A disciplinary committee in the UK just suspended London Mayor Ken Livingstone for a month and fined him £80,000 for likening a reporter, who’s Jewish, with a concentration-camp guard. The local papers are shocked at the precedent of an electorate’s will being overruled by an unelected tribunal. I am also shocked that the cause is speech. Says The Guardian’s Mark Lawson:
It’s worth remembering that when Bill Clinton was threatened with removal from office by the members of the House and Senate - over allegations of serious sexual and legal error - considerable concern was expressed about whether even elected representatives had the right to overturn the will of the people as expressed in an election.
The Times editorial:
That such a sentence should be passed on him not by London’s electors, but anonymous officials after a costly tribunal into his behaviour is, though, ludicrous.
The Telegraph’s leader:
In a democracy, people should be free to vote for whom they wish, and politicians to act as they please within the law.
: And tonight on Bill Maher’s show, Irshad Manji ties the discussion of Holocaust denier David Irving to this: Another man said more stupid things and is jailed.
: One more: Telegraph columnist Simon Heffer ties together the tales of Irving and a media steambath over Prince Charles’ leaked critical diary of a China visit.
For two Englishmen, this has been a week when freedom of speech has come at a high price….Let us start with Herr Irving…. [T]he notion that he has been locked up for taking such an irresponsible, stupid and offensive view of history is appalling. The best way to guard against anti-Semitism is to let people such as Irving have their say. I doubt that a single anti-Semite has been created by reading any of Irving’s works. Indeed, it is far more likely that his every utterance has reinforced hatred of Nazism and Nazi doctrines, which is why he is more useful to humanity outside jail than in it.
What he and the Prince of Wales have in common is that the unlovely band of hysterics in pursuit of them prevent any such objective view of their behaviour.
The defense of speech usually comes to speech we do not like and that is fine for such speech does not hurt us. And isn’t that the lesson we should be demonstrating to all the cartoon rioters and murderers?
I will say it again:
The cold of the chill is more dangerous than the heat of the hate. I believe that a free marketplace of speech will succeed where a closed and controlled public square will fail.
One big exception: he did spoke as the mayor of London not as private citizen. as such he have some responsibilities and limits and which he apparently violated.
The problem is that all this punishment actually playing to the hands of people like Irving and Livingston. It would be better just to ignore them. But the suspension of Livingston isn’t the same as Jailing Irving.
tell that to larry summers!
As a resident of London I understand your point but please allow me to savor the moment of watching this horse’s ass be hoisted upon his own petard.
I for once wished that people could get this right: Irving distorted history to suit his own racist views- and that is fraud and the reason why he was jailed. Of course he should not have been jailed, being made bankrupt is enough of a punishment and does not make him look like an martyr of freedom of expression.
that said….. as loathsome as Ken Livingstone is, he should not have been suspended for being an offensive horse’s ass. like the market, we can all vote and choose to remove him from office - his suspension is un-democratic. same goes for Irving - he only becomes a martyr. for all the so-called sophistication and nuance my european brethren hold no candle to the maturity of the US when it comes to these matters.
Irving goes to jail, Livingstone gets “suspended” and meanwhile the Muslim savages in this blood curdling video user their freedom of speech to call for jihad:
http://littlegreenfootballs.com/weblog/?entry=19405_Cartoon_Madness_on_Video&only
London looks more like Gaza every day. Here is multiculturalism in all its glory.
You can add in the new flap over the broadcasting of a PBS documentary about the Armenian Massacre by Turkey. Apparently having a debate after the broadcast wasn’t enough “fairness”.
The pressure groups have gotten the program cancelled in LA, acccording to today’s NY Times.
Remember also that the UK doesn’t have a first amendment type of right. There was the stupid restriction on IRA members speaking on the air a few years ago. So the BBC hired actors to read their words.
The problem is deciding if there is a need for restricting inflamatory speech vs insulting or racist speech. The “crying fire in a crowded theater” test. Even if one were to chose to restrict inflamatory speech there is still the issue of is it meant to inspire direct action or only to rouse the ire of the followers. If they become inflamed and do something much later can it be traced back to the speeches. That was apparently the test used on the Muslim cleric just jailed in the UK.
It would seem that allowing rather than disallowing should be the norm and only things that promote immediate civil unrest should be limited.
The problem is deciding if there is a need for restricting inflamatory speech vs insulting or racist speech.
How would you define “insulting” speech when there are idiotic elements in large numbers that are insulted by Winnie the Pooh’s images?
Too damn bad. Somebody, somewhere is insulted by something every day. And racist speech?…….the MSM hasn’t censored Louis Farrakhan? Why the double standard?
