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>If Robin Hood steals from the rich to give to the poor, is that bad for society simply by virtue of theft being seen as generally wrong? It is. Theft causes h

>If Robin Hood steals from the rich to give to the poor, is that bad for society simply by virtue of theft being seen as generally wrong? It is. Theft causes harm to society because it deprives property from somebody that legally owns it. Humans can't survive without property in nature, which means that theft harms their survival. Furthermore, rampant theft in society means that individuals will spend a lot of effort on securing their property, effort that could've been used for better effect. Hate speech, on the other hand, is about being offended. Offense is taken, not given. Remember that speech that intimidates or harasses is already illegal and not part of hate speech laws. >that is why there are courts and judges and juries to settle cases and set precedents. This is still punishing. I imagine that most of us on this site agree that copyright law is not in a good spot right now, because justice is often only had when you spend a lot of money defending yourself. Courts, judges, and juries do not seem to make the process fair. And I believe many feel the same thing about hate speech laws in the UK, where a teenager was arrested and had to wear an ankle bracelet for quoting song lyrics on Instagram.

gitrog 7y ago
> Humans can't survive without property in nature This is a loaded statement. Humans can absolutely survive without property, they did so for hundreds of thousands of years before the concept of property was defined. What is speech that harasses covered under, if not hate speech? I would argue that the only reason why hate speech came into being was because so many harmful remarks didn't qualify as harassment in the same courts you question the fairness of. Let me be clear and say that I don't doubt that any of these things are tough to define once you really start looking at possible edge cases. My problem with your statements are more about how you think things are black and white, but hate speech is all grey. If I sing lyrics of a very violent song directly at a passer-by in the street, is that not threatening? Do you think that action should fall under harassment? > Courts, judges, and juries do not seem to make the process fair. If you don't trust courts, judges and juries (and I'm not saying I do), then you really can't rely on them, nor politicians, either to define what is lawful and what is not, and that includes theft, murder or whatever other offenses.

gitrog 7y ago

> Humans can't survive without property in nature This is a loaded statement. Humans can absolutely survive without property, they did so for hundreds of thousands of years before the concept of property was defined. What is speech that harasses covered under, if not hate speech? I would argue that the only reason why hate speech came into being was because so many harmful remarks didn't qualify as harassment in the same courts you question the fairness of. Let me be clear and say that I don't doubt that any of these things are tough to define once you really start looking at possible edge cases. My problem with your statements are more about how you think things are black and white, but hate speech is all grey. If I sing lyrics of a very violent song directly at a passer-by in the street, is that not threatening? Do you think that action should fall under harassment? > Courts, judges, and juries do not seem to make the process fair. If you don't trust courts, judges and juries (and I'm not saying I do), then you really can't rely on them, nor politicians, either to define what is lawful and what is not, and that includes theft, murder or whatever other offenses.