On
yesterday’s edition of Newstalk’s The Right Hook programme, George Hook
won a victory for common sense, and for the real meaning of free
speech.

Hook was
speaking to Senator Ivana Bacik about the protest organised by LGBT Noise
objecting to RTE’s apology and financial settlement with a number of people,
including representatives of the Iona Institute, over an incident on the
Saturday Night Show in which they were labelled ‘homophobes’.

Hook started
by asking Bacik to offer her definition of homophobia

“Homophobia is
expressing opinions or expressing views that are discriminatory or disrespectful
or that in some way discriminate against individuals because of their sexuality,
because they are gay, essentially, because they are lesbian or gay or bisexual
indeed.

So to be homophobic, to express those views of course can take
many different forms. I mean the most extreme form is that we see people who are
beaten up because they are gay, and that can and does still happen, we see very
extreme forms of homophobic laws in other countries, as in Russia currently, and
in Uganda where people are criminalised for
homosexuality.”

She went on to say
that by apologising, RTE were censoring legitimate debate.

Hook
responded:

“Terrible stuff, and
as a proponent of gay marriage I am appalled. But are you not entitled to your
good name in this country anymore?

It seems to me the
only censorship here is done by you, and LGBT (Noise) and Averil Power, who are
trying to say that people can libel you and you shouldn’t take
action!”

He went
on:

“Are you also
suggesting that the members of the Iona Institute and John Waters do not have a
right to their good name? I tell you, if someone called me homophobic on
television, I’d sue his ass off… I am entitled to my good name! As is every
citizen of the land… that’s why we have libel!

There are words like
‘racist’ and ‘homophobic’ and all these emotive words that are simply flung at
people, and of course you have no defence.

Contrary to what
you’re saying, we should have a very strong legal system about taking people’s
good name with impunity!”

Senator Bacik
responded “No one has ever stifled the language of the Iona Institute, you know,
they’ve been very vocal always…”

To which Hook
replied: “But they’ve never libelled anybody! You can be as voluble as you
like, as noisy as you like, as long as you do it within the
law!”

That last sentence
cuts to the heart of things. This whole debate revolves around the difference
between arguments and insults. Trying to stop anyone from making their case,
whether they are passionate advocates of same-sex marriage or equally
passionate opponents, is censorship.

But keeping insults
out of debates, and assuming good faith on behalf of our opponents can only
facilitate free speech. If a gay person cannot go on air without being the
target of anti-gay slurs, his arguments won’t get heard. He’ll be frozen
out.

Similarly, if a
person who believes that the idea of children being raised by a mother and a father is an
ideal worth protecting can’t state that belief without being called homophobic –
the same word that Senator Bacik used to describe the regimes in Russia and
Uganda – then their perspective will be frozen out in turn. Words have meanings,
and those meanings cannot be changed just because someone wants them to
change.

Now, maybe Senator
Bacik and the protesters want that perspective frozen out. But as George Hook
puts it, that’s not defending free speech. It’s censorship by
another name.