That'd be the exact criteria I'd want to change. Change that AND to an OR, or remove imminent from clause 1 and I'd call it a start.
It renders it functionally useless because anyone with two brain cells can loophole their threats, citing that since its not illegal to just generally advocate for genocide that advocating for genocide of a group doesn't construe an imminent threat. We simply don't take direct genocidal hate speech as a threat legally. And it lets the cops just look the other way, with very little recourse.
If and when it comes for advocating for lawless action history shows that all manner of nuance goes out the window. No one pushed the point of lawless violence is going to care two wits about it being illegal to talk about that violence. Also, lawless authoritarians don't need laws to enable their actions.
Change the criteria in either way and the protester goes to jail. You may consider that to be an acceptable loss, but you should think and talk about the ways your proposal can backfire instead of tunneling into the ways in which it can specifically be used to conquer your enemy.
As for statements about people not caring about the law when it comes to lawless violence and authorities not enforcing these laws, those arguments kind of weaken the point that these laws that will definitely require more enforcement will be effective. It's kind of weird to advocate for law as the answer and at the same time say that the law doesn't matter when the chips are down.
It's telling that you don't use Brandenburg to defend it, because the case is an example of what @Meeqe has been talking about - the titular Brandenburg was a Klansman, and was convicted of incitement for inciting violence as such. The legal system was so appalled by this that they gutted the law on incitement in response. Brandenburg is not a good ruling - it is a symbol of how our legal system has protected white supremacy and its related domestic terrorism through history.
Also, I'm pretty sure that we can create a standard that protects protesters while holding domestic terrorists (because that is what the Klan is) legally accountable, so the argument that we either protect both the protestor and the Klansman or we protect neither is not one I find terribly compelling.
We're stepping backwards here. My objective is to make sure both the pros and cons are considered when proposing changes that affect the current legal standard.
I'm not trying to hide anything. The harms of Brandenburg are exceedingly obvious and have been thoroughly discussed. However, the full context of the decision is that it has been reaffirmed multiple times, and not just for KKK members. We should acknowledge its implications in protecting speech other than white supremacy because that is reality. We have to think deeper than "this ruling helped a white supremacist and is therefore bad; white supremacists should never win anything in court."
The modification Meeqe mentioned above is practically unlikely because in all cases employing the Brandenburg test, the modifications would reverse the decision. If there are alternate modifications, they should be proposed so their effects and likelihood can be discussed.
Brandenburg is not bad because it "helped a white supremacist", but because of what it represents - laws that the Supreme Court had no problem upholding when used against groups and people that were viewed negatively by society suddenly became an affront when applied to an enforcer of white supremacy, and thus had to be removed. The legal community was so scandalized by the idea that a Klansman would be held accountable for inciting violence that they responded by restricting incitement so much that it's effectively dead as a law, as it is now easy to get around it. And while you keep talking about the positive aspects, you also give short shrift to the negative ones, which is what @Meeqe was talking about. It's hard to feel safe when people can whip up hate and violence against you, and there's nothing you can do about it legally.
There are plenty of things that can be done legally, as the multiple court cases and rulings presented in this thread can attest. Moreover, the narrative about white supremacy being the guiding force behind the decision does not reflect the actual course of history, as the Hess v. Indiana case did not involve white supremacy at all. The NAACP v. Claiborne Hardware Co ruling also used Brandenburg to protect the speech to protect the right of the NAACP to boycott white businesses after some of the participants made violent statements and violence did occur. The ruling was 8-0. Acknowledge that.
I in turn will acknowledge that people are threatened especially online by trollish harassment campaigns that skirt Brandenburg. Bad groups can organize hate campaigns and protests very likely to involve and cause violence down the line. But they are not immune to prosecution, as evidenced in the daily stormer case. The law isn't useless. It is not a gift given only to white supremacists and other malignant people. Again, history does not reflect this narrative. We must contend with reality and the legal history of the United States before we transplant any current hate speech law into our system. This is not due to our ignorance of the nature of freedom of speech and its harms, but rather due to frequent and thorough investigation at a level likely among the highest of all developed countries.
Marty: The future, it's where you're going? Doc: That's right, twenty five years into the future. I've always dreamed on seeing the future, looking beyond my years, seeing the progress of mankind. I'll also be able to see who wins the next twenty-five world series.
Which ones specifically do you want me to learn about?
That is a list of gish gallop and I can't chase them all down.
It's 33 short paragraphs on nations with hate speech laws on Wikipedia, including brief descriptions of what laws they have and how they work. Not sure I'd classify that as "gish gallop."
It's also pretty meaningless without a lot of larger legal context on a country by country basis. Laws are more than just the words on paper, the jurisprudence and enforcement matter.
I'm highly skeptical that even with generally similar language, that these two laws in actual practice are remotely similar.
Russia
According to Article 282 of the Criminal Code, 'Raising hates or hostility, or equally humiliation of human dignity'[71][72]:
Actions aimed at the incitement of hatred or enmity, as well as the humiliation of a person or group of persons on grounds of sex, race, nationality, language, origin, attitude to religion, as well as affiliation to any social group, committed publicly or with the use of media or information and telecommunication networks, including the network "Internet" shall be punished by ...
Iceland
In Iceland, the hate speech law is not confined to inciting hatred, as one can see from Article 233 a. in the Icelandic Penal Code, but includes public denigration:[35]
Anyone who publicly mocks, defames, denigrates or threatens a person or group of persons by comments or expressions of another nature, for example by means of pictures or symbols, for their nationality, colour, race, religion, sexual orientation or gender identity, or disseminates such materials, shall be fined or imprisoned for up to 2 years.
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MeeqeLord of the pants most fancySomeplace amazingRegistered Userregular
That Icelandic law looks pretty solid, and it would keep your example song legal, as police aren't a protected class mentioned there. Thank you for the excellent example for a country threading that needle
Which ones specifically do you want me to learn about?
That is a list of gish gallop and I can't chase them all down.
It's 33 short paragraphs on nations with hate speech laws on Wikipedia, including brief descriptions of what laws they have and how they work. Not sure I'd classify that as "gish gallop."
Right, its 33 different hate speech laws. There is no way to talk about 33 different laws as a whole because they all have different problems. So which problems are your favorite to have?
