USA news & politics

[ncurd]

If swearing public was a crime we'd have to send the entire armed forces to jail. And I'd be a full time inmate.

I'm still shocked when anyone in the UK cares about swearing...I was getting yelled at by my neighbour accross the street apparently I was using her drive to back my car onto my own, I hadn't infact, I hadn't done so since the first time she yelled at me for it. But the second I told her to **** off apparently I was in the complete wrong and taken things too far....

 

[Saintjay]

I dunno what they do outside abortion clinics is pretty horrendous.

Yes in all honesty after a quick look there's really not much you can't say in a lot of places.

 

[Ddanno]

If AI could create a billion big floating hammers that say "freedom of speech does not grant you freedom of the consequences of your speech" , and then bash anyone on the head that needs reminding of it, I'd actually be in favour of AI.

 

[McTallshort]

If swearing public was a crime we'd have to send the entire armed forces to jail. And I'd be a full time inmate.

I'm still shocked when anyone in the UK cares about swearing...I was getting yelled at by my neighbour accross the street apparently I was using her drive to back my car onto my own, I hadn't infact, I hadn't done so since the first time she yelled at me for it. But the second I told her to **** off apparently I was in the complete wrong and taken things too far....

Its a load ********. The alt right pump out all this rubbish about free speech because they don't want Americans asking why they have to pay loads more for healthcare than people do in every advanced nation. Same with mass gun ownership.

"Hey guys the reason the Brits have a National Health Service is because it's a communist country with no freedom of speech and a total ban on private gun ownership!, would you want to live in a libtard, commie hell hole like that just so your prescriptions only cost 15 bucks? Hell no!"

 

[Ddanno]

US Troops Kneel Down To Roll Out Red Carpet for Putin’s Arrival— Win for Putin?

Trump claps for Putin and rolls out a red carpet with US troops kneeling, but summit yields no ceasefire, Ukraine remains in limbo.

thedailyguardian.com

'Murica strong

 

[Welsh Exile]

“Make Kneeling Great Again”

 

[McTallshort]

US Troops Kneel Down To Roll Out Red Carpet for Putin’s Arrival— Win for Putin?

Trump claps for Putin and rolls out a red carpet with US troops kneeling, but summit yields no ceasefire, Ukraine remains in limbo.

thedailyguardian.com

'Murica strong

Yeah they truly are the party of Reagan.

 

[dirty harry]

Think you are confusing hate incident vs crime.

And i don't know any reasonable person who would want the right to say racist things to people's faces. Because that's the arguement in the we the US get to be racist to people and offensive etc. You don't have freespeech because you cant do that.

Swearing in the street still needs the police to show someone was caused harassment, alarm and distress. Goes to court it's always what the person on the Clapham omnibus would think.

As far as I can tell states in the US do have laws on disorderly conduct. I don't think you'd get away with standing outside a synagogue dropping F bombs and telling them to all F off home under freedom of speech.

No no, im talking about hate crimes. You can say absiloltlutely nothing offencive, but if your motives are perceived as offencive you can be criminalised.

I think what your talking about, is the non crime hate incidents, in which absolutely no crime is commited, confirmed no crime is committed by the police, but they still log and build a picture of you being hateful. Thats a different thing, but just as egregious.

Swearing in the street technically needs someone to be caused harassment, but that harassment can be inferred by an officer, and it doesn't need to be reported. Officers are not supposed to be able to be the offended participant, but their ability to be that is another egregious thing.

Disorderly conduct is just that though, standing outside a synagogue targeting Jews is not free speech, saying the F bomb to a Jewish person, or even in front of a Jewish person is absolutely allowed.

Im not sure of people actually deal with the UKs hate speech laws regularly, and thats the disconnect?

 

[dirty harry]

I dunno what they do outside abortion clinics is pretty horrendous.

And absolutely illegal. Infact loitering or even praying in your home alone can get you criminalised.

 

[dirty harry]

If AI could create a billion big floating hammers that say "freedom of speech does not grant you freedom of the consequences of your speech" , and then bash anyone on the head that needs reminding of it, I'd actually be in favour of AI.

Who's discussing freedom from consequences? Hahahaha

 

[Welsh Exile]

I mean, what is 'different' free speech? In the US they can say what they want without threat of arrest from the government, in the UK we can say what we want as long as it doesnt offend, or could be perceived offencive.

Theres a massive ******* chasm of difference there, and I dont think Europe is maintaining that chasm, its certainly been growing for the last 2 decades, to the point children with learning diffs are being arrested for likening police officers to their lesbian nana's, or quoting Winston Churchil.

As I say we've had hate speech laws for quite a while now. It doesn't really effect my day to day to be honest and I imagine it's that way for 90% of Brits.

