verte76 said:
And some would argue that certain forms of freedom are bad. I'm not one of them. But like I said I'm not Austrian. If I were I might feel different. It's a cultural gap.
When we start dividing our liberties into positive and negative that is the path of authoritarianism.
Positive Liberty - Peaceful Religious Expression, Speech That Doesn't Offend, Innofensive Art etc.
Negative Liberty - Ruinous Gambling, Drugs, Suicide, Self-Harm, Hate Speech etc.
These are all expressions of liberty - the individual rights to self, some are considered good and some are considered bad. When we start equating liberties with violations of those liberties it is dangerous, how long does it take for the gap to close on free speech, starts with anti-Nazi laws, then anti-Racist laws, then anti-Islamophobic laws, before you know it gay rights groups are getting censure over calling Sharia Law anti-gay.
In an ideal society the individual would be accountable to themselves alone and could excercise whatever liberties they desire without infringing on the rights of others - rights that do not include the right not to be offended.
Punishment within a society is a way of securing rights and enforcing the no-harm principle. The death penalty is the ultimate violation and suspension of rights - the right to exist, however it is excercised against those who have commited the ultimate violation of another individuals rights. While there is room for moral and ethical opposition to this punishment equating a punitive measure against those who violate the no harm principle to one against those who excercise their liberties is in principle wrong. You have elaborated an argument to say that hate speech is wrong because police beat up immigrants. You are correct in that beating up immigrants is wrong, but the cause of that rests exclusively upon the officers and possibly the immigrants (depending on the situation), the violation of the immigrants rights and their personal security by the police is an independent violation. In a courtroom the officer could not lay blame for their excessive use of force upon an anti-immigrant speaker and make them suffer the ultimate punishment. The by-extension argument denies individual responsibility and ascribes actions to outside forces - forces that just happen to be offensive to most peoples sensibilities. Beating up immigrants and speaking out against immigrants/immigration are in my opinion different things and the distinction between liberty and violation of liberty should not be blurred to make the case against free speech.
Hate speech is not an infringement of any other individuals rights, drug use is also not an infringement of other peoples rights, gay marriage is not an infringement other peoples rights. All of these things should be made legal, not celebrated or glorified, but made legal.
Assault, Murder, Theft and Fraud are violations of other peoples rights (rights to personal security and property). They should be met with a proportional deprivation of the offenders liberties, in some societies they deem the death penalty to be the highest punishment, but the reason for the punishment remains the deprivation of another individuals liberty and as such is completely different than excercising the liberty of free speech to say offensive and racist things.
The logic of making hate speech illegal is not consistent with those of free speech. The right to tell people what they do not want to hear is the highest state of affairs and to subvert it in the name of harmony or anti-racism is a form of trading liberty for security.