The harm in hate speech [electronic resource] / Jeremy Waldron.
Waldron, Jeremy.
2012
KF9345 .W34 2012eb
Available Online

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Title The harm in hate speech [electronic resource] / Jeremy Waldron.
Author Waldron, Jeremy.
ISBN 9780674065086 electronic book
9780674065895 hardcover
Imprint Cambridge, Mass. : Harvard University Press, 2012.
Language English
Description 1 online resource (vi, 292 p._
Call Number KF9345 .W34 2012eb
Dewey Decimal Classification 345.73/0256
Summary Every liberal democracy has laws or codes against hate speech, except the United States. For constitutionalists, regulation of hate speech violates the First Amendment and damages a free society. Against this absolutist view, the author argues that hate speech should be regulated as part of our commitment to human dignity and to inclusion and respect for members of vulnerable minorities. Causing offense, by depicting a religious leader as a terrorist in a newspaper cartoon, for example, is not the same as launching a libelous attack on a group's dignity, according to the author, and it lies outside the reach of law. But defamation of a minority group, through hate speech, undermines a public good that can and should be protected: the basic assurance of inclusion in society for all members. A social environment polluted by anti-gay leaflets, Nazi banners, and burning crosses sends an implicit message to the targets of such hatred: your security is uncertain and you can expect to face humiliation and discrimination when you leave your home. Free-speech advocates boast of despising what racists say but defending to the death their right to say it. The author finds this emphasis on intellectual resilience misguided and points instead to the threat hate speech poses to the lives, dignity, and reputations of minority members. Finding support for his view among philosophers of the Enlightenment, he asks us to move beyond knee-jerk American exceptionalism in our debates over the serious consequences of hateful speech.
Bibliography, etc. Note Includes bibliographical references (p. [235]-278) and index.
Access Note Access limited to authorized users.
Source of Description Description based on print version record.
Series The Oliver Wendell Holmes Lectures, 2009
Available in Other Form Harm in hate speech.
Linked Resources Online Access
Record Appears in Online Resources > Ebooks
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Approaching hate speech
Anthony Lewis's Freedom for the Thought That we Hate
Why call hate speech group libel?
The appearance of hate
Protecting dignity or protection from offense?
C. Edwin Baker and the autonomy argument
Ronald Dworkin and the legitimacy argument
Toleration and calumny.

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