Free Speech Should Not Be Hate Speech

Despite the opinion of many of those who commented on this NYTimes report, in France, cradle of modern democracy, they know to differentiate between free and unlimited and unrestricted speech and speech which is hateful and intending to cause eventual crimes and stems from hostility which has corrupted one's moral fibre -

Court Convicts Galliano in Anti-Semitism 

John Galliano, the British fashion designer whose career imploded after a videotaped anti-Semitic rant, was found guilty and given a suspended fine of 6,000 euros on Thursday by a French tribunal in connection with two separate bar clashes in Paris with people who accused him of hate crimes.

...The tribunal issued a fine and then suspended it, Mr. Galliano, who was fired six months ago as the creative director of the fashion house Dior, had told the French court that he remembered nothing about the incidents and at the time was debilitated by job stress and addiction to Valium and alcohol. He condemned racism and anti-Semitism and apologized to the victims...the prosecutor had accused him of indulging in an ugly variety of “racism and anti-Semitism of the parking lot and the supermarket.”

Mr. Galliano’s apology and humility, expressed during his trial in a low voice...resonated with the judges, who convicted him of the hate crime but reduced his sentence...His lawyer, Aurélien Hamelle, told reporters that the court’s ruling was a strong gesture and a “wise judgment” and that he did not plan to appeal...