Incitement is a serious and imminent threat
until it no longer is
Jenny and Chris visited our ranch last week. They were vacationing here from Wiltshire. They said they had ventured out because they “needed a break from it all.” “Why was that,” we wanted to know? “Well, it’s many things that add all up,” they said, “it makes us lose our appetite to carry on.” What could be so grave? “Well, for starters,” Jenny said, “my sister has just been imprisoned for twenty months. All she had done, was to advocate for British values online. In her latest post, she had said that she had bought an Axminster carpet and tossed the ‘Persian Bijar rubbish’ out onto the street. The Crown claimed that to be ‘incitement,’ both to ‘racial hatred’ and to ‘illegal dumping.’ The judge went along and they locked her up.” We ranchers did not know what we were hearing, but when we dug a little deeper, it all started to add up...
We had been thinking of Britain as a green island, predominantly spotted with quaint villages, with the exception of a few bustling cities that still had much in common with the villages. For instance, one wouldn’t need to walk for more than a half-mile before running into a pub that offered fish and chips, steak and kidney pie and hand-draughted beer. Of course, there had been some immigration, but we assumed that that had mostly consisted of peaceful muslims who had wanted to better their life, had wanted to start over in Britain and had enriched the local culture by providing tajines and Pakistani curries as an occasional, yet welcome palate cleanser. However, in recent years, not all immigrants have had such good intentions. Many have, but it only takes a few radicals to cause societal upsets, such as Islamists, who aspire to enforce Islamic law and values, or Jihadis, who fight an eternal “holy” war against infidels. In a reasonable world, such extremists would readily be filtered out, but that is where the situation seems adrift right now. To depict what is going on, I am afraid that we will have to dive into some incidents far less palatable than food. Gear up…
For at least a decade, Britain has been pretty much turning a blind eye towards criminality from Islamists, whereas any opposition to such activity has been labeled ‘extreme right-wing’ and has led to immediate repercussion. For instance, in the town of Rotherham, Jihadis have been operating rape gangs, with the explicit motivation to blithe the Infidels’ daughters. One would expect that such depravity would soon be exposed and come to a halt, but it actually took for this scandal to reach major proportions, with an estimated total of 1400 victims, before the government started to roll it up. Mainstream reports admit that for a long time, no action was taken as “Several staff described their nervousness about identifying the ethnic origins of perpetrators for fear of being thought as racist; others remembered clear direction from their managers not to do so.” More recent examples of Jihadi extremism in England abound as well. In 2021, Conservative MP Sir David Amess was stabbed to death in plain daylight. While the media initially pointed the public discussion in the direction of the “dangers of online anonymity,” the murderer turned out to be Ali Harbi Ali, a Somalian who committed the atrocity in the name of Jihad. I doubt that he would have changed his mind if he had seen different online content, or if he had been required to use digital identification. Just a year later, aspiring Royal Marine Tommy Roberts was stabbed to death by Lweeze Abdulfararelzai (or whatever his similar real name is, should I care about his feelings?), an “asylum” seeker who happened to already have committed a double murder in Serbia prior to illegally entering the United Kingdom. In spite of all the atrocities, the authorities’ reaction up to this point has been to pretend that there is no issue with massive immigration, even if it imports radical Jihadis, and to label those who claim there is as “right-wing extremists.” I beg to differ and say that the evidence points in the opposite direction.
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At this point, let’s cross the English Channel into Germany. The German society is another example of a European society upset by Jihadi extremist immigration, yet politicians who dare as much as call out that there is an issue with Afghan rape gangs are sentenced fines for “hate speech.” For instance, AfD politician Marie-Therese Kaiser was fined EUR6000 for decorating a government action to house Afghan refugees with the comment “Welcome to gang rapes.” In such a climate, it should not surprise that the situation is getting worse, and it is. Just a few months ago, six people were stabbed at an anti-islamist event in Mannheim, including a police officer, who died shortly after the attack. The offender was an Afghan “refugee,” who turned out to be ... yet another radical Jihadist. If in spite of the gruesome nature of this attack, one would be left to think that such attacks only occur when provoked by “right-wing” events, one would be mistaken. Just a few weeks later, three people were stabbed to death at a Festival of Diversity in Solingen. The attack was soon after credited by the Islamic State.
It would be pretty misguided to claim that this is the “normal state of affairs” in Germany. Up to some extent, the Germans’ inherent propensity to regulate could be annoying. In Germany, it would not be uncommon to get called out for not following rules by fellow citizens on banal topics like driving a bike outside of designated bike lanes. However, this inherent respect for rules did make Germany a very safe country. All of that has changed in the name of “Vielfalt,” or, “diversity,” which the media are propagandizing night and day. I can only remark that there is not much true diversity to be found in a group in which everyone has blue hair and wears a trans and a Hamas flag. That said, Germany has been importing immigrants of different stripes in increasing numbers over the last three decades. Of course, having people with different backgrounds will have an effect on the fabric of society. The debate should be had whether that effect is positive or negative. However, instead, any criticism of massive immigration has consequently been labeled as “right-wing extremism” and has been suppressed.
