The Turkish cab drivers aren’t opposing Uber because it is bent. But because it is honest.
– ‘Chester Draws’ commenting on the Continental Telegraph.
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Holocaust denial is, of course, completely irrational, has no basis in historical fact, and is almost always motivated by deep-seated racism. But there are no specific laws against Holocaust denial in the UK. Britain has even resisted attempts to enforce an EU directive outlawing Holocaust denial. In 2008, British courts prevented the extradition of suspected Holocaust denier Frederick Toben to Germany. No matter how abhorrent Holocaust denial is, there are important reasons not to ban it in law. Deborah Lipstadt, who successfully defended a libel suit from the notorious Holocaust denier, David Irving, argues against giving politicians ‘the power to legislate history’. Banning Holocaust denial simply turns deniers into martyrs. It should be defeated by the facts, not by the law, argues Lipstadt. May 31st, 2018 | 30 comments - (Comments are closed)
 At the end of a week in which the House of Commons defeated Labour’s draconian plans to regulate the press, the Tories revealed their own draconian plans to regulate the internet. The culture secretary, Matt Hancock, has pledged to make Britain ‘the safest place in the world’ to be online. But when the world’s ‘safest’ internet is currently found in China, where access is heavily restricted and censored by the state, it becomes clear how terrifying the government’s safety agenda really could be. May 27th, 2018 | 13 comments - (Comments are closed)
Two stories related to freedom of speech are doing the rounds tonight: The BBC reports: YouTuber Alison Chabloz guilty over anti-Semitic songs Chabloz is a nasty and stupid woman, whose delusions will be given more credibility by the fact that she was persecuted for them. The Hull Daily Mail reports: Former EDL leader Tommy Robinson ‘being held in Hull prison’ after arrest I do not know what to make of Robinson himself, nor of his arrest. There are some complications about contempt of court and his breaching the terms of his earlier suspended sentence that, frankly, I cannot summon up the energy to investigate; it may not be as simple a case of persecution as it is presented as being in this PJ Media story. The authorities imagine that by placing reporting restrictions on Robinson’s case they will make people think he is as clearly bad as Chabloz is. The actual effect is to make the public wonder whether she, like he, might have something to be said in her favour. May 26th, 2018 | 109 comments - (Comments are closed)
Some farm employees kicked pigs and stabbed them with pitchforks. An organisation called Animal Equity who do undercover investigations with the aim of reducing cruelty to farm animals used hidden cameras to capture the evidence. They gave it to the press, who confronted the farm, who fired the employees.
The British Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, Michael Gove, said:
Oops, sorry, wrong universe. He actually said that he has pledged to restore the UK as a leader in animal welfare. May 23rd, 2018 | 14 comments - (Comments are closed)
I am a radical on Town & Country planning as on other economic issues. I would abolish it. To me it is offensive that the value of a man’s land is stripped from him by laws that deny him the right to put it to its highest and best use without grovelling to local politicians in thrall to his envious neighbours. May 17th, 2018 | 29 comments - (Comments are closed)
Is a fair summary of the antics of a bunch of Cornish bureaucrats in Padstow, (a harbour and tourist attraction on Cornwall’s north coast) supported by the local MP Scott Mann, in a battle against street traders, who are within the law. And we have that bureaucrats favourite concept, a ‘multi-agency approach’, (which I first heard in the early 1990s), with the following wastes of public money involved: Cornwall Council, Devon & Cornwall Police, Padstow Town Council, Padstow Harbour Commissioners (the Harbour is established by law with government oversight).
It is rather concerning that the local Police are getting involved in a matter that is not illegal, street trading by selling services is not, well, according to Cornwall Council’s legal advice.
Or as the bureaucrats find to their evident dismay.
