As Labour recommits to introducing tougher ‘hate crime’ laws, a new paper highlights the need to protect free speech in the face of trans activists’ pro-censorship demands

[IwantToRetire]

Trans activists’ demands to shutdown dissent is a major threat to free speech.

• Transgender individuals should be entirely free to identify with their chosen gender – and equally, contrary opinions on trans identity and policy should be debatable.
• Influential activist groups like Stonewall and Mermaids advocate for gender critical views to be criminalised under ‘hate speech’ laws.
• Expanding hate speech laws threatens debate on controversial issues such as gender self-identification laws, female-only spaces in hospitals, and single-sex sports.
• Labour MP Graham Stringer says the paper “skewers the authoritarianism and the irrationality of the transgender ideology” while Conservative MP Nick Fletcher says it is a “much-needed wake-up call to libertarians and conservatives”.

As Labour recommits to introducing tougher ‘hate crime’ laws, a new paper highlights the need to protect free speech in the face of trans activists’ pro-censorship demands.

Marc Glendening, paper author and Head of Cultural Affairs at the free market Institute of Economic Affairs, cites a series of high profile cases to demonstrate that activists “do not aim to win the debate but rather to prevent debate from occurring”, including:

• Mermaids and Stonewall claiming that opposition to self-identification constitutes ‘hate speech’ and that it should be banned;
• Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer’s intention to bolster hate crime legislation to make sure “every LGBT+ crime is treated as an aggravated offence,” raising concerns that ‘misgendering’ people could lead to a criminal conviction;
• Police investigations of individuals for expressing gender critical views under existing public order offence laws and the recording of ‘non-crime hate incidents’;
• Harassment and threats towards gender critical voices such as Rosie Duffield and attempts to physically prevent gender critical voices from speaking publicly;
• Preventing medical professionals from providing non-affirming gender identity care under the auspices of banning ‘conversion therapy’.

https://iea.org.uk/media/dont-outlaw-gender-critical-views-says-new-paper/

Mermaids and Stonewall claiming that opposition to self-identification constitutes ‘hate speech’ and that it should be banned

What? Really?

I agree that trans-activists tend to be authoritarians that want to censor, but did they go that far?

It's made 5he daily mail
Free speech is under attack from trans rights activists, report warns https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-12434981/Free-speech-attack-trans-rights-activists-attempting-shut-debate-stronger-hate-crime-laws-lead-prosecutions-misgendering-report-warns.html?ito=native_share_article-nativemenubutton

And they are correct. Free speech is very much under attack from trans activists.
I hope this receives due consideration from the politicians.

Haven't read the whole paper but the last paragraph nails it.

^The movement seeks to sweep away conventionally determined beliefs concerning the nature of existence and to reject the view that language can reflect observable reality. This is a prerequisite for the making of a new order. If there is no recognition of our right as individuals to pursue and share with others what we believe to be objectively true, then there is no way for us to democratically and peaceably navigate how we should live as a political community. There is only the assertion of raw political power by one political perspective upon the rest. This is the goal to which transgender ideology, together with its closely associated doctrines, is
now working.^

Fuck that's scary.

What I see in practice is, "We don't deny biological reality", "there is a difference between biology and gender".

So why are you trying to change sex on a birth certificate?

You don't deny biology, but you want to falsify it on official documents, or you want to keep it secret?

You don't deny biology, but suddenly it doesn't matter for sports? Why aren't you willing to compete in sports according to your biological sex category?

And I hope they nail it down before the next election, when the woke mob are likely to get in. Labour are still truly captured, whatever tidbits they throw to women to try and convince us otherwise.

This is terrifying. How are we supposed to protect ourselves, our children, our rights to safety and privacy if we can't speak up and defend ourselves against men who are trying to obliterate us and our rights? Why can't they identify as whatever they want to be and go get on with their lives. Why are they so hell bent on trying to trying to change everything and oppress everyone's right to free speech? And why on Earth are there so many willing to support them in their relentless attacks on women. How a minority of misogynistic, mentally ill men, many of them sex offenders and violent criminals have gained this kind of control is beyond belief.

I've only skimmed the report but I can't see evidence that makes all the elements of that exact claim stand up. I may have missed it or the author over-reached himself: whichever it is, the report is either written carelessly or the author is inaccurate.

https://iea.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2023/08/Perspectives_3_Transgender-ideology_August_web.pdf

Mermaids and Stonewall claiming that opposition to self-identification constitutes ‘hate speech’ and that it should be banned
What? Really?
I agree that trans-activists tend to be authoritarians that want to censor, but did they go that far?

.
Iam really puzzled that any one on FWR should think this hasn't already been happening.

There have been endless threads about women, and other users on social media, being reported for hate speach. Which on investigation turns out to be stating biolgoical facts.

There have been threads about speakers at conferences being banned for daring to say you cant change your sex.

And the police have been willing to accept that this is hate speech and investigate on that basis.

Who knows what Starmer meant when he talked about legislating against hate speech towards trans people. We dont know and it quite possible he doesn't know.

He could just have been virtue signalling about it as it isn't that long ago that a Tory minister (and others) said the police should not use their time to investigate somebody taking offense against something else.

So based on police actions, which has effectively been silencing those with a GC view, the author of the report could claim that is the intention of Starmer's vague soapbox pronouncement.

Its a bit like the proposal to have a law against conversiont therapy. On one level that seems obvious. People of whatever age who think or realise they are gay or lesbian shouldn't then have people trying to tell them they are wrong and should accept heterosexuality.

