* "Hate speech" is an ill-defined or incoherent concept
* People will never agree about what belongs in this category
* No one can be trusted to make an authoritative decision about this
* U.S. law, unlike that of European countries, has never included such a category of unprotected speech, and it would not be constitutionally permissible for the government to prohibit it
"Threat" seems no easier to define than "hate speech". I'm not a lawyer but I imagine that boundaries of "threat" exist as a long series of judicial decisions, many of them containing the word "reasonable person".
The US does not ban hate speech, but I don't know precisely what protects hate speech but does not protect threats.
As I said I'm not a lawyer, so I can only observe this from outside. I remain baffled at the way lawyers talk as if they have rigid interpretations of the law, which as a scientist and programmer I find unlikely.
Moving on to shakier ground, I think the (US) rules are that if I even say "X should all be killed", that's definitely hate speech, but it's still not a threat.
If I'm talking to others, and I say "Go kill all the X" (or "Let's go kill all the X"), that's incitement to violence, but I'm still not sure that's a threat.
If I say "I'm going to kill you, you X", that's a threat.
As I said, IANAL. I welcome corrections from those who actually know this stuff...
I do get that racially motivated crimes can create fear among whatever demographic has been targeted. On the other hand, that sounds like terrorism, which we have laws prohibiting.
At the end of the day, hate crime laws end up looking like they're toeing the line of "thought crimes" to me. Robbing a store is bad, but if you decide to rob a store run by Latinx people because you (probably wrongly) blame them for losing your job is worse. But if you blame WalMart for losing your job and decide to rob a WalMart to get back at them, that's somehow better in the eyes of the law.
I just don't see the need to delineate. I'm totally open to changing that view though; someone else (or everyone else) may have found a way to reason about that that I haven't though of.
I'm generally opposed to these kinds of "under these circumstances, it's worse" laws though. I don't like DUI laws for the same reason. We already have reckless operation laws in most states. If someone kills another person through their reckless driving, I doubt their loved ones care whether it was because of alcohol, lack of sleep or playing on a phone. Why is swerving between lanes because you're drunk terrible, but swerving between lanes because you haven't slept in 2 days is just a slap on the wrist? Ticket/arrest people based on the threat they pose to others, not based on the threat they pose multiplied by some "we don't like that" factor.
