Agreed!

Therefore what is hate speech? Are words violence in and of themselves?

Not a lawyer or a linguist, just Yet Another Internet Spectator.

Sometimes hate speech can be done with a smile and a calm voice, but it's still toxic. I'd posit that that kind of speech has been quite effective in ramping up the political divide and I only see it getting worse.

I recognize that real censorship is a dangerous thing, but would counter that there's a lot of speech that, while legal, should not be celebrated.

I wonder if their evaluation of the "escalating risk" had anything to do with the legal standard of imminent action is. Probably not.

I suppose who ever put such a law in US court system is holding their breath for the guy who got on International TV / web streaming / a huge crowd of people in Ferguson (?) and said 'burn this bitch down' - burn this mutherfucker down.. [1]

I dunno, maybe he was arrested for this and it is a real thing, if so I missed the news about it.

Or maybe it's technically possible to have to go to court for such a thing, but maybe only a few ever have, and the outcome of such a thing is anyone's guess, even those really into speech law [2]

[1] - https://www.cnn.com/2014/11/25/us/michael-brown-stepfather-v... [2] - Imminent lawless action test still being fleshed out - https://www.mtsu.edu/first-amendment/article/970/incitement-...

Pretty sure calls for acts of violence is legal in the United States unless that call for violence is intended to produce an imminent lawless action.

Not entirely sure you’re correct on this one?

Where does it specifically say in the US Constitution that you’re allowed to incite violence? :-)

Usually the answer here is going to be someone cites the 1st Amendment, and a persons right to free speech. From that we have Brandenburg vs. Ohio, and also then Hess vs. Indiana, and subsequent cases which use those precedents from the Supreme Court, these hold that 1A protection does disappear where someone is calling for “imminent violence”.

Many of the internet hellholes hiding behind Cloudflare have significant quantities of unmoderated and extreme discourse where participants do call for imminent violence against another party and that is not 1A protected behavior.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/True_threat

[2] https://www.supremecourt.gov/DocketPDF/20/20-1459/198236/202...

https://www.mtsu.edu/first-amendment/article/1025/true-threa...

https://mtsu.edu/first-amendment/article/970/incitement-to-i...

Wasn't aware, thank you. That said, this message [1] sounds an awful lot like "the speaker mean[t] to communicate a serious expression of an intent to commit an act of unlawful violence to a particular individual" [2].

Aside: And with that tweet read, I'm out. Happy Labor Day weekend folks.

[1] https://twitter.com/keffals/status/1566153033586810885

[2] https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/538/343/case.pdf

You mean lawless violence. :-)

I would bet calls for killing some private citizen (e.g. agitating, “kill Rodney Dangerfield”) would not survive as protected speech in the courts anymore.

Which websites are you referring to, in what numbers are you talking about, and how are you determining that those calls for violence are imminent? Wouldn't that suggest that a lot of violence has already occurred stemming from those websites? (presumably not stopped by a slow legal system like Cloudflare implies would have happened in this case)

>Under Texas law, any threat of violence to either person or property can be the basis of a terroristic threat charge. However, that threat of violence must be accompanied with criminal intent to either follow through with the threat or terrify another into believing you may do so. There are six specific types of intent covered by Texas law, and the prosecutor only needs to prove you had one of them to obtain a conviction.

cause a reaction of any type to his threat by an official or volunteer agency organized to deal with emergencies;

place any person in fear of imminent serious bodily injury;

prevent or interrupt the occupation or use of a building, room, place of assembly, place to which the public has access, place of employment or occupation, aircraft, automobile, or other forms of conveyance, or other public places;

cause impairment or interruption of public communications, public transportation, public water, gas, or power supply or other public services;

place the public or a substantial group of the public in fear of serious bodily injury; or influence the conduct or activities of a branch or agency of the federal government, the state, or a political subdivision of the state.

So it’s fine to call for violence, as long as the violence in question would be legal if it were acted upon?

That makes so much sense, it seems like it would go without saying. If the violent act itself was legal (like a war, or an organized boxing match), why wouldn’t it be legal to solicit or petition for it?

No. It's fine to call for violence as long as your call is not designed to provoke and cause imminent lawless action. Brandenburg advocated for "revengeance" against the government if their demands were not met, and that was protected speech. Hess v. Indiana also affirms that advocating for lawless action is protected speech.