New commissioner calls for 18C axing
AUSTRALIA’S new Human Rights Commissioner Tim Wilson (pictured) has called for Section 18C of the Racial Discrimination Act to be axed “in its entirety”.
In an exclusive interview with The AJN, Wilson said Attorney-General George Brandis should go further than merely tighten the wording of the legislative protection against hate speech and scrap that part of the law altogether.
Section 18C of the act deems it unlawful to “offend, insult, humiliate or intimidate” a person or group based on race, ethnicity or colour.
Where Brandis has suggested retaining the words “humiliate” and “intimidate” as he considers the nature of imminent amendments, Wilson contends that even these measures pose too great a restriction on free speech. He said views on what constitutes humiliating or intimidating speech are inconsistent and difficult to determine across cultures.
“It’s always very difficult to know what would offend somebody else. I’m an openly gay man myself, and I know there are some people from certain racial or cultural backgrounds who think the mere idea of being called a homosexual is humiliating or intimidating.”
“I think it’s a very low bar,” he said, adding that the “best way to deal with it” is to “repeal it in its entirety so that we actually have active, robust discussion in public life and that of course means that I support very strongly free speech.”
While proponents of Section 18C have highlighted its use in the successful prosecution of Holocaust denier Fredrick Toben, Wilson said using the law to prosecute deniers creates the illusion that “what they actually have to say is valid”.
More effective, he argued, is “to explain to the public just how ignorant, how bigoted, how completely out of touch these people are”.
Read the full interview in this week’s AJN.
TIMNA JACKS
Human Rights Commissioner Tim Wilson
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