IMO this is a demonstration of something that comes up pretty frequently. JR Vance’s pro-fascist lectures in Europe (and generally the fact its pretty hard to hold up any aspect of American political as good example for others right now) notwithstanding. The way the US defines free speech and other fundamental rights, as a concise, (relatively) unabigous set of absolute statements is a really good thing. That actually protects peoples rights, such as the right to free speech, far better than the more verbose, more ambiguous, and more wishy washy, alternatives used in other countries, such as the European Convention on Human Rights.
In this particular example you have Roger Waters (who has unfortunately turned into an absolute tankie arsehole who has expressed pro-Putin views😢, as discussed in that thread) expressing support for Palestine Action a “direct action” group (who vandalize targets they consider associated with the Israeli military) that has recently been declared a “terrorist organization”, and so risks a long prison sentence.
This is clearly a massive infringement of the freedom of speech, that would not be allowed in the US because of the first amendment (even with the current pathetic excuse of an judicial branch). This is has nothing to do with whether Roger Waters is a tankie arsehole or whether Palestine Action has helped a single Gazan child by vandalizing Cambridge University (don’t side track this thread with those discussions please). No one is claiming Palestine Action is using their freedom of speech when they smash up a company HQ and no one is claiming Roger Waters is conspiring with Palestine Action to commit crimes. He simply called them a “great organization,”, which is enough under UK law to be considered encouraging terrorism, as Palestine Action has been added to the list of proscribed organizations. Cases like this highlight how much better a bill of rights, like the US has, is better than the alternatives IMO
I’m not saying it’s perfect (or some kind of god given infallible document that is America’s gift to the world). I’m not even saying its going to prevent the collapse of America democracy (there is a limit to what any system if checks and balances will do ultimately, if one side is actively trying to subvert them, and can get a majority of voters on their side). But i will say it’s doing a hell of a lot more to prevent that than alternatives did in other countries where autocrats have set up de facto dictatorships (e.g. Hungary, Turkey, etc). Hell if Trump had the power to arbitrarily call organizations terrorists and make supporting them a crime, he’d have done that to the the Democratic Party by now (no exaggeration there he absolutely would)
Missed edit window. I’d also add I am fully aware just because the UK government could prosecute Roger Waters over his statement that doesn’t mean they will choose to prosecute a rich popular elderly grandee of British music industry.
There are plenty of other similar cases where they did however:
The fact that Hezbollah are undeniably an actual terrorist organization whereas it’s much more debatable whether Palestine Action are, doesn’t make it any less an infringement of freedom of speech. As with all these laws, if your constitution doesn’t protect your right to express your views about downright evil people it will also not protect your right to express your views about anyone else.
The British government has proscribed Palestine Action as a “terrorist group” from 5 July 2025 under UK’s , making it illegal to fundraise for it or wear or display anything arousing reasonable suspicion of support, or to express an opinion or belief supportive of Palestine Action which might encourage others to support it.
That seems like pretty excessive.
Germany has some strict constraints on nazism-type activity, and that is understandable, yet, at least in the US, assholes are allowed to out themselves, which makes it easier to keep track of them. It also allows them to rally support, which seems problematic.
The thing that distinguishes Palestine Action from Hezbollah is that they shout and smash expensive things but do not attack persons. It is also not apparent that they have expressed support for Hezbollah or Hamas (groups that have caused injury/death).
Yeah I don’t think anyone would claim that Palestine Action are the same as Hezbollah. But my point is if your constitution does not protect your right to say nice things about Hezbollah it doesn’t protect your right to say nice things about Palestine Action (or for that matter about the Green Party).
Its easier for the government to get away with it when they can say “look at those evil people! Look at the terrible things they’ve done! We can’t have people supporting them!”. But if they get away with it for evil people they can get away with it for everyone else too.
Right. And if you read The Economist article I linked to, it gives specific examples of creep, to where people have been prosecuted (perhaps civilly, I don’t recall) for calling politicians “idiots.”
If you can’t call a politician literally any name you like (short of defamation, perhaps) then you don’t have free speech at all
It gives an example of someone in Finland being prosecuted for using a bible verse to denounce homosexuality. I’m not defending the position, of course, but it is very much a mainstream view among some mainstream Christian sects that homosexuality is a sin. So I don’t know how you criminalize that and claim to have free speech.
Or the hijab ban enacted in France. Absolute blatant infringement of the freedom of religion (its completely insane to me, like, is it not obvious that if your constitution doesn’t protect your right to wear a hijab when the majority doesn’t want you to, it won’t protect your right not to wear one when the majority wants you to?) If Trump thought he could get away with a hijab ban he’d enact one tomorrow (literally it would be a good way to distract everyone from the Epstein business) but even the collection of cowardly partisans currently at the top of Judicial branch would strike it down as a blatant violation of the 1st amendment.
Just to reiterate what I said in the thread this was spun off from, Waters is a nut job, and his politics are revolting, but in a free society he has a right to hold them. That he is potentially facing 14 years in jail for voicing support of an organization the UK government doesn’t like is something that has no place in a modern liberal democracy. I find even the idea that donating money to an organization that the government can arbitrarily declare as terrorist to be on very dangerous grounds. There’s a country that regularly sends its citizens to jail for voicing support for things the government doesn’t like, and sentences people to 12-year prison terms for donating $50 to a cause it doesn’t like. That country is Russia. It’s not supposed to be Western Europe.
