Hate speech on Ratz. Should we tolerate it?

[Svartalf]

it's not so much hate speech as announcing a will to commit terrorist acts.

[Coito ergo sum]

it's not so much hate speech as announcing a will to commit terrorist acts.

Well, by the definitions of "hate speech" used in most countries, words that incite hatred of another person, or are intended to incite violence against another person, would be textbook hate speech. Surrounding a church and opening calling for the death and dismemberment of the priest would seem to qualify....

[Svartalf]

Thing is inciting... from the speech and the circumstances, it looks like the inciting happened some time before the reported snippet was uttered.

It's not the same to yell 'death to the morons' in a room full of people, than to say, 'we're killing that moron and nobody is stopping us' when you're already surrounding the house with torches, pitchforks, ropes and gasoline.
The former is hate speech, inciting hatred and trying to get action, the other is just a statement of intent after the hate speech proper has already borne fruit.

[Coito ergo sum]

Thing is inciting... from the speech and the circumstances, it looks like the inciting happened some time before the reported snippet was uttered.

And, the Muslim mob is continuing to incite...

It's not the same to yell 'death to the morons' in a room full of people, than to say, 'we're killing that moron and nobody is stopping us' when you're already surrounding the house with torches, pitchforks, ropes and gasoline.

Except that what their saying encourages others to join them.

The former is hate speech, inciting hatred and trying to get action, the other is just a statement of intent after the hate speech proper has already borne fruit.

The two are not mutually exclusive.

[Seth]

Thing is inciting... from the speech and the circumstances, it looks like the inciting happened some time before the reported snippet was uttered.

And, the Muslim mob is continuing to incite...

It's not the same to yell 'death to the morons' in a room full of people, than to say, 'we're killing that moron and nobody is stopping us' when you're already surrounding the house with torches, pitchforks, ropes and gasoline.

Except that what their saying encourages others to join them.

The former is hate speech, inciting hatred and trying to get action, the other is just a statement of intent after the hate speech proper has already borne fruit.

The two are not mutually exclusive.

Generally, the distinction between "hate speech" and "incitement" is that incitement, which may be prosecuted, is speech that "is likely to cause an immediate breach of the peace." The SCOTUS has addressed hateful speech many times, from calling cops "pigs" to defacing the flag and has distinguished between political speech that may be controversial and direct incitement to a criminal act that does, or reasonably might result in an IMMEDIATE breach of the peace. Even where speech that incites is in a setting, like on a TV show, where no immediate breach of the peace is likely, the Court has protected free speech.

"Hate speech" is a different category altogether because it's not necessarily speech that incites people to immediate violence, it's a manifestation of an internal belief about something or someone. Here in the US, "hate speech" laws are generally used as sentence enhancers going to motive when ANOTHER crime has occurred. Thus, bashing the face of a gay person while remaining silent is simple assault, but doing it while uttering the words "I hate fucking fags" is a "hate crime" that can lead to a significant sentence enhancement. It's an example of thought crime in the same way that a sentence enhancement for a "depraved indifference" crime like homicide is a different category of crime.

Unfortunately, one cannot accurately judge the mental state of an individual merely based on their speech, and hate speech laws violate equal protection principles because they punish one person more harshly for uttering some hateful speech associated with a criminal act while not punishing another person who commits the exact same act for exactly the same reason and with exactly the same motivation who does NOT utter the words out loud while committing the crime.

In other words, "hate speech" laws are nothing more than an attempt by society to supress free speech that it finds socially unacceptable. It doesn't work because all anyone has to do is to not utter the hate speech but rather conceal the bigoted and prejudiced motives while still oppressing and harming the demeaned group to escape the law.

It must also be noted that it is a civil right to hate people and even to discriminate against them, with a very few explicit exceptions when it comes to interstate commerce, which makes trying to suppress "hate" a direct conflict with the rights of the individual to both express themselves freely and to associate...and disassociate...freely.

Besides, I'd rather the bigots announce their beliefs and intentions publicly, so we can identify them and revile and discriminate against them in turn. Hidden bigotry and prejudice is far more dangerous than openly expressed bigotry because the ways in which a bigot can oppress the target of their bigotry without actually violating a law are numerous.

Take an employer who hates gays. Is it better for gays to know that this employer hates them so they can seek employment elsewhere, and is it better for other workers and customers to know and disseminate knowledge of the bigotry and prejudice so that people can choose whether or not to associate with that company or person, or is it better for the law to force the employer to hide his prejudice and bigotry and find subtle "legal" ways to harass and demean gays in his employ?

I prefer the former because no law will ever change the opinion of a bigot, it merely drives the bigotry underground, where it festers and grows out of sight of the public. I like to know who the bigots are so I can publicly revile and hate them and disassociate from them.

[Gallstones]

We should allow it as long as it's followed by "I'm just sayin"

I think we otter round up all them nig nog raghead Joo bastids and ship 'em back to you-rope or whichever all they comes from. I'm just sayin.

Too much to type. How about a simple j/k?

[Gallstones]

What he said.

[MrJonno]

Take an employer who hates gays. Is it better for gays to know that this employer hates them so they can seek employment elsewhere, and is it better for other workers and customers to know and disseminate knowledge of the bigotry and prejudice so that people can choose whether or not to associate with that company or person, or is it better for the law to force the employer to hide his prejudice and bigotry and find subtle "legal" ways to harass and demean gays in his employ?

