Twitter users given legal warning in Britain

Originally posted by rikgrimsby
no free speech on twitter then... what one finds offensive another might not... time to get rid of my twitter i think

Freedom of Speech - USA law

The right to freedom of expression is recognized as a human right under Article 19 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and recognized in international human rights law in the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR). Article 19 of the ICCPR states that "everyone shall have the right to hold opinions without interference" and "everyone shall have the right to freedom of expression; this right shall include freedom to seek, receive and impart information and ideas of all kinds, regardless of frontiers, either orally, in writing or in print, in the form of art, or through any other media of his choice". Article 19 goes on to say that the exercise of these rights carries "special duties and responsibilities" and may "therefore be subject to certain restrictions" when necessary "for respect of the rights or reputation of others" or "for the protection of national security or of public order (order public), or of public health or morals"

en.wikipedia.org...

Freedom of speech SO LONG AS you respect of the rights or reputation of others.

Seems pretty clear both in actual law and in common sense

Originally posted by muzzleflash

Originally posted by elevenaugust

- Some 17 arrests have been made in connection with the alleged naming on Twitter of the woman that Wales footballer Ched Evans was last month convicted of raping.

17 people arrested because someone's name was admitted?
Wow, they will go to any length to hide the Truth.

What if some of those 17 people get raped in prison?
That means the government policy actually promotes more rape than would have happened in the first place.

I take it you don't know UK law or just don't want to respect it? In the UK, if someone is convicted of rape, it is not legal for the victim to be named in any manner of media. Those people did name the person who a court agreed had been raped, therefore they broke the law and exposed the victim to potential further suffering.

I have no inclination to worry about what may or may not happen to the people who willfully decided to commit such a childish, pathetic and cowardly act.

Originally posted by elevenaugust

Twitter users given legal warning in Britain

phys.org

The Internet is not a law-free zone, the British government's top law officer warned Twitter users, adding that he would not hesitate to take action over offending posts.
Attorney General Dominic Grieve spoke out following a series of high-profile court cases involving postings made on the micro-blogging site.
"If somebody goes down to the pub with printed sheets of paper and hands it out, that's no different than if somebody goes and and does a tweet," Grieve told BBC radio.

(visit the link for the full news article)



Related AboveTopSecret.com Discussion Threads:
Fabrice Muamba: Racist Twitter user jailed for 56 days (Right or Wrong)

yes, there are a ton of people on Twitter and other networking sites that post immature, inappropritae, SPAM, and other nonsensical crap. However, I am not surprised that a country using Socialized medicine, etc. would seek to go after and control their people....However, Britian is a small country...and more and more other cultures are coming there....their economy is crap....gas is $11 per gallon, lots of pubs have and are closing....I think they have more important things to worry about than Twitt's.....pun intended.

Originally posted by zorgon

Originally posted by rikgrimsby
no free speech on twitter then... what one finds offensive another might not... time to get rid of my twitter i think

Freedom of Speech - USA law

The right to freedom of expression is recognized as a human right under Article 19 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and recognized in international human rights law in the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR). Article 19 of the ICCPR states that "everyone shall have the right to hold opinions without interference" and "everyone shall have the right to freedom of expression; this right shall include freedom to seek, receive and impart information and ideas of all kinds, regardless of frontiers, either orally, in writing or in print, in the form of art, or through any other media of his choice". Article 19 goes on to say that the exercise of these rights carries "special duties and responsibilities" and may "therefore be subject to certain restrictions" when necessary "for respect of the rights or reputation of others" or "for the protection of national security or of public order (order public), or of public health or morals"

en.wikipedia.org...

Freedom of speech SO LONG AS you respect of the rights or reputation of others.

Seems pretty clear both in actual law and in common sense

excellent post! I was not aware of the details of Article 19; especially the last few sentences! I appreciate the wiki quote and your clarification on this issue :-)

Originally posted by QQXXw
reply to post by RicoMarston

 

You should not be afraid that the truth will be found out about you, it will be found out about everyone else as well.

