J D Vance Munich address today.

I think people who oppose abortion have a right to hold that view. Free speech is supporting the right to the speech we hate.
The left have been generally been useless in the last few years on free speech, they have handed this present to the right, along with many other gifts.

Abortion has always been a "free vote" issue in parliament, not left or right.

And I don't see how one can separate an issue from the debates on speech around it.

I dont mind arguing But you arent going to shift me on my concerns around speech in this country. As I say the left may as well have wrapped this issue up in a big red bow and handed it to the right.

Sigh.

I hate to argue on this point Galaxy. It just makes me sick the idea of women having to face what many have, and that Vance could casually lie about the issue and inflame matters especially when we know whats happening in the USA..

(posted before I read your post, Galaxy).

The guidelines are there to protect women Galaxy, having to run some kind of gauntlet on their way to a clinic. And we did have this kind of threat to women in the UK

the Guardian yesterday:

"Rachael Clarke remembers life before buffer zones. Almost every day, the head of staff at the UK’s biggest abortion provider would get emails from staff worried about protesters outside clinics – and women crying in the waiting room.

"Some of the protesters had huge placards with graphic images of foetuses. Others held candlelit vigils and said prayers. One scattered baby clothes in the bushes. “We had every­thing from people telling women that having an abortion was putting their baby in a meat grinder to people following nurses down the road in the dark telling them they were killing babies,” says Clarke.

Since buffer zones were rolled out nationally late last year – building on public space protection orders that were already in place outside some clinics – she says things have drastically improved."

The article goes on to describe how the *US funded and sponsored group the SDF is trying to break the buffer zones in detail.

www.theguardian.com/world/2025/feb/16/prayer-and-prosecutions-the-us-hate-group-waging-war-over-britains-abortion-clinic-buffer-zones

They are pushing the idea that the UK is trying to operate some kind of "thought police" to win support,

but at the heart of their efforts is an attempt to stop our womens health rights.

We know the issues about speech in the last few years, as I said we dont need Vance to tell us, what it means is we dont trust the other 'side' either. That ship sailed years ago.

(I mean abortion rights removed altogether, as Vance would have it). "Freedoms" are not absolutes. They are a balance, when it involves conflicting interests.

Remember, above all, Vance stood up and lied: deliberate, inflammatory statements to further his own abortion "hobby horse"

There is a difference between speech and burning clinics down.

How can we have utterly total free speech if womens' freedoms and rights are taken away from them by demonstrations outside clinics?

In the USA clinics have been attacked and burned down, and doctors attacked and demonstrations outside their homes.
Or their rights taken away altogether.

Is this what we are prepared to allow?

How can anyone listen to Vance talking about free speech when Trump is cosying up with Putin.
Free speech in Russia disagreeing with Putin ends in people disappearing or falling out of windows in tall buildings.
They should be aiming their free speech accusations at Russia and China.

Vance lied - there has been nothing that has suggested poole are not free to pray or think what they will - the letter is about people using private premises to publicly (verbally or visibly) promote hate against women going enroute to a clinic.

What is really, hypocritical is that Vance government at home has just signed away another bit of peoples freedoms under new ICE regulations

*ICE plans to monitor social media for threats and negative comments
Immigration law enforcement agency has requested information from companies that can provide social media and online monitoring for threats against ICE*

In a 15-page statement of objectives, ICE said it seeks a company that can scour social media, open-source online databases, the dark web and the deep web to find potential threats and identify them to the agency using geolocation, psychological profiles, facial recognition technology and more

Its even planning to hand the contract out to a private company.

Precisely.
It seems many are wilfully putting their heads in the sand over the subject of free speech still.

The articles that have been produced on this page from the BBC etc make me very uncomfortable, it is an authoritarian approach that scares me. These discussions on speech have been going on long before Vance became involved it is just no one was listening.

What was wrong with the letters, no one told anyone not to pray or think.

