Slashdot Log In
Three Years in Prison for Posting Hatespeak
Posted by
Zonk
on Sat Oct 07, 2006 06:12 AM
from the don't-feed-the-trolls dept.
from the don't-feed-the-trolls dept.
Vainglorious Coward writes "In the UK, a man has been sentenced to three years in prison for posting inflammatory messages to a website. Pleading guilty to inciting racial hatred on a site dedicated to the memory of a murdered black teenager, the 30-year old accused stated that he was not racist, and had intended to stir up an argument on the website, but did not believe in what he had written. The defending lawyer described her client as 'isolated and living in a fantasy world, spending hours on his computer in his room where his persona could be as he made it, good or bad.'"
Related Stories
[+]
Technology: Police Using YouTube to Catch Killers 111 comments
Accommodate Students writes "The BBC is reporting on Greater Manchester police's attempts to use YouTube to catch the killers of the 15 year old, Jessie James. The video features a message from Jessie's mother Barbara Reid and sister Rosemary. BBC radio news has said this is the first time the police force have used YouTube in this way to catch criminals." Update: 10/08 07:40 GMT by Z : Sorry, misunderstood the situation. Thanks for the clarification.
This discussion has been archived.
No new comments can be posted.
The Fine Print: The following comments are owned by whoever posted them. We are not responsible for them in any way.
Full
Abbreviated
Hidden
Loading... please wait.
If only.... (Score:5, Funny)
...they'd start charging all the -1 Trolls on Slashdot. Now that would be progress.
have you metamoderated lately? (Score:5, Insightful)
Parent
No because it has flaws (Score:5, Insightful)
Basically people are modding it down since they disagree with what I'm saying, and I don't think meta moderation catches them.
Even if it does, that's no guarantee, again because of the whole groupthink thing. If a bunch of metamods decide that they don't like what I said and give props to the overrated mod then nothing happens (supposing it even shows up).
The system isn't bad, but it still has the problem that the quality of moderators is checked by other moderators.
Parent
Re:have you metamoderated lately? (Score:5, Insightful)
Parent
Crap, we have laws like that? (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:Crap, we have laws like that? (Score:5, Informative)
/Mikael
Parent
Re:Crap, we have laws like that? (Score:5, Informative)
I agree that it's sometimes great to let the nutcases say their peice in public in order to ridicule them, but we also have to protect people from violent acts by these nutcases. It's obviously a fine line- the UK (and most of Europe)'s rules differ quite a bit from those in the US.
I think the common ground here which we can all agree on is that racism is a problem, and that we want to protect the public. From there, we can have a dialog on how to best accomplish it while maintaining individual civil liberties.
Parent
incitement to violence (Score:4, Interesting)
"I believe the whole of Britain has become Dar ul-Harb (land of war [jihadwatch.org])," the Syria-born Mohammed said. Therefore, "the kafir (non-believer) has no sanctity for their own life or property," - Omar Bakri Mohammed
was Re:Crap, we have laws like that?
Parent
Re:Crap, we have laws like that? (Score:5, Insightful)
This is the key issue here. I feel sorry for the victim and his family, but I don't think what his mother said here makes any sense:
Censorship was one of Hitlers most effective tools, so equating this verdict to "stopping Hitler" is absurd.
Parent
No country had "Moral Authority" on any issue. (Score:5, Insightful)
Parent
Re:Lock up racist government terrorists first (Score:4, Interesting)
Reading a book with the word "nigger" in it (oh GROW UP already, it's just a damn word), is nowhere, not anywhere, not even close to being near what that jerk did. That jerk went on a board set up in support of a guy that was murdered and he claimed it was great, and the the victims' family ought to be murdered too.
I'm pretty sure the point of the aborted lynching scene is NOT that all niggers must burn, and that you wouldn't make anyone genuinly feel threatened for their safety by reading your book.
Parent
Re:Crap, we have laws like that? (Score:5, Insightful)
No! It isn't!
Everybody has a cause for which they believe it is worth the loss of 'smaller' liberties. But for whatever liberties we have (that do not infringe on the liberties of others), they are NEVER worth giving up.
