Who’s the April Fool? Scotland’s shiny new hate speech laws went into effect on the first of the month. Years in the making, the law is designed to punish anyone who “stirs up hatred”, by speaking “in a manner that a reasonable person would consider to be threatening, abusive or insulting.” The law carries a sentence of up to 7 years in prison.
Author J K Rowling, who lives in Scotland drew attention to the new law, publishing a list of trans-identified men on her X account, referring to them as men. “I’m currently out of the country,” she posted, “but if what I’ve written here qualifies as an offence under the terms of the new act, I look forward to being arrested when I return to the birthplace of the Scottish Enlightenment.”
It would seem that this law is not a lot different than those on the books in many Western nations, and most crimes covered by the Hate Crime Act are already illegal in Scotland. However, Glasgow University law professor, James Chalmers explained that the new Act will afford the ability to categorize and punish “really serious” offences. He remains unconvinced that many cases will be prosecuted.
Writing at The Critic, Glasgow University’s Michael Foran agrees that the Act allows Scottish law enforcement to add "aggravation” to speech against protected classes. However, he says quantifying what counts as "stirring up” offence presents more worrying possiblities, since:
In our current political climate, there is profound disagreement about the substance of these competing claims, and this has bled into disagreement about what counts as abusive behaviour…Misgendering or accurately sexing, depending on one’s view, is either legitimate political speech or it is abusive and potentially criminal.
Both professors recognize the chilling effect this Act could have on speech and that Scots are concerned. One government minister said that “misgendering” would not meet the criminal threshold to be a hate crime, but later said that was for the police to decide. Additionally, Professor Foran says that people understandably worry about the intrusion that may come from police “turning up at their workplace and using new powers in this Act to seize their phones and laptops” before deciding there was no crime after all.
In our day, offence is eminently weaponizable. Unsurprisingly, Scottish police were inundated with more than 3,000 complaints within the first 24 hours of the law being in effect. Whether there is manpower to investigate them all remains to be seen, but it shows the willingness of people to harbor resentment and how readily they are to believe themselves to be victims.
Being called a man when you want to be perceived as a woman may sound mean but it is not loving to speak lies. There is no need to be obnoxious about it, but the truth can sting. Christians know this quite well since we confess every week that we are poor, miserable sinners. We also confess that we have been made a new creation. The world will not want to hear about this new identity, hid with Christ in God, because
Being told you’re a sinner is an offence The cross of Jesus Christ is an offence Grace at the expense of another is an offence Feasting on Christ's body and blood is too.
It is not pleasant to learn that we have offended a holy God. And it’s not pleasant to learn we can do nothing to save ourselves from his righteous wrath. Yet, Jesus asked those who would turn away from hard truth, “Does this offend you? What then if you should see the Son of Man ascend where He was before?” To see Christ in his glory will be too much for the workers of lawlessness – that he lives, reigns and saves from sin is already hard enough for them to hear!
Whether a nation’s laws are favorable to truth or not, we cannot live by lies. We must keep repeating the words of eternal life, as our Savior did and expect to take hits for it. Good laws can curb men’s folly and we should pray that our leaders rule justly. But only the Spirit of God can truly change hearts. Fools will continue in their charades, but souls wearied by lies will find the forgiveness and peace they seek in the truth, even if it hurts.