Government ministers have asked the US to order American websites hosting al-Qaeda videos to remove them.If they contravene US law, they will do, I’m sure.
But if they don’t….
Security minister Baroness Neville-Jones is reported to have recently told Washington officials the sites incited murder and would be banned in the UK.Well, yes, I’m sure they would. But they aren’t in the UK, are they? That’s the point, you utter imbecile!
Complain all you want. The US takes freedom of speech a lot more seriously than we do here, and if it isn’t breaching their laws, it isn’t coming down.
You’ll just have to curb your inner control freak, Baroness.
So they will start adding 'socially offensive' sites to the DNS blacklist of already censored paedophile and extreme sex sites.
ReplyDeleteThis is the problem with censorship. once it starts, even for the best of reasons, it's so easy to stretch it that little bit more, and more, and more...
Two words - TOR/Vidalia...
ReplyDeleteAs things stand that will enable UK surfers to read pretty much what they want to.
"inner control freak" very funny. I like it. They amended their constitution to afeguard freedom of speech. Since this constitution is based on the English Bill of Rights you would expect the UK to uphold freedom of speech as the Americans do. Unfortunately it is given a mauling by several laws incuding the piece of crap from Harperson which the new numpties in charge amazingly allowed onto the statute book. I think i just broke that law with my description of the government.
ReplyDeleteOne could be excused for not blaming the Baroness entirely ..
ReplyDeleteYou see, in the rarified atmosphere in which she exists, it has probably escaped her noble attention that for the past 50,or so years .. the trend has been that WE slavishly copy whatever the Yanks do & cravenly obey what the Yanks tell us to do ...
Not the other way round ...
Any chance of incompetent news programmes being banned as a consequence of any of this? With some luck we could end up with Samizdat only. I look forward to a retro-world in which I read AP over my cornflakes in fresh Banda aniline purple paper copy!
ReplyDeleteA classic example. The self same people would proclaim loudly about how they support freedom of speech.
ReplyDeleteYou are free to say whatever you like, as long as I don't object to what you have to say.
Is terrorism and extremism caused by some swivel-eyed loon on youtube? I think not.
I despair sometimes.
I think the last government tried to get the US to do this too, evidentally the US constitution hasn't been read by many British politicos.
ReplyDelete"This is the problem with censorship. once it starts, even for the best of reasons, it's so easy to stretch it that little bit more, and more, and more..."
ReplyDeleteSlippery slope indeed. We're on it, and don't even realise....
"Two words - TOR/Vidalia...
As things stand that will enable UK surfers to read pretty much what they want to."
There's always ways round anything. Human ingenuity - whether for good or ill - cannot be contained.
"Since this constitution is based on the English Bill of Rights you would expect the UK to uphold freedom of speech as the Americans do."
I would. But then, I know us too well....
"...it has probably escaped her noble attention that for the past 50,or so years .. the trend has been that WE slavishly copy whatever the Yanks do & cravenly obey what the Yanks tell us to do ..."
Heh!
"Any chance of incompetent news programmes being banned as a consequence of any of this?"
Ooooh, if only! The BBC would have to transmit yet more repeats to fill in the gaps...
"Is terrorism and extremism caused by some swivel-eyed loon on youtube? I think not."
It seems to have been sparked by the Timms case. Yet, there's be nothing to prevent the loon in that case from hearing the same stuff elsewhere.
It's like the old saying 'Guns don't kill people, people kill people'.
Guns just make it easier!
"I think the last government tried to get the US to do this too, evidentally the US constitution hasn't been read by many British politicos."
Or journalists. Not a one pointed this out.
To be honest I don't have a problem with these videos on YouTube. It's not just the nutters that view them, you see. Those "murder every kuffar on the planet" videos are stark evidence of why we should oppose the bastards rather than appease them. Why would Baroness Nopeville want to censor the uncomfortable truth?
ReplyDeleteOh, wait...