Since mainstream voices won’t touch this topic, I will share my view on immigration in Germany. Germany has seen immigration from different countries, but until the early 2010s, the group that stood out, both in numbers and in vocality, were the Turks. Back in the day, there were already those conservative voices who would say that the Turks were upsetting the German society. I would subjectively label those claims as “false.” There is little evidence that the Turks were anything other than hard-working immigrants who arrived with the hopeful promise that maybe, some day, Germany might learn to cook. However, all of that changed in the mid-2010s. At first, the conflict from Syria did not only import refugees, but also Islamic State militants. More recently, Germany has seen a significant influx from Afghanistan. Any reasonable observer would conclude that accommodation for immigrants from regions where women are being hanged from goalposts in football fields and where ancient monuments like giant Buddhas or the Temple of Ba’alshemin are blown up for being pre-islamic, would merit a different level of security screening compared to Turkish farmers. But none of that happened, since left-wing European governments insist that screening immigrants is “xenophobic.” They collectively look the other way, which is why we have ended up where we are.
It is a good question why British and European elites are pushing unchecked, unvetted immigration. We need to go into speculative territory to explain why this might be happening. Here is a plausible theory. The European Commission, as a supernational organization, exists to ensure that elites stay in power. That is more or less its sole reason of existence. It does so by eliminating democracy in member states: while not being elected directly itself, the Commission has the power to overrule laws passed in individual states by representatives who are directly elected. That lack of democracy has increasingly been recognized in the working classes, who, justifiably so, feel not represented at all by the political class. For that reason, movements have gained traction in several nations to exit the European Union. As such an exit is deemed repugnant by elites, they have engaged to stop it. Since populist national movements are rarely supported by immigrants, elites’ strategy has been to increase the numbers of the latter. Moreover, given that elites live in pretty secluded circles, they fail to recognize how big the issue is. Elites live in circles where foreign newcomers are deemed “fine society” when those invest billions into the country and are welcome to include such members of foreign elites, as was the case, for instance, when the Al-Fayed family bought Harrods. However, due to the extent of the disconnect between elite societies and any layers underneath, they do not seem to understand that some immigrants may come with lower levels of civility than the Al-Fayeds, even when accounting for the accusations of sexual harassment against the latter.
Not much different from mainland Europe, the general British public increasingly feel that they are treated unfairly by their own justice system. Many mocked it a ‘two-tier’ system, in which for reasons opaque to any reasonable observer, there was much more tolerance for Jihadism than for concerned citizens to express their opinions. However, a few recent events poured quite a bit of fuel onto the simmering fire.
Violence took on new proportions when three young girls were stabbed to death. The perpetrator, Aluku Randukablublana (or whatever his similar real name is, should I care?) was the English-born son of Rwandan immigrants. His motives are still unclear as they were at the time the news broke, but these new levels of violence understandably created new levels of frustration. While the perpetrator’s identity remained unknown, the broader public was left to speculate. Given the numerous precedents of Jihadi stabbings, it was not unlikely at all for the stabber to have Jihadi motives. We still don’t know if it was a Jihadist attack this time around. That notwithstanding, furious mobs took to the streets. The enraged mobs engaged in indiscriminate attacks against local mosques and asylum centres, which is inexcusable. However, while the rioters were maybe not as self-contained as one might like, I can still understand how their growing frustrations brought them to the brink. However, elites, living in their safe spaces disconnected from reality, still can’t, which is what triggered a disproportionate government response.
The newly-appointed British prime minister, Keir Starmer, could have taken many measures to assuage the mood. He could have introduced legislation to ensure life sentence without parole nor leniency for killing minors, regardless of the colour or religion of the perpetrator. He could have gone a step further, and he could have stated that his new government would be different from his predecessor and would swiftly prosecute terrorism of any kind. Yet he did nothing of the likes. Instead, courts were ordered to set up televised, lightning-speed trials in which people who played any perceived role in the protests, be it online or offline, were convicted to a twenty-months’ prison sentence. There were many examples of criminal charges of “incitement” that consisted of examples such as: to ask on Facebook if the stabber was a muslim, to shout at a police dog, or to bare one’s teeth at a police officer. The authorities even went as far as releasing other prisoners early, so prisons can accommodate for people who have committed grave crimes like stating that “it is ok to be white.”
