I know it already is but should it be?
This is what the paradox of tolerance is all about. Extending tolerance to those who are intolerant of others only serves to enable the rise and eventual dominance of intolerance, thus undermining the original principle. The only way to combat this is (ironically) to be intolerant of such behaviour on both a cultural and systemic level.
There is no paradox once you realize that it is not a law, but a social contract.
Those that are intolerant remove themselves from the social contract, and are no longer protected by it. This then allows them to be no longer tolerated by the tolerant, preserving that contract for those who obey it.
Yeah, honestly when viewed this (the correct) way it becomes ridiculous to call it a paradox at all.
just a reminder- the 1st amendment is an amendment. When the people running things on behalf of their monied backers want to change things, they can change them and will.
your right to speech is not something an amendment can create or remove.
we already have laws against inciting violence, so there’s that.
but when uncle sam says you are no longer allowed to say “fuck israel and zionism” - remember, you are in the right to to say it.
Stochastic terrorism should be a crime. As it is, only if it’s from the left. The right wing media as well as the current occupant of the executive branch, get away with it regularly.
No, it should not. “My freedom ends where it starts infringing on other peoples rights.” is the basic law of humanity. Any law book should basically follow this line, and mostly actually do.
yes it should be protected but depending on the size of the audience it should have a duty to correct itself if it contains untruths and if it incites any violence the person that said it who’s identity will be attached to it will be arrested
What human right does hate speech infringe upon? No one has, or needs, the right to be unoffended, imo.
Obviously, violent rhetoric is notwithstanding.
So hate speech is non-violent rhetoric to you?
And it is more about “just don’t offend” than about the individual levels of feeling offended.
There are many levels. Someone saying “I hate foreigners” or “I hate fascists” or “I hate capitalists” or “I hate gays” or “I hate cars” or “I hate science denialism” or “I hate AI” or “I hate health insurance CEOs”…that’s all very different than saying “I think all (take your pick)s should be killed.” Don’t you think? All I’m saying is, it’s just about the most subjective thing your trying to codify and it’s just not possible, reasonable, or to society to do so, imo.
“Just don’t offend” is a huge leap from “My freedom ends where someone else’s rights start”. It’s impossible not to offend somebody on this planet just by existing, and some opinions deserve the public shame that offends the people who have them.
Forgive my ignorance, but how can words infringe on the rights of others? As a member of a minority class with several hateful and hurtful slurs (that were on their way to becoming hate speech prior to the second Trump administration) I understand that some folks can get very upset but I don’t think anyone has the right to not be upset. I could be misunderstanding something though.
When someone would scream into your face “Animals like you should be shot!”, wouldn’t it hurt you?
If someone spread lies about you or your family or your business if you had one, wouldn’t it do damage?
If someone spread the word that people of color or other minorities would do this or that (wasn’t it “Haitians eating dogs” or something recently?) and it led to people attacking this minority, wouldn’t it be dangerous?
Remember January 6th, where Trump whipped up the stupid to storm the Capitol? He did not use a cattle prod or stick, he only used words, and see what has happened.
And look closely at what the GOP is doing. They are spreading lies, and repeat them, until they fester and replace the truth in the hearts of the listeners.
And now tell me again that words can do no harm.
I mean I kind of see what you’re saying but it doesn’t really pass the smell test.
Yelling in someone’s face is assault. Spreading harmful lies about specific individuals or businesses is lible. Speech that incites violence is not protected by the first amendment. And the rest: January 6th and the misinformation machine aren’t something that can really be legislated. Lies unfortunately are protected speech unless they incite imminent violence. As much as I would like to hang the raid on the capital on Trump I watched his speech (and Bannon’s) and he only ever implies violence. The crowd whipped themselves up into the violence frenzy we saw that day.
Words absolutely can cause harm in the right conditions, but the ones that do the most damage would definitely not be hate speech. Fox News ran a segment last year where one of the hosts said homeless people should be killed and within a few days there were three separate incidents where armed men walked into homeless encampments and opened fire. I think the death toll was 9 people across the three events. But fox news spreading lies about ivermectin and masking during covid killed potentially tens of thousands. In the case of the homeless what the host did was already illegal, but the lies can’t be legislated.
The more I think about it the less I’m concerned about hate speech. The things that need to be illegal, inciting violence, already are, and the things that aren’t are murky at best and a slippery slope at worst. Especially when you consider who would be determining what is or isn’t hate speech. Right now the powers that be would label your comment as hate speech because it’s critical of the gop.
