[random4369]

It's sad how little progress we've made in terms of freedom of speech and expression. In the 1800s the church was the censorship machine, with sex as the main vector. Today it's the government, still with sex as the main vector.

[SiempreViernes]

What are you talking about, black people can vote, gay people can marry, but there has hardly been any freedom of speech progress since 1800?

[verylittlemeat]

Well he did put emphasis on sex. Social norms regarding pornography, sexuality, prostitution and nudity are still depressingly puritanical in the US.

I think the ripple effects from being raised to believe sexuality and nudity are shameful or obscene are much greater than we appreciate.

[SiempreViernes]

They are puritanical yes, but they've hardly become more so in the last 200 years. I think it is merely that the law has become more prevalent across the country.

[Afforess]

The US has made negative progress on sexual liberation on the whole of history. Prostitution was common and generally legal in the late 1700's and 1800's. The temperance movements in the late 1800's and early 1900's (yes, the same movement that caused the 18th amendment) led to the illegalization of sex work and other vices. America has not yet recovered from this criminalization, despite being one hundred years in the past.

[IAmEveryone]

Denying the progress of sexual freedoms over the last 300 years can only come from an exclusively male/white/adult/heterosexual perspective.

Some freedoms that quickly come to mind:

the right NOT to have sex (rape within marriage, or of slaves, was legal. Other rape laws were largely unenforced)

gay sex, interracial marriage (and sex), sex among teenagers

Access to pornography is legal, and vastly easier due to technical reasons than in the past.

Women have been recognised as sexual beings equal to men, and their pleasure is no longer ignored.

The possibility to have sex and not get pregnant arose and became easier. So did abortion.

Norms around age of consent were lowered.

Specifically for prostitution: It's a point of heated debate in the feminist community if the liberalisation in, for example, some European countries actually led to better working conditions and less human trafficking.

That's why that community, which advocated for legalisation in the past, is now split on the subject. It's just not clear if legalisation was successful.

[mirimir]

> Norms around age of consent were lowered.

Huh? I'd say "raised".

[SiempreViernes]

Sure, just ignore that sex wasn't something consenting adults could do unless they where married, whenever that was.

[jonathanyc]

Are you seriously saying that prostitution having become mostly illegal is a greater setback to sexual liberation than all the other advances we have made with regards to women’s rights? (For example, women being able to legally resist having sex with their husbands?)

[hueving]

From a public behavior perspective, yes we have regressed. Women's rights are much better but you can show someone getting violently murdered on TV easier than you can show a tit.

[SiempreViernes]

Look, just such a simple fact women who are raped by their husbands can actually call and expect to be defended is to me obviously much more important than the fact that the tits on some statues are censored when shown on tv.

[hueving]

Textbook false dichotomy. Freedom of expression is about as related to rape as it is to the right to a trial.

[BlackFly]

The problem is, the definition of obscenity is community based in the USA. It is totally allowable for the government to censor things which the public considers obscene and the government used to censor literature explaining how to get a divorce.

So, the views of the community have evolved since then and people no longer consider calls for divorce to be obscene. Therefore, the government is not allowed to censor them.

However, no changes have been made to the legal framework. You can easily fall back into Comstockery if the public overwhelmingly decides that such a thing is obscene. The Miller test is not something to be proud of as the safeguard of freedom of expression especially when you consider the current context: people finding discussions of safe prostitution to be obscene. Compare that to the protections offered to people calling for genocide (of Jews, of Muslims, of Atheists, of blacks, etc.) and it is rather perplexing.

[random4369]

`women are no longer being raped by their husbands` -> `state censorship is justified`

Amazing mental gymnastics.

[eeZah7Ux]

You are confusing sex liberation, which is all about how sexuality is vilified or accepted in society, with women's rights.

They are both important topics and there can be often overlaps but they are ultimately different topics.

[psyc]

You sound surprised, but the problem is that you're equivocating on the words sexual liberation. It may sound as though your example is related to sexual and liberation, but the phrase almost always refers to the liberation of the human sex drive from control by the church, the state, and community norms.

Edit: You seem to have a problem with the quotes, so I changed them to italics.

[jonathanyc]

I’m sorry, but the post we are replying compares now to the 1700s and 1800s; the modern conception of “sexual liberation” includes freedoms related to marriage (e.g. divorce, premarital sex), and extending this back to the 1700s while not considering things like the obligation of wives to have sex with their husbands is anachronistic and myopic.

I’m not sure what your thought exercise about putting quotes around words is supposed to prove; feel free to read, say, the Wikipedia article on the subject.

Also, are you seriously saying that my example isn’t a case of community norms?

[whataretensors]

Voting became a gameable activity primarily designed to convince the masses they matter. Almost all major decisions are made behind closed doors.

Bills like this are always bipartisan yet despised by the public.

[noobermin]

I believe s/he was using hyperbole. Their general sentiment is at the least this is a set back for the rights and protection of sex workers.

[hueving]

Neither of those have anything to do with censorship.

[SiempreViernes]

Being unable to openly express affection upon pain of death seems like a pretty obvious case of censorship.

[nukeop]

If this is what "freedom of speech" earns us then we're better off without it, it's completely useless or even worse, it seems to set us back.

[klokoman]

Voting is not speech. Also it's what you aren't allowed to say that changed.

[mtgx]

> gay people can marry

That happened like in the past few years, which is a tiny fraction of the past 2 centuries. And if extremist Republicans get to rule the government for another decade (whether directly or with the help of "moderate Democrats"), then I don't know if that will last either.

[nkkollaw]

In the US..