The leak of the Police Scotland training materials telling officers they should target actors and comedians for ‘hate speech’ under the new law coming into force on April 1st has intensified concerns that the draconian legislation will kill comedy. The Telegraph‘s Dominic Cavendish has more.
When the Herald newspaper published its report on March 19th, advising that “Police Scotland’s officers are being told they should target actors and comedians under Scotland’s new hate crime laws”, the comedian Al Murray delivered a pithy, pretty unprintable response on X: “F___ this.” Later he elaborated: “I normally suck my teeth at the ‘haven’t you got anything better to do copper?’ reflex, but for this I make the exception…” He added: “It’ll mean the law looking daft.”
To recap: legislation due to come into force on April 1st (the Hate Crime and Public Order (Scotland) Act) entails a new offence of “stirring up hatred against a group of persons based on the group being defined by reference to race, colour, nationality (including citizenship), or ethnic or national origins”.
An offence may also be committed if hatred is stirred up against a group bearing these characteristics: age, disability, religion (or perceived religious affiliation), sexual orientation, transgender identity and variations in sex characteristics. Those convicted can expect to face fines and/or a prison sentence of up to seven years. These groups (except age, a new group added by the new laws) are currently protected to some degree by specific laws which the new offence consolidates.
In the face of initial resistance to the proposed legislation, which saw then Justice Secretary (now First Minister) Humza Yousaf roundly criticised, with Rowan Atkinson joining the fightback, modifications were made and legal provision given for freedom of expression to be protected. But the Herald report suggested that Police Scotland’s officers would indeed investigate actors and comedians if complaints are made; the leaked training material referenced the “public performance of a play” as an example of how hateful material could be communicated.
“When I turned down a safe space contract from SOAS in 2018 to make the point that our ability to make jokes is being threatened by a creeping climate of authoritarian censorship, many in the comedy industry laughed at me,” Konstantin Kisin, the Russian-British comedian and co-host of the Triggernometry podcast, tells me. “They’re not laughing now.”
Police Scotland issued a statement insisting that it wasn’t “instructing officers to target comedians, or any other people or groups” – but this hasn’t been conclusively reassuring to those following the issue closely.
As Andrew Doyle, the comedian, broadcaster and a published authority on free speech (he dwells in detail on the legislation in The New Puritans) points out: “I wasn’t surprised [by the Herald report]. The sub-section on the public performance of a play was flagged in 2020. Roddy Dunlop QC, wrote about how an old-fashioned ‘Scotsman, Irishman and Englishman’ joke would be perceived as discriminatory.
“We’ve always known this could affect comedians. Humza Yousaf was asked about this concept of stirring up hatred through the medium of theatre and he said it was conceivable that neo-Nazis might stage a play in order to radicalise people, which shows how little he understands neo-Nazis. All that has happened is that the materials from recent police training sessions have been leaked and become news. People don’t believe it until they see it.”
Worth reading in full.
Andrew Doyle has elaborated on his comments further in UnHerd:
Many of us have been sounding the alarm over the SNP’s draconian measures since the bill was proposed in early 2020. The Scottish Police Federation warned that the effects of the bill would be tantamount to the “policing of what people think or feel”, and the Law Society of Scotland called it a “significant threat to freedom of expression”. Senior Catholic bishops, meanwhile, pointed out that the story of Sodom and Gomorrah might be deemed hateful towards homosexuals and so even owning a copy of the Bible could be criminalised.
As for comedians, Roddy Dunlop KC cautioned that stand-up would not be exempt, and that even the old “Scotsman, Irishman and Englishman” joke would be perceived as discriminatory. But in the face of all this criticism, Humza Yousaf (who was then Justice Secretary) was dogged in his determination to see the bill pass.
Naturally, supporters of the SNP scoffed at the suggestion that anyone would be arrested for simply expressing controversial opinions or telling jokes. The police have said they will not target performers, but at the same time have promised to investigate all complaints. This is, of course, precisely the problem. Activists have already pledged to weaponise the new law to see J.K. Rowling prosecuted for the “crime” of referring to a man as male (in this case the former Big Brother contestant and online troll India Willoughby). Solicitor Rajan Barot replied to Rowling on Twitter/X, stating that any of her posts in which Willoughby was referred to as a man would be “amenable to prosecution in Scotland” after April 1st. “Start deleting!” he demanded. The SNP has effectively reintroduced blasphemy laws by stealth, only now it is in the name of the new state religion of Critical Social Justice.
