[okeuro49]

In the UK there is "social media intelligence", where AI systems scan the firehose of messages as they appear. [1]

So people have been arrested for posting something online, even if nobody appears to have seen it, and they delete it shortly after.

The policing is selective, depending on political view. For example, there were recently people with placards in London calling for the death of JK Rowling, which is de facto allowed by the police.

In comparison the wrong social media post can carry a lengthy jail sentence. [2]

The difference is so noticeable, it is now called "two tier policing".

If someone perceives something you say as "hateful" they can report you to the police, who can record a "Non-crime hate incident" against your name. [3]

This can show up on enhanced job checks, affecting employment.

It's very similar to a Stasi file.

[1] https://policinginsight.com/feature/advertisement/social-med...

[2] https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/the-punishment-of-lucy-c...

[3] https://www.slaterheelis.co.uk/articles/crime-category/non-c...

[saagarjha]

You put hateful in quotes but I do want to point out that this is the tweet from the thing you linked:

> Mass deportation now, set fire to all the f*** hotels full of the bastards for all I care …. I feel physically sick knowing what these families will now have to endure. If that makes me racist so be it

[n4r9]

The context also needs to be noted. This was part of the social media storm that whipped up a wave of right-wing, racist hatred and violence in the wake of the Southport riots. No such waves of violence have sprung out of trans activism.

[okeuro49]

There is no "far right" or people being "whipped up". Disorder is a consequence of failed government policy.

E.g. from 2023: "Northern seaside town now a 'powder keg' over asylum seeker tensions"

"The tension in Skegness has grown after hundreds of migrants from the Middle East, Africa and Albania were crammed into former tourist hotels on the seafront."

"Cars have been vandalised, shop windows broken, mattresses set alight and scuffles reported between migrants and security staff. Officials say 229 asylum seekers are staying in up to seven hotels on and around the town’s promenade, but locals say the figure is more like 700."

[n4r9]

> There is no "far right" or people being "whipped up".

The wikipedia page about the riots has 127 mentions of "far-right" [0]. From the very start there were links between the protestors and organisations like the EDL. The online misinformation was spread by far-right influencers such Tommy Robinson, Katie Hopkins, and Andrew Tate, as well as a host of global right-wing accounts. The organisation Alliance4Europe which campaigns against online misinformation found that "non-domestic far-right groups played a significant role in inflaming tensions following the Southport murders" [1].

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2024_United_Kingdom_riots

[1] https://alliance4europe.eu/the-international-far-rights-impa...

[okeuro49]

The EDL hasn't been around for years.

The "far right" narrative is to hide state failure.

Even the group "Hope not Hate" (former far-left "Searchlight" publication) admitted the "far right" narrative was a hoax. [1]

[1] https://www.express.co.uk/news/uk/1933625/uk-riots-list-hoax

[n4r9]

Is that the article you meant to link? It says that a specific document was a hoax, not the entire concept of the far right.

[roenxi]

Far-right, unfortunately, is something of a trigger word suggesting Wikipedia is about to become unreliable in its coverage. As far as I can tell any suggestion that immigration levels should be low is likely to be a far-right position which means it is a very large tent. A tent that includes some undesirables and a lot of quite normal people.

There is an odd situation where apparently countries can simultaneously adopt anti-growth policies while having an infinite surplus of real resources to handle more migrants and anyone who believes otherwise is de-facto attempting to restart the Jew ovens whether they personally deny it or not. Where a more charitable view would be if a country maintains high immigration into a situation where real resources don't grow that is quite possibly leading towards a genocide. People aren't all smiles and sunshine when times get tough; it is more sensible to engineer society towards prosperity.

[n4r9]

Not so; Keir Starmer is talking about cracking down on immigration and is certainly not far-right. You veer into the far-right when you dehumanise immigrants and use terms like "cockroaches", "Muslim invasion", or "great replacement".

[like_any_other]

Was the misinformation even material? The perpetrator of the Southport stabbings was the child of recent African immigrants, so I don't see how the true facts of the case would have calmed any right-wing unrest.

[n4r9]

The furore was whipped up on the basis of the perpetrator being Muslim, illegal, and an immigrant. In my opinion it fed off the residual unresolved tensions of grooming gang cases. But of course the actual perpetrator was none of these three things.

