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Free Speech vs. Authoritarianism in Britain
To set the record straight from the onset, Great Britain is a nation that, unlike its offshoot, upstart former American colonies, does not allow freedom of speech to the extent that America does. Speech in Britain is often curtailed and suppressed for fear that certain speech could disturb the peace, incite riots, or more generally hurt the feelings of certain ethnic, racial, or gender groups.
Note that in America, inciting riots can also run afoul of the law but typically riots have to occur in order for the law to be invoked. A blathering idiot who stands at a podium or on a plastic milk crate in the public square and calls for passersby or sympathetic followers to march down main streets and vent their rage by hurling bricks through storefront windows is not likely to get arrested if his or her listeners ignore the obsessed orator’s appeals and remain passive. Such is the tolerance for rabid and radical speech in these here United States.
Likewise, an individual, nicely attired, holding a cell phone and calmly live-streaming his comments as he or she strolls near a courthouse about what’s happening within is typically paid no mind by passersby or the authorities, since he or she doesn’t appear to pose a threat to the nearby court or the immediate community … in America.
Not so in Britain. British authorities can instantly identify this sort of behavior as threatening to civil order and possible incitements to riot. And the mild-mannered commentator can be hauled off to prison because in not-so-transparent Britain it’s against the law to comment on certain court proceedings; which from an American perspective seems a tad totalitarian.
Tommy Robinson (née Stephen Yaxley-Lennon), the commentator who was recently tossed into prison, is a political, one might say cultural activist in England, who has historically run afoul of the law in Britain. He’s often characterized as a member of the alt-right, ultra-nationalist, anti-immigrant racist fringe of British society in mainstream British media outlets. I’ll leave it to you to explore the background of Mr. Robinson and decide for yourself how reprehensible, dangerous, or vile he is.
For Tommy Robinson’s recent and seemingly mild-mannered live-streaming (see the video), he’s been sent to prison for 13 months and may face physical assault or death at the hands of incarcerated Muslim inmates. The court case and the verdict rendered that he was commenting on dealt with 26 Muslim men and two Muslim women who were accused of rape, trafficking, sexual activity with a child, child neglect, child abduction, supplying drugs, and making of indecent images of children. This isn’t the first time that a scandal of child sex rings perpetrated by Muslim immigrants has erupted in Britain. Remember Rotherham … or perhaps I should say, never forget Rotherham.
Robinson’s supporters aren’t exactly happy about his arrest. Here’s a protest near Whitehall posted on YouTube yesterday. Perhaps Ricochet members in Great Britain can weigh in on whether this video is available in YouTube in the UK.
If you feel that my use of the term “totalitarian” earlier was a bit extreme, then consider this: judges in Great Britain actually have the power to incarcerate anyone for speaking about or publicly reporting on certain court cases but even speaking about the arrest and incarceration of said mild-mannered offender. At the moment there is reporting that press outlets are under a gag order not to discuss the arrest of Robinson. As of this writing, there is no mention of Robinson’s arrest on SkyNews’ website. The BBC website is reporting that Robinson is banned from Twitter but makes no reference to the current “child grooming” (such a polite euphemism for child rape) court case or the growing protests supporting Robinson near No. 10 Downing Street that occurred yesterday. The Telegraph and The Guardian also make no mention of Robinson’s arrest or the protest of the arrest on their sites. So, if there’s not an explicit gag order in place, these brave media outlets may be self-gagging themselves.
From the judge’s perspective, the Robinson arrest was not about free speech:
“This is not about free speech, not about the freedom of the press, nor about legitimate journalism, and not about political correctness,” the judge told Robinson at the time.
“It is about justice and ensuring that a trial can be carried out justly and fairly, it’s about being innocent until proven guilty.”
“It is about preserving the integrity of the jury to continue without people being intimidated or being affected by irresponsible and inaccurate ‘reporting’, if that’s what it was.”
Please note that on the one hand, the judge claims that Robinson’s arrest was not about legitimate journalism and then later states that the jury shouldn’t be intimidated by irresponsible and inaccurate reporting, “if that’s what it was.” So, which is it? Was Robinson in direct contact with the jurors? It doesn’t seem so. I haven’t seen reporting that he was. Was he inaccurate or irresponsible in his reporting on the case? Regrettably, we don’t have the entire Robinson video to see what was said on the live-stream prior to his arrest, but if it was similar to the Metro article cited above which describes what each of the defendants is accused of, then perhaps the writer of the Metro article should be imprisoned for 13 months as well.
