The Daily Signal - #527: The Rise of 'Hate Speech' Policing in Europe

Episode Date: August 16, 2019

Free speech is increasingly under attack on college campuses -- but if you think it’s bad here, look across the pond to Europe. Authorities over there are increasingly cracking down on so-called “hate speech” -- a label that’s been applied to speech critical of Islam, homosexuality, and more. Paul Coleman, a British attorney who’s had a front row seat to this concerning trend, explains the origin of these hate speech laws and give his assessment about the future of free speech. We also cover these stories:•President Donald Trump says Reps. Ilhan Omar and Rashida Tlaib should not be allowed to visit Israel. •Hundreds of Chinese paramilitary forces gathered for drills in Shenzhen on Thursday, just across the border from Hong Kong. •Reports about the autopsy of Jeffrey Epstein find a curious fact about the condition of his body.The Daily Signal podcast is available on Ricochet, iTunes, SoundCloud, Google Play, or Stitcher. All of our podcasts can be found at DailySignal.com/podcasts. If you like what you hear, please leave a review. You can also leave us a message at 202-608-6205 or write us at [e-mail]. Enjoy the show! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This is the Daily Signal podcast for Friday, August 16th. I'm Kate Trinko. And I'm Daniel Davis. Free speech is increasingly under attack on college campuses, but if you think it's bad here, look across the pond to Europe. Authorities over there are increasingly cracking down on so-called hate speech, a label that's been applied to speech critical of Islam, homosexuality, and more. Today, I'll speak with Paul Coleman, a British attorney who's had a front row seat to this concerning trend. He'll explain the origin of these hate speech laws and give his assessment about the future of free speech. And if you're enjoying this podcast, please be sure to leave a review or a five-star rating on iTunes and please subscribe. Now on to our top news. Will representatives Ilan Omar and Rashida Talib be able to visit Israel as they had planned to this weekend?

It looks unlikely with reports emerging that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu won't allow the Democratic Congress. Congresswoman to enter the country. President Trump tweeted Thursday, quote, It would show great weakness if Israel allowed Representative Omar and Representative Talib to visit. They hate Israel and all Jewish people and there is nothing that can be said or done to change their minds. Well, hundreds of Chinese paramilitary forces gathered for drills in Shenzhen on Thursday right across the border from Hong Kong. Men in fatigues were seen in the Shenzhen Bay Sports Center, according to Reuters. And a drill there was carried out with some men dressed in black clothes similar to the Hong Kong protesters. The editor of a state-run newspaper People's Daily said the drill was a clear warning to rioters in Hong Kong.

That drill comes in the wake of intensifying protests in Hong Kong, where pro-democracy protesters shut down the city's airport for two days. An unnamed senior Western envoy told Reuters that the drills were more posturing than a sign of eminent action from China. quote, we are seeing an escalation in the posturing that appears designed to send messages to both Hong Kong and the mainland. But we are confident we are still in the realms of propaganda here. The trucks aren't about to roll at this point. A shooting standoff Wednesday night between Philadelphia police and alleged shooter Maurice Hill ended with six police officers wounded. All are now released from the hospital and the prognosis is good.

President Trump tweeted, quote, the Philadelphia shooter should never have been allowed to be on the streets. He had a long and very dangerous criminal record. Looked like he was having a good time after his capture and after wounding so many police. Long sentence must get much tougher on street crime. Congressman Steve King is facing new calls to resign after making controversial remarks relating to rape and incest. Top Democrats and some Republicans, including the number three House Republican, Liz Cheney, are calling on him to step down.

The Iowa Republican isn't alone in believing abortion should be banned in all cases, including for rape and incest, but on Wednesday he had defended his view in a highly unusual way, telling the Des Moines Register, quote, we know the reasons why we don't accept exceptions, most of us for rape and incest, because it's not the baby's fault.

