Free speech covers ads
DPP Legislator Lai Chin-lin (賴勁麟) accused a monthly magazine of "taking advantage of freedom of speech while trying to promote sexual services through advertisements [for massage] like these" ("DPP legislator denounces `massage' advertisements," Feb. 21, page 2.) The article goes on to state that the Taipei City Government ordered the magazine to stop printing such advertisements or face fines of up to NT$600,000.
Evidently, neither Lai or the Taipei City Government has any idea of what freedom of speech means. It doesn't mean "You have a legal right to say or print anything you want to ... as long as you agree with me." That's Orwellian double speak. And it's a principle more in keeping with the government in China.
Freedom of speech necessarily implies that much of what gets said or printed is going to upset someone.
Of course, the speech in question here is naturally upsetting to many people. Most good citizens disapprove of prostitution and are repelled to see thinly veiled advertisements for it in print. But hard cases make bad law. The proper course here is not to ban the advertisements but to seek legal and social means to combat prostitution at the appropriate levels.
The authorities should prosecute anyone holding or selling women against their will to the full extent of the law. Where women are engaged as free agents the proper response should be social -- NGOs can offer education on STDs, vocational training, counseling, and shelter if need be.
What the government should not do is intervene in the right of individuals, newspapers, and magazines to print whatever they choose. That's a serious breech of civil liberties and the right of grown adults to make informed choices on their own.
Jeff Conolly
Taipei
Act now to save the parks
Every time I go to Hohuang-shan, I feel that something must be done as soon as possible to protect this heritage site. Gar-bage is accumulating everywhere, yet everyone seems happy with the situation. Most of people just go by car to the designated spots, get out and look at the scenery for 10 minutes, take a photo, then climb back into the car and continue their tour.
Our politicians usually do the same. But because their visits are announced ahead of time, the people in charge may carryout a scenery face-lift so politicians are left even more misguided.
To make matters worse, while walking in the forest behind the Guanying hostel, I almost got caught in a bait trap. This trap was less than 100m from a place where people are supposed to go to rest and perhaps decide to go for a walk in the nearby woods. The truth for Taiwan's national parks appears to be "do not go off the paved road or anything that happens to you will be your responsibility."
Every time I go to Hohuang-shan, there is more park construction which -- due to their location -- must cost a great deal of money. These facilities are supposed to attract tourists and serve them. Well, the best service and attraction begins with the essentials, that is, keeping the environment as wild and pristine as possible.
If the national parks (Shuei-pa and Wuling farm are almost the same) cannot cope with the amount of garbage and damage produced by the relatively few tourists they get now, how dare they think of trying to attract more people to these areas?
We are killing Taiwan's wilderness, step by step. Making it easy for tourists to go to remote areas without appropriated management and maintenance is an ecological nonsense equal to eco-suicide.
I hope government officials will one day get out of their cars and walk along the central cross-island highway, alone and unescorted (there's no security danger, except for the trucks and buses going up and down the narrow, winding road). While walking they should try to enter into a dialogue with nature, then look at all the different kinds of garbage along the side of the road, the slopes cleared for farming, the buses and trucks. If they do not realize then that there is a problem ... well perhaps, maybe they are the problem.
Francisco Carin Garcia
Taishan, Taipei County
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