South Korean Man Given Suspended Sentence For Retweeting NK Propaganda 90
tukang writes "Park Jung-geun, 24, of South Korea has been given a 10 month suspended prison sentence for violating the country's National Security Law, which prohibits 'praising, encouraging or propagandizing' North Korea, by retweeting over 100 North Korean propaganda posts."
Re:Different Counties Have Different Laws. (Score:2, Informative)
Canada also has laws against disrespecting the queen (more specifically, alarming her in any way). There's also a law that says you may not be in a residential area at night (prowling), amongst other silly laws that rarely get enforced. Let's not forget the hate speech laws...
This doesn't mean these countries (including mine) aren't absolutely idiotic for having them.
Re:Different Counties Have Different Laws. (Score:4, Informative)
Canada also has laws against disrespecting the queen (more specifically, alarming her in any way). There's also a law that says you may not be in a residential area at night (prowling), amongst other silly laws that rarely get enforced. Let's not forget the hate speech laws...
This doesn't mean these countries (including mine) aren't absolutely idiotic for having them.
There are a lot of crazy people who, for some reason, like discharging unloaded firearms at or in the presence of royalty. I think it has happened to Queen Elizabeth at least once and it happened to Queen Victoria a few times, and neither perpetrator was doing it for any other reason than being crazy. Basically, since the firearm was unloaded, it was was not an attack, but discharging firearms or making loud noises like that around the head of state is usually not a good thing for anyone. That is why countries associated with the UK may have laws about "alarming" the monarch, because the usual cause of the alarm involves explosions, firearms, or situations that are particular to being a head of state.
I agree, though, there are a lot of silly laws out there, but something like lese majeste, used to be a very serious crime when monarchies were not as constitutional as they are now, and even most common people might call for it to be enforced. In Thailand, they still make great use of that law, but ironically, it is actually used more by the elected government against people criticizing the country than by the King himself. The King frequently pardons people accused of that crime. Of course, with everything having to do with Thailand, it is not entirely certain how much the King is involved in the actual governance. Some people think he's purely a figurehead, except his great popularity, and some think that he's quietly running the whole thing himself.