But I certainly wonder about this. What if we went back through all the family trees and just pulled those people out who was a product of rape and incest? Would there be any population of the world left if we did that? Considering all the wars and all the rapes and pillages that happened throughout all these different nations, I know that I can't certify that I was not a part of a product of that, end quote. Well, it's not the first time King's words have backfired on him. Earlier this year, House Republicans stripped him of his committee assignments

after he questioned whether white supremacy and white nationalism were negative terms. Is it possible that Jeffrey Epstein was murdered and didn't die by suicide? The Washington Post citing unnamed sources is reporting that one of the bones broken in Epstein's neck area is more common with people who are murdered via strangulation, although not impossible, especially in an older person, for someone who dies by suicide via hanging. A seized Iranian oil tanker is now free to set sail after British Marines had seized and impounded the ship in the British territory of Gibraltar. The tanker was allegedly transporting oil to Syria and therefore in violation, of European Union sanctions. The Supreme Court in Gibraltar approved its release after local authorities said they no longer

wanted to detain it. Gibraltar's chief minister said he had received assurances from Iran that if released, the tanker would not bring its cargo to Syria. That decision comes despite a last-minute legal effort by the U.S. to block the tanker's release. John Hickenlooper, former Colorado governor and Denver mayor, is dropping out of the crowded Democratic presidential field. Hickenlooper hadn't.

made much of a splash, but had become perhaps best known for his opposition to socialism. The New Yorker reported in July, quote, what seemed to spook him about socialism was an implied passivity and quoted Hickenlooper as saying, that rut of thinking that government's going to solve all our problems. Well, up next, I'll speak to attorney Paul Coleman about the rise of hate speech laws in Europe. Tired of high taxes, fewer health care choices, and bigger government, become a part of the Heritage Foundation. We're fighting the rising tide of homegrown socialism while developing conservative solutions

that make families more free and more prosperous. Find out more at heritage.org. Well, we are joined now over the phone by Paul Coleman. He serves as executive director of ADF International, which is the international branch of the Religious Liberty Law Firm Alliance Defending Freedom. He's also author of the book Censored, how European hate speech laws are threatening freedom of speech. Paul, thanks for joining us over the phone.

Thank you very much for having me on the show. So, Paul, you write in your book about the rise of hate speech laws in Europe. Those words hate speech in quotes throughout the book. First off, is hate speech something that can actually be defined? Well, I put hate speech in quotes throughout the book and a lot of other people writing on the issue of hate speech do the same because we don't accept. that the term itself is understood or definable. And when it comes to deciding what is hate speech and what should be considered free speech, the reality is that that is a line that is impossible to draw. And so we see a lot of people talking about hate speech, but when we actually press them on what they mean by it,

then they come up with all sorts of different definitions. And a lot of the time, these definitions are circular in nature. So hate speech is speech that is hateful and so forth. And so one of the biggest problems with hate speech laws is we're trying to criminalize something that we can't even define. Right. So what kind of speech restrictions are actually being passed in Europe? Well, we have laws that ban criminalize things like insult, things like offense, things like wounding religious feelings, all these sorts of terms. And every country in Europe has adopted criminal hate speech. provisions. They don't all call them hate speech laws, but that is what they are. And to varying

degrees, they all criminalize what people can and can't say. So, you know, in particular, there's a controversy these days over speech against Islam, speech against LGBT activity. What kinds of penalties are we seeing for speech on those matters? Well, we have, so in Europe, it's about 800 million people. and obviously the speech that these people create each and every day is huge, particularly when we think of the digital age and we think of how much speech is uploaded every minute, every second to YouTube, to Twitter, Facebook and so forth. And so when it comes to policing speech of this many people, of course, it's impossible

to do that well or accurately. And so the law enforcement agencies across Europe often zoom in on politically, charged topics and we see that in particular with the issues that you've mentioned and so we see for example pastors from churches or even Catholic cardinals and bishops being investigated by the police for homilies or sermons that talk about the biblical view of sexuality and homosexuality and that sort of thing we see politicians members of the media investigated by the police arrested and find for speaking about issues such as immigration or radical Islam. And we often see these politically charged topics.

