Britain to ban criticism of religion

[Gabu]

Even stirring up "hatred" should be legal, as one does not have an inherent right to be free of hate.

Maybe not (although a reverse arguement *could* be that you don't have a right to hate people either) but you do have to understand the context of all this; the 2001 riots scared the hell out of a lot of people and the Government has been looking to do something about this for a while.
Now you can argue that you should be able to say whatever you damn well please, and I'd be able to respect that.
But a lot of the opposition to the bill has been deeply hypocritical (especially from that **** Evan Harris) and some of the absurd claims on this thread have really pissed me off....

</rant>

If anyone is unfamiliar with what Al is talking about regarding the 2001 riots, I looked into it and found this page created by the BBC seems to be a pretty good overview.

Personally, I think it's a gray area with no simple solution.  It's very easy to say that inciting hatred should be legal while inciting violence should not be, but the problem I see with this assertion is that it's not really that simple.  Every bout of violence like this comes directly from hatred.  Even if inciting hatred does not immediately create any sort of violence, it seems to me that, at the very least, it makes the atmosphere more conducive to violence, and at worse, it could completely set the stage for a violent confrontation at a later time.  The issue that I see here is that inciting hatred may well be inciting violence at a later date, even if we don't know it yet.

I'm not saying that we should ban all expression of hatred or anything stupid like that, but what I am saying is that if we really want to prevent violence, we simply must come to terms with the fact that hatred leads to violence, and that acting otherwise, by making the direct incitement of violence illegal while completely ignoring the very possible indirect incitement of violence through the incitement of hatred, is being very naive.

[Gabu]

Personally, I think it's a gray area with no simple solution.  It's very easy to say that inciting hatred should be legal while inciting violence should not be, but the problem I see with this assertion is that it's not really that simple.  Every bout of violence like this comes directly from hatred.  Even if inciting hatred does not immediately create any sort of violence, it seems to me that, at the very least, it makes the atmosphere more conducive to violence, and at worse, it could completely set the stage for a violent confrontation at a later time.  The issue that I see here is that inciting hatred may well be inciting violence at a later date, even if we don't know it yet.

I subscribe to the view that in circumstances like this, expression should be free unless it actually poses a "clear and present danger." Speculation about the remote effects of an action are not, in my opinion, sufficient grounds for restricting the civil liberties of the People.

I would agree with that.  All I'm saying is that so far, people seem to be acting as if the incitement of hatred and the incitement of violence are two completely divorced subjects, and I'm just saying that they really aren't.  It seems to me that there are many cases where it would be unsure if it was actually an incitement of violence, or simply an incitement of hatred that led to violence.

For example, a guy could go to a KKK rally and spend an hour ranting and raving about this black family and how evil this family was and how everyone present should despise that family.  Nowhere does he make any call to action about it, he simply says how horrible this family is.  However, a week or so later, a group of people present at the rally go and murder this family.  Was that a direct incitement of violence or merely an incitement of hatred?