If you think it is ok to spread hate, you’ll have to live with the consequences. I don’t think the world needs more hate.
And, btw, hate is what brought the GOP to power. Think about it.
I don’t know why you are being downvoted, this is correct: “My freedom ends where the next person’s freedom starts.” We can do everything we want as long it doesn’t harm or encroach (and “harm” and “encroach” are loaded words in this context) on the next person. “Harm” and “encroach” here means you don’t diminish the other persons rights, at all.
My only gripe with this is that the state in its current form cannot be trusted to be an impartial judge of what constitutes hate speech. We see today that many states around the world are using anti hate speech laws to suppress criticism of the state of Israel. Giving the state broad powers to crack down on speech that it deems hateful will inevitably result in the state deciding that all criticism of its actions or the actions of its allies constitutes hate speech.
As an alternative, I prefer that hate speech be met with social consequences rather than criminal ones.
Impartiality is key to any such decision. Not only when one is rightfully criticising the genocide in Gaza.
I voted to raise my taxes to fund my local school. Now my neighbors have to pay more in taxes as well… Did I just harm them?
No, that benefits society as a whole by increasing education for the next generation. Which leads to better lives and more opportunities.
When something benefits the whole, not all individuals will see obvious benefits to themselves. But they still get to benefit from the outcomes, like better jobs more opportunities and such.
Ah, so it would have been harmful to vote against it.
The question is what is less harm? Increased taxes or lack of education?
Perhaps both of them harm (or help) different parties by different amounts. So maybe a system where “My freedom ends where it starts infringing on other peoples rights.” looks like a common sense framework, but when scrutinized reveals that it doesn’t really stand for anything at all.
If it were not, it would just be inviting the government take a massive dump all over it.
Despite the crapshow that is the current US government, you can’t be arrested for standing in front of the Whitehouse shouting your support for whatever idea or group you beleive in (granted you are a Citizen of the USA).
Compare that to something like the UK where people have been charged and thrown in jail for wearing a t shirt or holding a sign, even outside of a protest because the government can just designate whatever it wants to be “hate speech”.
Private spaces like social media are not bound by this which is fine, but social media is so ridiculously controlled and filtered as a result, that you’re better off sticking to a non mainstream platform (like lemmy) where your comments won’t get banned and deleted for stepping out of line.
You have to be a citizen for the constitution to apply?
just so it’s clear - a lot of the constitution, especially the 1st amendment, applies to everyone in the country. citizen or not.
No, its just that the current administration has been going around and depoting visa and greencard holders.
The problem is you hand government and courts the right to decide what is hate speech.
In the UK the government is already trying to classify anti-zionist speech as banned hate speech.
Laws are weapons, your enemies can use them against you.
Imagine living in Queensland rn. Where the phrase “from the river to the sea” is banned…
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2026-03-05/qld-hate-speech-laws-passed-parliament/106420306
Can you think of a useful purpose it serves?
No, hate speech should not be protected, and there’s an obvious reason for that. We already recognize that speech that purposely harms people is not protected, for example going into a theater room and screaming FIRE causing people to panic and stampede and killing someone the person will be charged with involuntary manslaughter. That is not so different from someone going online and saying “gay people should be killed” and causing people to go out and do that, in fact I would even drop the involuntary from the charges against that person, because his intention was clearly to incite someone to do it. I’m not taking away the responsibility from the person who committed the act, but this situation is similar to a how in a group planning a crime even the boss who was in every meeting telling people to commit the crime but did not actually participate in gets charged with. And the same excuses apply “No, I didn’t think that because I told them to go and kill someone they would do it” is not a valid defense for a mafia boss, and it shouldn’t be for any person with public influence.
Yes because otherwise you can shut down speech you dislike by labeling it “hate speech”
Canada restricts hate speech, as does most of Europe.
Yet its the US with the speech suppression issues going on right now.
You shouldn’t base a law on “The current government is okay” simply because the next one might not be.
That implies the bad government will care about following the laws, or won’t change the law or its enforcement
You shouldn’t base a law on “The current government is okay”
The definition of hate speech doesn’t change each time we get a new prime minister.
And that’s why you need a democratic process and not a dictatorship that decides unilaterally what is fine.