These are the things that form the subjects of police complaints and investigation. And although we see people arrested and sometimes imprisoned, the reality is a lot of the time, what we're seeing is police arresting and investigating these people. and then the cases don't really go anywhere. But in many ways, the process of the whole thing is the punishment. And for everyone else looking on, they see what's happening. And then they self-censor themselves for fear of the same thing happening to them.

Yeah, you mentioned in the book, in your home country of Great Britain, there's a long history of public preaching on streets. And you note that in recent years, more and more street preachers are being arrested almost routinely. Can you expound on why the change? Why was this something that was accepted for so long and now suddenly is, was there a law that was passed or was there some legal change? I think what we see with the increased censorship and the use of hate speech laws in Europe and the UK and elsewhere is just part of a wider trend that we see across the West of what people would have referred to as, for example, political correctness or just this increased sensitivity of what we can and can't say. So in the past, in the very recent past, it was generally accepted that people would say things that we didn't like to hear, that we disagreed with, that we found offensive, and they had every right to do so. And there's been a change even in the last few years where now it's essentially being said that I don't like this or this offends me.

And therefore, it should not be allowed. Therefore, it should be banned. And so with the street preachers, with this long tradition of street preaching in the UK, we do see, street preachers routinely arrested by the police. And this is because of an oversensitivity on behalf of the police and the public, that they hear something that they think is offensive or they subjectively think others don't want to hear. And then their knee-jerk reaction is, well, therefore, it must be illegal. Therefore, we have to do something. And in all of these cases, these street preachers, they are released sometime later.

if they're charged, they are ultimately acquitted. Many of them have sued the police successfully for wrongful arrest. And so as I say, it's rare that these hate speech cases lead to people actually doing real jail time. But for everyone else looking on, they fear that getting dragged to the court, they fear police knocking at their door. And so there's an increased culture of censorship in Europe as a result. What about the use of transgender pronouns? That's something that's been increasingly under debate here in North America and Canada actually passed a law requiring people to use transgender pronouns.

It's something that a psychologist Jordan Peterson was very publicly upset about. Are you seeing a similar trend in Europe and are people suffering legal penalties yet for refusing to participate in those pronouns? Well, interestingly enough, Europe has not yet, at least not on mass, gone down that route. I'm sure it will follow, and I'm sure this will come. But for whatever reason right now, we're not seeing a lot of cases on that issue. Now, certainly, talking about issues of transgenderism, gender identity,

these sorts of topics is highly controversial. We're seeing people what they're saying, taken off social media, no platformed, and what have you. But as of yet, we've not seen, or at least I've not seen criminal investigations and that sort of thing for using the wrong pronoun. But it's something that's a bit of an outlier in Europe. I expect Europe will soon catch up with Canada and elsewhere if the current trends continue. So is there a country in Europe that's more open to free speech on these issues that kind of stands out? And if so, what are they doing right and what are they doing differently? I don't think there's any country in Europe or indeed outside the US in the West that stands out as now having a strong, robust defence of freedom of speech.

Interestingly, as we look at the last century, the 20th century, the position of the US, many countries in Europe was quite similar. But over the course of the 20th century, the US went in a direction more and more in favour of freedom of speech. in case law developed by the US Supreme Court, and countries in Europe went in the exact opposite direction, going more and more in favor of censorship. And so today, as we look across the entire continent, then there are very few examples of few people speaking out in defense of freedom of speech.

And even countries like my own from the UK, which has had a long tradition of free speech, we have the government at the moment which is meant to be a conservative government, which for years has been trying to introduce the concept of, extremism and they've been trying to ban what they consider to be this incredibly vague term of extremism. And if we look across other countries and think, or who else is trying to do this, well, the closest comparator to what the Conservative Party in the UK are trying to do is Russia.

