I think this summary conflates at least four different concepts:<p>* "Hate speech" is an ill-defined or incoherent concept<p>* People will never agree about what belongs in this category<p>* No one can be trusted to make an authoritative decision about this<p>* U.S. law, unlike that of European countries, has never included such a category of unprotected speech, and it would not be constitutionally permissible for the government to prohibit it
This is likely unpopular, but I don't care for any of the laws regarding hate crimes. I do think hate crimes are awful, but I can't find a good reason why someone shooting their neighbor because of their race/religion/gender/etc is worse than shooting them because they don't like the color their neighbor painted their house or because they slept with their SO or whatever it may be.<p>I do get that racially motivated crimes can create fear among whatever demographic has been targeted. On the other hand, that sounds like terrorism, which we have laws prohibiting.<p>At the end of the day, hate crime laws end up looking like they're toeing the line of "thought crimes" to me. Robbing a store is bad, but if you decide to rob a store run by Latinx people because you (probably wrongly) blame them for losing your job is worse. But if you blame WalMart for losing your job and decide to rob a WalMart to get back at them, that's somehow better in the eyes of the law.<p>I just don't see the need to delineate. I'm totally open to changing that view though; someone else (or everyone else) may have found a way to reason about that that I haven't though of.<p>I'm generally opposed to these kinds of "under these circumstances, it's worse" laws though. I don't like DUI laws for the same reason. We already have reckless operation laws in most states. If someone kills another person through their reckless driving, I doubt their loved ones care whether it was because of alcohol, lack of sleep or playing on a phone. Why is swerving between lanes because you're drunk terrible, but swerving between lanes because you haven't slept in 2 days is just a slap on the wrist? Ticket/arrest people based on the threat they pose to others, not based on the threat they pose multiplied by some "we don't like that" factor.