[nxm]

What is happening in Britain is people are being actually arrested for “offensive” speech, which is of course subjective, subject to abuse, and open to totalitarian oppression. This is why the First Amendment in the US constitution is so important

[KaiserPro]

> Britain is people are being actually arrested for “offensive” speech

This isn't actually new though. The difference is that they'd normally be nicked for breaching the peace, which is loosey goosey enough to be used for most things.

ASBOs are far more totalitarian as they can legally stop people from doing legal things. (ie stop a child playing in a park)

But to tackle your main point, Yes people are being arrested for offensive speech, but thats normally only part of the reason for arrest.

I can call my MP a massive <pejorative that gets the Americans all abother>, I cannot however cause a race riot, as that's not allowed under freedom of expression.

I also cannot give advice on pensions.

I cannot threaten the lives of people

I also cannot claim to be a policeman

etc.

The thing you must understand is that _most_ people (ie not columnists or former PMs) accept that there is a tradeoff between "free speech" and a pleasant society. Sure we did look at your first amendment and think "ooo thats probably nice" but then we have the human rights act that enforces freedom of expression. (which the same columnists/former ministers are decrying freedom of speech are looking to get rid of "because it protects immigrants")

The Online safety act is a mess, because ofcom have not issued proper guidance, and the draft bill was directed by someone who was borderline insane (nadine dorris)

Age assurance is not actually a problem, what is a problem is asking me to hand over personal details so some fly by night US startup who'll get hacked/sell my data to blackmailers.

forcing websites to have moderation policies is fine, not having a flexible approach for smaller sites is not fine.

The act is flawed, but its not _actually_ that different from how Network TV is moderated in the USA.

[hn_throw2025]

You post recognises the boundary between free and illegal speech.

You have not addressed the fact that UK policing guidelines now have a third category of “legal but harmful” (which has resulted in real door knocks). This is subject to political outlook and therefore as “loosey goosey” as it gets.

[KaiserPro]

> now have a third category of “legal but harmful”

I'm sorry but the police always have had that. Again, ASBOs, public order offences, "please move along now", town dispersal orders.

Specifically ASBOs give the police the power to stop someone doing almost any action, the courts have deemed antisocial.

A good example of that is street preachers being stopped from using megaphones, which must have happened as early as ~2005

> which has resulted in real door knocks

from the OSA, I'm not aware of any cases yet?

> This is subject to political outlook and therefore as “loosey goosey” as it gets.

The law is always subject to political outlook. Even a constitution is no match for a concerted effort to undermine it. For example: article 124/125 of the 1936 USSR constitution allowed freedom of press, religion and the right to gather.

Look, unless we get someone extreme in power, and they are uniquely competent, they we are mostly safe. What will change that is the steady drip drip drip, of both economic hardship, and a willing medium to blame that on minorities.

So 2028 is around the time that jenrick will attempt to lock us all up.

[hn_throw2025]

I am talking about a Police visit over a sarcastic satirical tweet. There are other cases.

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2025/05/31/kent-police-20k-...

> Look, unless we get someone extreme in power, and they are uniquely competent, they we are mostly safe. What will change that is the steady drip drip drip, of both economic hardship, and a willing medium to blame that on minorities. So 2028 is around the time that jenrick will attempt to lock us all up.

Sigh, I was half expecting drivel like that.

[KaiserPro]

Yes, but as the news piece clearly points out, it was incorrect and cost the police £20k.

> Sigh, I was half expecting drivel like that.

Look I have been railing against this shit for _years_ the Public Order Act 2023 is the latest in a looooong line of laws that have actually and practically curtailed our rights to protest.

I have organise, I have petitioned, I have shouted and screamed, and yet here we are. I have given up.

I look over at the states and just have to hope that it reeks enough that it puts people off the badenoch/jenrick/farage wank fest.

Sadly with the underfunding of courts, and the move to bench trials, means that we are probably fucked, no recourse unless you're rich

[amanaplanacanal]

I think you mean broadcast TV. Broadcast radio is similar. The legal justification is something about the limited supply of public airwaves. Those regulations wouldn't fly in the US for any other medium.

