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The charge seems ok to me, and he was not charged with hate speech. At the end of the day, 12 ordinary people came to the same conclusion, and so he is guilty.
by orf 9y ago
The charge seems ok to me, and he was not charged with hate speech.
At the end of the day, 12 ordinary people came to the same conclusion, and so he is guilty. It's hardly the "big evil government cracking down on this nice man's (non existent) right to be racist".
Perhaps in a one on one situation it wouldn't be a crime, but doing infront of a thousand people is clearly very bad and distressing. Perhaps it's down to poor judgement, but that's not an excuse.
- nailer 9y agoIsn't racism judging someone's character by the colour of their skin? The joke is poor, but pointing out that pale skinned people are pale or dark skinned people are dark doesn't seem to be making any judgement on their character.
- Joeboy 9y ago> 12 ordinary people came to the same conclusion I'm also not in any way outraged by the outcome, but actually this was heard in a magistrates' court so there would be no jury involved. > big evil government Nah, it's kind of down to the whims of the individual judge. The wording of the statutes is pretty broad and vague, and in practice I think you inevitably have to rely on the individuals who comprise the legal system to not be terrible. Right now I'd say that if people want to be outraged about the UK's legal system, they'd do better to direct their ire towards cuts in legal aid rather than "hate speech" laws (which have always existed in some form).
- orf 9y agoOh right, my bad, it was indeed a magistrates court. That's not great I agree, and lends a bit too much to an individual's opinion.