| Hate speech should be able to be regulated. The problem is finding the right standards and distinguishing between what is to be permitted and what banned. We should be able to enforce some minimal standards of public decency in our discourse. But, I have such little confidence in people in power to exercise judgment and restraint that I fear the treatment may well be worse than the disease. When the President and Vice-President can call all dissenters unpatriotic and cowards and seek to silence them by many means fair and foul, and when we can torture and abuse prisoners, then I fear that the value of hate speech regulation may well be outweighed by its benefits. But beating the drum of hate leads to disasters such as Nazi Germany, Rwanda, and the Balkans and crimes against those on the margins already and so having some legal means to limit it is appealing. The decision in Sweden shows that there are limits to such laws, as there ought to be. Steve On Nov 29, 2005, at 3:42 PM, Ed Brayton wrote: Rick Duncan wrote:Well I certainly hope that we can all, regardless of our religious views or opinions about homosexuality, cheer that decision. You will find no stronger advocate of gay rights than yours truly, but give me freedom above all else, including the freedom to disagree with me. Indeed, one cannot coherently argue for gay rights without also supporting the right to speak out against homosexuality, whether that is in the US, in Sweden as in this particular case, or in Canada with the Stephen Boissoin case (another minister up on charges for writing an anti-gay letter to a newspaper). -- Prof. Steven D. Jamar vox: 202-806-8017 Howard University School of Law fax: 202-806-8567 2900 Van Ness Street NW mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Washington, DC 20008 http://www.law.howard.edu/faculty/pages/jamar/ "It is by education I learn to do by choice, what other men do by the constraint of fear." Aristotle |
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