(c) 2006 Bonnie Jacobs

The difference between speech and hate is far greater than 2 letters. The recent debate surrounding protecting hate often seems to forget that there is a distinct difference between speech and hate. It’s obvious, I know it, you know it, everyone knows it. Hate is hate and speech is speech and the only people that can’t understand this are the haters, as the saying goes “haters gonna hate.”

The prevalence of nazis in our midst cannot be overstated. Over 300 people in a country of 300 million (.000001%) made themselves known as nazis by going and supporting Richard Spencer. That is .000001% too much and their hate must be countered.

Due to the blatantly obvious potential harm (which is often manifested physically) from hate there is a present need for its censorship. President Trump and his administration must narrow their definition of speech so the haters can finally be silenced. Trump is often lauded for his calm demeanor and judicious thinking so we know we can trust the government to handle their increased powers.

Looking at history, reasonable censorship has had much success. If one needs a modern day example, just look Cuba. Although some people were jailed, their government has done a great job of preventing hate. The foundation of this is increased police powers, which we all know is desperately needed. Charlottesville is a great example, police weren’t allowed to go far enough to prevent hate.

The people that claim that limiting speech would only exacerbate the problem by allowing hateful ideas to fester undebated are just wrong. The best way to combat hate speech is not by openly debating and showing that hateful ideas are wrong but rather to make sure that they never have a place in discourse. Arguments that cite limiting speech as unconstitutional or that there could be a slippery slope to limiting only one side of debate are too wrong. Orwell’s 1984 was simply fiction and our forefathers would too be appalled at hate speech. We must come together as a nation, but not entirely together because that means the haters would be with us too.