Here lets start with a question. Do you think its worth protecting the right to criticize religions and religious institutions? Because if so, there a quite a few of those I can cross of the list as untenable.
That Icelandic law looks pretty solid, and it would keep your example song legal, as police aren't a protected class mentioned there. Thank you for the excellent example for a country threading that needle
I am super not down with making it illegal to mock religion.
While racing light mechs, your Urbanmech comes in second place, but only because it ran out of ammo.
That Icelandic law looks pretty solid, and it would keep your example song legal, as police aren't a protected class mentioned there. Thank you for the excellent example for a country threading that needle
I am super not down with making it illegal to mock religion.
Religion is particularly annoying when it comes to defending people's rights. It feels wrong to make being fundamentally wrong about how the universe functions into a protected class, but if you don't do it then some people will inevitably be oppressed by other people who are fundamentally wrong about how the universe functions in a slightly different way.
That Icelandic law looks pretty solid, and it would keep your example song legal, as police aren't a protected class mentioned there. Thank you for the excellent example for a country threading that needle
Except you you were talking about changing what it means for something to be considered a threat. Say the Icelandic law is enacted now in the US. "X will not replace us" or "Burn in hell" are still not threats.
But to address the iceland law directly.
Nas - American Way
Condoleeza Rice, I don't really get this chick
Tell her if she ever really cared about poor schools
About poor children, then she gotta prove that she
Ain't just another coon Uncle Tom fool
Like these MC's, gotta give 'em the rules
Lie to the youth, Uncle Tom you confused
Might as well give the Hip-Hop community a noose
Need a truce with the gangs and some food for the hungry
On Kerry nuts, he look at you like a monkey
You MC's on that old slavery path
The Bushs'll look at yo' ass and laugh
That is 100% a racial disparagement of Condoleeza Rice. Which actually brings me to a follow up point I'd like to see discussion on. There is a sort of societal rule most people follow, especially in comedy, that essentially it is okay to make the joke if its about your own race(or white people). The sort of "in the family" rule. That doesn't really work as a legal principle.
We just recently had a SCOTUS case over this, With an Asian American band call The Nips being denied trademark status on their name as it is a slur, with the judgement being the ban on trademarking slurs struck down.
Here lets start with a question. Do you think its worth protecting the right to criticize religions and religious institutions? Because if so, there a quite a few of those I can cross of the list as untenable.
Here lets start with a question. Do you think its worth protecting the right to criticize religions and religious institutions? Because if so, there a quite a few of those I can cross of the list as untenable.
Religion seems iffy until, say, a major world leader starts saying that Muslim elected official should "go back to where she's from" then it dawns on you that the kind of dangerous bigots that these laws are targeting hate people with other religions too.
Should it be OK to criticize anti-vaxx religious people?
Should it be OK to criticize anti-gay religious people?
Should it be OK to take umbridge with a religious practice if say, it includes killing an animal and you are an animal rights activist?
Yes. Do you think that Sam Harris' behavior, most notably his anti-Muslim bigotry which he tries to put a thin veneer of "science!" over as justification, is okay?
Should it be OK to criticize anti-vaxx religious people?
Should it be OK to criticize anti-gay religious people?
Should it be OK to take umbridge with a religious practice if say, it includes killing an animal and you are an animal rights activist?
Yes. Do you think that Sam Harris' behavior, most notably his anti-Muslim bigotry which he tries to put a thin veneer of "science!" over as justification, is okay?
Should it be OK to criticize anti-vaxx religious people?
Should it be OK to criticize anti-gay religious people?
Should it be OK to take umbridge with a religious practice if say, it includes killing an animal and you are an animal rights activist?
Yes. Do you think that Sam Harris' behavior, most notably his anti-Muslim bigotry which he tries to put a thin veneer of "science!" over as justification, is okay?
I don't know who that is and I don't really care.
Then you're not arguing in good faith. If you want your questions to be taken seriously, then perhaps you should reciprocate. So, allow me to rephrase: is it acceptable for bigots to use discourse as a shield to push their bigotry against a religion?
Should it be OK to criticize anti-vaxx religious people?
Should it be OK to criticize anti-gay religious people?
Should it be OK to take umbridge with a religious practice if say, it includes killing an animal and you are an animal rights activist?
Yes. Do you think that Sam Harris' behavior, most notably his anti-Muslim bigotry which he tries to put a thin veneer of "science!" over as justification, is okay?
I don't know who that is and I don't really care.
Then you're not arguing in good faith. If you want your questions to be taken seriously, then perhaps you should reciprocate. So, allow me to rephrase: is it acceptable for bigots to use discourse as a shield to push their bigotry against a religion?
Here lets start with a question. Do you think its worth protecting the right to criticize religions and religious institutions? Because if so, there a quite a few of those I can cross of the list as untenable.
Edit: My point being that there's a lot of people who try to shield their bigotry in the guise of "discourse", and they get away with that too often.
So that guy took a quote from Harris that was said in 2006, when I don't think anyone here would have dared to believe Trump or white supremacy would be a significant problem in 2018, as a "hey gotchya, you're a bigot".
Criticism of Islamic tenants, say the death penalty for apostasy, is not bigotry.
Should it be OK to criticize anti-vaxx religious people?
Should it be OK to criticize anti-gay religious people?
Should it be OK to take umbridge with a religious practice if say, it includes killing an animal and you are an animal rights activist?
Yes. Do you think that Sam Harris' behavior, most notably his anti-Muslim bigotry which he tries to put a thin veneer of "science!" over as justification, is okay?
I don't know who that is and I don't really care.
Then you're not arguing in good faith. If you want your questions to be taken seriously, then perhaps you should reciprocate. So, allow me to rephrase: is it acceptable for bigots to use discourse as a shield to push their bigotry against a religion?
Yes, asking juries to identify bad faith actors by divining people's hidden true intentions is just asking for massive bias in enforcement.
While racing light mechs, your Urbanmech comes in second place, but only because it ran out of ammo.
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MeeqeLord of the pants most fancySomeplace amazingRegistered Userregular
Here lets start with a question. Do you think its worth protecting the right to criticize religions and religious institutions? Because if so, there a quite a few of those I can cross of the list as untenable.
