ggecko: I just don't understand how the First Amendment protects your right to blatantly lie.

I can truly understand the defense of "I didn't know I was lying", but this protects your right to outright lie.

So, now if I lie on a resume' I can just say it is my first Amendment right to do so?

Yes, you can. And you don't get arrested for it.
Your employer can fire your ass though.

abhorrent1: I fought the Germans at Pearl Harbor.

At least it wasn't over at that point.

ggecko: I just don't understand how the First Amendment protects your right to blatantly lie.

I can truly understand the defense of "I didn't know I was lying", but this protects your right to outright lie.

So, now if I lie on a resume' I can just say it is my first Amendment right to do so?

No. Fraud (wrongful or criminal deception intended to result in financial or personal gain) is still illegal. That's not what this law was about. The Stolen Valor Act made it a federal crime to lie about receiving military awards/citations/medals, even if that lie was not intended to result in any sort of financial gain. Simply telling a woman in a bar "I was awarded the Medal of Honor" could theoretically have resulted in a one year prison sentence.

Basically, if the person is lying about awards and medals just to look cool, it's not illegal. If he is lying about it as part of a fraudulent attempt to get you to give him money or other things of value, that is just as illegal now as it was before.

Esc7: Millennium: ggecko: I just don't understand how the First Amendment protects your right to blatantly lie.

I can truly understand the defense of "I didn't know I was lying", but this protects your right to outright lie.

So, now if I lie on a resume' I can just say it is my first Amendment right to do so?

Yeah, though you'd still be guilty of fraud.

I think fraud would depend on what you're lying about. Like for instance if you lied to your patients that you're a licensed doctor...that would be fraud, and we have laws that deal with that.

But lying to your patients that you served in Iraq? That your favorite color is blue? Who the hell cares?

Exactly. Fraud is a very specific type of lying. You can lie about whatever you want--just don't make money from your lies, essentially.

Trance750: eddiesocket: How was this vote not 9-0? Jesus. Yes, you're allowed to lie in this country.

If Congress is allowed to lie, so are we

Tell that to the IRS.

Mell of a Hess: In the other news everyone was waiting for out of the Supreme Court today, men all over America can go back to their favorite pick up line of "I am a millionaire, astronaut, cowboy, medal of honor recipient" without fear of prosecution

There's nothing funny at all about what SCOTUS did today. Nothing.

I agree. Upholding freedom of speech is a serious matter.

There are days that I think that I'm the only guy to have ever served in the military who wasn't in some kind of top secret thingamajig or other.

And I seem to have missed a chapter. What happened with FLYNAVY? Did he get outed as a non-whatever-he-was-claiming-to-be?

Tat'dGreaser: What a crock of sh*t. It's illegal to impersonate an officer, it should be illegal to fake the earning of an award.

Seconded.

verbaltoxin: I really do have an Air Medal with a silver leaf cluster.

I'm calling bullshiat......6 times???? (If the member receives a sixth award, a silver oak leaf cluster replaces the four bronze oak leaf clusters.)
Really?
/highly doubtful.
//I used to work for Uncle Sam, so I am really getting a kick out of most of these replies. Some of you guys are very good at making it sound like you know what you are talking about. But trust me.... You don't. I think you just want to make yourself sound smart, when in reality you dont know what you are talking about. This is how bad info gets passed around. If you dont know about the topic....Dont make yourself sound like you do. Cuz some Farkers belive anything they hear."

Perducci: "Wait a minute... you're only pretending that you killed all those brown people overseas, aren't you?"

+1

Trance750: eddiesocket: How was this vote not 9-0? Jesus. Yes, you're allowed to lie in this country.

If Congress is allowed to lie, so are we

It's never quite that clear-cut. If you lie on a bank loan application that's fraud... if your contractor lies about the cost of the materials he's charging you for that's illegal.. and similar cases are also illegal.

Now, I happen to agree that just claiming to be a medal of honor recipient shouldn't be illegal and that sort of lie is protected speech, but somewhere in between there's a line that separates lying to make yourself look good and lying that hurts others (fraud, deception, etc).