[like_any_other]

You mean in the wake of the Southport child murder mass stabbing, right?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2024_Southport_stabbings

[n4r9]

Yes. But specifically I'm referring to how a group of far-right social media accounts exploited that tragedy to whip up a violent frenzy of riots, starting with Southport.

[leereeves]

That certainly doesn't meet the threshold for a credible threat.

It's a despicable thing to say, and it seems like even she realized that when she calmed down and deleted it. But what's the basis for treating it as a crime?

[ryandrake]

From OP's post, it wasn't treated as a crime. I would absolutely expect a background check to reveal statements like that, that people voluntarily, publicly post.

[leereeves]

No, that was a separate detail in OP's post. According to the second link, the woman who tweeted that received a 31-month sentence, as the post says: "the wrong social media post can carry a lengthy jail sentence".

[foldr]

It wasn’t prosecuted as a death threat, so it’s not really relevant whether or not the threat was credible. The relevant offense is inciting racial hatred.

[leereeves]

Ok, so it is very much political. Similar principles are being used right now to punish supporters of Palestine under the guise of preventing anti-Semitism.

Brief expressions of anger after a mass killing don't justify imprisoning someone.

Edit: the enforcement is political, I mean. Basically, not all hate speech is treated equal, it depends on who the speech is about, and what concerns the government. In the US it was terrorism after 9/11 and opposition to Israel now. It sounds like in the UK right now it is anti-immigrant sentiment. At least in the US we have a strong First Amendment to protect us from the government policing our speech.

[foldr]

The tweet was posted elsewhere in this thread. It doesn’t express any political view. It just says hateful stuff.

To your edit: If you’re making the comparison to anti-TERF “hate speech”, then it’s not treated equally because the law itself doesn’t treat racism on a par with anti-TERF sentiment. You can disagree with that, but it doesn’t show unequal policing of the law as-is.

[tossandthrow]

> So people have been arrested for posting something online, even if nobody appears to have seen it, and they delete it shortly after.

The message you are quoting is now being propagated,which is unfortunate.

Most of the western world is moving to a risk based legal system and has a proportionaly measure build in.

If the message in question had a limited reach, then it should not lead to a conviction.

Just like we don't convict people who has inappropriate thoughts or write inappropriate things in their diary.

[saagarjha]

I'm not sharing the message because it brings me joy to have it shown to more people. I think it's a pretty reprehensible thing to say. I'm sure people say worse into their personal diary or even among friends and that is not criminalized. I might possibly even consider the defense of "oh nobody really reads my posts anyway and I deleted it quickly".

But I absolutely will not stand for trying to claim that the post was scare-quotes "hateful". It was hateful, full stop. This is not polite discourse that was unfairly marked as hate because of some political slant. It was clearly hate, even if wasn't seen by anyone, even if it got deleted.

[Saline9515]

Hate is a normal thing in human societies. Freedom of speech also encompasses expressing hatred and negative feelings. What you can do to mitigate it is to solve the problems that create hate. In the case of the UK, addressing the mass-rapes of British girls, among other things.

Sending people to prison for social media posts is a typical totalitarian move, similar to what you find in China, North Korea or Russia. None of the underlying issues are solved by intimidating your population, who, at some point, will just start to leave quietly.

[foldr]

Lots of countries outlaw hate speech. I know that Americans tend to think that this is a slippery slope to totalitarianism, but much of the rest of the world disagrees. And America in its present state isn't a great advertisment for its own particular model of public discourse and political freedom.

Obviously, you can also be jailed in the US for social media posts that break the law. Here is one example:

https://www.justice.gov/usao-edny/pr/social-media-influencer...

It's tasteless to bring up rape cases that are irrelevant here. The tweet we're talking about was posted in the wake of the Southport stabbings. Nobody can seriously suggest that historical failures to investigate rape cases in Pakistani communities can be related to an outburst decades later about burning down hotels housing asylum seekers.

[tossandthrow]

I am not trying to say that it was not hateful - and proper moderation should be in place. Just like it has always been.

I am merely trying to say that there should be proportion in the reaction.

The society does not give you a death sentence to jay walk.

[saagarjha]

I'm not arguing with you. I'm arguing with the quotes around "hate".

