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Free Speech in ‘this twittering world’

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05 March 2020 / Nicholas Dobson
Issue: 7877 / Categories: Features , Public , Human rights
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Despite clear rights to freedom of expression, those using Twitter would do well to consider the possible consequences, says Nicholas Dobson
  • College of Policing ‘Hate Crime Operational Guidance’ was lawful.
  • Disproportionate interference with the claimant’s right to freedom of expression.

According to the ancient Greek historian Herodotus, Xerxes I of Persia (commenting on what he mistakenly took to be a valiantly supportive war manoeuvre by Queen Artemisia of Caria) said: ‘My men have turned into women and my women into men’.

However, if Xerxes were around in the UK today, with the widespread ‘dogmatic belief’ that ‘that trans women are literally women. . .trans men are literally men, and . . .any dissent on this point must automatically be transphobic’ (per Professor Kathleen Stock, Professor of Philosophy at Sussex University), Xerxes may have been irked to find his comment recorded as a ‘non-crime hate incident’.

For that’s what happened to former police officer, Harry Miller. Following the Government’s 2018 consultation on reforms to

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