Reply #35: I had a longish argument about this one

[Lexingtonian]

with my parents. No one condones violence, but there is a question of righteous anger. This problem is one of moral behavior.

There are two things that invoking freedom of speech as an absolute defense ignores. First of all, offensive speech has to contain broad and adequate truth about the situation to be morally justifiable.

Secondly, when offensive speech has low or inadequate truth content, the difference in power between the offense-giving party and the offended party is critical. The materially stronger party of the two has a greater moral duty to truth and mercy.

Right wingers are immoralists, so they break or invert this arrangement constantly. Often they will pretend to victimhood and political weakness or minority in order to evade the higher moral duty requirement.