[KaiserPro]

It was about morals.

Hence the hollywood code, and all that sort of stuff.

The US really loved censorship, but just not in overt ways. Sure you could publish anything, but it'd never get syndicated by radio, newpaper, TV or cinema.

[nrawe]

I'm happy to be wrong, but I don't believe that's correct. There have been some people arrested for inciting violence via social media during the Southport riots.

There is also Tommy Robinson/Stephen Yaxley-Lennon, who has been remanded in custody for contempt of court for continuing to libel an immigrant even after his claims were proven to be false. And by contempt of court, he literally has produced a movie continuing to slander said immigrant for his own ends.

Another is Palestine Action being made a proscribed terror group. While lots of people, as evidenced by recent protests, see this as problematic, its not particularly different to other groups like environmental activists that commit criminal acts being proscribed and there are numerous examples UK/abroad of that. PA members at the direction of PA leadership have fallen into that category not because of their beliefs, but because of their actions – like breaking into Israeli-owned security research company with a van, and into an RAF base, in both cases committing vandalism and destruction of property.

Some people believe there is a problem, but there really isn't a legislative agenda against free speech.

[moomin]

Vandalism and destruction of property is a shockingly low bar. The suffragettes threw an axe at the king and no-one said they should be a proscribed organisation.

[nrawe]

I'll stand to be wrong, but I believe in one case a member of staff and two police officers were also assaulted. Terrorism isn't necessarily about body count, it's about motivation. If the motive is political change, and the ends is violence/criminal damaged/anti-social behaviour that tends to be enough. Similar cases exist in the US, too.

I personally think its a bit of a stretch and will likely be undone. However, to pretend they are simply peaceful protests being unfairly targeted is also incorrect.

[tacticus]

Yeah the assault one is interesting cause they didn't end up charging them with it at all... perhaps reading the police statements without corroborating evidence is problematic.

[ChocolateGod]

Breaking into a military base and attempting to damage military equipment used to defend the country is a very high bar.

[KaiserPro]

> no-one said they should be a proscribed organisation.

That wasn't a thing back then, not really

https://www.londonmuseum.org.uk/collections/v/object-453005/...

Arrested for "obstructing a policeman"

All of the suffragettes that were caught were normally caused with vandalism

[foldr]

If I broke into a US military base and started vandalizing B-52s, I honestly think I'd be pretty lucky to escape with my life.

[normie3000]

> no-one said they should be a proscribed organisation

Is this true? I'd be surprised.

[zimpenfish]

> its not particularly different to other groups like environmental activists that commit criminal acts being proscribed

I can't find any on [0] - do you have examples?

[0] https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/proscribed-terror...

[nrawe]

I should note that my comparison was to a US organisation proscribed as an eco-terror organisation, the name of which escapes me, and which I couldn't find in a quick scan back through my reading or here[0]. I came across them through a podcast interviewing both sides about a decade out. I'll keep looking though and try and qualify my source :)

I guess what I mean is this: while I think the PA proscription is probably misjudged, it's not without its precedent.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eco-terrorism

[vixen99]

In one area at least, there is progress: https://www.gov.uk/government/news/free-speech-rules-to-prot...

[gadders]

>>some people arrested for inciting violence via social media during the Southport riots.

Yes, but only on the right. The leader of Hope not Hate was not charged for his inflammatory tweets, and then you have this guy saying he hoped right wing protestors' throats would be cut being completely let off:

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2025/08/15/suspended-labour...

[darrenf]

Arrests are up, but sentences are down — i.e. fewer convictions/criminal records

https://lordslibrary.parliament.uk/select-communications-off...

> there are several reasons why an arrest may not result in a sentence, such as out-of-court resolutions, but said the “most common is “evidential difficulties””, specifically that the victim does not support taking further action.

As mentioned at the top of the above document, there was a debate in the Lords on 17th July on the topic where many of the participants were pretty scathing about the situation: https://hansard.parliament.uk/Lords/2025-07-17/debates/F807C...

The minister was naturally defensive towards the end, albeit they did say:

> Importantly, the National Police Chiefs’ Council and the College of Policing, at the request of the Home Secretary, are currently undertaking a review of how non-crime hate incidents are dealt with. We expect to see some information from the police on that. It is self-evidently important that some of those incidents help us gather intelligence on potential future crime, but, equally, we do not want the police to do things that waste their time and not focus on the type of crime that the noble Lord rightly mentioned in his introduction.

[abtinf]

That quote could be taken straight out of “Yes, Minister”.

[xienze]

> Arrests are up, but sentences are down — i.e. fewer convictions/criminal records

Well that’s certainly a relief! People are only being _arrested_ for """offensive""" speech, not convicted!

[darrenf]

I mean … is it not a relief that “””offensive””” speech isn’t actually a crime?

There’s widespread recognition right up to the Lords that this is a shitty situation, dangerous/chilling, and a waste of police time. We all think it's nonsense, and it’s being called out for being nonsense in parliament. Literally no-one, AFAICT, thinks it’s a good thing that arrest numbers are rising for non-criminal speech.

TBH I would hope when the dust settles that more people will get in shit for wasting police time — either reporting non-crimes to the police, or not actually wanting any (further) action taken. Feels like in many cases the “victims” are just playing the system as it (rapidly) develops, to take an online beef offline, rather than totalitarianism. If it were totalitarianism they’d be locking folk up, or at least convicting them of something, but that’s where we came in — those numbers are falling.

[crinkly]

The US constitution is only valuable if enforced, which is clearly not the case at the moment.

[matthewmacleod]

There are very significant concerns about the actions of the Westminster government recently no doubt – this is stupid legislation, and it compounds with other stupid legislation (see the recent arrests for supporting proscribed groups). Everyone should be protesting this nonsense.

That said, there is equally a clear and obvious effort to distort what is happening. And I don't think anybody should really be taking lessons about "totalitarian oppression" when current US government policy is to send gangs of masked thugs to round up brown people.

[dgroshev]

The government in power has little to do with the Act, it was passed two years ago by a different party that is now refusing to own the mess that they created. Sure, one can say that the government could be more diligent at repealing bad laws, but the Parliament had quite a few things on its plate already, so it's not surprising that this Act coming into power during the summer recess wasn't high on the agenda.

[matthewmacleod]

This is entirely not true, and the government is entirely free to withdraw this stupid, harmful legislation. Do not make excuses, because this is how the Labour Party get away with this sort of stupid action.

[dgroshev]

The government can't "withdraw" an Act of Parliament, only the Parliament can, by passing a new bill.

It's not a Labour Party's action, the deadline was written into the act two years ago.

[eftpotrm]

Passed with the support of the current governing party, it should be noted.

[xienze]

Ignoring the usual baiting about how those brown people are illegal aliens and that’s the underlying reason they’re being rounded up — European countries are always held up as the standard the US should strive towards. So yes, it’s fair game for us to criticize them when they do things like police “offensive” speech.

[matthewmacleod]

No, this isn't baiting – it's an actual thing that's happening, regardless of how much you want to remain in denial about it. And I don't care about whatever weird preconceptions you've imposed – European countries have their own struggles to deal with and equally can do it badly. None of this is interesting discussion, and focusing on these weird "purity tests" around hypothetical freedom when ignoring the actual substantive impacts of the policies is why these people keep getting away with their terrible legislation.

[lkramer]

Sure, but so are people in the US, despite the first amendment.

[te_chris]

Definitely not happening in the us too! Certainly no academic visas being cancelled.

[1234letshaveatw]

Yes, yes! This is all well and good, but whatabout America bad?!

[exe34]

No I think it's projection. It's happening over there, so they want to deflect attention and pretend "bad things" are happening over here instead, in a bid to support their chosen fascists in the next election.