
Also hunting serves a valuable service. The killing of deer is probably one of the most visible good things. You can be killed by running into a deer. The more dear raoming about the more your chances of one being hit by your car.
Grooms narrow mind does not permit him to understand the complicated world we live in.
Wow, defending incest one day, videos of animal cruelty the next. To each their own, I guess. ‘Merica!
Of course they need to rewrite the law – who in their right mind would leave anything up to common sense anymore in this country? If there is a loophole in the law that could be used to get people in trouble that aren’t doing anything wrong, then by all means fix it. Heck, even throw some additional language in there while you’re at it – just in case anyone out there would be dense enough to not understand the difference between capturing footage of illegal activities with the sole purpose of providing it to the police as evidence, and capturing the same footage with the intent of profiting from it’s distribution or exploting the suffering of animals for “entertainment”. Even though I’m sure there’s no one out there that could possibly be that dense.
As long as the dog-fighting wastes of space still get what they have coming to them, do whatever you have to do to make the law as idiot-proof as you can make it.
“Any society which does not insist upon respect for all life
must necessarily decay.” –ALBERT EINSTEIN
“The world is a dangerous place, not because of those who do evil, but because of those who look on and do nothing.” –ALBERT EINSTEIN
– the United States of America has sunk to a new all time low. The US Justices have given their blessings for sexual perversion and making it legal for even children and teenagers to download this sick material on countless internet sites across America.
Chris, you have to understand Frank Griffin’s purpose here: It’s simply to go against the grain of what is truthful and right, and no matter what, he will disagree and try to incite as many people as he possibly can. An angry, bitter, right winged hater nut job that has been denounced by most everyone here. Like any true fool, he always comes back for more, and the last word.