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UK government states that 'safety' act is about influence over public discourse

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Re: UK government states that 'safety' act is about influence over public discourse

#91

Post by khalic »

doublerabbit wrote: post #79
khalic wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’m just going to say it: you are wrong, protests, public pressure and civil disobedience are why you have many of the right you have today. I get you don’t have the will/energy/possibility to do anything, but don’t go around telling lies about the usefulness of public intervention.

> you are wrong, protests, public pressure and civil disobedience are why you have many of the right you have today. Once upon a time, yes. But they don't work in the modern world we live in now. Show me a successful protest that achieved change in the past ten years?

Wasn’t turkye’s failed coup less than 10 years ago? Direct result of public intervention

The French yellow vest

The Dutch farmer protests

I can go on if you want

Re: UK government states that 'safety' act is about influence over public discourse

#92

Post by moomin »

nrawe wrote: post #87
nxm wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What is happening in Britain is people are being actually arrested for “offensive” speech, which is of course subjective, subject to abuse, and open to totalitarian oppression. This is why the First Amendment in the US constitution is so important

I'm happy to be wrong, but I don't believe that's correct. There have been some people arrested for inciting violence via social media during the Southport riots. There is also Tommy Robinson/Stephen Yaxley-Lennon, who has been remanded in custody for contempt of court for continuing to libel an immigrant even after his claims were proven to be false. And by contempt of court, he literally has produced a movie contin…

Vandalism and destruction of property is a shockingly low bar. The suffragettes threw an axe at the king and no-one said they should be a proscribed organisation.

Re: UK government states that 'safety' act is about influence over public discourse

#93

Post by holoduke »

mcjiggerlog wrote: post #40
dustincoates wrote: post #5

Without passing judgment on the act, this is incredibly misleading. I found the source of the original quotes[0], and they are taken quite out of context. From the article: >First, we are told, the relevant secretary of state (Michelle Donelan) expressed “concern” that the legislation might whack sites such as Amazon instead of Pornhub. In response, officials explained that the regulation in question was “not primari…

There oddly seems to be a concerted effort online to paint the UK as some kind of failing police state recently. This narrative seems to have really taken off with some Americans, who now seem completely convinced that the UK government is some kind of totalitarian oppressor who are snatching people off the streets. Meanwhile, Brits just look on at this narrative wondering what the hell they're talking about. Look, I…

The problem in the UK is that politics are not in any way looking after its citizens. Its a group of elitists that serve large financial institutes. If you look at the UK now it really is much worse than lets say 30 years ago. Infrastructure is in a bad shape. Poverty is pretty visible. Loads of people living paycheck by paycheck. The mighty UK empire is gone.

Re: UK government states that 'safety' act is about influence over public discourse

#94

Post by te_chris »

nxm wrote: post #61
mcjiggerlog wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There oddly seems to be a concerted effort online to paint the UK as some kind of failing police state recently. This narrative seems to have really taken off with some Americans, who now seem completely convinced that the UK government is some kind of totalitarian oppressor who are snatching people off the streets. Meanwhile, Brits just look on at this narrative wondering what the hell they're talking about. Look, I…

What is happening in Britain is people are being actually arrested for “offensive” speech, which is of course subjective, subject to abuse, and open to totalitarian oppression. This is why the First Amendment in the US constitution is so important

Definitely not happening in the us too! Certainly no academic visas being cancelled.

Re: UK government states that 'safety' act is about influence over public discourse

#95

Post by jphoward »

JFingleton wrote: post #25
ap99 wrote: post #18

For the Americans looking at this act, you're maybe putting it in the context of American politics and thinking who cares if the porn sites have my face or id. But in the UK you can be arrested and jailed for saying something online that offends someone else.

Here is more information about the arrests that are currently taking place: https://freespeechunion.org/police-make-30-arrests-a-day-for...

Why does that link say the current director of public prosecutions is Sir Kier Starmer? It's hard to take it seriously.

Re: UK government states that 'safety' act is about influence over public discourse

#96

Post by polshaw »

toyg wrote: post #45
ap99 wrote: post #18

For the Americans looking at this act, you're maybe putting it in the context of American politics and thinking who cares if the porn sites have my face or id. But in the UK you can be arrested and jailed for saying something online that offends someone else.

