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[Hate Speech]: how America (and the world) deals with it
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You're not guaranteed to get somewhere with your speech! Again, Dawkins isn't in the poorhouse.
The 1st Amendment protects you from government restrictions on your speech... it makes no promise that others will listen.
I didn't say you were just like him; Beck is fucking insane. You do, however, share the same self righteous intolerance of the other side. I don't really mean to single you out, you just happened to be the one to come out with it this thread. There are a lot of people on these boards that sound disturbingly like Beck, Hannity and Limbaugh, and don't realize it.
These sorts of critiques are problematic, since they maintain that a person can non-actively support a particular power dynamic, or whatever, within a larger cultural context, simply by not actively acting against it.
It is, perhaps, a problematic understanding of what it is to support something.
Calling someone Glenn Beck is offensive to some, because they don't agree with his views and you're ascribing his views to them.
Do those strike you as similar?
That sentence had too many syllables. Apologize!
That said, Regina, I do apologize if I inadvertently called you a misanthropic, Mormon fundamentalist who I can't prove didn't rape and murder a girl in 1990.
The reasons they're dissimilar are pretty important.
It doesn't really matter if the trait is immutable or innate. Religion is often covered by hate speech laws, and that's a choice.
It does matter that gay people have been common targets of violence and discrimination; I think it's a legitimate concern that hate speech is closely associated with these acts of violence. So when somebody, like Regina Fong for example, says "I think we should restrict hate speech in order to quell violence," I am sympathetic to that position, even though I have reservations.
It does matter that there's a more polite, less inflammatory way to say "I don't like gay people" than to call them fags. If you have a legitimate political or ideological reason to oppose homosexuality, there is a valid way to express that belief without using slurs.
And of course the prospect of being dragged into court will in no way chill legitimate speech.
"Responsible?" What? That's a funny use of the word "responsibility," because if my burning your bible causes you to burn shit down, that sounds like you are the problem. I fail to see how he can be held responsible for the actions of a bunch of fucking barbarians.
This entire thread hurts my head.
I can agree that we may need to go a bit further on harassment, stalking, incitement, and libel/slander laws, among some others*. But actual hate speech laws? Fuck that. I have a right to be a dick. I'll make everybody here a deal, though. We get rid of freedom of religion, first. Once we stop accepting indoctrination of children into misogynistic cults and organized child rape rings, I'll consider curbing my right to call them misogynistic cults and organized child rape rings.
* - disorderly conduct would be another...there are certainly more
That's between me and my audience/advertisers. Or between me and my publisher, and between them and our audience/advertisers.
I didn't even want to come in here, to be honest, because I knew it would make me want to stab my brain out.
Agreed. I can't say it's worth the disruption to the lives of the people's whose funerals they disrupted, and that's part of what I mean when I say we can expand our laws restricting speech in content-agnostic ways. But yeah, I definitely think that having such a moustache-twirling caricature of homophobic bullshit certainly did more good than harm, in the long run.
Only because of where we were at the time, of course. If we were already in a wonderland of full acceptance of gays, then they'd still just be dicks.
I am 40% certain that they are an ACLU front group.
If it weren't for me hearing about some documentary or whatever about family members that have left the WBC, I'd be like 70% certain.
I'll have to run this by her, but I think she would actually appreciate it. She used to own a bookstore with a massive LGBT section in a relatively conservative community. It'd be more likely to get all her old customers/bookstore-related friends to come out and pay their respects than anything.
By narrowly defining what constitutes hate speech (and perhaps prevent it from being a charge all its own, much like how "texting while driving" can't get you pulled over in and of itself), you can avoid much of the fear factor.
Besides which, a law being tested in court is part of its natural life cycle, and a necessary part of its survival/demise. That is, in part, what the courts are there to do.
Well, it's not like he won awards for his work as a civil rights attorney or actively supported Al Gore's presidential bid in '88...or got 30% of the vote In a Democratic Senate primary...alright, what the fuck, Phelps? You come clean right this minute.
What the... fuck?
And sure, just about every law any civilization has ever passed restricting speech has ended up suppressing completely valid minority opinions, but I'm sure we'll get it right this time guys. Right? Right?
I'd subscribe to that over "Loose Change"
And specifically in the evolution of democracy, free expression was permissible in the US colonies and British Empire. Without it, there would never have been democracy.
QEDMF xbl: PantsB G+
Sure, but you've got really convenient examples there.
What about quoting Exodus 22:18 - Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live - while discussing wicca or D&D? Just quoting. Not instructing, not inciting, just saying. Perhaps you'd call it incitement? Or not, and that's up to a judge to decide?
How about 'the first thing we do, we kill all the lawyers', or 'X group (usually right-wing politicians) will be first up against the wall'. Not inciting? Or is, depending on context?
