An examination of the history of the free speech doctrine in the U.S. finds that though the First Amendment has been in the Constitution since 1787, Communists and other lefts were prosecuted and found not to have their speech protected in WW I while opposing that capitalist war ( in the famous first cases applying the First Amendment, the result in the cases which made Holmes and Brandeis famous was that they found Leftist speech was NOT protected. Holmes sent Eugene Debs to prison,uphold ing his conviction for opposing WW I !!!) in the 1920's , in the 30's and during McCarthyism. What I am saying is that the protection of the bourgeois constitution for Lefts was not there when it counted, so what are we losing in advocating no freedom of speech for fascists. Throughout this whole history fascists (KKK) were prosecuted much more rarely than lefts.
Charles Brown
>>> <seanno at ksu.edu> 10/22 5:20 AM >>>
Chris,
The effect of laws prohibiting hate speech would be to allow the state to determine what speech is hateful and which is not. To me this is the cusp. There is a world of difference between Doug tossing someone off this list for being a troll, or people hurling rotten tomatoes at a reactionary shitferbrains and giving the state wide ranging powers to determine what forms of speech it defines as acceptable. Inevitably hate speech laws would be used to suppress leftists. Leftists have much more to lose from censorship than anyone on the right. Not only are bourgeois rights not absolute, but the state that enforces those rights is structurally racist, sexist and heterosexist at its core.
Besides, occasionally when people are hurling stuff at the Phelps clan every once in awhile they miss and hit a cop.
Sean Noonan seanno at ksu.edu