5 ms·

Scaring me is getting to prison for expressing my opinion on a social platform.

by p4trik 2y ago

n4r9 2y ago
For context, there's a right-wing narrative in the UK that "thousands of people have been arrested just for posting their opinion on social media". The reality is that the UK's "Communications Act" [0] does allow prosecutions for electronic communications (email, forums, and social media). The number of arrests under this Act are in the thousands, but it covers a wide range of issues like grooming, stalking, and racially aggravated hate crimes. Earlier this year there were a number of violent & destructive riots across the UK which happened in response to a stabbing of 3 kids in Southport [1]. The riots were whipped up by a number of far-right entities on social media - personalities such as Stephen Yaxley-Lennon, Andrew Tate, and Katie Hopkins - as well as more nebulous entities such as Europe Invasion. A crucial aspect of the far-right narrative was a false claim that the perpetrator was a Muslim asylum seeker. Arrests were made for directly inciting violence [2] as well as for generating misinformation about the perpetrator [3]. The discussion around this is in the sensitive area of free speech vs hate speech. In the UK we are a little more nuanced about the absolute requirement for freedom of speech. While I do appreciate the argument that policing of speech can become dangerous depending on who does the policing, I think the case of the riots is a good example of where we may need to evolve our ideas about what it means to incite violence. This episode demonstrates social media's potency and the horrific potential of the deliberate spreading of misinformation. [0] https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2003/21/section/127 https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2003/21/section/127 [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2024_United_Kingdom_riots https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2024_United_Kingdom_riots [2] https://www.theguardian.com/politics/article/2024/aug/09/two-men-jailed-for-social-media-posts-that-stirred-up-far-right-violence https://www.theguardian.com/politics/article/2024/aug/09/two... [3] https://metro.co.uk/2024/08/08/woman-first-shared-fake-southport-suspect-rumour-sparked-riots-arrested-21389346/ https://metro.co.uk/2024/08/08/woman-first-shared-fake-south...
- carlosjobim 2y ago
  [flagged]
  - jsheard 2y ago
    The stabber was British-born of legal Rwandan immigrants, and from a devout Christian family. The incitement was the completely fabricated narrative that the stabber was an immigrant, which he isn't unless you count him being second generation, and/or a Muslim, which he isn't in any sense, hence the protests being mostly directed at immigrants and Muslims rather than anything actually relevant to the stabbings.
  - n4r9 2y ago
    The relevant information is that they are neither muslim nor a migrant, two false claims that formed the basis for the riots.
- mdp2021 2y ago
  I just stumbled for an article on the Spectator (looking for something else), posted nearby, and I read: > After the recent riots, people were given prison sentences for posting words and images on social media. In some cases, the illegal incitement to violence was obvious [... But] Lee Dunn, fifty-one, on the other hand, got eight weeks for sharing three images of Asian-looking men with captions such as “Coming to a town near you”
  - n4r9 2y ago
    In my view The Spectator is being disingenuous (which makes sense as one of the most right-wing mainstream publications in the UK). They omit to describe the content of the images, which showed Asian men entering Britain by boat and wielding knives in Westminster. This fuels the narrative of Asian/muslim asylum seekers being a violent threat to British society. In the context of an ongoing frenzy being whipped up based on false claims about asylum seekers, I think this did verge into the realm of racist hate speech. Note that Lee Dunn pled guilty to the charges.
    - switch007 2y ago
      > Note that Lee Dunn pled guilty to the charges. This did not strengthen your comment. You know many innocent people plead guilty all the time. > This fuels the narrative of Asian/muslim asylum seekers being a violent threat to British society Narrative? That almost seems to imply it is wholly false [0] "Moroccan asylum seeker Ahmed Alid, 45, roamed the streets in Hartlepool looking for a victim to attack in "revenge" for the Israel-Hamas conflict in October" [0] (You need not point out that the overwhelming of terrorist incidents are by British-born people. I am addressing what you meant to imply by "narrative") [0] https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/crgyggw4z05o https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/crgyggw4z05o
      - n4r9 2y ago
        By "narrative" I mean the idea that the typical muslim asylum seeker would be a threat to anyone in the UK.
- gadders 2y ago
  For those not in the UK, the parent comment is the middle-class left wing perspective. It is worth noting that the leader of a left wing organisation, "Hope Not Hate" also spread an unfounded rumour on X that a fascist protestor had thrown acid on a muslim woman. This attempt to stir up counter protests was not prosecuted. There are many examples of two tier policing and prosecution like this in the UK.
  - n4r9 2y ago
    > the parent comment is the middle-class left wing perspective Won't deny it, but note that I thoroughly cited my post. > It is worth noting that the leader of a left wing organisation, "Hope Not Hate" also spread an unfounded rumour on X that a fascist protestor had thrown acid on a muslim woman. Won't deny this. Hard to argue that such a post stirs up racial hatred. > two tier policing This is laughable. The rioters threw petrol bombs at mosques, set fire to hotels and cars, attacked and injured police personnel, looted shops, and beat up bystanders. Counter-protests were generally peaceful with the exception of a couple of isolated incidents (which I hope are brought to justice).
    - gadders 2y ago