It's not completely unreasonable to me that someone could argue in good faith that this type of lying has negative consequences to society. I don't agree, but I can accept the argument at least.

Hello, my name is Inigo Montoya. I have a good relationship with my father.

positronica: All the government needs to do is pass a law where the penalty for lying about your medal of honor status is a tax. That's the new "constitutional" way for the government to control any behavior it wants. While they're at it, they should put a tax on being gay, getting an abortion, burning the flag, and being a minority. Then America will be saved.

From mere stupidity to the depths of idiocy in three sentences - that's impressive.

Tat'dGreaser: What a crock of sh*t. It's illegal to impersonate an officer, it should be illegal to fake the earning of an award.


Yes, because pretending you have authority to detain/arrest people and pretending you were brave once in the past are comparable.

This is good news for Fark Independents^TM!

While this douchebag's motives and "message" baffle me, I saw problems categorizing it as "fraud".

I mean, it's not illegal to wear medals in a play or on a movie set, right? It's understood you're in-character and not actually claiming these medals IRL.

I'm saying his outfit was so absurd, it's generally unreasonable to assume it was real. Essentially, a parody, a protected form of speech for copyright purposes as it does not claim to be the "real thing". The sheer number was absurd for his age, he's grown a soul patch which would never be used with military dress and everyone can see it looks "wrong", he's got a eclectic mix of rare awards such as Secret Service White House duty, and the weird medallion is an Order of the British Empire. You don't have to understand medals and acceptable facial hair to go "WTF is that?? He can't be for real..."

I found it interesting to see these frauds this law brought up... because in general, they don't seem to be doing it to defraud anyone for material gains. Like I say, I find their motives baffling. You could just dismiss it as "crazy", and I'm not saying they're not crazy, but the psychology of what is broken in their heads is something more specific. It's like they're LARP'ing without understanding that the military is supposed to be a REAL thing. One guy kept hanging around the VFW post in uniform and most could see he was a fraud. He should have KNOWN that would happen.

I think he thought he was honoring them through symbolic mimicry, like one of those Passion Plays where they reenact Jesus' crucifixion. It's, like, the author of Jaws didn't feel bad about making up the famous "Anyway, we delivered the bomb" speech, nor did the actor feel bad about enacting it. It IS often assumed to be a real story not a movie quote. Maybe these Stolen Valor frauds just have a problem understanding the difference between fantasy and reality- and perhaps a bit too self-important on their "work" on the character they're playing, as, in general, it seems unremarkable.

This means Mitt Romney can fabricate his military history. His writers are fast at work.

Esc7: I think fraud would depend on what you're lying about. Like for instance if you lied to your patients that you're a licensed doctor...that would be fraud, and we have laws that deal with that.

Not so much what you're lying about as why you're lying. Lying to a customer about a license, for example, is clearly an attempt to get someone to pay you for services that you are not qualified to provide. That's what makes it fraud.

This guy was lying to pick up chicks. Some would argue that lying for the purposes of sex should be a crime -there are arguments going both ways here- but currently it is not. He wasn't committing a crime with his speech, so the prosecution tried to argue that the speech itself was criminal, and that's where they ran afoul of the First Amendment.

But lying to your patients that you served in Iraq? That your favorite color is blue? Who the hell cares?

Presumably your patients don't -not very much, anyway- and thus there's no fraud, though depending on how and to whom you do this you might run afoul of truth-in-advertising regulation.

The situation is similar for impersonation statutes. You can't be busted for your sexy-cop Halloween costume, but if you try to flash a badge to get into somebody's home that is another story entirely.

what_now: Look, I know a lot of good soldiers from the Core, and I think this law is an abomination. They spent 5 weeks sweating at Parish Island to get the right to hit on girls at bars, and some chucklehead can just PRETEND?

This is what happens in Obama's America.

Nice. I like it.

Tat'dGreaser: What a crock of sh*t. It's illegal to impersonate an officer, it should be illegal to fake the earning of an award.

If earning an award empowered you with the authority to issue orders, you'd have a point.

