Free speech, American stylen is all or nothing: either you can say absolutely everything, without any reserve, or it is not free speech.<p>Free speech, European style, is: let&#x27;s cut the bottom 1% in public places--knowing full well it will necessarily be somewhat arbitrary, debatable and potentially dangerous--if it gives a much, much saner space for everybody else. That&#x27;s a trade-off, and not an easy one: opponents to it will immediately ask &quot;who decides&quot;, &quot;what if they want to shut _you_ up&quot;, or they&#x27;ll invoke slippery-slope style arguments. But, for all these issues, there is some point where the trade-off is a huge win for society, according to proponents. That&#x27;s always debatable, but I think it is as reasonable a stance as the previous one.<p>Besides, it&#x27;s not because a limit is very difficult to set that we should give up defining one. For instance, think about under age sex; who&#x27;s to say what age is ok, but two weeks before is a serious crime? It is prone to the same kind of induction and slippery slope arguments as free speech, but most people (me included) don&#x27;t argue about setting some arbitrary limit.