Brickbat: Sticks and Stones

West Yorkshire, England, police say they will take no further action against a 16-year-old autistic girl they arrested and held for suspicion of a homophobic offense. Officers had picked up the girl in Leeds for reportedly being intoxicated and returned her home. When she arrived home, the girl apparently said one of the officers "looked like her nana, who is a lesbian," according to the girl's mother. The officer took that as a homophobic remark and several officers entered the home and arrested the girl. The police department said its professional standards division is investigating the matter and that the girl would face no further actions from police.

Comments

[Adans smith]

Those cops acted like a bunch of queers.

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[Don't look at me!]

Wordcrime.

It’s a new phrase, and I coined it!

[Commenter_XY]

Mouthcrime?

[Gozer the Gozarian]

Oralcrime

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[MatthewSlyfield]

No, you didn't use it first.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8Gv0H-vPoDc

[Fist of Etiquette]

The sun never sets on the Streisand Effect.

[Gozer the Gozarian]

Speech laws are by design weapons against the people. So don't be surprised when shit like this becomes de jour.

[Sometimes a Great Notion]

Verba Non Facta

[Will Nonya]

I've spoken to Brits who think that our first ammendment is unnecessary with the rational that if we have to have the law then we don't have the freedom. Incidents like this seem to make it clear just how necessary it is.

[Davedave]

The police acted completely unlawfully here. There is no law that even begins to support their actions.

Police misbehaviour is a problem the UK has imported from the USA.

[Its_Not_Inevitable]

LOL You just throw shit out there to see what sticks, amiright?

[Davedave]

No, you're insane, so you don't accept facts that conflict with what you want to believe. You're so mad you'll even claim police misbehaviour isn't a thing.

Do point to a law that proves me wrong...

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[Minadin]

Is that what he claimed?

You claim that police misbehaviour in the UK is imported from the USA.

I claim that many examples of this from the UK pre-date America. Example: Robin Hood legend. Crusades era.

[Medulla Oblongata]

Would *seem* to be the case, as the words were merely insulting at worst, and not a threat. OTOH, the UK is not all too keen on free speech, and have at times criminalized merely "insulting" speech.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hate_speech_laws_in_the_United_Kingdom

On 13 October 2001, Harry Hammond, an evangelist, was arrested and charged under section 5 of the Public Order Act (1986) because he had displayed to people in Bournemouth a large sign bearing the words "Jesus Gives Peace, Jesus is Alive, Stop Immorality, Stop Homosexuality, Stop Lesbianism, Jesus is Lord". In April 2002, a magistrate convicted Hammond, fined him £300, and ordered him to pay costs of £395.

On 2 September 2006, Stephen Green was arrested in Cardiff for distributing pamphlets which called sexual activity between members of the same sex a sin. On 28 September 2006, the Crown advised Cardiff Magistrates Court that it would not proceed with the prosecution.

On 20 April 2010, police arrested Dale McAlpine, a Christian preacher, of Workington in Cumbria, for saying that homosexual conduct was a sin. On 14 May 2010, the Crown decided not to prosecute McAlpine. Later still the police apologised to McAlpine for arresting him at all, and paid him several thousand pounds compensation.

[Medulla Oblongata]

Homophobic, biphobic and transphobic hate crime - the legislation
S.66 Sentencing Act 2020 (which applies to all convictions on or after 1st December 2020)
There is no aggravated offence of homophobic, biphobic or transphobic hate crime but s.66 Sentencing Act 2020 imposes a duty upon courts, when considering the seriousness of an offence, to treat as an aggravating factor that either:

at the time of committing the offence, or immediately before or after doing so, the offender demonstrated hostility towards the victim based upon the sexual orientation (or presumed sexual orientation) of the victim or based upon the victim being (or being presumed to be) transgender; or
the offence was motivated (wholly or partly) by hostility towards persons who are of a particular sexual orientation or who are transgender.
Note that these are alternatives. This means that in a case where a demonstration of hostility can be proved, there is no need also to prove motivation, and vice versa.

[Mickey Rat]

The fact thar Britain has laws criminalizing blaspheming homsexuality is the actual problem. The disregard for the principle of free speech is one a government should not have.

[Davedave]

There is no law criminalising the speech in this case, or even one that tangentially approaches doing so. It's the usual problem of police making shit up to avoid doing any real work.