I do hear you on the hate speech stuff to some degree though. There's obviously been examples of things like this being used badly and you can argue there's a slippery slope. I personally see the merit in protecting immutable characteristics but I don't like how religion is grouped in there as that's not immutable characteristic and you should be allowed to say whatever you want about someone's religion without fear of prosecution. But as I say it doesn't effect my day to day. It's not like I'm an American resident who has the audacity to be pro Palestinian and worried I might get deported.

 

[Saintjay]

No no, im talking about hate crimes. You can say absiloltlutely nothing offencive, but if your motives are perceived as offencive you can be criminalised.

I think what your talking about, is the non crime hate incidents, in which absolutely no crime is commited, confirmed no crime is committed by the police, but they still log and build a picture of you being hateful. Thats a different thing, but just as egregious.

Swearing in the street technically needs someone to be caused harassment, but that harassment can be inferred by an officer, and it doesn't need to be reported. Officers are not supposed to be able to be the offended participant, but their ability to be that is another egregious thing.

Disorderly conduct is just that though, standing outside a synagogue targeting Jews is not free speech, saying the F bomb to a Jewish person, or even in front of a Jewish person is absolutely allowed.

Im not sure of people actually deal with the UKs hate speech laws regularly, and thats the disconnect?

Not entirely true, police officers are expected to have more reasonable firmness than the average person. Then a court would normally expect them to have more tolerance than Joe public.

Section 5 the police will normally warn someone first about there conduct.

We don't have hate speech laws. Public Order Act, Harassment Act, Malicious Communications etc we do have. The hate crime is tagged on as aggravating factor if it's racist etc

 

[ncurd]

I dont know saintjay's exact background but its been apparent for ages they have quite a knowledgeable background in how policing works in the UK.

 

[dirty harry]

As I say we've had hate speech laws for quite a while now. It doesn't really effect my day to day to be honest and I imagine it's that way for 90% of Brits.

I do hear you on the hate speech stuff to some degree though. There's obviously been examples of things like this being used badly and you can argue there's a slippery slope. I personally see the merit in protecting immutable characteristics but I don't like how religion is grouped in there as that's not immutable characteristic and you should be allowed to say whatever you want about someone's religion without fear of prosecution. But as I say it doesn't effect my day to day. It's not like I'm an American resident who has the audacity to be pro Palestinian and worried I might get deported.

Thisnis the key issue though, it won't effect your day to day, until it does, and you've already failed to protect speech of others. Speech isnt eroded with a bang, it is slowly incurred under the guise of safety. Saved Javid once said he wanted the UK to be the safest place in the world to go online, and that scared the **** out of me, as it should every sane person who hears it.

We have had hate speech laws previously, but the tenet of our system, as opposed to the continent is that if something isnt prohibited, its permitted, well with hate speech laws, non crime hate incidents and the new online safety act that tenet of British law has been overturned.

Look at hate speech laws, protecting characteristics, in the context of employment absolutely, in the context of crime 100%, but in the context of speech?!?! And let's say ok, I'll accept you cant say offencive things to protected characteristics, to be criminalised with 0 evidence outside of perception of the proposed victim... do you know how many times I have to deal with fake accusations of hate crimes? As an organisation mine used to report a crime to the police 1.5 times a month, since early 2024, we make nearly 3 reports a week, 75% of them are hate crime accusations. You wouldnt beleive how effective they are when weaponised, and you wouldnt believe how shocked most kids are when criminalised for something they had no idea would be illegal.

I'll give you a great example, a kid recently was criminalised for using the term 'paki shop' in front of officers, who canvassed staff for offence. When they refused, police attended the local shop and asked if the owner would be offended by the term.The kid was in residential care in deep valleys, and its what they called the local shop up there, he just didnt know any better (still ******* able to vote soon at 16 though ffs), and has undiagnosed learning diffs.

Absolutely disgraceful!

 

[dirty harry]

Not entirely true, police officers are expected to have more reasonable firmness than the average person. Then a court would normally expect them to have more tolerance than Joe public.

Section 5 the police will normally warn someone first about there conduct.

We don't have hate speech laws. Public Order Act, Harassment Act, Malicious Communications etc.

The words 'normally' 'ecpected' 'reasonable' all mean nothing. Ive seen too many kids arrested for BS reasons under the guise of section 5, and its getting worse...

What annoys me most, is the willingness from officers to utilise legislation to get what they want, the non crime hate incident, the absolute abuse of section 5, and even 43 of the TA

 

[Saintjay]

The words 'normally' 'ecpected' 'reasonable' all mean nothing. Ive seen too many kids arrested for BS reasons under the guise of section 5, and its getting worse...

