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Okay, you are clearly missing the context of what we’re discussing in this thread. Here’s a primer: - The UK has experienced racial riots over the past few we

Okay, you are clearly missing the context of what we’re discussing in this thread. Here’s a primer: - The UK has experienced racial riots over the past few weeks. - There was a mass murder in the last weeks. - During these racial riots, someone "identified" an immigrant as the attacker, which turned out to be misinformation and incited a manhunt. - This individual was apprehended. - 4chan went full "fr33d0m" and launched a DDoS attack against the police website. - In response, the UK police blocked international IPs to mitigate this attack. The law is clear-cut: it defines illegal hate speech as public incitement to violence or hatred directed against a group of persons or a member of such a group, defined by reference to race, color, religion, descent, or national or ethnic origin. This is the situation we’re discussing. Your stance may be that you believe the woman had the right to lie and incite violence, but that still violates the specific law we're addressing, and my initial comment was directed at this particular issue, this law. You might not agree with the law and may argue that saying "Kill all illegal immigrants." or "Kill this specific immigrant." is acceptable online or even offline. While Elon might be on board with that perspective, I’m glad the governing bodies of the UK and EU are not. It's the libertè thing again...

23B1 2y ago
The "clear cut" of the law you cited is anything but. The definition of hatred, for example, is not only insufficient for a just law, but can be – and is – reasonably stretched to encompass anything the current regime doesn't like.
- BoredPositron 2y ago
  That's why there is a division of powers but I am not gonna try to explain that to a person who tries to haggle about the meaning of words while calling a freshly elected democratic government a regime. That would just be silly. lmao
  - 23B1 2y ago
    A freshly elected democratic government can still be called a regime. Very normal use of the word.
    - BoredPositron 2y ago
      Sure thing it's just weird asf.
_heimdall 2y ago
> The law is clear-cut: it defines illegal hate speech as public incitement to violence or hatred directed against a group of persons or a member of such a group, defined by reference to race, color, religion, descent, or national or ethnic origin. The law isn't clear though. The Verge had a write up [1] on Section 127 a couple years ago that does a good job of pointing out where that specific law is vague. Other hate speech laws in the UK have similar issues. The law is clear in defining what power it is granting to authorities and what classifications can be used to deem speech illegal. It is very unclear on how it will be decided that speech has crossed that line. Functionally what this means is that judges are given the sole authority to decide when speech crosses the line and citizens have no way of knowing what that determination will be. [1] https://www.theverge.com/2022/2/7/22912054/uk-grossly-offensive-tweet-prosecution-section-127-2003-communications-act https://www.theverge.com/2022/2/7/22912054/uk-grossly-offens...
- BoredPositron 2y ago
  And if we had a time machine and went back to 2022 I would agree with you. Section 127 got repealed in 2023 and got updated with a more comprehensive version see [1] and you know what they will probably define it even more if there are other ambiguities. Like it should be and like I said before. I am seriously questioning your intentions now, it's clearly not in good faith anymore. [1] https://www.brettwilson.co.uk/blog/the-online-safety-act-2023-nine-new-criminal-offences-come-into-force/ https://www.brettwilson.co.uk/blog/the-online-safety-act-202...
  - _heimdall 2y ago
    I missed that the UK extended that law, thanks for the link. I still see a lot of fray area there left up to a judge's interpretation after the fact. > 1. send a message; > 2. conveying information that they know to be false; > 3. at the time of sending it they intend the message to cause non-trivial psychological or physical harm to a likely audience (i.e. someone who is likely to read it, whether originally or after someone has shared it); and > 4. they have no reasonable excuse for sending the message (1) seems totally fine, no gray area there. The last three points are all only known by the person being charged with the crime. It is extremely difficult to prove intent , or what the person knew at the moment of sending a message. Short of the person confessing, prosecutors would be left with having to find evidence that proves beyond a reasonable doubt what the person knew at the time and the intent behind a message. My argument there is that realistically this will lead to either no convictions or convictions based on circumstantial evidence and a judge's opinion of what the person knew and intended. The qualifications listed for threats have similar gray area, I won't copy them here for brevity. To the citizen, this means anything they say related to a topic protected by these laws may be legal or illegal, they will never know unless a judge is asked to decide. Two reasonable judges could interpret a person's message and intent differently, meaning that the law is too unclear to be enforced fairly on the public.

23B1 2y ago

The "clear cut" of the law you cited is anything but. The definition of hatred, for example, is not only insufficient for a just law, but can be – and is – reasonably stretched to encompass anything the current regime doesn't like.

BoredPositron 2y ago
That's why there is a division of powers but I am not gonna try to explain that to a person who tries to haggle about the meaning of words while calling a freshly elected democratic government a regime. That would just be silly. lmao
- 23B1 2y ago
  A freshly elected democratic government can still be called a regime. Very normal use of the word.
  - BoredPositron 2y ago
    Sure thing it's just weird asf.

_heimdall 2y ago

> The law is clear-cut: it defines illegal hate speech as public incitement to violence or hatred directed against a group of persons or a member of such a group, defined by reference to race, color, religion, descent, or national or ethnic origin. The law isn't clear though. The Verge had a write up [1] on Section 127 a couple years ago that does a good job of pointing out where that specific law is vague. Other hate speech laws in the UK have similar issues. The law is clear in defining what power it is granting to authorities and what classifications can be used to deem speech illegal. It is very unclear on how it will be decided that speech has crossed that line. Functionally what this means is that judges are given the sole authority to decide when speech crosses the line and citizens have no way of knowing what that determination will be. [1] https://www.theverge.com/2022/2/7/22912054/uk-grossly-offensive-tweet-prosecution-section-127-2003-communications-act https://www.theverge.com/2022/2/7/22912054/uk-grossly-offens...

BoredPositron 2y ago
And if we had a time machine and went back to 2022 I would agree with you. Section 127 got repealed in 2023 and got updated with a more comprehensive version see [1] and you know what they will probably define it even more if there are other ambiguities. Like it should be and like I said before. I am seriously questioning your intentions now, it's clearly not in good faith anymore. [1] https://www.brettwilson.co.uk/blog/the-online-safety-act-2023-nine-new-criminal-offences-come-into-force/ https://www.brettwilson.co.uk/blog/the-online-safety-act-202...
- _heimdall 2y ago
  I missed that the UK extended that law, thanks for the link. I still see a lot of fray area there left up to a judge's interpretation after the fact. > 1. send a message; > 2. conveying information that they know to be false; > 3. at the time of sending it they intend the message to cause non-trivial psychological or physical harm to a likely audience (i.e. someone who is likely to read it, whether originally or after someone has shared it); and > 4. they have no reasonable excuse for sending the message (1) seems totally fine, no gray area there. The last three points are all only known by the person being charged with the crime. It is extremely difficult to prove intent , or what the person knew at the moment of sending a message. Short of the person confessing, prosecutors would be left with having to find evidence that proves beyond a reasonable doubt what the person knew at the time and the intent behind a message. My argument there is that realistically this will lead to either no convictions or convictions based on circumstantial evidence and a judge's opinion of what the person knew and intended. The qualifications listed for threats have similar gray area, I won't copy them here for brevity. To the citizen, this means anything they say related to a topic protected by these laws may be legal or illegal, they will never know unless a judge is asked to decide. Two reasonable judges could interpret a person's message and intent differently, meaning that the law is too unclear to be enforced fairly on the public.