Word of the day

Fogou – a form of artificial underground passage or chamber; a man-made underground passage or chamber lined with stone; a souterrain; an underground, dry-stone structure found on Iron Age or Romano-British-defended settlement sites in Cornwall.

Sowell says

We need laws written by people who have confronted life in the real world, not in the sheltered world of trust fund recipients or the insulated cocoon of academia. Nor do we need people who have nothing to offer in the private sector that would earn them more than what they…

— Thomas Sowell Wisdom (@TheThomasSowell) March 26, 2024

Biology trumps beliefs

Whatever people may choose to believe about sex, you can’t argue with biology.

The Women of Wessex are about to start exercising their Article 10 rights so stand by…
-Humans cannot change sex.
-Only women have a cervix.
-Medical transition of children is child abuse.
-There are only two sexes. You are either male or female. That’s it.#TruthIsNotAHateCrime pic.twitter.com/THRxCcInzX

— Women of Wessex (@WomenOfWessex) April 1, 2024

Saved by the Minister

Justice Minister Paul Goldsmith has instructed the Law Commission to stop all work on hate speech laws:

New Zealand Minister of Justice Paul Goldsmith has instructed the Law Commission to stop all work on hate speech laws. These reforms were a fool’s errand from the start, and this is a decision worth celebrating. . . 

It is indeed worth celebrating because had the work continued we might have followed Scotland’s bad example:

Imagine living in a world where sitting in your own living room and saying “men can’t be women” could result in the police logging a “hate incident” against your name.

Imagine, too, that your legally protected right to express such an opinion counted for nothing because all that mattered was whether the person who heard you perceived it to be offensive.

If you live in Scotland, this is the world you will be living in as of Monday. And no, it’s not an April Fool’s prank by the Scottish Government, despite the date when it comes into force.

The Hate and Public Order (Scotland) Act will, according to its critics, be a state-sponsored assault on free speech with sinister parallels to the Stasi in East Germany. . . 

Meanwhile, The Telegraph has been told that Police Scotland – which has just announced it will no longer investigate certain low-level crimes – is diverting resources so it can investigate the expected influx of accusatory phone calls it will receive from those offended by other people’s opinions.

The force has promised to investigate every hate crime complaint it receives, and if the complainant (or victim, as they are officially referred to) insists they were upset by something they perceived to be a hate crime, it will be logged as a non-crime hate incident (NCHI) even if there is not a shred of evidence of any crime being committed.

Little wonder that women’s rights campaigners fear that the new law will be used by trans radicals to settle scores and silence anyone who dares to challenge their world view.  

If George Orwell was still around, he could perhaps write a book about it and call it Twenty Twenty-Four.  . . 

The Minister has saved us from this dangerous road to censorship which would have allowed subjectivity to rule silence not only opinion but facts to which a complainant objected.

You can add your signature to the Free Speech Union’s letter of thanks to the Minister here.

Tens of thousands of Kiwis insisted that the proposed hate speech laws were dropped. The Minister of Justice listened. It’s a decision worth celebrating. Join us in thanking @PaulGoldsmithMP here: https://t.co/k02TNnXPCD pic.twitter.com/7Vme5iMIku

— 🗣 Free Speech Union ✊ (@NZFreeSpeech) March 24, 2024