For some, the proposal is redundant compared with the existing legal arsenal. A lawyer believes it is a duplicate of Article 24-7, which already punishes acts of discrimination, and that any statement that incites exclusion already falls under the law.
The text indicates that racism does not come from nowhere and links certain racist and xenophobic remarks expressed in public debate and in the media to serious acts.
The text aims to supplement the law of July 29, 1881 on freedom of the press. It specifies that incitement to discrimination, hatred or violence can notably result from remarks that, by invoking the replacement of one population by another or the need for remigration, designate a group of people as a threat because of their origin or their membership, real or supposed, in an ethnicity or a nation.
Freedom of expression already has limits when it constitutes incitement to discrimination, racial defamation or racial insult, three offenses defined by the 1972 law on the fight against racism.
According to the bill, when they are repeated, disseminated and trivialized in the public space, these discourses contribute to establishing a climate of distrust and hostility toward people because of their real or supposed origin.