Russia is the other country that is banning and has successfully banned extremism and religious extremism. And the UK is wanting to go in that direction. So, It's bizarre and unfortunately we have no good model, no good country to look at in Europe. Well, speaking of Russia, you write in the book that these laws, a lot of these hate speech laws in Europe originated with Soviet influence during the Cold War. Can you explain that? Sure. Well, I have to go back in time a little bit. To the end of the Second World War and really the beginnings of what we now have as the international human rights legal landscape, which now underpins a lot of the

legal traditions of countries around the world. And so we have the Universal Declaration of Human Rights that was adopted in 1948, and then a number of other international treaties that the majority of the countries of the world have signed and ratified and lucked to follow. And as these treaties were being negotiated, the world really divided into two very clear lines. We had on the one hand, the countries

with a more Western liberal tradition of free speech, And then on the other hand, we have the Soviet-led countries that were pushing for concepts such as incitement to discrimination and incitement to hatred. And when it came to the votes on what these treaties would say about issues of freedom of speech, it was the Soviet side of things that won out. And so what we have now is an international legal framework, international treaties that many countries have signed and ratified that really creates the internationalization. of hate speech codes. And so what happened, this was all in there from the 40s through to the 60s. And then these countries then started to adopt these provisions at the national level. So one by one countries in Europe and then also places like Canada, Australia and so forth,

started adopting the principles of these treaties into their own criminal codes. And that's really, you can draw a straight line from where we are today back to that time. And so you see the influence of the Soviet Union, the influence of this totalitarian ideology and the role of the state in controlling the speech fit citizens adopted successfully at the international level and then trickled down to all these other countries at the national level. That's remarkable if that ideological influence continues even after the fall of the Soviet Union. You write that hate speech crimes often don't require a victim. in order to be prosecuted.

And that seems odd to a lot of people because you usually have to have standing to sue somebody in court for damages. How is hate speech being treated differently? Hate speech is an outlier's different to a lot of the normal ways that the criminal law operates. And one of the ways you mention is in terms of the lack of a victim. So, of course, there are some laws and some cases

in which someone has been insulted or offended and they are the victim, so to speak, of that speech. But a lot of the laws do not require any victim at all. And so what's happening is people are being prosecuted by the state on behalf of non-existent or hypothetical victims. So we had a situation recently here in Austria where a professor had delivered a series of lectures on Islam and she had given remarks that were considered to be offensive to Muslims.

There were no offended people present, no offended Muslims present, and nevertheless there was a undercover reporter present, and she submitted a complaint to the public prosecutor, and this lady was criminally convicted. Her convictions were upheld throughout the Austrian legal system, And then the European Court of Human Rights said that Austria was well within its rights to do so. And in that whole scenario, there was not any single person who was coming forward and saying, I'm a Muslim, and I was offended by what I heard.

It was all hypothetical victims, and the state was acting on their behalf. And so it really is a remarkable way for the criminal law to operate. Well, some of the examples you cite in the book are pretty surreal. You compare some of them to medieval cases, even though they're happening in 21st century Europe. You note one case in Sweden, where a pastor was on trial for preaching from the Bible against homosexuality in his own church pulpit, not even outside. And you say the judge told him to use a different Bible. Is that kind of dismissive attitude toward traditional religion or traditional Christianity becoming more common among the judges in Western Europe? I would say that there is a mentality that we see across Europe and elsewhere of, you can have free speech, but, and it's always that but that is the big problem.

And so in this case, for example, they would have said, oh, you can, we have no problem with you preaching from the Bible. We have no problem at all, but not this part of the Bible, or don't say that. And so we see this mentality and attitude play out in a number of different ways and different cases across Europe and elsewhere, where they want to create two clean categories. One is everything that you are allowed to say, and you can have your nice bits of the Bible, you can have your nice things to say on issues of immigration and what have you. And then there is the other category of these are the things that you are not allowed to say. And so these are the parts of the Bible that you're not allowed to preach on. These are the things about immigration. You're not allowed to point out.

