Talk:Town square test

old talk
Is the quote of the test correct? If so, it's hard to see how any society could be a free one because fear is subjective -- i might fear that bad things will happen when i express my views in the town square, but they might not happen. and if they do happen, how can we say that it is not an aberration, that person or persons react violently to what i say? i realise that his is not an actual test which would be applied everywhere, just to the countries that the imperialist countries oppose, but still the quote seems a little odd in that it does not specify governmental authorities -- which is what would be the source of fear, i suspect.

Imperialist countries is a very non-NPOV. Beside, this could have been a test imagined by the left easily.

My dictionary defines imperialism as military or economic dominance by one country over another. Is this not the policy of the US, UK, Australia, France, Germany and the rest? I would not dream of editing a wikipedia article and using this word, because my use of it is POV -- but this is a talk page, so i think i'm excused. And yes, a test like this could've been imagined by the left, but would it have been used to legitimise imperialist wars of conquest? I think not. The UK govt considered -- and attempted to introduce -- a ban on "glorifying terror". This hazy concept would have made people fearful of expressing their views in public. Would the UK have been a "fear society" if this law had've been passed? The "town square test" is impossible to pass, but i don't believe it's an earnest test...


 * Don't be so picky. The test is describing a reasonable and likely-to-be-fulfilled fear of arrest and physical harm. Obviously there's always a chance that someone will mug us because of our views, but in a free society it won't be the police or government agents. Also, there will always be exceptions, even in a free society. For example, if a KKK member went into the square and started insulting and encouraging violence against blacks, he should still have a fear of being arrested and imprisoned. LK 02:29, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

Please keep in mind that wikipedia is not a forum for political debate. It is not our damn business whether the test is correct or stupid. Our job is (a) to describe it and (b) to report what important people think about it &mdash; basing on published reliable sources. `'Míkka 02:45, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

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External links modified
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Joke connection
There's a probably a connection to a joke that was pretty well-known in the Soviet Union. There were many versions of it, but here's how it appears on our Russian political jokes article: AnonMoos (talk) 17:59, 4 November 2018 (UTC)

"In the USA, you can stand in front of the White House in Washington, DC, and yell, 'Down with Reagan!', and you will not be punished. Equally, you can also stand in Red Square in Moscow and yell, 'Down with Reagan!', and you will not be punished."