Grenfell garden bonfire video

An intersting opinion. But not sure it is the police who will make a decision to prosecute or make up the laws!
It is the police who act on information that a crime MAY have been committed. Their job is to find evidence, to protect the public, uphold existing laws. If on investigation no law has been broken then no action taken. In this case men went to the police, police followed through and will present a case to CPS who make a decision.

I am unclear how the video became public. But if you play on the edge you have to expect the possibility of falling off!

if they didn't intend it to be made public why did they film it and put it on social media?

It was crystal clear from the very first reports of the video that it was filmed at the time and put on WhatsApp as anyone with more than one brain cell means it can then go viral. That meant the private event became public and it happened because the people concerned wanted others to see what racist idiots they are

Baggs

No surprise but I agree totally with the thought process behind the words in your link.

Slippery slope arguments are the last refuge for an inadequate argument and sadly very common here and out there

Could you expand on your thoughts on " slippery slope" argument please maryeliza. I am genuinely interested.

I am never sure when "better to ignore" and" need to challenge" start & end.
We know in the past those masterminding the rise of facism pareaded as respectable whilst rabble rousing amongst disgruntled/ poorly educated groups. In between people turned blind eyes, thought it " would never happen" kept low profiles etc. Then we had WW2

Yes certainly old. In the last paragraph he suggests that the alternative to not allowing vile racist comments is a totalitarian state. That’s rubbish - there are many steps in n between and prosecuting these racists ( if indeed that’s the outcome) does not lead inevitably to totalitarianism. And he also misses the point spectacularly that the issue is not what they did in private but that it was published.

meliza is correct about slippery slope arguments being fallacious.

Embery's argument about resisting giving the police powers over hate speech still holds though.

Thanks. I still cannot understand how people drew a parallel between this and burning a Guy or an effigy of a political figure.

Baggs he makes much of the private aspect. In public surely there has to be a line drawn somewhere as to how far someone can go with hate fillled speech.
old drawing a paralllell between this and effigies of GF is classic whataboutery and equally fallacious and intelllectually impoverished. It’s used to detract from the gravity of a specific incident by widening the scope of the debate with different examples so as to make it meaningless. The hope then is that the initial incident/example will be forgotten.

maryeliza, so much more articulate than me. I was beside myself about this and then the insults started.

www.libertyhumanrights.org.uk/human-rights/free-speech-and-protest/speech-offences

This is quite helpful

Old Batty

I still cannot understand how people can draw a parallel between burning an effigy of Guy Fawkes and burning effigies of serving Politicians !

In public surely there has to be a line drawn somewhere as to how far someone can go with hate fillled speech.

I agree, meliza. There is such a line. It is the line that incitement to violence or other criminal activity draws, well defined by law.

Hmmm I am not sure about this topic. I totally agree that what they did was not very nice and it was incredibly hurtful and "in bad taste" but i really think there are bigger police issues where the time spent investigating this can be used. And as was said above is this any more wrong than burning effigies

not very nice?

disrespectful. i am not being flippant i assure you

I agree with the sentiment expressed.

The point which stood out for me was the idea that the price we pay for a free society is accepting that sometimes we will encounter things which to us are unpleasant, yet are not crimes.

Heaven knows the police have enough to do dealing with real crimes. Yes the bonfire and video were in bad taste, but if a crime wasn't committed, they shouldn't get involved.

Oohhh Jennifer perhaps you could explain how the police decide whether something might be a crime without getting involved?

I take it you’re a lawyer btw?

I think that recreating a terrible, terrible tragedy, laughing and mocking whilst filming it, and then putting it on show is a huge deal.
It isn't the same as burning effigies, although that is in bad taste.
It was recreating the scene of peoples deaths, which happened only recently.
How those who lost family must have felt about it I can't imagine.
It seems extremely hateful to me.

Absolutely Miss when posters talk about bad taste I do wonder what these posts say about their moral compasses.

Yes something in bad taste is an unsavoury comment or perhaps a smutty joke. Making figures, going to the trouble of giving them brown faces and hijab and filming whilst you burn the thing, is a bit more than bad taste or not nice.