From: bhv@areaplg2.corp.mot.com (Bronis Vidugiris)
Subject: Re: women as victims
Organization: Motorola, CCR&D, CORP, Schaumburg, IL
Date: Thu, 8 Oct 1992 15:40:31 GMT
Followup-To: alt.feminism

ljf writes:
> 
> In article <DSTEINBE.92Oct7095856@emmy.nmsu.edu> dsteinbe@nmsu.edu (David Steinberg) writes:
> >I see the point behind some of the sexual harrasment arguments, but
> >you can't deny that many of them are restrictions on speech.  If you
> >think the restrictions are justified, then defend them.  But don't try
> >saying that they're not.
> 
> Of course, some of them are restrictions on speech.  And yet, in a
> working environment, aren't there already restrictions on speech?  
> 
> I don't know about you, but I think most people would quickly be in
> trouble if they started calling a coworker a fuckhead, a nigger, a
> yid (insert derogatory comment of choice).
> 
> Is it reasonable to expect a Jewish worker to share an office with
> someone who puts up Hitler posters?  How uncomfortable can you make
> someone until your actions and/or speech become harassment?

To make the answer really brief - Fighting words!  [You fuckhead nigger would
seem to qualify as fighting words, BTW].  Bikini posters, however, wouldn't.


From the "UWM Post" case:

 The Supreme Court in Chapinsky set out the fighting words doctrine.  The
Chapinsky Court stated:
  There are certain well-defined and narrowly limited classes of speech, the
prevention and punishment of which has never been thought to raise any
Constitutional problem.  These include the lewd and obscene, the profane, the
libelous, and the insulting or "fighting' ' words--those which by their very
utterance inflict injury or tend to incite an immediate breach of the peace.
 Chaplinsky at 571-72 (emphasis added and footnotes omitted).
 Thus, the Chaplinsly Court set out a two-part definition for fighting words:
(1) words which by their very utterance inflict injury and (2) words which by
their very utterance tend to incite an immediate breach of the peace.  The two
parts of the fighting words definition correspond to different concerns
regarding reactions to offensive expressions.  See Rutzick, "Offensive Language
and the Evolution of First Amendment Protection," 9 Harv. C.R.-C.L.L.Rev. 1, 6
(1974).  The first half relates to the prevention of psychological injury,
primarily in the form of emotional upset and injury to the ' 'sensibilities' '
[FN3] of addressees.  The second half addresses the prevention of physical
retaliation likely to cause a breach of the peace.
 While the Chaplinsky Court set forth a two-part definition for fighting words,
it applied only the second half.

....

 Since Chaplinsky, the Supreme Court has narrowed and clarified the scope of
the fighting words doctrine in at least three ways.  First, the Court has
limited the fighting words definition so that it now only includes its second
half. [FN4]  Second, the Court has stated that in order for words to meet the
second half of the definition they must "naturally tend to provoke violent
resentment."  Finally, the Court has held that fighting words must be "directed
at the person of the hearer."
 *8 The Supreme Court has reduced the scope of fighting words to include
only words which tend to incite an immediate breach of the peace.  In Gooding
v. Wilson, the Supreme Court held that Georgia Code Ann. s 26-6303 was
overbroad because "the Georgia appellate decisions [had] not construed s 26-
6303 to be limited in application, as in Chapinsky, to words that 'have a
direct tendency to cause acts of violence by the person to whom, individually,
the remark is addressed." '  405 U.S. 518, 524 (1972).  Thus, the Court held
that s 266303 was unconstitutional because it failed to meet the second half of
the fighting words doctrine.

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