Protesters gather in Dublin to call on Gardaí to enforce hate speech legislation

Protesters gathered in Dublin today to call on the Gardaí to enforce hate speech legislation.

The protest began at Irishtown Garda Station before moving to Barrowstreet, where the Google headquarters is located.

There, Gardaí had to stand between anti-racism campaigners and a rival group of protestors.

Green Party Councillor Hazel Chu spoke at the rally. She said she has received hate mail and six 'heavy breathing' phone calls in one day.

She said: "Someone from abroad with a lot of following tweeted at my name questioning whether I was from Ireland, saying that I clearly wasn't and that I was just pretending to be Irish and then tweeting those kind of things.

"That kind of snowballed then because all of a sudden instead of a handful of messages coming my way that were questioning my nationality and ethnicity, suddenly it was hundreds."

Today I..

Got more mail than ever. Great mix of lovely & some rather hate fill ones.

Spoke to Gardai on hate mail & six breathing calls I got. They're going to perform trace.

Acted as Lord Mayor.

Got constituency work done.

Thanks folks! Don't forget #SpeakersUnicorner tmrw. pic.twitter.com/mYBIUCcgPI

— Hazel Chu (@hazechu) August 9, 2019