'This is a new form of authoritarianism' - Free speech or just plain offensive? Q+A investigates free speech

April 1, 2018

Whena Owen investigates.

Whena Owens of TVNZ1's Q+A investigates whether New Zealand needs to examine 'free speech'.

Almost every week now there is a new offence in New Zealand, including one issue that ended up on the steps of parliament this week around Sir Bob Jones' NBR column calling for a Maori gratitude day. 

Musician and writer Lizzie Marvelly told Q+A: "It feels like there's this moment where all of a sudden there's all sorts of issues that are bubbling to the surface and it just feels to me like we are in a time of action."

The Humans Rights commission say they are doing some work around hate speech, or as they refer to it as disharmonious speech.  

"Those that are proponents of call-out culture... they're really about making things more conformist," said political scientist Dr Bryce Edwards.

"It's quite different from the 1960's when liberals wanted to get rid of censorship. This is a new form of authoritarianism."

Although New Zealand doesn't yet have the discourse around censorship highly charged like North American and British campus's, Historian Paul Moon says "it might be a cause of when rather than if it happens."

Mr Moon says, we have to be very careful that the laws don't intrude into how we react and how we try to discover the truth.

"I can imagine a time in the future, if I find one of your questions 'disharmonious, have you committed an offence? This is a possibility."


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