Hate crime? Hate speech? Freedom of Expression? - Your choice.

[Petros Agapetos]

Do you believe in hate crime laws? Do you support some restrictions on the freedom of speech and expression? would you base them on hate?

Hate speech refers to inflammatory statements made directly or indirectly towards a group based on said group's race, skin colour, religion, beliefs, background, mental health, physical ability, social class, sexual preference orientation, gender and so forth that may incite violence or encourage discrimination.

Due to power dynamics in many multicultural societies, most hate speech laws are designed to protect historically persecuted people from groups with power.

Difference from hate crime

In the U.S., hate speech is distinguished from a "hate crime" in that no one is physically hurt by the former and it isn't illegal. A hate crime is a crime of violence against a person or their property motivated by hatred of the victim for reasons of their religious, racial, disabled or sexual status. Hate speech uttered in the commission of a crime may be taken as evidence of the hate-driven motive for it.

[Petros Agapetos]

Hate crime is a crime where the motive is the victim's affiliation (or perceived affiliation) to a particular social group, like race, religion, sexual orientation, disability, ethnicity, nationality, age, gender, gender identity, or political affiliation. These crimes produce the intimidation of other individuals pertaining to the victim's group.

The best understanding (and the more legally specific term that should have been used when writing these laws) is "domestic terrorism" or "bias-motivated crime". By application and description, a hate crime is not a crime that simply involves the hatred of one person over another, but is in fact an attack on an entire group by the single act of violence. It is sending a message of fear to those individuals who are part of that group, that they should "watch themselves," not "cross the line", or "get uppity."

The term is not 100% literal, and "hate crime" specifically does not refer to any crimes that involve any degree of hate. That is dumb and quite pointless – almost every crime would then be a "hate crime," and we'd instead be looking for a term to describe non-hate crimes.

[Petros Agapetos]

National hate crime laws

Most modern "Western" countries have some hate crimes on the books for race, religion, and national origin. Some include age and gender, and a few include sexual orientation and gender identity.

Canada – offence was motivated by bias, prejudice or hate based on race, national or ethnic origin, language, colour, religion, sex, age, mental or physical disability, sexual orientation, or any other similar factor. Canada's laws affect the sentencing. Canada's laws are intentionally open ended to allow for groups which are not listed, to appeal to the judge for consideration of "bias motivation," including (not necessarily successfully) political groups or activist groups.
European Union – specifically addresses hate crimes done over the internet.

France – applies harsher sentence for crimes against actual or perceived ethnicity, nation, race, religion, or sexual orientation.

Finland – applies to race, ethnicity, or national origin; done not (per wikipedia) protect gender, age or sexual orientation. Has specific language to protect protesters of any political, religious or social group from "backlash".


Germany – criminalizes hate speech and applies only to the judicial sentencing after the trial.

Ireland – specifies: race, color, nationality, religion, sexual orientation, ethnic or national origins, or membership of the Traveller community, an indigenous minority group.

Italy – allows enhanced sentencing for crimes motivated by race, ethnicity, or religion but not gender, gender identity or sexual orientation.

United Kingdom overall – general provisions specifies racial groups and religious groups only. There are no general provisions for sexual orientation, age, or gender. However, laws vary across the UK in smaller government units. Scotland, for example, allows the lawyer and judge to apply the law to anyone who makes a claim that he or she belongs to a targeted "group" of any type. The judge has discretion to decide if that group qualifies for protection (from age and gender, to particular social or sports groups have tried to use this provision).

US Federal – Hate Crime laws originally protected race, religion, and national origin. In 2009, the Matthew Shepard bill added gender, gender identity, and sexual orientation. These are applicable only to federal crimes.

US States – 45 US States have some kind of hate crime laws on the books, but they vary in coverage and how they can be applied (ie are they a crime in and of themselves, or only a part of the sentencing system).

[Petros Agapetos]

Freedom of Speech

Some argue that freedom of speech should not encompass hateful speech about women or various minorities -- sexual, religious or racial. In some countries, a balance is sought between freedom of speech (which people should have) and people's right not to be offended. By contrast, in the U.S. political speech is protected above all other categories of protected speech and therefore no balancing test occurs; the state flatly may not prohibit political views and statements no matter how hateful they may actually be. Moreover, the fact that, say, some Christians regard any critical examination of Christianity or the Bible as hate speech shows that one person's hate speech is another person's political (and merely critical, not hateful) speech.

The First Amendment only applies to the government and the actions it is constrained from; private entities generally may have speech codes or otherwise limit speech. Therefore, only state universities are prohibited from banning hate speech, although private universities also tend to respect freedom of speech as well as academic freedom. An alarming number of U.S. colleges have pulled hate speech codes out of their asses, and few were so egregious that the faculty overturned them before court action took place; one of the most notable instances occurred at the University of Wisconsin–Madison after a student attempted to have a professor sanctioned over explaining Geoffrey Chaucer's use of the word niggardly in an English class. But such schemes have never been held to be constitutional at public universities.

Unfortunately, the percentage of the public who believes there are legal bans on hate speech is depressingly high; the number of college students who also believe it is a cause for some alarm. Of course, statements considered to constitute hate speech actually can be deleterious to the persons it is said about or directed at. But it is not the proper role of the state to play arbiter of what mere ideas a citizen may utter under penalty of criminal conviction and sanction.

[Sarmatian]

It's all bollocks. The laws should be as universal as possible. A criminal act is a criminal act regardless of motives. An offensive speech is an offensive speech regardless of to whom it's being addressed. It should be prosecuted regardless of specific details of victim's social affiliation. When you start singling out some groups and applying protective laws towards them you artificially creating social inequality. That's how we are coming to situation when a white male can't open his mouth without being ostracized while at the same time crowds of blacks openly chanting 'Kill da whitey' and Muslims yell 'Death to infidels' without any consequences.

[Petros Agapetos]

It's all bollocks. The laws should be as universal as possible. A criminal act is a criminal act regardless of motives. An offensive speech is an offensive speech regardless of to whom it's being addressed. It should be prosecuted regardless of specific details of victim's social affiliation. When you start singling out some groups and applying protective laws towards them you artificially creating social inequality. That's how we are coming to situation when a white male can't open his mouth without being ostracized while at the same time crowds of blacks openly chanting 'Kill da whitey' and Muslims yell 'Death to infidels' without any consequences.

But if you support hate speech laws, these laws could also be extended to people who use their religion to justify hatred and violence against innocent people. This includes anti-white Islamists.

[Sarmatian]

But if you support hate speech laws, these laws could also be extended to people who use their religion to justify hatred and violence against innocent people. This includes anti-white Islamists.

Again laws have to be as general as possible. It doesn't matter what leads to violence - a religion, a tribal mentality, a homophobia or what not, so long as there is any violence it's should be illegal. Generating legal procedures for specific cases will not help to prosecute any offenders but will create pretext for variety of exploits and abuses of power.

[Petros Agapetos]

What do you think of hate speech laws? Do you support them? What is somebody engages in bullying, harassment, defamation, slander, libel, lying...should all of these forms of expression be tolerated or would you place certain restrictions on their freedom to express themselves?

[Hadouken]

I think you are very hateful to be honest . you just thumbed me down because of a harmless joke . shame on you

[Petros Agapetos]

I think you are very hateful to be honest . you just thumbed me down because of a harmless joke . shame on you

lol, that is not evidence of hate. hate is a strong term. I can reverse the thumb down, don't worry. besides, I don't even dislike you. I just quoted you and said "you say something once". You seem to be obsessed with my name for someone who doesn't like me.