“Britain is now an elitist dictatorship where majority opinion is suppressed,” The Telegraph wrote last year, before a Briton was recently jailed for making unauthorised social media posts that “incited racial hatred”.
(Your Honor, here is the evidence. Here is the cup the defendant used. Here, in a protective container, is the remains of the 8 ounces of racist hate that the defendant poured out. Here is the spoon…)
And now the UK may have another reason to arrest and prosecute social media users: “extreme misogyny”, which we're told could be the equivalent of terrorism under UK law.
All of this is part of an effort to address violence against women and girls. Again, the Southport murders of July 29th may come to mind, in which a teenager of Rwandan descent, Axel Rudakubana, stabbed to death three girls and injured many others. (Because authorities are so concerned about violence against women and girls, they have yet to reveal Rudakubana's motive; they simply insist that the “right wing” is wrong, whatever that may be.)
What exactly constitutes “misogynistic” was not reported. What is legal was not reported. Is third degree misogyny acceptable? Mild? Three eight-year-old boys saying no girls allowed in a treehouse?
And, of course, there's no mention of misandry whatsoever (in fact, my writing program doesn't recognise “misandy” as a word, but it does recognise “misogyny”. Does that say a lot?).
Huffington Post UK reports the misogynistic news. The paper reports that Yvette Cooper, Home Office secretary for security, law and order and immigration, has ordered a “rapid analytical sprint” on Britain's counter-terrorism strategy. Huffington Post cites The Sunday Telegraph as saying the government
He hopes to be able to “map and monitor extremist trends” and understand what stops people from becoming radicalized (why not induce mass immigration from the Third World into their countries?).
This is part of a broader strategy that also aims to counter Islamism and far-right extremism.
The Home Secretary's plans also include making it a legal requirement for teachers to refer pupils suspected of extreme misogyny to the Government's anti-terrorism programme, Prevent.
It comes amid growing concern that online influencers such as Andrew Tate are radicalising young boys.
Mr Cooper told the paper: “For too long, the government has failed to tackle the rise of extremism both online and on our streets, leading to growing numbers of young people being radicalised online.”
… She said she wants to “crack down hard on those who promote harmful, hateful beliefs and violence.”
…The Home Office has already listed several extremism categories of “concern”, including the misogynistic online subculture “incel” (which stands for involuntary celibate), but officials worry that this does not capture all the nuances of extreme misogyny.
MSN readers who commented on the HuffPo article were quick to point out the flaws in the government's plan: “The word terrorist has been applied to so many countries, organizations and individuals that it barely means anything anymore,” one top commenter wrote.
“So who gets to decide what is defined as 'extreme misogyny'?” another asked rhetorically.
Yet another commenter said the strategy was “another attack on men.” Why did he write “another”? “This should need no explanation,” I argued in 2010.
But as evidence, I can point to Christina Hoff Sommers' book The War on Boys, the continued portrayal of men as fools in movies, TV shows, and commercials, articles I've written on the subject, the first-hand account of 11-year-old student Sam Besserman, the acceptance of anti-male T-shirts with sentiments like “Boys are stupid. Throw stones at them!”, or products like the “All Men Are Bastards” knife holder (which allows you to insert knives into the body of a male statue so that happy housewives can keep them close at hand). And these are just a few examples.
A “man tax” was proposed in Sweden in 2004, and a few years earlier feminists in Sweden, Germany and Australia launched a new campaign to force men to urinate while sitting down.
At this point, one might ask, “What if women were the targets of the above behavior?” But there's no need to wonder. Consider this: Inspired by girls wearing “Girls Rules” T-shirts, sometimes teasing boys, boys at a Boston-area elementary school wore tops that read, “Boys Are Good” a few years ago. Then, and only then, did an outcry ensue.
And yet misandry is not only “not a word,” but laws banning “misogynist” speech have long been under consideration. Consider what moral liberal Michelle J. Benton wrote in 2012:
The UK and 18 other countries, including Germany and France, have signed the ridiculous UN Convention on Women, which calls for new laws to be enacted to criminalise sexist speech and outlaw “psychological violence”, which is broadly defined to include speech that “seriously impairs a person's mental integrity through coercion or intimidation”. It is being sold to the public as part of a false campaign against domestic violence.
We cannot hope that these laws will be applied as selectively as the social prohibitions mentioned above. This is important as to why violence against women is said to be on the rise in the UK. A commenter on MSN also put forward a theory on this:
“A graph showing this increase would probably look very similar to a graph showing an increase in immigration,” he wrote.
Benton then asked whether a pastor who quoted St. Paul about the differences between men and women could be prosecuted under misogyny laws. Good question. Here's another one.
Should the same standards be applied to those who quote the Quran about gender differences?
What is certain is that “hate speech” has always been anything that opposes the will of the government.