Show images in the context of a story. Write what you want. That’s what a free press is all about - not the craven dhimmiscribes that self-censor and hide under their desks?
If certain elements of your audience don suicide belts, then they’ve as excercised their free speech and law enforcement will deal with it. Should we muzzle our speech just so they’ll behave?
Oh, and who should be appointed to decide what’s fit to say and print, your “need” editor?
Let me try this again:
The problem is deciding if there is a need for restricting inflamatory speech vs insulting or racist speech.
How would you define “insulting†speech when there are idiotic elements in large numbers that are insulted by Winnie the Pooh’s images?
Too damn bad. Somebody, somewhere is insulted by something every day. And racist speech?…….the MSM hasn’t censored Louis Farrakhan? Why the double standard?
Show images in the context of a story. Write what you want. That’s what a free press is all about - not the craven dhimmiscribes that self-censor and hide under their desks?
If certain elements of your audience don suicide belts, then they’ve as excercised their free speech and law enforcement will deal with it. Should we muzzle our speech just so they’ll behave?
Oh, and who should be appointed to decide what’s fit to say and print, your “need†editor?
This is just another proof that Muslims are correct when talking about double standards in European countries. In the name of freedom of speech one can attack and ridicule Muslims. But when dares attack Jews or Christians they are immediately sent to justice.
This blatant hipocrisy can only widen the divide between the Western world and Arab and Muslim countries. This is also the reason that, while I’m a Catholic from Spain, I boycott Danish products.
Pablo,
The only thing dviding the Western and Islamic world is the primitive barbarism of the Islamic world.
Since you hate double standards so much, I’m sure you’ll find some peace of mind when sharia law reigns once again over al-Andalus.
Pablo,
And BTW, you’re looking for double-standards, than compare the treatment of Muslims in the West versus the treatment of Christians, Jews, Hindus, Buddhists and others in the Islamic world.
You are such an idiot.
[...] WIERDNESS: “A disciplinary committee in the UK just suspended London Mayor Ken Livingstone for a month and fined him £80,000 for likening a reporter, who’s Jewish, with a concentration-camp guard. The local papers are shocked at the precedent of an electorate’s will being overruled by an unelected tribunal. I am also shocked that the cause is speech” …. (buzzmachine) [...]
HA, your reply is just the one I expected. It sounds like president Bush declaring that “if you’re not with us, you’re against us”.
What do dictatorial and totalitarian regimes in the Arab world have to do with ridiculing Mohamed? In your view, the fact that I criticize Danish newspapers means that I also support Arab governments. What kind of twisted and simplistic view is that? Can’t one criticize both racist Danish newspapers and totalitarian Arab regimes? Is this incompatible? Should we also punish all Christians because 60 years ago Germany carried out the worst war in human history? Should we also publish a cartoon depicting Jesus together with Hitler killing millions of Jews or Soviets just because Hitler was christian?
The case is not about Arab societies not being free but about a racist, unimportant and megalomaniac “journalist” in Denmark that thought we were in the 11th century and wanted to start a crusade against “evil” Muslims. Why did he refuse to publish cartoons ridiculing Jesus? He deliberately chose to attack Muslims (which is of course his damn right), reflecting the deeper racist sentiment that prevails in Denmark and the other Scandinavian countries, except Finland.
All other excuses are simple hypocrisy. The message that Europeans send the Arab world is an Orwelian “all religions are equal but Islam significantly less than the others”. Since I don’t have any other means to attack racist Danes, I boycott their products.
Go to http://www.arlafoods.com to see the effects of boycotts on the Danish dairy industry
[...] In a few posts lately, I have connected the apparently unconnected incidents of the riots and deaths over the alleged offense of the Mohamed cartoons, the David Irving imprisonment over Holocaust denial, and the suspension of Mayor Ken Livingstone in London over an offensive insult. In today’s Guardian, Timothy Garton Ash writes an eloquent column that also ties together these threats to chill speech under what he calls the “creeping tyranny of the group veto.” And he adds one more case, a story that has been getting much attention here in the U.K.: The bravery of a teenager to stand up against animal-rights fanatics and to stand for research and science, which has led to counterdemonstrations in favor of reason. Ash writes after watching this counterprotest in favor of an animal-research lab at Oxford: …I was proud of the demonstrators who were reminding my university what, at best, it is still about: the pursuit of truth and the defence of reason. Protests against student loans or higher rents - these we expect. But here were students turning out on a chilly Saturday morning to stand up for science. [...]
And now Don Imus got the boot for making racist remarks (insult?). An ordinary Joe hurling racist or inflammatory remarks is one thing but a public figure doing the same is something that needs to be stopped. For the simple reason that his/her audience is quite large and could stir their opinion immensely.