Edit: My point being that there's a lot of people who try to shield their bigotry in the guise of "discourse", and they get away with that too often.
So that guy took a quote from Harris that was said in 2006, when I don't think anyone here would have dared to believe Trump or white supremacy would be a significant problem in 2018, as a "hey gotchya, you're a bigot".
Criticism of Islamic tenants, say the death penalty for apostasy, is not bigotry.
Actually, if you read the piece, it's addressing an interview of Harris by Kara Swisher of Re/code from earlier this year where he literally says that white supremacy isn't a real problem:
[White supremacy] is a fringe phenomenon in the United States. We’re not talking about 30 million white supremacists and we’re not talking about 30 million people who are likely to become white supremacists. Or certainly not violent, militia-joining white supremacists. But it doesn’t take a lot of people to create a lot of havoc.
And also claims that the Christchurch attack wasn't about religion, unlike the attack in Sri Lanka:
The difference I would draw between Christchurch, a white supremacist atrocity, and what just happened in Sri Lanka or any jihadist attack you could name, the difference there is that white supremacy is an ideology, I’ll grant you. It doesn’t link up with so many good things in a person’s life that it is attracting psychologically normal non-beleaguered people into its fold. It may become that on some level.
It doesn’t have all the elements of a true religion. I mean, there are ways in which it’s entangled with certain forms of Christianity. Again, there’s not a death cult of martyrdom forming there. It’s conceivable that one could form there. I’m not ruling out the white supremacists for causing a lot of havoc in the world. But in reality, white supremacy, and certainly murderous white supremacy, is the fringe of the fringe in our society and any society. And if you’re gonna link it up with Christianity, it is the fringe of the fringe of Christianity. If you’re gonna debate a fundamentalist Christian, as I occasionally do, if I were to say, “Yeah, but what about white supremacy and all the …” He’s not gonna know what you’re … It’s not part of their doctrine in a meaningful way.
So no, this is not about some comment that Harris made over a decade ago - its about what he is saying today, and how he tries to dress himself up as an expert while having no real training in religious studies (and it shows.)
Here lets start with a question. Do you think its worth protecting the right to criticize religions and religious institutions? Because if so, there a quite a few of those I can cross of the list as untenable.
Edit: My point being that there's a lot of people who try to shield their bigotry in the guise of "discourse", and they get away with that too often.
So that guy took a quote from Harris that was said in 2006, when I don't think anyone here would have dared to believe Trump or white supremacy would be a significant problem in 2018, as a "hey gotchya, you're a bigot".
Criticism of Islamic tenants, say the death penalty for apostasy, is not bigotry.
That'd be a defense of Sam Harris if not for the fact that he's continued to persist with this bullshit up to right now. Bari Weiss named Harris as part of the "intellectual Dark Web" alongside folks like Ben Shapiro, Jordan Peterson, and Stefan Molyneux.
I used to subscribe to a number skeptical publications before they all started sliding into the very same rhetorical pitfalls they were so critical of fundamentalist Christians of utilizing. Sam Harris is no different than all the "skeptic" YouTubers coming up with "rational" reasons to justify all the bigotry in the alt-right movement, except that he was a bigger name in the skeptic community to begin with.
"X will not replace us" or "Burn in hell" are still not threats.
Hard disagree. If you can't see that as a threat then I don't know how to go further in this debate.
I think that like we were discussing before you have to examine the context. It's basically pointless/impossible to take a fixed approach to language. I'm sure for many people "X will not replace us" is not intended as a threat. They don't wish for Jewish people to be exterminated or whatever. For many people that is what they want, but I'm just saying it's not going to be universal.
So you have to look at the context of how it is being spoken to decide if it's a threat. If you are, for example, blockading a jewish worker from entering a building or burning a star of david while you chant it, then it would be considered a threat, versus having it come-up in conversation or an explicitly non-violent protest.
As for burn in hell, I don't think you want to try and legislate emotional outbursts. You might as well say every derogatory word or phrase is a threat. "Fuck off," "fuck you," "you're an asshole," etc. But if you are saying something like that while holding say, a gun, whilst standing on the street outside someone's house, or in some other context as to convey an intent to cause harm or damage then I think it can be considered as additional evidence.
Should it be OK to criticize anti-vaxx religious people?
Should it be OK to criticize anti-gay religious people?
Should it be OK to take umbridge with a religious practice if say, it includes killing an animal and you are an animal rights activist?
Yes. Do you think that Sam Harris' behavior, most notably his anti-Muslim bigotry which he tries to put a thin veneer of "science!" over as justification, is okay?
I don't know who that is and I don't really care.
Then you're not arguing in good faith. If you want your questions to be taken seriously, then perhaps you should reciprocate. So, allow me to rephrase: is it acceptable for bigots to use discourse as a shield to push their bigotry against a religion?
Yes, asking juries to identify bad faith actors by divining people's hidden true intentions is just asking for massive bias in enforcement.
I'm not sure it's more biased that it is currently though. I mean all speech laws, I think, have intent as part of what needs to be proven. Fraud, defamation, intimidation, threats, etc. In all those cases the defendant can claim that they did not intend to do them even if that was the final outcome. Even in non speech cases like assault and murder, there is still a component of the perpetrators intent that decides how bad the crime was.
I don't think there is anyway to have reasonable laws period (not just in the case of hate speech), without asking juries to judge intent.
Jebus314 on
"The world is a mess, and I just need to rule it" - Dr Horrible
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WhiteZinfandelYour insidesLet me show you themRegistered Userregular
"X will not replace us" or "Burn in hell" are still not threats.
Hard disagree. If you can't see that as a threat then I don't know how to go further in this debate.
The former there is threatening in a "not technically a threat" way, but are you seriously saying that you see "burn in hell" as a threat? :eh:
How about saying that X group will burn in hell? That's not very different from "burn in hell" and it's literally a foundational concept of the religion that most of the U.S. holds.
Here lets start with a question. Do you think its worth protecting the right to criticize religions and religious institutions? Because if so, there a quite a few of those I can cross of the list as untenable.
Edit: My point being that there's a lot of people who try to shield their bigotry in the guise of "discourse", and they get away with that too often.
