Brickbat: Highly Immoral

In London, England, police arrested street preacher Tony Miano for speaking insulting words in public. Miano delivered a sermon on sexual immorality and listed homosexuality and fornication as examples of sexual sins. A woman complained, and two police officers were sent to arrest him.

Comments

[invisible furry hand]

There's just no place for a street preaching man

A similar tale here

[Snark Plissken]

I just hope this jerk doesn't go on the Reason cruise.

[Radioactive]

you must be more specific; the preacher, the cop (assuming one did all the work and the other stood donut watch) or the complainant? seems like more than enough jerkitude to go around

[Fist of Etiquette]

Mr Miano, who served as a Deputy Sherriff in Los Angeles County, said his experience suggested that the term "thought police" had become a reality in the UK.

He said he was amazed that it was now possible "in the country that produced the Magna Carta" for people to be arrested for what they say

He said they should be arrested for the color of their skin and the substances they put in their own bodies and the attitude they give law enforcement. That's what peace officers do.

[UnCivilServant]

Did they also arrest the complainer for wasting police time?

[Radioactive]

but did they shoot his dog?

[UnCivilServant]

British Police. It wasn't an armed response unit, so they had nothing with which to shoot the dog.

[Scarecrow Repair]

Didn't they at least kick it?

[PM]

They still have to kill British dogs the old fashioned way.

[Death Rock and Skull]

Feeding it haggis?

[Jquip]

Uppity peasant. How dare he publicly read historical fiction that his fabulous betters dislike?

/snap

[Matrix]

Freedom of speech/religion is overrated!

/progtard

[PM]

Freedom of speech/religion is overrated!

/progtard3/4 of the Reason commentariat

Just sayin'

[PM]

Fucking HTML tags, how do they work?

Should, of course, be

Freedom of speech/religion is overrated!

/progtard3/4 of the Reason commentariat

[UnCivilServant]

Reason, your file photo needs to be updated, the uniform of the MPD is now a neon yellow in color (Hi-Vis jackets are manditory for them).

[Snark Plissken]

Except that's a picture of the actual guy getting arrested.

[UnCivilServant]

If it is, those cops are in violation of uniform policy and should be suspended.

[SugarFree]

Just yellow? Did they decommission the pink?

[invisible furry hand]

Yes - only one of them got to the other side, and it wasn't the pink one

[UnCivilServant]

I don't know if pink is allowed, but I only ever saw the neon yellow when I was there recently. I wanted so much to walk up to one and tell them that it made them look laughable and completely impotent - but I didn't want to take a baton to the teeth.

[Mencken Sense]

How is it the limeys can have both a state religion AND a law that says its illegal to preach that state religion? They really get you coming and going, don't they?

[UnCivilServant]

Well, you see, he wasn't a vetted and paid for member of the state church, and thus a rival of theirs, making this a crime against the crown (also the justification for the many purges of catholics they've had).

[Doctor Whom]

Sadly, I know of many Europeans and Canadians who seem to believe that people like Tony Miano should be locked up and that America has gone overboard in defending freedom of speech. When I point out how such laws can be used against them, I get that all-purpose scathing rebuttal known as "La la la, I can't hear you."

[Winston]

Shows how important the Bill of Rights is. The Right to Bear Arms and Freedom of Speech were once considered important rights in England (where do you think the Founders got those ideas from?) but as we have seen they have fallen out of favour in the Commonwealth.

[Eduard van Haalen]

I've noted before that currently they're thinking of a new law which would replace ASBOs with injunctions which are even easier to get, putting even more restrictions on alleged antisocial behavior and (if I recall) bypassing trial by jury.

Think of this - they don't think ASBOs are adequate to serve the government's repressive needs.

This is not exactly good news for disreputable street preachers, given that the govt sees their behavior as antisocial.