Too much liberty of expression survives in that country for the government’s liking:
New laws to clamp down on racism are being prepared by the Government after the leader of the far-right British National Party was cleared of stirring up racial hatred by attacking Islam.
Gordon Brown swiftly pledged to bring in tougher powers to raise the chance of convictions in similar cases, calling the BNP’s statements offensive.
His intervention came after an all-white jury decided that Nick Griffin, the BNP chairman, broke no law when he condemned Islam as “a wicked, vicious faith” at a secretly filmed meeting.
Plans for an offence of incitement to religious hatred were thrown out in a rare Commons defeat for the Government in February after a campaign led by the comedian Rowan Atkinson.
(Andrew Norfolk and Greg Hurst, “Race-hate laws to be changed after BNP case fails”, Times Online, Nov. 11). More: Feb. 4, etc. Comment: Rod Liddle.
4 Comments
I’ll bet that if someone were game enough to sneak some voice recorders into British mosques a lot of Moslem preachers could be charged under these proposed laws.
I don’t claim to understand the British political system, but Gordon Brown is the Chancellor of the Exchequer, a senior cabinet position, which makes him roughly equivalent to the Secretary of the Treasury. Now, I gather that he’s also the presumed next leader of the Labour Party and therefore the next PM should Labour retain power, but in the meantime, what the hell is he doing pledging the above while he’s still in the Cabinet?
Also, Rowan Atkinson! A million bravos to you and the House of Commons! Keep up the good work.
CSI, I’ll be you’re right, and I think the U.K. has made a squeak or two about this aspect of free expression — er, I mean, hate speech. But like civil rights laws in the U.S., the intended beneficiaries and targets are clear enough. It’s not the precious protected groups they want to prosecute, it’s those stubborn nativists backward enough to want to preserve their traditional society. It’s positively Orwellian that Griffin is being prosecuted for these particular remarks, which were actually made BEFORE 7/7. But as the British authorities correctly state, the truth is no defense to “hate speech” crimes.
“I’ll bet that if someone were game enough to sneak some voice recorders into British mosques a lot of Moslem preachers could be charged under these proposed laws.”
1. You wouldn’t have to sneak it in – they do quite enough in public.
2. The operative word there is “could”. They ALREADY “could” be charged. But they aren’t, and they won’t be. Thes laws are bing mad FOR them, not against them.