To think banning the sale of the daily mail goes against all free speech stands for

[BumpowderSneezeonAndSnot]

Now I'm not a fan of it but everyone is allowed to speak their views. Aibu to think banning the sale of any one news outlet goes against the principles of free speech?

They're not banning it. You can take a copy on the train. You can read the online version on the train. They just don't want to sell it. They have the freedom to sell what they want; the DM doesn't have the right to be sold wherever they want.

YANBU. Another campaign by the authoritarian snowflakes. (And I say that as a lefty Remain voter.)

I’m very upset that Virgin Trains don’t stock blue cheese sandwiches. It goes against my principles of being able to eat what I want, even though I could just bring it on the train and eat it anyway.

Loads of shops in Liverpool stopped selling/stocking The Sun after the lies they printed about Hillsborough. Do you have an opinion on that op?

It's always worth looking at the facts beneath the headline. In this case the primary reason is that the Mail isn't selling well. The secondary reason is that the owner of Virgin doesn't want to sell the Mail (possibly because of disagreement on Brexit, more likely because the Mail has recently been critical of Virgin Rail,). So a mixture of commercial and ideological reasons, both taken by a private company that has the perfect right to stock or not stock any particular newspaper. I'm a little surprised that they sell newspapers at all and wonder if the Times, FT and Mirror really sell much better.

With regard to newspapers sold on campus I see no substantiating links but would wonder as PP how many students buy print newspapers anyway so if this is again a commercial decision and more importantly whether this 'ban' is really the student union deciding not to sell the DM in their stores (so nothing to do with the university) which could well be for ideological reasons. I doubt very much that a university run store is banning anything although they are at liberty not to sell one or more newspapers.

well I doubt that many people have been killed by the Daily Mail

I would beg to differ.

The DM is responsible for some of the most disgusting, scare mongering, anti-benefits rhetoric of recent years.

Their direct influence on popular opinion, despite having been proven to lie repeatedly (and no, free speech does not include lying through your teeth, sorry) has directly resulted in policy which has killled thousands of disabled people.

THeir rhetoric is also responsible (imo) for a massive rise in hate crime which has resulted in the deaths of innocent people.

So yeah, they are responsible for many deaths.

(see also- everythng causing/curing cancer)

It hasn't been "banned" ffs.

Virgin have decided to stop sellling it due to public/ staff opinion

That's consuer pressure, and in no way a free speech issue.

Do those who object to Virgin ditching the DM, also object to retailers with a strong moral objection to selling The Sun, in Liverpool, also think that is an attack on free speech??

For fuck's sake, it's not banned. Not stocking something ≠ banning it. But carry on harping on about virtue signalling and "authoritarian snowflakes" if that makes some of you feel better.

it doesn't sell on their trains - it's a purely commercial decision

I bet they don't stock 'Dog Fanciers Monthly' or 'What Paper Bin' either but I doubt they are against dogs or bins

OP you may have read the link but I don't think you understood it

I'm angry because they don't sell "Komodo Dragon Lovers" at my local WH SMiths.

AIBU to think this an attack on free speech??

Most students I know DO read the sidebar of shame on dailymail online.. But the point is that university campus shops are stocking every national newspapers except the DM and DE. That can't be right.

Students who want to buy a print edition should have the freedom of choice.

The move towards no-platforming, trigger warnings and safe spaces is making the idea acceptable that it's OK to ban and shut down voices or opinions that we don't agree with. It's an immature approach -
'we don't like what you have to say so just go away'. Instead of a more mature attitude which would be to discuss, debate, reason and show why you think your opinion is right. I'm not saying reason with radicals such as Holocaust deniers or radical Islamists, but feminists and moderate Muslim feminists have been no-platformed by universities.

So many on here saying 'I don't like the a daily mail so I don't care if it's banned'. What a short-sighted, scary mentality.

Students who want to buy a print edition should have the freedom of choice
They do - it's called choosing to go to a newsagents.

