Freedom for some is freedom for none.

Ok so things have died down a bit over Richard Spencer getting clocked in the face.

Some people have cheered on the attacker because Spencer is a Nazi, other have said that it was an act of cowardice on the part of the Left.

First off, just who is Richard Spencer?

He's a White supremacist and president of White nationalist think tank National Policy Institute. He calls for a homeland for the White race and calls for "peaceful ethic cleansing". Overall a pretty rotten individual. The guy is a piece of shit, there is no argument on that one. The world would be a better place if he just went out into the desert and lived as a hermit.

But is that enough to physically assault someone, and therefore revoke their right to free speech (yes I'm aware the 1st Amendment applies to the government and not private parties)? Let's be clear here, Spencer wasn't physically attacking anyone, just voicing his views. If there is going to be a time where it is acceptable to physically assault someone for their speech then where are going to draw the line?

Are we going to draw the line at "evil" and "hateful" ideology? That sounds nice and reasonable, but the fact of the matter is, while there is an absolute evil, that absolute evil is surrounded by grey area. Is maliciously killing another person evil? Yes. Is accidentally killing someone with no intent to do so evil? Well it could be, like if someone was driving drunk. Is killing someone in-self defense evil? Well the law says no... but it also says you could go too far...

That being said, what happens when we start getting into that gray haze around the evil core? Many Christians see abortion as evil and a pro-choice stance as an evil ideology. Ok, so if the standard of where we draw the line then is what is "evil" and "hateful" then logically it would follow that because someone from a particular group or mindset, or just of a particular thought saw someone who was voicing support for a pro-choice view, that it would be permissible to punch that pro-choice person in the face.

While yes there are limits to the 1st Amendment but here's the thing, those limits are whether or not the government is allowed to censor someone's speech. It has nothing do to with permitting acts of violence on an individual for non-protected speech. State regulations and limitations on the 1st Amendment are also set on the basis of public order, as opposed to controlling thought. Spencer was punched for what he said, not how he said it.

So again, where do we draw the line? On that note, who's the one who gets to decide where the line is to begin with? Because of that grey area that surrounds the things that are universally considered evil, that's an axe that swings both ways. Say it is ok to punch someone in the face on the basis for political speech, is the Left willing to accept being punched in the face by someone on the Right who sees them as an emerging Mao Tstung? If the answer is yes, then well I guess the Left better get caught up with the Right when it comes to self-defense preparations. If the answer is no, then why should they be exempt from getting clocked in the face while the other side isn't?

Say we do allow for violence to be inflicted on a person on the basis of unpopular speech. How far should that violence go? Why stop at a punch and why not go the whole nine yards and just stab or shoot the speaker to death? After all, they're evil right? And the only thing for evil to flourish is for good men to do nothing right? I doubt more than a handful of radicals will argue that Nazis aren't evil, so why shouldn't it be acceptable to just shoot a Nazi or some crazy right winger even if they're not physically harming someone?

Well there's been just as much evil on the left as there has been on the right, Stalin, Mao, Pol Pot and the Kims have killed countless people in the name of Communism. So if people on one side have the freedom to start attacking people on the other side for nothing more than their speech, then the people on the other side also have the freedom to punch the other side as well. Otherwise we have a situation where only pre-approve opinions are allowed. That's not freedom, there's no freedom of thought there.

And is that where we want to go? Where only prescribed ideas are acceptable. Well ok, if that's where you want to take us, then what happens when you're out of power and it's the other side that gets to decide what is right-think? What happens when you're getting knocked in the face, or just out right shot? Not because of anything you did, but because of something you said...

I've been called a very opinionated person in the past. Lately I don't agree too much with the Left, in fact it see a lot of the ideas the Left is floating to be out right repugnant and down right insidious. Is it ok then for me to punch an SJW hipster square on the nose as hard as I can, not because he was threatening or assaulting me, but because he was saying that minorities are too weak to get by without the help of "privileged" Whites? Is it ok for me to cave in his face?

Remember, the axe has to swing both ways unless we want thought police, if we're even going to be swinging the axe around to being with. If you want thought police, then I sure hope you're ready for the proverbial gulag when the other side becomes the thought police.

There's also an underlying sense of arrogance on the side that would argue that it is permissible to physically assault someone based upon their speech. It shows a distinct lack of faith in those around them. Think about it for a second, if someone is spewing insane despicable ideology like Nazism, than reasonable people wouldn't give that person a second thought. They would quickly go out of business in the market place of ideas on their own. But instead, the, I guess I'll call them activists, sees a need to physically attack them to silence them. As if they have the exclusive domain of knowing what should and shouldn't be allowed into the market place of ideas. It shows that the activists thinks they know better than anyone else.

