The Westboro Baptist Church

You will notice Freedom of Speech is not written into our charter of rights and freedoms. It is covered by freedom of expression and we decided that they need reasonable limits.

Which reminds me, anyone else seen Red State?

The WBC is like Chaos, it grows stronger off of the negative emotions and hate for it.

It's like a shitty simile, barreling toward you like a train that just left Denver going 55 miles per hour.

Oh i think pretty much every american hates them with a passion, even fox news hates them (and you would think they would like them)

No, not really, I'm pretty sure the WBC is against the war, so....

There is no reason FOX news would ever like them.

I guess it's kinda like in Sweden. We have freedom of speech as long as you follow laws, meaning that you are not allowed to give a speech that can be considered hateful or harrassing.

For example you are allowed to say "I don't think X is a good foreign politics minister" but not "X is an awful human being" and/or "because he is homosexual".

Hooray for enforced political correctness. Can't be having anyone's feelings get hurt, so it's best that we criminalize mean speech.

What is the point with insulting anyone then? Do you really think insults should be part of freedom of speech?

You're not allowed to directly hurt people in Sweden, I think that's a good thing. You cannot legally hit anyone just the same as you cannot legally harrass someone.

Harassment isn't the same thing as 'hate speech.'

If somebody says that he hates homosexuals for example, shouldn't homosexuals be offended?

They are just a dumb cult who's leader is a guy that has thousands of dollars becouse the idiotic followers just gave him money for nothing.
I don't understand why they harass people and do all these morally wrong things for a figure of love.
The only reason they are doing all those bad things for people is not becouse they follow god no they only do it for attenting and the money the new idiotic followers bring in becouse of their shitty protests.

I might be offended that you wear white after Labor Day, does that mean you should be punished for it?

Offensiveness doesn't have any value where free expression is concerned.

No, they're indoctrinated all right. Like Christianity.

Well you don't chose to be a homosexual. That's the difference.

I wouldn't say that's the difference.

Though I wouldn't suggest using "hate" when you don't like that people wear white after labor day, there may be a decent reason for why you don't like it.

You're not allowed to hate anyone because he or she has a specific opinion, skin colour, sexuality, religion, gender and so on (or well, you're not allowed to express that atleast). And you're not allowed to insult/attack someone personly/harrass anyone. That's a bit more precise. Does that seem wrong?

^^^^
What he said.

Why should somebody not be allowed to say I hate gays or I hate african americans? As long as they are not trying to harm African Americans or gays or whoever they hate, they should be able to say "I hate them" all they want.

I won't get into the argument about free speech again (Kalalification and I already went through that on another thread), but I will side with Giggle and Observer here, as the German laws are similar to Sweden's and to an extent, Canada's also, and I do support them.

Anyways, the WBC are complete asshats. When I first heard of them, I thought they were made up as a joke from The Onion. But no. I was mistaken. I wonder if the whole group will collapse once Fred Phelps kicks the bucket.