Artistic freedom exists because of the people who have died for it over thousands of years often in grotesque and brutal ways like degloving or burning alive, but a useful idiot like you who only knows how to sit on their ass and consume what others make for them wouldn't know anything about that so no one can blame you.
In fact its smart people's fault for building society so comfortable and safe even someone like you who used to be weeded out by evolution gets to reproduce.
"Artistic freedom exists because of the people who have died for it over thousands of years often in grotesque and brutal ways like degloving or burning alive". Give me example dude. I can tell you about how many people died during the crusades and about the ideological war like the cold war but I've never heard of people waging war because of artistic freedom. Make stuff up buddy.
Discipline: Contemporary Art, Sculpture, Installation
Incident: Beaten by police in 2009 in Chengdu while investigating a school collapse after the Sichuan earthquake. Later detained for 81 days in 2011 without charge.
Reason: His art and activism frequently criticize the Chinese government.
Discipline: Performance Art
Incident: In 2016, she was attacked with a painting on the head by an artist during an exhibition in Florence.
Reason: Though not politically motivated, the attacker claimed it was part of his own “artistic performance.”
Discipline: Punk Rock/Performance Art
Incident: Members were violently arrested, imprisoned, and reportedly mistreated for a 2012 performance in a Moscow cathedral.
Reason: Their anti-Putin/pro-feminist stance and criticism of the Russian Orthodox Church.
Discipline: Music (Kurdish/Turkish protest songs)
Incident: Repeatedly arrested and tortured during the 1980s and 1990s.
Reason: His songs addressed Kurdish rights and criticized Turkish state repression.
Discipline: Photography/Installation Art
Incident: Not directly attacked, but faced detainment and harassment in relation to politically charged works about Palestinian identity.
Reason: Focused on displacement and border politics in the Middle East.
Discipline: Cartoonist, Painter
Incident: Jailed and allegedly tortured in 2014 for satirical cartoons mocking Iranian politicians.
Reason: Her art criticized laws restricting women’s rights in Iran.
Discipline: Cartoonist
Incident: Assassinated in London in 1987.
Reason: His cartoons were critical of multiple regimes across the Arab world.
Discipline: Filmmaker
Incident: Arrested in Crimea in 2014, tortured by Russian security forces, and imprisoned for 5 years.
Reason: Opposed Russian annexation of Crimea; his films carried strong political commentary.
Discipline: Music and Visual Art (Christian underground artists)
Incident: Many have faced torture or long imprisonment for creating or distributing Christian-themed art and music.
Reason: Seen as religious and cultural dissent.
Discipline: Blogger and Poet
Incident: Tortured and imprisoned multiple times.
Reason: His writing and activism were critical of the Vietnamese government.
Discipline: Singer-Songwriter, Theater Director
Incident: Arrested during the 1973 Chilean military coup. In the Estadio Chile (converted into a torture center):
His hands were broken and smashed by soldiers.
They mocked him by asking him to play guitar.
He was then beaten, tortured, and shot over 40 times.
Reason: His protest music supported socialist President Allende and opposed the Pinochet dictatorship.
Discipline: Photography, Caricature
Incident: During the Paris Commune, artists and political cartoonists aligned with the Communards were often executed en masse, including collaborators of Nadar. Some were tortured before being shot or hanged.
Reason: Their satirical and revolutionary imagery threatened conservative powers.
Discipline: Filmmaker, Writer
Incident (2004): Brutally murdered in Amsterdam by an Islamic extremist after releasing Submission, a short film critical of the treatment of women in some Islamic societies.
Slashed throat, shot multiple times, and a knife with a death threat to collaborator Ayaan Hirsi Ali was stabbed into his body.
Reason: The film was considered blasphemous by some; it used provocative imagery and narration.
Discipline: Cartoonists, Satirists
Incident (2015): 12 people, including prominent cartoonists like Charb, Cabu, and Wolinski, were massacred by two gunmen at the Charlie Hebdo offices in Paris.
Gunmen claimed retaliation for publishing cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad.
Reason: Satirical content seen as blasphemous/offensive to Islam. One of the most violent modern attacks on free speech and art.
Discipline: Actor, Singer, Activist
Incident: Subjected to severe FBI surveillance, passport revoked, and denied work. Attempted suicides and deep psychological damage followed.
Reason: Robeson’s art and speech supported socialism and civil rights, making him a target during the McCarthy era.
While not physically tortured in a classic sense, he was systematically destroyed by the U.S. government.
Discipline: Composer, Singer, Performance Artist
Incident: Died homeless and forgotten in 1990 after years of being pushed out of the music world due to his race, queerness, and provocative compositions (e.g., Gay Guerrilla, Evil Nigger).
Reason: His radical identity and titles were seen as too controversial. Systemic neglect, ostracism, and police harassment contributed to his decline.
Discipline: Comedian
Incident: Repeatedly arrested, jailed, and brutalized by police for obscenity in the 1960s. Harassed to the point of breakdown.
Reason: His provocative comedy challenged religious institutions, American conservatism, and censorship laws.
Died of a drug overdose, seen by many as a casualty of state harassment.
Discipline: Jazz Singer
Incident: The FBI targeted her for performing Strange Fruit, a haunting song about lynchings in the American South.
They arrested her, harassed her, and denied medical treatment while she was dying in a hospital under police guard.
Reason: The song was considered subversive and unpatriotic by law enforcement; her prominence as a Black artist made her a target.
Discipline: Politician, Activist (closely tied with public art and LGBTQ+ cultural activism)
Incident (1978): Assassinated in San Francisco alongside Mayor George Moscone.
Reason: One of the first openly gay elected officials in the U.S. He inspired art, murals, films — and was murdered in part for what he represented culturally.
