> Things like libel/slander.

Those are civil offences; they're not "banned", the victim has to sue for damages.

> Threats. Blackmail.

Those are indeed banned, i.e. criminal. They are both effectively threats. It's a criminal act to threaten a criminal act.

> Did that happen? That's a silly thing to arrest someone for.

Oh yes, it did:

https://www.standard.co.uk/news/uk/police-arrest-blank-paper...

"Silly" is rather a gentle way to characterize it; it was oppressive. But this country is very silly about it's monarchy - as the USA is about it's constitution.

I am a republican (small 'r'), and using the police to suppress anti-monarchist sentiment is offensive, and to me scary. Anti-monarchist opinions have a long tradition here; there was some other king called Charles, that we decapitated 400 years ago.

[Edit] No threat to Charles III intended; got to be careful what you say, if you can be arrested for holding a blank piece of paper, maybe you can be arrested for having a blank mind.

> Those are civil offences; they're not "banned", the victim has to sue for damages.

Is that not still a form of punishment? And a reason why most people would refrain from saying these things?

> > Threats. Blackmail.

> Those are indeed banned, i.e. criminal. They are both effectively threats. It's a criminal act to threaten a criminal act.

A threat is a threat to do something illegal. Blackmail is a threat to do something that's often completely legal, but sufficiently embarrassing that it would still make the target change their behaviour.

But as with libel and slander, the fact that they're illegal doesn't mean they don't happen. In fact, there's plenty of people threatening others online. And often it takes a judge to decide whether or not that threat counts as a credible threat. And then there's indirect threats, where the threatener doesn't directly threaten, but directs others to do it. Possibly in an unspoken way. And sometimes the vague things someone says can still inspire a mob to storm the Capitol with a gallows from which to have the Vice President.

Where do you draw that line? And can you only draw it after people act on it? These issues are incredibly complex, and very context dependent. And pretending they're simple is going to make us ignore all the edge cases. And there's a lot of those.

> Is that not still a form of punishment?

No, it's not. It's compensation for damage done. If a bad driver bends your car in an accident, they don't get punished, they just have to pay for your repairs.

> A threat is a threat to do something illegal. Blackmail is a threat to do something that's often completely legal

You seem to have contradicted yourself; if a threat is a threat to do something illegal, how can a threat to do something completely legal be a threat?

> But as with libel and slander, the fact that they're illegal doesn't mean they don't happen.

There is such a thing as criminal libel, for which you can be punished; but in the general case, neither libel nor slander is "illegal". They are torts, or "wrongs", for which a victim can demand compensation. Criminal libel has been abolished in my jurisdiction. I don't think it ever existed in the USA. [Edit] I'm wrong; some states apparently have criminal libel statutes.

> And can you only draw it after people act on it?

"Threatening behaviour" is a criminal offence here. It generally means placing someone in fear of physical or mental injury. You don't have to actually injure them to commit the offence.

> make us ignore all the edge cases

I guess that's why libel cases often cost lots of money in lawyer's fees. Equity and tort are two fields of civil law with lots of edge-cases. People litigate these cases precisely because the lines aren't drawn clearly. They tend to turn on issues like fairness, issues that are ultimately a matter of judgement.

> It's compensation for damage done.

But you're still being held liable for that damage, despite the fact that you did not cause any physical damage. It was just words, and yet their effect is considered damaging.

That's aside from the fact that there's also a thing called "punitive damages", so that still is quite explicitly punishment. So these are words that do damage, and they're punished for.

> if a threat is a threat to do something illegal, how can a threat to do something completely legal be a threat?

I guess I should explain the terms I use a bit better. You're right that words can mean different things, and I'm talking about the legal concepts of threat and blackmail, but in my too-brief explanation of blackmail, I use the word "threat" in one of its other meanings.

So here's what I mean by threat and blackmail:

Threat: expressing an intend to hurt someone. Here, hurting someone is illegal, but expressing the intention to do so is illegal as well.

Blackmail: expressing an intend to reveal embarrassing information about someone unless they do something, in order to coerce them to do that thing against their will. Here, revealing the embarrassing information might be totally legal. In fact, if the information is about a crime the target committed, revealing it might even be the right thing to do. And yet saying you're going to reveal it unless they do a particular thing, is illegal.

In any case, I think we have established that there are forms of speech that are illegal, are considered damaging, and/or are sufficiently harmful or damaging to warrant compensation or punishment.

So to get back to the original topic: is hate speech damaging? And is it sufficiently damaging to warrant compensation or punishment? And if we were to conclude that they are, legislating that is not necessarily a more significant infringement on the freedom of speech than the existing laws against libel, blackmail and threats are.

> But you're still being held liable for that damage, despite the fact that you did not cause any physical damage. It was just words, and yet their effect is considered damaging.

It is a complete defence to an accusation of libel that what you wrote is true.

That is, libel means publishing damaging lies about someone. In most jurisdictions, it also means that the lies were malicious: the writer or publisher intended to cause damage. Damages are assessed as lost money; if the lies hurt your feelings, you won't get damages. But if your hurt feelings required therapy, you can sue for the therapist's fees.

It's annoying (understatement) that damage to reputation is assessed in this way; it means that rich, famous people get much larger awards than ordinary people, because they lose more money from damage to reputation (they have more money to lose, for one thing). You can't sue someone for torpedoing a $1M deal if you aren't the kind of person that makes $1M deals.

> It is a complete defence to an accusation of libel that what you wrote is true.

Obviously. It would be a bit too dystopian if the truth was illegal (though in oppressive regimes it often is). I agree that it's a problem that harmful lies about rich people are punished harder than lies about poor people, because they can attach a larger monetary value to the damage. That's of course a product of the fact that it's a civil issue and revolves around damages. Getting rid of that artefact would probably involve making all lies illegal, and I think everybody here agrees that that would be a couple of steps too far.

And then there's the fact that the entire justice system is simply far more accessible to rich people. And they do sometimes use it to try to suppress inconvenient truths.

As an aside, I love it that blank sheets of paper turned into the go to way to message a protest. You can't get less menacing and a stronger "the emperor has no clothes" message than that.

> Things like libel/slander. Threats. Blackmail.

Libel and slander are civil matters in the United States.