Hate Speech Law

[isha]

The Incitement to Violence or Hatred and Hate Offences Bill will be published today. It is expected to be enacted some time over the next couple of months. It covers online speech.

The protected characteristics set out in the Hate Crime Bill are:

race
colour
nationality
religion
ethnic or national origin
sexual orientation
gender (including gender expression and identity)
disability

I suppose it is as well to have a thread on this as it will likely be quite a consequential law going forward. It will give rise to interesting case law. I wonder how it will affect online debate and discussion forums.

This is as close as I can find to what will actually be in the Bill - https://www.gov.ie/en/press-release/74e ... xpression/

But maybe someone has a link to the actual bill.

For the moment I can not see a specific issue with it. Hate speech is horrible. For example, saying unvaccinated people are fascists, as Fintan O'Toole did, is horrible.

I am presuming that stating the truth will not be hate speech eg human beings cannot change sex. I am presuming one can constructively criticise ideologies including fundamentalist religious beliefs, without it being hate speech. I am also happy to have it frowned upon, even illegal, to publicly use rotten language about any groups of which one is not a member. I'm presuming however that one will be able to vigorously comment on social, political, ideological etc etc issues without being charged. If not, I'm perfectly willing to go to court to defend in a test case against hate speech charges.

We shall see how it goes.

Extract of speech by Leo Varadkar
https://www.gov.ie/en/speech/7c6a80-spe ... y-diversi/

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[Mirabeau]

Its like the Romans creating a desert and calling it peace.

[Cyclepath]

I am presuming that stating the truth will not be hate speech eg human beings cannot change sex. I am presuming one can constructively criticise ideologies including fundamentalist religious beliefs, without it being hate speech. I am also happy to have it frowned upon, even illegal, to publicly use rotten language about any groups of which one is not a member. I'm presuming however that one will be able to vigorously comment on social, political, ideological etc etc issues without being charged. If not, I'm perfectly willing to go to court to defend in a test case against hate speech charges.

We shall see how it goes.

Unfortunately, the devil is always in the detail, and I firmly believe that everything will hinge on the interpretation of 'hate' as opposed to valid criticism, stating scientific fact, and so on. I'm pessimistic by nature and can almost guarantee that there will very soon be a queue of offended persons seeking retribution via the courts. I also predict that most if not all cases will be brought on religious or gender expression grounds.

[Diamonds of Frost]

I see 'hate' as being a difficult to determine experience.
It's not an emotion I currently hold but I have in the past and not because of a person's difference but because of their character and what they had done.

Hating a group of people simply because they are a different sexuality or religion or gender etc to me isn't something I can imagine ever feeling. The trouble seems to lie in how views are expressed.

Or will it be broader than that? None of us are without judgement so at what point does it fall under the banner of the new law?

Will sharing my beliefs regarding transpeople - that there may be underlying psychological issues - land me in court? Can I say that the influx in to Ireland of all refugees, be they fleeing hardship or not concerns me? To me that isn't hate speech but it could well be soon.

I fall on the side of being able to discuss and hold opinions about anything and everything while maintaining respect towards others no matter ethnicity or sexuality etc. A bit like how I am towards religion. I'm atheist but I won't treat a person of faith badly or look down upon them or cause them harm.

More to think about.

[isha]

Agreed, Diamonds. I think it will be interesting times ahead.

Even without prosecution, the fear of being taken to court for an opinion might chill public debate.

Example, I have been friends for a long while with a chap from Morocco who has over time become more religious. I appreciate aspects of esoteric Islam and we have had lots of chats over the years about say the poetry etc. But I have a strong opinion on hijab - the wearing of it has become a power struggle both from a clash of religions point of view, and in a battle for domination of the female sex.

As he has become more religious he argues more for the modesty and the respect and protective functions of the covering of females. Even as friends I have to couch my views more carefully now. He can be quite determined in his view, as can I!!

I could easily envisage where someone less friendly with me might describe my sometimes quite strong views on veiling, eg where influential western females are LARPing as submissives before influential politicians say in Iran, instead of standing up for women in brutal imprisonment, as being hate speech.

I don't have a problem with voluntary veiling AT ALL. I have such a huge problem with compelled speech or any activity including veiling that I wonder does it leave me open to accusations of hate speech for example.

[knownunknown]

We need only look across the pond to where that circus of a case with Markus meechan for making a joke about a pug dog. He lost his ability to work because of the high profile nature of the case, and was eventually convicted of causing mass offence. https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-scotland-gl ... t-43478925

Or that teenage girl, Chelsea Russell who posted rap lyrics to the Facebook page of her friend who had died as a tribute. Problem is those lyrics contained the n word and she got prosecuted. https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-merseyside-43816921

It might be great to sit here and think they’ll take context into account but these types of laws never do. It’s all about how much offence is taken, not how much is given.

