When will the prime minister publicly condemn the disgusting online abuse that Gina miller is receiving?

[KarlosKKrinkelbeim]

As well as the ignorant attacks on the judges who heard the brexit case?
Context: I am a Conservative party member considering resigning my membership in utter disgust at the government's conduct in relation to these matters.

Well your a bit silly then many people of many colours voted brexit and personally I would put my money on the people a abuseing her being UKIP supporters rather than Tory's

And why sould TM say anything I very much doubt she is sitting in number 10 thinking awsome Gina is getting death threats

Probably never. Although she should.

Abusing judges is a democratic right. Personally I am not sure the case should have been heard or indeed whether a judge who is publicly pro-Europe (or anti-Europe) should have heard it.

The judges decide the law without regard to their personal views of course. The fact the press are suggesting otherwise is very wrong indeed as the press is misleading the public on this.

The judges decide the law without regard to their personal views of course

Thats what they are meant to do, that is why they routinely recuse themselves if there is a conflict.

As leader of this country, TM should be roundly condemning this sort of behaviour. Even some of her MPs are calling on her to do so, including Dominic Grieve who makes the comparison with Mugabe's Zimbabwe: “reading hostile coverage in the Mail and The Telegraph... started to make one think that one was living in Robert Mugabe’s Zimbabwe … I think there’s a danger of a sort of mob psyche developing – and mature democracies should take sensible steps to avoid that”.
Things have become quite ugly in the UK, stirred up by a rabble-rousing press. The PM should certainly be speaking out about this. Unfortunately, she only seems capabe of scripted soundbites.

So your prescription for freedom is the Prime Minister criticising a Free Press?

There is free speech and there is incitement/rabble-rousing. May herself has chosen to frame this issue in the same way as you, saying she values freedom of press link here but - like you - seems unable to see a distinction between press freedoms and their right to call people traitors, especially in these divided times.

As much as Theresa May tries to pretend, the result of the EU referendum demonstrated an incredibly divided country.

17.4m versus 16.1m. That's an incredibly close vote.

I think she has got herself into the mindset that if she keeps going on about the "will of the people", it will stick.

Despite the fact that the difference was not much than 1m votes. If 16.1m voted the other way, how can you ever say it is the will of the people?

It would be more grown up and more reaponsible to acknowledge that this is a divisive issue. Incredibly divisive. She could have adopted the narrative that it is a divisive issue, but there was a narrow majority for Brexit.

Instead, she is feeding the hate by ignoring 16m voters so when they respectfully disagree, those on the "majority" side retaliate as they are seen as being the only ones with valid views.

I suspect she knows she's fucked up with the political messaging but it's too late.

This is what the Tories do. They come up with a bingo catch phrase and try and make it stick. Eg "we are all in this together", "we don't want to be another Greece", "it is the will of the people".

It is so simplistic and dangerous.

I don't think TM should be jumping into the Gina Miller furore. It's for the police to crack down on death threats etc.

Agreed, Believeitornot, apart from the "This is what the Tories do" bit. They all do it, all of them, which is one of the reasons many people have been totally turned off politics.

You can't have a little bit of freedom of the press - it's like being slightly pregnant.

You can't have a little bit of freedom of the press - it's like being slightly pregnant.

That's a ridiculous analogy. What you're saying is that the press should have carte blanche to print anything they want regardless of whether it is accurate or factual. Are you arguing, too, that the press should be free to harass, free to name children in sex cases, free to name victims of sexual assault etc., all of which are against IPSO's code of practice? It sounds like you are.

Argy I deliberate said it was what the Tories do because they do it and do it well. The catch phrases stick.

Labour are useless and cannot form an effective opposition. It wouldn't take much! The Tories have given us Brexit, long term damage to communities due to the thatcher legacy of the 1980s,a broken NHS, a demoralised teaching force, continued propping up of the housing market

They have been in power since 2010 and I see little if any improvement.

Online abuse of anyone is unacceptable, but I do think there is a lot of hypocrisy going on. The tone of a lot of debate and journalism during and since the referendum has been pretty dreadful (eg Polly Toynbee's article in the Guardian after the murder of Jo Cox saying that all leavers were responsible - paraphrasing obviously but that was her jist). I think if people want to see an end to the awful division and hurling around of abuse, they need to criticise it whoever it comes from, and not just in a one-sided way. We reap what we sow, and every time someone joins in with the denigrating and insulting of others (whichever "side") they are making the situation worse.

Just to clarify in case my post gave that impression, I am not accusing you of hypocrisy OP, as I presume you have not been handing out abuse to anyone. I was referring to people who seem happy to throw round nasty insults to others and then get on their high horses when other people join in.

Well that was interesting.

Thanks for giving us your "paraphrase" of Polly Toynbee's article, WrongTrouser.

I went and read what she actually wrote. Which is:

This attack on a public official cannot be viewed in isolation. It occurs against a backdrop of an ugly public mood in which we have been told to despise the political class, to distrust those who serve, to dehumanise those with whom we do not readily identify.

