I don’t approve of hate speech laws. Not even ones that would jail bastards like Jimmy Swaggart, who go on TV to say (paraphrase) ‘if any bloke eyes you up, kill him’.
So while it would give me great pleasure to see Mr Swaggart imprisoned and thoroughly humiliated, I’d be morally obliged to campaign for his fair treatment and release, which would be unnecessarily tedious and ironic.
Did you ever see that story in The Onion about the ACLU defending the right of neo-Nazis to burn down the ACLU?
Laugh? I thought my trousers would never dry.
You’ve got your priorities all wrong. Or rather you’ve failed to set them. There are lots of desiriable rights, like free speech and the right to not to live in fear of violence. These rights are in conflict here, but that’s only a problem if you put them all on a par with each other.
So it’s simple really. Swaggart’s right to free speech is trumped by his would-be victims right not to live in fear of violence.