What annoys me most, is the willingness from officers to utilise legislation to get what they want, the non crime hate incident, the absolute abuse of section 5, and even 43 of the TA

Honestly if anything the Police under use Sec 5. You'd have nobody left in any city centre or town on a Friday/ Saturday night. If they nicked everyone for swearing at them.

Simply because nobody wants to deal with a drunk idiot, fill custody up and leave a few cops to deal with the more serious incidents that will most likely happen.

Same as any job you get good and competent people and some not so.

 

[Welsh Exile]

Thisnis the key issue though, it won't effect your day to day, until it does, and you've already failed to protect speech of others. Speech isnt eroded with a bang, it is slowly incurred under the guise of safety. Saved Javid once said he wanted the UK to be the safest place in the world to go online, and that scared the **** out of me, as it should every sane person who hears it.

We have had hate speech laws previously, but the tenet of our system, as opposed to the continent is that if something isnt prohibited, its permitted, well with hate speech laws, non crime hate incidents and the new online safety act that tenet of British law has been overturned.

Look at hate speech laws, protecting characteristics, in the context of employment absolutely, in the context of crime 100%, but in the context of speech?!?! And let's say ok, I'll accept you cant say offencive things to protected characteristics, to be criminalised with 0 evidence outside of perception of the proposed victim... do you know how many times I have to deal with fake accusations of hate crimes? As an organisation mine used to report a crime to the police 1.5 times a month, since early 2024, we make nearly 3 reports a week, 75% of them are hate crime accusations. You wouldnt beleive how effective they are when weaponised, and you wouldnt believe how shocked most kids are when criminalised for something they had no idea would be illegal.

I'll give you a great example, a kid recently was criminalised for using the term 'paki shop' in front of officers, who canvassed staff for offence. When they refused, police attended the local shop and asked if the owner would be offended by the term.The kid was in residential care in deep valleys, and its what they called the local shop up there, he just didnt know any better (still ******* able to vote soon at 16 though ffs), and has undiagnosed learning diffs.

Absolutely disgraceful!

As I say, I can see the merit in some of what you say, I acknowledged there’s potentially a slippery slope but I’ll say it again, it doesn’t effect my day to day and it doesn’t effect 90% (probably closer to 99%) of Brits. You can say it doesn’t effect you till it does but these laws have been around as long as I’ve been alive so you’ll forgive me if I’m not overly worried.

I don’t mean to discredit your experience, though. Maybe you’re just at that sharper end of this kind of stuff given your job so you see more than normal people and therefore, understandably, think it’s a bigger problem than it is. Or maybe you’re right and in a few years no one in the UK will be free to say anything without fear of being locked up. I’m not that pessimistic yet.

 

[Saintjay]

As I say, I can see the merit in some of what you say, I acknowledged there's potentially a slippery slope but I'll say it again, it doesn't effect my day to day and it doesn't effect 90% (probably closer to 99%) of Brits. You can say it doesn't effect you till it does but these laws have been around as long as I've been alive so you'll forgive me if I'm not overly worried.

I don't mean to discredit your experience, though. Maybe you're just at that sharper end of this kind of stuff given your job so you see more than normal people and therefore, understandably, think it's a bigger problem than it is. Or maybe you're right and in a few years no one in the UK will be free to say anything without fear of being locked up. I'm not that pessimistic yet.

Most of the laws aren't particularly new. It's become a problem because both sides have weoponised it to support there cause.

The Popo are caught in the middle of it.

 

[dirty harry]

As I say, I can see the merit in some of what you say, I acknowledged there's potentially a slippery slope but I'll say it again, it doesn't effect my day to day and it doesn't effect 90% (probably closer to 99%) of Brits. You can say it doesn't effect you till it does but these laws have been around as long as I've been alive so you'll forgive me if I'm not overly worried.

I don't mean to discredit your experience, though. Maybe you're just at that sharper end of this kind of stuff given your job so you see more than normal people and therefore, understandably, think it's a bigger problem than it is. Or maybe you're right and in a few years no one in the UK will be free to say anything without fear of being locked up. I'm not that pessimistic yet.

25% of working aged people in the UK have criminal records... up from 22% in 2019.

You may have avoided it thus far, but your an expletive in public, or a bad tweet away from joining them...

Burglary doesnt effect my day to day, as it doesnt 90%, but 99% of people lock their doors at night.

 

[dirty harry]

Most of the laws aren't particularly new. It's become a problem because both sides have weoponised it to support there cause.

The Popo are caught in the middle of it.

This is a very apt comment (except for the equalities act 2010) I would add the standards of policing has dropped in recent years, and i wasnt meaning to attack officers in general.

The sad state of policing is you can absolutely determine what thebinteraction is going to be like by seeing the (usually) 2 officers walking up the road, I won't go into detail for the whining hear but there are 2 combinations of officers that guarantee an escalation leading to arrest regardless of situation.