Hate speech has remained a topic of great debate, especially after the Second World War. In order to put limits on the absolute right to freedom of expression, international community jotted down various agreements in the shape of conventions and charters but out of these three international instruments named as the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR), the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination (CERD), and the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) are very much famous in granting the right to freedom of expression to all humans though conditional with various restrictions as deemed necessary and fit under law in order to protect the respect, reputation and honour of others. This limitation is extended by the ICCPR and CERD; as Article 4(a) of the CERD expressly requires from the state parties to it to ensure the prohibition on the dissemination of all forms of ideas as based on racial superiority or hatred. Besides this Article 20 of the …show more content…
The paradigm of its definition is quite vast and yet debatable (for more detail see Figure 1 on page….). Treaties of international stature such as International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights or the ICCPR has also tried to define it in its Article 20 under the veil of freedom of expression in relation to the Article 19 of the UDHR. Being generic in nature, it refers to those words that are uttered reflecting discrimination, antagonism or violence by targeting particular group or community of people in order to harm their feelings. Hate speech (be it conveyed through text, images or sound) in fact has no boundaries. People ignite targeted discrimination and fuel more in violent activities by using hatred words and ultimately achieve their hidden motives but the ICCPR in its Article 20(2) somehow imposes obligations on the states party to it to prohibit hate speeches; enshrined
are simply meaningless words meant to damage, humiliate and degrade certain groups of people. To prove those words worthless, the same groups of people that those hate words
Entrenched within the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms lies the fundamental rights that Canadian citizens share. The primary freedoms recognized within Section 2 of the Charter, such as the freedom of speech and expression, are necessary for a free and democratic society. Yet, a crucial conflict of rights exists within the system when the freedom of expression is used to perpetuate willful hatred against a certain individual or group. Controversy arises from this conflict first and foremost because the freedom of expression is meant to secure each person the right to express ideas and opinions without governmental interference, irrespective of what that opinion may be. In this paper, I will discuss the conflicting views of restricting the freedom of expression when it is used to promote hatred. I refer to the insights offered by Joel Feinberg and Joseph Raz to advance the view that the “right” to freedom of expression is not final and absolute, as expressions of hated do in fact cause real harm to people, and there rights too must be taken into consideration. Fundamental rights should be viewed as a privilege, which includes a responsibility to respect and value the rights of others to provide for a truly liberal democracy. I will refer to the landmark judicial decision in the Canadian Supreme Court case of R. v. Keegstra to argue that the rights of individuals and groups to be afforded the right to respect and dignity outweigh any claim to freedom of expression.
Hate speech directs people to commit hateful crimes. The difference between hate crimes and regular crimes is that hate crimes are committed to a person because of his/her differences. Some examples of differences would be their gender, race, hair color, body shape, intelligence, sexual orientation, etc. Hate speech doesn’t have to be direct talking. Hate speech can now be down on the Internet or through magazine; and more people are using the Internet to publicize their vile beliefs. In the last five years, the number of hate crimes that have been reported to the FBI has increased by 3,743 (FBI statistics). That means that 11,690 hate crimes were reported in 2000 in only 48 states and not all police forces released their data. Imagine how many other hate crimes were committed that weren’t even reported to the police. Ethnic and racial violence or tension has decreased in Europe due to newly implemented hate speech laws (ABC News).
When the topic of hate and bias crime legislation is brought up two justifications commonly come to mind. In her article entitled “Why Liberals Should Hate ‘Hate Crime Legislation” author Heidi M. Hurd discusses the courts and states views that those who commit hate and bias crimes ought to be more severely punished. She takes into consideration both sides of the argument to determine the validity of each but ultimately ends the article in hopes to have persuaded the reader into understanding and agreeing with her view that laws concerning the punishment of hate and bias laws should not be codified. Hate crime is described as a violent, prejudice crime that occurs when a victim is targeted because of their membership in a specific group. The types of crime can vary from physical assault, vandalism, harassment or hate speech. Throughout the article Hurd tried to defend her view and explain why there should be no difference of punishment for similar crimes no matter the reason behind it. Her reason behind her article came from the law that President Obama signed in 2009 declaring that crimes committed with hatred or prejudice should have more sever punishments. While the court has their own views to justify their reasoning behind such decisions, in the article Hurd brings up points and facts to prove the wrongfulness of creating such a law. However, though Hurd has made her views clear in the following essay I will discuss reasons why the penalties are justifiable, why they should receive the same degree of punishment, less punishment and my personal view on the topic.
