Gabrielle Giffords shooting reignites row over rightwing rhetoric in US

reply to post by guohua


Careful there: we don't want those pesky facts cluttering up a perfectly good liberal pity party and rant.


Second line.

reply to post by The Revenant


This is getting seriously inane. The Brits have outlawed anti-leftist speech - "hate speech." They are hoping for a whole globe where it is illegal for people to talk back to their overlord wannabes.

Originally posted by LarryLove
reply to post by traditionaldrummer

 

It seems he was fairly well read and I am sure many people of both left and right political persuasions have read the little red book. As to the assassins politics, the jury's still out. What is clear and central to this thread is that violent political rhetoric can probably be as dangerous as a gun.

That is not clear at all. There is zero evidence that he was influenced by anyone. Can't a nutjob just be a flippin nutjob?

reply to post by sara123123


I would like to call you on that allegation. We actually have an excellent tradition of freedom of speech. Have you ever been to Hyde Park Corner? I think "Hate speech" is an Amercanism.

reply to post by guohua


I wonder what Parker's political/social leanings are? Just wondering. is all.

reply to post by sara123123


(EDIT; Beaten to it by Tiger5)

No, we have outlawed inciting violence. You can go to Hyde Park Corner any time you like and tell the whole effing country how much you hate environmental reforms, lax immigration laws and so on. So long as you don't call for anyone to be beaten, shot, stabbed, or blown up, you're perfectly fine.

There's a difference.

reply to post by sara123123


Actually, it is quite the opposite and I am thankful I live in a country where my political leaders don't advocate the murder of people who oppose their government.

reply to post by mydarkpassenger


I agree and won't be rushing to any preconceptions. However, I do think the issue of violent political rhetoric from both the left and right needs to be addressed.

Originally posted by LarryLove
reply to post by mydarkpassenger

 

I agree and won't be rushing to any preconceptions. However, I do think the issue of violent political rhetoric from both the left and right needs to be addressed.

I can agree with that. I think we all know that most politicians are full of crap as a christmas turkey to begin with, so they don't need to season what they shovel with a lot of bile and vitriol.

I just don't see the influence in this particular case.

reply to post by LarryLove


Oh that's rich! Britian has never murdered anyone ever. Keep telling yourself that.

reply to post by TheWill


And the Left get to decide what speech is "inciting violence." Are you guys allowed to defend yourselves from attack yet or is your government still putting you in prision if you take out a criminal who is victimizing you?

reply to post by sara123123


He (I'm assuming) didn't say that.

What he said was that our leaders aren't allowed to advocate murder... say, by saying "these are the positions that we want to gun down this year", or "if the opposition's going to bring a knife, I'm gonna bring a gun."

They can't say that because it's inciting violence, and they'd get prosecuted.

They can still go to war, etc, etc, and britain's history isn't exactly sparkling, I'll give you that, but that particular law is one of the good ones.

EDIT:

In response to your second post, Note that the current government is a fusion of the LIBERAL DEMOCRAT and CONSERVATIVE parties.

So, um, they're not all left. And generally, it's quite easy to tell what's inciting violence... e.g "All good christians should blow up mosques!" is. "Eastern Europeans are taking British jobs far more than is acceptable" is not.


(And, like every commonwealth country, we do still have the concept of "justifiable homicide". We also have "reasonable force". So you can kill someone if it's the only way you could defend yourself against them, although if possible it's better to knock them out. You just have to make a decent case in the court)

reply to post by sara123123


If you really must post, then at least understand the context of the messages you are replying to and do a little background check within the thread. You have already been corrected on what freedom of speech and incitement to violence is.

reply to post by LarryLove


I will post and disagree with you any time I want to. Get that? We are not in Britian.

Originally posted by sara123123
reply to post by TheWill

 

And the Left get to decide what speech is "inciting violence." Are you guys allowed to defend yourselves from attack yet or is your government still putting you in prision if you take out a criminal who is victimizing you?

An oversimpified argument is not a credible argument. Yes we can use reasonable force to defend ourself from criminals. I have used it myself and have not been incarcerated. We do not allow our population to carry concealed weapons and we practice gun control. So less innocent people are shot.

It is a fact that guns do not prevent crime.

Actually the Judiciary decide who is "Inciting violence" it is their job to do so.

reply to post by tiger5


Care to prove that "fact"?

reply to post by TheWill


I know what he is saying.

And I said that Britian controls and punishes the speech of people who do not agree with the government's position. The government decides what speech is inciting violence. So if, say, I was a British citizen and opposed to the immigration policy of the government and expressed my observations of the invasion in negative terms as I experienced and observed them to gain political support for my postion from other voters, I could be punished and silenced for inciting violence.

We have free speech here. The government does not get to play political games with outlawing speech - yet. If Palin or anyone else in the US actually, directly called for the murder of a politican, that would be illegal here.

Obama took the power to kill enemies of the State through Executive Order under the Patriot Act. Palin suggested he use that unconstitutional and outrageous power to kill Julian A. That is not illegal as she called for our fascist President to legally murder a man she considers an "enemy of the state." We can call for the death penality for criminals, here, but until the war on terror that meant as punishment if a jury found the person guilty. No more when it comes to the US President, unfortunately. He can kill anyone he wants to kill with no trial and conviction necessary.

reply to post by LarryLove

By the same measure, if we all went shooting our mouths off in real life about the issues we discuss on ATS, then I am sure a few people would listen and report leaving us to be questioned by one or more alphabet agency.

Exactly!
Doesn't that bother you? Do you realize how far we have progressed on the path to a police state?
It is only a matter of time, before it is complete.

reply to post by sara123123


And congratulations, your post has just confirmed the very ideas behind the opening statement. You have taken a whole bunch of random thoughts and preconceptions and mixed them in a cauldron of Palin 'misspeaks'.