It is unreasonable to offend someone because of his skin colour, it is unreasonable to offend someone because of his beliefs, it is unreasonable to offend someone because of his sexuality and it is unreasonable to offend someone because of his nationality. Offending a racist may be reasonable if it is the only way to eventually stop it from offending minorities.

People don't choose what to be offended by, which is why we need to be flexible and stop as much offending as possible. A racist being offended because he cannot express his hateful views makes no sense. A religious society being offended by a minority because they don't share their beliefs makes no sense. A Jew being offended by hateful speech every day on his way to work does make sense.

It is all about being reasonable.

It is unreasonable to offend someone because of his skin colour, it is unreasonable to offend someone because of his beliefs, it is unreasonable to offend someone because of his sexuality and it is unreasonable to offend someone because of his nationality. Offending a racist may be reasonable if it is the only way to eventually stop it from offending minorities.

People don't choose what to be offended by, which is why we need to be flexible and stop as much offending as possible. A racist being offended because he cannot express his hateful views makes no sense. A religious society being offended by a minority because they don't share their beliefs makes no sense. A Jew being offended by hateful speech every day on his way to work does make sense.

It is all about being reasonable.

It is unreasonable to offend someone because of his skin colour, it is unreasonable to offend someone because of his beliefs, it is unreasonable to offend someone because of his sexuality and it is unreasonable to offend someone because of his nationality. Offending a racist may be reasonable if it is the only way to eventually stop it from offending minorities.

People don't choose what to be offended by, which is why we need to be flexible and stop as much offending as possible. A racist being offended because he cannot express his hateful views makes no sense. A religious society being offended by a minority because they don't share their beliefs makes no sense. A Jew being offended by hateful speech every day on his way to work does make sense.

It is all about being reasonable.

Laws prohibiting violence protect people from real physical demonstrable harm.  It is protecting the freedom of people to not be injured.  If I punch someone on the nose, I know for a fact its going to cause them pain, and may break their nose.  If I call someone gay online, I don't know if they'll take it as a joke, shrug it off, be offended and commit suicide, or decide to have a rational discussion about the incident.  I have NO control over that.  The outcome is UNKNOWN, and only ONE of those possible outcomes could be construed as harmful, and there are several that can be construed as beneficial. 

As for suicide, nobody made that person hang themselves, cut themselves, or shoot themselves.  They were all actions the individual chose to take.  I don't like bullying, and the people who take part in it are asses, that's for sure.  But lets not pretend that someone calling you fat or gay forced you in any way to harm yourself.  Under your logic, the guy responsible for the suicide of an investor who lost his fortunes on the stock market rests on the ones responsible for buying his stock and ruining him, not the guy hanging from the rope himself.

If you can't handle any of my "verbal flaps", that is not my problem.  I have absolutely no control over how you or anyone else will react to what I say.  Therefore, any responsibility for actions as a result of how you react to what I say is yours (or theirs).  If I did have that kind of control, then you might have a case, but I'm not a psychic or psionic or any other sci-f-/fantasy creature capable of controlling others thoughts and feelings.  How you feel about what I say is your problem, not mine.

Let me put it this way: A man who gets punched in his nose never chose to have his nose bleeding, or to experience the following pain. In a similar manner, people don't choose to be offended or mentally harmed. If people keep getting punched by others (who may also have the right to do so), the victims won't be able to be free in their own societies. If a person or his/her family can't leave their house without facing massive verbal protests against them living there as a minority, they are anything but free. You can't just shake off whatever hateful words people may throw at you, everyone has their unique limit. And the purpose of our laws in our Nordic society is to stop as many approaches to this limit, among our population, as possible. We want people to be free from verbal offences. America? They want people to be able to throw shit at whoever they want, while it's up to the receiver to learn to clean their shitty clothes.

Nothing good can come out of being intentionally offensive.

You missed my point.  My point was that if I insult someone their reaction is UNKNOWN.  There is no way to determine before I say something how that person will react to what is said.  I don't know if they'll feel pain, or anguish, or find it funny, or want to have a discourse.  Thats the cool thing about free speech, you never know where its going to go and what NEW ideas or changed points of view will result.  And who do you trust to determine if an off color joke was meant to genuinely insult or to just be silly.  I don't trust anyone, especially in a political climate as volatile as ours.

As for feigning insult, the examples here were intentionally satiracle.  There are TONS of instances in the political discourse of the Unites States where one party or groups acts far more insulted by something someone said (who happens to be their political enemy) than they have any right to.  They do this with the express and explicit intent to silence their enemy through intimidation and social reprisal.