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Criminalize racist and bigoted words?

Should racist and bigoted words be outlawed?

  • Total voters
    90
joko104 said:
On another thread it has been brought up that some schools are taking punitive actions students they discover use the "N" word on the Internet. If young people should be punished for using racist or bigoted words, obviously adults should.

Should racist and bigoted words and expressions be outlawed?
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of course not. schools that do that should be hit with 42 USC S 1983 civil lawsuits for the deprivation of constitutional rights under the color of state law.
 
rocket88 said:
The real issue here is that people don't want to be called out for what they say. Nowheree in the
Constitution are you guaranteed no consequences for your free speech.
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If someone punches you in the face for merely using a term they don't like they will go to jail and you should sue them. If my son were to tell a joke and some adult took offense and punched him I would kill the adult and I doubt I would be charged
 
joko104 said:
On another thread it has been brought up that some schools are taking punitive actions students they discover use the "N" word on the Internet. If young people should be punished for using racist or bigoted words, obviously adults should.

Should racist and bigoted words and expressions be outlawed?
Click to expand...

Your comparison is a fail.

Adults would be "punished" if they agreed to a Code of Conduct at work, as an example. And that'd be up to and including firing. Policemen and firemen routinely sign Code of Conduct agreements for their actions on and off the job. If your boss called you a nigger, I'd venture to guess his ass would be grass like...immediately. Adults could be fired sans contract for using "nigger" at work. Adults would be thrown out of the library book club for calling someone a kike. Adults are punished.

Have we really gone stark raving mad??
 
rocket88 said:
The real issue here is that people don't want to be called out for what they say. Nowheree in the
Constitution are you guaranteed no consequences for your free speech.
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Yep, you issue it you own it where speech is concerned. I have no problem with hateful words being punished socially, but legally no freakin' way, rights are too important to just hand back and even words we don't like must be protected. That said if a racist got punched in the face for calling the wrong guy the N word I won't shed a tear.
 
Dion said:
Words themselves cannot be outlawed yet if a citizens is using those words to incite violence, criminal activity, harm, harass or create injustice to other citizens it can be against the law. i would say it needs to be considered on a case by case basis.
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If someone corners a person using slurs and threatening language it becomes fighting words, the potential victim has every right to fight back or stop that agression against them. Speech has a very precise circle of protection, hate speech with no other harm but to cause anger is protected, hate speech that seeks to induce harm through various degrees of violence, introduces a public endangerment or defamation may be restricted.
 
joko104 said:
On another thread it has been brought up that some schools are taking punitive actions students they discover use the "N" word on the Internet. If young people should be punished for using racist or bigoted words, obviously adults should.

Should racist and bigoted words and expressions be outlawed?
Click to expand...

Nigga, please.
 
joko104 said:
When did statutory mandatory school attendance by children become statutory mandatory whole-life political correctness by children?

What possible justification is there for a school to punish a student for in his/her private life being a bigot? Lots of people claim religions are bigoted, so that also therefore punishable. It certainly is not illegal to have and express prejudices - though a school could do so within school as a matter of maintaining order.

Just how far do you think schools are allowed to go to monitor and punish wrongful thoughts and views of students in their private lives? Suspend a student for posting on Facebook she doesn't find fat boys attractive? Or he thinks Islam is a stupid religion? Or he doesn't like "Mexican" gangs? Or that he doesn't think the USA should have a black man, ie a "N" as president? Oh yes, a student saying that definitely should be thrown out of chess club or the basketball team, ridiculed to everyone else in school also inviting harassment and attack for it, and required to do community service.

Maybe, really, children should just be totally raised by schools in child rearing government centers for the good of the nation - constantly under audio and video surveillance to do the best possible job of preventing prohibited thinking, questioning and conversations.
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Sorry, but if you participate in extracurricular activities, such as playing on a sports team, you are a representative of your school. If you then go online and advertise your school affiliation while at the same time bringing discredit upon your school, your school has every right to take action in showing that the student does not in fact represent the school's position or values.

I don't think they should be expelled because they are entitled to an education. But kicking them off a sports team is certainly justified. If you are going to go online and say stupid stuff like that then don't affiliate yourself with your school.
 
joko104 said:
On another thread it has been brought up that some schools are taking punitive actions students they discover use the "N" word on the Internet. If young people should be punished for using racist or bigoted words, obviously adults should.
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Good lord what an overreaction.