      I mean two tier policing of the anti-immigration protestors vs the rioters two weeks or so earlier in Leeds, sparked by children of (I believe) Romanian travellers being taken into care. You could also look at other examples - protestors against Israel's actions in Gaza doing nazi salutes, for instance, or singing anti-semitic songs. The other canonnical example is during lockdown, the treatment given to women protesting the murder of Sarah Everard vs BLM protestors.
      - n4r9 2y ago
        > the rioters two weeks or so earlier in Leeds So in a riot of vastly smaller scale, there 27 arrests and 4 charged. > protestors against Israel's actions in Gaza doing nazi salutes, for instance In a protest that was overwhelmingly peaceful, there were 4 arrests, including of someone who did a nazi salute: https://www.mylondon.news/news/three-arrested-after-nazi-salute-29672215 https://www.mylondon.news/news/three-arrested-after-nazi-sal... . And if we compare it to the delightful things we're seeing in far-right protests: - https://x.com/AntiRacismDay/status/1819790189369143691 https://x.com/AntiRacismDay/status/1819790189369143691 - https://x.com/StanCollymore/status/1819451687566004237 https://x.com/StanCollymore/status/1819451687566004237 The responses look proportionate to the behaviour.
- okeuro49 2y ago
  Stephen Yaxley-Lennon repeatedly called for calm, and explicitly condemned the violence. The lies around this issue are really noticeable now. I used to believe that Yaxley-Lennon -- "Tommy Robinson" -- was a bigot, until I watched his Oxford union speech: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_YQ94jFg_4A https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_YQ94jFg_4A All violence should be condemned and prosecuted. However when looking for the causes, what happened regarding the riots wasn't "whipped up" by online agitators. It was the result of failure of government policy. Successive governments have lost control of the border, and there have been insane policies, such as putting a hotel of unvetted migrant men into a hotel in Rotherham, where immigration notoriously resulted in mass rape by grooming gangs. The authorities turned a blind eye to grooming gangs, worried about being accused of racism. [1] "The report found: "Several staff described their nervousness about identifying the ethnic origins of perpetrators for fear of being thought as racist; others remembered clear direction from their managers not to do so". Furthermore, the rioting occurred after the government suggested that rioting works. In Harehills, Leeds, government social workers returned children after riots. [2] [1] https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-south-yorkshire-28939089 https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-south-yorkshire-289390... [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2024_Harehills_riot https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2024_Harehills_riot
  - n4r9 2y ago
    Yaxley-Lennon made several tweets spreading misinformation, inflaming racial tensions, legitimising ongoing violence, and undermining trust in the establishment. For example: - Spreading false claims that a stabbing in Stirling was carried out by a muslim - Spreading false claims that a far-right protester in Stoke was stabbed by muslims - Spreading the false rumour that the Southport attacker was muslim - Claiming that the police were lying about the Southport attacker's identity - Calling the Southport riots "justified" - Describing Islam as a "mental health issue" He's spent years crafting a narrative in which the once-glorious UK is being overrun by dirty foreigners who are changing its way of life and raping and pillaging its people. It's the quintessential archetype of far-right propaganda, so analogous to the kind of things Hitler said in the 1920s that I have to pinch myself. My belief is that he enjoys the idea of having an army of followers hanging off every word. I've skipped through the Oxford union address. It looks like the same tired story he peddles about how he saw some bad things growing up in Luton while the al-Muhajiroun were active. I will concede that he is a good speaker, he caters to his audience, and is mostly smart about sticking to dogwhistles and cherry-picked datapoints, stopping short of directly inciting violence.
sofixa 2y ago
Unless your opinion is that XYZ group of immutable characteristics is subhuman/has to be expelled/deserves less rights/has to be killed , you're safe.
- carlosjobim 2y ago
  I take it that you cannot be pro abortion in the UK, then? "Oh, but they are not human that can have any rights. Of course they can be killed and expelled."
  - n4r9 2y ago
    You're comparing people saying "All people of a certain ethnicity should be removed" vs people saying "Women have a right to decide whether to abort a pregnancy".
    - carlosjobim 2y ago
      Which is worse: Being expelled from a foreign country or being killed because as a fetus you are considered subhuman? Historically newborns in Europe have also been considered subhuman, without any rights, and subject to the practice of "exposure" if the parents pleased. Just as easily as upstanding citizens today consider the unborn to be subhuman, just as easy has it been in the past (and in the future) for upstanding citizens to consider certain groups of people as subhuman. It only depends on what the rulers consider convenient at the moment, and 90% of the population are ready to adopt any opinion at the drop of a hat if instructed so by their rulers. Especially intelligent people, who can take pleasure in mental games to justify following orders.
      - n4r9 2y ago
        I wouldn't say that a foetus is subhuman. I just think that a human's right to life does not extend to the right to use another's body for 9 months. Which is another reason why this doesn't compare to immigration.
mdp2021 2y ago
Coincidentally, I just met this article from the Spectator: # Free speech is dying in Britain - https://thespectator.com/topic/free-speech-died-britain/ https://thespectator.com/topic/free-speech-died-britain/ Everything should be verified, but the article mentions cases that can be of concern.
- gadders 2y ago
  See also: https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/britain-isnt-a-free-country/ https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/britain-isnt-a-free-coun...