Whether protests of Robinson’s arrest grow and shake up or eventually cause British politicians to reflect on the current law and the limitations of speech remains to be seen. It’s clear that juries shouldn’t be unduly influenced by the sentiments of the public at large in considering the guilt or innocence of the accused. That’s why juries are occasionally sequestered to shield them from public or media firestorms surrounding a given case … and cases involving rampant rape of children have a tendency to do that. It’s clear that those accused of crimes have the opportunity for a fair trial and equal treatment under the law. That would include the Muslim defendants accused of these multiple cases of child rape as well as Mr. Robinson who it appears was reporting on the alleged rapists.
In his memoirs, Kaiser Wilhelm II expressed admiration for Britain’s restrictions on speech and the press, and wished he’d had something as stringent in Imperial Germany.
From six years ago:
Technically, according to UK law, “breaching the peace” has nothing to do with the content of one’s words. If you’re outside a court with a camera and a microphone and the police decide you’re “making a ruckus”, they can arrest you.
The only place you’re allowed to speak in public is at a Speaker’s Corner, like the one in Hyde Park. However, even at a Speaker’s Corner you aren’t allowed to say anything illegal (e.g. uttering threats, or hate speech, etc.).
To sum up: At a Speaker’s Corner you can get arrested for saying the wrong thing. Outside of a Speaker’s Corner you can get arrested for saying anything.
Yes, it’s gives UK police way too much power to stifle speech, but that’s how their law works. It’s how their law has always worked. This is nothing new.
Bullseye.
It didn’t appear that Robinson was making a ruckus. He didn’t appear to be disrupting passersby, or the court proceedings, or generally being a nuisance. He wasn’t using a bullhorn or a megaphone and didn’t appear to have a crowd around him. He didn’t appear to be taking photos or video of anyone entering or exiting the court. He appeared to be speaking in a calm and measured way into his cell phone and live streaming his comments. The only disturbance that seemed to occur was when police moved in to arrest him for calmly speaking into his phone.
Since, from the outset I made a clear distinction between freedom of speech in America versus tolerated speech in Britain, I’m not specifically taking issue with current British law other than to point out its authoritarian nature and its potential for abuse by politicians, judges, and the police as the Rowan Atkinson video indicates.
It seems to me that the 13-month incarceration is quite excessive given the presumed infraction and if, sometime during those 13 months in prison, Robinson is brutally assaulted or murdered then the resulting public backlash and uproar could be intense…to put it mildly. Let’s hope that scenario doesn’t play out.
Additional video on the Whitehall Protest:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1q91kzzwdSc
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4CX8UKrdQI8
This, from Breitbart:
Hey, Washington Post. Tell me again how democracy dies?
Gatestone Institute, who do a good job imho of keeping an eye on the shenanigans of the muslims and their sycophants has a good piece here. The abstract:
James Delingpole had a fantastic podcast interview with Tommy a year or so ago – check out the Delingpole Podcast (#58) to listen.
I find this really scary. I think we have a lot of younger people in the USA that would not object too strenuously to similar laws here.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vzKU_xjLzE4
Rallies in support of Tommie Robinson are now scheduled in Sydney, Melbourne and Adelaide, Australia. This story may be gaining steam.
The political myth of the Magna Carta is that it protected the rights of the common man. It really protected the rights of the nobility in their dealings with the king. The US Constitution, and especially the Bill of Rights was the perfected version of what the Magna Carta should have been.
There is a distinct stratified class system even to this day in Great Britain. It is determined by the family you were born into. Where you are educated, the local accent you speak with, and the religion you practice. You do not question your betters. The fact that the British courts, and the police are representatives of the monarch means any criticism may be considered a form of sedition against the authority of the monarch, even in this day. One does not question the representatives of Her Majesty, especially those individuals in the lower classes.
Brian, Michael Black is new to me. Do you know anything about him?
Actually not much…but he sounded sober and intelligent and has apparently posted numerous videos on YouTube. It’s been difficult finding a bio on him. His YouTube channel states he is a former intel officer.
I believe the 13 month sentence was actually the imposition of a suspended sentence from a previous crime. Whatever he was doing here must have been a violation of a court order, which resulted in the suspension being lifted. A probation violation, basically. That kind of thing happens here, too. Due process for probation violations is not as extensive.
Brian,
The case:
https://youtu.be/gofvIQ6f4tE
If the government is stupid enough to let Tommy Robinson be murdered by the ‘animals’ in that jail it will not be forgotten for a very long time.
Regards,
Jim
These are the sorts of things I was thinking of when reading recently about knife laws in the UK and various commonwealth nations. They all talk about a person needing to have a “good reason” for various articles. The very idea that a figure should ask a free citizen to justify themselves should send anyone into a rage. The only proper response would be “I’m a free person, not a COCVing slave you COCVing COCV! I don’t have to justify myself to you, or any-COCVing-one else!” Followed possibly by some unflattering accusations about the authority figures parentage.
