To feel so upset about the government censorship?

[Utterlydisillusioned]

This has just appeared in my news feed and I feel so upset and disillusioned. I was a labour voter, thinking we voted the bad guys out but I'm now really scared about what we've let in...what on earth have we done...? https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2024/08/17/education-secretary-bridget-phillipson-private-school-tax-r/

😁

This thread got too long.

So we've had

1. Can't afford a couple of grand extra of optional spending.
2. It's not fair, it's education, dammit.
3. State schools don't want us.
4. We're doing the state a favour.
5. We'll cause chaos.
6. There are no spaces.
7. The thousands of spaces aren't going to be where we want them.
8. We'll just buy big houses and pay out tens of thousands more than the tax and then you'll be sorry when your kids can't get places.
9. We're doing state parents a favour.
10. We can afford it but it's the principle.
11. We pay shitloads of tax.
12. We're very important and wealthy but simultaneously poor as church mice people.
13. Our kid will be sad.
14. We're just as good as the private parents who can afford the tax.
15. Childminders don't exist, we'll need schools to be open for 50 hours a week.
16. All the qualified private teachers will go and work in Sainsbury's rather than deal with state school children.
17. You're all just jealous.
18. We aren't like the other parents.
19. The private schools will all go bust, local economies will collapse, thousands will be unemployed and all will be lost.

And now, because they've been horrified to find out that actually, nobody really cares;
20, IT'S CENSORSHIP OF FREE SPEECH JUST LIKE THE NAZIS AND STALINISTS AND YOU'RE ALL SLEEPWALKING INTO GULAGS AND SUMMARY EXECUTIONS.

When the video came out there were Tweets coming out saying "he won't be arrested".

As soon as he was arrested they switched to ""he won't go to prison".

If and when he receives a custodial sentence it'll be "well, he wasn't sentenced to life imprisonment, was he?"

One of the things so mental about the crazy right wingers is their reaction when provided with facts. You'd think they'd be relieved to know PC Plod isn't going to turn up and arrest them for chatting shit on their socials, and there's no 2 tier policing biased against them, but no. They get all humpy about it.

WTF is that about?

Not all of them are receiving replies, thats the problem. They then take to social media and their comments/questions are deleted. Maybe we disagree on this but unless the comment is hateful, i dont think the education secretary should be deleting feedback.

One thing's for sure, a fairly large portion of the public, especially those on the right, seem to have an extremely difficult time with understanding what 'freedom of expression' actually entails.

I think a lot (not all!) know perfectly well.
They're just put out and sulking because they can't abuse people under the guise of "free speech" as freely as they used to.

I don’t bother saying it any more. Not worth worrying about the knock on the door in the middle of the night.

It is relevant because female politicians have to very extra vigilant about any comments they receive, and act accordingly, there is lots more safeguarding involved. I’m sure I don’t need to explain why. If she is getting a lot of hate for this policy, maybe this is how she has decided to respond. You can always email her directly, all her contact details will be in the public domain and you are more likely to get a proper response..
You were inferring that this government is no different just because you don’t agree with one policy and are peeved your comment was removed. Which is absolutely ridiculous frankly.

Oh yes. We wouldn’t want too much public debate in a democracy. How unseemly!

The appropriate person to contact remains your MP, if you want to be heard. If you’re not getting a response, make a complaint. Nobody on social media is going to address your concerns so posting on FB in the hope they will is pissing in the wind.

Whether they reply on social media is not the concern, the concern is that reasonable comments are being deleted in their droves and people dont like it.

People only have a year to sue in defamation so if they don’t become aware of defamatory comments until after that there’s very little chance that the statements could be challenged, at least in defamation.

And there’s no law against offensive comments. There’s offence regulation for TV and radio, but it’s generally only applied on the basis of being unsuitable when lots of children might be watching; and for adults the limits of offence in broadcasting are very, very wide.

Which is all as it should be IMO.

You're wrong.

They absolutely understand.

Well in their own heads they do.

But in the alternate parallel universe that is their skull space they think it means they can do and say as they please without consequence and if presented with facts it's a lefty plot to take over the world.

I wish I had as much time in my life to visit this land - but sadly reality takes up enough of my time

Yes I understand that, and if they’re unhappy they should go through the appropriate channels. Being pragmatic, the deleting of things from social media is unremarkable, common and, while faintly annoying, something to be taken on the chin. No more sinister than that.

Are they reasonable comments though?

I have no idea, since nobody who has made the claim that they are has as yet provided us with any examples.

When its a professional page for an elected representative, i completely disagree that its unremarkable for comments to be deleted.

Unless, of course, they voted for Fartage to be their MP. In which case he won't give a flying fuck about them...

Someone has made a group showing a bunch of them. Nothing remotely offensive that would warrant being deleted as far as i can see.

https://www.facebook.com/share/qRkP74k9SjR4itrS/

Maybe that's not actually the issue and instead it's the volume of almost identical posts on the same topic spamming her FB account - so that it swamps any other matter or discussion. In which case a bit of judicious thinning out seems quite reasonable

See the same tactics on MN when any politician gets x1000 trans-related questions pushing out any others

It does very much look like a MN thread

Yup. Every single post her account makes is flooded by the same stock complaints from private school parents about the VAT issue.

No one is stopping public debate. If you want your view heard you have many options. Write to your MP or attend their surgery. Write to your local paper. Post something on social media on your own page. Go on question time, phone into a talk show on the radio.

If you want answers to your questions, listen to parliamentary debates and radio 4 interviews, read the papers.

What you can't expect is to be able to have your own personal question answered every time on every forum.

Unfortunately lots of people can't be bothered to do the most basic of research themselves - if they want an answer they immediately leap into Facebook. Often with some kind of half truth or misinformation either through ignorance or deliberately. This is not debate. This is spamming.