1. The school did not "punish" the students, they suspended them from a sport team that the school sponsored for violating a conduct pledge the students signed in order to participate on that team.
2. The school in that OP was a PRIVATE school, for crying out loud.
3. Adults face consequences for things they say everyday. I certainly could be fired from my job for making a racist comment or even face legal consequences if a coworker or employee felt I was making the office into a hostile work environment.
 
Sarcogito said:
Sorry, but if you participate in extracurricular activities, such as playing on a sports team, you are a representative of your school. If you then go online and advertise your school affiliation while at the same time bringing discredit upon your school, your school has every right to take action in showing that the student does not in fact represent the school's position or values.

I don't think they should be expelled because they are entitled to an education. But kicking them off a sports team is certainly justified. If you are going to go online and say stupid stuff like that then don't affiliate yourself with your school.
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If that's the context sure. I don't know that it was the case this time, but everything done as a representative of an extra curricular is fair game. If for instance a quarterback for a majority white school said something like "we're gonna take those N words down" towards a majority black school in any capacity he should be released from the team and disciplined. If he says "I don't like N words" as himself, not so sure that is the schools business.

In neither case am I condoning that BTW.
 
CriticalThought said:
Good lord what an overreaction.

1. The school did not "punish" the students, they suspended them from a sport team that the school sponsored for violating a conduct pledge the students signed in order to participate on that team.
2. The school in that OP was a PRIVATE school, for crying out loud.
3. Adults face consequences for things they say everyday. I certainly could be fired from my job for making a racist comment or even face legal consequences if a coworker or employee felt I was making the office into a hostile work environment.
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So a pledge was signed. No issue then, if they violated a contract the students are in the wrong, period.
 
LaMidRighter said:
If that's the context sure. I don't know that it was the case this time, but everything done as a representative of an extra curricular is fair game. If for instance a quarterback for a majority white school said something like "we're gonna take those N words down" towards a majority black school in any capacity he should be released from the team and disciplined. If he says "I don't like N words" as himself, not so sure that is the schools business.

In neither case am I condoning that BTW.
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well if the football captain of a mostly white school posts something on his face book page noting that that Carmel Indiana (a mainly white school near Indy) is playing "Crispus Attucks (a historically all black school-Oscar Robertson is perhaps its most famous member, I know its not still a HS) and stated we are going to "kick some nigger ass tomorrow" then I can see the school sanctioning that activity since the student is representing his school and making racist comments.

On the other hand if the student uses an anonymous handle-say Hamster and makes similar comments in general, its hard to see how the school has any legitimate right
 
TurtleDude said:
well if the football captain of a mostly white school posts something on his face book page noting that that Carmel Indiana (a mainly white school near Indy) is playing "Crispus Attucks (a historically all black school-Oscar Robertson is perhaps its most famous member, I know its not still a HS) and stated we are going to "kick some nigger ass tomorrow" then I can see the school sanctioning that activity since the student is representing his school and making racist comments.

On the other hand if the student uses an anonymous handle-say Hamster and makes similar comments in general, its hard to see how the school has any legitimate right
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Right, if there is a degree of seperation it's out of the schools responsibility IMO. Apparently there was a conduct code signed though, so that would actually put the school in the right.
 
joko104 said:
On another thread it has been brought up that some schools are taking punitive actions students they discover use the "N" word on the Internet. If young people should be punished for using racist or bigoted words, obviously adults should.

Should racist and bigoted words and expressions be outlawed?
Click to expand...

Freedom of speech. Not freedom from being offended.

Besides, as far as I'm concerned if a group of people want to call themselves something then it is stupid, hypocritical, and bigoted for them to cry foul when someone that they don't condone says it.
 
I think the contract idea was more of a guess.

Parents who were reporting what they saw other students posting on the interwebz began calling the school trying to find ways to get the students in trouble for using a word they didn't like.

What kind of worthless **** is that..........
 
Kal'Stang said:
Freedom of speech. Not freedom from being offended.
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It's also not "freedom from repercussions" from what you chose to say.

The idea behind freedom of speech isn't that you have the freedom to say whatever you want and never have to face any consequences from anyone for saying it.
 
Caine said:
I think the contract idea was more of a guess.

Parents who were reporting what they saw other students posting on the interwebz began calling the school trying to find ways to get the students in trouble for using a word they didn't like.

What kind of worthless **** is that..........
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It's called freedom of speech. You know...that principle where people have the right to voice their opinion about something. Oh wait! You only cared about freedom of speech when it related to students being allowed to use racial epithets, not when it is used to inform school officials of how those epithets affected people who read them.
 
