The NZ Skeptics put together a submission for the Ministry of Justice in response to their new Hate Speech proposals. You can read the submission (opens new window) on our website, but I thought it would be fun to use EleutherAI's free online GPT-J-6G (opens new window) deep learning model to write a submission for us. I gave the software the first few paragraphs of our real submission, and then clicked the button to guess the next hundred or so words. I then fed the result back into the algorithm so that it could create the next block of text, and so on.
Eventually the text started getting repetitive, and veering off track, but for a while what I was being given by this trained algorithm made sense and looked pretty believable. I didn't agree with its arguments, but at least it seemed to be creating text that reads like a coherent argument. Please be aware that the pieces of legislation it mentions probably don't exist - this software is just trying to emulate the kinds of language it's been trained on, writing in blogs and on forums from all across the internet.
In the text below, everything in bold comes from our actual proposal. The ensuing text that is not in bold, starting at "We also acknowledge that there is a public interest", is written by the deep learning algorithm. Have a read and see if, like me, you're more than a little bit impressed with how well it did:
# NZ Skeptics submission on the Ministry of Justice Proposals against incitement of hatred and discrimination
# The NZ Skeptics
We are a New Zealand/Aoteaoroa charity dedicated to education and the promotion of evidence based practices, both in government policy and elsewhere in New Zealand public life. We believe that all government policy decisions should be informed by the best available evidence from relevant groups. We believe that legislation should be based in reality and evidence, rather than on unproven ideas.
# The Proposals
Our main concern is regarding Proposal five, with the addition of incitement to discriminate to the Human Rights Act.
We accept that inciting others to hate a group of people for their religious belief can be (and has been) a problem in this country, and that it makes sense to have some level of legislation to protect people from this behaviour.
We also acknowledge that there is a public interest in protecting people from incitement to commit acts of violence and/or to cause harm to others, such as in the case of terrorism.
We believe that the proposed new offences of incitement to discriminate and incitement to hatred are problematic for several reasons, and we are writing this submission to highlight the problems associated with these proposed changes.
Firstly, the proposed offences are deeply problematic because of their language. The wording of the proposal appears to be based on the "hate speech" model, which has been shown to be legally flawed in countries such as the United States, Canada, Australia and the United Kingdom. The "hate speech" model of lawmaking is based on the idea that "hate speech" is a form of dangerous speech, and therefore should be regulated as a form of dangerous speech. This assumption is based on the idea that, when someone says something that is "hate speech", it causes people to act on their feelings and to commit violence. It has been shown, however, that this is not true in many cases. Research shows that most people in most countries who commit violence have a different mental disorder (such as schizophrenia) and are more likely to have been victims of violence. It is also shown that people who commit violence are more likely to be victims of violence. The idea that "hate speech" causes violence has also been shown to be false.
To add insult to injury, the proposed offences are vague. They leave too many questions unanswered. What does "discriminate" actually mean? What does "hate" mean? What does "harm" mean? What if someone is just saying something that they disagree with? What if a large group of people are just saying something that they disagree with? How would the "discriminate" be proven? How would the "hate" be proven? How would the "harm" be proven?
As an example of the vagueness, consider the following clause from the proposed Human Rights Act amendment:
(4) Without prejudice to the generality of subsection (3), it is unlawful for a person to incite any other person to discriminate against a person or a group of persons or to incite a person to commit any act of violence or to do any act to cause harm to a person or to a group of persons in the context of a public discussion, debate or other public event, or in any other public place or context.
If someone is inciting a large group of people to discriminate against a group of people, such as race or gender discrimination, is that person committing an offence?
If someone is inciting a group of people to cause harm to a group of people, such as to murder a group of people or to burn down a church, is that person committing an offence?
There are many, many questions about the new offences, and it is not possible to answer these questions from the description. The wording of the proposal needs to be changed to make it clear what is meant by the language "incite to discriminate" and "incite to hate".
Secondly, the proposed new offences are very broad. The Human Rights Act is very broad, and the proposed amendments add little to the breadth of what is already covered. They appear to be largely drafted for the purpose of adding new offences. They do not appear to be drafted to make the law more effective. It would be impossible to draft a bill that is not overly broad.
The proposed Human Rights Act is already quite broad. It bans a number of things that are arguably not discriminatory or hateful, such as incitement to boycott. Even if the Human Rights Act is broadened, as proposed, it would still need to be kept within the bounds of the Constitution.
The proposed offences are also vague. The definition of "hate" (which is not defined) and "harm" (which is not defined) is incredibly broad. Many things that are not discriminatory or hateful can be described as "harmful". To use an example from the Bible, the book of Isaiah says that Yahweh is "a jealous God and an avenger, who takes vengeance on his adversaries." This has been used by many people as an example of Yahweh being hateful towards other religions. However, it is not hate speech. It does not incite violence or discrimination against other religions. It simply tells the truth about Yahweh. The book of Isaiah also says that Yahweh will judge his enemies, and that Yahweh will be "a refuge for the oppressed and a refuge in times of trouble". This is not hate speech. It is stating the truth about Yahweh.
We believe that the wording of the new offences needs to be significantly changed to make them more clear. In particular, we believe that the words "hate" and "harm" need to be clearly defined.
Thirdly, the proposed new offences appear to be based on the assumption that people can be "protected" from certain ideas. This is an unproven theory. There is no evidence that people can be protected from certain ideas, and this evidence is being ignored.