Scaring me is getting to prison for expressing my opinion on a social platform.

by p4trik 2y ago

Scaring me is getting to prison for expressing my opinion on a social platform.

n4r9 2y ago

For context, there's a right-wing narrative in the UK that "thousands of people have been arrested just for posting their opinion on social media". The reality is that the UK's "Communications Act" [0] does allow prosecutions for electronic communications (email, forums, and social media). The number of arrests under this Act are in the thousands, but it covers a wide range of issues like grooming, stalking, and racially aggravated hate crimes. Earlier this year there were a number of violent & destructive riots across the UK which happened in response to a stabbing of 3 kids in Southport [1]. The riots were whipped up by a number of far-right entities on social media - personalities such as Stephen Yaxley-Lennon, Andrew Tate, and Katie Hopkins - as well as more nebulous entities such as Europe Invasion. A crucial aspect of the far-right narrative was a false claim that the perpetrator was a Muslim asylum seeker. Arrests were made for directly inciting violence [2] as well as for generating misinformation about the perpetrator [3]. The discussion around this is in the sensitive area of free speech vs hate speech. In the UK we are a little more nuanced about the absolute requirement for freedom of speech. While I do appreciate the argument that policing of speech can become dangerous depending on who does the policing, I think the case of the riots is a good example of where we may need to evolve our ideas about what it means to incite violence. This episode demonstrates social media's potency and the horrific potential of the deliberate spreading of misinformation. [0] https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2003/21/section/127 https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2003/21/section/127 [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2024_United_Kingdom_riots https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2024_United_Kingdom_riots [2] https://www.theguardian.com/politics/article/2024/aug/09/two-men-jailed-for-social-media-posts-that-stirred-up-far-right-violence https://www.theguardian.com/politics/article/2024/aug/09/two... [3] https://metro.co.uk/2024/08/08/woman-first-shared-fake-southport-suspect-rumour-sparked-riots-arrested-21389346/ https://metro.co.uk/2024/08/08/woman-first-shared-fake-south...