I'm not sure what you're trying to highlight with the Sam Harris example. Are you saying it should be illegal to claim that white supremacy isn't really a problem in the US?
I know that you clearly disagree with that statement, but are you saying it should be illegal to state it? Because that seems like it is going to be very difficult to legislate. I mean, it would be difficult to prove definitively, let alone prove that it is true and that the speaker knew about it and that they intentionally lied about it and that their goal in doing so was to further some racist cause.
Certainly we can easily speculate that that is what's happening, but I just don't see any easy way to connect those dots in a rigorous, beyond a reasonable doubt, fashion. Even if that was something that we wanted to do.
"The world is a mess, and I just need to rule it" - Dr Horrible
Here lets start with a question. Do you think its worth protecting the right to criticize religions and religious institutions? Because if so, there a quite a few of those I can cross of the list as untenable.
Edit: My point being that there's a lot of people who try to shield their bigotry in the guise of "discourse", and they get away with that too often.
I'm not sure what you're trying to highlight with the Sam Harris example. Are you saying it should be illegal to claim that white supremacy isn't really a problem in the US?
I know that you clearly disagree with that statement, but are you saying it should be illegal to state it? Because that seems like it is going to be very difficult to legislate. I mean, it would be difficult to prove definitively, let alone prove that it is true and that the speaker knew about it and that they intentionally lied about it and that their goal in doing so was to further some racist cause.
Certainly we can easily speculate that that is what's happening, but I just don't see any easy way to connect those dots in a rigorous, beyond a reasonable doubt, fashion. Even if that was something that we wanted to do.
What I was highlighting is that Harris is a bigot who tries to cover up his bigotry (not very well, mind you) with a veneer of "academic inquiry". He's particularly notorious for his anti-Muslim bigotry in particular. My argument is that when people are saying "we need to be able to criticize religion", are they talking about actual criticism, or are they talking about allowing someone like Harris cover?
I don't think it's incorrect to say white supremacy is a fringe group in the US, nor is it to say it's a fringe group of Christianity as a whole. But you, Angel, seem to think that saying as such is proof of bigotry, that therefore their opinion doesn't matter, and that such bigotry should be punishable by law via Hate Speech laws.
"X will not replace us" or "Burn in hell" are still not threats.
Hard disagree. If you can't see that as a threat then I don't know how to go further in this debate.
Under US law they aren't, which was the point under discussion.
You said Iceland's law would not ban something like RTJ, because police aren't listed in in(in the US they 100% would be, but besides the point), but that's only part of the equation.
If you want to stop "X will not replace us", you still also need to your changes of making something being a threat include broad and nonspecific, because under US law it isn't one. So the adopted Icelandic law wouldn't stop people from marching around chanting it.
And if it is a threat, What is it a threat of?
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JuliusCaptain of Serenityon my shipRegistered Userregular
That'd be the exact criteria I'd want to change. Change that AND to an OR, or remove imminent from clause 1 and I'd call it a start.
It renders it functionally useless because anyone with two brain cells can loophole their threats, citing that since its not illegal to just generally advocate for genocide that advocating for genocide of a group doesn't construe an imminent threat. We simply don't take direct genocidal hate speech as a threat legally. And it lets the cops just look the other way, with very little recourse.
If and when it comes for advocating for lawless action history shows that all manner of nuance goes out the window. No one pushed the point of lawless violence is going to care two wits about it being illegal to talk about that violence. Also, lawless authoritarians don't need laws to enable their actions.
Change the criteria in either way and the protester goes to jail. You may consider that to be an acceptable loss, but you should think and talk about the ways your proposal can backfire instead of tunneling into the ways in which it can specifically be used to conquer your enemy.
As for statements about people not caring about the law when it comes to lawless violence and authorities not enforcing these laws, those arguments kind of weaken the point that these laws that will definitely require more enforcement will be effective. It's kind of weird to advocate for law as the answer and at the same time say that the law doesn't matter when the chips are down.
Also, I'm pretty sure that we can create a standard that protects protesters while holding domestic terrorists (because that is what the Klan is) legally accountable, so the argument that we either protect both the protestor and the Klansman or we protect neither is not one I find terribly compelling.
Well, if you're pretty sure then go ahead and walk us through how.
Well, for one, we start acknowledging domestic terrorists like the Klan for what they are and respond accordingly - a large part of the problem is that as a society we are loathe to do that. But beyond that, we're coming back to one argument that's been running through this thread - that hate speech is the "price" of free speech, and thus you can't deal with the former without negatively impacting the latter. The thing is, this argument is never made outright (I would imagine because people know how it sounds), but is always couched in language that makes hate speech sound less harmful than it is (as well as presenting it as a matter of viewpoint.)
It seems highly problematic to make being on a list of domestic terrorist organizations have any influence on the legality of one's speech. Besides the obvious equality issue, such a list is going to be highly political and the bias likely in favour of the side you don't want. It's 100% going to result in Black Lives Matter activists being thrown in jail and Klansmen walking free.
But more importantly: It is unnecessary. You don't want to change the criteria for the Brandenburg test, which seem perfectly fair, you want to make an exception. The Brandenburg ruling wasn't about hate speech, it was about advocacy of violence. The court held that the government isn't allowed to prohibit speech containing mere advocacy of a doctrine even if it is violent or criminal. i.e. it is every American's God-given right to advocate for overthrowing the government. The changes proposed by Meeqe wouldn't just change the test, they would directly reverse the decision. It would be a serious restriction on free speech.
What you want is that the government isn't allowed to prohibit such speech except for when it is directed at people based on their skin colour, nationality, sex, etc. Because that is what hate speech laws are. Those laws in the link @Phillishere provided don't outlaw any advocacy of violence and then create exceptions for when it is ok. That's dumb, they just outlaw hate speech.
The big problem here is that the exception most likely requires a constitutional amendment. Even if a future court reverses Brandenburg, they will not be able to differentiate hate speech.
Here lets start with a question. Do you think its worth protecting the right to criticize religions and religious institutions? Because if so, there a quite a few of those I can cross of the list as untenable.
Edit: My point being that there's a lot of people who try to shield their bigotry in the guise of "discourse", and they get away with that too often.
So that guy took a quote from Harris that was said in 2006, when I don't think anyone here would have dared to believe Trump or white supremacy would be a significant problem in 2018, as a "hey gotchya, you're a bigot".
