Cannabis News The November Coalition
  Sheltering Straphangers from ... Controversy?
Posted by FoM on February 19, 2002 at 19:36:12 PT
By Amanda Paulson, Staff writer of The CSM 
Source: Christian Science Monitor  

cannabis Once again, the city that spawned the expression "banned in Boston" is facing charges of government censorship. This time, it's not controversial plays or books being axed, but certain advertisements submitted to the city's subways and buses - involving the relative criminality of marijuana use and the "Christianliness" of Santa Claus.

Despite repeated losses over the years to advertisers suing on free-speech grounds, the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority (MBTA) finds itself facing two fresh legal challenges - both claiming that the public agency is overstepping its authority to regulate ads.

Disputes over the use of public advertising space - and whether free speech protections extend to advertisers - are common. But the frequency with which the MBTA gets tangled in these disputes - five times in the past 30 years - is unusual, especially given the Massachussetts liberal reputation.

"You read the transit free-speech cases, and it's like a travel directory of the United States," says Harvey Schwartz, the attorney representing both of the current plaintiffs. "But you don't see any repeat cases.... Boston is stubborn."

Indeed, many Bostonians say there's a more profound cultural reality at play: A deep-seeded Puritan morality and the strong political influence of the Roman Catholic Church that form a conservative alterego to the region's otherwise liberal public face.

One of the two new cases is a federal lawsuit - tried earlier this month and awaiting the judge's verdict - that was brought by a drug-policy reform group, Change the Climate. The Massachusetts group encourages debate about the fairness of marijuana laws. The MBTA argues that the group's ads tacitly encourage illegal activity.

ONE of the group's three ads submitted to the MBTA depicted a teenage girl, with the text: "Smoking pot is not cool, but we're not stupid ya know. Marijuana is NOT cocaine or heroin. Tell us the truth...."

In rejecting the ads, the MBTA says it was simply acting within its guidelines that prohibit ads that contain violent criminal content, are harmful to children, or denigrate groups based on gender, race, ethnicity, religion, or political affiliation.

"We are an agency that works with the public," says MBTA spokeswoman Lydia Rivera. "We owe the community a transit that they shouldn't feel uncomfortable with.... Other transits might agree [with us], but bend a little. And we don't. We refuse."

Indeed, Washington, D.C., for example, already ran similar ads from Change the Climate. Ever since its transit agency tried unsuccessfully in 1984 to ban an ad that ridiculed Ronald Reagan as president of the "jellybean republic," about the only major guideline it's had is that ads can't carry inaccurate information, says Lisa Farbstein, Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority spokeswoman.

Legally, a public agency like the MBTA is allowed to create certain rules - like banning pornography and profanity, for instance - so long as they are enforced equally, across political views. In the case of Change the Climate, the MBTA says the ads fall into the "harmful to children" category by tacitly encouraging illegal activity.

In the case of the Church with the Good News - the plaintiff in the second new lawsuit - the MBTA claimed the church's ad violated its prohibition against denigrating a group based on religion. The church's ad promoted its website which, the MBTA says, declares other religions false.

But the court cases contend that the agency guidelines are too vague. In the last similar legal battle, a suit brought in 1994 by the AIDS Action Committee of Massachusetts, a federal court handed down an opinion saying the MBTA used a policy so vague as to be incomprehensible, says Sarah Wunsch, an attorney for the ACLU of Massachusetts.

"You'd think they'd learn," says Ms. Wunsch, noting that in court earlier this month, the MBTA was still arguing that "Boston is different: 'We have standards here.' "

Indeed, those standards are the root of a recurring trend. From its Puritan roots to the notorious Watch and Ward Society in the 1920s which outlawed, among other things, Theodore Dreiser's "An American Tragedy" and Walt Whitman's "Leaves of Grass," Boston has a very long history of enforcing morality, says Stephen Nonack, head of reader services at the Boston Athenaeum, an independent library that specializes in local history. "The term 'banned in Boston' has got a familiar ring all over the country," he adds.

