France’s Freedom of Speech: How Free Is It?

France’s Freedom of Speech: How Free Is it?

A nation’s ability to communicate comes from the way its Media is Structure, and more often the structure of the media stems from what can and cannot be said. These rules of speech are usually outlined in some Freedom of speech doctrine.  In France and in much of Western Europe hate speech is simply not allowed.  Frances hates speech law “criminalizes incitement to racial discrimination, hatred, or violence on the basis of one’s origin or membership (or non-membership) in an ethic, national, racial, or religious group”. Many of these laws can be found all over Europe and come from a fear of what can happen if hate speech runs ramped.  It was Hitler’s hate speech against the Jews that rallied and fired up the Nazi party in the late1930s, which subsequently started the Second World War and one of humanities darkest tragedies, the Holocaust.  It would be natural for Europe to be adamant about people expressing their hatred through speech for fear of a repeat.  However, does limiting someone’s ability to speak freely hinder the democratic process?

Another issue is when does one draw the line on what is hate speech, and what is just insulting? Ethically hate speech should be outlawed but if a civil suite were filed every time some one felt insulted the courts would be over whelmed it would be an impractical law.  Also in France It has been very easy for extremist groups to manipulate these laws in their favor many have won large sums of compensations.  Currently the high courts of France are in the process of ruling on several high profile hate speech cases. In particular a Frenchman named Dieudonné M’bala M’bal, a Comedian, has built his entire comedy routine around anti-Semitic jokes.  The Government has banded him from all French venues, and he is in the process of appealing these punishments on grounds of violation of his freedom of speech.  The French government in this matter protects the rights and freedoms of the a collective or group being “hated” and the individual is over looked.

This contrasts with the United States’ views on hate speech, which protects  the individual’s right to a freedom of expression and speech by the first amendment of the United States Constitution. A United States citizen is allowed to express any form of emotion as long as it doesn’t insight a clear and present danger to them selves or those around them.   This insures that the individual is able to speak out against the government in times of turmoil if need be.  It is also believed that speech is just that, speech.  It is often assumed “that there should be laws preventing bad behavior but no laws preventing bad beliefs.”

Sources:

http://www.legal-project.org/issues/european-hate-speech-laws

http://www.americanbar.org/groups/public_education/initiatives_awards/students_in_action/debate_hate.html

http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10001424052702304347904579308710662277206