The Thai lèse majesté law states that any insult to the Thai royal family is a serious crime punishable by years in jail. I would assume most people would agree this flies in the face of any idea of free speech. If you don’t have the right to insult the head of state you don’t have free speech.
If that law was used against someone who was also involved in planning to assassinate the king, would that justify the law and make it any less a contradiction of the concept of free speech? Even if the prosecutor made no attempt to show that the accused was actually attempting to assassinate the king? What if the judge did not even mention that plot in their judgement, and only mention the insults?
I would assume, again, that most people would say that changes nothing. Banning insulting the king is still blatantly contravenes the concept of freedom of speech.
Likewise in this case. This was NOT a prosecution for advocating violence. There was no mention of advocating genocide in the judgement. The law used does not criminalize advocating genocide or other violence. It criminalizes any online speech (opinion, joke, whatever) that the state considers “grossly offensive”. People are not defending advocating genocide by criticizing it.
Here’s another excellent example of how these laws really serve to protect the community and appropriately penalize the true criminals in our society.
A 19-year-old woman, in an effort to pay tribute to a kid who was killed in a car accident, posted some rap lyrics from a Snap Dogg song (NOT Snoop Dogg). The lyrics contained some offensive language; the story doesn’t go into specifics, but I’m sure you have a good idea.
She was charged with sending a “grossly offensive” message, and found guilty.
I’m sure that the people of the UK are much safer as a result of this worthy exercise of justice.
I think it’s quite possible, yes. It would, after all, be straight out of the Daily Stormer stylebook, which states that one should present calls to gas all the Jews in a light, jokey tone in order to fly under the radar:
There is a well-established strategy of using the framing devices of humour and irony as cover for the sincere communication of far-right views. It’s not new as such - Sartre called the Nazis and their collaborators out on it in the 40s:
But you can see it now. After Richard Spencer gives a speech in which he refers to the press as a “golem”, suggests that the 1930s German expression “lugenpresse” should be resurrected, and ends with a cry of “Hail Trump, Hail the people, Hail our victory”, he hastens to point out that this is all an ironic joke, a bit of fun.
If you expect that the far-right will only ever present themselves as entirely sincere, you are behind the curve.
On that point, it’s actually notable that Meechan has actually engaged in actual publicity events with noted actual violent actual far right actual thug Tommy Robinson, and actually become a hero of the actual far-right. The flood of abusive comments directed at Scottish Jews in the wake of the video emerging online -as testified to in court- may also be some evidence that people did interpret his video as inciting hatred against Jews. Happily, the hatred stirred up by the video has been expressed online rather than in violence - that, I suggest, is a contingency that owes more to luck and circumstance rather than Meechan’s careful judgement.
First reaction: this is a bullshit disgrace.
Second reaction: yup.
Third reaction: I’m assuming, of course, that “effort to pay a tribute to a kid who was killed in a car accident” isn’t just the defendant’s claim, but the the facts as decided by the court. Because occasionally people claim motives for an action in court that were not their true motive. But if that was her intent, this is a bullshit disgrace.
To be honest, I wouldn’t care if it’s the defendant’s claim or not. If she came right out and said, “I post some lyrics with the word ‘nigger’ just to shock and offend some people,” I don’t think the disgrace of this ruling would be mitigated at all.
It would make me think less of the young woman in question, and I would be happy to use my own free speech rights to call her an idiot and a troll and a racist. But I still wouldn’t think she should be subject to legal penalties.
You might think that saying ‘gas the jews’ to a dog as a joke is s genuine advocacy of genocide, but that is completely irrelevant.
The people prosecuting this case didn’t think so, because they never made that claim during the trial or in judgement. He wasn’t prosecuted for advocating genocide or any violent crime, and the law in question doesn’t require advocacy of violence. So the fact you think that is completely irrelevant.
This law, as demonstrated by this case (and the case mhendo posted above) criminalizes ANY speech which the state finds offensive. That flies in the face of the concept of free speech
The fact it is being used against horrible racist arseholes also irrelevant. If it the constitution doesn’t protect racist arseholes, it doesn’t protect anyone. The law applies to everyone, if the state decided that advocating gay rights or atheism was “grossly offensive” then you can have no complaints.