The only internet users that are against email surveillance or law enforcement account access to popular social media are

1) racists
2) criminals/terrorists

Bollocks!, here we go with the 'if you haven't got anything to hide then you've nothing to fear' So thank you for making everybody's mind up for them (including mine). Maybe your privacy doesn't mean a thing to you but just because you wanna show me yours doesn't mean I have to show you mine. In case you haven't noticed there are armies of corporations out there just waiting to take advantage of all that private data whether it is correct or not. Take the recent tale of the TSA taking a two and a half year old girl off a plane because her personal data identified her as a terrorist. Anyone with common sense would know this it is quite a stretch of the imagination to believe that a child of that age could be a terrorist whether the data says so or not. so the moral of the story is you can be profiled incorrectly on the basis of your personal data. But then there's nothing scary or even inconvenient about that right?

Originally posted by robbo961

Originally posted by QQXXw
reply to post by RicoMarston

 

You should not be afraid that the truth will be found out about you, it will be found out about everyone else as well.

The only internet users that are against email surveillance or law enforcement account access to popular social media are

1) racists
2) criminals/terrorists

Bollocks!, here we go with the 'if you haven't got anything to hide then you've nothing to fear' So thank you for making everybody's mind up for them (including mine). Maybe your privacy doesn't mean a thing to you but just because you wanna show me yours doesn't mean I have to show you mine. In case you haven't noticed there are armies of corporations out there just waiting to take advantage of all that private data whether it is correct or not. Take the recent tale of the TSA taking a two and a half year old girl off a plane because her personal data identified her as a terrorist. Anyone with common sense would know this it is quite a stretch of the imagination to believe that a child of that age could be a terrorist whether the data says so or not. so the moral of the story is you can be profiled incorrectly on the basis of your personal data. But then there's nothing scary or even inconvenient about that right?

oops!, the above paragraph should be here...

Many of you seem to be missing the point. These people were all investigated by the police because someone reported them, not because of internet police trawling tweets. Whether you say something out loud or something on Twitter, if it is unlawful and you are reported to the police, you should face the consequences.

Originally posted by rikgrimsby
no free speech on twitter then... what one finds offensive another might not... time to get rid of my twitter i think

Free speech rights on Twitter are just the same as on any other form of media.

Free speech only goes so far. Forms of speech that are currently seen as violating the law, would be no different on twitter than any other medium.

That's Freedom Of Speech almost evaporated then...what next, our Freedom Of Thought!!?

reply to post by elevenaugust


Wow, that's amazing, but actually I'd love to see Twitter just vanish from the net. Can't stand it. Facebook as well...

I love freedom of speech.

But that doesn't remove you from taking responsibility for your actions. If I went around making racist remarks about that footballer who keeled over and had a heart attack mid-game on the streets I would get beat by the people up for it and arrested by the police.

Same way, if I started revealing confidential information about a court case, especially if it involves the name of a rape victim in a high profile case I wouldn't be unaccountable for my actions either.

While I understands trolling, and understand that it isn't real life and I do see the funny side, there are limits, and if you push those you will and should be held accountable for them.

reply to post by elevenaugust


I have never used it and never intend to. It's bad enough I am on Facebook, the last sociaal media site I will ever use.

Originally posted by earthinhabitant
reply to post by elevenaugust

 

yes, looks like we may be getting closer to whom was involved with 9/11 and a few other things, masterminds?

Thought police...?

edit on 12-5-2012 by earthinhabitant because: (no reason given)

edit on 12-5-2012 by earthinhabitant because: (no reason given)

To be honest, Earthinhabitant, if I had any control I would request that you to change your avatar. People died in that image. It gives me the chills just to look at it.

Originally posted by Germanicus
Pretty scary.

Most ATS members could be arrested.

I wonder how far they can go back to look. Will the stuff we post today and in the past be used against us in the future?

ill do 60 days in the slammer
to be able to say what i wanted.

60 days aint nothing

Originally posted by something wicked

Originally posted by muzzleflash

Originally posted by elevenaugust

- Some 17 arrests have been made in connection with the alleged naming on Twitter of the woman that Wales footballer Ched Evans was last month convicted of raping.

17 people arrested because someone's name was admitted?
Wow, they will go to any length to hide the Truth.

What if some of those 17 people get raped in prison?
That means the government policy actually promotes more rape than would have happened in the first place.