The most important goal in any modern country should be to insure civil liberties. This is so that we can protect ourselves from the government [wikipedia.org], the entity who has the largest ability to harm us. World War II certainly was catastrophic (over 60 million casualities by some estimations), but it will be nothing compared to the suffering in the future if our population of over 6 billion becomes subject to police states. For each civil liberty that we give up, we get a step closer to that future.
Don't get me wrong, I haven't made up my mind on this particular case; I realize that some speech is considered a direct violation of people's natural rights. However, if a speech fails to rise to that threshold (and it is a very high threshold), than it ought to be free, and no number of casualities past or present should change that.
Be careful what you say; true liberties are NEVER worth giving up.
Parent
Re:Crap, we have laws like that? (Score:4, Insightful)
Sadly the idealism of pretecting yourself from your government is a long lost cause.... They could destroy your country in a second. But! as long as you don't loose your society, the goverment knows its got something to loose by mistreating you.
Parent
Re:Crap, we have laws like that? (Score:5, Insightful)
Sadly the idealism of pretecting yourself from your government is a long lost cause
This is a fundamental error that a lot of people make. The "government" isn't a group of aliens or some amorphous blob-like entity which is different from the rest of us. It is us. Its composed of people just like you and me, people who are your neighbours, friends and family. The only real difference is that they have been mandated by the rest of the people to do certain things, like enforce laws, or collect taxes. If you don't want these people to do certain things, the rest of the population needs to tell them that, change their employment contracts. Its when they refuse to listen to the rest of the people that a problem arises.
I think that three years in this case is an excessively long sentence, probably handed down by a judge trying to make an example of this man (am I the only one who feels that lawyers, lawmakers and judges are terrified of the internet for some reason?), but it could have all sorts of knock on consequences for any clown who gets his hackles raised in a flamewar with a troll on the internet, with spurious suits and wasting the time of the courts which could be better spent elsewhere.
Yes, what he said was very wrong and offensive. But three years in jail with rapists, murderers, violent criminals and drug dealers isn't going to make him any better a human being. If he was any way serious about his statements, what it will do is make him a much better connected hate monger. If he wasn't serious about his statements, he most likely will be by the time he makes it out.
The judge in this case could well be accused of knee jerk reactionism, and frankly an abuse of powers.
Parent
Re:Crap, we have laws like that? (Score:4, Interesting)
Parent
Re:Crap, we have laws like that? (Score:5, Insightful)
Parent
Not strictly accurate... (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Not strictly accurate... (Score:4, Informative)
From the article:
I think it's fair to say that makes the Slashdor summary "sentenced to three years in prison for posting inflammatory messages to a website" inaccurate.
Parent
Potty mouth vs. murder (Score:5, Insightful)
In the former case, some choose to place their faith in the government and legal system, and draw satisfaction at three years incarceration for ignorant speech, at the risk of social fragmentation.
I think the Amish community would have simply shunned such a foul-mouthed fool, without putting money into lawyer's pockets, or wasting real estate on a prison.
Social progress.
Re:Potty mouth vs. murder (Score:5, Interesting)
Maybe if you read about the murder of this guy (http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/england/merse
Parent
Re:Potty mouth vs. murder (Score:4, Informative)
Impressed by their piety, courts have permitted the Amish to live outside the law. But in some places, the group's ethic of forgive and forget has produced a plague of incest--and let many perpetrators go unpunished.
Amish forgiveness has just as much chance for arbitrary tyranny as any other system. Only a rational, secular legal system can successfully remove arbitrariness from the social order you live under.
Parent
Bizarre (Score:5, Insightful)
It sounds like the guy needs help. Trolling is one thing, but trolling on website dedicated to the memory of a recently murdered teenager? Combined with the child pornography aspect, it's very worrying indeed.
So how does locking the guy up help anyone? He may have problems but that doesn't mean he's dangerous now; conversely, if he is dangerous now, then he needs psychiatric help, not prison. In either case prison is not the answer.
How does locking someone up help (Score:5, Insightful)
Once upon a time people who were unable to lead a normal life in society were locked up in mental hospitals. But we've closed all those and replaced them with "care in the community". This policy, which in fact is implemented as "neglect in the community", has a variety of outcomes for the people concerned.
