The Online Rant

I read a quote this morning that I thought was really relevant to our current society and culture. The quote goes like this.

“The trouble with fighting for human freedom is that one spends most of one’s time defending scoundrels. For it is against scoundrels that oppressive laws are first aimed, and oppression must be stopped at the beginning if it is to be stopped at all.”
- HL Mencken

There has been a lot of talk in the news lately about “hate speech.” The main theme being that modern society should not tolerate or accept “hate speech.” And to some extent, I agree. I often cringe when I read or hear some of the things that people say. The hurtful and misleading things they say aren’t right, and they really shouldn’t be tolerated by the main stream of our society.

But unlike many who are calling for laws against this kind of thing, I don’t believe that laws are the way they should be handled. For one thing, laws won’t solve the problem. The racists, xenophobes, and intolerant people will still be there. They will still be around and will still be racist and intolerant. For another, who gets to decide what is defined as “hate speech.” Anyone can be offended by anything. So who gets to decide what crosses the line when it comes to free speech?

Freedom of speech, even for racist or hateful people, is far more important than not being offended by what someone says. As the quote above implies, once you start restricting what people are allowed to say, you will end up with laws against anything you say. While it’s never been my intention to offend, I’m sure there are things I’ve said on this blog that have offended people. So if we start restricting the speech of people like NeoNazis(who’s speech we all would agree is offensive and wrong), how long before this blog and others like it are told what they can and can’t say?

As the quote says, I don’t like having to defend the rights of people who are hateful and wrong, but I find myself having to defend their rights in defense of my own. I don’t think we should tolerate or accept hate speech, but I also don’t think we can ever outlaw it or be free of it.