# What exactly is hate speech?

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-exactly-is-hate-speech/515624>\
**Category:** About This Message Board\
**Created:** [October 29, 2009, 4:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-exactly-is-hate-speech/515624 "2009-10-29T16:37:21Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 1\
**Showing post:** 46

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**Author:** ![mhendo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mhendo/32/3159_2.png) [@mhendo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mhendo)\
**Post date:** [November 19, 2009, 9:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-exactly-is-hate-speech/515624/46 "2009-11-19T21:02:32Z")

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> [@C\_K\_Dexter\_Haven](#):
>
> Defining “hate speech” isn’t an issue outside the Pit (it’s certainly covered under “no personal insults.”)

See, i don’t understand this at all.

It’s quite possible to use hate speech, as we commonly understand the term, without making it a personal insult directed toward someone who is a member of the SDMB. Definitions of hate speech are generally based only on the particular individual at whom the speech itself is directed. If someone in a group starts ranting about how all faggots should be beaten, isn’t that hate speech even if there’s not a single gay person in the group?

If all that is true, then surely it’s not simply enough to say that, outside the Pit, hate speech isn’t an issue because it’s covered under the “no personal insults” rule.

There’s actually a recent example that i think is rather on point here. In the GD thread about the fake marine, one poster observed:

> [@Fake Marine in full uniform at his High School reunion is found out by classmate & arrested With pic](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fake-marine-in-full-uniform-at-his-high-school-reunion-is-found-out-by-classmate-arrested-with-pic/517292/197):
>
> These decorations are an official, meaningful, solemn military honor.
> 
> They are not something for random faggots to play with.

In what possible world is that not hate speech? Even if it wasn’t directed at a particular SDMB member, or at any individual posting in the thread, surely it qualifies under any reasonable definition of the term?

I’m ambivalent about whether we need the hate speech rule at all, but if we’re going to have it, surely this is a cut-and-dried case for its enforcement?

And yet two moderators have specifically responded to that post without invoking the hate speech rule. One wrote:

> [@Fake Marine in full uniform at his High School reunion is found out by classmate & arrested With pic](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fake-marine-in-full-uniform-at-his-high-school-reunion-is-found-out-by-classmate-arrested-with-pic/517292/202):
>
> This is just plain inappropriate. You’ve been here long enough to know that.

and the other specifically noted that he let it slide because it wasn’t a personal insult:

> [@Fake Marine in full uniform at his High School reunion is found out by classmate & arrested With pic](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fake-marine-in-full-uniform-at-his-high-school-reunion-is-found-out-by-classmate-arrested-with-pic/517292/214):
>
> Your “faggot” comment was inappropriate, but I didn’t give a warning because you were making a (nasty) generalization about a group rather than any specific posters.

As i said, we can debate the merits of having the hate speech rule at all, but if we’re going to have it, then at least its enforcement needs to demonstrate some basic concordance with the general understanding of what hate speech is. And referring to gay people as faggots, as far as i know, generally qualifies, particularly when there was clearly no irony and no humorous intent in the post.

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