To be clear, it's not that the victim of the police abuse was saying something that in other circumstances might be a hate crime, or that she had some special defence by virtue of being autistic. The police just made up an entirely new crime out of thin air. Even if the words were abusive - and plainly they weren't - that's still not a crime.

[Á àß äẞç ãþÇđ âÞ¢Đæ ǎB€Ðëf ảhf]

It's a crime in the UK. Have you been sleeping under a rock, or is this just your usual idiocy?

[Davedave]

Don't just make shit up. There is no such crime. There isn't even a crime a little bit like this. Hate speech crimes are not relevant to such speech. It's straight-up police bullshit, which... Let's be honest, even the loons round here know that's a thing.

If there is such a crime, and you know all about it, you'll be able to point us to it, won't you?

Thought not.

[Á àß äẞç ãþÇđ âÞ¢Đæ ǎB€Ðëf ảhf]

If you'd been paying attention to the news the last several years, you'd know that yes, people in the UK have been arrested and sent to prison for these "crimes."

I'm not wasting my time showing you to be a liar. Everyone already knows that, including you.

[Davedave]

No, this is nothing even vaguely similar to hate crimes. You're just making stuff up because you're stupid as well as crazy, and don't like facts that get in the way of the insane things you want to believe.

How's that working out for you? Let me guess, you're embittered and full of hate because you're an utter failure, right?

[Don't look at me!]

Fuck off

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hate_speech_laws_in_the_United_Kingdom#:~:text=Hate%20speech%20laws%20in%20England,or%20sexual%20orientation%20is%20forbidden.

[Á àß äẞç ãþÇđ âÞ¢Đæ ǎB€Ðëf ảhf]

Thank you, but it's pointless. He never acknowledges the slightest mistake or misunderstanding.

[Diane Reynolds (Paul.)]

There IS a crime in the UK called a Homophobic Public Order Offence. Don't just make shit up.

[Medulla Oblongata]

The Criminal Justice and Immigration Act 2008 amended Part 3A of the Public Order Act 1986. The amended Part 3A adds, for England and Wales, the offence of inciting hatred on the ground of sexual orientation. All the offences in Part 3 attach to the following acts: the use of words or behaviour or display of written material, publishing or distributing written material, the public performance of a play, distributing, showing or playing a recording, broadcasting or including a programme in a programme service, and possession of inflammatory material. In the circumstances of hatred based on religious belief or on sexual orientation, the relevant act (namely, words, behaviour, written material, or recordings, or programme) must be threatening and not just abusive or insulting.[10]

A number of different UK laws outlaw hate speech. Among them is Section 4 of the Public Order Act 1986 (POA), which makes it an offence for a person to use “threatening, abusive or insulting words or behaviour that causes, or is likely to cause, another person harassment, alarm or distress”. This law has been revised over the years to include language that is deemed to incite “racial and religious hatred”, as well as “hatred on the grounds of sexual orientation” and language that “encourages terrorism”.

[Medulla Oblongata]

Autistic people seem particularly vulnerable to plod’s apparent crusade to stop people – including their own officers – having their feelings hurt. In 2020, a Welsh 19-year-old, who suffers with Asperger’s, anxiety and depression, was convicted of a hate crime for shouting ‘Is it a boy or is it a girl?’ at a transgender community-support officer. He was given a 12-week curfew and ordered to pay £590. West Yorkshire Police were also hauled over the coals earlier this year for recording a ‘non-crime hate incident’ against an autistic schoolboy from Wakefield, who brought a Koran to school and dropped it on the floor, scuffing it slightly. Even though the boy was sent death threats, after news of the ‘desecration’ got out on social media, he was the one who ended up being formally investigated by the police.

All these examples and more point to something deeply sinister. The police have become the armed wing of offence culture. So desperate are they to find some new moral mission, to cleanse themselves of past sins and contemporary bad PR, that they’ve become obsessed with punishing wrongthinkers – even vulnerable young people whose only ‘crime’ is to offend the delicate sensibilities of a cop.

[https://www.spiked-online.com/2023/08/11/is-it-a-crime-to-call-a-police-officer-a-lesbian/]

[Guy]

Maybe he/she does look like nana. Nana is a lesbian. Where's the insult/hate?