[nickdothutton]

Unfortunately we are at the stage in the UK now where people do receive visits from the police to (and I use the exact language of the police here) "Check their thinking". This is a consequence of attempting to police speech which previously fell below the level of criminal activity, but now may have been elevated to a crime via volumes of new hate crime laws. Indeed society has now decayed here to such an extent that we have "non crime hate incidents" which still fall below the criminal threshold but warrant an investigation by the police.

[Arkhaine_kupo]

> If the message in question had a limited reach, then it should not lead to a conviction.

her husband shares a prominent political position. Her reach and views way larger than her twitter following. By association alone she has authoritative voice.

If Melania Trump was tweeting about racist things, how quickly she deletes the tweet would not be the main issue to give a prominent example

[Saline9515]

If Melania posts some distasteful ideas, she won't go to prison since US citizens have freedom of speech, unlike in the UK and their Orwellian laws.

[Arkhaine_kupo]

> US citizens have freedom of speech

just a reminder that anti protest laws now allow people to be send to prision for speech. But I guess as long as hippie looking they/them who are pro palestine at uni go to jail instead of racist white people then the US does not have Orwellian laws.

Please never actually read the book or else you might need to stop using it as a adjective because doublethink is what you are actively doing right now

[Saline9515]

Given how "hippie looking they/them" wanted to silence their political opponents in the past administration, it's kind of ironic how life comes back at you, fast?

Also, kudos for the classist part assuming that I have never read a book.

[DonHopkins]

Melania Trump literally did spread racist lies on national TV. And when confronted with evidence that directly contradicted her racist lies that she could not refute, she justified her racist lies with her racist "feelings".

Melania Trump Supported Her Husband's Racist Birtherism Claims on TV:

https://www.teenvogue.com/story/melania-trump-supported-her-...

>People need to stop talking about "freeing Melania."

>An old clip resurfaced on the internet over the weekend of Melania Trump supporting her husband Donald Trump's claims that former president Barack Obama wasn't born in the U.S.

>On April 20, 2011, Melania appeared on the Joy Behar Show and backed up her husband's allegations that Obama wasn't born in the state of Hawaii like live birth records suggest.

>"It’s not only Donald who wants to see [Obama's birth certificate], it’s American people who voted for him and who didn’t vote for him. They want to see that," she argued. Behar then made the point that the birth certificate had already been on display and all over the internet. "We feel it’s different than birth certificate," Melania responded.

Melania Trump On Obama's Birth Certificate:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P6i0YlHriKk&t=98s

>Joy asks Melania Trump if Donald is really going to run for president or if it's a publicity stunt & why he's obsessed with President Obama's birth certificate.

[echelon_musk]

There was a CCC talk on the practices of the Stasi some years ago (I forget exactly which year).

What stayed with me from the talk was that they had shown recovered Stasi photos of a young man's home where he had a wall dedicated to American iconography.

The speaker stated that in the current era this would just be trivially collected from social media instead of needing to gain physical access to property.

Edit: It was 32C3 What Does Big Brother See While He Is Watching at appx the 40m mark.

[walterbell]

Thanks for the pointer, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FS2oAOieECk

> Over the course of three years, I was able to research the archives left by East Germany's Stasi to look for visual memories of this notorious surveillance system and more recently I was invited to spend some weeks looking at the archive by the Czechoslovak StB. Illustrating with images I have found during my research, I would like to address the question why this material is still relevant – even 25 years after the fall of the Iron Curtain.

[lifestyleguru]

The birthday party with Stasi members dressed up as the individuals they spy on is really brutal, the costumes themselves were likely confiscated from their victims. Stereotypically confirming that "German sense of humor is not a laughing matter". There is always a brutally cynical undertone in their jokes.

[1718627440]

Are you just taking internal jokes of a repressive regime as representative for a country?

[lifestyleguru]

Most of bureaucrats of any 20th century regime, first or second half the century, remained working within country's structures after the fall of the regime. If not for government officially, then at least in law, debt collection, or security industries. The general attitude hadn't changed only because the regime failed.

[DonHopkins]

British jokes can be deadly, too!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YeMnPyusuBE

[bertylicious]

You forgot to add a source for your claim that protestors called for the death of Rowling.

