First Amendment Right to Free Speech in the States

[bec_87rb]

Okay, Dr. Chaos made me go do some reading, here is some of the gist.

Comments

[suegypt]

Yep. You got it.

[bec_87rb]

Confirmation, then. I guess it never hurts to actually look something up, eh?

[suegypt]

Wish 45 would do the same, but, he'd never catch up.

[bec_87rb]

Not a reader is our President.

do not incite the audience to go kill or injure

[chhinnamasta]

Incitement to injure or kill? I wonder how much time can elapse between cause and effect (the message and subsequent violence) before no offence can be argued to have occurred? How much time can pass before the lawless action is no longer considered imminent? Is there a certain class of speech that is considered incitement, regardless of the consequences of said speech? Can you be punished if no violence issued from the incitement? Or, does someone have to be murdered, or injured, as a direct consequence of the speech? I wonder what constitutes incitement? That's a class of speech, right? It sounds like some aspect of criminal law trumps the first amendment here?

My problem with any hate speech is that, at some point downstream, I suspect a case be made that all of it is incitement to violence. For any politically charged violence, I imagine you can follow the sequence of events far enough back to find a hate speech connection? In any racist, sexist or homophobic person's past there has been exposure to hate speech?

RE: do not incite the audience to go kill or injure

[bec_87rb]

suegypt might be a better source, being a pairalegal, which is where you learn enough legal for two?

I don't think the actual lawless action has to actually occur, and hence retroactively make the speech illegal.

Is there a certain class of speech that is considered incitement, regardless of the consequences of said speech?

That is the crux of the Virginia case of the guy having a rally around a burning cross - Virginia felt that sort of speech was always an incitement to violence, so should be illegal, whether or not any lawless acts followed after. I am sure there are some phrases wherein you tell someone to go kill or injure someone, even if that is part of your political opinion, where the state is allowed to punish you for the utterance. But I'm not a lawyer.

My problem with any hate speech is that, at some point downstream, I suspect a case be made that all of it is incitement to violence. For any politically charged violence, I imagine you can follow the sequence of events far enough back to find a hate speech connection

RE: do not incite the audience to go kill or injure

[chhinnamasta]

Reductio ad absurdum - Are we arguing that when some guy punches a gay Jewish Mexican, we should retroactively go back and find the first people who suggested to him that the problem with this country is all those gays, Jews, and Mexicans, and arrest them, too?

I am arguing nothing. I am pointing out a threshold problem. If we are saying that speech should be punishable when it leads to violence, there is an inherent need to be precise in the definition of the cause and effect relationship.

What is legally hate speech in Canada?

I am definitely not a lawyer, either, and it is a gnarly question. Here's a journalist trying to break it down for us. The last section in that article, hate crimes, summarizes it quite nicely.

[chhinnamasta]

Thought of you. Jesse Brown talks to Consevative party candidate Michael Chong about Canadian hate speech legislation, among other things, in this episode of Canadaland. Chong would like to see it repealed. Jesse Brown is pro free speech, being a journalist, but expresses reservations, given what we're witnessing in the current media landscape. The talk about this issue starts around 22:30.