Discipline: Radio Host (articulate social commentator)
Incident (1984): Assassinated by white supremacists in Denver for his outspoken liberal and anti-racist views.
Reason: His broadcasts challenged far-right ideology; he became a target of The Order, a neo-Nazi terrorist group.
Discipline: Philosopher, Poet, Playwright
Crime: His philosophical writings and poems challenged Church doctrine — including the idea of an infinite universe and pantheism.
Punishment: Burned alive at the stake by the Inquisition in Rome.
Brutality:
Tongue pierced and gagged with an iron spike to silence him.
Kept in prison for 7 years before execution.
Legacy: Symbol of free thought and martyrdom for artistic and intellectual freedom.
Role: Philosopher, mathematician, teacher
Crime: Taught Neoplatonism and was a symbol of pagan intellectual life.
Punishment:
Dragged from her chariot by a mob of Christian zealots.
Stripped naked, then skinned alive with oyster shells or roof tiles.
Her limbs were torn apart, and her body burned in pieces.
Legacy: A symbol of the destruction of classical knowledge and anti-intellectual violence.
Role: Young noble, poet, student of Enlightenment thinkers
Crime: Allegedly sang anti-religious songs and failed to salute a religious procession.
Punishment:
Tongue torn out, right hand cut off, then beheaded.
His body was burned with a copy of Voltaire’s Dictionnaire Philosophique nailed to his chest.
Legacy: Became a symbol of the barbarity of religious repression and censorship.
Role: Writer, philosopher
Works: Justine, 120 Days of Sodom, and other sexually explicit, sadomasochistic literature
Punishment:
Repeatedly imprisoned, tortured, and confined to asylums.
Spent 32 years in prisons or mental institutions, often under horrific conditions.
Cause: His graphic sexual content was seen as both pornographic and anti-religious; he was labeled dangerous to public morality.
Legacy: His name became the origin of the word sadism. Still controversial but central to discussions of censorship and sexual freedom.
Role: Psychiatrist, early sexologist
Works: Psychopathia Sexualis — described taboo sexual behavior, including homosexuality, fetishes, and sadomasochism
Punishment:
His books were banned, censored, and he was targeted by religious authorities.
Patients who echoed his writings were sometimes subjected to medical torture, including castration, electroshock, and institutional abuse.
Cause: His open classification and study of sexuality challenged Victorian and Christian moral norms.
Role: Playwright, novelist
Works: The Carnal Prayer Mat (淫词艳曲) — a comedic, sexually explicit novel
Punishment:
The Qing dynasty deemed his work obscene; his writings were banned and burned.
While he may have escaped execution, artists of similar content at the time were known to face corporal punishment, exile, and torture.
Cause: The novel’s erotic content was viewed as corrupting public morals and disrespecting Confucian values.
Examples:
Klaus Mann (Germany), gay writer, son of Thomas Mann, fled Nazi persecution.
Federico García Lorca (Spain), poet and playwright with queer themes.
Punishment:
Lorca was arrested, tortured, and executed without trial during the Spanish Civil War.
Nazi Germany and Francoist Spain both imprisoned or castrated people for sexual or queer artistic expression.
Cause: Fascist regimes viewed sexual deviance and gender nonconformity as threats to national purity.
Role: Dancer and choreographer
Incident:
While not physically tortured, she was hounded, censored, and exiled for her provocative, sexually expressive dances and bohemian lifestyle.
Labeled indecent and immoral in several countries.
Impact: Shows how non-explicit sexual expression, especially by women, was criminalized and socially punished.
Punishment:
Writers, painters, and poets accused of “obscenity” or “carnal sin” faced:
Torture chambers, use of the rack, whippings, or mutilation
Many were burned alive for mixing eroticism with religious imagery
Examples:
Erotic engravings or “forbidden books” like La Celestina (Spain) led to authors being imprisoned or disappearing under torture.
Every drop of blood spilled has paid a debt to the future of freedom
Damn ai sure is useful. That said, most of this are actually not specifically about artistic freedom but going against established norm, anti-religion or criticizing an authoritarian state. Questioning the dear leader? To the gallows. Being a homosexual? To the gallows. Asking why can't have big booty statues like the ancient Greeks did? Believe it or not to the gallows with you. But I'll concede what they fought for is something we take for granted in the modern age. I can freely declare I'm agnostic without getting targeted by a religious inquisition not because some guy asked why they couldn't write smut but because people fought against religious persecution.
I got more invested in this argument than I would like. As long as what you're fighting for is the freedom of expression and not some weird shit, then sure you'd have my support.
Honestly banning art directly has never been a popular regime since people really enjoy art. But banning art you don't like has. Every seriously tyrannical regime has done it since time immoral and the only reason you can't do so in America is because of all the people who have died standing up for what they thought is right (and the ideology those people's deaths helped inspire.) Even something as silly as starmaker story would get you hanged in a place like Iran. That seems like an overblown and seriously ridiculous notion to first world citizens but it's very possible in places without explicit freedom of artistic expression.
You couldn't say you have freedom of speech if your senator could cut your tongue off if you said something bad about him right? That's basically what artistic freedom is. We could easily backslide right back to 50 years ago where we deplatform and harass someone to death because their game was too sexually explicit or criticized the government.
I have no intention of collecting attention or validation, I don't care if people make me a martyr, a hero, a villain, or rightly continuing thinking of me as a nobody. I wasn't born into this world desperately clinging to anyone but my mother and my father. I was simply naked cold and probably quite miserable after someone smacked me on the ass.
If someone told me they would shoot me if I didn't let them censor this game or any other game I would 100% be a bitch and just let it go. But I'm not going to let it get to that point, so I say something while i still can say it comfortably.
