Adam wrote:This isn't a free speech issue, though. It's a "direct threat of intimidation/incitement" issue.
Absolutely it's freedom of speech issue. Clamping down on our freedoms is exactly what Fascists like Griffin want to do, if we do their work for them they've already won.
You are still conflating two completely separate issues.
1) Should people, including legal political parties, have the right to freedom of speech provided they stay within the law?
2) Should people be punished if they abuse that right by saying something illegal?
I answer "yes" to both of those questions. But they are quite different and descrete.
O'Boogie wrote:On the first issue, I'm not in favour of denying a legal political party freedom of speech because without it they are powerless and effectively we are banning the party themselves. I don't want to live in a country which does that however repugnant I personally find that party. Quite apart from the principle, there's also the thin end of the wedge argument, if we accept, on principle, that parties can be proscribed because the majority find their views offensive then sooner or later that principle will be used against a party or organisation which I support.
On the second issue, if what Griffin has said is determined by a court of law to have been incitement and therefore illegal then he should be punished in a manner deemed appropriate by that court.