But when you talk about conversion therapy in relation to people thinking they are trans, at which point is it conversion therapy and at which point rational counselling from a trained professional to help someone think more deeply about why they feel alienated from their body, or think it is wrong to like to do and behave in a way that is more stereotypically associated with the opposite sex.

Labour are setting themselves up for a humungous train crash.

It's made 5he daily mail

In fact it was because I saw news reports in the DM and other "right wing" papers that I looked up the source which turned out to be this paper.

And not posting because I am saying every word is true, but that because it was endorsed or has a quote from Maya Forstater who has after all had some experience of this!

And just for balance, well not quite, statements from 1 Labour MP and 2 Conservative MPs.

Its one of those double standard things, ie many on the left will say the Tories are silencing people's right to free street through curtailing the right to protest, but are willing to see a law that could mean through its implementation not being able to discuss sex based rights and protections.

This never happens????

The police now seem to be basing who they charge on unsubstantiated reports posted online by trans safety network

A none crime hate incident has been recorded against@HarryTheOwl101
by@LincsPolice following the publication of this woefully misleading conference report . @FamEdTrust

https://twitter.com/WeAreFairCop/status/1693898116804616691

This still never happerns?????

BREAKING: A woman in her 70s was interviewed for half an hour by @WestYorksPolice because she was caught on CCTV photographing a sticker supporting single sex spaces.

The police warned that the message could cause “harassment and alarm” to the members of Happy Valley Pride.

https://twitter.com/WeAreFairCop/status/1694239847274135728

I was planning to vote Labour for the first time in my life at the next General election after this train wreck of a Government. However I’m really struggling with what to do now. I just feel like there isn’t anyone I can vote for.

I think the problem is that the police are using actual crimes like malicious communication etc to pursue GC voicing wrong thought. As this is an actual crime it can be considered an aggravated hate crime factor in determining the sentence.

This is Labour's view. I remember doing the consultation but can't remember seeing the results.

labour.org.uk/press/labour-pledges-tougher-fairer-hate-crime-laws-to-keep-lgbt-people-safer/#:~:text=Labour%20has%20today%20pledged%20to,identity%2C%20transgender%20identity%20or%20disability.

Have now found the Law Commission's findings!
https://www.lawcom.gov.uk/project/hate-crime/

Page 103 in the full pdf covers Trans etc.
(That's another half hour gone, must stop being diverted)

That's another half hour gone, must stop being diverted

Much appreciated but ... the report is refering to a remark by Starmer not what is being said by the law commission.

Or has Starmer's comment been taken out of context and he was saying he supports the Law Commission proposals.

If the later then the report linked in OP is baseless. ie Labour isn't proposing to introduce stronger hate crime laws.

Sorry don't want to confuse matters.
I'm taking they're refering to KS saying he wants to strengthen laws [ as in Labour statement I linked to ] as he wants to implement Law Comm's recommendations, rather like the Conversion Therapy recommendations.

I'm not clear if KS has made any statement recently, but thought this would, perhaps intentionally, put him under pressure to confirm his position.

Maybe I just need a stiff drink.

I could be wrong.

I'm taking they're refering to KS saying he wants to strengthen laws

From 2021? I assumed it was something more recent.

More and more I think politics / political parties are the worst way to run a country.

It just becomes a game, that those of us who cant commit ourselves to full time are always outside of the loop.

Also in the Times they ask Labour for a response and all they can muster is this:
A Labour source said: “This is nonsense from the organisation that created the blueprint for Liz Truss’s disastrous kamikaze budget which crashed the economy and saddled working people with a mortgage bombshell.”

Not a denial they're not going to strengthen Hate Crime legislation.

There is nothing on the Labour Party web site, not even in extract from Conference speeches relationg to hate crime and transgender later than the link posted above, ie in 2021.

So wonder why this group, rightwing or otherwise, thought now was a time to respond to that ie 2 years later.

But it shows the power a press release can have - when news outlets choose to pick up on it. Expect, though not surprisingly, the Guardian and the Mirror.

But also shows how easy it is to get the press to whip up a perspective of someone or a party. Not saying they should write their paper, and as I said earlier, I partly posted it because of quote from Maya Forstater. So most people would have the time or tenancity of FWR contributors to ask questions about the basis of the allegations in the paper.

Its no longer clear what if anything Labour is committed to, which is quite strange as they are in a strong position, because so many are just fed up with the Tories, so you would think they would want to present a clear and different future.

And whether or not hate crimes are redefined what is absolutely clear is that it seems police forces are taking it upon themselves to decide what is or is not a hate crime. How can taking a photo of a sticker lead to someone being detained for questioning.

Would be good if any party would have the guts and committment to protect people to make a statement about events like this.

I cannot fathom why Labour think this would be a vote winner - people are not crying out for more restrictions on speech

Maybe they think this is their balancing act? (Try to? Pretend to?) Reassure women they’re not going full hog with self ID on the one hand. Tell the Trans community that mis gendering will become aggravated hate crime on the other. Congratulate themselves on job well done….

Only, Labour clearly haven’t really understood or thought through this issue as it’s now sufficiently contested and news worthy (because of high profile cases involving prisons and sports), it could be trumpeted on the front pages of the tabloids in a run up to the election.

Given the opinion of the majority viz yougov polling, it could become a key anti Labour tactic. I used to vote LD, and I would’ve voted Labour or Green but now have no idea who to vote for. I’d seriously look at an independent because of having lost faith in all the parties.

This is so important.