It's the edge cases, the middle cases, that cause issues. It's all the things you don't publish because it might be punished.
First, I disagree that the difference is "clear cut." These two statements may exist on either side of some divide, sure, but where that cut occurs is probably anything but "clear." It only appears "clear" because you've chosen the two extreme examples, while ignoring the broad spectrum between them. That's cheating.
And that's accepting that they actually do exist on opposite sides of some divide. Honestly, I find "I disagree with the homosexual agenda" to be no less hateful or insidious, though I guess it depends whether you're taking the "KILL" part literally (a legitimate call to murder being on the other side of a bright line, regardless of target). Hatred is no better when it's dressed up as reason, and honestly I think it can be much worse for society.
Except those are still content-neutral with the possible exception of obscenity (which is so narrowly tailored so as to only cover valueless speech as only part of the standard, a nigh impossible standard to meet)
RAV vs City of St Paul 1992 9-0 decision that essentially prohibited hate speech laws in the US:
Scalia (all these decisions are sizable majorities)
Or from the left Blackmun (Forsyth County, Georgia v. The Nationalist Movement) Or Marshall (Police Department of the City of Chicago v. Mosley )
Or more centrist, Justice Stevens (Hill v Colorado) Powell and Stevens again concurring in part (CONSOLIDATED EDISON CO. v. PUBLIC SERV. COMM'N)
The exceptions are times when speech can be regulated or prohibited using content-neutral means. I can't say fighting words are illegal if they are also racist for instance because it favors attempts to suppress a viewpoint
QEDMF xbl: PantsB G+
It's not cheating. I've said from the beginning that I'm okay with curtailing very blatant and clear cut examples of hate speech. Enforcement and sanction are entirely different matters, and complex ones at that. I never said this would be easy.
Damn fucking straight.
I agree. And this is why we have the courts to help us establish where the boundaries lie.
Yes, but there's a line between being a dick, and being the Grand Dragon of the Ku Klux Klan. I'm okay with living in a society that outlaws such organizations.
I think it is helpful to make the conversation less about "free speech!" and more about getting people to articulate what exact problem they are trying to solve by limiting particular linguistic utterances.
You want to stop physical violence? Great. Do that. Words are not physical violence.
You want to remove the ideas of racial intolerance, or homophobia, from the public consciousness? Great. Educate people. Making a law against saying "Fag" isn't actually changing anyone's mind.
You want to prevent people from having their feelings hurt as a result of being called names? Grow the fuck up.
Most attempts to limit speech mischaracterize speech as having some significant causal role in the act they actually want to prevent. Once we dissolve that notion, we're left with either people who think we live in the Harry Potter universe, and so particular linguistic utterances have some magical power to directly harm another individual, or middle aged women who just don't like hearing particular noises.
I agree. Actively engaging in acts that legitimately disenfranchise groups through political and social movements is not beneficial, and we ought to work together as a society to minimize instances of physical violence, economic unfairness, social limitations, etc.
None of that has anything to do with the words people say, though.
If you want to prevent your African American neighbor from voting? Fuck you.
If you want to call your African American neighbor Sambo, and talk about how inferior black people are? Great. Go for it.
Because these are different things. One is actual violence against someone's well-being. Another is making noises, and looking like an ass.
Edit: We need to punish people who lynch their fellow human beings, and actively engaged in the preparation for lynching. Talking about lynching is fine, because it's just noise. The second when a person moves from "Man, we should totally lynch that guy" to buying rope is when we act. Now apply that to all speech / act distinctions.
..but buying rope is just buying rope. Who's going to outlaw rope? Tying a noose is just tying a knot. Are we going to outlaw knots?
Yeah, like I said I'm not sure "I disagree with the homosexual agenda" is really any better, as far as society goes, that "I HATE FAGS." It's just more...polite. But honestly, I think "polite" homophobia is harder to eradicate, has a sheen of respectability, and as such is worse. Like KD said, the WBC almost helps the gay cause by being so completely fucking awful. No amount of suburban conservative parents "just asking the question" or "just worrying about my kids" will necessarily do that...it passes as reasonable. When it really, truly, isn't, and is just as hateful.
I'm unconvinced there's any such line. You're drawing one, I suppose, but it's not like it's already there or anything. There's a broad spectrum of dickery.
Excellent points.
I believe you're being facetious (sorry if not), but it's a serious issue. At what point does it become intent, such that it can be made illegal? Arguably it's the combination of speech combined with preparatory action. But neither one alone.
Like, the KKK is problematic in a clear sense given that it's a violent organization.
What about the WBC? They're a "hate group", but they aren't violent.
And how do we deal with satire and parody?