carlosjobim 2y ago
[flagged]
- jsheard 2y ago
  The stabber was British-born of legal Rwandan immigrants, and from a devout Christian family. The incitement was the completely fabricated narrative that the stabber was an immigrant, which he isn't unless you count him being second generation, and/or a Muslim, which he isn't in any sense, hence the protests being mostly directed at immigrants and Muslims rather than anything actually relevant to the stabbings.
- n4r9 2y ago
  The relevant information is that they are neither muslim nor a migrant, two false claims that formed the basis for the riots.
mdp2021 2y ago
I just stumbled for an article on the Spectator (looking for something else), posted nearby, and I read: > After the recent riots, people were given prison sentences for posting words and images on social media. In some cases, the illegal incitement to violence was obvious [... But] Lee Dunn, fifty-one, on the other hand, got eight weeks for sharing three images of Asian-looking men with captions such as “Coming to a town near you”
- n4r9 2y ago
  In my view The Spectator is being disingenuous (which makes sense as one of the most right-wing mainstream publications in the UK). They omit to describe the content of the images, which showed Asian men entering Britain by boat and wielding knives in Westminster. This fuels the narrative of Asian/muslim asylum seekers being a violent threat to British society. In the context of an ongoing frenzy being whipped up based on false claims about asylum seekers, I think this did verge into the realm of racist hate speech. Note that Lee Dunn pled guilty to the charges.
  - switch007 2y ago
    > Note that Lee Dunn pled guilty to the charges. This did not strengthen your comment. You know many innocent people plead guilty all the time. > This fuels the narrative of Asian/muslim asylum seekers being a violent threat to British society Narrative? That almost seems to imply it is wholly false [0] "Moroccan asylum seeker Ahmed Alid, 45, roamed the streets in Hartlepool looking for a victim to attack in "revenge" for the Israel-Hamas conflict in October" [0] (You need not point out that the overwhelming of terrorist incidents are by British-born people. I am addressing what you meant to imply by "narrative") [0] https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/crgyggw4z05o https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/crgyggw4z05o
    - n4r9 2y ago
      By "narrative" I mean the idea that the typical muslim asylum seeker would be a threat to anyone in the UK.
gadders 2y ago
For those not in the UK, the parent comment is the middle-class left wing perspective. It is worth noting that the leader of a left wing organisation, "Hope Not Hate" also spread an unfounded rumour on X that a fascist protestor had thrown acid on a muslim woman. This attempt to stir up counter protests was not prosecuted. There are many examples of two tier policing and prosecution like this in the UK.
- n4r9 2y ago
  > the parent comment is the middle-class left wing perspective Won't deny it, but note that I thoroughly cited my post. > It is worth noting that the leader of a left wing organisation, "Hope Not Hate" also spread an unfounded rumour on X that a fascist protestor had thrown acid on a muslim woman. Won't deny this. Hard to argue that such a post stirs up racial hatred. > two tier policing This is laughable. The rioters threw petrol bombs at mosques, set fire to hotels and cars, attacked and injured police personnel, looted shops, and beat up bystanders. Counter-protests were generally peaceful with the exception of a couple of isolated incidents (which I hope are brought to justice).
  - gadders 2y ago
    I mean two tier policing of the anti-immigration protestors vs the rioters two weeks or so earlier in Leeds, sparked by children of (I believe) Romanian travellers being taken into care. You could also look at other examples - protestors against Israel's actions in Gaza doing nazi salutes, for instance, or singing anti-semitic songs. The other canonnical example is during lockdown, the treatment given to women protesting the murder of Sarah Everard vs BLM protestors.
    - n4r9 2y ago
      > the rioters two weeks or so earlier in Leeds So in a riot of vastly smaller scale, there 27 arrests and 4 charged. > protestors against Israel's actions in Gaza doing nazi salutes, for instance In a protest that was overwhelmingly peaceful, there were 4 arrests, including of someone who did a nazi salute: https://www.mylondon.news/news/three-arrested-after-nazi-salute-29672215 https://www.mylondon.news/news/three-arrested-after-nazi-sal... . And if we compare it to the delightful things we're seeing in far-right protests: - https://x.com/AntiRacismDay/status/1819790189369143691 https://x.com/AntiRacismDay/status/1819790189369143691 - https://x.com/StanCollymore/status/1819451687566004237 https://x.com/StanCollymore/status/1819451687566004237 The responses look proportionate to the behaviour.
okeuro49 2y ago
Stephen Yaxley-Lennon repeatedly called for calm, and explicitly condemned the violence. The lies around this issue are really noticeable now. I used to believe that Yaxley-Lennon -- "Tommy Robinson" -- was a bigot, until I watched his Oxford union speech: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_YQ94jFg_4A https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_YQ94jFg_4A All violence should be condemned and prosecuted. However when looking for the causes, what happened regarding the riots wasn't "whipped up" by online agitators. It was the result of failure of government policy. Successive governments have lost control of the border, and there have been insane policies, such as putting a hotel of unvetted migrant men into a hotel in Rotherham, where immigration notoriously resulted in mass rape by grooming gangs. The authorities turned a blind eye to grooming gangs, worried about being accused of racism. [1] "The report found: "Several staff described their nervousness about identifying the ethnic origins of perpetrators for fear of being thought as racist; others remembered clear direction from their managers not to do so". Furthermore, the rioting occurred after the government suggested that rioting works. In Harehills, Leeds, government social workers returned children after riots. [2] [1] https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-south-yorkshire-28939089 https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-south-yorkshire-289390... [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2024_Harehills_riot https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2024_Harehills_riot
- n4r9 2y ago
  Yaxley-Lennon made several tweets spreading misinformation, inflaming racial tensions, legitimising ongoing violence, and undermining trust in the establishment. For example: - Spreading false claims that a stabbing in Stirling was carried out by a muslim - Spreading false claims that a far-right protester in Stoke was stabbed by muslims - Spreading the false rumour that the Southport attacker was muslim - Claiming that the police were lying about the Southport attacker's identity - Calling the Southport riots "justified" - Describing Islam as a "mental health issue" He's spent years crafting a narrative in which the once-glorious UK is being overrun by dirty foreigners who are changing its way of life and raping and pillaging its people. It's the quintessential archetype of far-right propaganda, so analogous to the kind of things Hitler said in the 1920s that I have to pinch myself. My belief is that he enjoys the idea of having an army of followers hanging off every word. I've skipped through the Oxford union address. It looks like the same tired story he peddles about how he saw some bad things growing up in Luton while the al-Muhajiroun were active. I will concede that he is a good speaker, he caters to his audience, and is mostly smart about sticking to dogwhistles and cherry-picked datapoints, stopping short of directly inciting violence.

