Hate Speech Bans

The First Amendment guarantees of free speech are a treasured part of the American tradition and set us apart from almost every other country. Many democratic countries support free speech. However, hate speech is not considered part of it and is prohibited under human rights standards. In sharp contrast, US continues to support its position that all hate speech bans violate the First Amendment. The US is the only country from the commonwealth countries where intended provocation to racial hatred is constitutionally protected speech, believing such matter of principle is wrong and ineffective. Hate speech laws are controversial. Should hate speech that addressed to public at large (public demonstrations, newspapers or magazines) be protected

However, there is an absence of clear evidence showing the the results of hate speech bans and connection between hate speech and harms such as discrimination, social exclusion, and violence in stable democracies. Also, these laws are ineffective and can be counter productive. It is not clear that these laws have done any good or prevented any harm. The benefits of punishment are not obvious. This uncertainty is not strong evidence to justify constraining a fundamental human right such as freedom of expression. Allowing freedom of speech, including hateful speech, shows how a country is politically stable with strong social stability. However, ruling that it is OK to ban hate speech will open the door to banning other speech as well. This is not a power we can trust the government with. For example, if an uneducated man uses crude language to shows his hate about Mexican immigration or his Christian disapproval of gays should not be

No rights are absolute. Rights must be limited by respect for others, and by the needs of society as a whole. Hateful speech should be protected as free speech as long it does not dehumanize a group of people based on their religion or skin color etc. If hateful speech targets a specific group as less than human, we start to see the damage of hateful speech. In the Balkans in the 1990 's, the Serbs saw Muslims as not human; therefore, committing crimes against them was not considered violating human rights and this goes for Jews and Nazis as well. It is important to ban speeches that view some groups in a nonhuman way and deny mutual recognition to all groups in society because this is considered an abuse of free speech in the true sense of the word when it strips other groups from their human