Monday, December 11, 2006

Defending Hate Speech


A controversial title like that should have got somebodies attention, and I seriously mean it.

I was at a party a few weeks ago and I got into a bit of a debate about people's right to hate speech. I was arguing that if we try and stop any types of speech, not only are we just addressing the symptoms of "hate" we are also curbing free speech, and the slope is very slippery when Governments are defining what is "hate" and what isn't.

Hate speech is free speech. While stopping the public espousing of hateful views, and holding a firm belief that people are influenced easily in crowds, and tend not to think for themselves (see the Cronulla Riots) I would say these people were thinking, were relying on bigotry that they had learnt from previous memes they had been exposed to, and in some cases previous experience. This was no doubt encourage by Alan Jones' hate speech, however, it is important to protect his right to say it, so we have the right to challenge it with equally compelling ideas of how to deal with tribal conflicts.

It would seem the ACLU agree with me, according to the article on their website. It explains in a much more eloquent fashion, why hate speech needs to be protected. hopefully with its protection, all of our competing ideas and memes can evolve through a Darwinian/ Wilson memetic evolution. More ideas, not less will accomplish our goals of eradicating hate.

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