The Michigan House of Representatives has passed new hate speech legislation which criminalizes misgendering if someone feels ‘terrorized, frightened, or threatened’ by words, with offenders potentially facing up to five years imprisonment or a $10,000 fine.
Bill HB 4474 – passed in the Michigan House on June 20 – could make it a felony to intentionally “intimidate” someone for, among other things, using the wrong pronouns. The bill also extends to a number of “protected classes,” including race or color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, or national origin.”
By “intimidate,” the House means “a willful course of conduct involving repeated or continuing harassment of another individual that would cause a reasonable individual to feel terrorized, frightened, or threatened, and that actually causes the victim to feel terrorized, frightened, or threatened.”
However, the bill does not offer an objective definition against which intimidation or harassment can be held. Therefore, it is up to the interpretation of the listener as well as the local prosecutor to determine whether what was said was indeed intimidation.
Bill HB 4474 is “part of a [continued] effort by Democrats in the state [of Michigan] to advance a pro-LGBTQ+ agenda in their first months in power,” reports The Daily Mail.
“Make no mistake about it. Those advocating for this legislation will wield these policies as a weapon capable of destroying conservative expression or viewpoints grounded in the sacred,” adds Professor Emeritus William Wagner.