[Bishop_Brennan]

We need only look across the pond to where that circus of a case with Markus meechan for making a joke about a pug dog. He lost his ability to work because of the high profile nature of the case, and was eventually convicted of causing mass offence. https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-scotland-gl ... t-43478925

Or that teenage girl, Chelsea Russell who posted rap lyrics to the Facebook page of her friend who had died as a tribute. Problem is those lyrics contained the n word and she got prosecuted. https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-merseyside-43816921

It might be great to sit here and think they’ll take context into account but these types of laws never do. It’s all about how much offence is taken, not how much is given.

That is just incredible, does context not mean anything ???

Amazing the same people that cheered removal of blasphemy laws in Ireland are the ones championing these new blasphemy laws.

[Avey Terrible]

Anyone who supports that is immediately suspect.

[Bishop_Brennan]

Anyone who supports that is immediately suspect.

Unfortunately a lot of people support it naively, thinking it will protect minorities, and is the righteous thing to do.

This is bad for minorities too, look how it's gone for Travellers giving them that protected race status.

[knownunknown]

Unfortunately a lot of people support it naively, thinking it will protect minorities, and is the righteous thing to do.

This is bad for minorities too, look how it's gone for Travellers giving them that protected race status.

Soft bigotry of low expectations: The practice of expecting less from members of a disadvantaged group and thus implicitly encouraging those people not to reach their full potential.

I.e. lowering the test scores to enter a university for a disadvantaged group has the unintended consequence of requiring that group to work far less.

It is a form of bigotry.

[isha]

One thing I notice recently with trans rights activists is they are sort of dropping the insane idea that transgender identification makes one indistinguishable from the preferred biological sex, and they have moved to "but why would you say it?" Eg don't date them if you don't believe the trans woman is a lesbian but why announce it?

I had to have a think about this, it reminded me of something. And then I realised it is "Don't say, don't tell". That was the US military policy towards homosexual people up til 2010. Eventually gay people started to find that kind of patronising, demeaning, secretive approach to be not good for them, and rightly so. I don't see how being honest about sex being immutable could be hate speech. I think don't ask, don't tell, don't say out loud and just pretend you think a trans man is indistinguishable from a gay man is the real hate "non-speech".

[knownunknown]

The BBC and other publications have spoken at length about the increase in hate crimes all across the board and the explanation always given is that people are now more confident in reporting these types of things. What they fail to mention is the massive rise in hate crime hoaxes also, which is evident in the lack of prosecutions. https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-63157965

“Professor Wilfred Reilly examines over one hundred widely publicized incidents of so-called hate crimes that never actually happened. With a critical eye and attention to detail, Reilly debunks these fabricated incidents—many of them alleged to have happened on college campuses—and explores why so many Americans are driven to fake hate crimes. We're not experiencing an epidemic of hate crimes, Reilly concludes—but we might be experiencing an unprecented epidemic of hate crime hoaxes.”

[Bishop_Brennan]

The BBC and other publications have spoken at length about the increase in hate crimes all across the board and the explanation always given is that people are now more confident in reporting these types of things. What they fail to mention is the massive rise in hate crime hoaxes also, which is evident in the lack of prosecutions. https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-63157965

“Professor Wilfred Reilly examines over one hundred widely publicized incidents of so-called hate crimes that never actually happened. With a critical eye and attention to detail, Reilly debunks these fabricated incidents—many of them alleged to have happened on college campuses—and explores why so many Americans are driven to fake hate crimes. We're not experiencing an epidemic of hate crimes, Reilly concludes—but we might be experiencing an unprecented epidemic of hate crime hoaxes.”

Also the definition of "hate crime" is a complete joke , it's getting broader and broader so even if there were no hoaxes, they'd still increase.

[DeletedUser]

Laws than only apply to certain groups are bad laws.

Muslims are freely allowed to threaten schoolteachers over a cartoon, or the positive mentions of gay and lesbian people but Heaven forbid if you so much as mention that 99% of the rape gangs in the UK are Muslim!

[isha]

Section 3.2(d) of the Bill defines gender -
“gender” means the gender of a person or the gender which a person expresses as
the person’s preferred gender or with which the person identifies and includes
transgender and a gender other than those of male and female.


Shryllopguck means the shryllopguck of a person or the shryllopguck which a person expresses as
the person’s preferred shryllopguck or with which the person identifies and includes transshryllopguck and a shryllopguck other than those of male and female.....are we all clear now?

