I think that the position of Noam Chomsky regarding free speech and anti-fascism should be most illuminating. He correctly identifies free speech as an aim rather than a tool, as a worthy goal, to be more specific as the most important right after freedom of thought. He also correctly points out that obviously if the opinion is controversial, the right should be protected even more strongly (the consensus view doesn’t need additional protection, after all). He directly tackles the issue of hate speech, since he explicitely mentions Holocaust deniers, correctly noting that while in Europe this is a huge problem “despite” the laws prohibiting it (living in Europe myself, I can very much attest to the truth of this assessment), and takes over the public discourse at each minor incident, in the US it is essentially a non issue, despite its proponents being protected by the right to free expression. Despite being himself Jewish, he mantains that this is one of the few areas where he feels America truly excels with respect to the rest of the world, and rightly mentions that Holocaust deniers shouldn’t be silenced through censorship, but defeated in a debate, as they easily can be, and thus reduced to irrelevance without resorting to the use of violence (albeit non physical) and state power. The video is available here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j3X1zm16u90