No its better for gays to deliberately apply for work there, get openly turned down for being gay or have reduced promotion prospects and then sue that person benefiting themselves and society but showing society won't tolerate such behaviour in the work place and then you will be seriously punished for it

[Seth]

Take an employer who hates gays. Is it better for gays to know that this employer hates them so they can seek employment elsewhere, and is it better for other workers and customers to know and disseminate knowledge of the bigotry and prejudice so that people can choose whether or not to associate with that company or person, or is it better for the law to force the employer to hide his prejudice and bigotry and find subtle "legal" ways to harass and demean gays in his employ?

No its better for gays to deliberately apply for work there, get openly turned down for being gay or have reduced promotion prospects and then sue that person benefiting themselves and society but showing society won't tolerate such behaviour in the work place and then you will be seriously punished for it

Good luck with that. It's incredibly difficult or impossible to win a discrimination case (even if it were illegal to discriminate against gays in most of the US, which it's not...) if the employer is careful in how he goes about it. There's a million ways and reasons to fire someone having nothing to do with sexual orientation, and an employer is justified in firing someone for the slightest mistake, or in many states for no reason other than the employer doesn't like your face.

Just ask the ladies who tried to class-action sue Wal-Mart...

Far better to use the power of the free market to identify and boycott bigots and put them out of business.

[Warren Dew]

Good luck with that. It's incredibly difficult or impossible to win a discrimination case (even if it were illegal to discriminate against gays in most of the US, which it's not...)

That depends on the state. Some states have laws against such discrimination, even without a federal law.

Just ask the ladies who tried to class-action sue Wal-Mart...

They may well win their lawsuit and damages. They just didn't turn out to be typical of millions of other ladies, so they weren't allowed to represent those others.

[Coito ergo sum]

Take an employer who hates gays. Is it better for gays to know that this employer hates them so they can seek employment elsewhere, and is it better for other workers and customers to know and disseminate knowledge of the bigotry and prejudice so that people can choose whether or not to associate with that company or person, or is it better for the law to force the employer to hide his prejudice and bigotry and find subtle "legal" ways to harass and demean gays in his employ?

No its better for gays to deliberately apply for work there, get openly turned down for being gay or have reduced promotion prospects and then sue that person benefiting themselves and society but showing society won't tolerate such behaviour in the work place and then you will be seriously punished for it

Good luck with that. It's incredibly difficult or impossible to win a discrimination case (even if it were illegal to discriminate against gays in most of the US, which it's not...) if the employer is careful in how he goes about it. There's a million ways and reasons to fire someone having nothing to do with sexual orientation, and an employer is justified in firing someone for the slightest mistake, or in many states for no reason other than the employer doesn't like your face.

Just ask the ladies who tried to class-action sue Wal-Mart...

Far better to use the power of the free market to identify and boycott bigots and put them out of business.

The ladies who tried to class action sue Wal-Mart didn't lose on the merits of their case, they only lost on the issue of class certification. They could still file suit individually, and the argument for class certification seemed to be quite a stretch to begin with.

[Coito ergo sum]

Lessons from a country that doesn't tolerate hate speech.

Saudi Arabia to Give Australian 500 Lashes, Jail for Blasphemy
Insulting the friends of the founder of Islam earned an Australian national 500 lashes and a year in jail in Saudi Arabia last month.

http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/ ... t-JErK5Pjx

Stop the hate! The Saudis, putting up the good fight!

[FBM]

Lessons from a country that doesn't tolerate hate speech.

Saudi Arabia to Give Australian 500 Lashes, Jail for Blasphemy
Insulting the friends of the founder of Islam earned an Australian national 500 lashes and a year in jail in Saudi Arabia last month.

http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/ ... t-JErK5Pjx

Stop the hate! The Saudis, putting up the good fight!

That's clearly a strawman argument to the OP, innit? The OP had to do with racism, not religion or blasphemy. I don't think "Insulting the friends of..." is hate speech. "All fucking niggers must fucking hang" would be an example of hate speech.

[Coito ergo sum]

Lessons from a country that doesn't tolerate hate speech.

Saudi Arabia to Give Australian 500 Lashes, Jail for Blasphemy
Insulting the friends of the founder of Islam earned an Australian national 500 lashes and a year in jail in Saudi Arabia last month.

http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/ ... t-JErK5Pjx

Stop the hate! The Saudis, putting up the good fight!

That's clearly a strawman argument to the OP, innit? The OP had to do with racism, not religion or blasphemy. I don't think "Insulting the friends of..." is hate speech. "All fucking niggers must fucking hang" would be an example of hate speech.

Well, "hate speech" in most countries is defined as making hateful, biased or discriminatory statements, or inciting hatred in, other people because of their race, sex, or religion, and sometimes sexual orientation, etc.

An example would be Canada, which has a board that investigates people's expressions of opinion (far tamer than the one you gave as an example) and some of which involve criticisms of religion, and determines whether the expressions are criminal. Videos of such an investigation, an interview, have been posted here before.

it's not a strawman argument, depending on what one defines the "hate" to be. It is not unusual for anti-religious statements to be defined as "hate speech." As I mentioned Canada as one example, we can also look to Holland with the Geert Wilders affair, and Germany and Austria with examples fairly recently where statements not involving vulgar, racist subornations of murder were considered hate speech. In fact, I don't think there is a definition of "hate speech" anywhere in the world that is limited to only such statements as "all fucking niggers must fucking hang."

[FBM]

Fucking Canadians. They should all experience an evening of social awkwardness!!