Well who died and made you king and gave you authority to decide what ideas I do and don't get exposed to? I'll decide what I will and won't take seriously thank you very much, especially if I've been around a tad bit longer than you have been.

I've heard the argument that Spencer is too charismatic and could one day get people to carry out his bidding, and that's why physically assaulting him is ok. Well, thing with that is that line of reasoning can be used to justify assassination for something that someone might or might not do. Is that a road we want to go down on? Sure it's one thing when it's someone you don't like who gets whacked, but what if someone else sees your side as the bad guys and it's someone you support that gets whacked? Is that something you're prepared to accept as a reality?

Now if Spencer was out causing violence, under US law it would be legally justified to even go as far as fatally shooting him depending on what he was doing. Acts of violence is a wholly different story. If Spencer was running around assaulting people, trying to burn down buildings with molotov cocktails, trying to run people over with his car, then yes by all means shoot the fucker dead. Shoot him dead and anyone else with him being a danger to other people.

And that's the thing beyond a narrow set of circumstances, like murder, like subjugating other's individual rights, there's a bit of grey area and degrees of evil. So if you're going to argue that it's ok to censor someone with violence based upon the content of their speech, then you'd best be prepared for the other side to the do the same thing to you. Because in that grey area one person's evil conduct is another's permissible conduct. You might think that speech from some radical feminist like this (satire or not) is permissible, but another may take this as evil in the level of Nazis... so does that mean it's ok for someone to come punch Lori Day in the face? Or you if you're speaking in support of it in public? The other thing to consider though, if violence based upon speech content is the road you want to go down on then that fist might not even be a fist at all, it could be a blade, it could be a bullet. Is that really a road you want to go down on? Is being on the receiving end of violence, potentially lethal violence, for the contents of your speech something you are prepared to accept?

No?

Well that's the reason courts have ruled the way they have, courts are very reluctant to restrict speech based on content. Equality would mean that the axe must swing both ways. If it's permitted to assault one extreme, then it's permitted to assault the other extreme. Otherwise there really is only freedom of thought so long as you pick an approved thought to have. And who gets to have the power to choose what approved thought is? The mob? The State? The Party? It doesn't matter because as long as there is someone who is in charge of deciding what is right-think and there is a mechanism to enforce that, there is no freedom of thought.

So why even swing the axe at all? That's why you would still be charged with a crime even if the person you committed the criminal act on deserved it like a Nazi would. Does he deserve to get cracked in the face? Sure does. Should he? No. In law the principal is generally that words are not enough to allow for assault. Same principal here, words alone, generally, aren't enough to justify violence.

Personally I'll take freedom over any sort of content filtering by any random person with no State authority. At least a state authority has to act within the confines of a system, a random person punch people in the face because they don't like what they have to say is acting under nothing more than their feelings.

No the Dreamcast didn't get killed by PS2 hype, the PS2 really was just a better system

So every now and then I'll see a article on the Sega Dreamcast on Facebook and almost always there are comments declaring that the system was killed because of the PS2 hype train. This kind of implies that the PS2 wasn't a better system and it only came out on top, not on it's merits but on it's marketing blitz.

I am going to say that the PlayStation 2, genuinely was a better system.

Before I get called a PS fanboy or some other crap like that, I have both systems. I had a Dreamcast right next to my PS2 back in 2001. I liked the Dreamcast, it was a good system, it's just that the PS2 was a great system, and I'll explain why.

The first thing that comes to mind is the PS2's DVD drive. Back in 2001, DVD players were no where near as ubiquitous as they are now. A 2-in-1 system was a big deal since now you didn't need to spend another couple hundred dollars for a separate device to play movies on. I remember I specifically bought a 3rd party remote control so my dad could use my PS2 as a DVD player. It was great for multimedia, but it also gave a benefit to game developers. They now had a bigger storage medium, and therefore bigger games. Bigger in more ways than one. Developers now had more options, multiple audio tracks if they wanted, multiple control schemes if they wanted, or more content.

Or cut scenes like Yuna's concert in Final Fantasy X-2.

A single layer PS2 DVD stores up to 4.7GB. In comparison a Dreamcast GD-ROM disk holds around 1GB. That's over 4x the space giving developers more freedom in what to put into their games and how to implement things.

Next is the hardware. I don't want to talk too much about the hardware and specs since that can be debated till the sun burns out. Though the PS2 was more powerful (not by too much) and it did have better looking games.


