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  • septimine
    +3

    There are two questions here. Is it good to have a man make fun of someone, and is it something that should be punished by the government.

    First, the man was mean and cruel to the boy. There's no humor in mocking a disabled child. Especially publicly.

    But at the same time, I don't think a free society can exist if the government is punishing ideas. Even if the ideas are terrible, it's bad, because what ends up happening is that controversial things are not said. It's too risky. If you say the wrong thing, you're going to jail. And I don't think you can get by with just banning insults, because the list of things that can be called insulting is ever growing. It might be disagreeing on a deeply held political idea, if the argument gets heated. You might be insulted when I say that abortion is wrong because it kills a baby. I might get insulted when you say that it's just tissue. Debates can get heated, and it's actually good when that happens. It means that both sides give a crap about what's good for the country.