[roenxi]

That isn't the part of the argument that needs a source - pretty much everyone who is anyone in the public sphere seems to have death threats made against them and threats of extreme violence are actually pretty common at protests. Guillotines at protests are a reasonably common fixture for example [0]. That is the reason the standard needs to be someone actually doing something before the police get involved - people say all sorts of threatening things in political contexts. It's pretty scary but it is better to tolerate it and let people get their emotions out into the open. They generally don't mean it.

[X] has has been subject to death threats at a protest is a pretty safe blind claim. Particularly for politicians, public figures, rich people, identifiable races and political groupings. Some yobbo will write something stupid on a placard and wave it around sooner or later.

[0] I searched for "guillotines at political protests" as a sanity check and straight away saw a "decapitate TERFs" placard. https://news.sky.com/story/scottish-politicians-and-jk-rowli...

[n4r9]

Maybe so, but it's still important to callenge okeuro49's claims. Extremist takes like that give off an air of believability despite being unsubstantiated. Relying solely on the common sense of the readership leads to situations where extremist views simply drown out the rest. It should not be seen as acceptable to present a wilfully distorted view of the facts.

[roenxi]

JK Rowling is famous, wealthy, a public figure and female. I guarantee you she has received death threats and the police have shrugged it off as not a credible problem.

Whether they are public or not is more of an academic detail, but given the level of hostility aimed at her it is a pretty safe bet that someone has somewhere whether or not it was reported on the internet. If someone wants to die on the hill of every claim being cited then fair enough, at least it is a principled hill. But this is like asking for a cite that US political debate got heated. Rowling has genuine anti-fans out there, I've seen totally spontaneous wild hate sessions break out against her in my wanderings through the internet. It'll have spilled out into real-world protest somewhere.

[foldr]

The original claim was that people were carrying placards at a recent protest in London calling for the death of JK Rowling. It’s not obvious that this has in fact happened, and it’s reasonable to ask for evidence of it.

[roenxi]

Let me google that for you: https://celebrity.nine.com.au/latest/jk-rowling-slams-transg...

I'm just saying, I didn't even check before this comment. And who knew? bunch of death threats targeting Rowling with activists trying to make sure everyone can find her in meatspace in case the threat makes her quieten down. "Did she receive death threats" is really not the part of this to try and question. And if you want to make a point about did someone do it while at a protest - I mean yeah. Yeah they did. Maybe nobody bothered to record it, because that sort of thing is routine and boring.

If someone wants to attack the police response part that I have no idea about. Maybe they did respond and it was exemplary - that is the sort of thing that does need a source. But the death threats part is just another year as a public figure. There are a lot of death threats out there. And it'd spill over to placards.

EDIT And it turned out to be remarkably easy to find a citation, note the "decapitate TERFs" link 2 comments up. As expected. It's easy to tune out because in practice calling for the death of someone at a protest is in practice a pretty minor thing to do. Which TERFs do they want to decapitate if not Rowling? Is there fine print on the back of the sign that exempts her? Its Sky News so I I'll admit that is possible.

[EnPissant]

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2025/04/22/trans-activists-...

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-14638683/Police-inv...

[input_sh]

I haven't seen a single example of someone calling for death of JK Rowling specifically in any of those?

The only references to her I see is a sign saying "go shit on a pile of Harry Potter books" and people chanting "fuck JK Rowling".

[hn_throw2025]

The thumbnail might do in case you don’t want to watch the YT video :

https://youtu.be/8LO0I8v8EvE?si=y6numFgiqCYd-eLe

The placard carried by the individual* said “bring back witch burning… JK”.

* I don’t see calling for such a thing as a typical female trait, but then again these protestors did also desecrate a Suffragette memorial, so I expect their ideas are a little confused.

[EnPissant]

It's an example of police ignoring death threats. It references Harry Potter, and JK Rowling is the most common target of the "TERF" epithet. In any case, it supports the claim that the UK police selectively enforce speech laws.

[input_sh]

Ah so nobody called for the death of JK Rowling, but terfs in general, which she happens to be? A death threat by nonintrinsic affiliation if you will? Seems pretty stupid if you ask me.

Perhaps she could not make it her whole identity so that when people say "death to this specific type of bigotry", random people on the internet don't immediately make the logical leap to think people wish for her death specifically?

[Saline9515]

Hate speech laws are a very convenient tool for an authoritarian regime as their application is totally subjective. You could argue that saying "death to terfs" would mean only to end an ideology, but "death to Islam" would send you in prison as you are threatening muslims. In general, it's the same thing, but depending on the prevailing ideology, Police and courts can apply it selectively.