The problem, of course, is who gets to decide what falls in which category and where do we draw the line? And these are the two major questions when it comes to free speech and hate speech that are unanswerable. So when it comes to who gets to draw the line between one and the other, the reality is that it's those in power and people who are not accountable, sort of subjectively deciding what falls where. And how we draw this line is not like there are clean categories. It's inherently gray and blurry as to what is allowed in one and what is not allowed in the other. And so sometimes what I do when I'm speaking on this issue is put a bunch of text upon the screen, things that people have said and ask people to categorize them.

Can you put these into two categories, one being what was upheld as being free speech and one that was prosecuted as hate speech. And no one has ever successfully divided that list correctly. And that just shows there is, it's impossible to draw the line between what is considered free speech and hate speech and what goes in one category or the other. And we see this attitude playing out from the judges, but also from politicians, from tech companies, and really across the board. That's remarkable.

So is there popular pushback in these countries to any of these hate speech laws or are they generally backed by the public? I think that, well, one of the things that I try and do in my work is create opposition to the idea of hate speech laws, but there is not much of movement in that direction at the moment it has to be said. I think that at the moment at least there's a feeling or there's an idea that if you support, the abolition of hate speech laws, then you must somehow support hate speech, which is obviously nonsense. There's a big difference between saying, I think this ought to be allowed. I think this ought to be legal and saying, I agree with this. But unfortunately, they are blurred at the moment.

And so we don't see much movement towards repealing or reforming these laws or indeed people speaking out in favor of a free speech at the popular level. And so I think we've got a long way to go in Europe. And I mean, one of the concerning things really is when we look at the US, which has a very strong legal tradition protecting freedom of speech. But if we look at the movement taking place on college campuses with tomorrow's leaders and we see movement taking place within big powerful tech companies, then it has to be said that they're moving closer and closer towards this European mentality

than the other way around at the moment. Right. Well, to that point, some might argue, I guess they do argue, that banning certain types of speech creates a better, more polite, more tolerant, state of affairs in society. Why is it so important to defend the principle of free speech when it can be so badly abused? Well, I think that the problem with banning certain types of speech

is there is no way to, properly draw the line and so what happens is this shrinking dictionary just keeps on shrinking and it gives those in power the ability to restrict the speech of that it doesn't want to hear it prevents people from being able to speak out on important and public issues and so I think that the person who I think said it best is it a US scholar who said that it's not that we, I'll paraphrase, but he said that we recognize that speech causes harm. It's not harmless, but we fear the censorship more. And I think that's an accurate way of putting it. It's the idea that, yes, we recognize that speech can be painful.

Yes, we recognize that speech can be offensive and insulting. But the idea of going down the root of censorship is far worse, and especially when that censorship is backed and enforced by the criminal law. Well, in your book, despite all the negative trends, you do have cause for hope, and you write that in Europe, some of these laws could be rolled back. Explain why you have cause for hope there. Well, I wrote the book in 2016, and maybe I was feeling more hopeful then than 2019 when things continue to trend in a negative direction.

Who knows? But it is possible to see these laws reformed. And we've seen, for example, in the UK, there was a criminal law that banned insulting speech, which was obviously ridiculous. And there was a very broad-based campaign to reform that law that was backed by, for example, a conservative Christian organization

from the National Secular Society in the UK and a number of other prominent people who would otherwise be ideological opponents. And so we saw hope there that people can come together and start to reform these laws and move things in a positive direction. We've also seen a little bit of movement in some other countries as well. And so it is possible that we could see the rollback of some of these laws, but we have to create more of an appetite for it within the societal level,

