The would you have voted yes or no to the civil rights act in 64 is an old question thats been asked to libertarians for decades because they know they can spew the answer to make that particular libertarian sound racist. They also know the general brain dead public just hears racist and the game is on……..this world is void of people who can think for themselves or see pass social conditioning.

Again I’m not saying I agree or disagree with Paul, just that, the idea that his answer thus makes him a racist is well…f’n childish at best.

One thing I think is important to consider in this discussion is the idea of “business owner” vs “business entity.” If “Steve” owns a home, Steve can choose to never let Canadians into his home. That is his right as a property owner.

However, if Steve forms a business called Steve’s All America Hockey Store, LLC, Steve may be the business owner but he is not the business entity. Steve can hate Canadians all he wants. But his business (LLC) can’t keep Canadians out of his store. In exchange for opening his LLC’s store to everyone, Steve enjoys some government protections (like bankruptcy and liability shielding).

This gets into the minutia of business law (of which I have almost no knowledge (for instance, could Steve choose not to form an entity and still run a store that excludes all Canadians since he doesn’t enjoy any special protections?)), but this is generally how I reconcile my strong support of an individuals rights with the power of the government to regulate businesses.

The other counter point I think we noted in one of Jay’s references. Basically, we as a nation tried to allow market forces to de-segregate the nation after the Civil War. After 100 years, the experiment hadn’t worked because certain externalities precluded efficient market movement (e.g. high barriers to entry for minority business owners). I believe the government should intervene whenever markets are not or cannot operate efficiently (i.e. problems of public goods like air, water, or national defense). So, basically, we tried to let the market work it out and it couldn’t. So the feds stepped in to smooth things out.

Of course, that all might be a result of description more than substance. Legal analysis often is.

Terrorism is a good example of a [vaguely] legal idea that has grown and broadened at a fairly frightening rate.

Of course, terrorism threatens white people and power structures, whereas hate speech rarely does that; in fact it’s usually the opposite. That makes a big difference.

however, i think to just say, “oh, we deal with slippery slopes all the time in law,” is just kinda disturbingly dismissive of real, legitimate concerns. for instance, look at what’s happened to our government’s (explicit) position on human rights (and i ask you right now to totally forgive my underly-detailed and overly-convenient account of history before i even start, but i think it’s close enough to reality for me to just try and make a point real quick): so, back in the day we’re all about human rights and everyone knows it so enemy soldiers during WWII are way more willing to surrender to us, then clinton starts leading us down the slope with extraordinary rendition (ok, i skipped a little bit), then 9/11 happens, and before you know it, it’s out with geneva and habeas corpus and any sort of attempt to actually ascertain someone’s guilt or innocence before we lock them up and throw away the key, and in with torture and indefinite detentions.

and it keeps going: they start with “enemy combatants” (whatever that means), slip down to anyone accused of being a terrorist who’s not an american citizen, and now we’ve gotten to the point where john mccain is mocking the idea of reading an american citizen his miranda rights (another legacy from arizona, btw, which i’m sure you already know), just because he’s accused of terrorism. how long until they expand the definition of terrorism and they can just go around nabbing accused gang members off the street and start torturing them? before bush, i would’ve thought that was just a paranoid fantasy, now i know it’s all too possible.

same deal with the use of mercenaries: we start in other countries, we bring them in for only special circumstances, and, if we’re not careful, we end up with a permanent paramilitary organization mucking everything up like they do in south america.

point is, the “slippery slope” is not just a rhetorical technique, it’s not just an abstract point. there are real, practical concerns about outcomes that are really, truly possible. i think it’s just a lack of imagination and complacency that’s so endemic to our country to think that our system is so great that we’ll never have to face those problems. we have slipped, we are slipping, we will slip in the future. we might be able to pull ourselves back up, but what we need to do is look at what’s at the end of that slope, decide how bad that outcome is and how likely we really are to get there, and then decide if it’s worth taking that first step, not just dismiss those concerns outright.

@jay
here’s-the-interesting-thing-jitsu? dude. you rock.

Legal responses to racist speech is discussed quite a lot in academic circles, if not in the public’s doctrinaire understanding of the 1st Amendment. These two articles make really compelling arguments:

Richard Delgado: “Words that Wound: A Tort Action for Racial Epithets, Insults, and Name-Calling.” Harvard Civil Rights-Civil Liberties Law Review, Spring, 1982

Mari Matsuda: “Public Response to Racist Speech: Considering the Victim’s Story.” Michigan Law Review August 1989.