I take it you don't know UK law or just don't want to respect it? In the UK, if someone is convicted of rape, it is not legal for the victim to be named in any manner of media. Those people did name the person who a court agreed had been raped, therefore they broke the law and exposed the victim to potential further suffering.

I have no inclination to worry about what may or may not happen to the people who willfully decided to commit such a childish, pathetic and cowardly act.

Talking isn't childish, pathetic or cowardly.

If you believe the State has the authority to censor speech through violent arrest tactics, than you do not have a clue what free speech is about.

Which is more costly? Allowing the state to arrest 17 people because they said someones name?
Or just trying to help the victim recover while ignoring the rest of the world's pointless opinions?

I am honestly bewildered that you would use false moral justifications such as "feel sorry for person X" and use this as the crux from which you CENSOR speech through government oppression.

I hope one day you say something illegal. Then you can sit in jail and think about how wonderful and awesome your Constitutional Monarchy really is.

You people care about what others think/say way too much and need to be put in your place (mind your own freaking business and stop arresting people over a word).

But since you find it ok to oppress people over a word, than I find no problem condemning your sick system of authoritarianism and totalitarianism.

You can't tell me to mind my business because you sure as hell don't mind yours.

Talk about big brother. The U.S. will fall in-line shortly.

Originally posted by revmoofoo
Also, as my dearly departed mother used to say "If you don't have anything nice to say, don't say anything at all" We could all learn from that simple statement I'm sure.

True enough friend, to a degree, but if we operated under such a conservative linguistic model then surely nothing at all would ever be said about western politics or the swine that run that freak show. And surely at least in this field of information, saying nothing at all is far more dangerous than having bad (read:truthful) things said.

What a bunch of lost sheep gossip about on that piece of garbage twitter is so far below my radar that I find it offensive that anyone could possibly believe that I could care about such bullsh*t. I mean no disrespect to any rape victims or subjects of racial abuse, my heart goes out to them. I simply mean to say that such crap is completely irrelevant compared to what the self-proclaimed "leaders" of the world are allowed to get away with every minute of every day. Those rapists and racist genocidal maniacs are killing thousands of innocent brown (and white) people a day while raping disadvantaged countries of their resources and future. Tweet that you sad degenerates!

In any case, I don't really care for their rules and never did. I didn't vote for any of this censorship crap. And I consider myself intelligent and compassionate enough to be able to operate under my own instinct and jurisdiction without hurting anyone who doesn't deserve it. F*ck the west and their censorship war, and if they don't like me saying that, then maybe THEY should stop reading the things I write when it was never intended for their eyes in the first place. I don't care for their opinion so why do they care so much for mine?

I'm forced to read their lies and propaganda on a daily basis so as far as I'm concerned, they can put up with my own hate-fueled gibberish from time to time. I feel after all these years of intellectual suffering I've earned the right to speak my mind. This game works both ways. And if it doesn't, what does that say about the fascist warmongers that run this god damned cesspool?

Racism/ human discrimination of any kind is a sad social cancer but political discrimination is what will save this planet, if there's any hope at all...

“All that is necessary for evil to triumph is that good men do nothing.” (Edmund Burke?)

"Do" and "say" are not mutually exclusive actions. Perhaps if you replaced "nice" with "constructive", then that age-old saying might hold some rationality. I understand where you're coming from but quite frankly there's nothing nice about what's going on in the world today so if we can't speak about it what the hell are we ever going to do about it?

reply to post by robbo961


There is nothing bollocks about my post. Your history online is already recorded. Your email and social media accounts will be checked if you are flagged for racism or illegal activity and there is nothing you can do about it.

A lot of the online racists interpret events like this as a sign that soon they too will have to take responsibility for their online history and naturally they get anxious and try to hide behind their interpretation of free speech.

Originally posted by QQXXw
reply to post by robbo961

 

There is nothing bollocks about my post. Your history online is already recorded. Your email and social media accounts will be checked if you are flagged for racism or illegal activity and there is nothing you can do about it.

There's one thing you can do.

Don't use social media.

reply to post by petrus4


It is quite hard for the average internet user to avoid using social media, like you using this forum for example.