The importance of humour for democracy: good humour vs bad humour

An interactive workshop, hosted by Alberto Godioli and Tjeerd Royaards.
In this session, we will explore satire and the limits to freedom of expression. Using several court cases involving visual humour that was published in newspapers or in online media as examples, we will explain which arguments are used to either allow or sanction certain kinds of humour. Before we reveal the outcome of each court case, we will gauge how the audience would have judged, and afterwards we will explain the legal arguments that lead to a verdict.
This workshop will give insight into the role visual satire has within journalism, how it contributes to the public debate, but also how it sometimes derails into racism, sexism or hate speech. Along the way we will touch upon subjects like copyright law, the parody exception and to what extent public figures should be able to take a joke.