Criticism of Islamic tenants, say the death penalty for apostasy, is not bigotry.
That'd be a defense of Sam Harris if not for the fact that he's continued to persist with this bullshit up to right now. Bari Weiss named Harris as part of the "intellectual Dark Web" alongside folks like Ben Shapiro, Jordan Peterson, and Stefan Molyneux.
I used to subscribe to a number skeptical publications before they all started sliding into the very same rhetorical pitfalls they were so critical of fundamentalist Christians of utilizing. Sam Harris is no different than all the "skeptic" YouTubers coming up with "rational" reasons to justify all the bigotry in the alt-right movement, except that he was a bigger name in the skeptic community to begin with.
So I can't read it, because it's behind a paywall, but still, that's the fucking smoking gun here? A fucking RETWEET of an article from the Wall Street Journal, one of the 2-3 largest newspapers in the US? Look at what a biggot he is, he reads something other than Daily Kos and NPR. Burn Him!*
e:Not a threat, unless we use @Meeqe rules, in which case see you all after my nickle.
Here lets start with a question. Do you think its worth protecting the right to criticize religions and religious institutions? Because if so, there a quite a few of those I can cross of the list as untenable.
Edit: My point being that there's a lot of people who try to shield their bigotry in the guise of "discourse", and they get away with that too often.
I'm not sure what you're trying to highlight with the Sam Harris example. Are you saying it should be illegal to claim that white supremacy isn't really a problem in the US?
I know that you clearly disagree with that statement, but are you saying it should be illegal to state it? Because that seems like it is going to be very difficult to legislate. I mean, it would be difficult to prove definitively, let alone prove that it is true and that the speaker knew about it and that they intentionally lied about it and that their goal in doing so was to further some racist cause.
Certainly we can easily speculate that that is what's happening, but I just don't see any easy way to connect those dots in a rigorous, beyond a reasonable doubt, fashion. Even if that was something that we wanted to do.
What I was highlighting is that Harris is a bigot who tries to cover up his bigotry (not very well, mind you) with a veneer of "academic inquiry". He's particularly notorious for his anti-Muslim bigotry in particular. My argument is that when people are saying "we need to be able to criticize religion", are they talking about actual criticism, or are they talking about allowing someone like Harris cover?
Why does it matter? Do you just want to insinuate that everyone who disagrees with you is a secret racist who just wants to provide cover for racists or is there some substance to your point? Are the courts supposed to somehow distinguish between actual criticism and criticism used as cover and only convict the latter?
While racing light mechs, your Urbanmech comes in second place, but only because it ran out of ammo.
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JuliusCaptain of Serenityon my shipRegistered Userregular
Brandenburg is not bad because it "helped a white supremacist", but because of what it represents - laws that the Supreme Court had no problem upholding when used against groups and people that were viewed negatively by society suddenly became an affront when applied to an enforcer of white supremacy, and thus had to be removed. The legal community was so scandalized by the idea that a Klansman would be held accountable for inciting violence that they responded by restricting incitement so much that it's effectively dead as a law, as it is now easy to get around it. And while you keep talking about the positive aspects, you also give short shrift to the negative ones, which is what Meeqe was talking about. It's hard to feel safe when people can whip up hate and violence against you, and there's nothing you can do about it legally.
This is just ridiculous and clearly false based on the workings of the US legal system alone. Brandenburg appealed to the Supreme Court, meaning that he was put on trial and convicted and that decision upheld until that point. So at the very least, the part of the legal community represented by the court of Hamilton County, the First District of Ohio and the Supreme Court of Ohio was perfectly ok with holding a Klansman accountable. It seems likely that plenty more people from the larger legal community were ok with it. It was 1969 after all. I don't think the opinion of 9 guys is enough evidence to say the legal community was scandalized.
Instead of just talking about what Brandenburg represents, let's talk about what the case was actually about. The statute under which Brandenburg was convicted was the Ohio Crime Syndicalism statute, which banned "advocat[ing]...the duty, necessity, or propriety of crime, sabotage, violence, or unlawful methods of terrorism as a means of accomplishing industrial or political reform". This statute was put in place to combat communism in 1919. In fact, all the rulings overturned by the decision were about the prosecution of communists. As you say, a group viewed negatively by society so nobody cared. But Brandenburg was convicted under the statute for a good reason, he said the courts/president/congress were holding the white race down and talked about marching on Washington. He was advocating violence against the state. Even if the legal community was so pro-KKK that they were willing to let communists go (in the 60s), they surely wouldn't miss that this guy was advocating violence against the state including the courts. Your characterization of the community seems dubious given this.
Anyway, I could easily say you're giving short shrift to the positive aspects here. The prosecution of communists was fucking unjust, as were the censorious actions of the government. It is good that communists, or civil rights activists, are free to advocate freely for reform. It is good that Killer Mike can drop a sick verse about killing cops without needing to fear jail. Yes it is bad that people can whip up hate against you for your skin or sexual orientation, but then again I doubt that without this decision the people we are concerned about would feel any safer.
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JuliusCaptain of Serenityon my shipRegistered Userregular
like, the obvious defense against that Ohio law is saying you were just advocating for the legal genocide of a group.
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WhiteZinfandelYour insidesLet me show you themRegistered Userregular
When Mark Meechan taught his girlfriend's dog to raise its right paw in response to "sieg heil" in an explicitly stated insincere fashion then it's probably not harmful in any measurable way and, if it is, is definitely not on the same level. Yet he fell afoul of speech laws and was sentenced to pay a fine of 800 euros for it.
You brought this up a few times, so I looked up the matter, wanting to better understand what happened. Wikipedia provides a good synopsis, so let's start there. First off, while his teaching the dog to do the Roman salute to "sieg Heil" is what is always brought up, it turns out that the video had more to it than that:
In April 2016, Meechan posted a video of his girlfriend's pet pug Buddha titled "M8 Yer Dugs A Nazi". At the start of the video, he says: "My girlfriend is always ranting and raving about how cute and adorable her wee dog is so I thought I would turn him into the least cute thing I could think of, which is a Nazi". In the video, the dog is seen raising his right paw in the manner of a Nazi salute (when prompted by the command "Sieg Heil"), watching a speech by Adolf Hitler and responding immediately when asked if he wanted to "gas the Jews". It ends with images of Adolf Hitler and Buddha depicted with a toothbrush moustache similar to the one Hitler sported.
