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Welcome to 1984

Get your tin foil hats, friends. You might actually need them now.

Can we please stop making the 1984 comparisons all the time? It kind of devalues the original work. In the actual book, the main character lived in a world where everyone knew the government was lying, but they just pretended to go along with it, even if it meant accepting that the enemy they were at war with was somebody else "all along". They lived in a world where their whole day was monitored and planned, even morning exercises. They lived in a world where you had to be selfish to survive, like eating more than your share of your family's rations, or choosing not to tell your coworker that their enthusiasm for their job will probably lead to them "disappearing".

What you mention certainly deserves careful scrutiny (along with practically everything else) but if the term 1984 keeps getting thrown around like gate, then it will eventually befall the same fate-- kids today probably think watergate had to do with water bottle labels or something rather than a major uncovered conspiracy that rocked America's faith in the political system itself.

1984 isn't just about censorship-- it's a meaningful work about people being complacent with it. The very fact that you aren't and are able to fight against what you perceive as censorship without being permanently censored means that the comparison is stretching the limit of hyperbole. And hyperbole is fine, but if used too frequently it eventually leads to a "boy who cried wolf" effect.

What comparison will you be able to make if you uncover something major like Snowden? Because if you also compare it to 1984 and nothing else, then logically speaking a la the property of transitivity, you'd be equating it to this, and the two are clearly not equal in severity.

I thought you were going to link to this: Met police respond to FOIA request, arrests for 'online crimes of speech' up 37% in 5 years in London. Just came out yesterday.

They refuse to give context or list specific examples of speech which has gotten people arrested, but you can see how loose the language is.

Indecent and menacing are not exactly legal terms (and last I checked obscenity wasn't even illegal). Is it menacing to Muslims to publicly criticize Islam and its practices? Europe (esp Sweden, Germany) is increasingly saying "yes" and jailing people for exactly that.

Remember that guy who tweeted about a Muslim woman's "mealy-mouthed reply" to the Brussels bombing? He was initially arrested under this law.

Dutch police are making stops at people's homes to threaten warn them about their tone online and let them know they're being monitored. The Dutch are less secretive about their approach. { A spokesman for the national police acknowledged to Handelsblad that there are ten intelligence units of “digital detectives” monitoring in real time Facebook pages and Twitter accounts and looking for posts that go “too far”. }

The tweet: “The college of Sliedrecht has a proposal to receive 250 refugees in the coming 2 years. What a bad plan! #letusresist” caused police to visit Mark Jongeneel's house and workplace.

{ “I asked them what the problem was and they said ‘your tweets.’

“They asked me to be careful about my Twitter behaviour, because if there are riots, then I’m responsible.”

“You tweet a lot,” said the police, explaining: “We have orders to ask you to watch your tone. Your tweets may seem seditious”. }

Sedition is the illegal act of inciting a riot or rebellion against your government. When the police show up at your door over innocuous tweets threatening you with charges of sedition, you can't really be blamed for making a 1984 connection.

I'm pretty sure the link you posted is social media services pledging to work under these "crimes of speech" laws. Thought I'm also sure you meant it in sarcasm, a 1984 connection is, again, not completely unfounded when your government first threatens people with arrest over speech they don't agree with, and then private market services pledge to help out with surveillance/enforcement efforts. Combine that with the "college activism" going on, which is getting people fired and ostracized from their community over statements as innocent as "surely college students are old enough to hold an adult conversation instead of throwing a tantrum over a Halloween costume", and this whole picture becomes a bit more grim. More dangerous than knowing the government is lying yet going along with it are these social activists who 100% believe they are The Absolute Truth.

Should people get arrested or fined for hate speech? Absolutely not. Does this mean that online platforms should allow any and all forms of hate speech to be directed at their userbase, up to and including anonymous death threats? I really rather they didn't.

An online community is only as good as the worst comments allowed by the moderation team. Allowing bad actors to control the discourse discourages other, more thoughtful users from participating. What good is "no rules" when you have to carefully watch what you say to avoid getting dogpiled by people eager to call you every name in the book and tell you in graphic detail what they're going to do to you?

@Lisa

Firstly, your only source is Breitbart, which is about as trustworthy as Jezebel (that is to say, not even remotely). Your argument is worth jack shit based on that alone, but for the purpose of this argument, I'll assume it has at least one iota of truth to it.

You'll note that the article repeatedly uses the word "arrest," but "arrest" does not imply the suspect was convicted, or even taken to court. How many people have actually been sentenced under this law? The article can cite just one instance, and I'm willing to bet it's one of just a few convictions under this law, if not the only one.

Breitbart links The Register, which first reported on the freedom of information request, as well as the FOI report itself, which notes that the Met Police don't keep prosecution statistics and advise a separate request to the CPS for that info.

Did you actually read even just the first two sentences of that link, where both of said links are located, or did you see it was a Breitbart link and decide to disregard it completely? That's called willful ignorance, you inflict it on yourself.

Last time I checked only very few people have actually been convicted for hate speech but I still hate it as a stipulation. Given how sensitive people are these days you never know what they'll try to deem "hate speech".

Ministry of Justice stats for 2014 show 1,209 guilty convictions under Section 127 of the Communications Act 2003. There were 143 guilty convictions in 2004. Under the Malicious Communications Act, it shows 694 guilty convictions.

The Guardian also has an older report featuring three people who were convicted and sentenced under the law.

{ Joshua Cryer, a law student, was convicted after posting a series of racist tweets aimed at the footballer Stan Collymore. The judge determined they fell into the category of "grossly offensive" and sentenced him to a two-year community order.

John Kerlen – aka Sir Olly C – was found guilty earlier this month of sending tweets the judge determined were both grossly offensive and menacing, for posting a picture of a Bexley councillor's house and asking: "Which cunt lives in a house like this. Answers on a postcard to #bexleycouncil"; followed by a second tweet saying: "It's silly posting a picture of a house on Twitter without an address, that will come later. Please feel free to post actual shit."

Paul Chambers's case, widely known as the Twitter joke trial, is perhaps the most famous of the trio and arguably the most ridiculous. Due in more than a week to travel to see his girlfriend and noting the local airport was closed, he was convicted after he tweeted "Crap! Robin Hood airport is closed. You've got a week and a bit to get your shit together otherwise I'm blowing the airport sky high!!" }

Paul Chamber's lost an initial appeal and a High Court appeal before finally winning on a second High Court appeal.

@lisalombs

Well shit. Thanks for the info then.