As clearly shown in the judgement the ONLY consideration that was needed for the conviction was to show that society found the opinion “grossly offensive”. There is no limit to what society (as in the state) decides is “grossly offensive”.
I agree with griffin1977. To say that an idea is grossly offense removes that idea from the public discourse and allows the government to declare that certain topics for debate are forbidden.
It can start with universally hated ideas like genocide. However, if the words do not put anyone in imminent danger of actually being killed, the remedy for hateful speech is more speech, not pushing it underground.
If this was the law in the United States in 1996, what would stop any legislature or the Congress from labeling any talk of same sex marriage as “grossly offensive” or “an assault on the core of the family” or any other such high sounding labels so as to ban the discussion of it. Such an idea that the government can suppress an opinion causes me far more fear than one person who advocates genocide to his dog.
I agree, up to a point. But I was asked, after all, so it’s only polite to answer. And I do think there is clearly an issue to be addressed: if neo-Nazis have learned to couch their calls for genocide or violence against those pesky untermenschen in ironic terms so that they can deny any culpability for their own message, then how does society respond? Allowing “it was a joke” to permit calls for violence against minorities doesn’t seem like the optimal solution.
That last bit’s not true though, is it? The limits were clearly laid out in the judgement I linked to above. Here they are again:
The limits are:
That the state must apply the standards of a society that is
a) open;
b) just; and
c) multi-racial.
That the standards so applied must be reasonably enlightened.
That particular consideration should be given to how offensive the message would be to those to whom it relates.
You are concerned that, at some future time, a judge in the UK might rule that support for gay rights is grossly offensive to straight people according the reasonably enlightened standards of an open and just (and multi-racial) society.
It’s not a concern I share. The contingency, as they say, is a remote one. But let us grant it. Clearly, in such an event, society and its standards will have changed massively. There will have been a major retrograde shift in our concepts of justice, openness, equality, sexual freedom and liberty. What is it that could have brought about such a shift?
The most likely answer that I can see right now - and it’s not very likely - is a rise in the popularity of far-right ideology. If you’re concerned about this, that is a concern I share. Such ideologies are becoming more popular in both the US and Europe than they were. It would be good if that popularity did not continue to grow. Given the obvious risks of the rise of neo-Nazism, I don’t have a massive objection to slapping down a smartarse wee wank when his antisemitic video stirs up a wave of abuse against Jews as a means of drawing a line about what counts as opinion shared in the market place of ideas and what counts as cheerleading for applied bigotry.
He wasn’t prosecuted for calling for violence. The law doesn’t require any call for violence. There was no mention of a call for violence in the trial or judgement. So that is completely irrelevant.
Except it is true. As shown by the statement you just posted: “As a matter of law, the test is not whether the video was offensive but whether it was grossly offensive.” That is exactly the statement I made, in black and white, directly from a legal judgement. The only test required to prosecuted by the state is for a video to be found “grossly offensive”. In early 21st century multi-cultural Britain anti-semitic or racist opinions are considered, rightly grossly offensive, whereas advocating for homosexual tolerance is not (also rightly). But there is no guarantee that will not change, I hope not, but given recent political events I would not bet against it.
But if it does this law will quite clearly criminalize those opinions. Not a hypothetical law LIKE this one, this EXACT law if it is still on the books would make advocating for tolerance of homosexual lifestyles illegal.
Note the term “reasonably enlightened contemporary standards”. According to British law that is what your hypothetical “man on the Clapham omnibus” would think is “grossly offensive”. Spoiler alert: the man on the Clapham omnibus might be super homophobic! If the British constitution doesn’t protect an arsehole’s right to air racist opinions it doesn’t protect your right to air pro-gay opinions. The only thing that means the former is prosecuted and the latter is not right now is the mores of contemporary society. And they WILL change, and we cannot predict how.
In the US offensive opinions are protected by the constitution. So if society decides it finds homosexuality more offensive than racism (just as likely to happen in the US as the UK) then those opinions are protected.
In this way the US constitution is objectively better than the UK one.
Well its a good thing this judgement made all those arseholes give up their racist beliefs and go away. It didn’t allow them to portray themselves as martyrs for free speech and raise tons of cash.