Yes, Parliament never regulated this, so why don’t you all eff off back to your desks, submit your resignations, and ask for your jobs not to be replaced? It’s freedom that upsets you, isn’t it? No one is getting their hair braided without consent, no one is getting tattooed by force, just don’t buy it. There is no trespass, no obstruction, no nuisance, no wrong done, it’s just something that you can’t (yet) licence. A chink of light through the curtain of licensing darkness. It is not a loophole, it is simply not banned. A loophole would be making it legal to sell goods on the street without a licence only if you wore a red hat. It is for Parliament to propose changes in the law, not bureaucrats, who are paid to do their jobs, and Councillors are, really, paid bureaucrats. Let the public pester the MP, and let him propose what he might, so that her Majesty, with the Advice of the Commons and the Lords Temporal and Spiritual, may so enact if it please her. To be fair to him, this appears to be what he has in mind. It is a symptom of the political culture in Britain, even far from London, that this is something for bureaucrats to fret about, all mask of neutrality has fallen here. The attitude of the police officer involved is particularly dismaying:
Why didn’t he say something like:
OK, the last sentence is perhaps a little unkind. May 16th, 2018 | 14 comments - (Comments are closed)
You know you are a nerd when you are avidly googling the name of the author of a series of erotic novels all of which feature the word “cocky” in their titles because of the interesting legal issues the “Cockygate scandal” has brought up. Dale L Roberts vlogs about self-publishing. In this video published on May 7th he explains that Faleena Hopkins, the author in question, wrote a slew of “Cease and Desist” letters to other indie romance authors on Amazon using the word “cocky” in their titles. Amazon, with typical cowardice, removed these other authors’ books as soon as Hopkins asked them to. Worse yet, Faleena Hopkins’ letter to the other authors included the phrase “My attorney at Morris Yorn Entertainment Law has advised me that if I sue you I will win all the moneys you have earned on this title plus lawyer fees will be paid by you as well.” I suspect that Morris Yorn Entertainment Law are not entirely happy with this summary of their advice. I came across this story via the fantasy/SF author Chris Fox. His nine minute video dated May 11th explains well why this incident should and did arouse the anger of the community of authors who self-publish on Kindle and similar platforms – but he also spares a thought for Hopkins herself. In the four days since the earlier video, the situation had changed dramatically – and the trouble with internet shaming is that even when some punishment is deserved, there is no off switch. May 14th, 2018 | 17 comments - (Comments are closed)
Earlier today the Press Gazette reported,
You did read that right. Tom Watson’s amendment to Section 40 would have meant that newspapers refusing to join Max Moseley’s pet* regulator Impress would have been liable for costs when sued for libel even if they won the case. In recent years the Guardian has not often lived up to its name. But I am glad to note that even they balked at such blatant perversion of the justice system. In the event Watson declined to put his amendment to a vote, and Ed Miliband’s less shameless but still repressive amendment regarding a second Leveson enquiry into press regulation was defeated. Perhaps that’s the end of it, perhaps not. This monster has been apparently killed before but did not stay dead. I do not know what stage of the horror movie we are at. May 9th, 2018 | 9 comments - (Comments are closed)
I found this interesting, just a mere twitter exchange relating to the Day of Freedom rally that you will never see the BBC say much (or indeed anything I suspect) about.  I am increasingly willing to accept almost anyone on the correct side of this as an ally, and if the Guardian wants to tar anyone who supports free speech as ‘far right’, well who cares? It turns out that support for free speech is in fact ‘multicultural as fuck’. May 7th, 2018 | 14 comments - (Comments are closed)
Writing in CapX, Chris Deerin argues that opposition to ID cards is out of date. He seems to agree that they may solve problems including terrorism and mis-treatment of immigrants. He suggests that government would be better if we did not need to leave the house to talk to it; that democracy would be better if we could vote online. He suggests that because some people are horrified by Facebook’s sharing of data while others happily tell Facebook everything, that we should all be happy to tell the government everything. He suggests that because people under the age of 25 enjoy the convenience and fun of online services from private companies, that they should also enjoy being forced to sign up to a single unified government database too.
He suggests that because people voluntarily hand over information of their choosing to companies even though those companies sometimes make mistakes and leak information, that they are silly to be nervous of being forced to hand over whatever information the government wants to be stored on a centralised government database. As if it is just the same thing. The entire article is nonsense that ignores the fundamental difference between the state and private individuals: that we do not interact with the state voluntarily. May 3rd, 2018 | 34 comments - (Comments are closed)
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