40% of Millennials OK with limiting speech offensive to minorities

[riversedge]

http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2015/11/20/40-of-millennials-ok-with-limiting-speech-offensive-to-minorities/
November 20, 2015


40% of Millennials OK with limiting speech offensive to minorities

By Jacob Poushter46 comments

American Millennials are far more likely than older generations to say the government should be able to prevent people from saying offensive statements about minority groups, according to a new analysis of Pew Research Center survey data on free speech and media across the globe.

U.S. Millennials More Likely to Support Censoring Offensive Statements About MinoritiesWe asked whether people believe that citizens should be able to make public statements that are offensive to minority groups, or whether the government should be able to prevent people from saying these things. Four-in-ten Millennials say the government should be able to prevent people publicly making statements that are offensive to minority groups, while 58% said such speech is OK.

Even though a larger share of Millennials favor allowing offensive speech against minorities, the 40% who oppose it is striking given that only around a quarter of Gen Xers (27%) and Boomers (24%) and roughly one-in-ten Silents (12%) say the government should be able to prevent such speech.

Compared with people we surveyed in dozens of nations, Americans as a whole are less likely to favor the government being able to prevent speech of any kind. The debate over what kind of speech should be tolerated in public has become a major story around the globe in recent weeks – from racial issues on many U.S. college campuses to questions about speech laws in Europe in the wake of concerns about refugees from the Middle East and the terrorist attacks in Paris.

Overall, our global survey found that a majority of Americans say that people should be able to say offensive things about minority groups publicly. Two-thirds of Americans say this, compared with a median of 35% among the 38 nations we polled.

In the U.S., our findings also show a racial divide on this question, with non-whites more likely (38%) to support government prevention of such speech than non-Hispanic whites (23%).

Nearly twice as many Democrats say the government should be able to stop speech against minorities (35%) compared with Republicans (18%). Independents, as is often the case, find themselves in the middle. One-third of all women say the government should be able to curtail speech that is offensive to minorities vs. 23% of men who say the same.

Furthermore, Americans who have a high school degree or less are more likely than those with at least a college degree to say that speech offensive to minority groups should be able to be restricted (a 9-percentage-point difference).

Europe More Supportive Than U.S. of Censoring Statements Offensive to MinoritiesIn Europe, where long-simmering racial tensions are of a different nature, compounded by the recent flow of migrants from North Africa and the Middle East, people are more willing than Americans to accept government controls on speech against minorities. A median of 49% across the six EU nations surveyed say this compared with 28% of Americans.........................

[Android3.14]

1. Well thank goodness we live in the USA

Social blowback is one thing, but wanting the government to limit speech is just stupid.

[Dr Hobbitstein]

2. So 40% of millennials are idiots?

It kind of proves a theory I had about them.

In all seriousness, I find it perplexing that anyone would want to go down that path. 1A is there to protect unpopular speech, not popular speech.

[malthaussen]

3. Depends, I suppose, on your defintion of "idiot."

I'd be more inclined to think that 40% of millennials haven't thought the thing through. Since I doubt any of us has perfect judgement, I wouldn't call that "idiocy." (yeah. I get that you are being ironic)

I'd think it more a function of age, though. Younger people are more inclined to take everything personally. Ergo, on the subject of offensive speech, they react with a sense of personal umbrage. Since it also appears that common courtesy and civilized discourse are in the eclipse (just look at our police officers and politicians. Or, rather, listen to them), it is also probable that the younger cohort is subject to offensive speech more often than were older generations. Then one must also consider the demographics within the generations, as the rising generation has a larger percentage of persons associated with oppressed groups than older ones, and thus a larger percentage who have been subject to offensive speech as a matter of course.

Still a bad idea.

-- Mal

[Abouttime]

4. Hate Speech

These kids grew up in an era of hyper-hate speech, Fox News, Limbaugh etc. They aren't hardened to it like us adults are, they are rightly sick of it and they would like to see it go. We need to look at ways of limiting hate speech for profit ie. Limbaugh. There's nothing in the constitution that guarantees the right to broadcast lies and hate over the public airwaves. The fairness doctrine needs to be brought back at the very least to bring some balance to the airwaves.