Also worth reading in full.
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Macron has exempted the POLICE from the mandatory jab…….
…….and then sends them to crush resistance to the mandatory jab.
I can think of nothing that reeks greater of despotism, injustice and dishonesty.
Any unjabbed police oppressing these protesters are total hypocrites.
Only in the cities. The Police nationale who police the cities are exempt but “encouraged” to be vaccinated, the Gendarmerie who police everywhere else were mandated to be vaccinated by 15 September https://www.crashdebug.fr/covid-19-les-gendarmes-obliges-de-se-vacciner-avant-le-15-septembre-les-policiers-incites-actu17-fr
Why are the police exempt?
Just a cockup Toby?
Macron’s only reaction to people protesting anything is send in the riot police. He has been doing this before COVID already and he has generally been extremely aggressive regarding any COVID policies. French president trying to suppress protest with heavy-handed policing doesn’t say anything about the actions of the UK government.
Not literally no; however this is a global pattern. Hardly unrelated discrete events. Coercion and fear everywhere. In the UK there is less protest and violence but the gov is just as culpable and more insidious. A cockup is a very poor description wherever you turn.
There’s no global pattern: The people engaging in COVID gymnastics don’t even control all of the USA, let alone all of the world. That countries all over the globe implement global policies the WHO and interested parties in the USA are pushing in somewhat different ways is certainly not a surprise.
But that doesn’t turn Boris & The Bunglers into evil masterminds of a global conspiracy (invented by the so-called American right and heavily propagated on the internet). I’m not even sure about that, though, all this “Waahh! It’s a conspiracy!” could as well be a very effective diversionary strategy of the branch covidians designed to occupy as many people and resources as possible with harmless (to them) nonsense in order to get them out of the way.
So you are a Covidian Nominalist. There is no common ‘Universal’ conspiracy, it just seems like everyone is being oppressed for the same reason, at the same time.
Forgive me, but that’s just a tad obtuse.
There is no need for conspiracy to explain the handling of protests in France and other countries: police is there to uphold the law; stupid laws are in force that ban protests; the reason for the stupid laws is the (somewhat) stupid belief that mass gatherings increase spread of COVID-19.
Logically, what would YOU do, if you believe in the premises and your goal is to curb the spread and uphold “law and order”? Let all the crazy protesters gather lawlessly and make the spread bigger? Potentially transform into a full blown riot, too? Possibly also fueled by some foreign secret service which does not like your country very much and likes to place more violent protesters and agitators between the peaceful ones? It is a domestic problem, but of course, the root cause is stupid lawmaking. That the lawmaking is stupid everywhere does not require conspiracy either, they just copy each other in a senseless attempt to show how they are “fighting the pandemic” to their more stupid voters.
So it’s less of a conspiracy and more of a show of utter incompetence and lack of planning, especially with regards to collateral damage. They can do it as long as the collateral damage does not fall on their asses, which it won’t, as they have successfully managed to deflect all responsibility and are now in a divide-and-conquer situation where a dumb majority is turned against an oppressed minority. Simply as a convenient scapegoat to divert attention to cover up all the egregious mistakes and corruption they have enabled since the beginning of this fiasco. It’s all a huge cover-your-ass action, and you would behave the same if you had ruined a country and stolen big amounts of money in a recent time. The worst scenario that the politicians must deal with is themselves being brought to justice, everything else follows from this fear.
I get your argument. I myself was unconvinced of ‘the conspiracy’ (mainly as a conscious way of staying sane), but the actions of the government have been truly insane and seem to be veiled in propaganda, lies, coercion, and blustering way beyond mere ‘cockup’ territory. The recent reversal on the passports was my red line into allowing myself to think it could be a conspiracy. And why couldn’t it be? Maybe it’s both? Or neither? Let’s see.
