Thursday, July 9, 2009

Free Speech - What Ezra Levant and Stephen Boissoin are Fighting For

What Happens if Jennifer Lynch Gets Her Way

Jennifer Lynch wants to tighten up the Hate Speech areas of freedom of speech legislation in our country, to properly criminalise hatred. I for one do not want her to have anything to do with it. Get out of the hate speech/free speech business like you belong Jennifer. You are wasting my tax dollars, while you mainly persecute people that He Who Will Not Be Named In My Blog thinks are worthy of persecution, not necessarily a good basis, and that nobody else has ever heard of. Oh, and the others that you and your CASHRA colleagues have chosen to behead metaphorically, have spoken the truth, but have offended somebody's feelings, and we have this wonky legislation around the country that allows their lives to be made hell for of all things, telling the truth.

It's really not that bad. What are you going on about anyway, mbrandon8026? Wake up, people. Look over at England to see where we will be in a few years, where offending somebody's feelings gets you, if they have the might of government and legislation they can tweak to their liking to make you dance to their tune.

In the United Kingdom, they have these things called Anti-Social Behaviour Order or ASBO. An ASBO may be issued in response to "conduct which caused or was likely to cause harm, harassment, alarm or distress, to one or more persons not of the same household as him or herself and where an ASBO is seen as necessary to protect relevant persons from further anti-social acts by the Defendant".

Anti-social behaviour has typically included such egregious acts as spitting, begging, fare dodging, dumping your garbage where it does not belong, making unnecessary noise, intimidation and the like.

These cases go before magistrates, and hearsay evidence is allowed, though higher courts can choose to discount hearsay evidence totally, partly or maybe.

An anti-social behaviour order is a Court Order which tells an individual over 10 years old how they must not behave. An Order can contain only negative prohibitions. To obtain an ASBO a two-stage test must be satisfied by the applicant authority. The first is that the defendant has committed acts causing or likely to cause harassment, alarm or distress within six months of the date of issue of the summons. The second is that an order is necessary to protect persons from further anti-social behaviour.

This all sounds like our kangaroo courts we lovingly call HRCs/HRTs.

So, into this nonsense comes Ted Atkinson. Ted, who is now over 80 years of age is a former member of Her Majesty's Military Service, and is active in Pro-Life work, though hobbled by disease. Here is some of what happened to him in his own words.

"On May 4th, 2006 I was convicted at Swaffham Magistrates Court, Norfolk under the Malicious Communications Act for sending pro-life material through the post to Mrs Ruth May, Chief Executive of the Queen Elizabeth Hospital, Kings Lynn.

Mrs Ruth May sent for the Police because this material alluded to the murder of unborn babies. I was fined £500 and was made subject to a 5 year Anti-Social Behaviour Order (ASBO). The hospital placed me on the barred list and will not treat me unless I’m in a life threatening condition. I subsequently discovered that the same hospital murders more than 5 babies per
week.

On 12th December I was arrested for the same thing, this time for sending material to the Adjustamatic bed company in North Wales when cancelling an order for an adjustable mattress. This time I was charged for both breaching the Malicious Communications Act and breaching my ASBO which runs for 5 years.

After a committal hearing at Kings Lynn Magistrates court on Friday, 9th January, I was committed for trial at Kings Lynn Magistrates for Wednesday, 4th March, 2009.

I am already having £5 per week deducted to pay off the £500 fine. It seems that if I am found guilty, I could go to prison for 5 years.

I am 77 years of age, I have diabetes, inflammation around the heart with a narrowing of the arteries, arthritis affecting both hands and a bad hip.

However, I have no trade, no profession, no debts and no dependents so I can afford to place my neck on the block.

I am under no illusions, as the world sees these things, that it is an exercise in futility, like a man who tries to hold up a Churchill tank armed only with a pea shooter and a pocketful of peas, but I can clear my conscience before Almighty God.

Perhaps it shows the double standards that are practised in the Queen Elizabeth Hospital when I tell you that in that same hospital there is a leading surgeon, a Mr Bone, who has undergone a sex-change operation (as if anyone could) because he has some weird notion that he is really a woman.

This ASBO was issued against me to render me inactive and silent in the face of the abortion holocaust. At Swaffham Magistrates Court in 2006 I asked the Judge, Philip Browning if he thought that murdering unborn babies is antisocial but he ignored me."

In Court, Mr. Atkinson said the purpose of sending the images had been "to educate", adding:
I accept that the documentation was highly distressing. It's horrendous, monstrous and sickening but it represents the truth of what is going on in our world. Everyone in this courtroom knows that abortion is murder and no one has the guts to say it.
In sentencing Atkinson, the judge said: "It is clear that you intended to shock and I am certain your purpose was to cause distress and anxiety."

For having forcefully exercised his right of free speech in protecting unborn babies and causing 'upset':
  • On 4 May 2006, Atkinson was jailed for 28 days.
  • Plus an extra 14 days in prison for non-payment of a £650 fine imposed in 2002 for a similar offence.
  • Plus the old age pensioner was told that an order would also be made for £500 of the £700 court costs to be deducted direct from his pension.
  • Plus he was given a five-year anti-social behaviour order and was told by district judge Phillip Brown that if he disobeyed the ASBO he faced five years in jail. But Atkinson replied "Then you may as well lock me up and throw away the key."
  • Plus his area hospital now formally denies him all but treatment for life threatening illnesses
  • Plus his area hospital has taken him off their waiting list for surgery on his hip justifying it with this statement: "Our legal advisers were consulted and their opinion was that this man's actions contravened the Natioinal Health Service Zero Tolerance policy in cases of abuse or unacceptable behaviour towards our staff."
Mr. Atkinson hurt people's feelings by telling the truth. The people who's feelings were hurt were more powerful than him, and had legislation working in their favour even if they had to bend it to their purpose, since it sure did not fit as it was designed.

Mark my words. If we stay silent in this country, this will be our fate. I do not want Stephen Boissoin's blood or the blood of any other martyr for free speech on my hands.

Stephen, if you have the courage to speak the truth as you understand it, do so, not that you need my permission to so do. If my feelings are hurt, I will get over it, though I may pout for a bit. I have done sinful things in my life and I wish someone who spoke with truth and authority had had the courage to speak up to me and tell me I was on a wrong path at those times. I might not have listened, but then again, I might have, and saved myself and people I love a lot of heartache. But, we will never know, will we?

We need people speaking the truth as they understand it in this country. Then we have the chance to build up our own consciences and form ourselves and conform ourselves to the truth. Everything else is Blah, Blah, Blah.

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