Ctrl-Alt-Del: Spaghetti Eatin' Goombah: Odd Bird: FLYNAVY covered? Check.

moving along

Does anyone have a link to the famous FLYNAVY thread?

The real fun starts about a third of the way down, with user zap branigan
You're welcome

Thanks!

Heh-woah. My name is Elmer J. Fudd, Millionaire. I own a mansion and a yacht.



Works like a charm!

"My boyfriend, astronaut Mike Dexter..."

Tat'dGreaser: What??? I think you're confused as to what a military officer is.

Oh my bad. I was thinking police.

/tired.

Although, faking being any sort of authority figure has more potential repercussions than just feigning having an award.

Tat'dGreaser: GuidoDelConfuso: If earning an award empowered you with the authority to issue orders, you'd have a point.

It's fraud, plain and simple

You don't know what the word "fraud" means, do you? Lying doesn't necessarily equal fraud. It's only fraud if you're lying for material gain or to cause damage to another.

Talos: You forgot "Navy SEAL who whacked Bin Laden."

That's a given

Captain Steroid: I killed a hundred Vietcong in ONE DAY in Vietnam! :D

And who among us did not??

cgraves67: Can I still be a "Gangster of Love"?

Yes - no ruling from SCOTUS on Steve Miller songs, enjoy

abhorrent1: I fought the Germans at Pearl Harbor.

You're on a roll

lohphat: Fox News [sic] won the right to lie so why not people faking their professional/military credentials?

You can fake what-ever medal you want. Licensed and certified professions where you pay money to the state are protected by law - i.e. if you claim to be one without actually holding that license, you can face a huge fine. If it's medical, you can actually go to jail in many states for even claiming to be a CNA without having your certification.

As I understand, it's also considered a crime to falsify that you were a service member for the purposes of obtaining a job or benefits.

Ironic that it was signed into law by a guy fudged his own military record.

Is referring to the marine corps as the "core" a meme I'm not familiar with or is fark full of idiots? or both..?

fireclown: T
And I seem to have missed a chapter. What happened with FLYNAVY? Did he get outed as a non-whatever-he-was-claiming-to-be?

Yes. I posed this question some time ago and was directed to the thread (which I did not save). The concensus was that while he may have served in some form, he sure as hell wasn't an aviator.
He crashed hard, it was ugly and beautiful at the same time. Haven't seen him since.

Nana's Vibrator: Guess wut ladiez? I'm a poor short fat guy with AIDs and a history of being raped by homosexual incestuous family members and I has extremely hairy balls but no other hair anywhere. My balls are a messed up dude from ZZ Top.

How YOU doin'.

semiotix: On free speech principles, I agree with you. But as someone who worked very hard to become an accomplished liar, I have to say, having laws against lying makes everyone a better liar. If I know I'm going to jail for telling the wrong lie, I'm going to bring my A-game.

--Summer Glau

-- Michael Scott.

"Congress shall make no law...abridging the freedom of speech"

Considering that the possibility of exceptions to this is not acknowledged in the text of the First Amendment, amazing there are as many exceptions are there are, and it's very hard to create new ones.

The message is, if you have an idea to make it illegal for somebody to say something, if it's not already illegal, you're probably going to fail to make it illegal.

i couldn't think of anything to say so i posted a picture.

ransack.: Is referring to the marine corps as the "core" a meme I'm not familiar with or is fark full of idiots? or both..?

It's a meme you're not familiar with.

Sticky Hands: Zebulon: Simply telling a woman in a bar "I was awarded the Medal of Honor" could theoretically have resulted in a one year prison sentence.

Yeah, if she sleeps with him because of that, it should be considered rape.

So if you lie to get someone into bed, that's rape? Do you realized you just called 90% of sexually active adults rapists?

I fought the law and the law lost.

ransack.: Is referring to the marine corps as the "core" a meme I'm not familiar with or is fark full of idiots? or both..?

You have GOT to me kidding or you haven't been on Fark in the last 10 years??
/No I'm not posting "welcome to Fark" cause it's not warranted.
//1/10...and it's "corpse" BTW