The main phenomenological cause of a ‘conspiracy perception’ is the global nature of the virus, the pan-national response, and the power and reach of global media and the internet, which is unprecedented and truly head-spinning. We seek a total, overall, neat solution, in realtime. Maybe our descriptions are hokum, or maybe they aren’t so far fetched. Taken rationally, it is unwise to jump to conclusions about the situation, but we can’t minimise the evil that is going on, either, which is the danger in seeing all this is ‘mere politics’ or ‘mere civil unrest’.
The risk is we get split up into factions, some focusing on science, politics, others on theology, some on passports, others on whatever, when unity is actually required. But my point is that I think we can agree that what’s happening is deeply wrong, even if we express our ideas differently. So I am open to both the ‘nominalist’ and ‘realist’ visions of explaining Covidianism, but also to real events, people, and the ’emotional’ side. Let’s crack on and hold them to account.
Did the fact that the subset of people on this planet affected by Corona policies all experience the same pandemic at the same time and get the same health advice from the same people already occur to you? Plus – obviously – they’re also largely part of the global influence sphere of the USA and it’s the domestic policy of the current US government. And such domestic policies of the good Americans always get picked up by their avid, cosplaying fans all over the world.
That’s why there’s BLM in Germany despite no German state ever had any relation to the atlantic slave trade and associated industries. That’s something the Americans obviously don’t care about as their world is the USA. And these Germans also don’t care about it. Americans have BLM! We want some, too!!
BTW, switching from arguments, however weak they might be, to namecalling and general insults is a classic disinformation tactic.
Sorry to offend, but I did refer to ‘that’ [view] being obtuse: not you personally. But my argument is strong.
After all, at the heyday of slavery, Germany did not exist. Yet Germans did — and they played their part in the transatlantic slave trade.
It all started in 1682, with the founding of the African Company by the grand elector of Brandenburg-Prussia, Frederick William. Determined to rival Europe’s great sea powers, he ordered the establishment of a fort on the coast of present-day Ghana, to be named Groß Friedrichsburg. The fort was designed to serve as a point of departure for the German slave trade. In the decades that followed, German slave ships, such as the Friedrich III, transported thousands of African slaves overseas. Many of them ended up on the slave market of St. Thomas, in the Virgin Islands, over which Prussia gained control from Denmark in 1685. For some time, St. Thomas had the dubious distinction of being the most important slave market in the world.
On the logic of the ‘not a conspiracy’ people Hitler did not personally order the Holocaust directly. He just moved his arm to sign some documents with a pen.
“There’s no global pattern”
Yes there is for much of the USA, Canada, Europe, Australasia. Finland is 100% face masks and non-stop propaganda from the Government.
We all know Covid doesn’t exist – it’s a mass psychosis. Everyone is controlled by fear – fear of a virus, and the fear that if you declare it to be fake that the Government will ‘deal’ with you. First they will inject your children to show you they have absolute power over you.
Quite: it is obvious that the serfs keep hitting the gendarme’s batons with their heads. Clearly not an organized squad of the SS picking on modern-day Jews under government orders!
Do you think Toby Young reads the comments on this site? He’s probably too busy counting his Pfizer shares.
Who knows? We do know that he thinks it is just a cockup, from previous articles published here.
“The reaction of the French riot police to the peaceful protestors is extremely aggressive, reminiscent of the Met’s Territorial Support Group“
Again, this is how you know whether you are a genuine dissenter against elite misrule (in which case the regime will crack down on you hard, the police hierarchy will pass that message down the line, and rank and file police officers will know that you are not “protected” and they will not face consequences for treating you abusively), or just a member of a bullying mob trying to push elite dogmas, to intimidate resisters and to push the existing policies harder, in which case police will kowtow to you, “take the knee” and protect you against people trying to stop you disrupting their lives.
For the latter, see the bullying mobs pushing causes that are already politically dominant, such as BLM and XR. They don’t need to demonstrate at all, because their causes are already supported at the highest levels, but they seek to signal their virtue and further suppress resistance. For the former, protesters against covid panic measures, and those for almost any conservative or traditionalist cause.
