Britain's Orwellian speech police knocked down a veteran journalist on Remembrance Sunday morning for allegedly “inciting racial hatred” on social media.
Alison Pearson, long-time conservative columnist in London daily telegraph The paper said two police officers visited her home on Sunday and told her she was being investigated over comments she posted on Elon Musk's social media platform X a year ago.
I asked the police to disclose the details of the thought crime, but the police refused to respond.
However, Pearson speculates that it may have had something to do with her post about the October 7 terrorist attack on Israel by Islamist Hamas terrorists. The incident was a hot topic online at this time last year, after widespread anti-Israel protests erupted in the UK. attack.
According to the columnist, police also refused to reveal the accuser's name and even told her, “They are not the accusers…they are called victims.”
“It was surreal. I have hundreds of black and Asian followers on (X/Twitter) and not a single one suggested I said anything bad or hateful. (Who decides where to set the standard for what is offensive?) This is supposed to be 2024, but even though it's 1984, the police officer is George. “It seemed like he was acting according to an Orwellian playbook,” Pearson said. I wrote for telegraph paper.
Essex Police confirmed they had launched an investigation into the woman under Section 17 of the Public Order Act 1986, which deals with content “likely to, or intended to cause, racial hatred”.
“We are investigating a report passed to us by another faction. This report concerns a social media post that has since been deleted. An investigation is currently underway under Article 17 of the Public Security Act.” a police spokesperson said.
Although there was some backlash against the spread of thought crime under the previous Conservative government, much of the legal infrastructure for hate speech remains in place by the so-called Conservative Party, allowing a left-wing Labor government to tighten censorship. It became like that. It is relatively easy to enter the country.
Indeed, Home Secretary Yvette Cooper, who took office in the summer, has urged the government to reverse moves to reduce police recording of “non-criminal hate incidents” and add tougher hate speech regulations, particularly around anti-Semitism and Islamophobia. promoted.
Since its introduction in 2014, British police have recorded more than 120,000 non-criminal hate incidents, even though the “incidents” did not actually rise to the level of crimes. However, being listed in a criminal database can have serious real-world consequences, as many prospective employers have access to such databases through criminal background checks.
Given that non-criminal hate incidents are not crimes, there is little that people can do to clear their names, as there are no courts to judge what they say. Additionally, many people logged into police databases for suspected offensive posts online were left in the dark.
Critics of the system, such as the Free Speech Union (FSU), noticed Despite hundreds of thousands of non-criminal hate incidents being recorded, there is no evidence that this practice has prevented actual crimes.
Former Conservative home secretary Suella Braverman, who led efforts to stop the recording of so-called non-criminal hate incidents, commented on the case against Mr Pearson: said: “We need to stop policing the words on social media.” [and] Fight real crimes. My message to the Labor Party: focus on defending free speech, stopping overreach and keeping our streets safe. ”
Free Speech Coalition Director Toby Young added: 'No wonder 93 per cent of motoring crimes went unsolved in Essex last year – local police officers were too busy policing journalists' tweets to police the streets.
“I think they want to investigate actual crimes rather than ‘non-crimes,’ but their politically correct bosses are more interested in punishing the wrong ideas.”