which currently I don't think we're seeing. I was encouraged recently that there was a Law Review article written by Amal Cluny, George Clooney's wife, who was also arguing in favor of reforming the international legal process as well to uphold freedom of speech. And so there are people out there who are seeking to change the law to better defend freedom of speech. but right now, before these legal codes can be successfully changed, we need to see society at large better understand the need for free speech, better cherish it. And I think that is where the biggest cause for concern is because there is just such an

attitude of, I don't like this, and therefore it should be banned. Well, you mentioned the United States and how certain corporations are enforcing stricter speech codes, also universities, it's becoming more common, but that is at the cultural level, not so much at the state and legal level. Do you expect that in the United States those free speech restrictions will remain a cultural thing, something that takes place in companies and private organizations, or do you think that the legal codes themselves, the law in America could eventually begin to restrict free speech? I think that if I was in the US, I would be concerned because we have...

the direction, the things going on on college campuses where we see the young leaders who are going to be the judges and the lawmakers of tomorrow very much embracing the idea of censorship. We see these movements of no platforming and all that sort of stuff, very pro-censorship. And then we also see the most powerful companies in the US and Silicon Valley and elsewhere who are going down a more European model of censorship. And so if you have the leaders of tomorrow plus the biggest companies in the US all speaking out in favor of censorship, I think it would be foolish not to be concerned about that. And what would it take? Well, would it be possible for the US Supreme Court to carve out an exception within its First Amendment jurisprudence to say that hate speech is not constitutionally protected? I think that is within the realms of possibility. And as I said earlier, they've throughout the 20th century into the 21st century adopted robust free speech standards.

But the possibility that that could change is obviously there and it's a real one. And so I think that there is a concern that things could change legally in the US. But even the more pressing reality is not so much a carve out within the First Amendment or a change in the law, but more just this cultural mentality. that censorship is a good thing. And I think that it's, what's being done is trying to pit civility versus liberty. And that's what we see. So people would think, well, they've given up some of their liberty in Europe in order

to be more civil to one another. But I don't think those two things ought to be held as opposites to one another. And I don't think that going down the route of censorship makes us more civil. And I think there's plenty of evidence in Europe to the contrary. That would be my warning to the U.S. Well, you've been working on these issues in Europe for a long time. Are there any specific lessons that Americans should take from the European experience as we grapple with our own battles over religious liberty and free speech and discrimination?

Well, I think probably just this idea. So at the moment, as there is a big debate going on in the US, particularly in regard to the way that tech companies are operating. And people are looking to Europe within those spaces and saying, well, Europe has gone down this route. So why don't we? And so my, I suppose the lesson of my warning to America is that it is not working well in Europe by any means. It is not creating a more civil public discourse. It is not creating a nicer space by any means. What we see is huge societal tensions.

We see huge overreach by the state that is not leading to a more civil environment, but is instead driving these things underground where they could be far more dangerous. And so I think if you look at the polarization and what have you, within European politics, and this is within the backdrop of 60 years, of censorship. It's impossible to look at what's happening and say, ah, these laws are working. And so the biggest lesson, really, is to look at what's happening in Europe, look at it closely, and not believe people when they say we should go down this route because Europe has, and it's working for Europe. Well, it's a very informative and sobering book. The book is called

Censored, How European Hate Speech Flaws Are Threatening Freedom of Speech, available on Amazon. Paul Coleman, thanks for your time today. Thank you very much. Do you have an opinion that you'd like to share? Leave us a voicemail at 202-608-6205 or email us at letters at dailysignal.com. Yours could be featured on the Daily Signal podcast. And that's going to do it for today's episode. Thanks for listening to The Daily Signal podcast brought to you from the Robert H. Bruce Radio

Studio at the Heritage Foundation. Please be sure to subscribe on iTunes, Google Play, or SoundCloud, and please leave us a review or rating on iTunes to give us any feedback. Rob and Virginia will be with you on Monday. The Daily Signal podcast is executive produced by Kate Trinko and Daniel Davis. Sound design by Lauren Evans and Thalia Rampersad. For more information, visit DailySignal.com.