Yes fully aware of what you could come up with if you searched the different meanings of speech.

You labelling what happened as hate speech though, well......what was that about clutching straws again?

I would find offence, yes. Not as a man per se, but on behalf of women. In this context the implication is that it is somehow 'inferior' to 'be a woman' and that it isn't the right way to be.

A man can get angry, get upset, cry and sulk like anyone can. It's just that a lot of men perceive crying (for instance) as being 'unmanly' so therefore use condescending terms like 'stop being a woman'.

What they actually mean is 'stop reacting in such a way that I feel uncomfortable with as it confounds my notions of "masculinity".'

But instead the aggressor will tend to say things in such a way that it persecutes another and stops them acknowledging their own vulnerability and sense of insecurity.

In a rugby context, for instance (seeing as this is a rugby board) say if one of the players gets walloped tonight and rather than lamping the aggressor several times, the cry on they well up and show some pain. So what? They are not 'being a big girl' they are merely being themself - a man. A different man with different outlooks and reactions to another in that situation, but no less of one (nor 'no more' of one either).

I do a lot of work in my job working with notions of identity and of 'isms' that people experience and how it affects them. This one of 'being a girl' comes up a lot with young men / boys and adult men that i work with.

Conversely, some young women / girls and adult women i work with have started saying how they feel they are criticised or looked down upon by showing emotional vulnerability and sensitivity.

Look at the Snickers advert - they have been sly in saying 'have a snickers, you turn into a right diva otherwise' (rather than saying 'a right woman' but i think this was a clever side-step to avoid more offense). Then 'get some nuts'.

Due to the double intonation of 'get some nuts' - here 'get a snickers'; generally meaning 'be a man / get some balls' they are suggesting that being a 'diva' is 'not ok' and that 'having nuts' is what is needed.

Why is it?

I suspect Gotcha may be the type of person that would buy in to such messages acceptingly; i am not. Yet we are both men. Gotcha is no more manly than I. I am no more than him. He may be stronger than me and could beat me up if he wanted - I might be more emotionally resilient than him and could support him with problems, relationships and emotions better than he could himself.

Swings and roundabouts really.

Hate speech is speech that attacks a person or group on the basis of e.g. race, religion, gender, disability, or sexual orientation

Thats the definition from dictionary.com

I have yet to see any definition which refers to the length of what the person said.

I'd be wary of being a slave to a dictionary definition here. "Hate speech" does seem a rather strong description for this incident (there's a lack of hatred in it, for a start). I'm not sure it's that helpful to use that sort of language in this case.

I always thought a "fag" was something you smoked when you needed nicotine and that a "faggot" was something you ate with mash and onion gravy!

Where have I been all this time that these simple words have been turned into homophobic slurs?

In Seriousness though, he has been caught using a homophobic slur and found not be a homophobe. He has been dealt with by the RFL who think that a 5 game ban and £300 fine is sufficient punishment for his heat of the moment mistake.

If I've read it correctly is he also spending some time with the pink rhinos and LGBT Community as an educational process? Will this make him think twice before slurring again?

In the heat of a RL game, things will always be spoken in the heat of the moment, some will get picked up and be publicised in the way that this case has and others will just fall by the wayside.

The RFL have set out their stall now and anyone found guilty of using homophobic, racist, other discriminatory language should incur the same length ban as Zak as an absolute minimum.

So we are agreed it was not white on white, and there was no wrongness. So therefore your response was irrelevant.

I'd disagree. Firstly it refers to the word not to person. Hardaker used a word which was hate speech. It is a word used by people to attack homosexuals. That i think is unarguable.

I've said numerous times that i dont believe Hardaker to be homophobic, nor that there was homophobic intent in what he said.

I think 'hate speech' is a good description of the word, because it makes it clear why it can't also be used as just a random 'frustration' word.

Thats why i use 'hate speech' to describe the word. Because thats what it is. Winding back to find something more palatable to describe the word, is pretending that it isnt used in the very very negative way we both know it is. Even if it wasnt in this instance.

Oh dear

thats your worst effort yet. Why is white on white the definitive factor in that example? Why is it different to say an asian person to a white person? Or perhaps a person of Polynesian extraction to a person of Afro-Caribbean heritage?

I think that's a problem with the language we use to describe this sort of incident. I think there are clear connotations attached to phrases like "hate speech" and "hate crime" that I think have everything to do with motivation. I am not sure a word can, of itself, carry hate. That has to be added by the user, in my opinion.

If we keep these definitions absolute then Zak Hardaker's unthinking use of a word (that we clearly both agree is not an acceptable word in this context and needs to be removed from the vernacular) sits snugly alongside other "hate speech" we might associate with Abu Hamza, Nick Griffin or Fred Phelps. I'm not suggesting that you are intentionally making that link, but it is there. I would maintain that that is not helpful.

But the reason we would call it hate speech is precisely because it is used by that type of person to convey hate.
The reason why it is unacceptable is because it is hate speech.

You can't separate the reasons why Hardaker can't use that word, from its use as hate speech. They are entirely the same thing.

If we start from a position that Hardaker didnt intend to say something homophobic or hateful, then the reason he was wrong to use the word he did was because it is hate speech used by others to convey hate and discriminate.

If he were to have intend to say something homophobic and hateful then he wouldnt have been wrong to use that word. He would be a homophobic f1ck but he would have chosen the right word.

To pretend it isnt hate speech, or to try and make the description more palatable, is also does the same thing to those who are to use it in the disgusting ways people like Fred Phelps did.

Hardakers mistake was to use hate speech not to express hate (an emotion we all believe he didnt have) but to express frustration. You can mistakenly use a fork to cut your food. Its still a fork.

Thats all very nice, but still not an explanation of why it is any different for a white man to say it to a white man, as opposed to any other ethnicity to any other ethnicity. Until You can explain why it is different. You can't hide behind the specificity of the example.

I may come across as all those things. I have however managed to not be a bigot hiding behind calling people knob-jockeys and assorted names. (though i admit i did call you a d1ck and for many reasons that was unnecessary) and that at least is an improvement on yourself.

I am not "pretending" it isn't hate speech, I am arguing for a definition of "hate speech" that requires the presence of hatred. Dismissing counterpoints as "pretending" is not a great debating technique.

I am contending that motivation is important. That is why Hardaker's offence (and you will see that I acknowledge an offence) is, in my opinion, very different to the preaching of Fred Phelps. In much the same way that manslaughter is different from murder.

Your fork analogy makes the assumption that my giving credence to motive and intent is mistaken. You are yet to persuade me of that. I duly don't accept the validity of that analogy.

Oh for the love of god I just feel pity for you now......learn when to quit man.