That said, I’m not a citizen of a European country, and I can very much understand why there are, for example, laws against voicing support for or displaying symbols associated with Nazism in Europe that would not survive in the US. To me though, this law is pretty clearly taking thing way, way too far.
Well, it’s not like people TFG put in power don’t want to do blatantly unconstitutional things:
Yeah though my point is the law has not changed. The same law that made it illegal to say nice things about the neo-nazi group Atomwaffen, or ISIS, also made it illegal to say nice things about Palestine Action. Its not a slippery slope, if your constitution allows one it allows the other
France is an interesting case. I think under a recent iteration of the law it is illegal to walk around wearing, e.g., a motorcycle helmet or a ski mask, anything, really. Officially, people are supposed to have freedom of religion, but equally officially the republic does not recognize any religious sects and freedom of religious expression does not trump whatever the state decides is in the interest of public order. I am not sure that a “hijab” is an extremely religious fashion accessory, by the way, nor does it always veil the face.
I’m talking about different laws though. The law in the UK that Waters risks running afoul of as I understand it is the UK’s Terrorism Act 2000. Laws prohibiting “the distribution or public use of symbols of unconstitutional groups—in particular, flags, insignia, uniforms, slogans and forms of greeting” in Germany are codified in Strafgesetzbuch section 86a and similarly in Austria under Verbotsgesetz 1947. There are damn good reasons that those laws were enacted and are in place and I don’t really have an issue with them. The same way that there are limits to free speech in the US prefventing you from shouting ‘fire’ in a crowded theater, when your country had a political party or was affected by a political party on your continent that carried out the largest organized genocide in history killing 10 million people and that was only what they were able to carry out while at war with the world with plans to carry it out on an a scale an order of magnitude larger, yeah, I think there are justifiable reasons for restricting speech or actions encouraging the return of such a political party.
I’ve been meaning to start a thread on free speech (if I ever get time) after hearing about this case of a man prosecuted for burning a Quran and insulting Islam outside the Turkish embassy.
It’s alarming not for the severity of the punishment, which was just a fine, but that he was prosecuted at all, and for the reasoning of the judge: that since two different people violently attacked him, he was obviously guilty of inciting disorder. Blaming the victim, and sending the message that if you respond to speech with violence, other people will have their free speech restricted as a result.
Is there any evidence this actually works, though?
If we can’t call ourselves “Nazis,” and give the Roman Salute, we can always call ourselves “Yazis” and use a closed fist held at a particular angle to the right when we meet to discuss our antisemitism.
In nations with such rules the fascists don’t seem to be seizing power, at least. The one bit of empirical evidence we have is that it’s America with American rules that’s speedrunning its way to fascism; not those other countries.
I’m not so sure about that. The far right, which aligns well with MAGA, has been making gains all over Europe. We might be leading the pack, but it’s too early to say the others won’t catch up.
Anyway, I don’t think that’s evidence that banning (ie) Nazis and their trappings prevents people from being Nazis.
If restricting their propaganda has no effect then we might as well give up, since that makes them out to be some sort of natural force or inherent endpoint of society. It works for everything else, after all, so that’s a claim that they are some special inevitable force.
Yeah, it’s not accurate. Hungary has been ruled by Fidesz since 2010, Italy currently has a right-wing populist party in power, ditto Switzerland, the Finns Party is part of the coalition government in Finland, the Sweden Democrats back the government in Sweden, the PVV won the most seats in the 2023 Dutch election and was part of the government in the Netherlands until it recently collapsed.
Far-right parties are on the rise in nearly every country in Europe; it’s more likely to be the difference in electoral systems (FPTP vs proportional representation, and Primaries as a way to select candidates in the US) that makes a difference here.
No it doesn’t. The Nazis were a product of their place and time, just as Trump is of his. When we study the second world war, we can recognise various factors that led to the rise of the Nazis (and of the Fascists in Italy), and we can similarly see such factors today.
Whether legal censorship and suppression of the sort done in Europe works, we don’t really know. If repression is brutal enough then it can be effective for the duration: see Soviet Russia. But hopefully we never reach that stage.
While it’s great that our friends in the colonies are so concerned for our well-being, you might like to ponder that no one in Europe thinks a lack of free speech here is in the list of our twenty most pressing political problems. Of course, there are a small number of far-right grifters who are quick to express on the internet their deep concerns about possible problems, but since they are actively striving to make fascism great again, decent people are not encouraging them. Thank you for your attention in this matter.
(Aside: I think the posters here identify as left of centre in American terms. When Europeans say that the European far-right is equivalent to the American left, this is the sort of discussion we are thinking about.)
(Second aside: and to the extent we ever think about free speech issues, literally none of us looks to the American model as anything more than a stark warning about how badly wrong you can go. Really.)
Do you watch the news? The Reform party in the UK and the Afd in Germany seemed poised to seize power in the next election cycle or so.
The current UK government is the most pale pink middle of the road, centrist, very very small S “socialists”. And they used these laws to make it illegal to say nice things about Palestine Action, who almost no one would consider terrorists. What do you think Farage or whichever facsist Musk hand picks to replace him, will do with that law when he becomes PM?