Ducati Sporting Club UK > General > DSC Website - Help and Notices > Posting and Moderation on the message board

[Jools]

Originally Posted by bradders

Chris, in that case sad day indeed....freedon of speech truely has disappeared in the UK

I don't know where the illusion of ever having complete freedom of speech in the UK came from. We've never had it at any time in our history and it doesn't exist anywhere else in the world.

[twpd]

Originally Posted by Jools

I don't know where the illusion of ever having complete freedom of speech in the UK came from. We've never had it at any time in our history and it doesn't exist anywhere else in the world.

But by the same token that doesn't mean we should tolerate an erosion in our ability to express our opinions and thoughts. The next step will be them.

I am against all forms of censorship. I believe that rubbish, libellous comments, spurious statements of "fact" will eventually be outed or destroyed by good reasoned debate and the support of solid facts. To rely on censorship to quieten the vocal minorities/idiots is failure.

[Jools]

Originally Posted by twpd

But by the same token that doesn't mean we should tolerate an erosion in our ability to express our opinions and thoughts. The next step will be them.

I am against all forms of censorship. I believe that rubbish, libellous comments, spurious statements of "fact" will eventually be outed or destroyed by good reasoned debate and the support of solid facts. To rely on censorship to quieten the vocal minorities/idiots is failure.

I agree with all of that, but in the context of this thread it depends on whether everybody who uses this board has the ability to employ good reasoned debate in support of their arguement. It is abundantly clear that not everybody has that capability, and some are quite capable of causing a great deal of offence very quickly.

In my view, these offensive remarks are more often levelled by members against other members rather than directly at the webteam or the MT, so to interpret this policy as something for the MT to hide behind, or exert greater control over views expressed by the members is illogical and, in my view, takes 'MT conspiracy' theories to new heights of paranoia.

Failure it may be to exert some form of 'censorship', but the fact remains that control exists over what people say in public to an enormous extent. As a simple example, supposing that you were in a pub with your partner and someone started to insult them in an extremely offensive way. Supposing that you tried reasoned debate, but you were up against the most oaf-ish individual who was quite clearly too thick to understand the eloquence of your arguement. Would you stand behind your principles of using reason or decide that the time honoured censorship of a smack in the teeth would be more appropriate? If you did that the landlord would be entirely within his rights to throw you both out, since causing an affray might have legal repercussions for him.

[antonye]

Originally Posted by twpd

But by the same token that doesn't mean we should tolerate an erosion in our ability to express our opinions and thoughts. The next step will be them.

Unfortunately we live in a country where you can be sent to jail for "thought crime"...
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/7084801.stm

[Loz]

Originally Posted by antonye

Unfortunately we live in a country where you can be sent to jail for "thought crime"...
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/7084801.stm

Deeply worrisome. "Thought crime" indeed - until you get to the almost throw-away line near the end of the article where the defendant allegedly had attempted to donate money to a terrorist organisation. I think that would be a crime, morally if not in law.

[antonye]

Originally Posted by Loz

Deeply worrisome. "Thought crime" indeed - until you get to the almost throw-away line near the end of the article where the defendant allegedly had attempted to donate money to a terrorist organisation. I think that would be a crime, morally if not in law.

Note the "allegedly" in there, let alone "attempted"!

"attempted" requires a definition; thought about it but didn't? Wrote a cheque but ripped it up? Put some money into a box at a mosque?

The whole "terror manuals" thing is bullshit. She had the owner's manual for a Dragunov sniper rifle on her computer; the owner's manual for a rifle which is widely available in most countries and it not technically illegal in this country either if you hold the correct licence. FFS, I've got pictures of me on my website firing that very same rifle (and scoring 45/50 at 250m!) so does that make me a terrorist as well? Surely that's worse than owning the user manual?

In this case, and it opens a whole can of worms, I think that the police backed up the terrorism charges with some very weak circumstantial evidence to paint a very bad view of a very naiive person; god help us if they ever checked out most people on this board!

[MJS]

Originally Posted by antonye

Note the "allegedly" in there, let alone "attempted"!

"attempted" requires a definition; thought about it but didn't? Wrote a cheque but ripped it up? Put some money into a box at a mosque?

The whole "terror manuals" thing is bullshit. She had the owner's manual for a Dragunov sniper rifle on her computer; the owner's manual for a rifle which is widely available in most countries and it not technically illegal in this country either if you hold the correct licence. FFS, I've got pictures of me on my website firing that very same rifle (and scoring 45/50 at 250m!) so does that make me a terrorist as well? Surely that's worse than owning the user manual?

In this case, and it opens a whole can of worms, I think that the police backed up the terrorism charges with some very weak circumstantial evidence to paint a very bad view of a very naiive person; god help us if they ever checked out most people on this board!

Damned if they do, damned if they don't.

If this person did happen to be involved in atrocity in the near future and it came out that the authorities had known about her and done nothing for lack of evidence, they would have been wrong then as well...

[antonye]

Originally Posted by Urban996

Damned if they do, damned if they don't.

If this person did happen to be involved in atrocity in the near future and it came out that the authorities had known about her and done nothing for lack of evidence, they would have been wrong then as well...

Very true.

But isn't that what the security services should be doing - keeping a close eye on people like this and making their way higher up the chain to unravel the networks and make a bigger impact? Picking off the minions won't make much of a difference.

If they'd have found 2lbs of C4 under her bed then I would applaud the conviction, but as it stands what little evidence that has been provided is very circumstantial and I'm surprised it stood up in court.

But we're digressing from the subject...

[Ray]

Originally Posted by antonye

Unfortunately we live in a country where you can be sent to jail for "thought crime"...
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/7084801.stm

You can still think what you like, just don't write your thoughts down/"publish" them or speak about them.

Ray.

[antonye]

Originally Posted by Ray

You can still think what you like, just don't write your thoughts down/"publish" them or speak about them.

Why not?

What's the difference between having the thought and writing them down or speaking out?

Surely the deciding factor should be the intention?

I downloaded the Hacker's Handbook many years ago when I first got access to the internet because I thought it would be interesting to read (which it was). I never had any intention of using the information it contained, and most of it was US based so wouldn't work anyway, but if I did the same today I'd have a spell at Her Majesty's Pleasure!

I have similar books about internet security and hacking sitting on my bookshelf at home due to the nature of my job. They are years out of date but if my house was raided and the police were that desperate to send me down, I'm sure they'd be used as evidence against me.