Please indulge my curiosity again. From what we know (and this is provisional; dependent upon the actual content of the leaflets in question), the governmental action that is the subject of debate was in respect of incitement to violence against gay people. You have said yourself that incitement to violence is a crime in the US, and appear to hold that this is justified and does not compromise the right to free speech.

Are there other restrictions on “unlimited” speech – such as calling “fire” in a crowded theatre, slander / libel, sedition and so on – which might be imposed while preserving the right to “free” speech? If so, what is the underlying principle that justifies these restrictions without compromising that right? (And if not, I suppose, what is special about incitement to violence that it stands alone as the only justifiable restriction on unlimited speech?)

My view on it is that free speech is a right that must be balanced against other rights. As far as I can see, no-one disagrees that incitement to violence is a valid restriction on unlimited expression. I think there are other kinds of speech which ought to be restricted in order to protect rights other than freedom of speech – again, this seems uncontroversial. The only disagreement between people seems to be the degree to which speech may be restricted in pursuit of the protection of other rights.

In equating it to China and Iran, your condemnation of the UK as an “enemy of free speech” is pretty strong. We’ve established that the leaflets in question probably constituted incitement to violence, and possibly to murder, so this particular case does not support your conclusion about the UK’s position on free speech. What exactly about the UK’s regulation of expression does support your conclusion?

Incidentally, it may be of interest that, by incorporating article 10 of the European Convention on Human Rights, the Human Rights Act 1998 creates a presumption in UK law of the right to freedom of expression.

I wouldn’t argue that Britain and Iran as quite as bad, but both criminalize speech that the political elites find undesirable in a manner that is not content-neutral, and therefore, both deserve a place in the “hall of shame” of enemies of free speech.

On the other hand, I wonder about the basis on which people who support criminalizing people for their opinions with “hate speech” laws would condemn Iran for similarly waging war on people’s right to free speech. Will they say: “Iran is even worse than we are”?

“To answer your question I will give a single example, in the US the right of freedom of speech allows rich political candidates and businesses to pour huge amounts of money into political campaigning, whereas in Britain we see a right to a reasonably level political playing field and impose caps on campaign spending.”

Riiiight. That is just a policy decision, which has absolutely nothing to do with a supposed “right to a reasonably level political playing field” – though you try to force it into that category. Rather, British policymakers probably (correctly) consider it undesirable that wealthy candidates could have a great advantage (though you’d have to check the legislative history to be sure). It is also not clear whether under US law, spending by wealthy candidates has something to do with an alleged right to “free speech”. It is more like a backdoor: the candidate’s campaign borrows money from the candidate and never repays it. As for businesses, under Citizens United, they can wage issue-related campaigns, not political campaigns – though I do understand that the line is often quite tenuous. Moreover, the English ‘restriction’ that you mention is content-neutral and does not unnecessarily prohibit free speech, just like restrictions on the basis of place are (you can voice your opinion, just not on my front porch if I disallow it), and therefore does not infringe on free speech rights. So on all counts, your example does not prove what you think it does.

Now I’d like you to show where political speech infringes on the rights of other people.

I am sorry I don’t see the the self-contradiction. You appear to believe that if speech is curtailed in more than a few very specific circumstances e.g. incitment to violence then speech is not free. Most of the rest of the world does not see the issue in such black and white terms as you do and place Britain and Iran in the same category.

To answer your question I will give a single example, in the US the right of freedom of speech allows rich political candidates and businesses to pour huge amounts of money into political campaigning, whereas in Britain we see a right to a reasonably level political playing field and impose caps on campaign spending.

Your post was (a little) self-contradictory. I don’t think I misrepresented it. After all, it is not permitted to incite others to violently assault or threaten people in the US. But you presented that as a very broad right to free speech that trumps other rights. So what right would that be? The right to silence other people?

Priya: “its what they publish that would be on trial.”

You’re kidding? Did you draw inspiration from United States v. One Book Called Ulysses?

” hate speech is against the law then publishing Leviticus 20:13 is rationally against the law as well regardless of whether the publishers personally endorse or believe that viewpoint.”

How very strange. So if I engage in “hate speech”, would it be against the law for you to quote that and say: “This is what Brutus says about X: [hate speech]“?

“I only have a layperson’s understanding of hate speech laws, but I believe that would not be a hate crime because it does not adocate killing or violence against women.”

I agree that inciting people to killing or violence should be a crime. However, suppose that a Canadian “Human Rights Tribunal” found Aristotle’s insistence that women should not own property to be “hate speech”. Should publishers be forced to excise such passages from Aristotle’s works, or be subject to hate speech prosecutions themselves?

“Further to my last point. Junius’s claim that the publishers of Leviticus 20:13 aren’t guilty of hate speech because they don’t endorse it is similar to a person who’s libeled or slandered someone else claiming “I’m not guilty because I don’t believe what I wrote/said.”. No way is such an excuse going to fly in a court of law.”

In a situation that is actually comparable, it actually does fly. If politician A claims that politician B is corrupt, and the New York Times reports on this, there is no way politician B can sue the New York Times for libel, since the New York Times merely reported on the accusation made by politician A. Maybe in England (as it has very strict libel laws), but nowhere else in the world.

