GC people do not want one rule for them and another for everyone else. They want the same standards applied to everyone: speech is allowed, credible threats and violence are not. The sticking point is what counts as a credible threat in UK law.
What is a credible threat?
In UK law the exact offences vary, but the common thread is intent plus a realistic prospect of harm. Courts look at context, not just a single sentence. Key tests often include:
• Specificity: is there a named target or clearly identifiable group or person, rather than a vague slogan.
• Immediacy and proximity: is it urging imminent action or tied to a time and place.
• Capability and likelihood: is there a real prospect the threat could be carried out, not obvious hyperbole.
• Intent to cause fear or encourage crime: would a reasonable person think the speaker intended to make the target fear violence, or intended others to commit violence.
• Pattern and context: prior conduct, surrounding events, and how the audience is likely to take it.
Relevant offences include Threats to Kill, Public Order offences, encouraging or assisting crime, and communications offences. All of them turn on context and intent, not simply whether the words are nasty.
Applying that to the examples raised
• Placards like “decapitate TERFs” or chants like “punch a TERF”: revolting, yes. On their own, courts often treat this kind of crude protest rhetoric as hyperbolic rather than a credible plan to kill or injure. If there is organisation, direction at named individuals, attempts to locate someone, or incitement tied to a time and place, it becomes far more legally serious.
• “Give KJK a NZ welcome”: in isolation it looks flippant. In context, after a prior mobbing where she was physically attacked, it can reasonably be read as encouraging a repeat. That context moves it closer to a credible encouragement of violence even if the words are coy.
• Graham Linehan’s “punch in the genitals” line: it is crude and wrong. But the legal question is not “is it offensive” but “is it a credible threat or incitement.” It was not a targeted, time-and-place instruction, nor directed at a specific person, nor something he was arranging or capable of carrying out. In legal terms it reads as hyperbolic venting, so it is unlikely to meet the threshold for a credible threat or for encouraging a specific offence. It can still breach platform rules or merit criticism. Equal standards means we should say the same when “our side” mouths off.
Why convicted violent offenders are different
This is where GC concerns about safeguarding come in. Once you move from speech to acts of violence, or to specific, directed threats that a court has found credible, you are no longer in the free-speech realm. You are dealing with known risk. Saying “we should not house or search female people alongside males with a record of violent or sexual offending” is a safeguarding position, not a speech preference. There is a clear, evidence-based difference between someone tweeting something stupid and someone with a proven history of violence.
Bottom line
• One rule for all: protect speech, prosecute credible threats and violence, regardless of who says them.
• Condemn vile rhetoric across the board, but reserve police time and criminal penalties for cases that meet the legal tests.
• Safeguarding decisions should be based on risk from behaviour and convictions, not on identity labels.
That is the GC position in plain terms.