Should Atrocious Speech Be Legally Protected?

Some countries limit speech that is likely to incite hate-motivated violence upon a group or breach public peace. Internationally, political tension subsists between free speech advocates and those who want to regulate “hate speech”. In countries without prohibitions against hate speech, efforts to limit harm from public speech acts falls to private actors, who feel pressure either to adopt policies to create safe spaces or to allow all speech. This paper refocuses the debate and argues that the current tension between legal regulations of hate speech and cancel culture antagonists misses an entire genre of speech acts that the law should protect its citizens against-- atrocious speech, which yields atrocious harm. The Atrocity Paradigm, the non-ideal ethical theory defended by Claudia Card and others, contends that ethics and legal theory should be dedicated to prevent the worst sorts of harms, atrocities. Speech acts which predictably lead to inexcusable, intolerable harm can be distinguished from those which predictably lead to ordinary, or even, hateful wrongdoing. Focusing on atrocious speech allows for legal protections cantered on transmutative harm and inexcusability, and preserves public good obligations to preserve the existence and dignity of oppressed people groups.