Thursday, September 13, 2007

White v. Sparks (9th Cir. - Aug. 29, 2007)

So I take it that this means that I have a First Amendment right to sit in a park and paint pictures of naked women and sell them to the public too. That's equally protected speech, right?

The Ninth Circuit says that paintings of nature may convey a protected "message that human beings are driving their spiritual brothers and sisters, the animals, into extinction." Surely my paintings of naked men and/or women frolicking in various poses sends an even more direct message, no?

Interesting. I thought that there were some legitimate constraints on fairly clearly commercial speech. But apparently they are less permissible than I originally thought.