Let’s hear it for contempt

The Blairite ‘Respect agenda’ is bunkum. We must all be free to insult each other or else only bullies will prevail

Stealthily, an idea which was born under New Labour has wormed itself into the imagination of post-millennial Britain. It is the concept of Respect, not least as applied to how we talk or write about each other. The implications of the ‘Respect agenda’ for free speech are perilous, and subterranean — the more insidious for imposing self-censorship by means of a model of supposed 21st-century good manners backed by laws which ‘send a message’ and chill the climate in which ‘hate-speech’ might otherwise occur.

The message is that we may argue at will in abstract terms, but should not offend other groups in society by speech or writing that they find personally hateful.

At first glance this rule sounds innocuous. But I believe that the freedom to give gratuitous offence, to mock, sneer, scorn, belittle, deride and verbally abuse, is one of the most important pillars in the power of language to challenge belief and behaviour.