This is also what turned me a against Obama in the 2008 election. The comment “We will allow you to keep your doctor,” showed that he had a very skewed idea of the President’s place in our society. My response was “Ex-COCVing-cuse me?!? How dare you think that it is the President’s place to allow us to do anything? We’re electing a COCVing President, not a COCVing dictator!”
Hopefully this story is starting to gain some real steam, and it might finally cause some to wake up.
Note: (COCV stands for Code-of-Conduct violation. When you read this, feel free to replace that in your head with any grammatically appropriate Ricochet-unfriendly term)
I have no doubt that the British establishment targets Tommy Robinson because he has inconvenient views.
However, there is a legitimate fear that should there be publicity around the trial (upon which he was attempting to ‘report’) while it is going on, the defendants will be able to claim a mistrial, and, indeed, that no (fair) trial will ever be possible, because no jury can be sufficiently free of the taint of such publicity. So that, at the end of the day, the defendants will never be punished for their heinous acts.
Should the system be like this? Probably not. But that is the system folks are trying to administer. (Although with a heavily biased thumb on the scale against the inconvenient – and, let’s face it, not terribly attractive – Mr Robinson.)
I wrote on grooming gangs here on Ricochet, suggesting that the total numbers, based on extrapolation from known data, are ENORMOUS. Critics of my post suggested that since the official media and numbers don’t support my numbers, I was just talking out of my left ear.
Then, too, there was a story over the weekend that the Rotherham police officers and politicians had sex with the victims.
I suggest that the “official” sources are entirely unreliable, and worse. All we can do is extrapolate from known data.
It appears that the British public have been kept in the dark about some of these “grooming” trials. In America, if a judge in decides not to permit a trial to be broadcast, reporters and illustrators are still permitted to sit in the court and gather information. Not so in Britain apparently. Complete public blackout of information can be imposed. On a more scandalous level, one need only to look at the rampant and comprehensive cover-up in the Rotherham case that occurred over several years that the greater British public had no idea was happening until articles in The Times started to expose the truth. As I pointed out earlier, there are ways to shield a jury from the public at large during the course of a trial. If those tools aren’t available in Britain, then perhaps it’s understandable why judges would be a bit high strung. What makes this story a bit extreme, apart from Robinson’s occasional extreme behavior, is the power that the state and the judiciary can command by shutting down any media discussion or inquiry of the trial but also of Robinson’s arrest who was outside the court. It also looked as though the verdict in the trial had already been rendered as Robinson was conducting his live stream, so his activities outside the courthouse on this occasion didn’t appear to have any influence on the trial proceedings at all.
gen,
Watch the Dave Rubin interview. Robinson isn’t a candidate for a position at Oxford but he isn’t a dark person at all. He comes off as classical British working class. Perhaps that is the problem. The establishment was hoping for someone corrupt that would either play their game or become really extremist. Robinson has very solid basic values and just assumes that sooner or later that will win out. Hopefully, he won’t be murdered for it.
Regards,
Jim
To your point:
Bruce Bawer has another piece on this at Gatestone:
“I am in a country that is not free… I feel jealous as hell of you guys in America. You don’t know how lucky you are.” — Carl Benjamin (aka Sargon of Akkad), YouTuber with around a million subscribers.
“I am trying to recall a legal case where someone was convicted of a ‘crime’ which cannot be reported on.” — Gerald Batten, UKIP member of the European Parliament.
“UKIP Peer Malcolm Lord Pearson has written to Home Secretary Sajid Javid today saying: if Tommy is murdered or injured in prison he and others will mount a private prosecution against Mr Javid as an accessory, or for misconduct in public office.” — Gerald Batten.
Good on Lord Pearson.
They who must not be named.
Scott,
With a runaway government full of itself and glorious political correctness, a good smack across the snout from somebody with enough gravitas to do it is about what you need. I think keeping Tommy alive and uninjured should be the prime target of all efforts at this point. No kidding that it was a false arrest. No kidding that being convicted of a crime which cannot be reported on is ridiculous.
First, keep him alive and then sort out the law, the politics, and the pure BS.
Regards,
Jim
If you google Tommy Robinson you can find headlines like this one at the Daily Mail:
“Far-right demonstrators mass at the gates of Downing Street to demand EDL founder Tommy Robinson is released following his arrest for breaching the peace”
Question: In the UK, if you and your friends are at the demonstration and are not “far-right,” can you sue the newspaper for slander?
A second question: What is taking so long for this post to get to the main feed?