Man jailed for April Jones comments written on facebook

[Clarino]

[OGPhilly]

[Clarino]

[OGPhilly]

So I mean, can it be argued in court? I'm not at all familiar with your judicial system but I'd think that would be a legitimate argument.

[Clarino]

That this is protected by freedom of expression? Absolutely, but the process will likely take longer than his prison term.

If it went to the ECHR it would certainly be overturned (IMO) but I doubt it will get that far.

[Thundertaker]

I don't know about a prison sentence, but the guy definately deserves a punch in the face, and whoever did it to have the t-shirt he wore as a mitigating factor...

[OGPhilly]

You have quite the barbaric mindset. There might as well not be freedom of speech if we look the other way when people excercising it are physically assaulted.

[Thundertaker]

[Boris Johnson]

The law behind it is actually quite complicated, if I can be bothered i'll look it up.

However, the current legislation which everyone is talking about (actually I think 2 possibly 3 pieces of legislation) holds basically to J.S Mill's notion of the concept: You can publish certain views in material like 'f**k muslims' in a paper, but you can't have it on a placard. (not literally what the law says obviously) The point is there is a distinction made between the immediacy of the statement to the possibility of violence and the medium in which it is expressed. Intellectuals discussing concepts in a series of letters fine, slack yawed yokels waving a sign calling for the death of blacks in the street, not ok. Nor is this a particularly hard distinction for a court to make.



N.B me describing someone does not mean i agree with it. Just turning this boat away from derp island.

My opinion: As i've said before on the forum the idea of "U NEED FREEDUM OF EXPRESSION TO LIKE HAVE NAZIS AND SHIT OR YOU DON@TS GOT IT THEN 'INSERT ORWELL PASTICHE HERE' " is the lazy response to the trauma that broadly liberal values had in the 1930'ies and frankly has never been fully instituted by any country anywhere.

[OGPhilly]

I'm not sure I understand the incoherent argument you were mocking at the end. But I think I get the gist. Well, isn't it fair to say that if you dont protect offensive expression then the idea of free expression is a fail? Inoffensive expression rarely needs protection to begin with.