Some do actually cope with life on the outside (maybe they didn't need to be in the mental hospitals in the first place), with or without any extra support that they are lucky enough to receive. Some don't cope, and end up homeless and living on the streets, maybe dying of drug overdoses or exposure in winter. Some cope fine with keeping themselves alive but end up in prison because their behaviour, which they can't do anything about, is unacceptable to society.
Prison is generally reckoned not to be a suitable place to keep these people locked up, as you say
Parent
Re:Bizarre (Score:4, Insightful)
Yes, that's exactly what trolls in general do. Where else if they are most succssful there? It's the same thing when they troll here about Linux if it's a Linux article, or on an IMDb Star Wars original trilogy thread if it's about how good the original trilogy was. Just not as gruesome, but the very same philosophy behind it anyway.
Parent
I sense a disturbance in the force (Score:5, Funny)
hmm?? (Score:5, Funny)
How did she know that he read slashdot?
Free Speech started with an idea... (Score:5, Insightful)
*Shudder*
Eerie resemblance to "thoughtcrime"...
Re:Free Speech started with an idea... (Score:4, Insightful)
But of course. The most important thing for woman who lost her son in a senseless murder is to keep a sense of perspective and scale when some racist bastard tries to rub salt in her wounds.
Parent
Bad Summary (Score:4, Interesting)
TFA doesn't say anything about what crime in particular he was jailed for, and his sentence may have been partly or completely due to his having 33 images of child pornography on his computer.
TFA is also very lacking in details, and doesn't say anything about the reason for the search warrant, and the aforementioned lack of explanation for his sentence.
Re:Bad Summary (Score:5, Informative)
He was sentenced at Liverpool crown court to two years and eight months' in jail for the race hate crime and six months consecutively for the child pornography offences.
Parent
Why stop at race? (Score:4, Insightful)
Regardless of what you think of hate speech, once the infrastructure for persecuting people on their thoughts/attitudes/opinions is in place it becomes quite trivial to make it encompass your personal/ideological enemies. All you have to do is redefine "hate."
Anti-government speech --> anti-American speech --> hate.
Anti-religion speech --> hate.
Pro-religion speech --> hate. (look at verse X of book Y! so intolerant!)
. . .
Maybe it would would end up being more specific, or more round about, but what matters is that motivating ideology is now on the table as something that can be legislated for/against.
Sad Day in the UK (Score:5, Insightful)
Guns and speech (Score:5, Informative)
Prior to that, there had actually been a history of private firearm ownership *and legal protection for same*. See an historian's book about UK/US firearm regulation history [barnesandnoble.com] for details. The Glorious Revolution produced a charter of rights guaranteeing weapons posession (by Protestants only, but that's another issue). This is all well documented but almost forgotten.
(Not to mention that our notions about using force in self-defense come from UK law).
The US may be unusually devoted to free speech, but our reasons come from your own philosopher John Stuart Mill. For one thing, the arguments on the side of good (e.g. cooperation among racial groups) need to be refined and tested against counter-arguments to make sure they will convince people and thus improve society. For another, it's important to know how widespread racism actually is. Driving something underground only gives you the illusion of safety. For another, it's also good speech that can be unpopular. In 1830 you abolished slavery, after decades of abolitionists speaking against the "property rights" of slavers and calling them names. Fortunately the abolitionists were not suppressed for "hate speech".
The US also has a problem that makes regulation of speech dangerous. Some people here are far too quick to label any criticism as being racist. Fallacious scientific research, objections to affirmative action, and references to the Mafia have all drawn allegations of racism. Hernstein and Murray deserve to be exposed as wrong, not to be imprisoned. Affirmative action may not be working the way it's supposed to and that's a subject that needs careful discussion to protect everyone's rights.
Parent
In other news (Score:4, Insightful)
Note to 'Free Speech!' activists (Score:4, Insightful)
While I am all for Free Speech, there is a limit when someone starts actually calling for murdering specific persons. According to TFA, the perpetrator posted in response to the killing of Anthony Walker, a black teenager:
That's incitement to murder, hardly a category of protected speech.
