hate speech law

is extremely difficult to litigate owing to the fact that hate speech is a public act whereas the resolution process is not a broad public initiation in kind, but rather, an overwhelmingly private matter... an apology or agreement between two individuals in a closed setting.

Hate speech is both by NSW statutory definition and in accordance with the phenomenology which will be suggested in this book a public act. Yet the resolution process is overwhelmingly private... an apology or agreement to desist facilitated between two individuals in a closed setting. I will suggest that the public, broad impact of hate speech is not sufficiently ameliorated by a private and confidential resolution mechanism, because such a mechanism does not allow for a broader, public initiation or generation of a response to the hate speech.

is justified in the same way that many other forms of speech (i.e. Defamation, obscenity, incitement to commit a criminal act, etc.) are justified, insofar as it can be demonstrated that it is harmful.

On the other hand, it can be acknowledged that many types of speech are already subject to regulation, including defamation, obscenity, commercial speech and incitement to commit a criminal act. Insofar as it can be demonstrated that hate speech is harmful, some writers argue that state regulation of this particular exercise of the speech liberty4 is justifiable. Writers including Frederick Schauer, Cass Sunstein, Owen Fiss, Mari Matsuda, Judith Butler and Catharine MacKinnon all argue that some regulation appears justifiable, although they disagree as to the form and content of such regulation.

is justified insofar as speech is capable of causing harms, and specifically the harm of inhibiting its victims' ability to speak, and moreover inhibiting them from developing and exercising their individual capabilities.

The conclusion that the policy goal of a capabilities-oriented speech policy could be engagement and participation in expressive activity, not restriction or punishment of aberrant speech, relies on an as-yet untested premise: the premise that hate speech might be capable of causing harms, and specifically that it might be capable of causing the harm of inhibiting its victims' ability to speak. Inhibiting some people's ability to speak inhibits them from developing and exercising their individual capabilities, and therefore justifies a policy response. P. 47

is well-intentioned but ineffective in addressing the real problems of hate speech because rely on a statutory definition of hate speech which is either vague and difficult to enforce, or is too restrictive and renders much hate speech immune from regulation.

Thirdly, these laws tend to rely on a statutory definition of hate speech which is either vague and difficult to enforce, or is too restrictive and renders much hate speech immune from regulation.

is well-intentioned but ineffective in addressing the real problems of hate speech because they pit the largely incompatible goals of free speech on the one hand, and the ameliorating of the harms of hate speech on the other.

In Australia today, as in a growing number of Western liberal democracies, laws designed to ameliorate hate speech have been put in place. I will argue that these laws, although well-intentioned, do little to address the real problems of hate speech, because they unnecessarily counterpose the goals of securing free speech and ameliorating the harms of hate speech.

is well-intentioned but wrongheaded --- they invoke a private and individualized resolution process for what is essentially a public problem.

Secondly, these laws tend to invoke a private and individualised resolution process for what is essentially a public problem, which means there is little scope for directly addressing the broader harms enacted by hate speech, and resolution depends on the identification of individuals willing and able to pursue a complaint to finalisation over a significant period of time.

hate speech law, n.Definitions

hate speech law