<h3>Speech regulation: a linguistic sewerage system</h3>
<p class="comments"><a href="http://www.abc.net.au/unleashed/3337882.html#comments"><span>139
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<p class="author"><span>
<a href="http://www.abc.net.au/unleashed/annabelle-lukin-2464768.html">Annabelle Lukin</a>
</span></p>
<a href="http://www.abc.net.au/unleashed/annabelle-lukin-2464768.html"><img src="http://www.abc.net.au/unleashed/linkableblob/2464768/thumbnail/annabelle-lukin-thumbnail.jpg" alt="Annabelle Lukin" class="authorImg" height="100" width="100"></a>
<p>As other commentators on the <a href="http://www.abc.net.au/news/2011-09-28/bolt-found-guilty-of-breaching-discrimination-act/3025918" target="_blank" title="">Bromberg decision</a> have already noted, even an open democracy like Australia's regulates speech.</p>
<p>The
Trade Practices Act, as well as laws concerning racial
discrimination/vilification, and defamation, are all a testament to the
view that speech can have the power to hurt individuals, groups, and
societies.</p><p>This view runs counter to many of the aphorisms we
recite as, and to, children - like 'sticks and stones may break my bones
but names will never hurt me'. But, to paraphrase Donne, no person is
an island. Humans are social creatures. We live in communities and
societies that are defined by an era's socially sanctioned currents of
ideas.</p><p>This is what Al Gore called 'the marketplace of ideas' in
his book Attack on Reason. Gore argued that, as a society, America just
isn't as smart as it used to be. Its collective intelligence had
suffered under the weight of too many stupid ideas pumped out into the
social environment. These ideas are a kind of brain pollution. They made
Americans fearful and small minded. They marginalised the role of
reason and expert thinking. They clouded critical thinking.</p><p>The great American linguist, Benjamin Lee Whorf, once wrote:</p><blockquote><p><em>Speech
is the best show man (sic) puts on. It is his own 'act' on the stage of
evolution, in which he comes before the cosmic backdrop and really
'does his stuff'.</em></p></blockquote><p>Even the most mundane of our
linguistic encounters leaves its mark on us. Small, unremarkable
conversations are all part of our individual processes of socialisation.
They shape who we are, and how we see the world.</p><p>Talk is
powerful. It can unite and divide. This is why it has to be regulated.
Under the right conditions, you can make some people believe and do
anything. Hate speech broadcast on radio has been considered one key
factor in the Rwandan genocide.</p><p>It is obviously not a simple
matter to decide where a line might be drawn; but the problem is not
intractable either. The debate about 'free speech' needs to be had in
the context of another question: 'what kind of society do we want to
live in?' This question invites us to scrutinise those who have more
influence than others on our 'marketplace of ideas', and to ask how
their ways of talking shape our society and our communities. And who, if
anyone, is funding them.</p><p>It's not so long ago that Sydney was
happily pumping its sewage from the cliff faces off Eastern suburbs
beaches. The term 'Bondi cigar', defined by one online dictionary as
'excrement, usually human, that inhabits the waters seeking out victim
swimmers to bump into', is testament to this history. But our attitude
to the physical environment has changed and the idea of pumping raw
sewage into the waters around where we live and play is anathema.
Dumping of pollution is subject to regulation because of its effects on
our physical environment.</p><p>When we regulate speech, it is for the
protection of the social environment. I'm not saying every such law is
the right one. But we need to recognise that the social environment is
as worthy of respect as the physical one, and almost as tangible. And
there is no doubt we have a linguistic version of raw sewage, and the
Bondi cigar.</p><p><a href="http://www.abc.net.au/unleashed/annabelle-lukin-2464768.html" target="_self" title=""><em>Dr Annabelle Lukin</em></a><em> is Senior Lecturer in Linguistics, in the Centre for Language in Social Life, at Macquarie University.</em></p>
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