Note: Where other transit agencies around the nation back off, Boston doggedly censors subway ads - and gets sued.

Source: Christian Science Monitor (US)
Author: Amanda Paulson, Staff Writer of The CSM
Published: February 20, 2002 edition
Copyright: 2002 The Christian Science Publishing Society
Contact: oped@csps.com
Website: http://www.csmonitor.com/

Related Articles & Web Site:

Change The Climate Ads
http://www.changetheclimate.com/ads/

MBTA Asks Court for Freedom To Disapprove Ads
http://cannabisnews.com/news/thread11903.shtml

Banned in Boston - Reason Magazine
http://cannabisnews.com/news/thread11897.shtml

Moving Words - Jacob Sullum
http://cannabisnews.com/news/thread8843.shtml


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Comment #2 posted by DdC on February 21, 2002 at 22:17:23 PT
Who's Keeping Score Besides Abbot and Costello?
One Plant One Planet One People, How can it be so complicated? The following articles gathered and displayed show somewhat just how crazy this WoD on Americans is. That is about the only thing consistant is the victims are citizens, dispite their new criminal records for medicating without paying Pharmaceuticals and taxes. Boston can't buy ads to protect the patients with private donations while the government spends millions on ads harming stigmatizing. One kid gets high marks for informing the public on medicinal cannabis bringing it to the science fair, while the drugczar skips science and says its all atheist commie I mean middle east terrorist. When cops need retirement homes what better way than forfeiture laws? Rainbow Farms or the latest escapades of the dimwitted topcop and his Keystone yesirs. Not able to find violent threats when their out spraying hemp with Napalm herbocides. While Keatings takes families providers and cages him up 90 years, throws away the keys growing the same plant in the muffin the girl got back from the teacher. Who know its medicine or why would they use it? Though Oklahoma sells oil in competition maybe instead of locking up medicinal users past a normal lifetime, they would still have the Federal Building and those babies alive. Now we bomb other countries to stop them from infiltrating their commie dope coincidentially in the places with crude oil. How sick can it get? Headlines change every day but they all say this wars insane, then turn around and escalate. Only profits on war and eliminating competition would explain this motivation from a drugczar chemist laundrymat, and heads buried deep as their pockets lined in Korpses green retiring on our misery. No bystanders.
Peace, Love and Liberty or D.E.A.th
DdC

Sheltering straphangers from ... controversy?
http://www.cannabisnews.com/news/thread12054.shtml

Medical Marijuana Exhibit on Displayed
http://www.cannabisnews.com/news/thread12065.shtml

Drug Drama: The Big Chill
http://www.cannabisnews.com/news/thread12064.shtml

New Ads Hint at Change in War on Drugs
http://www.cannabisnews.com/news/thread12062.shtml

James Geddes-47
90 YEARS-5 PLANTS!
Release Petition
http://hr95.org/geddes.petition.htm
Free James Geddes
http://hr95.org/Geddes,J.html


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Comment #1 posted by DdC on February 21, 2002 at 21:41:28 PT
Dear Change the Climate Supporter
--- joewhite@crocker.com wrote:
Subject: Sheltering straphangers from ... controversy?
Date: Fri, 22 Feb 2002 03:41:51 +0000

Greetings!

Dear Change the Climate Supporter,

We would like to point you to an excellent article covering our First Amendment court case in Boston. Take a moment and visit http://www.changetheclimate.org/news/csmonitor.php to read the article written by Amanda Paulson for The Christian Science Monitor.

The article points out that while disputes over the use of public advertising space are common, the frequency with which the MBTA has been taken to court over such cases is alarmingly high - five times in the past thirty years. We would also like to remind you that Change the Climate is looking into another advertising campaign in Washington D.C., but we won't be able to do it without your help! Please take a moment and visit http://www.changetheclimate.org/supportus/ and help bring our ads back to D.C.! Sincerely, Joseph White Executive Director Change the Climate

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