[dvanduzer]

It is not difficult to discern whether a candidate for hate speech violates Mill's harm principle. Speech of the form

    "All <insert_ethnic_group> are inherently inferior to <insert_other_ethnic_group>"

does not exist in a vacuum without any corresponding systemic / institutional problem. I think you're saying speech like that merely causes offense, and not harm, which gives me the general impression that you are arguing in bad faith.

[austincheney]

> I think you're saying speech like that merely causes offense, and not harm, which gives me the general impression that you are arguing in bad faith.

It seems you understand the correct answer in accordance with Mill, but then willfully choose to ignore that answer since it differs with your personal value system.

To be very direct, hate speech does not violate the harm principle in the same immediacy or capacity as does yelling FIRE! in a crowded theater.

[yesenadam]

Well, no, it certainly might, in some circumstances. Just as yelling "FIRE!" in some circumstances might - e.g. yelling something virulently racist while standing between two ethnic groups heatedly confronting each other in the street.

[austincheney]

That is an invalid comparison. There is a world of difference between panic and anger.

[yesenadam]

Well, evidently I don't think it's invalid. Just asserting that doesn't achieve much. I haven't given this a great deal of thought, but it seems the specific emotions are so far irrelevant; what is relevant is whether an action causes harm, or may be predicted to do so/usually does so.

[austincheney]

> Well, evidently I don't think it's invalid.

Fortunately, courts in the US do not have trouble discerning this difference.

[yesenadam]

Maybe if you made your points on here without seeming offensively snarky in your every sentence, you might have more success. "Don't be snarky."

[dvanduzer]

I'd challenge you to find some specific emphasis about immediacy in Mill's explanation of the harm principle, but I don't think you're arguing in good faith either.

[austincheney]

In that case how would hate speech qualify as a valid exception to liberty according to Mill?

[dvanduzer]

I am having trouble with all the disembodied concepts in your question. The very notion of classifying hate speech differently from "regular" speech, is predicated on the idea that some speech does, in fact, cause harm.

If J.S. Mill were here right now, he might concede that it is hard to find philosophical justification to treat the crime of yelling "FIRE" in a crowded movie theater differently than the crime of yelling "FIRE" in a crowded movie theater with the intent of killing people of a specific ethnic background...

No writer in the 19th century could have conceived of what "speech" would mean 150 years later in the context of instant worldwide communication. But Mill would not have trouble classifying the expression of certain opinions in certain contexts as causing harm. There is no major logical twist required to "infringe" on liberty in the case of hate speech, and remain consistent with Mill's writings.

[austincheney]

> The very notion of classifying hate speech differently from "regular" speech, is predicated on the idea that some speech does, in fact, cause harm.

That completely ignores many of the concepts addressed in chapter 2. If you have to discern harm from context and then use that to classify speech in such a way that it can (or could be) silenced you are violating liberty, according to Mill. Harmful speech is not the same as offensive speech. The difference is the cause of injury. Does the speech itself produce the injury or does it manifest derivative responses that are injurious, such as a fist punch?

> If J.S. Mill were here right now, he might concede that it is hard to find philosophical justification to treat the crime of yelling "FIRE" in a crowded movie theater differently than the crime of yelling "FIRE" in a crowded movie theater with the intent of killing people of a specific ethnic background...

Not relevant. The intent is to kill people either way.

> But Mill would not have trouble classifying the expression of certain opinions in certain contexts as causing harm.

Mill's writing absolutely disagrees with this. Read chapter 4. He provides specific examples.

[dvanduzer]

> Not relevant. The intent is to kill people either way.

Exactly, when there was always intent to harm, it is easy to see how speech causes harm.

> The difference is the cause of injury. Does the speech itself produce the injury or does it manifest derivative responses that are injurious, such as a fist punch?

You are contradicting yourself. The word "FIRE" isn't causing direct injury, it manifests derivative responses that involve people getting hurt.

> Mill's writing absolutely disagrees with this. Read chapter 4. He provides specific examples.

Okay, I re-read chapter 4. None of the examples justify this reading. Mill is far more focused on private behavior than public speech in that chapter. He thinks polygamy is bad because it subjugates women, but at the time Mormons literally fled the country to the Utah desert, so he has a hard time justifying why an American would call for interference with the ostensibly consensual polygamy of the early Mormon Church.

Nowhere does Mill suggest that speech can't cause harm.