• Quick note - the problem with Youtube videos not embedding on the forum appears to have been fixed, thanks to ZiprHead. If you do still see problems let me know.

Wow, UK has lost freedom of speech

Hercules56 said:
Just a reminder, this thread is about being sent to jail, fined, or other government enforced penalty for speech in public.
Click to expand...
You are being unreasonable, and you know it. There is no law against flag waving or being a nazi in the UK. You are free to think whatever you like. What the law does provide for is the right of redress, so if you go up to your neighbour's little kid and scream in its face, 'You're a retard!' then of course your neighbour should have the right to complain to an outside public body and if it is deemed a crime then your collar will be felt by Inspector Knacker of the Yard and/or have an eviction notice or an ASBO* slapped on you.

*Anti-Social Behaviour Order
 
Last edited:
Steve said:
And who understands that?
Click to expand...
I'd say the USA doesn't. Well I'd actually say that we have different concepts of freedom of speech. The USA defines the meaning narrowly to what the government can and can't do, in the UK it's broader, it's not just limited to what the government can and can't do. One such area I've mentioned before is that in the UK that you could be sacked because your employer thinks you are protesting something because you wear an orange shirt to work would be against our right to freedom of speech, but not in the USA.

Some folk seem to think that their country's meaning today is the only "correct" meaning, which would be quite a coincidence that perfection has only just been reached.

Our right to freedom of expression in the UK is anything but perfect but a bigger BUT is that simply because it is different to another country's doesn't somehow make it automatically "wrong".

If you're want to say the UK's right to freedom of expression is wrong you need to do more than simply state "it's wrong because it is different to my country's" if you want a discussion.
 
Planigale said:
I suspect that the interpretation of the first and second amendments has changed from the original intent. The first amendment only allows freedom of speech etc. in as far as it applies to petitioning the government for grievances, just as the right to bear arms only applied to well ordered militias. the freedom of speech etc. was only in relation to an individuals relationship with government it did not allow freedom in relation to relationships between individuals. Even civil law e.g. libel is still a law on speech. Espionage acts etc. clearly restrict an individuals right to communicate.

It has always, in England, been the case that if your speech is likely to cause a breach of the peace by provoking a violent reaction then that is a common law offence.
Click to expand...
And because times change what is a "breach of the peace" has changed. It's why the high court has had to explain to the police a few times that whilst the police force may be a bastion of polite language, where no one would ever be so vulgar as to use any profanity today's society has changed and they may hear a member of the public utter an occasional "damn" and that is not a breach of the peace.
 
Vixen said:
You are being unreasonable, and you know it. There is no law against flag waving or being a nazi in the UK. You are free to think whatever you like. What the law does provide for is the right of redress, so if you go up to your neighbour's little kid and scream in its face, 'You're a retard!' then of course your neighbour should have the right to complain to an outside public body and if it is deemed a crime then your collar will be felt by Inspector Knacker of the Yard and/or have an eviction notice or an ASBO* slapped on you.

*Anti-Social Behaviour Order
Click to expand...
Only in Scotland and Northern Ireland; ASBOs were done away with over a decade ago in England and Wales.
 
Mojo said:
Here's a comment from an English judge, in Redmond-Bate v DPP [1999] EWHC Admin 733:

Free speech includes not only the inoffensive but the irritating, the contentious, the eccentric, the heretical, the unwelcome and the provocative provided it does not tend to provoke violence. Freedom only to speak inoffensively is not worth having.
Click to expand...
It's the hilighted bit that those who want to stir up hatred, and their useful idiots "who understand what Freedom of Speech is supposed to be about", fail to understand.
Click to expand...

smartcooky said:
Here's a comment from an English judge, in Redmond-Bate v DPP [1999] EWHC Admin 733:
Free speech includes not only the inoffensive but the irritating, the contentious, the eccentric, the heretical, the unwelcome and the provocative provided it does not tend to provoke violence. Freedom only to speak inoffensively is not worth having.
Click to expand...
Click to expand...
Exactly as it should be! Unfortunately, that isn't the only speech or free expression you can be, accosted, detained or arrested.
Click to expand...
See what I mean?
 
Give what has happened in the USA, at best freedom of speech could be argued to be a necessary condition for a well functioning democracy, but clearly not sufficient. I think other factors that need to be taken into account are: the truthfulness of the speech; the relative power of the target of offensive speech; the intent of the speech. Perhaps if US legislators had thought about those they wouldn't be in the mess they are in now.
 
Ivor the Engineer said:
Give what has happened in the USA, at best freedom of speech could be argued to be a necessary condition for a well functioning democracy, but clearly not sufficient. I think other factors that need to be taken into account are: the truthfulness of the speech
Click to expand...
And who gets to be the arbiter of that truth?

Ivor the Engineer said:
the relative power of the target of offensive speech;
Click to expand...
Who gets to decides what is the balance of that relative power?

Ivor the Engineer said:
the intent of the speech.
Click to expand...
Who get to decide what the speaker's intent is?

One of the problems with society as it stands is that there are just too many professional offense-takers and self-proclaimed Social Justice Warriors.
 
