Hate speech laws and blasphemy laws - twin evils

In listening to Frank Wright's lecture on suppressing ideas, I realized something important.  When a group in power outlaws criticism, they are engaging in a type of totalitarian limitation on free speech, and in essence, thought control.

And while us westerners rightly blanch at Islamic blasphemy laws, there is a secular fundamentalist equivalent - hate speech laws.  Now, I still agree that there is a limit to free speech, in that we should not be allowed to slander others, nor incite violence against them, but criticism, especially moral disapproval, should NOT be disallowed under hate speech legislation. I should be equally able to criticize white supremacists, Islamic or Christian fundamentalists, politicians, or homosexual activists.