Yuratuhl wrote:
rikkilake wrote:
The only sub-cultures where I feel this is appropriate are where the pejorative is referring to something that is personal to them (ie: someone who is openly gay referring to someone else within their community as a "faggot"). Through words being reclaimed they have become acceptable, however that only applies to those people reclaiming it, not some under-grads trying to seem edgy.
I don't agree with anything that presents a double standard. The point of internet anonymity is specifically that a poster is an avatar that types words. If words are only charged with hate based on who is saying them, who can effectively police this when none of it is face to face? If gays can call gays "faggots" then I can too, not that I would. Same goes with racial epithets. If we're going to represent equality of language, it's everything or nothing.
For the record, I generally agree more with the European stance of restricting hate speech. But this is the internet, and I'm not Interpol, and most of us here are reasonable enough not to be flagrant racists/other-o-phobes.
To look at it as a "double standard" is to ignore what the word itself means and conveys to the masses. By reclaiming such words, the group is accepting the negative meaning behind the word and the power it has held over them. To deny that group the ability to use language like that exclusively and have it not hold a negative connotation within their own community is to force them to also try and ignore their past.
As for the anonymity of the internet, context is key when descerning between the two uses of words.
Unacceptable use:
Person 1: Rend is the boss that you kite, right?
Person 2: No, you fucking faggot, Rend is the one with the dragon.
Acceptable use:
Person 1: Sorry guys, I can't make it to UBRS tonight. I have a date with my male-partner
Person 2: Just call him and cancel so you can tank!
Person 1: I am too much of a faggot to reject someone as cute as him, sorry!

The issue, however, with restricting "hate speech" is what do you define as hate speech? Wikipedia.org defines it as:
Quote:
In law, hate speech is any speech, gesture or conduct, writing, or display which is forbidden because it may incite violence or prejudicial action against or by a protected individual or group, or because it disparages or intimidates a protected individual or group.
Given that, then you would not only ban someone spewing racial slurs at a group of minorities, but it would also mean that say at the protests in Greece is someone yelled, "Kill all cops!" That would also be hate speech and thus be banned.