[foldr]

The original post said that people had placards “calling for the death of JK Rowling”. It may be that the poster’s overall point does not rely on this specific factual claim. But don’t try to muddy the waters around this: it’s a straightforward factual claim and people are right to ask if it can be sourced. So far it has not been.

[EnPissant]

If there was a protest where people had signs that said “death to <slur>” while screaming “fuck <member of group targeted by slur>”, and calls were made to defecate on that person’s art, would you say death threats were made about that person? Please take a moment to substitute various groups and people.

[constantcrying]

So Britain is not a liberal democracy anymore? Are you sure you aren't falling for some propaganda here? This just seems very unlikely.

If this were actually true Britain would be violating basic premises of what is considered justice in a liberal democracy. Policing someone based on whether the targets of their threats are politically acceptable is obviously not are tactics used in autocratic regimes. Loyalists e.g. in Russia are free to threaten the opposition however they like at worst getting a slap on the wrist. At the same time much less serious threats against the regime are harshly punished.

If what you say were true and not just some propaganda operation, then the British political system has slid sharply towards authoritarianism. Obviously liberal democracy is more than equality before the law, but is one important pillar. This happening is incompatible with my view of the UK.

[leereeves]

There's no doubt that the part about the police investigating and recording non-criminal speech is true.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Non-crime_hate_incident

And according to these solicitors, such records are used in background checks:

https://www.slaterheelis.co.uk/articles/crime-category/non-c...

[chgs]

If you think an enhanced dbs check can affect your job wait to see what posting on social media will do.

[tonyedgecombe]

I must admit I'm struggling to see the problem. If someone is hostile or prejudiced against people of a certain race, sexual orientation or disability then they should be excluded from jobs working with those people.

[Arkhaine_kupo]

No, you see I can be hateful and not suffer consequences or else 1984. Also I should be allowed to vote and promote ideas that will actively harm people, gleefully admit it, and celebrating their suffering but it is not ok to stop me. As the famous poem goes first they came for the neo nazis and i did nothing, then they came from the online racists and i did nothing and now they are coming for me the lowly bigot and there is no one left to defend me.

Or something like that, I barely read anything that isnt a tweet length and preferably full of slurs.

(Trying to write a modern "modest proposal" is hard when reality is so blatantly stupid)

[Saline9515]

The problem here is that I could go to the police, report Tony Edgecombe as he told me at the coffee machine that devs who use 4 spaces instead of tabs are pure human scum who should be deported, and it will be written in your file. You then have no way to erase it.

The problem with thinking that such practice is totally ok, is that one day it will turn against you. Pro-Palestine liberals discovered this at their expense after the Trump election and the recent crackdown on their movement.

[tonyedgecombe]

>The problem here is that I could go to the police, report Tony Edgecombe as he told me at the coffee machine that devs who use 4 spaces instead of tabs are pure human scum who should be deported, and it will be written in your file. You then have no way to erase it.

The police would laugh at you before they sent you on your way.

Dig a little deeper on any of the examples you see posted here and you will find people inciting violence or racial hatred. We have had laws against this stuff for fifty years.

>Pro-Palestine liberals discovered this at their expense after the Trump election and the recent crackdown on their movement.

We aren't the US.

[Saline9515]

Yes, it was a joke. That said, you don't get the point - it's arbitrary and there is no way to prove that it's true. Yet, it will still be recorded. And yeah, saying once something wrong shouldn't follow you all your life. This is classic legal harassment and intimidation, similar to what was practiced in the USSR against ethnic minorities.

Regarding pro-Palestine protests, it was an example about how being fine with freedom of speech restrictions can come back and bite you in the ass. It always does.

[tonyedgecombe]

>That said, you don't get the point

I understand the point you are making, I just don't agree with it.

>it's arbitrary and there is no way to prove that it's true

You aren't going to get a record on hearsay.

>Yet, it will still be recorded.

I don't think you understand how policing works in the UK.

[walterbell]

Censoring of messengers can destroy early warning signals of systemic risks.

[lazide]

That’s the point, eh?

[bufferoverflow]

UK has a two-tier justice system.

[bilbo0s]

In fairness to UK, pretty much every place has a two tier justice system.

