You are in fact doing just that.

The journalists and cartoonists at Charlie Hebdo were murdered. Markus Meechan got a fine, which was paid for him by his fascist supporters. He was not fined for any reason to do with the dog, but because he placed on YouTube a video in which he ritually repeated the phrase 'Gas the Jews' something like eighteen times.

The sheriff did not accept that this was merely a joke (as opposed to a pretended joke, a known tactic of the far right) and did not accept the defence claim that the video was only meant to be seen by eight people since Meechan's business model depends on 'driving traffic' and the video has been seen by millions. Meechan was supported at court by Stephen Yaxley-Lennon ('Tommy Robinson') and has since joined the far-right UK Independence Party, as has Yaxley-Lennon. Meechan has also appeared as a featured speaker at one of Yaxley-Lennon's fascist rallies in London.

The Hebdo cartoons were reprinted in the uk.

I don't know why you would draw the conclusion that I am against the Hebdo covers. The logical conclusion from my posts surely should have been that I consider it all free speech, by which I mean I think hate speech laws are wrong.

But the drawing of Muhammed wearing a bomb turban on his head is pretty clearly hate speech. The hate speech trial over the three covers had to invent a reason why it was free speech that is logically inconsistent.

Part of the free speech hate speech trial around these cartoons centred on how people can just not buy the magazine if they don't want to see the offensive material. Similarly maybe don't click on a YouTube video titled "mate yur dogs a nazi" if you are offended by Nazis?

Separately btw I have no issue with YouTube deleting the video and banning the guy. I genuinely have no support for either the dog nazi guy or the Hebdo editors. But they both should have free speech because sometimes defending ****ty people saying ****ty things is the price for defending good people saying controversial things people aren't yet ready to hear.

Given the choice between the ACLU and British government when it comes to rights and freedoms I come down on the side of the ACLU.

Hate speech law is subjective and that is why it is wrong. How is Katie Hopkins or Boris Johnson or Jeremy Clarkson not in prison? Because they are powerful and connected so the rules don't apply to them like it would to powerless people like you and I even if we said or did something a fraction as bad.

I'm pretty comfortable occupying the apparent middle ground where people like Katie Hopkins, Tommy Robinson, Charlie Hebdo, that James Goddard bloke etc are easily identifiable as deliberately provocative hate-mongers and happily ignored by non-bigoted non-morons, without the need for them to be silenced, prosecuted or murdered.

You are arguing past me when you are stating he is a garbage person.

I likely hate these people more with more justifiable reasons than you.

I'm fine with people protesting the Oxford Union making them uninvite whoever the flavour of the month **** is. Jordan Peterson I guess. That is also free speech.

I don't care if YouTube or Facebook deplatform TR or they delete the dog video etc.

It is a very comfortable place but it's based, I think, either on the past before the social media era and/or the illusion of a very small groups that can in a limited way succeed in shutting out a large majority of the population who believe all sorts of crap. It doesn't solve anything because people just get angrier and go elsewhere to mostly worse places. And of course they still vote.

The likes of James Goddard are good examples. He ain't being tackled by being seen for what he is - he is revelling in being seen for what he is. Laws to limit what he can do/say can help tackle it and that's the uncomfortable route we have to navigate, hard and messy as it is. Katie Hopkins is another - iirc she both got a visit from the police and lost her job after calling for a final solution. Losing her job is great and may sound enough but eventually someone of the likes of Banks/Bannon etc will provide a forum for her (and others and worse) - except hopefully they cannot because they will fall fowl of hate speech legislation.

It's a shame we can't offer all the fascists safe passage to a remote unpopulated island somewhere that they can declare constitutionally a white ethno state, and just wait for them to declare war on someone, when we could justifiably bomb the **** out of them.

Can us yanks ship ours there? And can it be on a low lying island so they can test their global warming theories?

It isn't an island but how about that place with all the polar bears in Russia? Even the bears are white.

Sounds good to me....

Meaningful vote delayed again. May is a horrible ****.

"As a result of that [more talks in Brussels on Tuesday 26th Feb] , we won't bring a meaningful vote to Parliament this week, but we will ensure that that happens by 12 March," she added.

It'll be interesting to see how the Remainer Tories see this.