Mihangel: “Your “Patriot Act” would probably fit contentedly in the system of any dictatorship.”

Perhaps, perhaps not. I bet it’s a favorite trope of yours, but it’s completely irrelevant. After all, it has nothing to do with free speech. Perhaps it has to do with a sort of wounded pride on your part, and you are trying to lift up England by pointing to other (perceived) wrongs in the world. “Well, we may not have free speech, BUT LOOK OVER THERE! PATRIOT ACT! MCCARTHY! EMPEROR TITUS VESPASIAN!”

But here’s betting that you don’t know anything that the Patriot Act says (like most people who voted for it), and are merely repeating something that you’ve heard. Quick, look (or make) something up!

“We choose to exclude violence of speech from public discourse,”

Violence of speech? (George Orwell, is that you?) Send them to the Ministry of Love immediately!

“and FYI we’ve had a balasphemy law for centuries that has been dusted off by the right wing to silence a gay paper and poet in the 70s. “

Why, you object to that? You think that free speech should be UNLIMITED? And silence? NO! As you yourself said, the gay paper an poet were allowed to write whatever they wanted, BUT THERE WERE CONSEQUENCES.

AdrianT: “Junius – what is really dangerous, is the invention of the nonsense term ‘Islamophobia’, to attack anyone who criticises Islam (I will not be careful by the way), and equate it with racism. It is used as a way of silencing any debate.”

Only because they know that they can’t win the debate. Challenge them firmly and they’ll fold like a house of cards. On this very board, several people started calling opponents of the Ground Zero Mosque “racists”. When I challenged it, one of them made a very feeble and hilarious attempt to defend it (search for “Muslims might not be an ethic group” in http://www.boxturtlebulletin.com/2010/08/10/25267 ), but in subsequent threads, I never heard any of them say something similar, ever again. Instead, they turned to the word “bigoted”.

“To equate attacking, criticising islam with racism, is in itself racist as well as fascist.”

And it demeans victims of actual racism, to equate criticism of some ideology with hatred for people on the basis of the color of their skin.

“The people of Tunisia and Egypt are calling out for freedom right now – they don’t want theocracy, they don’t have beards. They want freedom, democracy, as well as affordable bread. Solidarity with all freedom fighters across the middle east.”

One can only hope, but I would point you to the fact that something similar happened in Iran. Islamists have a way of forcing their way into a power vacuum, regardless of what the people on the streets actually want. I’ll wait and see.

Personally, I agree with what T.J. wrote above:

If the pamphlet was simply arguing for why there should be a law punishing homosexuality with death, then that’s a legal argument and is protected.

In my view, while it’s morally repulsive to even speculate about legally re-instating the death penalty for consensual adult sodomy, arguments along this direction from Salafist Muslims in the UK or Christian Reconstructionists in the US are not tantamount to advocating extrajudicial lynchings of homosexuals by God-addled mobs.

But it’s possible Priya Lynn would argue that a pamphlet saying “an ideal government would execute homosexuals because God says so” DOES cross over that threshold into inciting violence, even though the pamphlet stops short of exhorting: “Hey, everybody, grab a rope and a bunch of stones and let’s kill us some queers!”

I think in Canada it is a crime to incite someone to commit any sort of criminal action. I suspect this may be the case in Britain and the U.S. as well.

… and a few who think it should be recriminalised, there are few enough who would agree with violence or the death penalty that I am confident a prosecution under incitement to violence would not be counter-productive. (I admit I am slightly concerned that prosecution under incitement to hatred might prove counter-productive.)

My argument that incitements to violence should be criminalised because they might work, could be generalised to incitements to any crime, but not to anything I do not like.

The BNP have not, as far as I am aware, advocated violence. Their views do resonate with a significant minority of the English population, with many more who think they should have a right to say what they do. You are quite correct that prosecuting the BNP was counter-productive. Those who argue for the killing of homosexuals are a quite different kettle of fish. While there are still many in Britain who regard homosexuality as wrong and a few who think it should be re-criminalised

It is stupid, because: there are Arab, Pakistani and Persian christians, jews and atheists. There are many people who leave their faith – look at the website of the Committe of Ex Muslims, run by the wonderful Maryam Namazie in London. Equally, there are many white caucasian converts to Islam, like the person believed to have masterminded the attack on Moscow airport last week.

To equate attacking, criticising islam with racism, is in itself racist as well as fascist. It is telling people of a certain origin: you are too stupid to walk away from your religion, too stupid to accept the theory of evolution, too stupid to think. And you will have no support if you dare to think for yourself.

Of course, the West has spent the last centuries keeping the ordinary people in servitude: from colonial rule, to maintaining control of oil and infrastructure, to supporting dictatorships to protect those interests, and most disgustingly, my arming, sheltering, funding extremists to stop democracy, to stop nationalists taking control. And now we are paying the price.

The people of Tunisia and Egypt are calling out for freedom right now – they don’t want theocracy, they don’t have beards. They want freedom, democracy, as well as affordable bread. Solidarity with all freedom fighters across the middle east.