Sorry, Elon, but Other Nations Don’t Care About Freedom of Speech – RedState

Recently, the European Commission (EU) fined X and Elon Musk $140 million for failing to control “harmful” content “in a brazen move to control freedom of expression.”

Elon Musk’s response: the fine was “Bull***t” and violated “freedom of expression (which) is the foundation (of) society.” He later tweeted: “The EU should be abolished and sovereignty returned to individual countries, so that governments can better represent their people. »

READ MORE: Musk Gives Epic One-Word Response to Insane EU X Speech Fine, Gets Support from Rubio

Sorry Elon, but abolishing the EU won’t achieve anything.

The real problem is that individual EU countries, the entire English-speaking world except the US and every other country, don’t actually protect freedom of speech. Everyone – including Canada – has voice codes that allow them to prosecute those who say something “harmful”. By “harmful,” they often mean speech regarding Islam and racial/ethnic minorities.

As I said before:

“…[M]All European countries have passed laws to criminalize the speech of their citizens in order to protect the feelings of ethnic, religious or gender minorities against authoritarian racist/nationalist groups. In Europe, a conviction for hate speech could even result in an actual prison sentence. Unfortunately, the truth of the statement in question rarely matters in a hate speech trial.”

However, these speech codes also cover citizen criticism of governments and their policies, the concept of DEI, objections to “climate change”, etc.

As an aside, let me point out that what we are talking about is government censorship of speechand not a private enterprise restricting freedom of expression, if not initiated by a government. Nor are we talking about speech that amounts to intimidation and likely assault, as happens on campus when someone shouts obscenities at “Zionists” (i.e. Jews) and raises their fists in anger at a man wearing a yarmulke.

In the EU, even political leaders who disagree with elite views can be prosecuted and punished. A major example is that of Geert Wilders, a Dutch politician whose party is one of the most popular in that country. Wilders endured a lengthy pressure campaign from Dutch elites and was twice put on trial for his speech.

During Wilders’ first trial, I compared it to the legal farce of the novel Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland. Wilders faced five hate speech charges for inciting hatred and/or discrimination against Muslims, for calling Islam “fascist” and for comparing the Quran to Mein Kampf. Possible sanctions ranged from a prison sentence of up to one year or a substantial fine. Dutch prosecutors initially declined to prosecute Wilders, but a three-judge appeals court overruled prosecutors’ objections. No jurors participated in the trial. The three-judge panel decided Wilders’ verdict and punishment – ​​literally acting as prosecutor, judge and jury.

The trial exposed crazy judicial bias that ultimately led to the creation of a new panel of judges:

On the opening day of the trial, October 4, 2010, the presiding judge, Judge Moors, made a sarcastic remark about Wilders…it became known that Judge Schalken had illegally met outside of court with Hans Jansen, an expert witness, and attempted to influence Jansen to change his testimony to Wilders’ detriment. At this meeting, the judge also personally reprimanded Jansen: “(you) as an intellectual should not mix with such a guy (i.e. Wilders). »…The appeals court as a whole was embarrassed enough to approve Wilders’ request for a new judicial panel – but not embarrassed enough to overturn the trial itself. There was no need to overturn, you see, because, as the presiding judge said: “It is not plausible that Schalken tried to influence Jansen,” so “(we) cannot conclude that the rights of the accused were violated.”

In 2011, the new committee took over and prosecutors again recommended acquittal. The judicial panel, once again, ignored them. The defense called for Wilders’ acquittal in the name of freedom of expression, justice and democracy. The lead defense lawyer also joked that he had never been to a trial where the defense could adopt the prosecution’s arguments.

On June 23, 2011, the Dutch court acquitted Wilders. But their reasoning was not reassuring:

Summing up its convoluted decision, the Court said that Wilders’ comments – even though they respected all elements of the Dutch code – were excused by the “context” of the statement. In other words, the Court said, we must decide this case based not only on a simple assessment of the elements of the crime, but also on an examination and evaluation of the following factors: who made the statement in question, where the statement was made, what statements preceded or followed the specific statement, and why the statement was made, etc.

And because Geert Wilders was the leader of a major party in Parliament, and because of the different context, the court ruled that he should not be convicted for his “harmful” speech.

This context, of course, would not be accessible to some poor Dutch bastard who was not a parliamentarian and who was more reckless in his speech.

What should worry Americans is that these types of voice codes are coming to America, and not just through X fines imposed by the EU. Under Presidents Barack Obama and Joe Biden, some speech was punished, sometimes by circumventing the Constitution and the law, and other times in blatantly unconstitutional and illegal ways. In 2012, the Obama administration took advantage of protests organized in the Arab world to attack an amateur film by a Californian filmmaker depicting the Muslim prophet Muhammad in a negative light. The filmmaker was eventually jailed for violating probation.

Then, under the Biden administration, and just before it, the federal government – ​​acting at the behest of the Biden administration OR left-wing government elites to oppose Donald Trump – censored and/or distorted criticism from left-wing elites.

Unfortunately, the next Democratic president will almost certainly continue this worrying trend.

Editor’s note: President Trump is leading America into the ‘gilded age’ as Democrats desperately try to stop him.

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