Britain has always been very hypocritical about freedom of speech. Take for example "Speaker's Corner", an area of Hyde Park were police will tolerate any sort of speech - except that, if there are complaints and the speech is considered potentially unlawful, they will arrest the speaker right after he's done speaking.

So there is not a magical space where the law does not apply? that is what you call hypocritical.

Re: UK government states that 'safety' act is about influence over public discourse

#97

Post by darrenf »

nxm wrote: post #61
mcjiggerlog wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There oddly seems to be a concerted effort online to paint the UK as some kind of failing police state recently. This narrative seems to have really taken off with some Americans, who now seem completely convinced that the UK government is some kind of totalitarian oppressor who are snatching people off the streets. Meanwhile, Brits just look on at this narrative wondering what the hell they're talking about. Look, I…

What is happening in Britain is people are being actually arrested for “offensive” speech, which is of course subjective, subject to abuse, and open to totalitarian oppression. This is why the First Amendment in the US constitution is so important

Arrests are up, but sentences are down — i.e. fewer convictions/criminal records

https://lordslibrary.parliament.uk/select-communications-off...

> there are several reasons why an arrest may not result in a sentence, such as out-of-court resolutions, but said the “most common is “evidential difficulties””, specifically that the victim does not support taking further action.

As mentioned at the top of the above document, there was a debate in the Lords on 17th July on the topic where many of the participants were pretty scathing about the situation: https://hansard.parliament.uk/Lords/2025-07-17/debates/F807C...

The minister was naturally defensive towards the end, albeit they did say:

> Importantly, the National Police Chiefs’ Council and the College of Policing, at the request of the Home Secretary, are currently undertaking a review of how non-crime hate incidents are dealt with. We expect to see some information from the police on that. It is self-evidently important that some of those incidents help us gather intelligence on potential future crime, but, equally, we do not want the police to do things that waste their time and not focus on the type of crime that the noble Lord rightly mentioned in his introduction.

Re: UK government states that 'safety' act is about influence over public discourse

#98

Post by tgv »

mdp2021 wrote: post #36
icarouse wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The owner of lobste.rs decided to censor lobste.rs. And then changed his mind. It's accessible from the UK as it was before.

I see. I only came to know it from the list. Now what about the rest of the list.

Is this you?

    news.ycombinator.com | Hacker News
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    Reported: 15 August, 2025 at 10:09
    Shut down on: 15 August, 2025
    Shutting down due to OSA
    Discussion site for insufferable nerds.
    Submitted

Re: UK government states that 'safety' act is about influence over public discourse

#99

Post by khalic »

extraisland wrote: post #83
khalic wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Then create a new party, give talks about this, mobilize your friends, family, make them understand that civil liberty is literally worth dying for

I really get annoyed when someone suggests this (it not your fault). You are believing what you are told at school about how Politics works. Many of us understand this is unrealistic. Here is an incomplete list of reasons why I would never get involved directly in politics: 1. It takes literally decades to get a political party off the ground without major backing. All the new parties that you hear of are bankrolled…

Sorry for your past, happy you got out of it.

1. Listen, yes it’s very hard work, but it’s this or be squeezed until there’s nothing else. And when people start having famines we’ll have a new French Revolution, millions will die, and this will require a lot more energy than doing changes today.

2. Will do, I don’t know enough on that subject to have an opinion on that. But unjust, unmovable systems, like monarchies (wink) have been toppled in the past. Even recently.

3. Sorry I was just using my environment as an example, I meant people that trust you, that you trust. This kind of movement starts small

Re: UK government states that 'safety' act is about influence over public discourse

#100

Post by doublerabbit »

khalic wrote: post #91
doublerabbit wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> you are wrong, protests, public pressure and civil disobedience are why you have many of the right you have today. Once upon a time, yes. But they don't work in the modern world we live in now. Show me a successful protest that achieved change in the past ten years?

Wasn’t turkye’s failed coup less than 10 years ago? Direct result of public intervention The French yellow vest The Dutch farmer protests I can go on if you want

Those are European, cool. Any successful UK protests?

As that is the country we are talking about here.

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