[KHD]

Wtf is a Shryllopguck ?!? All I'm getting is Sherlock Holmes!

Anyway I will still only recognise three genders.

Male
Female
Aliens from outerspace.

[isha]

A shryllopguck is anyone who identifies as a shryllopguck, you bigot!

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[knownunknown]

A shryllopguck is anyone who identifies as a shryllopguck, you bigot!

Typical of bigots, deny that shryllopguck’s exist under their coded language(dog whistles) of ‘just asking question’. This type of low level trolling is really offensive to shryllopguck’s.

[KHD]

Sounds like something out of Harry Potter. I take it you two smart asses are pulling my leg. Going out for a circular walk around the field to see if I can shake the bigotry off the heels of my wellies with my dogs, now that the neighbours have run out of artillery shells for the day.

[knownunknown]

Sounds like something out of Harry Potter. I take it you two smart asses are pulling my leg. Going out for a circular walk around the field to see if I can shake the bigotry off the heels of my wellies with my dogs, now that the neighbours have run out of artillery shells for the day.

If gender(expression of sex) is now a protected characteristic then why not age expression(timedilator) or racial expression(skinchanger) or whatever type of expression you can imagine (shryllopguck).

[KHD]

If gender(expression of sex) is now a protected characteristic then why not age expression(timedilator) or racial expression(skinchanger) or whatever type of expression you can imagine (shryllopguck).

I'm just thinking when this legislation is passed I bet there is a group of people out there ready to make a business out of providing consultancy and advisory services to businesses and multinational companies located here on practical implementation of this legislation within a workplace. I can imagine myself hauled up to HR for saying to a new starter, "alright man how's it going".

Some of the fookers that are pushing this legislation are the most hateful group of arseholes on the planet while the rest of us try to get on with more mundane things.

[KHD]

And another thought on this will there will be another glut of court cases clogging up the system. I take it our clownshow of a government haven't put something alongside this similar to the WRC ?

[knownunknown]

If any characteristic should be protected it should have to do with age.

Older people are not as healthy, not as strong, experience disease and problems more regularly and are regularly seen as soft targets to potential attackers.
Young people haven’t even developed their bone density, muscle mass, aren’t nearly as tall or as strong as others.
These are two groups we know for fact are weaker/have less power than average people.

Yet this characteristic isn’t even on the list, it’s a total farce. https://data.oireachtas.ie/ie/oireachta ... c-sent.pdf

Age used to be a protected characteristic on these types of lists e.g. human rights equality act, so why is it being removed? Who likes to incite hatred against old people over on planks? Who are the types of people you’d be seeing calling others middle aged men in a derogatory sense? The same ones pushing this bill and others like it. fecking hypocrites.

https://www.equalityhumanrights.com/en/ ... cteristics

[KHD]

So from briefly looking at the proposed criminal justice act, freedom of expression and alternative points of view will be gone when this bill goes through ? A sort of woke dictatorship we will be living by ?... you can't say that, off to court with ya... This is what your outlook should be, anything different and your a criminal uttering hate crimes. I note they have also thrown in military conflict situations, so questioning anything could be construed as hate / war crime denial.

[knownunknown]

So from briefly looking at the proposed criminal justice act, freedom of expression and alternative points of view will be gone when this bill goes through ? A sort of woke dictatorship we will be living by ?... you can't say that, off to court with ya... This is what your outlook should be, anything different and your a criminal uttering hate crimes. I note they have also thrown in military conflict situations, so questioning anything could be construed as hate / war crime denial.

I was looking the other day at a lot of cases from the Uk, mostly their laws are used as a way of penalising an already violent criminal, I.e. a scumbag who mugs someone with a knife might also shout an offensive racial slur and get their sentence increased because of it. This is what most of the convictions amount too, and a lot of wasted court time. Imo they should be treated harshly for being violent scumbags and save a lot of hassle.

Then you hear about other cases that are much more suspect where neighbours are offending others religious sensibilities and getting 3 months in prison. Or the guy who had a picture of the twin towers burning hanging in his window that could be seen from outside with the caption, ‘Islam out of Britain, protect the British people’. Bad taste certainly, but you should be free to do that.

These laws aren’t intended to make life better for individuals but to make it easier for government to govern us, avoiding backlashes, protests and uprisings. They will act when enough people complain about something you say or do, saying it’s grossly offensive demanding you either withdraw or remove it under penalty of imprisonment. Would have been much easier to jail that Burke fella for inciting hatred rather than contempt of court.