Last edited:
smartcooky said:
Oh, you can :rolleyes: all you like - you have mistaken me for someone who gives a ◊◊◊◊. I will continue to use the term whenever it suits me, as I regard it as both a correct and approprate term in the context in which I use it.. and if you don't like it Arth... tough!
Click to expand...
And I have the right to call you out every time. This kind of puerile discourse makes a mockery of human rights and basic decency. It degrades both you and your argument.
 
smartcooky said:
And who gets to be the arbiter of that truth? ...snip...
Click to expand...
In the geographical UK we handed that responsibility over to our courts about 500 years ago. Courts must determine what the facts are all the time; it's their fundamental role in society. We trust them so much to do so that we will deprive people of most of their rights and imprison them for decades, even their entire life on their determinations. Sure it's not perfect but nothing ever is.
 
smartcooky said:
And who gets to be the arbiter of that truth?
Click to expand...
Let's try a recent statement and see if we can determine where it lies between absolutely true to categorically false:

“This ‘climate change,’ it’s the greatest con job ever perpetrated on the world, in my opinion,” Trump said. “All of these predictions made by the United Nations and many others, often for bad reasons, were wrong. They were made by stupid people that have cost their countries fortunes and given those same countries no chance for success. If you don’t get away from this green scam, your country is going to fail.”

Facts, or statements close enough for all practical purposes, do exist. Similarly lies, or statements close enough for all practical purposes, do exist.

smartcooky said:
Who gets to decides what is the balance of that relative power?
Click to expand...
You, me, everyone else, juries, judges and legislators. One of the issues the UK and many other countries including the USA have is their very expensive legal systems being used by wealthy people to punish and silence anything they take offense to, commonly referred to as SLAPPs.

smartcooky said:
Who get to decide what the speaker's intent is?
Click to expand...
You, me, everyone else, juries, judges and legislators.
Edited by zooterkin}<Snip> for civility.[/edit: 
 
Last edited by a moderator:
Darat said:
In the geographical UK we handed that responsibility over to our courts about 500 years ago. Courts must determine what the facts are all the time; it's their fundamental role in society. We trust them so much to do so that we will deprive people of most of their rights and imprison them for decades, even their entire life on their determinations. Sure it's not perfect but nothing ever is.
Click to expand...
We'll they don't have a very good record with truth over the last 500 years do they?
 
Darat said:
Sure it's not perfect but nothing ever is.
Click to expand...

Exactly. And any analysis of "hits" (just and fair convictions) and "misses" (unjust convictions, miscarriages of justice) over that period would reveal an extraordinarily high batting average. It's just that the "misses" get a lot of attention - and rightly so, in our quest for an ever-better justice system - than the vastly more numerous "hits".

As so often, we should not concern ourselves with whether or not we have a perfect system; instead, we should focus on which system is the "least worst" of all comparable possibilities, and we should ensure that there are self-corrective and restorative elements baked into that system. In the same way, liberal democracies are not perfect systems for the government of civil societies, but they are demonstrably the "least worst" way to go about it.
 
Darat said:
No it isn't. Why you keep saying this is a puzzle.
Click to expand...

In England & Wales, it appears to be a criminal offence (my emphasis):

  • Terrorism offences – Hamas and Hezbollah are proscribed organisations under the Terrorism Act 2000, which makes it an offence to belong to, express support for including by arranging meetings, wearing articles or publishing images that arouse reasonable suspicion of support for the groups.

Palestine Protests – What are my rights? - Saunders Law

As hundreds of thousands of protestors across the UK have taken to the streets to call for a ceasefire in response to Israel’s airstrikes on Gaza, Home Secretary Suella Braverman...
www.saunders.co.uk www.saunders.co.uk
 
LondonJohn said:
In England & Wales, it appears to be a criminal offence (my emphasis):

  • Terrorism offences – Hamas and Hezbollah are proscribed organisations under the Terrorism Act 2000, which makes it an offence to belong to, express support for including by arranging meetings, wearing articles or publishing images that arouse reasonable suspicion of support for the groups.

Palestine Protests – What are my rights? - Saunders Law

As hundreds of thousands of protestors across the UK have taken to the streets to call for a ceasefire in response to Israel’s airstrikes on Gaza, Home Secretary Suella Braverman...
www.saunders.co.uk www.saunders.co.uk
Click to expand...
"that arouse reasonable suspicion of support for the groups."

The key point is about support, as was mentioned earlier I could have a Hamas flag with a skull and crossbones over it and the waving of that wouldn't be illegal, if we were filming a show or movie it wouldn't be illegal. It's the support that makes it illegal not the waving of the flag itself. The flag is not illegal in the UK.
 
Darat said:
"that arouse reasonable suspicion of support for the groups."

The key point is about support, as was mentioned earlier I could have a Hamas flag with a skull and crossbones over it and the waving of that wouldn't be illegal, if we were filming a show or movie it wouldn't be illegal. It's the support that makes it illegal not the waving of the flag itself. The flag is not illegal in the UK.
Click to expand...

Well....OK. But somewhat semantic. I think the courts would accept that video evidence showing a defendant waving a (un-annotated) Hamas flag would easily meet the test that the defendant is waving it in support of Hamas.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Back
Top Bottom