For those of you who are not aware, the boston MBTA (the subway authority) has recently banned all buskers from its area unless they now meet its exacting criteria.

Now while there are rules governing buskers, this new legislation is backed up by a 9/11 commision who feel they are a threat to security. Now I am normally a moderate person in politics but this act has outraged me.

As an American citizen I have no problems with the laws governing the safety of my or any other country, but I find it surprisingly curious that this legislation pops up 2 years after the fact. I am disgusted that anyone would try to use this atrocity upon my country as a reason to ban performers from a public area that has always been open to them.

you can read more about this at:
http://www.weeklydig.com/dig/content/5234.aspx


While I do not even perform in this area, I have seen other Magicians and a lot of other performer's working here This smacks of cenorship at its worst, cloaked in a veil of "Protecting us against terrorism". That and now the MBTA can shut down anyone they want under the guise of national security, regardless of whether or not you have a permit.

I would probaly not be so insulted if this had not been brought about as a 9/11 act.

Sorry, but as a city that was the birthplace of American Freedom, I needed to get this off my chest, and frankly warn others that if this law/act/whatever passes this may be coming to your city soon as well.

Mat Random

For those who are also disgusted by this you may feel free to sign a petition against it at:

http://www.petitiononline.com/Tmusic/petition.html

Thanks for everyones help,

Mat Random

Hey Random,

Originally from NYC, I was surprised to see how much better the street performers were in Boston. It's a shame the T cracks down on buskers and not those annoying "change" guys.

I am neither agreeing with nor criticing the regulations, but many have said that freedom comes with a price & to what extent we wish to protect that freedom we will also pay a price. It does sound foolish to believe that an instrument or simple amplification would hinder a warning signal, but prior to 911 I think many would have been ubale to believe that 3 jets could have been hijacked using nothing more than box cutters & take out the WTC, pentagon & 1000's of lives.

If freedom's price is basic freedom itself then what are we really buying ? and who is selling it ?

Have there been any developments concerning these regulations?

Soon after the regulation was brought to public light many people both in and out of the city fought them from enacting it. It seems that this was not so much a threat to the public as it was a way for 1 particular members of the city goverment to get rid of people he did not care for. After the whole issue was made more public it quickly vanished.

Heh. Good job on that brilliant idea.