Re:Note to 'Free Speech!' activists (Score:4, Insightful)
Only if there is a reasonable chance that it might actually incite someone to murder.
Considering that the writer was essentially a random net.kook posting his "incitement" on a website specificly for mourning the death of a member of that family, it is extremely unlikely that he would have convinced anyone to go out and kill the rest of the family because of it.
If just saying someone should be killed is incitement to murder, just about every talk-radio host would be in prison by now.
Parent
Brandenbug v. Ohio (Score:5, Insightful)
That's incitement to murder, hardly a category of protected speech.
Just calling for violence doesn't automatically exempt speech from protection - SCOTUS ruled [firstamendmentcenter.org] in 1969 that "[f]reedoms of speech and press do not permit a State to forbid advocacy of the use of force or of law violation except where such advocacy is directed to inciting or producing imminent lawless action and is likely to incite or produce such action."
One can hardly argue that a posting on a web forum is an incitement to imminent lawless action - if he had been speaking at a rally of armed white supremacists who were already whipped into a race-hate frenzy, his ass would be hanging out in the breeze, but in this situation he would be untouched in the US. I doubt there would even be an investigation. One of the few good things left about this country - I don't agree with his beliefs; I find them downright repugnant, but I believe he has every right to express them and certainly don't think he's crossed the line in this case.
Parent
State enforcement of morals (Score:4, Insightful)
Its my right to hate who ever i want, for any reason i want, AND to tell people about it. You dont like what i say? Then dont read/listen
Free Speech and other silly ideas (Score:5, Insightful)
- Voltaire
A quaint idea in todays world.
In the US if you were thinking the wrong thing at the time you commit a crime, your guilty of a hate crime. In France you can be charged with a crime for selling, and or distributing NAZI items. This UK example isn't unique to that isle. The ideal of free speech is being eroded, and nothing shows that more than the self censorship and reaction to the Mohammad cartoons.
It causes myself to ask questions like -
If we do not shun, or speak out against vile (but currently legal) speech, do we eventually loose the right to hear such speech because the state steps in?
Why are we (as a society) so afraid of words and their potential impact? Are we so imature, violent and framented that speech alone will destroy the cohesion of our societey?
While there are aspects of this case that seem to cry out for some attention, on the face of it, this guy committed a thought crime and is being sent to jail for it.
cluge
Re:Trolls (Score:4, Informative)
If you read the article, it talks about child pornography as well, so I do not say it was unfair in this case.
Parent
Re:Trolls (Score:5, Insightful)
It is very uncommon to get in trouble for written text or speech. To get in trouble, what you say or write must have the potential to cause violence against minorities.
The reason is of course the Nazi history, which led to a stronger emphasis of the protection of an individual's dignity and safety.
However, there was an interesting verdict in Germany recently, where public display of anti-constitutional symbols (read: the swastika, SS runes or similar) is illegal except for educational or artistic purposes. The owner of a mail-order shop was fined 3600 euros for selling anti-nazi items that contained the swastika (crossed out, thrown in a trash can, etc). The court ruled it was commercial distribution of an anti-constitutional symbol. Reactions to the verdict were between disbelieve and outrage and the Minister of Justice suggested that if the verdict holds, the law would have to be changed.
If you read the article, it talks about child pornography as well, so I do not say it was unfair in this case.
See, and that's quite a similar thing. One could argue child pornography was freedom of expression, at least as long as the children weren't harmed. But luckily, society has agreed on giving the protection of children a higher priority than pedophiles' "right" to look at such material. Similarly, European societies have agreed on giving the protection of minorities a higher priority than racists' "right" to express their hatred against them -- because last time we didn't, it didn't turn out well.
What a society deems acceptable, or what it considers an individual's fundamental right, is based on it's culture and historic experience. Europe's history was very violent, with millions brutally murdered by the Nazis out of hatred against political, religious and racial minorities. That this experience had an effect on its culture can't come as a surprise to anyone. That this is reflected in its laws is only natural, especially since these laws have been written directly after WW II.