There are many decent people involved in the campaign to secure Britain’s withdrawal from the EU, many who respect the referendum as the exercise in democracy that it is. But there are others whose recklessness has been open and shocking. I believe they bear responsibility, not for the attack itself, but for the current mood: for the inflammatory language, for the finger-jabbing, the dogwhistling and the overt racism.

It’s been part of a noxious brew, with a dangerous anti-politics and anti-MP stereotypes fomented by leave and their media backers mixed in.
...
Democracy is precious and precarious. It relies on a degree of respect for the opinions of others, soliciting support for political ideas without stirring up undue savagery and hatred against opponents. "Elites" are under attack in an anarchic way, when the "elite" justice minister can call on his supporters to ignore all experts.

Something close to a chilling culture war is breaking out in Britain, a divide deeper than I have ever known, as I listen to the anger aroused by this referendum campaign. The air is corrosive, it has been rendered so.

So no, she doesn't claim all Leavers were responsible for the murder. Or even any Leavers. Nor does she hurl any abuse or insult anyone. (I've selected highlights, but do click and read the whole thing.)

The examples she gave of inflammatory behaviour were indeed associated with Leave (Farage's poster, individual White Power intimidation), but she's explicit that these can't be ascribed to all Leavers.

Are we now arguing that Toynbee shouldn't have published the article unless she could come up with examples of equal gravity from people associated with Remain, for "balance"? (Were there any of equal gravity and magnitude?)

I'm very uncomfortable with any attempt to claim equivalence between inflammatory behaviour, and criticising that inflammatory behaviour. Because in that case, WrongTrouser's criticism of Toynbee's criticism of Farage's inflammatory behaviour is also inflammatory behaviour. And my post replying to WT. And so ad infinitem.

How could reasoned debate ever exist, in that case?

And is us discussing the Daily Mail headline also inflammatory behaviour or hypocrisy?

What are we supposed to do, in that case?

Say nothing? Not say anything until we can find an equivalent headline on a leftwing paper, "for balance"?

cdtaylornats: "So your prescription for freedom is the Prime Minister criticising a Free Press?"

It always depresses me that a lot of people don't seem to understand the meaning of the terms "free speech" or "free press". The fact that newspapers are free, within limits, to publish what they want doesn't mean that they should never be criticised for what they publish. Indeed, saying that people shouldn't criticise what newspapers write is in itself an attack on free speech.

Mind-blowing, eh?

There is a difference between you or I objecting to a newspaper article and the government doing it. Individually we should all be free to criticise a newspapers stance on a topic our representatives taking a position is a presumption on their part that shouldn't be allowed.

Flatly Yes, you are right and I have exagerrated. PT didn't say all leavers were responsible for Jo Co's murder and my paraphrase was a bit off. Unhelpful of me.

However if you look at the rhetoric of her piece and the impression it gives, well perhaps it's just me, but I find it horrifying. Even just the headline "The mood is ugly and now an MP is dead" - well, its fine to say in the article you are not blaming anyone but the murderer but how can you not be making that connection with a headline like that?

And this

Something close to a chilling culture war is breaking out in Britain, a divide deeper than I have ever known, as I listen to the anger aroused by this referendum campaign. The air is corrosive, it has been rendered so. One can register shock at what has happened, but not complete surprise.

Surely this is stoking a them-and-us divide and as the headline is about JC putting associating one side of the divide with her death?

Also, I don't think I was saying that criticising inflammatory behaviour is equivalent to inflamatory behaviour. What I am saying is that, if people want the situation de-inflamed, then they need to speak and act in a de-inflammatory way themselves (and my over-statement of PT's article is probably a helpful example of not doing this).

Are we now arguing that Toynbee shouldn't have published the article unless she could come up with examples of equal gravity from people associated with Remain, for "balance"? (Were there any of equal gravity and magnitude?)

I'm arguing that PT shouldn't have written an article linking the murder of JC with the EU referendum. JC's husband has said he does not think the two are related. PT could have written about inflamatory or otherwise unacceptable behaviour from elements within the leave campaign without bringing in the murder of JC.

NO. What the PM should be doing is condemming remoaners who consistently call ALL brexiteers xenophobic/rascist/poor educatrd/thick.

that's worse.

this bloody woman is a rich bitch whos out for herself. philanthropist my arse.

as are the judges.

BTW I voted to remain, but as a person who knows ewhat the words Democracy/result/acceptance means, Im getting on with life.

and I rescpect and accept the result.

stop bloody throwing toys out of prams and giving everyone else a bad name.

I am not trying to start an argument but Becker the sort of insults you use in your post are really unhelpful whoever they are directed at.

You are right that people should not be stereotyping and insulting leave voters, but throwing personal.insults at anyone is not the answer.

If you actually knew what democracy meant, you would know that in this country parliament is the guardian of democratic rights and freedoms.
The high court has stated that the executive cannot act so as to alter existing rights of uk persons without the sanction of parliament. Remember the post civil war political settlement?
In failing to point this out and challenge the more ignorant commentary on this issue, the prime minister is failing to show effective leadership, and colluding with a mindset which is becoming ever closer to fascism. I therefore decline to support a party which has her as leader and will be resigning my membership.