Given the date, it feels appropriate to point out that the same law also makes it illegal to send a message that you know to be false for the purpose of causing annoyance.
Twitter user sentenced to 150 hours of community service in UK
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Re: Twitter user sentenced to 150 hours of community service in UK
#212Earlier quoted context omitted.
...over the speed limit, yes. The point of parent's post is that the offensive nature of a statement or speech in general is subjective and can change with whims and the time. A speed limit is objective and quantifiable; if you go over the speed limit stated you get fined, there's no room for interpretation
Speed limits are not objective at all - Germany infamously does not have speed limits on highways. And yes, speed limit laws, do change over time. And no, you can't be punished for having broken a speed limit in the past, that is not in effect today. Parent's comparison seems rather apt.
They obviously meant speed is quantifiable. You can measure speed and say "you violated the limit".
Re: Twitter user sentenced to 150 hours of community service in UK
#213Crickets from the usual crowd who would be crying "cancel culture!" on all TV and radio for weeks and calling for heads to roll had the tweet been about something other than a cause they support (military worship). Governments and companies continue to get more and more empowered to do this stuff because people always show that it has never really been about freedom but rather pushing their own views.
If the national review doesn’t count as the usual crowd, I don't know who does. https://www.nationalreview.com/corner/the-scottish-governmen...
The National Review is very much on the respectable ideologically consistent side of the Usual Crowd (TM). (I mean, don't get me wrong, it's awful, but it largely has the courage of its convictions). Rest assured that, like, the Sun and Daily Mail and Spectator aren't going to be decrying this.
Re: Twitter user sentenced to 150 hours of community service in UK
#214Breaking: man in UK jailed for thinking bad thoughts, "experts say the body language of the man clearly indicated he was thinking thoughts that go against public interest, the man has been apprehended and we hope to set an example for this kind of behavior"
I mean this is satire now but with the way things are going its not entirely ludicrous
Re: Twitter user sentenced to 150 hours of community service in UK
#215No post body was provided.
Re: Twitter user sentenced to 150 hours of community service in UK
#216There's something I find loathesome about this "Send a message" sentencing. What the judge has done is send a clear message, that he won't sentence you on the merits of the case but will sentence you to serve his own agenda. The only message this sends is that justice has failed. It's always completely transparent who exactly gets made an example of, and who gets off with a slap on the wrist. We'll spend months hunti…
No post body was provided.
Re: Twitter user sentenced to 150 hours of community service in UK
#217I believe after Margaret Thatcher died, "Ding-Dong, the Witch Is Dead" hit Number 1 on iTunes UK. Should everyone who purchased the song have been sentenced to community service, too?
Re: Twitter user sentenced to 150 hours of community service in UK
#218Earlier quoted context omitted.
The problem with banning things like "racism" is that words change meaning over time. Maybe some time in the future, any reference to "White Privlege" may be considered racist, for instance.
The OK hand sign is racist now. There's rumbles of milk being racist. The scary thing that should terrify everyone is we are going to come to a point where being called racist no longer matters or nobody cares, and then your gonna see REAL racism come back with a fury and force you wont like.
The OK sign is only racist if it's being used by racists to signal to other racists that they are racist. This remains true if you replace "The OK sign" with any other innocuous act or item.
These kinds of statements are the result of a wretched game of Telephone. "White supremacists are using the OK sign as an identifying signal" became "Crazy leftists say the OK sign is racist". It's an effective recruiting tool on the uninformed.
Re: Twitter user sentenced to 150 hours of community service in UK
#219Stop using Twitter. Build open decentralized alternatives that won't cooperate with speech police. Defund the useless bureaucrats who exist only to police speech. Fire them. Let them compete for their bread and wine like all of us who work for a living.
It sounds great, except for the "decentralized alternative" part that sounds great, but there is nothing available soon enough.
Re: Twitter user sentenced to 150 hours of community service in UK
#220I feel like I must have been corrupted by the internet or something if the tweet in question is considered "grossly offensive". It certainly isn't nice , but 18 months supervision and 150 hours of community service? I don't even know how to put my bafflement into words here.
This is exactly why "hate speech" laws are so dangerous. It gives carte blanche to the government to go after anyone who says anything any one person (or the government itself) might find offensive.
Add the idea that has been floated over the years into making law enforcement officers a protected class as well and it's not a large leap to see how such seemingly well-intentioned things can be abused by the state.