🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <2782@uswnvg.uswnvg.com> gbarnet@uswnvg.com (Gary Barnette) writes:
>
[asking about legal problems with offensive sexist and racist material
in news]

>Our company has a policy for plurlism and against racism and sexism. 
>Some people think that to allow sexist and racist news articles
>of this type on our systems is therefore against company policy
>and should not be allowed. Has anyone else out there run into
>the append contradiction?
>
[...]

>I am NOT for censorship of any kind. I'm just trying to learn 
>what others have done so that I may be better informed to deal with
>the problem.

   I think that if you are considering banning an entire method of
communication because someone _may_ be offended by some small individual
unit, then you have worse problems than racism and sexism.
  
   Given that your company is a private organization, and not an academic
institution, you are free to do what you will without complaint from
outsiders. There isn't a free speech issue or an academic freedom issue.

   I can't imagine any legal problems comming from getting news. Certainly
it would be absurd to suggest that sexist remarks in alt.feminism could
create a hostile work environment, or some such thing.

   From your article, you suggest that there has already been complaints.
What are they about? What groups in particular?

   Personally, I will look for news access as a perk in whatever jobs I 
try to get. And I certainly wouldn't want the 'company' to go out of it's
way to protect me from such evils as sexism or free expression.

DanZ

-- 
    "I think it is a little premature to attribute the failures of American
     foriegn policy to Carl Kadie."
                                                     -Mike Godwin
This article for entertainment purposes only.

In <2782@uswnvg.uswnvg.com> gbarnet@uswnvg.com (Gary Barnette) writes:
]Issue 1:
]Does anyone know if any company has been sued over
]the contents of news articles? Some people here have
]a concern about the sexist and racist material found
]in some news groups. So concerned that all but comp.*,
]gnu.*, and news.* have been turned off until there is
]a review by our legal department.

Sounds like you have a deeper problem like fear of lawyers.
This is a common fear though and is easily worked through, just
beat them with baseball bats. After you've gone through ten or
twenty, sure you'll be tired, but it'll be a good kind of tired :-)

]Issue 2:

]Our company has a policy for plurlism and against racism and sexism. 
]Some people think that to allow sexist and racist news articles
]of this type on our systems is therefore against company policy
]and should not be allowed. Has anyone else out there run into
]the append contradiction?

News sites are always free to carry what they want. The worst stuff
though is generally in the alt groups, so a common fraidy-cat solution
is just not to carry alt's. This fear of someone being offended is 
often greatly exaggerated though. Everyone is certain that someone at
their organization would surely be offended, but as it turns out
usually no one is.  I see no contradictions really. I may be against
bigotry and want to throttle people who are bigots. But reading one of those
goofy news postings from someone who "knows" the Holocaust was a lie
doesn't offend me necessarily. It certainly doesn't make me mad at
the news guy for making it possible to read such things. 

]Please direct you opinions/answers to the general question.
]I am NOT for censorship of any kind. I'm just trying to learn 
]what others have done so that I may be better informed to deal with
]the problem. And it is a problem. We stand a chance of loosing
]our entire news feed!

Very sad. This is the point where I would be printing up resumes on the
company laser printer. USENET is not a mere perk, it's a condition
of employment. 

What little I have seen of legal opinion of it is that the original
author may be liable for content, but NOT the distribution system.
We can't sue the phone company for obscene phone calls, or the US 
Postal Service for objectionable mail. You should really talk
to the guys on comp.org.eff.talk about this sort of thing. I don't
really grok where the problem lies myself. Maybe in a lack of understanding
by people who haven't really read news much yet?

-- 
The War on Drugs is just part of the War on the US Constitution.