Michigan’s Democratic House passed legislation on Tuesday that enables attorneys to shut down “hate speech.” The new House Bill 4474 is a vague and unconstitutional censorship law that determines “feeling threatened” as reasonable grounds to prosecute offenders.
The punishment for making someone “feel threatened” in Michigan is five years in jail and a $10,000 fine.
An alternate sentence proposes “community service” in order to “enhance the offender’s understanding of the impact of the offense upon the victim and wider community.”
The problematic language about “feelings” can be found in the bill’s definition of “intimidation” as “willful course of conduct, involving repeated or continuing harassment of another individual that would cause a reasonable individual to feel terrorized, frightened, intimidated, threatened, harassed, or molested, and that actually causes the victim to feel terrorized, frightened, or threatened.”
Any kind of discrimination against a minority or a particular group of people is unacceptable and should be taken seriously. Michigan’s new bill, which prosecutes based on feelings, does not take it seriously. Someone’s subjective feelings, or even a lie about his or her subjective feelings, could land somebody jail time and ruin a life.
“Hate speech” accusations are designed with one outcome in mind: censorship. “Hate speech” is usually not hateful speech. What often constitutes “hate speech” is any language that opposes popular narrative. This label is causing damage to our nation.
Still in the drafting stage
Pirates didn’t care about feelz, if you seen the red skull and crossbones raised you knew straight away, there will be no mercy shown for anyone.
