Considering the staggering number of arrest for online/offensive communications in England & Wales, we should add Britain to the list of Russia and Iran 2017: ~5,500 arrests 2019: ~7,734 arrests 2023: ~12,183 arrests
I was also surprised the post focusses on Rus/Iran when Australia, UK, and many more countries (Malaysia, Thailand) have/are introducing laws to prevent large swaths of free speech (banning mediums by age, banning conversation by topic, or by making speaking one's mind online too risky, as almost anything now can be interpreted as 'offensive' or 'hate speech').
Staying ahead of censors in 2025
131–140 of 349 posts
Re: Staying ahead of censors in 2025
#132Earlier quoted context omitted.
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.
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.
> "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.
Re: Staying ahead of censors in 2025
#133> No mention of EU chat control > No mention of "age verification" > No mention of people arrested for Twitter posts in the UK and the EU What did they mean by this?
Nobody blocks them in the UK and the EU so there is nothing to fight in technical terms for TOR Project.
They are not EU/UK political representative to fight legally or politically.
Re: Staying ahead of censors in 2025
#134Earlier quoted context omitted.
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 democ…
> Hate speech is a problem. I agree, 100%. Donald Trump should have the power to jail people for things they say online.
Re: Staying ahead of censors in 2025
#135Earlier quoted context omitted.
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.
It’s Badenoch wanting to deport a British Citizen for what he posted online, not Starmer.
Re: Staying ahead of censors in 2025
#136Earlier quoted context omitted.
I was also surprised the post focusses on Rus/Iran when Australia, UK, and many more countries (Malaysia, Thailand) have/are introducing laws to prevent large swaths of free speech (banning mediums by age, banning conversation by topic, or by making speaking one's mind online too risky, as almost anything now can be interpreted as 'offensive' or 'hate speech').
"as almost anything now can be interpreted as 'offensive' or 'hate speech'" Are you serious here? In russia you get problems for calling a war a war and worse problems if you say it is a bad war. In UK you certainly can call a war a war and you can critize the government or other people all day long. What you cannot do is calling for violence against them. Or do you have counterexamples?
I’ve seen similar outrageous arrests for mean tweets in the UK.
Europe has lost its mind about right and wrong.
Re: Staying ahead of censors in 2025
#137Earlier quoted context omitted.
"as almost anything now can be interpreted as 'offensive' or 'hate speech'" Are you serious here? In russia you get problems for calling a war a war and worse problems if you say it is a bad war. In UK you certainly can call a war a war and you can critize the government or other people all day long. What you cannot do is calling for violence against them. Or do you have counterexamples?
In Germany you can receive a suspended sentence for raping a minor and then an actual jail sentence for insulting the rapist. I’ve seen similar outrageous arrests for mean tweets in the UK. Europe has lost its mind about right and wrong.
Re: Staying ahead of censors in 2025
#138Earlier quoted context omitted.
I was also surprised the post focusses on Rus/Iran when Australia, UK, and many more countries (Malaysia, Thailand) have/are introducing laws to prevent large swaths of free speech (banning mediums by age, banning conversation by topic, or by making speaking one's mind online too risky, as almost anything now can be interpreted as 'offensive' or 'hate speech').
"as almost anything now can be interpreted as 'offensive' or 'hate speech'" Are you serious here? In russia you get problems for calling a war a war and worse problems if you say it is a bad war. In UK you certainly can call a war a war and you can critize the government or other people all day long. What you cannot do is calling for violence against them. Or do you have counterexamples?
This is blatantly disingenuous. The Public Order Act 1986, Racial and Religious Hatred Act 2006 and the Criminal Justice and Immigration Act 2008 all criminalize "insulting" and "abusive" words, or any public display of literature that is "insulting" or "abusive" -- much more than calls for violence:
> A person who uses threatening, abusive or insulting words or behaviour, or displays any written material which is threatening, abusive or insulting, is guilty of an offence if—
> (b) having regard to all the circumstances racial hatred is likely to be stirred up thereby.
https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/1986/64/part/III/crossh...
British jurisprudence has consistently put the likelihood of racial hatred being stirred up to the whims of the presiding judge. If the unaccountable bureaucrat feels like your comments could likely stir up racial hatred to even a single one of your cousins, even if there was no evidence of any stirred, then you are guilty.
What exactly constitutes "abusive" or "insulting" is not only vague but applied solely to white Christians. Certainly a document that says polytheists should be murdered (Quran 9:5) or one that says Hebrews should "completely consume" all the people that they get control of "with no pity" (Deuteronomy 7:16) could be considered not only insulting and abusive, but outright threatening. But these statutes are only used to attack people saying "I don't like how many foreigners are in my country and they should be rounded up and shipped back." Whatever your position on this kind of jingoistic nationalist sentiment, you should be able to recognize that the hypocrisy and lack of liberty is stupid and dangerous and is going to eventually result in genocide (either of the native Britons by the new arrivals, or the latter in the backlash).
Elizabeth Kinney certainly did not "call for violence" against the man who beat her. She simply, minutes after being physically beaten, used a slur in a private text message to a friend, and was arrested for it:
https://www.facebook.com/piersmorganuncensored/videos/elizab...
It is extremely suspect that every thread that Hacker News and other prominent and influential platforms has on these statutes gets flooded by people spreading deliberate pro-government misinformation, claiming that people are only being arrested for "calls for violence".
Threatening violence against parties is generally punished by a separate, far more severe statute (Serious Crime Act 2007, which replaced the traditional mechanism for incitement so that it could be vaguely applied to overeager online comments) that is virtually never invoked for Facebook posts, because none of elderly people arrested under this statute are threatening violence. They are posting something considered unacceptable by the powers that be, because limitless immigration was rammed down the throat of the English without any regard to democratic will or desires.
Re: Staying ahead of censors in 2025
#139Earlier quoted context omitted.
> 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…
> Very bad faith interpretation. You know full well that's not what is meant when this phrase is employed. I hope you're willing to extend this charitable way of interpreting intentions to the hyperboles made by the far right in their slogans. What if a anti-immigration group came out with the "eat the aliens" slogan? Should they be allowed to chant that? Make signs? > Should we extend free speech to groups actively…
Re: Staying ahead of censors in 2025
#140Earlier quoted context omitted.
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 r pe gangs". Are those messages controversial? For sure. Should originator of these messages be prosecuted? I don't think so. Are anti-christian, "de…
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 m…
Free speech is repugnant speech. But I can make the case for far-leftists supporting Palestine action as well.