Free Speech vs. Social Justice: Should Hate Speech be Protected?

Abstract

Editor’s note: Publication by JIFP does not constitute an endorsement of the content or represent the official position of the Office for Intellectual Freedom (OIF) or the American Library Association (ALA). Commentaries, articles, and book reviews do not necessarily reflect the views of the editorial board of JIFP, OIF, ALA, or their affiliates.There is a troubling trend within the library profession. As a result of blind allegiance to free speech absolutism, librarians are forgetting that we exist in a society. Libraries are social spaces and therefore spaces for social justice.