Why we must repeal our hate-speech laws
from spiked:
Our political culture grows more censorious by the day. Social-media companies have banned an elected US president. University campuses have been turned into identitarian ‘safe spaces’. And criminal law is mobilised with increasing regularity to police thought, through draconian legislation. Andrew Bridgen is Conservative MP for North-West Leicestershire. He is campaigning to scrap Britain’s illiberal ‘hate speech’ laws. spiked caught up with him to find out more.
spiked: What is the core problem with hate-speech laws in the UK?
Andrew Bridgen: They are an infringement on free speech. Right now, something is classed as a hate crime if it offends someone else, or anyone thinks someone else could be offended by it. If something you say meets those criteria, you are potentially liable to have a visit from the police and have a hate crime registered.
That gives justification to cancel culture. It also legitimises the fact that large corporations in charge of swathes of social media decide they don’t like what an elected president of the US is saying, so effectively delist him. This is not democracy.
If we end up in a situation where having alternative views means you get cancelled and you can’t speak, what’s the difference between us and China? That’s democracy gone.
I fought for Brexit so that the people could take back control of British sovereignty. It’s no good if they don’t have freedom of speech.
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