Again the same word, "nonsense", interesting.. : )
What's your point? Am I not allowed to use the word "nonsense"?
Anyway, no comment from now on as others stated that your free speech exists until someone criticises you.
Not sure I understand what you're trying to say. Do you mean to suggest that I'm a hypocrite who pretends to value free speech but who reverses that stance when criticized? If that's what you claim, then it doesn't fit the facts. After all, I'm engaging in dialogue with you โ not attempting to silence you. I'm critiquing nonsense, not suppressing it.
I don't suppress speech, and I'm not a hypocrite on this topic. For example, a few years ago, a fellow wrote in public that "someone should slit [my] throat like a pig". (He didn't like my forecast about a bubble in the Chinese domain market, as I recall.) Konstantinos Zournas (on whose blog the comment appeared) wanted to remove the post, since it was akin to a death threat; but I asked him to let it remain. People are welcome to say negative things about me. But donโt be surprised if I respond and dispute what is said โ particularly if itโs nonsense,
@cyc.
Everything is fair game for critique:
Hate speech is speech that you hate.
No, that's not a helpful definition. "Hate speech" has a narrower meaning, which is pretty clear. It's not any statement that someone hates. Rather, it is speech that is
hateful toward some group.
Thus, when someone says they want to see me murdered, that is not โhate speechโ even though their sentiment isnโt particularly friendly. Thatโs because Iโm not a
group. The violence is only aimed at me as an individual. So itโs outside the definition.
Another example: I personally hate everything that is said by Trump apologist Kelly Anne Conway, who wriggles and deflects in an incessant sleight-of-hand to distract from the question and spread disinformation. But much as I hate listening to her or to Giuliani or to Lindsay Graham, what they say isnโt โhate speechโ merely because it annoys me. To be โhate speechโ, according to the way this phrase is normally used, it would need to be hateful toward some group.
When Rwandan radio advocates a โfinal warโ to โexterminate the cockroachesโ, that would clearly be hate speech, even if the genocide had been averted, because the purpose of such remarks is to promote hatred of a group:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/3257748.stm
Ditto antisemitic propaganda leading up to the holocaust (and since). Ditto the rhetoric surrounding ethnic cleansing of Bosnian muslims. Or more recently, the hate speech aimed at Rohingya muslims who have fled violence in Myanmar.
Closer to home, if someone justifies Trumpโs โmuslim banโ in ways that denigrate muslims, then that might be simple xenophobia. But if it is more inflammatory, then it might deserve the โhate speechโ label because the intent would be to spread hatred, which has led to arson, assault, and murder in the USA. Or if someone justifies Trumpโs mythical wall in terms of expelling โdirty low-IQ hispanicsโ, then that would be so derogatory that the โhate speechโ label will be applied by many of us. Certainly, when torch-carrying white nationalists march chanting โjews will not replace usโ, the nation needs to debate the topic of โhate speechโ.
There is no perfect agreement about which statements are โhate speechโ. But the general idea is fairly clear. The basic meaning can be shared even by people who disagree about the world. They can debate when to apply the label. And they may question how useful the label really is. Yet both sides in a debate need to accept the meaning of terms in order to communicate.
Suggesting that โhate speechโ is really just any statement that someone dislikes isnโt helpful because it conflates ordinary disagreement, broadly speaking, with something much less common and far more dangerous: bigoted rhetoric that targets some group, implying that members of that group are inferior or evil and that they deserve to be the targets of violence or repression. The phrase โhate speechโ should be a helpful shorthand for that kind of bigoted rhetoric.
I understand why Rob says that, these days, โhate speechโ is overused and diluted to the extent that it means only everyday disagreement. Itโs true that some people on the Left tend to resort to this label to pillory their opponents. Often they round up from ordinary prejudice to full-blown โhate speechโ when condemning someoneโs remarks. Yet there are many people who have old-fashioned ideas about race, homosexuality, women, or foreigners. They donโt need to be excused for making racist or sexist or xenophobic or bigoted remarks. But if their intent isnโt to advocate repression or violence, then the label โhate speechโ is unreasonably extreme.
We can agree on the basic meaning of โhate speechโ. And when people use it inaccurately, we should say so. For the phrase to be useful at all, it canโt be overused.
Recognizing a category of speech as โhate speechโ for purposes of discussion does not necessarily imply making it illegal, though some countries have made it a crime. Personally, I think thatโs a slippery slope. Iโd prefer to see hate speech permitted and publicly condemned. Advocating overt violence can be illegal, and that can be separated from remarks that are otherwise hostile to a group. This is debatable, of course. But it seems to me that society needs to allow criticism of groups. If mere hostility to a group becomes a crime, then that mechanism wonโt only be used for suppressing the bad guys. It will, sooner or later, be twisted to suppress the good guys too.