So, here's the thing - he didn't just teach the dog the salute, but also taught the dog to respond positively to an antisemitic command, as well as then trying to rope Buddhism into the "joke", as it were. I would imagine that it was those latter two parts that prompted the prosecution under the Communications Act of 2003, specifically the malicious communications statute. The revised guidelines for prosecution in the law are worth noting:
Revisions to the interim guidelines were issued on 20 June 2013 following a public consultation. The revisions specified that prosecutors should consider:
*whether messages were aggravated by references to race, religion or other minorities, and whether they breached existing rules to counter harassment or stalking; and
*the age and maturity of any wrongdoer should be taken into account and given great weight.
The revisions also clarified that criminal prosecutions were "unlikely":
*when the author of the message had "expressed genuine remorse";
*when "swift and effective action ... to remove the communication" was taken; or
*when messages were not intended for a wide audience.
This is worth noting because Meechan's initial defense was that the video was intended as a joke for his girlfriend - a claim the court rejected given he posted the video on a public YouTube channel that she did not subscribe to. Basically, he managed, through his own conduct, to hit all of the points above.
Afterwards, he became a right wing cause celebre:
Meechan was scrutinised for embracing support from right-wing figures Alex Jones and Tommy Robinson, to which he replied: "Imagine totally abandoning protecting human rights, just because someone you don't like is defending them too. Astounding". On 6 May 2018, Meechan spoke at the "Day for Freedom" rally, which was organized by Robinson, and was described as far-right by news media and observers.
United Kingdom Independence Party Member of the European Parliament for Scotland David Coburn released a two-page statement condemning the ruling as "an embarrassment". Philip Davies, Conservative MP for Shipley, brought up Meechan's case in the House of Commons and said: "Can we have a debate about freedom of speech in this country – something this country has long held dear and is in danger of throwing away needlessly?"
Ultimately, he wound up throwing his lot in with UKIP:
On 16 June 2018, Meechan announced that he had joined UKIP along with fellow YouTubers Carl Benjamin and Paul Joseph Watson in what Watson describes as an attempted "soft coup".
So, a summary - a YouTuber with right wing leanings creates a video of "turning his girlfriend's dog into a Nazi" containing antisemitic and antiBuddhist content, and is prosecuted under British hate speech laws. Afterwards, he winds up supported by a number of known alt-right figures, and ultimately himself joins UKIP - a political party built on racial grievance. Furthermore, his prosecution (which, let's note, he provided little in the way of a defense for) resulted in him having to pay an £800 fine, with no jail time. This does not strike me as a miscarriage of justice, but instead reminds me of what happened around weev in the US - tech community rallied around a misogynistic bully who liked to say racist things "ironically", and wound up being surprised when it turned out the racism wasn't ironic, with weev becoming the site administrator for...the Daily Stormer, the very website whose owner was just held liable for using it to encourage his followers to harass and threaten.
By the way, nobody has ever come up to me and told me that Meechan's video delegitimized and harmed them. So feck off with that personal accusation of "creating a deception for myself" claptrap.
So, we just had one of our formers explain - in detail - how videos that normalize hate create an environment where abuse and violence towards them is then normalized. And there have been many other minority voices out there explaining the same thing. The problem is not that nobody has come up to you and told you, because they have. The problem is that you're not listening.
Yeah, I read the wikipedia article too. I'm aware that there's the whole "gas the Jews" thing on top of the nazi salute. And by the way, Meechan didn't "rope Buddhism into the 'joke'." The dog's name (given by Meechan's girlfriend) is Buddha. You would know that if you'd done your research and actually watched the video. Anyway, none of what you've said really changes my assessment. Meechan made an offensive video as a joke (and if you doubt that it was a joke then, again, you need to actually watch it), was convicted of violating speech laws, and is ordered to pay 800 euros. That's unjust. It's arguably legal (currently the case is in some sort of appeals process from what I can tell) but also unjust. No post-hoc rationalization based on his subsequent actions changes that.
Also, can you quote or provide a link to the post where our forumer explains in detail how the Mark Meechan video, specifically (and this is the standard I previously set, low as it was), "delegitimized and harmed them?" Clearly I'm just so bad at listening that I missed that one.
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There are plenty of things that can be done legally, as the multiple court cases and rulings presented in this thread can attest. Moreover, the narrative about white supremacy being the guiding force behind the decision does not reflect the actual course of history, as the Hess v. Indiana case did not involve white supremacy at all. The NAACP v. Claiborne Hardware Co ruling also used Brandenburg to protect the speech to protect the right of the NAACP to boycott white businesses after some of the participants made violent statements and violence did occur. The ruling was 8-0. Acknowledge that.
I in turn will acknowledge that people are threatened especially online by trollish harassment campaigns that skirt Brandenburg. Bad groups can organize hate campaigns and protests very likely to involve and cause violence down the line. But they are not immune to prosecution, as evidenced in the daily stormer case. The law isn't useless. It is not a gift given only to white supremacists and other malignant people. Again, history does not reflect this narrative. We must contend with reality and the legal history of the United States before we transplant any current hate speech law into our system. This is not due to our ignorance of the nature of freedom of speech and its harms, but rather due to frequent and thorough investigation at a level likely among the highest of all developed countries.
Doc: That's right, twenty five years into the future. I've always dreamed on seeing the future, looking beyond my years, seeing the progress of mankind. I'll also be able to see who wins the next twenty-five world series.
It's also pretty meaningless without a lot of larger legal context on a country by country basis. Laws are more than just the words on paper, the jurisprudence and enforcement matter.
I'm highly skeptical that even with generally similar language, that these two laws in actual practice are remotely similar.
Russia
According to Article 282 of the Criminal Code, 'Raising hates or hostility, or equally humiliation of human dignity'[71][72]:
Actions aimed at the incitement of hatred or enmity, as well as the humiliation of a person or group of persons on grounds of sex, race, nationality, language, origin, attitude to religion, as well as affiliation to any social group, committed publicly or with the use of media or information and telecommunication networks, including the network "Internet" shall be punished by ...
