994
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[-] higgsboson@dubvee.org 42 points 4 months ago

That's very much the expected outcome. In the US, at least, the law has long recognized that there are some things you just can't say without expecting a beatdown. This is called the "fighting words doctrine." Generally, it covers things like the OP example, which is very clearly a direct personal insult that a reasonable person would expect could lead to violence.

[-] Anticorp@lemmy.world 21 points 4 months ago

And this is a very good policy that maintains civility between people in public. There are States now that will allow absolutely anything to be said to anyone, without any recourse available to the person being harassed. As you can expect, those policies have led to people with much louder mouths, and a general lack of respect. People tend to hold their tongue a lot more when they can get punched in the face.

[-] DragonTypeWyvern@midwest.social 16 points 4 months ago

Fighting words haven't had legal standing for a long time as anything but a mitigating circumstance for sentencing.

What let Aldrin off was the previous personal and targeted harassment.

this post was submitted on 20 Jul 2024
994 points (98.2% liked)

memes

10373 readers
1216 users here now

Community rules

1. Be civilNo trolling, bigotry or other insulting / annoying behaviour

2. No politicsThis is non-politics community. For political memes please go to !politicalmemes@lemmy.world

3. No recent repostsCheck for reposts when posting a meme, you can only repost after 1 month

4. No botsNo bots without the express approval of the mods or the admins

5. No Spam/AdsNo advertisements or spam. This is an instance rule and the only way to live.

Sister communities

founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS