[earthnail]

I’d much rather get arrested in Britain than Russia or Iran. And I certainly wouldn’t put the UK in the same bucket as Russia and Iran. Not even close.

Hate speech is a problem. If it wasn’t, why are Russia and China spending so much on troll farms? It’s a direct attack on a democracy’s ability to form consensus. I don’t think we’ve found the right, effective way to deal with this problem yet, but I applaud any democratic country that tries sth in that area.

I also think Tor is great, just for the record.

[fasbiner]

So to be clear, your sole expectation of a liberal democracy is that it have a better judicial system than Russia or Iran.

And beyond that, you applaud any democratic country's efforts to reign in speech by arresting their own citizens in order to combat foreign influence operations?

And the fulcrum of this argument is that we believe that Russia and China have uniquely pernicious influence operations and there are no other state-level actors domestically or semi-domestically whose intelligence services also exert influence through the passage of laws restricting speech?

Having seen the last two years of politics in the UK and the US, your impression is that there is an overwhelming Chinese-Russian troll farm operation which self-evidently justifies rolling back the last two centuries worth of hard-fought and incremental precedents won for free speech and free press.

And again, the water-line we need to stay above is merely "this is still better than being arrested in Russia or Iran", keeping in mind that many countries we would not consider to be democracies at all also meet this bar.

[graemep]

> And beyond that, you applaud any democratic country's efforts to reign in speech by arresting their own citizens in order to combat foreign influence operations?

The US has adopted policies based on that argument in the past: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/McCarthyism and I think its generally agreed it was a bad thing.

[like_any_other]

> in order to combat foreign influence operations?

They don't have to be foreign - domestic prohibited leafleting suffices: Samuel Melia: Far-right activist jailed after sticker campaign - https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-leeds-68448867

[earthnail]

I probably made my point not very well. I am indeed worried about freedom of speech, and your example about Mccarthy ism is very very valud. I come from Germany; the Nazis, and later the Stasi, were masters in suppressing freedom of speech, and both committed the most brutal atrocities that must never be repeated (and also, as a side note, completely ran the country they ruled into the ground).

Freedom of speech is really, really important. And yes, we absolutely must defend it. But it bothers me that it is used as a complete killer argument when politicians try to talk about other problems.

Our societies are getting more and more polarized. We are being bullied by various actors, and whenever someone points it out someone else (often the perpetrator) is quick to hide behind the false argument of freedom of speech.

I personally really believe that we need to do something against that polarization. It’s an attack vector that’s very actively and very effectively being exploited by adversaries, foreign and domestic alime. It’s not a new thing, propaganda and misinformation is centuries old, but in the age of the internet the dynamics change, and we need to adapt.

This is a super complex problem. And there is a huge risk that people abuse it to implement surveillance they always wanted to have. But yes, my general position is that I think it’s good that proposals are being made, and because of that, I don’t want to see Starmer in the same bucket as Putin in this discussion. It’s also good that there are fights about which proposals are good and bad. But my overall feeling is that we ignored the problem for too long, and now we have to catch up. Otherwise, we’ll just get more and more polarized societies, and this really, really worries me.

It may at this point also be worth pointing out that the proposals really are very different.

- The UK went for a centralist proposal on age verification around porn, which can very easily turn into a surveillance tool. I think it’s a terrible solution.

- Australia opts for banning social media for minors. Doesn’t strike me as a big surveillance tool. Maybe extreme if you don’t share their view on the dangers of social media, but clearly a very different approach, and also a different problem they think they identified to the UK

- Germany goes for better parental controls, i.e. mandating manufacturers to make it really easy for parents to enable a walled garden for their kids. I like it because it’s still up to the parents whether to enable it or not, and no government surveillance is involved at all.

The cool thing of having different countries experiment with different approaches - not just solutions, but also assumptions on what problems would need fixing - is that you can run many experiments in parallel. The scientist in me is very happy about that.

If we’re lucky, one or two of these will over time come out as great solutions and get widely adopted.

[miroljub]

If you live anywhere in the west, you should be more concerned by being arrested by your own government then by some government in the other part of the world.

[computerfriend]

This is true (modulo travel and extradition) regardless of where in the world you live.

[throwfaraway135]

The problem is that it is really difficult to define what hate speech is, and more often than not it's used as a cudgel to silence the opposition.

For Iran and Russia, it is what Khamenei and Putin don't want to hear,

in the UK it's what Starmer doesn't want to hear.

[Defletter]

> The problem is that it is really difficult to define what hate speech is

It can be, but free speech types like to pretend it's nigh impossible. The UK has had modern hate-speech laws (for want of a better term) since the Public Order Act 1986, which made it an offence to stir up or incite racial hatred. Amendments in 2006 and 2008 expanded that to religious and homophobic hatred respectively. This exists in stark contrast to the common strawman touted by freeze peach types of "are you just going to compile a list of 'bad words'?!" Hate speech is not magic: you're not casting the self-incriminatus spell by saying the bad word.

That said, I wont pretend like that aren't misuses of police powers in regard to speech, and expression more generally. We've seen a crackdown on protests over the past few years which is more than a little frightening. That said, it's become a pattern that anytime I encounter a discussion online about the UK trampling on freedom of speech or whatever, it always comes back to hate speech. It's almost never about protest or expression. I think that's interesting.

EDIT: Correction, the Criminal Justice and Immigration Act 2008 did not make stirring up or inciting "homophobic" hatred an offence, but rather hatred on the basis of sexual orientation. So one could get prosecuted for being inciting anti-straight hatred.

[thinkingemote]

In the UK the arrests are mostly about "grossly offensive" speech. That's more of a grey area than the clearly defined hate speech. Often there are arrests and investigations but convictions on these are less. Convictions of hate speech also occur but are not news worthy and no one objects. The two different offenses are being confused and so it becomes news. In the US they don't have the grossly offensive category.

It's an issue because people are being investigated because people are offended by some things while others are not, and others (like comments here) see the difference between offensive speech and outright calls for violence. The police in some areas are encouraged to actively investigate reports of offensiveness whether or not they seem to them serious. It's a good idea on paper but the ambiguities and unequal application of their policy is newsworthy. It leads to conspiratorial and political theories.

There is also a related newsworthy issue of the widening of what hate speech means to encompass forms of offensiveness. So some may say it's a direct call to violence to say some things but others may say it's not. This ambiguity leads to an effect and discussions.

"Silence is violence" and "From the river to the sea" are topical example quotes used in this debate.

[Defletter]

Yeaaaah, the Communications Act 2003 is not fit for purpose in the modern information age where [seemingly] the vast majority of conversation is taking place in digital spaces. Sidenote, I do think it's amusing how, prior to the Online Safety Act 2023, it was an offence to Cunningham's Law someone (posting a knowingly-false statement online to annoy someone into correcting you). That said, I'm more or less ambivalent about "grossly offensive" speech: most of the examples I find people moaning about are people being gratuitously abhorrent and should have known better. But again, there are examples of police and prosecutors getting it wrong.

But I think the leap from acknowledging that to "speech should never be infringed", as many freeze peachers would advocate, to be infinitely more destructive: just see what it's doing to America. Just look at what the infiltration of American-style freedom of speech principles is doing to this country: we have people defending Lucy Connolly, the woman who publicly advocated for the burning down of hotels housing asylum seekers, calling her a "political prisoner", that the government is "silencing the right".

One part where I agree with you is "From the river to the sea": there are two versions of this (more than two, but they are variations of the same thing), the first being "From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free", and the other "between the Sea and the Jordan there will only be Israeli sovereignty". Guess which one our government finds objectionable. And guess which one is being used to justify a genocide. It does bother me that the government can chill and punish speech that objects to its foreign policy. But I feel as if (this is just vibes, feel free to correct me) the most harm being done is through anti-protest laws, not grossly offensive digital communications: I personally know of multiple people who regularly post abrasive, if not downright virulent "silence is violence" type content online, but do not go to protests because they fear arrest, detention, and being fired.

[instig007]

> being gratuitously abhorrent and should have known better.

This is an incredibly stupid take, and I would vote for a legislation to penalise incredibly stupid ones before gratuitously abhorrent, and more harshly so. It would be gloriously wonderful, too.

[Defletter]

Cool beans

[naasking]

> which made it an offence to stir up or incite racial hatred.

If you point out that one racial demographic is responsible for more crimes than another, would that run afoul of the statute?

If not, what if you additionally point out that the reason these crimes were committed is likely because that behaviour is normalized in their culture? This seems like it would definitely run afoul of the statute, and if this logical deduction were valid, then this sort of criticism would be suppressed despite being legitimate, and could be weaponized against people.

I'm frankly not so convinced that it's possible to define hate speech in a way that does not allow for these failure modes.

[Defletter]

Do you have any examples of people being prosecuted for hate speech by stating nothing but dry facts?

[naasking]

Does the law explicitly specify that dry facts would be excluded? Or is it sufficiently broad that dry facts could be included if some over-zealous bureaucrats get it in their head that some speech or people are problematic?

I am interested in the letter of the law, because that's what matters, not how it's being applied while the winds are blowing in a particular direction.

[Defletter]

Okay, so just to be clear, you don't have even a single example of someone being prosecuted under hate speech laws for stating facts in the 40-odd years since its passage? Why is this not just concern trolling?

As to the general question, no, a statement being true does not immunise it from an accusation of it being used to stir up or incite hatred, or at the very least such a defence is not defined within the Public Order Act 1986. We do have the Human Rights Act which protects Freedom of Expression, but whether you could use it or other defences is pure speculation on my part: I would need to see some actual caselaw.

I've attempted my own searches but have only encountered the usual suspects: holocaust deniers and their ilk. Please let me know if you find such a case because I genuinely think that would be interesting to debate, but debating over pure speculation and innuendo is very boring.

[seattle_spring]

It's pretty apparent that the arrests are happening to people who explicitly call for violence, eg the woman who called for burning down all hotels housing immigrants. Musk, Rogan, etc are patient zero of the ones amplifying the false idea that you can get in legal trouble "for posting an opinion."

[naasking]

> It's pretty apparent that the arrests are happening to people who explicitly call for violence

Unless the statute specifically makes that distinction, then that's not very compelling. There are already laws against inciting violence. Hate speech laws are specifically understood to be about outlawing speech that contain or incite "hate", whose definition is typically broad.

[4bpp]

> freeze peach

Do you not think that trying to malign your opposition by putting a comical misspelling in their mouths is a bit infantile as a rhetorical tactic? The same thing being done to you would look something like an insinuation that what is being banned is "hurting someone's widdle fee-fees"; surely the discussion here would not benefit if everyone stooped down to that level.

[Defletter]

> surely the discussion here would not benefit if everyone stooped down to that level.

Oh we were already at that level by that time: the comment mine responds to makes the claim that "it is really difficult to define what hate speech is" (untrue); that "more often than not it's used as a cudgel to silence the opposition" (unsubstantiated); and claims that the UK government's intentions match that of Iran and Russia (untrue).

For some reason, so many people seem to tolerate outright disinformation but draw the line at mild childishness. It's bewildering.

[4bpp]

Do you think that the people who made those remarks you cite considered them untrue themselves? If yes, you are suggesting bad faith (which should be grounds to extricate yourself from the discussion and/or call it out, not add fuel to the fire); if not, you are suggesting that factual disagreement is appropriately answered by childishness, which basically is saying that you think every discussion worth the name should devolve into childishness.

Often, it seems like this concept of "disinformation" you invoke just serves as a way people give themselves moral license to suspend normal rules of debate conduct in the face of disagreement. Being charitable to your opponents and having to engage with their claims is tiring and difficult, and sometimes they even come better prepared - how much easier if you can just frame dissent as dangerous enemy action and shut it down.

[Defletter]

Do you also insist that we treat with proper decorum those who throw out assertions that jetfuel cannot melt steel beams? I notice you have yet to criticise them for posting what is at best misguided and unsubstantiated misinformation, and at worst disinformation. Hardly decorum on their part, is it? Instead, you are hyperfocusing on my "freeze peach", disregarding everything else I said in my comment. I find this to be a boring distraction from the topic at hand.

[Alex2037]

>free speech types

heh.

[ajb]

The previous law used to control racial hatred was the law of criminal libel; it was successfully used to prosecute antisemitism etc. As a species of libel, it had an absolute defence of of speaking the truth. Now, clearly you can be clever enough to spread hatred by only the use of true statements. But we have reached the point where those speaking the truth about atrocities committed by a foreign government are imprisoned for hate speech, and vastly more self censor. Your implied claim that those criticising the law just want to be free to be racist is not defensible - and indeed, you're not bold enough to defend it, merely "find it interesting".

[pastage]

> speaking the truth about atrocities committed

Why are they doing this, in what context?

Edit: from reading the thread I think this is about the war against Hamas and the dire situation on the West bank.

[immibis]

It's inaccurate to say there's a war against Hamas. We have enough video evidence by now, posted by the people doing the acts so there can be no doubt to its authenticity, to see it's a war against civilians.

[curtisblaine]

Norwood vs UK was about Norwood displaying an "Islam out of Britain" sign.

Samuel Melia was jailed 2 years for publishing downloadable stickers saying "Mass immigration is white genocide," "Second-generation? Third? Fourth? You have to go back," and "Labour loves Muslim rpe gangs".

Are those messages controversial? For sure. Should originator of these messages be prosecuted? I don't think so. Are anti-christian, "dead men don't rpe" or "eat the rich" messages treated the same in uk? Absolutely not.

[eloisius]

If you want to spell rape on HackerNews you can just spell it. There’s nothing wrong with using the word in its proper context, or in quotations. There’s no algorithm censoring the word, and you’re not shielding someone from “getting triggered” by replacing the vowels with an underscore.

[n4r9]

Re Norwood vs UK:

> Norwood, a member of an extreme right-wing political party [the British National Party], placed a poster on his apartment window that called for the removal of all Muslims from Britain.

> the poster in question contained a photograph of the Twin Towers in flame, the words “Islam out of Britain – Protect the British People” and a symbol of a crescent and star in a prohibition sign. The assessment made by the domestic courts was that the words and the images amounted to an attack on all Muslims in the UK. The ECtHR largely agreed with the assessment, and stated that such a general, vehement attack against a religious group, implying the group as a whole was guilty of a grave act of terrorism, is incompatible with the values proclaimed and guaranteed by the Convention, notably tolerance, social peace and non-discrimination

https://globalfreedomofexpression.columbia.edu/cases/norwood...

Re Melia:

> Melia was the head of the Telegram Messenger group Hundred Handers, a social media channel that generated racist and anti-immigration stickers that were printed off and displayed in public places.

> The stickers contained "ethnic slurs" about minority communities which displayed a "deep-seated antipathy to those groups", the court heard.

> The judge told Melia: "I am quite sure that your mindset is that of a racist and a white supremacist.

> "You hold Nazi sympathies and you are an antisemite."

> Melia, who was also found guilty of encouraging racially-aggravated criminal damage, was sentenced to two years for each charge to run concurrently.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-leeds-68448867

Interesting that the cases that spring to mind for you are literal neo-Nazis.

[Defletter]

> Interesting that the cases that spring to mind for you are literal neo-Nazis.

If I had a penny for every time this happened....

[curtisblaine]

> Interesting that the cases that spring to mind for you are literal neo-Nazis.

Free speech is repugnant speech. But I can make the case for far-leftists supporting Palestine action as well.

[immibis]

Do you find supporting Palestine action to be repugnant?

[delichon]

Apparently it isn't very hard to define as you just did so quite accurately. It's just whatever those who control the definition don't want to hear.

[immibis]

Murder is just the killing of people who are liked by those who control the definition of murder. But everyone still agrees murder should be illegal.

[delichon]

Murder is a far brighter line than hate, and therefore a law against it enables far less arbitrary power.

[immibis]

It means ICE officers can kill you but you can't kill ICE officers. This is arguably an even worse asymmetry than the one about speech.

[ben_w]

It is really difficult to define what hate speech is, it certainly can be used as a cudgel to silence the opposition though I'm not sure about "more often than not" and bluntly everything can be used that way: my previous commute took me across the lines of what was officially known as (translated) an "anti-fascist protection rampart"* to keep people from leaving a country that put "Demokratische" in its name.

For the UK, it's not even clear what Starmer doesn't want to hear, he's got the charisma of the 10th-worst-in-class GCSE-level presentation on a topic not of his own choice. This can be observed in the poll ratings which are both amusing and the kind of thing that should only be found in a farce and not reality.

I'd instead point to Musk, who has openly said that "cis" is "hate speech" on Twitter now he owns the site. Starmer may or may not have such examples, but it's just too hard to figure out what they even are 'cause he lacks presence even as PM with all the cameras pointed at him.

* And to English speakers, "the Berlin Wall"

[wartywhoa23]

It's not the puppets who don't want to hear, it's the puppet masters.

[hdgvhicv]

It’s Badenoch wanting to deport a British Citizen for what he posted online, not Starmer.

[qweiopqweiop]

More precisely, an Egyptian citizen who was given British citizenship recently without having visited the country, and his views (about Jews, killing police) clearly not being factored in when granting said citizenship. Whether right or wrong, your comment omits improtant details.

[teiferer]

> more often than not

Do you have any evidence for that claim or is it a gut feeling?

> in the UK it's what Starmer doesn't want to hear.

In a literal sense that can't be true, since upon change of government, the hate speech definition does not suddenly change. In contrast, Putin and Khamenei are very literally able to personally define the definition.

In a figurative sense, that's likely true. As a democratically elected representative of the people, what he wants censored reflects what the people want censored, so is in alignment with a democratic society. If the people change their mind or realize it's not actually what they wanted, they elect somebody else next time. Good luck trying that with Putin or Khamenei.

In either case, your comparison does not hold up.

[throwfaraway135]

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2025/01/04/grooming-gangs-s...

[teiferer]

So, use that information at the next election. If enough people care then it changes outcomes.

Again, try that with Putin or Khamenei. (If such an article even gets published instead of ending the career or life of the journalist.)

[JuniperMesos]

> In a literal sense that can't be true, since upon change of government, the hate speech definition does not suddenly change. In contrast, Putin and Khamenei are very literally able to personally define the definition.

Well it might if people systematically vote for politicians who promise to change the hate speech definition.

[thrance]

Just read the damn law before spouting nonsense. There have been hate speech laws since the 1980s. There are simply just more and more insane neonazis groyper-types online to which it is applicable.

[curtisblaine]

I don't think groyper speech is (or should be) automatically banned, though. It's a point of view that many find abhorrent, but it should be possible to express it. Same for far left messages encouraging the public to "eat the rich".

[thrance]

Please do not equate demands for more taxations with calls to do more genocides of jewish people. The far right is uniquely problematic in our modern political landscape.

And I disagree, free speech is a liberal value, you don't get to say nazi shit and hide behind free speech. Being a groyper is not a crime, but calling for genocide is and should be punished. Else we run the risk of normalizing these abhorrent ideas and repeating the worst times of our history, like the US seems on a course to doing.

[FergusArgyll]

What does "hide behind free speech" mean?

[immibis]

It means defending Nazi shit by claiming you're allowed to say anything you want.

Timmy: "I think it should be legal to kill Jews."

Moderator: (bans Timmy)

Timmy (elsewhere): "Help, I'm being persecuted for expressing my beliefs!" / "Moderator X is a fascist oppressing people based on their opinions!" / "Platform X hates free speech!"

XKCD covered this phenomenon years ago, but wasn't heeded: https://xkcd.com/1357/

You can see it even in the comments on this post about the UK. Most complaints about UK censorship don't say what was being censored. If Timmy said why the moderators banned him, his argument wouldn't even survive a cursory glance.

[curtisblaine]

> demands for more taxations

That would be "eat the rich"? It looks like more demand for homicide and cannibalism, at least at a face value.

> free speech is a liberal value

That is a really nice definition that allows your side to say whatever they want, but the other side to have their speech restricted. It looks like "free speech" because you say it is, but of course it is not.

> but calling for genocide is and should be punished

And that is the usual strawman. "Calling for genocide" is incredibly vague. Is repatriation of immigrants genocide? Is CECOT genocide? Is advocating bombing Gaza genocide? Is "from the river to the sea" a coded call for genocide? Is, God help us, saying that trans women are men advocating for "trans genocide"? (apparently that's a thing)

I have this feeling you don't want to establish a line in the sand for free speech to be free - you just want to pick and choose the examples that you deem acceptable.

[thrance]

> That would be "eat the rich"? It looks like more demand for homicide and cannibalism, at least at a face value.

Very bad faith interpretation. You know full well that's not what is meant when this phrase is employed.

> That is a really nice definition that allows your side to say whatever they want, but the other side to have their speech restricted. It looks like "free speech" because you say it is, but of course it is not.

Free speech is a liberal value. Don't take liberal as meaning "american left", take it as meaning pro-freedom. Nazis famously don't believe in it. The Trump administration only believes in it when they're making themselves to be the victims of supposedly unfair censorship, but then use the full power of the state to silence media, or individuals.

Should we extend free speech to groups actively trying to suppress it? That's the paradox of intolerance: "if a society extends tolerance to those who are intolerant, it risks enabling the eventual dominance of intolerance". Example of this to be found in the US.

> And that is the usual strawman. "Calling for genocide" is incredibly vague. Is repatriation of immigrants genocide? Is CECOT genocide? Is advocating bombing Gaza genocide? Is "from the river to the sea" a coded call for genocide? Is, God help us, saying that trans women are men advocating for "trans genocide"? (apparently that's a thing)

You're completely muddying the waters, you know what is a genocide. And throwing in a line about trans people for some reasons, because your side is literally obsessed with making their lives as miserable as possible.

You're pretending that the line can only be arbitrary, when every jurisdiction already has one. Look at that, for example: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hate_speech_laws_in_France

Or this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_free_speech_exce...

[flr03]

Law is always subject to interpretation and as imperfect as it sounds it is better than no law at all. And I'm not talking about hate speech specifically. Using this as a tool to silence opposition is possible and made easy in countries that do not value and nurture independence of institutions and have rampant corruption, often countries with authoritarian leadership. UK is not exempt of criticism, it would be unhealthy not to, but comparing Russia/Putin with UK/Starmer makes it evident that you are more concerned by pushing a political agenda that by facts and reason.

[earthnail]

That comparison is not only highly inaccurate, it’s also harmful in that it distracts from the real problem at hand.

Putin and Khamenei are ruthless, brutal dictators. You don’t need to like Starmer, but he’s none of that. He’s a proper democrat. The implication that they’re all somewhat the same delegitimises democracies and legitimises these dictators. That’s how they win.

I personally don’t think UK’s age verification thing is a good idea. I like Germany‘s idea of mandating PC and smartphone manufacturers to put simple parental controls in thar parents, not the central government, can enable for their kids.

I love Australia‘s banning of Social media for kids. Let’s see where that leads. I don’t live there but am very excited for rhe outcome of that experiment.

We can’t just sit here and simplify everything to black and white while Russian troll farms polarise our societies. We bear some responsibility here to have a nuanced debate about these things.

[cs02rm0]

> He’s a proper democrat.

The same Starmer who's cancelled local elections? Who's not looked at the polls and thought maybe it's time to go, because the demos clearly don't want me? The same Starmer who said no rise in NI in the manifesto, only to increase NI? The same Starmer who raised the threshold of votes required for an MP from within the Labour party to challenge his leadership?

He's no proper democrat. People are already talking about the rhetoric being used around war with Russia as laying the foundations for removing a 2029 general election.

[ben_w]

> The same Starmer who's cancelled local elections?

False: https://fullfact.org/online/council-elections-war-cancelled/

> Who's not looked at the polls and thought maybe it's time to go, because the demos clearly don't want me?

You seem to have missed the "did actually win power" and "this is how democracy works in the UK" parts.

I agree he should go, but I could say that about all of the UK politicians, they're all negative approval: https://www.pollcheck.co.uk/favourability-ratings

> The same Starmer who raised the threshold of votes required for an MP from within the Labour party to challenge his leadership?

From 10% of the MPs to 20% of the MPs. As challengers would have to, you know, get more MPs than him to win, the only thing going from 10% to 20% is to have less pointless drama.

> People are already talking about the rhetoric being used around war with Russia as laying the foundations for removing a 2029 general election.

First I've heard of that. Would be exceptionally dumb for a UK politician to do on purpose for the same reason that it would be correct to cancel elections in the event of such a war: the UK is not even remotely close to being ready to battle Russia. UK armed forces are just about big enough to keep the nuclear weapons safe, not much more besides that.

[cs02rm0]

It only becomes false to say they've been cancelled if they happen. They're planning on postponing them again, and if that continues to happen indefinitely, they've been cancelled.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cdd5p5gyvveo

Starmer doesn't just have negative approval ratings. His are through the floor. The last voting intention poll from YouGov (which has been relatively favourable for Labour) would have given them just 69 seats - fewer than the Lib Dems currently have.

[pclmulqdq]

So per your source, he did cancel local elections at a time where it is politically favorable for him to do so?

[ben_w]

No.

1. "Postponed" is not "cancelled"

2. "Postponed" is entirely normal within British politics. For most of my life, even the timing of general elections were at the whim of the government.

3. Given how Starmer polls, the delay is almost certainly going to make things un-favourable for him. Also unfavourable for Labour, unless they kick him out first.

Not that it would matter much if your conspiracy theory held water, given that one of the many constitutional problems the UK has is that local councils have negligible power (options are tied all over the place) and therefore local elections are functionally little more than opinion polls done in a voting booth.

[wartywhoa23]

> I love Australia‘s banning of Social media for kids.

Talking about ruthless dictators and true democrats in the same post.

[immibis]

Banning children from accessing things proven to be harmful to children does not a dictator make. Or else you'd be rallying just as hard to allow children to drink alcohol.

[wartywhoa23]

> Or else you'd be rallying just as hard to allow children to drink alcohol

Why? I don't have a threshold at 127 in my luminance channel.

Just a reminder - what children are allowed or not is not any government's business, it's parents' one. Which requires tearing their asses off from sofas and their eyes from screens and actually talk to their children and be in the know of their circles and activities.

[immibis]

I'm glad you agree that if a child happens to be born to parents who aren't very good at parenting, they deserve to suffer. Basically if a child's parents smoke around them and give them lung cancer, all we should do is yell at them and moan on the internet, not actually do anything (via the government) to prevent it.

Nothing you've said contradicts that you think the government should not forbid children from buying alcohol.

Social media appears to be more harmful to a child than low quantities of alcohol, but less harmful than lung cancer.

[JuniperMesos]

> Putin and Khamenei are ruthless, brutal dictators. You don’t need to like Starmer, but he’s none of that. He’s a proper democrat. The implication that they’re all somewhat the same delegitimises democracies and legitimises these dictators. That’s how they win.

Someone who is a citizen of the UK who has no connection to Iran or Russia is legitimately much more concerned with the ways in which Starmer governs the UK, than in whether Putin or Khamenei "win". I don't even disagree with you that Putin and Khamenei are ruthless dictators, and certainly plenty of people in Russia or Iran or countries in the Russian or Iranians sphere of influence have plenty of good reasons to politically oppose both those dictators. But a democratically-elected official can wield the power of the state against you and harm your interests just as much as a dictator can, and people in the UK who oppose Starmer and his party shouldn't let up in that opposition just because it makes Starmer seem closer to Putin or Khamenei than Starmer's supporters would like.

[kolektiv]

> a democratically-elected official can wield the power of the state against you and harm your interests just as much as a dictator can

Really? Can they? Because in a functioning democracy you generally have recourse to courts, tertiary adjudication of various forms, a (relatively) free press that you can try and interest in taking up your story, etc. In a brutal dictatorship you're likely to have none of those, and to go missing in the night if you try and suggest that you should.

It's absolutely right to oppose politicians you disagree with - that's what political engagement is all about! But beyond a certain level, hyperbole (and the general sense of "they're all the same") simply does serve to undermine not just democracy, but any rationale for political engagement vs. simple rioting.

[RobotToaster]

> He’s a proper democrat.

Cancelling elections and mass arrests of people protesting against genocide is your idea of a "proper democrat"?

[kortilla]

No, external influence is an attack on democracy’s ability to form consensus. No hate speech required to drive a wedge between constituents and make people focus on the wrong things.

[tarkin2]

"[A] direct attack on a democracy’s ability to form consensus" is a wonderfully precise term.

Splitting democratic nations through fearmongering targeted at everyone's online profile is an incredible weapon.

[naasking]

Democracies virtually never form a consensus, there are always dissenters on any issue. Democracies reach decisions by majority rule, not consensus.

[dmm]

> Hate speech is a problem.

I agree, 100%. Donald Trump should have the power to jail people for things they say online.

[dwb]

That is not how the legal system works in the UK or USA. That said, I am worried that we are going quickly in that direction.

[flr03]

No there is a thing call the law, those are passed by elected people and applied by a judicial system that is not the executive branch. Hope that helps.

[dmm]

> applied by a judicial system that is not the executive branch

You have the right to a trial. Defending yourself from a Federal felony charge only costs $250k+.

Given recent events, I think undermining civil liberties to expand executive powers is crazy.

[flr03]

I am nowhere advocating to expand executive power in my response.

edit: apologies for not getting your point, I actually think I'm in line. Being able to defend yourself in the US looks too expensive.

[llmslave2]

I'd rather get arrested in the UK too, but that's completely irrelevant.

> Hate speech is a problem. If it wasn’t, why are Russia and China spending so much on troll farms?

Non-sequitur. The existence of troll farms doesn’t mean it's such a big problem that we should give up our rights surrounding speech and communication that we fought hard for.

[aetherson]

I don't think it's completely irrelevant. Can we admit some nuance where the UK's fast ramp up of arrests for previously legal speech is genuinely concerning, but also that raw number of arrests (not even convictions!) is not the only basis for comparison?

[immibis]

What are people saying that gets them arrested? This important but as-yet-unanswered question is crucial to evaluating the severity of the UK's censorship regime.

[kolektiv]

Probably the most high-profile case was the Lucy Connolly one, where she posted:

> "Mass deportation now, set fire to all the fucking hotels full of the bastards for all I care, while you’re at it take the treacherous government and politicians with them. I feel physically sick knowing what these families will now have to endure. If that makes me racist so be it”

For additional context (which was relevant during the prosecution and sentencing) this was posted during a time of riots and arson attacks centred on asylum accommodations, and very shortly following a highly publicised mass-murder of children which was (entirely wrongly) being blamed on asylum seekers.

She also pleaded guilty to the charged offence, rather than contesting the charge, for clarity. While not all cases will be quite like this, it is definitely not the case that - as some parties of the right have claimed - she is a free-speech martyr, a political prisoner, and so on.

[seattle_spring]

So explicitly calling for violence, not just "posting a political opinion" like so many people are claiming.

[llmslave2]

If that comment meets the bar for "explicitly calling for violence", tens of Hackernews posters would be getting arrested daily for how they talk about billionaires. AOC should avoid travel to the UK because her "eat the rich" rhetoric is an explicit call for violence under this standard. Etc etc.

[immibis]

Yes, that's correct. Have you tried reporting them to the police? If they're in the UK, they can be prosecuted.

[thunderfork]

billionaires aren't a protected class in the UK (yet), afaik

[tyho]

> following a highly publicised mass-murder of children which was (entirely wrongly) being blamed on asylum seekers.

The mass-murder was a consequence of the asylum system. Given what is publicly known, parents of Axel Rudakubana were overwhelmingly likely to have been asylum seekers.