My student's union had a nestle ban - I didn't go three years without a kitkat. It was not the only shop in town, you see.

Anyway, you can take still take The Daily Mail on a Virgin train if you want, but I hear they provide proper toilet paper these days.

The move towards no-platforming, trigger warnings and safe spaces is making the idea acceptable that it's OK to ban and shut down voices or opinions that we don't agree with. It's an immature approach

I completely agree with this.

BUT....

Thishas fuck all to do with no platformin etc.

1. The DM prints lies as fact (they have been forced to retract lots of stories) s an arguement about "opinions" isn't valid here,
   If they printed the opinions as just opinions- fine.
   Buut they don't, do they?
   They (like many other media outlets, both left and right) print lies as FACTS- and that is a completely differentthing to opinion.

2. This is a capitalist decision. I'm not a fan of capitalism, the DM or Virgin, but if everyone insists we live in a captalist world, you can't get upset when the capitalists you endorse go by a capitalist ethos and ditch smoething that isn't selling well.

A private company deciding to stop providing a paper doesn’t equate to ‘banning’ it. Presumably passengers can just buy their own copy and bring it on board.

also the irony of posting this on mumsnet, where people rightly demand that made-up troll posts are taken down. DM's made-up trolling is no different. calling it a 'news outlet' is not exactly accurate.

Pretty much very university campus in the UK has access to one of the major news aggregating databases such as Factiva or Nexis UK. Every UK newspaper is available through them and the students and staff can access them for free whenever and where ever they like. If anyone desperately wants to read the Daily Fail they can access an ad free version of it through their library.

Students really don't buy newspapers and most union shops don't sell many at all any way, and it's STILL not a free speech issue even if they don't. National newspapers are not banned from UK campuses.

Oh and "banning" would be not allowing it on the train at all.

No one is stopping youfrom buying it and reading it on the train are they??

If they were snatching it out of your hand at the doors, you might have a point.....

What an overreaction! Nobody is banning anything! I expect there are quite a few other newspapers not sold on Virgin trains. You're still allowed to take a copy on board and read it!

I'm not really sure we know what we're talking about when we say 'freedom of speech'. Only those in very priviledged positions have the freedom to speak (to an audience) and it is not 'free' it goes hand in hand with wealth.
I often find those crying 'freedom of speech' are not raising awareness, but aggressively reasserting the status quo, to the detriment of those who do not have such freedom to speak.

It isn't being banned. How stupid do you have to be not to appreciate that? Virgin Trains are not stocking it (but then they're probably not stocking the Sporting Life either) and some university campuses aren't stocking it, to cater for the 0.256 per cent of students who still buy print media.

Free speech is being able to post on a board such as this without feeling in danger. Some of you aren't intelligent enough to merit that privilege.

Oh sorry Gin the context of my comment is the UK (home of the DM & MN), not Russia, North Korea, Saudi Arabia, Dubai, USA etc.

Virgin is a corporate retailer. They can, like any other retail outlet, choose what they do and don't sell in their retail spaces. We run a retail business. We have things we don't sell because we think they're crap and we don't agree with them. But it doesn't stop anyone buying them somewhere else. There is a difference between every retailer having to sell every paper and the state banning the printing of a given publication as a whole.

I am pleased that so few people were buying it when it was stocked. Totally understand rationing the choice of titles sold in the small buffet on their trains. No Daily Express, no Sun, no Guardian, no Daily Telegraph, but only because the Paper that Supported the Blackshirts isn't being stocked is a fuss made.

I like certain beers and Earl Grey tea but it is not offered on their trains, but I am not going to whinge about it.

This thread is very Daily Mail.

Get a grip op.

The title is like any DM headline; sensationalist click bait. It hasn't been banned.
If an item doesn't sell well or doesn't fit the company image, the company will stop stocking it.

A train is not a university.

(fuck off lazy journos)