Reports reveal how the Sentencing Council is actively advocating that the perpetrators of online "hate" posts, as it's calling them, be sentenced to prison time. Social media users who share or even just comment on posts dealing with race or LGBT issues, for instance, would face a minimum six-month prison sentence, while the authors of such posts would face up to three years in prison.
Pretty much any online content that's deemed as in any way contributing to the "stirring" up of hatred towards racial, religious, or sexual "minority" groups is potentially subject to the harsh punishments being pushed by the U.K.'s Sentencing Council as part of its continued efforts to control what people say and do online.
How the Council plans to determine what constitutes "hate" speech, whether or not it actually threatens or in any way contributes to possible violence against other people, or even who the originators of such posts actually are remains ambiguous – all of which illustrates the utter importance of First Amendment rights here in the United States.
"The recommendations, which will be subject to a three-month consultation, come at a time of deepening sensitivity to racism and abuse about sexuality online," explains the Daily Mail Online.
"The council's proposals say the most serious hate offences include speeches given by public figures with the aim of stirring up hatred, online content inciting violence towards racial or religious groups, and websites that publish abusive and insulting material to a worldwide audience over a long period."
Sentencing Council says actual criminals should roam free, especially when they're "minorities"
So is the Sentencing Council proposing upping the criminal justice ante for other crimes as well? To the contrary. According to reports, the Council is actually seeking to lessen the penalties for actual crimes like illegally brandishing a knife.
Young thugs and other criminals who choose to walk around with prohibited weaponry, the Council says, should avoid going to jail if they come from deprived or criminal family backgrounds. Having an "unstable upbringing," the Council claims, warrants giving certain young criminals a free pass after committing serious crimes.
Even people who steal from others in the U.K. can now avoid jail time, as long as it can be "proven" that they didn't intend any actual harm, and so long as the mugging was carried out with "minimal force."
Admitting one's crimes in court rather than denying them is another act that the Sentencing Council sees as vindicating a criminal – especially when such an admission is made during that criminal's first appearance in court. In such instances, the Sentencing Council believes that it's appropriate to cut sentencing time by as much as one-third.
But say something mean online that might offend a liberal and the Sentencing Council will seek to lock you up for as many years as possible. It's an insane double standard that Professor Anthony Glees, director of the Centre for Security and Intelligence Studies, describes as bizarre.
In his view, the Sentencing Council is "not strict enough where they should be strict, (and) too severe where greater leniency is called for."
Glees also says the Sentencing Council is failing to distinguish between "young and foolish" individuals who simply troll online, and "really dangerous radicalisers and purveyors of violence who exploit the social media to wreak havoc and death."
"Are these social critics guilty of hate speech for asking awkward questions about gender interest groups? Or are those who attack them the true guilty ones?" Glees asks poignantly.
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