Ten days ago, Phineas Mojapelo, deputy judge president of the South Gauteng Division of the High Court, ruled that the display of the pre-1994 South African flag — the apartheid flag — constitutes hate speech. It was a powerful ruling and one in a series of hate speech cases that our courts have recently grappled with.

Earlier last month, the South African National Editors’ Forum (Sanef) and a number of journalists argued in the Equality Court that the EFF’s targeting of them amounted to hate speech...