Ooh, sarcasm! That stings. 
That’s what I though. Apparently I was mistaken. Life of Brian was also illegal in a few European countries.
To reboot the debate a bit:
The UK expressed concern that Wilders’ visit would disrupt security and harmony, and some posters here agreed.
Would it be different if Wilders’ supporters were in the majority, or at least more numerous than Muslims, and the greater threat to security and harmony was not letting him in, but keeping him out. Say Wilders had 100,000 supporters marching through downtown London, chanting slogans and angrily demanding that he be allowed in, saying that if Wilders is kept out they will be deeply insulted. Maybe a few are carrying bats. It obviously couldn’t be said at that point that it’s in the interest of security to fan the flames by keeping him out … so should he be let in under those circumstances?
If you say no, ISTM obvious that the security issue is a smokescreen, and the real issue is just people not wanting a person they don’t like to get a hearing.
If you say yes, that means a rather perverse incentive structure is in place, in which free speech rights are diminished unless one’s supporters are seen to be dangerous.
Hello, and welcome to reality!
Freedom of speech is one of the many that Western society is founded on, among others being tolerance and public safety. The UK has no constitution guaranteeing his right to entry (other than the EU constitution, perhaps? Not sure, YMMV)
The House of Lords is not the House of Commons. The Lords are appointed, unelected, and are not part of the representative democracy.
The debate so far has mostly been about political ideals. This decision, though, seems to be based purely on political expediency. Wilders had no necessity to be in the UK; he isn’t seeking asylum or anything of the sort; he can communicate his ideas in many other ways; his freedom of speech isn’t being curtailed, since his film was still shown by the House of Lords.
His only contribution is in offering black-or-white ‘insights’ into a problem that is extremely delicate and complicated, with political, religious and demographic causes. If we take him at his word, it is also one of the most important issues to ever face modern humanity.
IMHO: Wilders seems to be an odious toe-rag who is attempting to kick his political career up a notch by latching on to a big issue and deliberately generating controversy so he can claim, as many other have, that he is being victimised for daring to speak the truth.
Also, his haircut is ridiculous.
Great. So you’re content with violent intimidation in politics. Glad you’re honest about it…
I get concerned when someone proclaims “a victory for the ____ community”. It has strong us vs. them connotations, and leads me to believe that is how the speaker views the world. It is very different than proclaiming “a victory for understanding and tolerance”.
Agree on both accounts. Unfortunately, he is having success: latest polls see his party move up further. They would be the second largest political party in the Netherlands would there be elections (and mind you, in the Dutch system, ony coalitions of 2-4 parties can achieve parlementary majority).
We don’t need a constitution to accept that free speech is an ideal that should be protected. Rather, we need an active citizenry to cause a stink whenever the government messes up, which is the purpose of this thread, isn’t it?
AND: has been pointed out multiple times, the UK has treaty obligations to allow free movement. The presence, or lack thereof, of a written British constitution here is irrelevant.
Irrelevant. The Lords are indisputably part of government in this country.
As pointed out, his right to free movement within the Eurozone is being curtailed. Necessity doesn’t come into it; the right to free movement isn’t predicated on necessity.
One may then question what the point of the ban was, and why a government minister was investing any time on this matter. Shouldn’t they, you know, be keeping convicted killers out, instead?
Not at all, but you were making out that what is obviously the real state of affairs is some kind of logical impossibility.
How much of this is due to Wilders? What is his position within the party?
My knowledge here is somewhat shaky, I admit, but surely if it was strictly and clearly against the law to do what has been done, wouldn’t they a) have not done it b) amended the law and c) been in major trouble with the European Court of Justice or the ECHR?
I defer to your experience, of course, (especially since I’ve been lurking here for two years and you were one of my favourite posters ;)) but it seems a little unlikely to me that in the terrorism-obsessed climate, states wouldn’t have left themselves some way to legally expel people even when they didn’t have any solid reason to do so.
I was simply correcting Švejk’s misapprehension that they are elected officials.
No misapprehension on my part - I did not say that they were elected officials, I said they were part of British representative democracy, which they are, even when they’re appointed.
Rushdie is no longer under guard at all. Khomeini’s fatwa has been revoked, for want of a better term.
The thing is, Britain has a long (and IMHO enviable) tradition of sheltering political radicals, from Karl Marx to Omar Bakri.
Presumably you’re referring to a 1998 announcement made by a former Iranian President Khatami:
From the same article:
More recent articles and links: blogs nytimes
Today in History: Fatwa on Rushdie Turns 20, Still in Force
From a June 2007 article in the Australian following the seething reaction by the Muslim world to Rushdie’s award of a knighthood: LINK
This attracted the usual pusillanimous response from those who govern Britain:
And from Wikipedia
Looking at that realistically, I believe Salman Rushdie would be ill advised to consider letting down his guard even for a moment.
When it bends the law it is later fined by the EU courts.
Fines at that level are not a real reason to not bend these laws. If I were Home Secretary and wanted to illegally detain 8 people and know that the most that would happen would be that I’d get charged less than £100K for it, I wouldn’t even hesitate.
For these laws to have weight there need to be proper sanctions for countries that flout them, but because exclusion of undesirable individuals whilst technically against the spirit of the ECHR and the subsequent legislation, no pragmatic government is going to let itself be constrained by them too much. There isn’t a strong enough consensus in the EU that forbidding entry to extremists is a bad thing to do, hence why there are no real sanctions for doing it.
No, the main force is that countries who keep bending the laws are acting like jerks and countries have little patience with that. I am sure the UK does not want to become the jerk of Europe and a pariah with a reputation for being assholes. A fine of 1 euro and a negative declaration of the court is sufficient. It is not the amount of the fine but the declarion of the court that the act was improper. I am quite sure the UK wants to live up to its highly regarded international reputation and has no intention or interest in jerking other countries around. Plus, I suppose the amounts would rise for repeated infractions.
One could argue that we already have, for a variety of reasons.
In an ideal world, which we don’t live in. Again, pragmatism will trump idealism every time, and our current government tends to leave towards the former in this issue than the latter.
This would be a sanction that would have an effect.
I don’t think the UK cares what the rest of Europe thinks, to be honest. France certainly doesn’t 
There are an awful lot of nutjobs at Speakers’ Corner on any given day (or at least there used to be). What’s one more?