more lefty nonsense!!

Geoffo_M

I think that when the police are powerless to protect us from having our properties invaded by romanian squatters to the point where they have to protect the squatters, we should be asking ourselves the question would we be better off without the police at all.

To my mind, when anyone breaks the law, they should immediately surrender their 'human rights'. Perhaps we should disband 90% of the police force (leaving those that investigate terrorism etc), give us all a huge tax rebate and allow citizens to employ private police forces - who at least would actually protect us all.

I'm not being serious, of course, but all this crap we put up with does start you thinking!

macaque_2

By making racist comments subject to the criminal law, the government has:

1. Made us more secretive (and more like the old USSR).
2. Undermined humour, an age old relief valve of social tension. People are slowly becoming as guarded and humourless Winston Smith. 'Duck Speak' is slowly replacing humour and thoughtful debate on prime time television.
3. Given small people a new tool to settle scores. The Rother District Council had no good reason to contact the police. No one was hurt and nothing was stolen. It was an 'invented crime' cooked up by a resentful official.
4. Agravated resentment and tension amongst moderate people. Is it coincidence that support for extremist political groups is higher today than it has been for generations.

One of the most destructive aspects of speech crimes is that the legality of a comment is highly subjective. If a sports comentator observes that "All the finalists in the 100m are black", that is safe. A similar comparison in other situations (of which I won't give an example) ,would have the fruit cakes and trouble makers jamming the police phone lines. We now have a creeping cancer eating away at free speech with the speech Taliban (whoops) trying to move the limits of illegal comments ever deeper into main stream speech.

It is the job of civilised society to moderate prejudiced views, not the police.

DVardysShadow

macaque wrote: »

[STRIKE]By making racist comments subject to the criminal law, [/STRIKE]the government has:

1. Made us [STRIKE]
2. more secretive (and more like the old USSR).
3. Undermined humour, an age old relief valve of social tension. People are slowly becoming as guarded and humourless Winston Smith. 'Duck Speak' is slowly replacing humour and thoughtful debate on prime time television.
4. Given small people a new tool to settle scores. The Rother District Council had no good reason to contact the police. No one was hurt and nothing was stolen. It was an 'invented crime' cooked up by a resentful official.
5. Agravated resentment and tension amongst[/STRIKE]moderate people. [STRIKE]Is it coincidence that[/STRIKE] support [STRIKE]for extremist political groups[/STRIKE] is higher today than it has been for generations.

[STRIKE]One of the most destructive aspects of speech crimes is that the legality of a comment is highly subjective. If a sports comentator observes [/STRIKE]that[STRIKE] "All the finalists in the 100m are black", that is safe. A similar comparison in other situations (of which I won't give an example) ,would have the fruit cakes and trouble makers jamming[/STRIKE] the police [STRIKE]phone lines. We now have a creeping cancer eating away at free speech with the speech Taliban (whoops) trying to move the limits of illegal comments ever deeper into main stream speech.

It is the job of civilised society to[/STRIKE] moderate prejudiced views[STRIKE], not the police.[/STRIKE]

Fixed your post.

macaque_2

DVardysShadow wrote: »

Fixed your post.

I sense a measure of passion behind this response.

If we were sitting in a pub together, I suspect we would share a common distaste for prejudice. The difference however would appear to be that your dislike of prejudice is a learned response based on laws and government edicts whereas mine is based on respect for my fellow men (and women of course).

DVardysShadow

macaque wrote: »

I sense a measure of passion behind this response.

If we were sitting in a pub together, I suspect we would share a common distaste for prejudice. The difference however would appear to be that your dislike of prejudice is a learned response based on laws and government edicts whereas mine is based on respect for my fellow men (and women of course).

You are on a considerably higher moral plane than me.

fc123

macaque wrote: »

By making racist comments subject to the criminal law, the government has:

1. Made us more secretive (and more like the old USSR)..

I'm sorry, I usually avoid these types of threads but the above is such an exaggeration...there is absolutely no way we are anything like the old USSR with regards to information being witheld or anything else (Peacocks clothing store is the most similar thing in the UK to the old USSR....except it has full racks all the time rather than now and again).

Have you ever lived in Communist Russia?

My SIL is Russian and I have had converations with her parents, cousins and her about what it is like living in the old USSR.

Son had an odd one with her cousin who is same age......he asked son what he did (he was at uni at the time) and son asked the same Q back he had just come back from serving his national service in Chechyna.
Shut son up for a moment.

The converstion was in a blend of Russian, English, German and sign language.
I don't want to anatagonise but we live in a far more global world now and if the older generation can't get their heads around it, fine, but the youngsters seem to be when they are not being fed untruths/myths/hearsay from the older generation.

macaque_2

fc123 wrote: »

[/LIST]I'm sorry, I usually avoid these types of threads but the above is such an exaggeration...there is absolutely no way we are anything like the old USSR with regards to information being witheld or anything else (Peacocks clothing store is the most similar thing in the UK to the old USSR....except it has full racks all the time rather than now and again).

Have you ever lived in Communist Russia?

My SIL is Russian and I have had converations with her parents, cousins and her about what it is like living in the old USSR.

Son had an odd one with her cousin who is same age......he asked son what he did (he was at uni at the time) and son asked the same Q back he had just come back from serving his national service in Chechyna.
Shut son up for a moment.

The converstion was in a blend of Russian, English, German and sign language.
I don't want to anatagonise but we live in a far more global world now and if the older generation can't get their heads around it, fine, but the youngsters seem to be when they are not being fed untruths/myths/hearsay from the older generation.

A fair challenge and in priniciple I agree with you. We are a million miles from the intimidation that low ranking KGB officers wreaked on the old USSR. My concern is that we are heading in the wrong direction. Once government edict becomes a substitute for common sense, we are heading on a path to ruin. How can a responsible body like a local authority conclude that the letter referenced in the OP justify calling in the police. And why didn't the duty officer tell the complainant to grow up? There was a time when common sense would have killed such a complaint at birth. Now people are scared because the rules keep changing and often have little link to accepted rights and wrongs (just like ...... the old USSR).

biscit

Conrad wrote: »

I cant wait for the state to start teaching children homosexuality is normal as per the Lib Dems announcement today to make this policy - what fun.

Luckily only a bigoted , angry minority will have a problem with this, and the average man in the street is brighter and more thoughtful than that. Trouble is, bigoted angry types think they are typical and that anything that doesn't fit in with their wierd mindset is "lefty nonsense" or "biased".

Rochdale_Pioneers

shuze wrote: »

One slight fly in the ointment - Rother District Council is Conservative.

And yet here we all are listening to a tirade against politically correct lefties.

I knew Cameron had tried to reform his party, I hadn't realised he had managed to transform Tory councillors into lefties....

peterg1965

The Police are lacking common sense and discretion. This is shamless on there part. They need to go out and find criminals.