People retweet things they tangentially, but don’t fully, agree with all the time.
In the context of this thread I don’t have one. Regulating speech is not the job of the state or the mob.
Sure, and things they heartily and fully agree with. Whether this is a case of the former or the latter is unknowable and I suspect those beliefs will align neatly with most people’s politics. We’re talking about three-word chants and retweets, not detailed policy papers. Trying to surmise from them that he’s “violating his oath of office” is idiotic, IMHO.
If this thread is about regulating speech, then I guess I’ll bow out. I read the title that said, “How do you define ‘hate speech’” and I thought it was how to define hate speech.
I can define it and not think it should be illegal. I think that hate speech exists in the US, but I think it remains legal here. I’m not going to make excuses for Amanpour’s misuse of the word – I agree that “Lock her up” isn’t hate speech, and yet I was still able to define it (or, technically, latch onto someone else’s definition).
I don’t understand why you won’t provide a definition.
While I’m on the subject, I think it’s odd that the OP of this very thread asked for definitions and then said that he thinks the term is meaningless. I wish he had put that in the OP. I probably wouldn’t have bothered joining in.
I was, perhaps, inartful in that post. I think leftists have, in recent years, tried to weaponize the concept of “hate speech” by labeling speech they don’t like as “hate speech”. I think The Tooth’s post #57 is an example of exactly this.
A more classic definition of “hate speech” would encompass things like racial slurs or bigoted speech based on gender, nationality, religion, or other protected classes. I can understand that definition, but I don’t think such speech should be banned, and so defining it as “hate speech” adds very little value in my eyes, and is, in short, fairly “meaningless”.
But I didn’t want this thread to be all about me and my views. I wanted to hear what Dopers thought. And I’m not surprised that the conversation has bled over to whether such speech should be legal or not.
This board is pretty lefty and with few exceptions, they didn’t define hate speech that way – this board mostly defined it as hateful speech against a group, pretty much like your second paragraph. However, I don’t know how Che Guevara or Eugene Debs would have used it, so maybe they and other “leftists” would have weaponized it.
Anyway, I’m happy with my adopted definition and I’m satisfied with how the US deals with hate speech (basically, leaves it alone), so I’m backing out of this thread.
Well at least you learned something.
Let’s say I believe (and I absolutely do not, just for the record) that blacks are a sub-human species that cannot be fully integrated into white society and that segregation is a good idea for their benefit. I further urge for a constitutional amendment to overturn the Loving decision so that these beastly blacks cannot pollute the white race with their inferior seed.
Under your regime, may I say any or all of that in public? What if I persist? Should I be jailed?
And keeping with the thread, is it “hate speech”? What if I cut out the terms “sub-human species” and “beastly” and “pollute” and “inferior”? What if I am as respectful as possible when I say it? Still “hate speech”?
I just don’t like the term because even at its inception it was used in a way to attempt to curb speech. Today, it is slowly coming to mean “any speech I don’t like.”
In my mind, the way to combat the hypothetical nonsense in my first paragraph is not to shout me down, call me names, or ostracize me. The way to combat it is with facts and reasoned debate. If I don’t listen to your reasoned debate, and still hold those views, then that is no different than failing to convince the other side on abortion, gun control, Trump, and all of the issues we currently discuss.
But, I think it is better that a person holding those views get his day in the public sphere instead of holding them in a shack in rural Mississippi talking about how a white man cannot even speak in public anymore and start thinking about building pipe bombs.
It would be idiotic of me to expect you to understand it. Besides, you still haven’t told me what part of “lock her up” implies a trial. Or perhaps you can share with us the manner in which he’s upholding the constitution by calling for someone to be imprisoned without trial, since you seem to think he’s doing so.
See post #63
That’s the post where you stopped saying a trial was implied and started saying, groundlessly, that suggesting Secretary Clinton be locked up every opportunity he gets doesn’t count, that the oath of office doesn’t apply then. But you didn’t point out how a trial is implied by “lock her up”.
I said in #32 “I think a trial was implied.” I don’t recall saying that something “doesn’t count” or “that the oath of office doesn’t apply then”.
If I say, “I’m going to the store to pick up some milk”, I haven’t specified whether I intend to pay for the milk or not. One possible interpretation of my proclamation is that I’m on my way to the grocer’s to commit armed robbery and steal their 2% goodness. Another possible interpretation is that, even though I did not explicitly say so, I intend to pay for the milk as customers regularly do. One of those things is vastly more likely than the other. I suppose if one were hell-bent on taking the least-charitable interpretation of my statement, you could sit here and say, “no no no, you never specified you were going to pay for the milk”, but I’m confident that most people will see that for the self-evident idiocy and nonsense that it is. Likewise, I’m confident most people will see your claims about the oath of office for the self-evident idiocy and nonsense they are.
Yeah, and I asked what part of “lock her up” implies a trial. You still haven’t told me. Perhaps you don’t understand the difference between ‘imply’ and ‘infer’, and are confused about the difference between things other people actually do or say or suggest and the opinions generated inside your own head.
I’m ignoring your milk story because it doesn’t involve violating any oaths taken to uphold the US constitution by suggesting - repeatedly and in public - that someone should be incarcerated without trial.
Reading this thread, I see that some think “Lock her up” is hate speech, and others don’t. Because it is in the eye of the beholder, it is impossible to restrict it fairly. Who gets to decide which speech is hate speech and which is not?
A good discussion of the issue: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hBPbd_JYIdw
As it touches on the incident in the OP, I thought this opinion piece on free speech was a good one:
By that logic, any law that has to define words is a bad law.
It’s entirely expected that people will not agree on the definitions of words. When you make a law, you define those words.
Who decides? The same people who decide every other law: “we the people.” We elect representatives who pass the laws we want them to pass. That question is always a silly one.
That said, I am unaware of any legal definition of hate speech that would include “lock her up.” The “hate” in hate speech always refers to some sort of bigotry. The exact line of what is so clearly bigoted and harmful that we should not allow it varies, but it’s still about bigotry.
And “lock her up” is not bigoted. Maybe some who say it are motivated by bigotry, but the statement itself is not bigoted.
The main thing behind hate speech laws is our acceptance that bigotry is wrong, and something we need to fight. It is arguing that bigotry is a big enough problem that some restrictions on bigoted speech are warranted. This is not unprecedented, as we also hold defamation that way. We hold intellectual property (e.g. copyright) violations that way. We hold false advertising that way.
Not even the US has pure, unrestricted freedom of speech. There are exceptions for compelling interests. Hate speech laws just advocate that extreme bigotry should be one of those reasons.
As for my personal definition? I have two.
The social level: Openly bigoted statements, made with clear bigoted intent. These are socially unacceptable.
The legal level: Advocating for discrimination or violence towards people for their suspect class status, which should additionally include sexuality, trans status, and mental illness, in addition to race, gender, ethnicity, religion (or lack thereof), etc.
Yes, these are very broad overviews, and don’t discuss specifics, like an actual law would have to do. But they cover the concept. Any law in any country that is about the latter is a hate speech law. While any rule that forbids the former is a hate speech rule.
Why two definitions? Just based on current usage. I would definitely prefer there to be two different words for the concepts. It would make things easier and less confusing.
But I’m a descriptivist. I don’t define words based on what I think they should mean, but what they appear to mean in the usage I’ve observed.