[tossandthrow]

That absolutely puts no fairness to the UK, but puts all these other places at equal shame.

[okeuro49]

It didn't used to have:

The hanging judge, that evil old man in scarlet robe and horse-hair wig,whom nothing short of dynamite will ever teach what century he is living in, but who will at any rate interpret the law according to the books and will in no circumstances take a money bribe, is one of the symbolic figures of England.

- Orwell

[cjbgkagh]

The dose makes the poison, and the UK is getting a big dose right now that they are not used to.

Plus the normal status quo is that you have an elite you cannot offend, now there are protected classes you cannot offend.

[croisillon]

@ZeroGravitas bitten by Poe's law :(

[xico]

This case sounds crazy, I cannot even imagine loosing a child and how anybody could expect someone to keep sane in those conditions.

Beyond this, there is a very clear difference between inciting hatred towards a group of people based on race, religion, nationality, origin, etc, and towards a single individual without those aggravations. The law is quite clear about this distinction in various countries (Public Order Act in the UK for instance), and the penalties are rightfully much stronger when one would try to instil hatred towards a racial (or other) group.

[hoseja]

There's not actually.

[Arkhaine_kupo]

Sometimes there is a worthwhile discussion on the reach and breath of policing, sometimes ridiculous people with insane views and 0 technical or legislative knowledge make opinion eds for people to share as rage bait.

Please just look at the other content from the "lovely" Laurie Wastell of the spectator to find the kind of groups, opinions and places she wants to protect vs those she doesn't.

like I would be kinda embarrased to share news sources from people being actively sued for the harm they caused with their misinformation (in their case vaccine lies).

> If someone perceives something you say as "hateful" they can report you to the police, who can record a "Non-crime hate incident" against your name. [3]

this was a law introudced by a conservative goverment, as part of their increase in police tools, which in large part came from support for "anti woke" policing of the pro black protests that came after it erupted in america.

People like the previouslike mentioned Mrs Wastell advocated for stronger sentencing and more police, and now that the leopards are eating the faces of the people who spend all day on facebook sending death threats to muslims she is now so incredibly offended.

Btw another reason for the focus on the NCHI is because the police are swamped, the Conservatives under theresa may cut their budget 40% which meant they have way less people so to keep stats up, you gotta focus on the easy shit.

Maybe if we hadn't brought in consulting types who advocate for stats to show work progress, conservative cuts to salaries and advocated for "blue lives matter" which pushed for stronger sentencing laws we would not be here but somehow Mrs Whitehall and you will take 0 accountability and instead blame "woke judges" or some other nonsense as she does in her article.

[Saline9515]

If you really believe that your fellow citizens can be easily influenced to undertake extreme actions by a twitter post, why not end democracy altogether? Since citizens are seemingly perpetual minors who lack agency over their actions. This is why all authoritarian regimes absolutely love hate speech laws.

[Arkhaine_kupo]

> If you really believe that your fellow citizens can be easily influenced to undertake extreme actions by a twitter post

so words have no capability of influencing people? Why speak at all if it can never change anyones opinion?

See what happens when you do reduction to absurdity of any argument?

But seriously, ask yourself: Is the entire ad industry a sham? Are state actors like the kremlin troll farms, the chinese fake newspapers and the cia meme department all wrong and no one can ever be influenced because they are adults and rational actors all the time? Are objectively effective misinformation campaigns like Brexit not proof of succesful compelling speech through channels like cambridge Analytica?

> why not end democracy altogether?

democracy is about empowering people. Leaving people to construct an identity through heaps of misinformation is not democracy, its insane and it cannot work.

> Since citizens are seemingly perpetual minors who lack agency over their actions.

Someone spending billions of dollars in anti intellectualism propaganda, political smear campaigns and capturing media networks is not the fault of the individual citizens, they are not minors they are victims of targetted hostile information hazards.

> This is why all authoritarian regimes absolutely love hate speech laws.

Authoritarian regimes tend to brag about how free their speech is. America spent the 50s chest bumping while sending people to jail over "communist ties" under mccarthyism, they spent the 60s bragging about free speech while sending students to jail for complaining about vietnam, they spent the early 2000s talking about free speech while punishing allies who did not agree with Irak (like France) and sending people to black sites like Guantanamo. And now they brag about free speech while the sitting president Elon decides which individual words get flagged in his social network and the vice president Trump jails 3 different judges over their rulings

you know all that free speech

[Saline9515]

Citizens are supposed to have critical thinking to distinguish what's right and wrong, what's true and false.

