Forgive Me, I Am Going To Be Racist - I Will No Longer Date White Women

Kevin Lewis opines;

""Free expression" is against the law if it attacks racial/ethnic/marginalized groups or individuals."

Apparently the United States Supreme Court disagrees with Kevin Lewis.

From: Wikipedia: Wikipedia: Hate Speech Laws by Country

"The United States does not have hate speech laws, since the U.S. Supreme Court has repeatedly ruled that laws criminalizing hate speech violate the guarantee to freedom of speech contained in the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. There are several categories of speech that are not protected by the First Amendment, such as speech that calls for imminent violence upon a person or group. However, the Supreme Court has ruled that hate speech that does not fall into one of these categories is constitutionally protected." 

What a Great Country ! ! !

Kevin isn't wrong because hate speech is unlawful in a lot of circumstances. In the context of employment, it is unlawful to simply talk about an employee or co-worker's perceived traits because of their racial, ethnic, gender or sexual preference. It doesn't even have to rise to hate speech. Simply stereotyping would fall under this. It creates what is called a discriminatory environment and is actionable in civil court. Many companies end up paying out big settlements/judgments for this sort of thing.

It can also be illegal in a criminal context if the speech was meant to intimidate or threaten someone. In the context an assault or other crime that causes some type of injury or an attempted injury, the perp would likely be charged with a hate crime. So, the speech itself in a vacuum is legal but put in the context of employment, the educational system, public accommodations or used in conjunction with other criminal activity or harassment is indeed illegal.  

Mark is confusing legality with a fireable cause.  In a "right to work state", for example, one can be fired for most any reason........including offensive speech.  The fired employee can not be put in jail for his speech, however, because it is not illegal.

People are regularly confused about free speech law, claiming that offensive speech can't get one fired, asked to leave a restaurant, kicked out of a school, or dropped by a girlfriend.

It sounds like you're the one who's confused. "Right to work" refers to laws that prohibit employers from requiring that employees belong to a union. It has nothing to do with free speech.

Also, employers have the right to require or prohibit employees' speech while on the job (as a condition of employment); restaurant owners have the right to prohibit certain customer behavior (as a condition of being served); schools have the right to require certain standards of behavior (as a condition of continuing enrollment); and of course, personal relationships aren't governed by free speech laws.

Sometimes it depends on who has the best shyster, as applies to most civil or criminal proceedings.  

I don't know who originally posted the Wipipedia thing, and it doesn't matter (to me).  I search Wiki myself for certain things.  But I have also embarrassed myself for not  reeaaallly verifying before putting it out there as fact in a speech or something.  Not saying that one was wrong...just don't depend on anything you find on the Internet if it is of importance to whatever you are using it for.  JMHO.

Candy

Wikipedia is an unimpeachable authority on all matters, when one agrees with whatever it says.

Isn't that the metric for "truth" these days? Some nimrod says, ooh, this looks good to me! and then slathers it onto a message board or whatever. Copy and paste something from Facebook or a clip from Fox News, because if you saw it there, it must be true!

As far as Wackypedia goes, I've found it very useful as a starting point for research. But taking it as gospel truth, verbatim? No way! The infomation there isn't vetted at all. They do seem to have a reasonably rigorous standard for citing material, but those citations aren't necessarily of reliable sources.

The statement in the Wikipedia article that DonDiego posted, though: "The United States does not have hate speech laws..." is simply factually incorrect.

Can one be arrested for violating what you call "speech laws".  No, one can not be arrested for such speech so the speech is LEGAL.  It's really a very simple concept.

I won't bother to attempt to explain it to you.

Yes. The example that comes to mind would be somebody burring a cross on the public street in front of a black person's home. 

Speech that incites violence is also illegal. Speech that incites violence against a racial, ethnic, or gender group is illegal and can be prosecuted as a hate crime.

The speech you mention is legal.  Firing an employee for such speech is also legal.  I won't bother to attempt an explaination for Kevin.

He knows that I'm correct and he's too stubborn to admit it.