Kill 18C to combat racists: Allowing racists right to free speech airs this evil to scrutiny, by Brendan O’Neill.
Leftists take it as a given that if you are anti-racist then you’ll be a cheerleader for section 18C. This bit of the Racial Discrimination Act acts as a “safety valve” on racially charged bile, and who but the most prejudiced low-life would want such a safety valve released?
In their minds, standing by 18C is the good, anti-racist thing to do, where calling for its repeal is at best socially irresponsible, at worst a racist demand. This is wrong. …
The truth is anti-racists should be at the front of the fight against 18C — for the simple reason that if you want to defeat racism, as I do, then you must insist racists have full freedom of speech so we can see and know their ideology, and confront it before the public. Leftie rads who love 18C’s suppression of racist speech are failing in their first duty as anti-racists: to shine a light on racism and do battle with it in the full glare of public life.
Well said Sir.
When I first got involved in leftie politics, in Britain in the mid-1990s, I whiled away my days doing two things: marching against racism and demanding free speech for racists. …
Leftist support for 18C tells us a lot about how about how illiberal left-wing thought has become. Their love of 18C is motored by a deep distrust of the plebs. … Their anti-racism is, ironically, driven by dark prejudices of its own: a view of the public as a pogrom in waiting.
