It was Johann Friedrich Von Schiller who said, "Whatever is not forbidden is permitted," which seems sensible until you bump up against the unsaid. The truth of this paradox was made clear this past week in Black Rock Desert, Nevada, at Burning Man--the sine qua non of all things permitted--when censorship struck.

The target was a sign for Jiffy Lube, a sex-and-dance club at Burning Man, that showed one man penetrating another. Pretty tame stuff, especially when compared to the live acts one might stumble upon during the dawn hours out on the great stark expanse of desert. Word traveled quickly through Black Rock City that the Pershing County Sheriff had arrived, ordering the camp to take down the sign on the grounds of obscenity. A rally was scheduled for the next day at noon, but the announcement wasn't made until the daily paper came out that day at 4:00 p.m.

I got the full story from an irate Burner named Bradley Jordan. The complaint had apparently been made by a parent upset with the sign's graphic nature. The sheriff, upon arrival at Jiffy Lube, allegedly called the campers "fucking faggots," lifted his gun out of his holster, and told a friend of Jordan's that if there weren't so many of them around, he'd "deal with things differently."

The protesters were careful to keep the event away from the family camping area, but when they tried to put the sign up at Center Camp (a general gathering place), they were turned away. Jordan--who took the sheriff's comments as very real threats to both First Amendment and gay rights--had volunteered to let himself be arrested if things got ugly, essentially offering to be the camp's scapegoat. But support for the camp's right to show the Jiffy Lube sign seemed to dwindle when festival organizers began to say that such violations could end Burning Man completely.

Frustrated with the way this political struggle has "shut people up," Jordan is methodically contacting media, and is considering state and federal claims (via Lambda Legal Defense and possibly the ACLU) against the Pershing County Sheriff's Office. "Burning Man is going to have to make a decision," he says, "between having children at the event, and having to censor what happens there." He is also planning a Sodomy Camp for next year's Burning Man: a show of all-sodomy art, presumably for freedom-of- expression minded people only. EMILY HALL

War in Babylon

Yet another report of organizational strife: Theatre Babylon, a fringe theater devoted to original work, has sent out the following press release: "The Board of Directors has disbanded the Artistic Board and asked William Cole and Heidi Heimarck to step down from leadership."

What makes this situation substantially different from the conflicts at On the Boards is that Babylon's board of directors is wholly composed of artists who work at the theater. The circumstances are also more openly rancorous. Heimarck--playwright, director, actor, and one of the fringe scene's more outspoken personalities--describes the event: "A small band of mean-spirited bandits led by [fellow artistic director] D.J. Hamilton blindsided [us] yesterday with concerns regarding [our] ability to maintain positions of leadership." Heimarck says that critical comments she made about Babylon productions were considered "unacceptable." Marcy Rodenborn, Babylon's literary manager and interim PR manager, responds, "There was no singular event that led to this decision... the welfare of the company necessitated this action. We are aware of William and Heidi's contributions to Theatre Babylon, and wish them well." D.J. Hamilton will now serve as Theatre Babylon's sole artistic director. BRET FETZER