‘We TOLD police we’d block M25 again – and they still let us go!’: Gloating Insulate Britain eco-zealots boast bungling officers let them walk out of custody for a second time in a week – despite explicitly vowing to block motorways AGAIN when released
PROTEST! (But on MY terms and for MY cause). The ear-splitting whine of the hard-done-by “conservative or traditionalist” aka ‘right’ fake libertarians. The pot to the government kettle.
“The ear-splitting whine “
Gosh, playground abuse again! From RickH!” Whodathought?
And yet the facts remain – BLM and XR “protesters” disrupt others’ lives pushing for yet more of the policies that are already being pushed by the regime, and get kid glove treatment, while true dissenters get beaten up just for marching, and headteachers are advised to call police if they even suspect protesters might turn up outside schools where jabs are to be inflicted on children without parental consent.
But personal abuse is so much easier than addressing uncomfortable and inconvenient truths.
This is great coverage. Unfortunately, I took a quick look scan the main French rags on Sunday and didn’t see a mention anywhere.
france is so much worse than us
disturbing video. decent people
It seems that their people are braver – and hence their politicians are running scared, hence the thugs dressed as gendarmes.
In time the UK will mirror France. Our Passport is just a few weeks into the future.
My brother-in-law lives in France. It is as shown here. Disgraceful! There will be a reckoning for those organising and complicit in this tyranny – world-wide.
Hats off to the French for trying to uphold liberté, égalité and fraternité.
C19 VAXX GENOCIDE – Idaho doctor reports a ‘20 times increase’ of cancer in vaccinated patients
https://yvymaraey.blogspot.com/2021/09/idaho-doctor-reports-20-times-increase.html
A doctor has found an increase in cancers since the COVID-19 inoculation rollout.
On March 18, Dr. Ryan Cole, a board-certified pathologist and owner and operator of a diagnostics lab, reported to the public in a video produced by Idaho state government’s “Capitol Clarity” project, that he is seeing a massive ‘uptick’ in various autoimmune diseases and cancers in patients who have been vaccinated.
“Since January 1, in the laboratory, I’m seeing a 20 times increase of endometrial cancers over what I see on an annual basis,” reported Dr. Cole in the video clip shared on Twitter.
“I’m not exaggerating at all because I look at my numbers year over year, I’m like ‘Gosh, I’ve never seen this many endometrial cancers before’,” he continued.
Explaining his findings at the March 18 event, Cole told Idahoans that the vaccines seem to be causing serious autoimmune issues, in a way he described as a “reverse HIV” response.
Cole explained that two types of cells are required for adequate immune system function: “Helper T-cells,” also called “CD4 cells,” and “killer T-cells,” often known as “CD8 cells.”
According to Cole, in patients with HIV, there is a massive suppression of “helper T-cells” which cause immune system functions to plummet, and leave the patient susceptible to a variety of illnesses.
Similarly, Cole describes, “post-vaccine, what we are seeing is a drop in your killer T-cells, in your CD8 cells,”
“And what do CD8 cells do? They keep all other viruses in check,” he continued…….read more in the link
Have you noticed that Drs McCullogh, Cole, Ardis, Fleming, Martin, Profs Malone, Woldag and co speak with no notes, that they blink very little if at all, and yet the level of detail they relate is simply phenomenal. A big advantage they have is they don’t appear to be running for election.
So MTF et al of similar ilk, that is one of the ways I judge people – they know what they are talking about, and there is no “shuffling of feet” as with Johnson, Whitty, Vallance and others when they lie to camera.
“In whom do you place your trust?”
There is talk of half a million at least on the streets this weekend. The fllow through of the health workers dismissals has been the final straw for some. Zemmour ( a sort of French Tucker Carlson) is the new hope for toppling Macron next year. His popularity is soaring.
Will they have elections? Will they just keep having states of emergencies and put them off? If they have them, will they not be fixed via online chicanery?
Half a million? And they still can’t get one man? (Macron)
Zemmour allegedly has super-wealthy backers like Macron did https://www.crashdebug.fr/zemmour-demasque-une-enquete-revele-que-sa-campagne-est-geree-par-des-puissants-banquiers-de-rothschild – that’s according to Radio France who are about as reliable as the BBC.