Freedom of speech allows to hear different views and apply this critical thinking. The problem is that you seem to know better and want to choose what's allowed and not allowed to say, given your political bias and contempt for your fellow citizens.

Last, democracy is not about empowering (what an empty word...) people, but about managing the various interest to end up with something that is acceptable. If a subgroup is being bullied, it is normal that it expresses its resentment. For instance, when white british people are being mass raped, and in some case, likely eaten[0], with no or little enforcement by the Police due to fear of being seen as "racists".

As a side note, all of the examples that you give are about reducing freedom of speech, so I don't really see your point. You could have cited the Weimar Republic, that had stringent hate speech laws, which did not prevent the access of the NSDAP to power.

[0] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Disappearance_of_Charlene_Do...

[Arkhaine_kupo]

> Citizens are supposed to have critical thinking

i wish someone didnt dismantle the education department of the federal goverment....

> Freedom of speech allows to hear different views and apply this critical thinking.

thats all well and good except it has never existed in the US, with countless examples of people being jailed for wrongthink it just happened that those people were all leftist. The second accountability crossed the aisle the uproar began. No one gave a shit when people were sent to jail for protesting Vietnam, or when the black panthers where jailed on terrorism charges but the second someone asked if Rupert murdoch should be held accountable for spreading lies for 30 years then it became a chest thumping issue.

> The problem is that you seem to know better and want to choose what's allowed and not allowed to say, given your political bias and contempt for your fellow citizens.

56% of americans cannot read past a 6th grade level. its not contempt, its pity

> democracy is not about empowering

Demos - people. Kratia - power. Gezz someone should tell the greeks they dont even know their language.

> but about managing the various interest to end up with something that is acceptable

that is not democracy, that is politics. Democracy is a form of politics, which has certain principles, like empowering the people (in liberal western democracy this is usually views that spawn from the french revolution, aka humanistic principles, education and voting and creating political groups to represent interests.

> If a subgroup is being bullied, it is normal that it expresses its resentment.

being bullied and FEELING they are bullied are different things, and certain personality disorders, education levels and religious views have a much larger overlap with those feelings. I personally do not care that a bunch of rich christians feel they are the butt of the joke, they have both monetary and political capital their feelings are literally not supported by reality. And arguing about their feelings is a pointless exercise in trying to explain to a entitled child why they are wrong.

> For instance, when white british people are being mass raped

not happening. Source: white british person.

> with no or little enforcement by the Police due to fear of being seen as "racists".

This is also not true. It is a literal talking point of Tommy Robinson, famous neo nazi, over the grooming gang that affected a small town in britain a few years ago.

i know YOU dont care, because you are just here to racist dogwhistle but I will explain the context for the people who might stumble upon your comment.

A small town in england had a serious problem, a group of men where grooming and hurting little girls. The police and local council were aware, however the town being small were scared that such a big scandal would tarnish their reputation. The police force, lacking funding and training fucked up the case beyond recognition and asked for support, the local council told them to keep it under wraps. A reporter a DECADE later brought the case up, as little girls were still being harmed. Due to how the justice works in the UK there is a media blackout (no one is allowed to report while a case is active) in this media blackout Tommy Robinson made up the unfounded lie that the police did not chase them due to fear of being called racist. Once the case was settled, a local council man (who was aware of the problem before it came to light) repeated Tommy Robinsons views as it exculpated him of letting little girls get hurt with his knowledge.

Other mass grooming cases with white perpetrators like the catholic schools in scotland case, reported by the same reporter and also decades long was somehow not national news in the same newspapers that reported the Tommy Robinson "fear of being racist" lines.

A neo nazi made up a lie, based on nothing and a council man who allowed the pain of minors in his council repeated it to not be accountable for his failings as a man. And now youre here a decade later, repeating it because you either know its false but want to spread hate, or dont know its fake and are contradicting your own claims that people are critical and can distinguish true and false.

> As a side note, all of the examples that you give are about reducing freedom of speech

by goverments bragging about their freedom of speech. You said countries who hate freedom of speech are the auth ones, I gave you examples of the country who uses the word freedom more than they use the word "the".