On Wednesday hopefully the Cooper/Letwin amendment will pass, "giving Parliament the opportunity to delay Brexit and prevent a no-deal situation if there is no agreement with the EU by the middle of March." (BBC).

Can parliament compel May to delay brexit? Like in a practical sense the only way to delay means she has to amend her a50 letter, with agreement of Europe. She can just tell Europe that she wants to extend brexit so we have more time to renegotiate removing the backdrop and Europe will just lolnope us into no deal exit at the end of March anyway.

Surely the only actual thing parliament can force is a withdrawal of a50 letter. By definition they can't force Europe to extend past 29/03 and Europe has already said they would only do so with a specific end goal, not to retread the exact same things they have rejected. Which is the only thing the government agreed on is that they need to do so.

A disorderly no deal deal brexit, with pretty much none of the legislation needed to run the country passed, is getting to be inevitable.

It's not in the EU's interest to force us into a no deal Brexit, especially at a time when Germany's economy is flat-lining, but it could happen through a combination of May's intransigence and a lack of Parliamentary consensus which is why the vote on Wednesday is so important.

The Guardian's reporting that senior officials at the EU regard a three month extension of A50 as insufficient and favour delaying the departure date until 2021, allowing "the UK and the EU to develop their plans for the future relationship with the aim of making the contentious Irish backstop redundant."

The bolded is the reverse of the case. The EU will do whatever they can to avoid a no deal brexit.

May as pm cannot be forced to do anything afaik. But it's just about unthinkable she would ignore a clear meaningful vote of the house for very long. If she did then we're getting to the stage where a determined majority in the house could get rid of her.

The UK have had over 2 years to negotiate a Brexit deal. May got a deal in December 2018, delayed the vote on it as it was clear that she would lose, apparently "renegotiated" it and lost by over 200 votes when she finally presented it to Parliament in January.

Since then pretty much nothing has changed, and she's now putting back the next vote because it's still clear that she will lose it. She has no idea what she's doing. Anything other than revoking article 50 and calling a General Election at this point is an absolute joke.

The most depressing point of all this is Labour have fallen to pieces and have no chance of either winning a GE or offering a credible solution to Brexit. I don't see how we get an acceptable deal at this point, so no deal seems nailed on unless May somehow finds it in her to pull back from the brink and cancel the A50 declaration, which would contradict everything she's said and done for the past 18 months.

Cheers, Cameron!

They'll also do whatever they can to avoid giving UK an easy Brexit.

That leaves only an extension of the negotiations until UK accepts something like the deal currently on table (basically soft Brexit... almost remain in all but name) or just revoke A50 altogether.

I agree except I don't think it's the EU trying to avoid giving an easy brexit. (Plus the deal in some form might well get though before an extension)

The withdrawal deal is a 'fairly easy brexit' whatever that means. What is it that we could want that is easier, coherent and that the EU are blocking?

My central case is:
1) Delay until 2 options - May's deal or no deal
2) Her deal is voted down
3) She postpones A50, resigns ala Cameron and calls for GE
4) Tories win the election due to FPTP system and split remain/soft brexit vote
5) Some ERG type PM delivers some form of hard brexit
6) UK is f*****.

The ERG has no incentive to support her deal under these assumptions and I think this is their thinking atm - either it's no deal and they win, or it's GE and they take over the party.
Only way out of this in my opinion is labour puts country over party (that's why it won't happen) and votes for her deal. However, I think they (wrongly) will try their luck in a GE and lose badly.

Not sure if the EU will accept a delay. The uncertainty is not helping the economy. Might be better for the EU just to force a choice between no deal/revoke a50/current deal.

If its a delay for further backstop/WA negotiations - sure, quite likely they will not agree for extension. But if it is for a GE I don't see how they will say no.

A lot of people on all sides are utterly sick of the whole thing and just want some resolution, no matter what it is.

You're not allowing for a potentially fatal split in the Tories if an ERGtard becomes leader.

The eu has been exceptionally accommodating and positive in negotiations.

They have two red lines:
1, no hard border on the island of Ireland can be possible in any deal
2, for any one free movement you must accept all free movement

They also ensured liabilities were defined and agreed to as a requirement of a deal, but I would place this separate given we owe the so called divorce bill regardless of whether we get a deal or not.

Britain had the option of doing whatever deal they wanted provided the two red lines don't get broken.

Well those people should just stfu then.