Iceland
In Iceland, the hate speech law is not confined to inciting hatred, as one can see from Article 233 a. in the Icelandic Penal Code, but includes public denigration:[35]
Anyone who publicly mocks, defames, denigrates or threatens a person or group of persons by comments or expressions of another nature, for example by means of pictures or symbols, for their nationality, colour, race, religion, sexual orientation or gender identity, or disseminates such materials, shall be fined or imprisoned for up to 2 years.
Right, its 33 different hate speech laws. There is no way to talk about 33 different laws as a whole because they all have different problems. So which problems are your favorite to have?
Here lets start with a question. Do you think its worth protecting the right to criticize religions and religious institutions? Because if so, there a quite a few of those I can cross of the list as untenable.
I am super not down with making it illegal to mock religion.
Religion is particularly annoying when it comes to defending people's rights. It feels wrong to make being fundamentally wrong about how the universe functions into a protected class, but if you don't do it then some people will inevitably be oppressed by other people who are fundamentally wrong about how the universe functions in a slightly different way.
Except you you were talking about changing what it means for something to be considered a threat. Say the Icelandic law is enacted now in the US. "X will not replace us" or "Burn in hell" are still not threats.
But to address the iceland law directly.
Nas - American Way
That is 100% a racial disparagement of Condoleeza Rice. Which actually brings me to a follow up point I'd like to see discussion on. There is a sort of societal rule most people follow, especially in comedy, that essentially it is okay to make the joke if its about your own race(or white people). The sort of "in the family" rule. That doesn't really work as a legal principle.
We just recently had a SCOTUS case over this, With an Asian American band call The Nips being denied trademark status on their name as it is a slur, with the judgement being the ban on trademarking slurs struck down.
So, are we talking actual criticism, or pretending that Sam Harris isn't a bigot who is completely out of his depth when talking about religion?
Edit: My point being that there's a lot of people who try to shield their bigotry in the guise of "discourse", and they get away with that too often.
Religion seems iffy until, say, a major world leader starts saying that Muslim elected official should "go back to where she's from" then it dawns on you that the kind of dangerous bigots that these laws are targeting hate people with other religions too.
Should it be OK to criticize anti-gay religious people?
Should it be OK to take umbridge with a religious practice if say, it includes killing an animal and you are an animal rights activist?
Do any of the nations that have hate crimes laws on the books have problems with these kinds of prosecutions?
Yes. Do you think that Sam Harris' behavior, most notably his anti-Muslim bigotry which he tries to put a thin veneer of "science!" over as justification, is okay?
Imagine a cartoon with two Muslim men holding a plaque that says "We demand equality" and the caption "not for gays or women, obviously".
Is that cartoon hate speech?
I don't know who that is and I don't really care.
Not by itself, but I'm sure you are going to add whatever it takes to make it illegal somewhere and feel all clever about your gotcha.
Not really? The thing that made it illegal is it was put in a place where religious people might see it.
Specifically an airport prayer room in the UK.
Then you're not arguing in good faith. If you want your questions to be taken seriously, then perhaps you should reciprocate. So, allow me to rephrase: is it acceptable for bigots to use discourse as a shield to push their bigotry against a religion?
What does acceptable mean?
Do I think its a good thing?
No.
Do I think it should be illegal?
No.
UK and France have both prosecuted for these things.
So that guy took a quote from Harris that was said in 2006, when I don't think anyone here would have dared to believe Trump or white supremacy would be a significant problem in 2018, as a "hey gotchya, you're a bigot".
Criticism of Islamic tenants, say the death penalty for apostasy, is not bigotry.
Yes, asking juries to identify bad faith actors by divining people's hidden true intentions is just asking for massive bias in enforcement.
Hard disagree. If you can't see that as a threat then I don't know how to go further in this debate.
Was a major international incident where a nuclear power was perceived as threatening another due to a mistranslation.
Actually, if you read the piece, it's addressing an interview of Harris by Kara Swisher of Re/code from earlier this year where he literally says that white supremacy isn't a real problem:
And also claims that the Christchurch attack wasn't about religion, unlike the attack in Sri Lanka:
So no, this is not about some comment that Harris made over a decade ago - its about what he is saying today, and how he tries to dress himself up as an expert while having no real training in religious studies (and it shows.)
But I do now know that you really hate him, so that's cool.
That'd be a defense of Sam Harris if not for the fact that he's continued to persist with this bullshit up to right now. Bari Weiss named Harris as part of the "intellectual Dark Web" alongside folks like Ben Shapiro, Jordan Peterson, and Stefan Molyneux.
Look what he retweeted just yesterday:
I used to subscribe to a number skeptical publications before they all started sliding into the very same rhetorical pitfalls they were so critical of fundamentalist Christians of utilizing. Sam Harris is no different than all the "skeptic" YouTubers coming up with "rational" reasons to justify all the bigotry in the alt-right movement, except that he was a bigger name in the skeptic community to begin with.
I think that like we were discussing before you have to examine the context. It's basically pointless/impossible to take a fixed approach to language. I'm sure for many people "X will not replace us" is not intended as a threat. They don't wish for Jewish people to be exterminated or whatever. For many people that is what they want, but I'm just saying it's not going to be universal.
So you have to look at the context of how it is being spoken to decide if it's a threat. If you are, for example, blockading a jewish worker from entering a building or burning a star of david while you chant it, then it would be considered a threat, versus having it come-up in conversation or an explicitly non-violent protest.
As for burn in hell, I don't think you want to try and legislate emotional outbursts. You might as well say every derogatory word or phrase is a threat. "Fuck off," "fuck you," "you're an asshole," etc. But if you are saying something like that while holding say, a gun, whilst standing on the street outside someone's house, or in some other context as to convey an intent to cause harm or damage then I think it can be considered as additional evidence.
I'm not sure it's more biased that it is currently though. I mean all speech laws, I think, have intent as part of what needs to be proven. Fraud, defamation, intimidation, threats, etc. In all those cases the defendant can claim that they did not intend to do them even if that was the final outcome. Even in non speech cases like assault and murder, there is still a component of the perpetrators intent that decides how bad the crime was.