sofixa 2y ago

Unless your opinion is that XYZ group of immutable characteristics is subhuman/has to be expelled/deserves less rights/has to be killed , you're safe.

carlosjobim 2y ago
I take it that you cannot be pro abortion in the UK, then? "Oh, but they are not human that can have any rights. Of course they can be killed and expelled."
- n4r9 2y ago
  You're comparing people saying "All people of a certain ethnicity should be removed" vs people saying "Women have a right to decide whether to abort a pregnancy".
  - carlosjobim 2y ago
    Which is worse: Being expelled from a foreign country or being killed because as a fetus you are considered subhuman? Historically newborns in Europe have also been considered subhuman, without any rights, and subject to the practice of "exposure" if the parents pleased. Just as easily as upstanding citizens today consider the unborn to be subhuman, just as easy has it been in the past (and in the future) for upstanding citizens to consider certain groups of people as subhuman. It only depends on what the rulers consider convenient at the moment, and 90% of the population are ready to adopt any opinion at the drop of a hat if instructed so by their rulers. Especially intelligent people, who can take pleasure in mental games to justify following orders.
    - n4r9 2y ago
      I wouldn't say that a foetus is subhuman. I just think that a human's right to life does not extend to the right to use another's body for 9 months. Which is another reason why this doesn't compare to immigration.

mdp2021 2y ago

Coincidentally, I just met this article from the Spectator: # Free speech is dying in Britain - https://thespectator.com/topic/free-speech-died-britain/ https://thespectator.com/topic/free-speech-died-britain/ Everything should be verified, but the article mentions cases that can be of concern.

gadders 2y ago
See also: https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/britain-isnt-a-free-country/ https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/britain-isnt-a-free-coun...