Animal Cruelty?

In 1999, Congress said that it was a federal crime to produce, distribute and sell images of events where cruelty to animals is showcased. The "crush videos" in particular was what initiated this decision to make such actions a federal crime. The “crush videos” depicted people crushing animals by feet. Pet-abuse.com states “Typically, those crushing will use their buttocks or feet, making this fetish popular amongst many foot fetishists, as crushing by feet is usually the main focus. The foot (barefoot or in shoes) is thus often idolized by someone with a crush fetish.” The Congress looked at this from an animal cruelty point of view.

The case United States v. Stevens in 2005 was a case where Robert J. Stevens engaged in the creation of three videos where it depicted animal cruelty. One of the videos was a footage of a pitbull attacking a pig which was meant to demonstrate of how a pitbull is trained to hunt wild hogs. Two of the videos were again with pitbulls, this time fighting with each other. Stevens didn't get accused of the actual engagement to animal cruelty since he wasn't in the videos and didn't shoot the footage himself. However, he was the narrator/commentator of the videos as well as the distributor and therefore acknowledging him as the author.

Chaplinksy v New Hampshire was used by the government to justify their argument to create a new category for speech that would then be protected under the First Amendment. What the government tried to do with the precedent was to analyze personal versus social interest. As extension to that and as a philosophical grounding, Zachariah Chafee's worthwhile v. worthless speech was also addressed. Chafee's notion was that people have the right to their own personal interest and that it shouldn't be generalized to be extended to social interest. Chafee begs the question “under what circumstances, if any, should speech of total interest be constrained or punished?” (Tedford and Herbeck, 435) Granted, speech that is “worthwhile” to one person could be “worthless” speech to another. Stevens probably wanted to sell these videos not to depict animal cruelty (since it's not people who are hurting the animals but the animals are hurting each other) but to spread knowledge on how animals fight with each other. Stevens also defends himself by saying that animal rights groups use images where animals are hurt for their campaigns and they are not being scrutinized. Just like animal rights groups, Steven probably had a purpose for wanting to show those videos. Eugene Volokh, a First Amendment specialist at the UCLA could attest to this. Through The New York Times, he states “What constitute serious value, is very much in the eye of the beholder”.

In the same NY Times article, it was mentioned that a similar clause to the SLAPs, a clause that we saw in the child pornography cases, was applied to the law. Serious religious, political, scientific, educational, journalistic, historical or artistic value would serve as exceptions if materials contained one or more of these. I understand that it would be hard to apply the above said in order to make Stevens' case an exception. In this case, I would apply C. Edwin Baker's Liberty Theory as a philosophical grounding. Although Stevens wasn't directly involved in the making of the animal fighting footage, he still expressed himself through narrating the videos. But in this case, the “message” being sent is more of a nonverbal expression since the “message” is the fact that videos were being distributed and sold. In Freedom of Speech in the United States, authors Tedford and Herbeck explains Baker's notions and they quote the philosopher, “My thesis is that the first amendment protects a broad realm of nonviolent, noncoercive, nonxpressive activity... nonverbal expressive conduct advances the same values [as verbal expression]... the nonverbal conduct should also be viewed as speech and should receive protection” (Tedford and Herbeck, 441) Through Baker's liberty model, it is suggested that free speech should, verbal or nonverbal should receive full protection as long as it does not incite violence. I don't think showing videos of animal fighting would incite violence. In Pamplona, Spain where Running of the Bulls is held, it is not considered violent but more of a yearly tradition for the Spaniards. Granted, people do get physically injured and hurt but it's their own personal choice to partake in this event.

Finally, if the law protects such a broad realm of freedom of speech, I don't think a new set of laws should be implied to the United States v. Stevens case. Therefore, I would protect Stevens for distributing and selling animal-fighting videos since it does not incite violence to citizens. However as for the “crush videos”, I am not quite sure how I feel about it because I wouldn't know how to apply the SLAPs value because it's an absurd action for me, personally. I understand that people have certain fetishes but it causes harming, in this case-- animals, I don't think I would protect it because it shows human beings killing animals and not an animal killing a fellow animal.