On December 15, 1791, the first amendment- along with the rest of the Bill of Rights- was passed by congress. Although the amendment allows verbal freedom to the citizens of America, many argue that it also comes with great risks.The possibility of both mental and physical harm to citizens through the practice of free speech should be taken into consideration. Limiting free speech has potentially saved lives by monitoring what a person can or can not say that could cause distress to the public (e.g.- yelling “bomb” on an airplane). Others argue that the limitation of free speech will hinder our progress as a nation, and could potentially lead to our downfall through governmental corruption. In a society where the freedom of speech is a reality, one must question the risks and limits of that right.
Freedom of speech is archetypally recognised as a basic human right in free and democratic societies. When contending whether speech that may be deemed offensive should be safeguarded one may refer to the judgement of Redmond-Bate v. DPP:
In society the topic of free speech comes up very frequently. One side will argue that there should be no limit on what someone wants to say, while others believe that the idea on full free speech is dangerous and should be restricted. In a video that was presented to us there was a debate that conquered this topic on why or why not this should be allowed. This topic of free speech has gone on for decades and continues to be a fight on whether it should be limited.
A gray area in the free speech of hate groups would be implying physical harm on a group of people without a direct threat. Everyone has the right to hold an opinion and say what they want about each other and feel a certain way about specific groups, but when violence is incited is where the line is drawn. The gray area would be people who praise violence by others but themselves do not incite any violence. This gray area is a concern when it comes to free speech because although a person may not try to hurt anyone the enjoyment they find in violence concerns other citizens (Sorial, Mackenzie, 2).
The use of hate should be illegal in the society. This is because the people who think that it is okay for them to commit such a thing, wouldn’t know how it would make the victim feel emotionally or physically about it. The people who would commit these types of hate speeches wouldn’t understand what the victim has gone through. For example, The “N” word is targeted towards African Americans, If a African American was called this by white male or female or any other race in general, They wouldn’t know how the African American male would feel. This is because of the African Americans past and what they have went through. In the article “The Case For Restricting Hate Speech” it states,” Hate speeches is doing something. It results in tangible
Can you imagine any American having the temerity to think they have a right to be critical of the Islamic religion, or of muslim terrorism. The outstanding conservative intellectual William F. Buckley once said, “Liberals claim to want to give a hearing to other views, but then are shocked and offended to discover that there are other views.” Any politically active college student should be familiar with this sentiment. Liberals preach inclusivity and diversity of all kinds, but not the diversity of thought. Opposing views are problematic wrong-thoughts that need to be ignored, or, better yet, purged. Liberals often claim that this is a misrepresentation of their views, and that they only care about banning “hate speech” and other forms of
The First Amendment is known as the most protected civil liberty that protects our right to freedom of speech. There has been much controversy regarding hate speech and laws that prohibit it. These problems have risen from generation to generation and have been protested whether freedom of speech is guaranteed. According to our text book, By the People, hate speech is defined as “hostile statements based on someone’s personal characteristics, such as race, ethnicity, religion, or sexual orientation.” Hate speech is a topic of issue for many people and their right’s, so the question is often proposed whether hate speech should be banned by government.
Should we be able to believe what we want as long as we don’t act on
The interviews helped organise and create new themes regarding hate speech and this contributes to the approach of the author stating that nationalist and cultural issues shape hate speech according to Erjavec & Kovačič, (2012:916). This is evident in the article as categories were created based on the use of hate speech and what was discussed in the interviews and organised producers of hate speech were identified (Erjavec & Kovačič, 2012:912). The first group is known as the soldiers which are the people who are political activists but some are part of non-governmental organisations, the believers are seen as the people who follow their role models and protect their political interest and attack enemies, the next group are known as the players who use hate speech to humiliate others and it is seen as an online game and the last category is the watchdogs who use hate speech to bring awareness about social issues (Erjavec & Kovačič, 2012:909-912). This shows us the effectiveness of interviews as this information was gained from interviewing the producers of hate speech. Quantitative content analysis was used when identifying the categories oh hate speech at is an effective way to analyse data as it is an analytical process that interprets the data and makes inferences regarding the data (Schroder,
Free speech is both a universal and national liberty. The United Nations and the United States of America believe that free speech is something that humans should be allowed to exercise. However, each respective group has their own limitations. These limitation, although broad, protect against free speech being taken too far. Like any liberty or privilege there must be a line in the sand to keep extremists from aggressively using and abusing this right. The United Nations formed "The Universal Declaration of Human Rights." With in this declaration are 40 articles with a preamble examining the rights which they believe are basic and necessary. Article 19 from this declaration says, "Everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression; this right includes freedom to hold opinions without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers."
Freedom of speech should have some limitations. The American people should have the right to say whatever they want, but to an extent. Whether it is on signs or verbally some things should not be expressed. The United States is well known for being “the home of the free,” but some people take their freedom a bit too far. People can burn flags, protest at military funerals, even use the “n” word and watching pornography in libraries.