Cossy

Galaxy

I am a woman and am quite frightened by the pro palestine protests that happen. I find those protests bullying and threatening. Can I suggest they dont happen.? I am pro abortion and with some reservations agreed with the idea of buffer zones, but the thing is it rarely stops there does it.
I dont need Vance to explain about the issues of freedom of speech in the UK, most feminists know the problems we have faced with regard to speech in the last few years. The fact that the left have handed this as a gift to the right is ridiculous.

I agree with the point that no-one, male or female, should be intimidated simply going about their business in the street, by any so-called peaceful protests.

I agree wholeheartedly with your post Galaxy and your additional points cossy.
But would add how much more passive can you be than silently thinking/praying?

There were letters sent out to residents, in the buffer zone, see the Scottish Daily Express for a photo of one.

Sadly this means JDV has a better handle on what is happening here than some of us UK citizens.
Perhaps our media should try to be more circumspect when reporting?

Namsnanny

Cossy

Namsnanny

My point is about having the right to think anything one wants to think.
The state should have no jurisdiction over free thought.
Incitement to violence is already covered by our laws
I am interested in finding the truth about these letters and not the abortion argument.

The Police are already acting on behalf of the state by arresting people
Free speach for all is a difficult subject for people to grapple with sometimes
But it is fundamental to our communities cohesion that it is upheld, imv

The letters sent out were only sent to residents living in the buffer-zone, so abortion is an integral part of this entire issue.

No one has been fined for their “thoughts”

So you are sure the letters were sent then?

So many have been sure this is a lie

Just bumping.

Sago

I have just listened to J D Vance’s speech in Munich today.

It was absolutely spot on, what a man!

What a worm!

Cossy

Namsnanny

My point is about having the right to think anything one wants to think.
The state should have no jurisdiction over free thought.
Incitement to violence is already covered by our laws
I am interested in finding the truth about these letters and not the abortion argument.

The Police are already acting on behalf of the state by arresting people
Free speach for all is a difficult subject for people to grapple with sometimes
But it is fundamental to our communities cohesion that it is upheld, imv

The letters sent out were only sent to residents living in the buffer-zone, so abortion is an integral part of this entire issue.

No one has been fined for their “thoughts”

So you are sure the letters were sent then?

So many have been sure this is a lie

Wyllow3

No I dont think freedom of speech includes harassing women going to health clinics, including saying they are committing sins and wrong in gods eyes.

Who said it did?
Don't conflate my position.
I'm talking about freedom of thought and speech NOT harassment of women, or abortion.
It just so happens the two topics converge

I think it's passive aggression. Anyone who really cared for the unborn children would pray at home or in their place of worship. My religious friends say God will hear wherever you pray.
Anti abortionists who pray outside abortion clinics are hypocrites.

Galaxy

I am a woman and am quite frightened by the pro palestine protests that happen. I find those protests bullying and threatening. Can I suggest they dont happen.? I am pro abortion and with some reservations agreed with the idea of buffer zones, but the thing is it rarely stops there does it.
I dont need Vance to explain about the issues of freedom of speech in the UK, most feminists know the problems we have faced with regard to speech in the last few years. The fact that the left have handed this as a gift to the right is ridiculous.

I agree with the point that no-one, male or female, should be intimidated simply going about their business in the street, by any so-called peaceful protests.

I am a woman and am quite frightened by the pro palestine protests that happen. I find those protests bullying and threatening. Can I suggest they dont happen.? I am pro abortion and with some reservations agreed with the idea of buffer zones, but the thing is it rarely stops there does it.
I dont need Vance to explain about the issues of freedom of speech in the UK, most feminists know the problems we have faced with regard to speech in the last few years. The fact that the left have handed this as a gift to the right is ridiculous.

In Matthew 6, Jesus tells us not to pray publicly, "as the hypocrites love to do", as they like to be seen, but privately.

Anti abortionists are using prayer like a weapon to get their own way. I doubt whether their God would approve of this sort of prayer. They are eroding the rights of women.
Free speech goes both ways and women have the right to say they want privacy and not to be heckled by praying anti abortionists. Because that is what they are doing using bullying tactics