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Anti-royal protesters are being arrested in the U.K. as 'Not My King' tag grows

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Re: Anti-royal protesters are being arrested in the U.K. as 'Not My King' tag grows

#171

Post by bArray »

> "Let her go! It's free speech!"

The UK unfortunately doesn't have freedom of speech, it has freedom of expression.

> The woman, 22, was arrested "in connection with a breach of the peace," a Police Scotland spokesperson told NPR, adding that she was formally charged and released, and her case is now pending at Edinburgh Sheriff Court.

Just to add, you can also be arrested at speakers corner if you upset enough people there and there is "reasonable cause" that they may become violent, despite you speaking peacefully.

This NPR article is false and clearly doesn't understand the laws of the UK.

Re: Anti-royal protesters are being arrested in the U.K. as 'Not My King' tag grows

#172

Post by metacritic12 »

junofan wrote: post #59
metacritic12 wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That section you linked shows that free-speech is indeed limited within a certain radius of certain funerals.

I suggest you read the whole section.

Are you referring to Synder v Phelps where the Supreme Court held that a distant (1000 ft away) protest didn't qualify for monetary (tort) damages for the deceased's family?

Because that case doesn't strike down the state laws preventing protests in close proximity. It just ruled that the private citizen can't get lots of money for emotional distress caused by a protest.

Re: Anti-royal protesters are being arrested in the U.K. as 'Not My King' tag grows

#173

Post by gw99 »

munk-a wrote: post #148
bjourne wrote: post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The queen was a public figure whose lavish livelihood were paid for by British tax-payers. So it seems to me that British people should have the right to celebrate her death in any way they please. Curtailing people's freedom of speech by misusing public order laws (the queen's funeral is not comparable to any normal funeral) is curtailing freedom of speech.

This is actually an incredibly false point. The royal family (if treated like anonymous land-owners) would cause a sudden and drastic drop in fundraising within the UK. Assuming their property wasn't seized having them retain their current station is actually a net positive to the British tax-payers - they lose far more potential income each year in free land leases and charitable donations (known collectively as the…

This is wrong. Seize it. Make it National Trust property. Job done. Doesn’t need an aristocracy present in it.

Also The Queen has a hell of a lot of hidden wealth.

Re: Anti-royal protesters are being arrested in the U.K. as 'Not My King' tag grows

#174

Post by samatman »

gambiting wrote: post #102
alasdair_ wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> They arrested a person for making a video of his dog doing nazi salutes. It's not that the royal family is singularly fragile about being upset by other peoples' expression, the whole of the UK is like that. And yet at the same time one of the biggest movies in the cinema was a Nazi spoof comedy with jokes in far poorer taste. But the movie producers have money.

That's like complaining that you will get arrested for having sex in the middle of the street, but sex in a film is somehow fine(surely it's because movie producers have money and are in cahoots with the government, and not for any other, more logical reason, like the fact that art forms, no matter how poor in taste, are protected by society).

The clip of the dog doing a Nazi salute was on YouTube, so by your logic, as they are both art forms in poor taste, they should both be protected.

Not what happened though.

Re: Anti-royal protesters are being arrested in the U.K. as 'Not My King' tag grows

#175

Post by type0 »

googlryas wrote: post #18
closewith wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> They aren’t being arrested for being anti-monarchy though. > They are being arrested for being rude about it. Got it. Arrested for poor taste. Hard to see the justification for that in a democracy?

It's not being arrested for poor taste. They're being arrested for their actions, not their beliefs. Is there some democracy somewhere which doesn't have a public nuisance/breaching the peace style law?

UK isn't a democracy it's a monarchy

Re: Anti-royal protesters are being arrested in the U.K. as 'Not My King' tag grows

#176

Post by pessimizer »

This is a great time for the British to have a little revolution with very modest aims like this. Both the government and the opposition are indistinguishable warmongering austerians who hate working people, British energy bills are tripling due to elite adventurism, posturing, and US ass-kissing, and the ex-colonies are openly proposing separating from the Commonwealth. What's more, the Queen alternated between a benign pleasantness and a prickly terseness that kept her internal states pretty mysterious and a bit charming, but now they know for a fact that their new King is a useless moron.

Getting rid of their magical fairy kingdom trappings (again) might give the population an impetus to flex some popular sovereignty over their own country. Pair it with the abolition/democratization of the Lords, and they'll finish the revolution that Cromwell spoiled.

Re: Anti-royal protesters are being arrested in the U.K. as 'Not My King' tag grows

#177

Post by noncoml »

“Strange women lying in ponds distributing swords is no basis for a system of government”

And no, I don’t mean it as a joke

If Britain wants to survive the next 100 years, they need to make some brave decisions. Dissolve monarchy and the class system, get back into EU, and hope Scotland will not declare independence.

Also, USA, wtf, why are you flying the flag at half staff? Did you forget what you fought about in 1776?

(edit: Actually I looked it up and apparently it has flown at half staff for foreign leaders a few times in the past. My bad, knee jerk reaction.)

Re: Anti-royal protesters are being arrested in the U.K. as 'Not My King' tag grows

#178

Post by Zach_the_Lizard »

lliamander wrote: post #108
Havoc wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>They are being arrested for being rude about it. Which is substantially worse. Rudeness is so subjective and context sensitive that it really shouldn't form the basis for arrests

It may not be good that people are being arrested for rudeness, but it is definitely better than them being arrested for their political views.

Is someone who rudely suggests support for the monarchy going to be arrested? I suspect not.

Re: Anti-royal protesters are being arrested in the U.K. as 'Not My King' tag grows

#179

Post by munk-a »

rtpg wrote: post #164
munk-a wrote: post #148

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is actually an incredibly false point. The royal family (if treated like anonymous land-owners) would cause a sudden and drastic drop in fundraising within the UK. Assuming their property wasn't seized having them retain their current station is actually a net positive to the British tax-payers - they lose far more potential income each year in free land leases and charitable donations (known collectively as the…

I mean… why would the royal family be allowed to “keep” anything in an abolished monarchy? Obviously you should just seize roughly all the property. It’s a product of the State, not the royal family working hard

Maybe? That's a really complicated question honestly - how much of their personal property actually is hereditary wealth and how much is a benefit of their station. I can tell you the answer is neither 0% nor 100% - the royal family (if dethroned) shouldn't be thrown out as paupers and it shouldn't be granted personal control of spaces that enjoy public use. Where precisely that line should be drawn is complicated but if that line leaves them with any significant portion of their current titular wealth the UK will end up losing money. The Crown Estate might be worth around 15.6 Billion, so a few hundred million every year is far less then the family would receive if they liquidated the lands at value and just invested it into an index fund. The actual income of the estate is significantly higher - with a lot of those assets under reporting their actual yield in terms of tourism and public benefits.

I think it's a really complicated question.

Lastly, while we're on this topic - why hasn't the US seized the wealth of the 100 most wealthy individuals unilaterally - that money would be of immense amount of benefit to the country so why do we let wealth accrue?

Re: Anti-royal protesters are being arrested in the U.K. as 'Not My King' tag grows

#180

Post by somewhereoutth »

The problem with the monarchy in the UK is not so much them themselves, but that they are the cornerstone of the remnants of the feudal system. We never had a cataclysmic revolution like the French, though the English Civil War was close. We've also been uninvaded for nearly a thousand years (unlike the French). So we have a fair amount of cruft built up.
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