On*March 6, 2012, six British soldiers were*killed*in Afghanistan by a*roadside explosive device, and a national*ritual of mourning and rage ensued. Prime Minister David Cameron called it a “desperately sad day for our country.”
A British teenager,*Azhar Ahmed, observed the reaction for two days*and then went to Facebook to angrily object that the innocent Afghans killed by British soldiers receive almost no*attention from British media. He*opined that the UK’s*soldiers in Afghanistan are guilty, their deaths deserved, and are therefore going to hell:
https://firstlook.org/wp-uploads/sit...5/01/azhar.png
The following day, Ahmed*was arrested*and “charged with a racially aggravated public order offense.” The police spokesman explained that “he didn’t make his point very well and that is why he has landed himself in bother.”
The state proceeded to prosecute him, and in October of that year, he was convicted “of sending a grossly offensive communication,” fined and*sentenced*to 240 hours of community service.
Criminal cases*for*online political speech are*now commonplace in the UK, notorious for its hostility to*basic free speech*and*press rights.
As*The Independent‘s James Bloodworth*reported*last week, “around 20,000 people in Britain have been investigated in the past three years for comments made online.”
But the persecution is by no means viewpoint-neutral. It instead is overwhelmingly directed at the country’s Muslims for expressing political opinions critical*of the state’s actions.
To put it mildly, not all online “hate speech” or advocacy of violence is treated equally. It is, for instance, extremely difficult to imagine*that Facebook users who sanction*violence by the UK in Iraq and Afghanistan, or who*spew*anti-Muslim animus, or who*call for and celebrate*the deaths of Gazans, would be similarly prosecuted.
In both the UK and Europe generally, cases are*occasionally broughtfor right-wing “hate speech” (the above warning from Scotland’s police was issued after a polemicist posted*repellent jokes*on Twitter about Ebola patients).*
But the proposed punishments for such advocacy are rarely more than symbolic: trivial*fines and the like.
The real punishment is meted out overwhelmingly against Muslim dissidents and critics of the West.
https://firstlook.org/theintercept/2...online-speech/
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