On the other hand, if you protect the nazis, you are one of them and you are letting them oppress whoever they want.
Personally, I know what side I prefer.
you want dictatorship of the majority? That just means minority groups (which may be the more moral group, eg anti slavery in the past, women’s rights in the past, lgbt+ rights now, vegans now) will be oppressed instead. To protect minorities you need absolute free speech, not just democracy
I said a democratic process, not a majority vote. To protect minorities you need laws that protect minorities and individual rights, freedom of speech is secondary, and actually often contradicting with the first part of my sentence.
It’s no mystery why the ones throwing “freedom of speech” all day long in all conversations are the nazis. If freedom of speech is king, then hate speech is tolerated. What needs to be of the utmost importance is the respect of individuals, and freedom of speech becomes a consequence of that.
How can minorities exist if they don’t have the freedom to express their minority opinions even if they’re 'hateful" to others? It sounds like only sanctioned minorities would be protected under your system, which makes no sense.
What about hating billionaires, I expect you would think that 'hate speech " is fine?
If individuals are respected, then their minority opinions will be fine as long as they are not breaking the rule of not blocking other’s freedoms.
Billionaires are in many way hostile to society as a whole, and destroy the freedom of most people, by choice. Nothing forces them to do it, they aren’t born that way or whatever else, and they are breaking the rule of respecting other’s freedom; as such hating on billionaires is not hate speech, because they broke the rule first and are doing it willingly and with complete choice over the matter.
But you’re right, there shouldn’t be hate speech against billionaires, because they shouldn’t be allowed to exist.
Isn’t it suspicious you’re the one who said “Fuck them” about Gaza children?
Hate speech laws are fascist. As in, they are laws that differentiate between people. Some are protected but not beholden, while others are beholden but not protected. These laws are already used to protect cultist child abusers from criticism.
always remember that Jews are not Semites but saying anything negative against them is anti-semitism. while Palestinians are Semites but hate speech and hate crimes against them are allowed.
I really wonder how many people in this thread have ever had hate speech directed at themselves.
Theyre also ignoring that the government is ultimately who will decide what hate speech is, not common sense. They could very easily decide “anti christian ideology,” such as lgbtq people existing, is hate speech.
Yes.
They should be encouraged to say whatever they want to say.
What they really want isn’t freedom of speech but freedom from consequence. And that’s something they shouldn’t have.
When is freedom of speech ever not equivalent to freedom of consequences from said speech?
I don’t understand what you’re trying to ask, sorry.
Yes. I don’t trust anyone to draw the line on what does or doesn’t count as hate speech.
Now, calls to violence are little more black-and-white. I can see a ban on that.
Specific well-defined instances of hate speech like “all members of group XYZ deserve to die” should be banned IMO. More ambiguous things should not, otherwise the government can start banning political sentiments that it does not like.
Putin and his friends absolutely deserve to die. I’m not really killing anyone, but I can say that (well, outside of Russia, because freedom of speech doesn’t work there). Freedom of speech allows me to say how exactly I don’t like him and his gang.
Also, from reading about cases where people were jailed for something they have said - if it’s allowed to prosecute people for anything, somebody might try to mess with your words to make you look guilty. For example, the law regarding “rehabilitating nazism” was used to prosecute people who were saying something about USSR working with nazi Germany in the beginning of WW2, or similar. Examples (sorry, too long to type so It’s llm summaries:- A person in Perm was fined 200,000 rubles for sharing an article that mentioned the “joint attack on Poland by the USSR and Germany” in 1939, which the authorities portrayed as “rehabilitating Nazism.”
- A woman in Smolensk was fined for posting a historical photo of her home under Nazi occupation, where a Wehrmacht flag and soldiers appeared in the background.
So if you make a word or a concept “bad”, someone will try to use it maliciously, at some point. It doesn’t help when court is not independent, that opens up a road to charging many people you don’t like on daily basis.
That does not sound like a charitable interpretation of my argument. For example
A woman in Smolensk was fined for posting a historical photo of her home under Nazi occupation, where a Wehrmacht flag and soldiers appeared in the background.
This has nothing to do with well-defined instances of hate speech. Even the Putin example is quite far fetched, though I guess I should have used a more precise example
I mean, if you create any precedent of prosecuting someone over “bad words”, you are fucked long-term
Well, you know, that’s just like uh, your opinion, man
Yep
And also I have to rewatch Lebowski now
