I've written a response to a quickly-deleted post by Rizo. I thought I'd post it anyway, in a lightly-edited form, because it might help the debate. I'm trying to get to the first order question: what, if anything, trumps the right to free speech? To put it another way, other rights are affected by free speech - which rights should take precedence?
The questions of what counts as extremism, hate speech, or whatnot are downstream of this, which is why I am trying to avoid them them just yet. That is to say, we should define the logic of our aims (we want to protect of the right to free speech except...) before we start talking about what actions, methodologies or strategies we need to take. Otherwise, we'll just end up acting on a jumble of impulses/prejudices.
I am sorry if I am coming across as blunt, but I don't think this discussion is worth having if we avoid the first order question - it is not 'blatantly obvious' to me what anyone's value judgements are, unless they are prepared to set them out.
And of course, I am interested in whether 'hate speech' (if we can define such a thing) can have the same effect as direct incitement to violence, because - without explaining why it alone deserves this status - Rizo made 'direct incitement to violence' the sole exception to the right to free speech. Who can say whether this is reasonable without answering the question, what are we trying to guard against when we limit the right to free speech?
