Alienable speech: Ideological variations in the application of free-speech principles

Research also suggests liberal-conservative differences in political tolerance (Davis & Silver, 2004). We measured U.S. citizens' political tolerance for speech acts, while manipulating the speaker’s ethnicity and the speech’s ideological content.

Speech criticizing Americans was protected more strongly than was speech criticizing Arabs, especially among more politically liberal respondents. Liberals also reported greater free-speech support. Respondents expressed greater political tolerance for a speaker when he was an exemplar of the criticized group, but showed equal political tolerance for speakers whose group membership (as a White or Black American) was irrelevant to the speech.