Kandahar said:
You have some strange ideas on education. Fortunately you don't have any power to enact them.
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Says the one person in this thread so far who is defending the idea that an educational institution should be granted power over the lives of its clients even when they are on their own time, on their own property, and completely outside of any reasonable vestige of that institution's jurisdiction.
 
CriticalThought said:
It's also not "freedom from repercussions" from what you chose to say.

The idea behind freedom of speech isn't that you have the freedom to say whatever you want and never have to face any consequences from anyone for saying it.
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Except that this thread is talking about consequences coming from the government. The 1st Amendment was made specifically to keep the government from enacting laws that punished people for expressing free speech. And yes, that includes offensive speech. As such the question that this thread puts forth is meaningless. Unless we're talking about a Constitutional Amendment? Something which I would still be against because it guts the very reason that free speech was put in the 1st Amendment.
 
Of course not. People who get offended by them should be encouraged to grow the hell up.
 
joko104 said:
On another thread it has been brought up that some schools are taking punitive actions students they discover use the "N" word on the Internet. If young people should be punished for using racist or bigoted words, obviously adults should.

Should racist and bigoted words and expressions be outlawed?
Click to expand...


If the "N word" were criminalized, there would be a lotta black folks in jail for using it... just sayin'.
 
Kal'Stang said:
Except that this thread is talking about consequences coming from the government. The 1st Amendment was made specifically to keep the government from enacting laws that punished people for expressing free speech. And yes, that includes offensive speech.
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And yet the limitation on free speech didn't come from the government, but from the students themselves. Assuming the students had gone to a public school, when they signed the conduct pledge in order to participate in the sports activities they constrained their own rights to speak freely. They accepted the role as public representatives of their school and the responsibilities that came with it. They had the choice to not sign that pledge and even to take the school to court if they felt it somehow violated their rights, but they chose of their own free will to comply and have only themselves to blame for their poor choice in how they practiced their free speech.
 
CriticalThought said:
And yet the limitation on free speech didn't come from the government, but from the students themselves. Assuming the students had gone to a public school, when they signed the conduct pledge in order to participate in the sports activities they constrained their own rights to speak freely. They accepted the role as public representatives of their school and the responsibilities that came with it. They had the choice to not sign that pledge and even to take the school to court if they felt it somehow violated their rights, but they chose of their own free will to comply and have only themselves to blame for their poor choice in how they practiced their free speech.
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Except the OP is about making a law to punish adults free speech. Yes the OP got the idea from that other thread but the OP boils down to making it against the law to say racist, bigoted words for everyone.
 
joko104 said:
On another thread it has been brought up that some schools are taking punitive actions students they discover use the "N" word on the Internet. If young people should be punished for using racist or bigoted words, obviously adults should.

Should racist and bigoted words and expressions be outlawed?
Click to expand...

That's just a bandaid for a deep underlying issue. Instead of banning words, why don't we just ****ing talk about it like adults? Open up the dialogue on race that we've been avoiding for over 300 years. We have done nothing to fix the problem, we just ignore it like it doesn't exist, and sweep it under the carpet and put bandaids over gaping wounds, hoping it never arises again.

So we make some words illegal, what does that do? If you throw a peckerwood in jail for calling a guy a nigger, the dumb honkey isn't going to learn anything. He's not going to magically see the light and not be racist anymore. It's just going to reaffirm his beliefs. This isn't something that can just be legislated away, we have to actually put forth real effort as individuals, which means it's never going to happen.
 
Bob Blaylock said:
Says the one person in this thread so far who is defending the idea that an educational institution should be granted power over the lives of its clients even when they are on their own time, on their own property, and completely outside of any reasonable vestige of that institution's jurisdiction.
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Well I think that students bullying each other (including off-campus bullying) *does* fall under the school's jurisdiction. And frankly I think that the idea that schools shouldn't care what happens to their students after the final bell rings, is nothing more than a holdover from the old assembly-line model of education. That notion is no longer the world we live in, and our education systems need to be much more holistic than that in order to succeed.
 
Kandahar said:
Well I think that students bullying each other (including off-campus bullying) *does* fall under the school's jurisdiction. And frankly I think that the idea that schools shouldn't care what happens to their students after the final bell rings, is nothing more than a holdover from the old assembly-line model of education. That notion is no longer the world we live in, and our education systems need to be much more holistic than that in order to succeed.
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If an institution, such as a school, can claim jurisdiction over a client's life when that client is not on the institution's property, and not under that institution's supervision or control, then what jurisdiction can that institution not claim?

I just do not see any rational basis for allowing such an institution such broad authority over things that happen outside of its own territory.
 
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