Likewise, what US society sees as its fundamental rights, like "unlimited" Free Speech (which really isn't unlimited at all), or the "right" to bear arms, has its roots in the experience of King George's reign. Its strong Christian roots, on the other hand, have resulted in laws against sexual expression which most Europeans would find utterly ridiculous, like that you're not allowed to sell penis shaped vibrators in Texas and that you have to pretend dildos are to educate about proper condom use.
Parent
Re:Trolls (Score:5, Insightful)
You have to understand that this concept is very hard for Americans to wrap their head around. Americans tend to think in absolutes. It stems from our deeply religious past but also that our founding fathers believed in "natural rights"; there are certain "inalienable" rights that exist independent of our human institutions. This belief motivated the framers of our Constitution to codify these rights in the Bill of Rights.
So when you say something like "well it's up to society to determine what are rights and what should be prohibited" simply does not compute to most Americans. Our rights are our rights by some "divine right" and not to be determined by the whims of society.
Parent
Re:Trolls (Score:5, Insightful)
You have to understand that this concept is very hard for Americans to wrap their head around. Americans tend to think in absolutes. It stems from our deeply religious past but also that our founding fathers believed in "natural rights"; there are certain "inalienable" rights that exist independent of our human institutions. This belief motivated the framers of our Constitution to codify these rights in the Bill of Rights.
I don't think we really see it that differently in Europe. It's just that where these rights conflict, like here Freedom of Speech and Human Dignity or the Right to Live, the priorities are different in some rare cases ("Hate Speech" really is the only one I can think of).
So when you say something like "well it's up to society to determine what are rights and what should be prohibited" simply does not compute to most Americans. Our rights are our rights by some "divine right" and not to be determined by the whims of society.
But it seems like society does that all the time. I'd say that with Sex and Drugs, you're generally better off in Europe. In Germany we don't have a general speed limit. We're allowed beer at 16. You can say swear words and show nudity on TV. There are several parties you can vote for to represent you in parliament...
From an outside perspective, it seems there are parts of US society which have a huge influence on what must be considered, if not illegal, then at least political or commercial suicide.
Parent
Re:Trolls (Score:4, Funny)
Parent
Re:Trolls (Score:5, Insightful)
Rubbish. Millions of people, famous and average, have said, openly and freely, that he is a bad president. They were not punished for it. Thousands of people have suggested that he should be impeached, openly and freely, and they have not been punished for it. Some people have even said that he should be murdered, and despite the fact that that would probably get you in trouble if you were talking about someone else, they were not punished for it.
Parent
Re:Trolls (Score:4, Informative)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sedition_Act_of_1918 [wikipedia.org]
The Sedition Act was repealed in 1921. Although the Sedition Act was upheld by the US Supreme Court in Schenck v. United States, most legal experts view the Sedition Act as being antithetical to the letter and spirit of the United States Constitution, specifically the 1st Amendment of the Bill of Rights.
And allow me to speak freely when I say that anyone wishing (albeit minor) financial support for a coup of my state or federal government, I'd be overjoyed to contribute. I'm positively sure that this is inciting violence under some reading of your laws, but under mine the only exception to the first amendment is falsely presenting a clear and imminent danger in order to severely disturb the peace.
Parent
Die President Die (Score:5, Funny)
Parent
Re:Trolls (Score:5, Interesting)
Parent
Re:All round nice guy (Score:5, Informative)
Anthony Walker was a nice black kid, waiting at a bus stop with a couple of white friends when a bunch of thugs starting shouting racist abuse at them. After they attempted to walk away from the abuse, the thugs chased then down, and murdered Walker by plunging an ice pick into his head.
It was a shockingly brutal and unprovoked attack that shocked the vast majority of people in the country.
Then less than a week after this happens, this guy anonymously posts on a memorial website that white people should celebrate the murder, that Anthony's family should be burned and made references to slavery and a "banana boat".
Parent
Re:All round nice guy (Score:4, Insightful)
The issue here is not whether people should sympathize with the troll, it's whether people should imprison him for three years. Of course he's contemptible. That can be different from being criminal.
Parent