To be as fair as I could I found two games that were held up for graphics on both systems that came out around the same time period in each of their respective console's life span. It just wouldn't be fair to compare a Dreamcast game to something on PS2 that was made after the Dreamcast was continued, like Zone of the Enders 2 or Ace Combat 05, when developers really started figuring out how to squeeze the most out of the PS2 (one could argue the Dreamcast wasn't around long enough for developers to really get out it's full potential). On the left we have Shenmue which came out in Japan in 1999, the year after the Dreamcast was launched in Japan. On the left is Metal Gear Solid 2 which came out the year after the PS2 had launched in Japan. Compared to Ryo, the Russian mercenary looks to have more detail and more crisp detail. Compare Ryo's belt buckle to the buckles on the mercenary's equipment harness. I'll admit I might be comparing apples to oranges a little bit given that one screenshot is outdoors while the other is indoor, but I tried to find the screenshots that bring out the games visuals the best.

But at the end of the day, graphics aren't everything, and I only wanted to briefly touch on this.

Then there's the control. Oh the controller. Fuck the Dreamcast controller, there I said it. By 2001 I've played the NES, SNES, Genesis, PS1 (OG controller, Dual Analogue and Dual Shock), Saturn, and the N64. I would easily consider the Dreamcast controller to be one of the worst. I'm not going to complain about the shape since that's something that's largely subjective, but I will call the Dreamcast controller obsolete.

Why is the controller a big deal? Well the controller is the way the player interacts with the game's world. The more versatile the controller, the more the player can interact with the world. Be it more things the player can do, or the more in-depth the player can interact with the world.

When the Sega Saturn came out in 1994 it came out with this controller. One D-pad and eight total buttons (6 face buttons, 2 shoulder buttons), that means at least 8 functions that the player can do in the game's world.

In 1997 the PlayStation came standard with the Dual Shock controller. Two analogue sticks and 10 buttons not counting Start and Select (4 face buttons, 4 shoulder buttons, and two more buttons integrated into the sticks). This controller worked very well for multiple games, especially action shooter games, and it's layout would become the standard for gaming controllers from then on out.

So what the hell was this...?!

I honestly find this design baffling. It has only six buttons, four face buttons and two triggers, a single d-pad and a single analogue stick. The single stick is a real head scratcher for me given that the dual stick design already proved itself in how well it works for First Person Shooters like Medal of Honor and Medal of Honor: Underground, for Third Person action games like Siphon Filter, and has been very intuitive even for flight simulators like Ace Combat 3. Love the controller all you want, but at the end of the day this controller design was a step back. The lay out would have been great when the Saturn came out, but when the Dreamcast hit the US it was already 1999. 

This is a big deal, because this controller quite possibly limited how developers can make their games. Lets take Zone of the Enders. ZoE took full advantage of the PS2's dual analogue design to control your mech in three dimensions. The left stick moved you around while the right stick allowed you to look around in all directions, you're ability to look and move was very precise.  Having two sticks made moving and looking in a three dimensional environment very intuitive. 

Compared to the PS2, had the Dreamcast continued on past when it was discontinued, unless Sega introduced a new controller with dual analogues, Dreamcast games would have gotten the same criticism that the PSP gets in terms of 3D action games. Metal Gear Solid 3 is considered one of the best games in the PS2's library. Hardware issues aside, had the game been ported to Dreamcast, because of the lack of four buttons and a stick, the game would have to play like either MGS: Portable Ops or MGS: Peace Walker in order to be playable. MGS:PO was very awkward compared to the console games, and your actions in MGS:PW were limited to compensate for what the PSP was capable of control and gameplay wise. 

Part of the reason the PS2 was able to bring out a lot of these great games was because the controller was able to make developer's ambitions a reality. I can conclude this because many games made use of every or very nearly every button. MGS3 in the form that it came in on the PS2 literally could not be done on the Dreamcast, not without a new controller design. MGS3 on Dreamcast would have been like MGS:PW. Other games like Devil May Cry or Onimusha would have worked well on the Dreamcast's controller, but others like Red Faction would have had to be gimped to compensate for the controller. 

Then there is networking/internet capability. I certainly have mention that. There's certainly no argument that Sega had a one-up on Sony in that regard and the Dreamcast, while not the first, was certainly a pioneer in online console gaming. But it lost that edge it have over the PS2 with the introduction of the PS2's Network Adapter in 2001. Given a choice would you rather play Unreal Tournament on a Dreamcast, or on a PS2?

Of course this isn't to say the Dreamcast wasn't good, this certainly isn't to say that it's library wasn't good. The original Soul Caliber remains on of the best games in the franchise. While hard as balls, Ikaruga is certainly one of the most fun overhead shooters. Aero Wings 2 is definitely a fun game for the aviation enthusiast, like a more realistic version of Pilot Wings. I would definitely love to see the Dreamcast library ported over to the PlayStation Network and to Xbox Live. But did the Dreamcast fall prey to a giant unstoppable hype machine? No, it was simply a case of "may the best system win" and PS2 came out on top. Sure the PS2 had a lot of media hype at it's launch, but it talked the talk and walked the walk.