Keir Starmer, who belongs to and represents elites, seems to have little regard for the civic concern of those people who actually perform labour. He exemplifies the absolute lack of empathy witnessed in so many present self-proclaimed leftists, who think of themselves of “compassionate” (towards despicable Jihadis), but who fail to show any compassion for people who do not want their children to be stabbed. By doubling down on the failed strategy of repressing his own electorate, combined with unjustifiable leniency towards Jihadism, he has only made the situation worse. The show trials witnessed over the last few weeks will not change that: the next time a girl gets stabbed, the tensions will be higher. I do not wish Keir Starmer or his family any harm, but if he does not change course, he is waiting to become the victim of one of these crimes himself, be it be an outraged and gone-crazy Briton, or by the umpteenth Jihadist, whoever gets to him first. Let’s hope his older age comes with reason.
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The fact that the British government’s reactions to these incidents will only serve to further increase tensions, is worrisome. But equally worrisome are the means with which it has done so. To claim that asking the question if a stabber is a Muslim is in any way “incitement,” is insane. In the United States, the bar to classify a statement as “incitement,” is very high. Since the 1969 ruling in Brandenburg v. Ohio, incitement is limited to statements that lead to imminent lawless conduct. In Britain, the standards are lower, and for instance the Racial and Religious Hatred Act (2006) states that any person that “uses threatening words or behaviour, or displays any written material which is threatening, is guilty of an offence if he intends thereby to stir up religious hatred.” Still, merely asking if the stabber was a Muslim does not fulfil the condition of intent to spur religious hatred. Even far less so do the acts of baring one’s teeth to police officers, or of shouting at a police dog. Was the dog going to commit immediate or religious hatred after that? Yet people have been jailed for such borderline ridiculous charges. However, what does fulfil the condition of religious hatred, is Jihadism. Jihadis violate the Religious Hatred Act on a 24/7 basis and I don’t see many get arrested for it.
Britain has a well documented history of judges who will convict citizens for absolutely minor offenses, while being lenient to more serious criminals, like paedophiles. What I wonder is why all those judges go along with so biased a distortion of the law. If Britain had separation of powers, judges would each reach their verdicts independently and we would not see a series of televised trials, all of which end in maximum sentences based on very similar far-fetched legal interpretations within the shortest time span. We would see a mix of convictions and acquittals, depending on the results of due process and on the justice. So, my conclusion is that Britain no longer has separation of powers. Separation of powers is another indispensable pillar of any democratic society. It is presently under attack from authorities, just like free speech and due process are. The separation of powers is not only under attack in Britain. For instance, an attack of a different nature can be observed in the recent judicial reforms in Mexico.
Without separation of powers, the Law has no meaning. It merely becomes a collection of words that can be interpreted whichever way the authorities please. Whoever is not liked by the authorities, can be convicted for “incitement to violence,” because all that is needed is a judge who is willing to interpret a given incident as “incitement.” In a system without separation of powers, all judges are willing to misinterpret the law. We are witnessing some of that today in Britain and up to a larger extent, in Brazil. I have explained before that many countries have a legal framework that could be used to arrest any citizen at any point in time - in theory. Britain seems to be converting that into practice. The flipside of that is, though, that if any citizen can just be arrested without regard to objective standards, then the question arises why anyone would still bother to respect those.
A society without separation of powers is very dangerous. Today, shouting at a police dog is interpreted as “incitement to violence.” What will be on the menu tomorrow? Is saying that there is no imminent climate catastrophe “incitement to violence?” Is it “incitement to violence” to point out that medical interventions, such as prophylaxis, have side effects? Is calling Osama bin Laden a “terrorist” incitement to islamophobic violence? Or, is asking these questions right here incitement to violence? In a society without separation of powers, anything can be considered “incitement.”
Well, as we learnt here at the ranch Britain is farther down the path to totalitarianism than we had thought. Over here, we won’t let that affect us too much, though. We have our pastures. We horses will eat our apples and our ranchers will have their steaks. Are they inciting to violence against cows? I also bear my teeth when I eat my apples. Am I inciting to violence? Not in our frame of reference, and if need be, we can still jump the fence.
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"Not much different from mainland Europe, the general British public increasingly feel that they are treated unfairly by their own justice system."
Not much different from New York City and America at large.....
Wiltshire is (was?) lovely. I lived in the UK for several years, including a year's stint in Birmingham. I'm told that city, and most of England, has become unrecognizable due to the changes you chronicle here. There is diversity, and then there is deliberate cultural deconstruction, a la cultural Marixsm alive and well in the UK. Your friends should stay on the American ranch, and live free or die......
The gravity of the situation is approaching pre-French Revolution levels. If the elite want to be hung on lampposts by populists carrying torches and pitchforks, they are doing a wonderful job.