Personally I think that people should not befriend the police and politicians, not let their children play with their children, not serve them in shops, and make the police and politicians the pariahs of society. I echo here the word the French lady in the video who says she is being made a pariah in society (0m34s) by the politicians and police.
What is happening in many countries is simply evil. A demonstration that western nations are no longer “democracies” but have turned into authoritarian states more akin to to the 1930s…
I read Ordinary Men last year. Anyone in a Police uniform is a threat as far as I’m concerned, they are not to be trusted.
Just following orders was not just a problem for the 20th Century German’s.
Meanwhile the BBC reports that the French see little disruption and it it all be OK.
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-58581682
what is also concerning is Italy is all workers are to required show a Covid passport.
This is despite the EU saying that passports (or whatever they want to be called) are to be used only for monitoring vaccine efficacy, potential side effects and adverse events;
they also said that (EU) citizens are informed that the vaccination is not mandatory and that no one is under political, social or other pressure to be vaccinated if they do not wish to do so. Going further to state, they should ensure that no one is discriminated against for not having been vaccinated, due to possible health risks or not wanting to be vaccinated;
https://pace.coe.int/en/files/29004/html
Here is my QR code should anyone want to use it.
That has made my morning – Salut ( not good at Italian)
Viva la Revolution! Meanwhile, in Australia, nationwide protests are planned for this Saturday (against lockdowns, masks, vaccine passports and the whole ‘social distancing’ catastrophe) because the Zero Covid mentality of our wise rulers refuses to concede that the war against the virus is lost.
The state of Victoria in particular is going all in on suppression of the virus by the suppression of the people. In a desperate bid to stop the protest in the Melbourne CBD, the Great Leader (the Labor Party’s Dan Andrews) is imposing an 8am to 2pm curfew in the city and erecting a ‘ring of steel’ to prevent access by blocking key roads with crash-barriers, cancelling or rerouting public transport, and packing the heart of Melbourne with police, fine-books at the ready and capsicum spray, tear gas and rubber bullets at hand.
Welcome to Melbourne! Yes, the jewel of the south, ranked (by the Economist Intelligence Unit) as the world’s most liveable city for seven years running until 2017 has now tumbled to eighth after six lockdowns. Unleashing Dan’s Blueshirts on ordinary citizens protesting the damaging lunacy of lockdown in scenes reminiscent of Tienamen Square (sans the tanks but I wouldn’t put that past the Dear Leader at some stage) will continue the once-wonderful city of Melbourne’s decline.
When I retired after three and half decades in the federal public service in Canberra (I know, you get less for murder!), I debated whether to opt for Melbourne or to return home to Adelaide. So glad I chose Adelaide – we have our own cyclical lockdown woes, and a Nutty Professor as Chief Health Officer who has the mask mandate lever permanently jammed in the ON position – but at least we aren’t Melbourne!
Phil, South Australia
The French police disgust me but I guess all the police forces disgust me. Just thugs in uniforms who perpetuate evil.
The USA is already having to close hospital departments due to dangerously ow levels of staffing. Nurses have walked out because they do not want to take the mandated vaccines. Who knows better than the nurses what Covid is like, and what the serious adverse events and deaths are like. Care homes in this country were already short staffed, now that problem has worsened.
Prof MY’s assessment of a very bad winter 2021/22 looks ever more likely every day.
How long until Macron bans people filming – especially those using drones (even TV news) to get the true picture of how many people attend these events and detailing (often unwarranted) ‘Police action’ against protesters?
Bear in mind that in the US, Biden just got the FAA to ban the use of drones that were showcasing 10k illegal immigrants in Texas encamped under a motorway overpass and the Aussie authorities essentially have banned protests altogether.
Over here, our MSM have been nice little lapdogs in doing as they are told and most don’t cover such protests (many of which are VERY large and peaceful [until the Old Bill get involved]) or pretend they are something they are not/misrepresnt the numbers any scuffles.
Save Our Rights UK – A Real Democracy
@saveourrightsuk
SATURDAY 25TH SEPT – 1PM – HYDE PARK CORNER
Do you want the Government to bring in Plan B? Vaccine passports, mandatory masks, working from home etc? Or even worse the secret option Plan C – lockdown?
If not join us with your feet on the street and vote for PLAN FREE