for the List [was neo-Nazis on the Net]

[Dale L. Larson]

> censorship, I have to disagree.  Censorship is when someone with legal 
> authority denies you the right to express your views using the facilities 
> normally available to the general public, or threatens to punish you for 
> expressing them at all.

This is a point of confusion and argument I've heard several times before
elsewhere, so let me try to stamp it out here. 

What's the point of arguing over the definition of censorship?  Check the
dictionary. The ones I've checked disagree with you by giving several
definitions which don't require anything which might be interpreted as
"legal authority."  Either way, who cares -- agree for the purpose of the 
discussion what your terms are and then carry on.

If it's important to you to have a different term for some purposes (for
example, if you feel some kinds of censorship are reprehensible but others
are OK), then define your terms and make your argument whether than
squabbling about whose dictionary has more authority. You can probably
make the distinction for the kind of censorship you're refering to by
calling it "governmental censorship."  That makes for less confusion and
moots the arguments about whether something is or isn't censorship on a
definitional basis. 

Perhaps the most broad dictionary definition of a censor is "any 
supervisor of public morals; a person who tells people how to behave."  

Since the decision for a publisher to accept a manuscript is based on so
many factors and constitutes a significant investment, I don't see how
declining a manuscript could ever correctly be called censorship under any
definition.  The publisher is making a choice not to get involved in the
author's project, so is deciding how he or she will behave, not how the
author will behave. As the publishing industry consolidates and
booksellers consolidate into a few corporate giants, I see dangerously
fewer people deciding what will and won't be published.  Perhaps at some
point there are so few publishers that it really becomes about censorship,
but we aren't close yet. 

I had an interesting argument along these lines with Jeff Bezos, president
and founder of Amazon.com, last month.  When I asked him about his
policies on including or not including books in his catalog, he said he
reserved the right to decide what he would sell.  I said that was fine,
and I expected that any physical store would use lots of criteria to
decide what they'd carry. But that at the point he claimed to carry (or
try to carry) every book in print, he had a moral obligation to not
include any based on their content.  At that point, he became a unique
resource and any decision he made to not include something in the catalog
because of "objectionable"  content would be just about the worst possible
form of censorship. He disagreed, but did go on to point out that as far
as he knew, he'd never declined to carry a book, and he did carry neo-nazi
stuff, for example.  He also pointed out that while the books were in the
catalog, no one promoting the books would be able to join the Amazon.com
associates program because of it's rules against sites which promote hate
or violence. 

As to your other example, the leases movie theaters have which don't
permit them to screen unrated or NC-17 movies seems certainly to be a kind
of private censorship on the part of the landlords, and I think it stinks.
It's fine if you think such leases are dandy, but I don't see the point of
discussing it by arguing about the definition of the word "censorship."