I don't think there is anyway to have reasonable laws period (not just in the case of hate speech), without asking juries to judge intent.
The former there is threatening in a "not technically a threat" way, but are you seriously saying that you see "burn in hell" as a threat? :eh:
How about saying that X group will burn in hell? That's not very different from "burn in hell" and it's literally a foundational concept of the religion that most of the U.S. holds.
I'm not sure what you're trying to highlight with the Sam Harris example. Are you saying it should be illegal to claim that white supremacy isn't really a problem in the US?
I know that you clearly disagree with that statement, but are you saying it should be illegal to state it? Because that seems like it is going to be very difficult to legislate. I mean, it would be difficult to prove definitively, let alone prove that it is true and that the speaker knew about it and that they intentionally lied about it and that their goal in doing so was to further some racist cause.
Certainly we can easily speculate that that is what's happening, but I just don't see any easy way to connect those dots in a rigorous, beyond a reasonable doubt, fashion. Even if that was something that we wanted to do.
What I was highlighting is that Harris is a bigot who tries to cover up his bigotry (not very well, mind you) with a veneer of "academic inquiry". He's particularly notorious for his anti-Muslim bigotry in particular. My argument is that when people are saying "we need to be able to criticize religion", are they talking about actual criticism, or are they talking about allowing someone like Harris cover?
Is that you're argument in a nutshell?
Under US law they aren't, which was the point under discussion.
You said Iceland's law would not ban something like RTJ, because police aren't listed in in(in the US they 100% would be, but besides the point), but that's only part of the equation.
If you want to stop "X will not replace us", you still also need to your changes of making something being a threat include broad and nonspecific, because under US law it isn't one. So the adopted Icelandic law wouldn't stop people from marching around chanting it.
And if it is a threat, What is it a threat of?
It seems highly problematic to make being on a list of domestic terrorist organizations have any influence on the legality of one's speech. Besides the obvious equality issue, such a list is going to be highly political and the bias likely in favour of the side you don't want. It's 100% going to result in Black Lives Matter activists being thrown in jail and Klansmen walking free.
But more importantly: It is unnecessary. You don't want to change the criteria for the Brandenburg test, which seem perfectly fair, you want to make an exception. The Brandenburg ruling wasn't about hate speech, it was about advocacy of violence. The court held that the government isn't allowed to prohibit speech containing mere advocacy of a doctrine even if it is violent or criminal. i.e. it is every American's God-given right to advocate for overthrowing the government. The changes proposed by Meeqe wouldn't just change the test, they would directly reverse the decision. It would be a serious restriction on free speech.
What you want is that the government isn't allowed to prohibit such speech except for when it is directed at people based on their skin colour, nationality, sex, etc. Because that is what hate speech laws are. Those laws in the link @Phillishere provided don't outlaw any advocacy of violence and then create exceptions for when it is ok. That's dumb, they just outlaw hate speech.
The big problem here is that the exception most likely requires a constitutional amendment. Even if a future court reverses Brandenburg, they will not be able to differentiate hate speech.
So I can't read it, because it's behind a paywall, but still, that's the fucking smoking gun here? A fucking RETWEET of an article from the Wall Street Journal, one of the 2-3 largest newspapers in the US? Look at what a biggot he is, he reads something other than Daily Kos and NPR. Burn Him!*
e:Not a threat, unless we use @Meeqe rules, in which case see you all after my nickle.
Why does it matter? Do you just want to insinuate that everyone who disagrees with you is a secret racist who just wants to provide cover for racists or is there some substance to your point? Are the courts supposed to somehow distinguish between actual criticism and criticism used as cover and only convict the latter?
This is just ridiculous and clearly false based on the workings of the US legal system alone. Brandenburg appealed to the Supreme Court, meaning that he was put on trial and convicted and that decision upheld until that point. So at the very least, the part of the legal community represented by the court of Hamilton County, the First District of Ohio and the Supreme Court of Ohio was perfectly ok with holding a Klansman accountable. It seems likely that plenty more people from the larger legal community were ok with it. It was 1969 after all. I don't think the opinion of 9 guys is enough evidence to say the legal community was scandalized.
Instead of just talking about what Brandenburg represents, let's talk about what the case was actually about. The statute under which Brandenburg was convicted was the Ohio Crime Syndicalism statute, which banned "advocat[ing]...the duty, necessity, or propriety of crime, sabotage, violence, or unlawful methods of terrorism as a means of accomplishing industrial or political reform". This statute was put in place to combat communism in 1919. In fact, all the rulings overturned by the decision were about the prosecution of communists. As you say, a group viewed negatively by society so nobody cared. But Brandenburg was convicted under the statute for a good reason, he said the courts/president/congress were holding the white race down and talked about marching on Washington. He was advocating violence against the state. Even if the legal community was so pro-KKK that they were willing to let communists go (in the 60s), they surely wouldn't miss that this guy was advocating violence against the state including the courts. Your characterization of the community seems dubious given this.
Anyway, I could easily say you're giving short shrift to the positive aspects here. The prosecution of communists was fucking unjust, as were the censorious actions of the government. It is good that communists, or civil rights activists, are free to advocate freely for reform. It is good that Killer Mike can drop a sick verse about killing cops without needing to fear jail. Yes it is bad that people can whip up hate against you for your skin or sexual orientation, but then again I doubt that without this decision the people we are concerned about would feel any safer.
Yeah, I read the wikipedia article too. I'm aware that there's the whole "gas the Jews" thing on top of the nazi salute. And by the way, Meechan didn't "rope Buddhism into the 'joke'." The dog's name (given by Meechan's girlfriend) is Buddha. You would know that if you'd done your research and actually watched the video. Anyway, none of what you've said really changes my assessment. Meechan made an offensive video as a joke (and if you doubt that it was a joke then, again, you need to actually watch it), was convicted of violating speech laws, and is ordered to pay 800 euros. That's unjust. It's arguably legal (currently the case is in some sort of appeals process from what I can tell) but also unjust. No post-hoc rationalization based on his subsequent actions changes that.
Also, can you quote or provide a link to the post where our forumer explains in detail how the Mark Meechan video, specifically (and this is the standard I previously set, low as it was), "delegitimized and harmed them?" Clearly I'm just so bad at listening that I missed that one.