> which did not prevent the access of the NSDAP to power.

The big difference there is that Germany was an incredibly poor and unstable country. Syria is not haviing a civil war due to their freedom of speech laws, and neither did Germany. How free the press is in Sudan is not the reason they are being investigated by the UN for genocide.

[Saline9515]

Then how about empowering them to - speak? Not just say what you believe is allowed to say (this is authoritarian).

I'm talking about the practice of democracy, by the way.

And regarding mass rapes, being British yourself is clearly not a reference for truth. The wikipedia article I linked mentioned a mass grooming case in this town. You can't close your eyes on the evidence each time it doesn't follow your totalitarian narrative and expect that people will just shut up. Or you have to pass laws to do it, which ends up with the toxic situation of the UK, that has nothing to envy to the USSR.

Which is kind of funny given that you have laws to punish people who said something "creating anxiety", which is ... a feeling and totally subjective?

And there is no difference with Germany. Freedom a speech isn't something only for the affluent, first world. And the war in Syria started due to political repression against free speech being expressed against the regime. It didn't end so well for said regime.

[Amezarak]

> A small town in england had a serious problem, a group of men where grooming and hurting little girls.

The exact same thing happened in dozens of English towns. It wasn't just Rotherham. This is trivially provable by simply going to the Wikipedia page. It's also still ongoing.

> the unfounded lie that the police did not chase them due to fear of being called racist

This was in fact not an unfounded lie made up by right-wing extremists, but what was actually found in the council report.

> The report found: "Several staff described their nervousness about identifying the ethnic origins of perpetrators for fear of being thought as racist; others remembered clear direction from their managers not to do so."

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-south-yorkshire-289516...

You can also find stories featuring the very words of police chiefs: https://metro.co.uk/2020/01/18/rotherham-police-chief-admits...

I think it's very concerning that you could be so dangerously misinformed on this and still post about it. I do think this is one of those stories that is so horrifying it's better not to think about it. But just dismissing it as insane racist nonsense is even worse.

[foldr]

> The difference is so noticeable, it is now called "two tier policing".

That’s what Elon Musk calls it. In fact, the difference in the case you mention is simply that:

(i) Inciting racial hatred is a specific offense which doesn’t require a credible death threat. There is no offense of inciting hatred against TERFs. Like that or don’t – but the police don’t make the laws.

(ii) The context of Connolly posting during the riots in which actual violent crimes against minority groups were being committed.

[mrtksn]

That's disturbing. Instead of the govt. going after people we should enable people going after people.

That's how it's done in real life and that's how we protect ourselves from arsholes in real life. That's why the police is only involved when some actual danger is present, you are not expected to just endure the constant harassment.

IMHO someone being a complete cunt and you not having a recourse is also not acceptable. It's terrorizing people, there must be a mechanism to stop these people and that mechanism should not be police intervention.

The things they do should somehow stick to their name for example or you should be able to go after them just as brutally. Honestly, I like 4Chans way with dealing with people much more than restricted, moderated police involved crap that the Web has become. Someone built a following, then they harass people but your only recourse is legal stuff and you can't do doxxing, can't use bad words etc because you get banned/demoted/shadowbanned/rate-limited. It's not working, it's destroying the society.

For example, the women jailed for just tweeting plead guilt that she was spreading materials with intention to stir racial hatred. In a real life such person will be quickly stopped one way or another, she will be confronted and then removed or ignored. If her material is actually good, it will be noted and supported and the issue resolved. Online is not like that people with agenda lie, spam and annoy people without facing a pushback or consequences. It's not a real discussion, it's not real problem solving.

[lazide]

Just wait until you see the difference in how the police treat someone between defending yourself and attacking someone in the UK. Note: Don’t try to defend yourself if you know what’s good for you.

[mrtksn]

The police is not always present and you don't have to attack anybody. For most cases it is good enough to be able to show credible defence. If you you are able to smack someone, they will get smacked if they insist and remember it even if afterwards you go through legal trouble(they will also get into legal trouble). Police and the courts cant un-smack them. As a result, people feeling causing trouble tread more carefully and don't cross a line unless they are fully motivated to go through all this.

Streets are significantly more polite than the online places and I think its because of the dynamic of it and not the people - they are the same people.

[lazide]

I really can’t tell what you are trying to say?