> ---------------------------------------------------
> Why must you always throw in some gratuitous remark? If it's
> too far beneath you to participate in this "silly" debate,
> why bother? No one is forcing you to use up your last post;
> there's no expiry date, and you can use it tomorrow on a
> subject more worthy of your talents. Jeez, you make it hard
> to motivate myself to even give you the courtesy of a reply.
This was not directed at you at all, but at the "posse of commissars" who explicitly said that my politics are not sufficiently "kosher" for this list and even suggested kicking me out altogether. I basically find your postings quite informative, which is why I did bother to reply - otherwise I simply ignore the postings that I consider irrational (i.e. based on pre-conceived notions or emotions and thus unlikely to be influences by rational arguments). I merely used my reply to your legitimate point (see below) as an opportunity to score a point with someone else - so please do not take it personally.
As to your point:
> The thuggery which you say had "nothing to do with free
> speech" had, in fact, everything to do with it; the left and
> the right tried to violently disrupt each other's meetings
> and dissemination of their party newspapers precisely in
> order to prevent each other from speaking freely to the masses.
I am not denying that the two were going hand in hand. All I was saying that the two are analytically separable and that the freedom of nazi speech alone, i.e. not backed by paramilitary thugs, the deep pockets of German industrialists, and the "window of political opportunity" would not get the Nazis very far. While we are at that, the nazis gained popularity not by their Jew- and Bolshevism- bashing rants, but by changing the tune and challenging the economic policies of the Weimar Republic and proposing alternatives - which started earning them votes. That is to say, it is not their hate speech that the posse of commissars want to censor but their legitimate political-economic programme - which could not be censored in any democratic state - that was instrumental in the Nazi ascent to power. Of course, there was more into it than just "speech" - the Great Depression and economic collapse, the hatred of Weimar liberalism and "decadence" shared by both Left and Right which lead to a political impasse, the international situation, the paramilitary thugs, the Iron-Rye alliance, etc.
The bottom line is that denying freedom of speech to fascists is a completely inconsequential symbolic act - that does nothing to stop them, but may inadvertently help their cause by giving them the aura of martyrdom - which they eagerly used to mobilize their supporters (cf. the lyrics of their anthem _Horst Wessel Lied_ which is full of martyrdom references http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/mod/horstwessel.html ).
> I'm opposed to hate legislation.
So am I, in principle. I think anyone should be free to love, and by the same virtue hate anyone he he/she wants and freely talk about it - as long as those feelings do not lead to adverse actions. However, I also think that the democratic state has legitimate interest in prohibiting any narrowly defined speech that is being used to provoke violence, riots or similar adverse actions against other people.
Wojtek