8 votes

Can the UK Really Do This to Tommy Robinson? [UK ban on reporting on grooming gang, reporter imprisoned 13 months]

10 comments

  1. Evolution
    (edited )
    Link
    I'll shamelessly steal from a couple of reddit comments because the summary / presentation is a bit misleading to say the least. First of all Tommy Robinson was currently under a 3-month sentence...

    I'll shamelessly steal from a couple of reddit comments because the summary / presentation is a bit misleading to say the least.

    First of all Tommy Robinson was currently under a 3-month sentence (suspended for 18 months) [source]. He got that sentence not because he tried to gatecrash a trial but because he stuck around after such an attempt and kept taping, which is illegal in the UK and which he was told to stop by security staff.

    After not complying he was arrested and given a 3-months suspended sentence for contempt of court. The full ruling can be found online. Let's look at a quote from the end of said document [source]:

    There will be no conditions that need to be attached to that suspended sentence, but you should be under no illusions that if you commit any further offence of any kind, and that would include, I would have thought a further contempt of court by similar actions, then that sentence of three months would be activated, and that would be on top of anything else that you were given by any other court.

    In short, Mr. Yaxley-Lennon, turn up at another court, refer to people as "Muslim paedophiles, Muslim rapists" and so on and so forth while trials are ongoing and before there has been a finding by a jury that that is what they are, and you will find yourself inside. Do you understand? Thank you very much.

    In the UK court proceedings are protected by the strict liability rule, which means you can't use prejudicial language against defendants in an ongoing trial. The goal is to avoid prejudicing the jury and to prevent trials-by-media.

    His current arrest needs to be seen with all of the above in mind. Maybe the officers who arrested him had no cause for it, maybe they did. But from what we know so far it sounds awfully close to him doing, again, precisely what a court already told him to not do.

    Keep in mind that this time it's also about protecting the identity of a minor involved, from that view alone it's understandable that police was more aggressive than usual because of his priors. Considering he wasn't just there 'reporting' but literally livestreamining (including the court entry, at the time of his arrest) there was a real possibility of him trying to again push things too far - just this time also endangering the identity of a minor.

    All in all this is quite far from "Journalist who simply tried to report on something was arrested with no reason whatsoever", despite that framing popping up quite a bit.

    22 votes
  2. jgb
    Link
    Terrible title. Tommy Robinson is not a true 'reporter' by any stretch. He's a football hooligan turned professional racist.

    Terrible title. Tommy Robinson is not a true 'reporter' by any stretch. He's a football hooligan turned professional racist.

    2 votes
  3. [7]
    Mumberthrax
    Link
    Not sure what the policy ought to be on clickbaity titles versus copying the title of the content submitted - hopefully my editorial in the brackets is sufficient. :P the tl;dr as far as I can...

    Not sure what the policy ought to be on clickbaity titles versus copying the title of the content submitted - hopefully my editorial in the brackets is sufficient. :P

    the tl;dr as far as I can tell is Tommy Robinson was reporting on a pedophilia grooming gang in the UK, and because of that he got sent to prison within an hour.

    edit: Some other tidbits I've come across which may need to be verified:

    • everything Tommy was reporting was information that had already been published by other news outlets

    • the trial was already over, all that was left was sentencing - meaning no risk of jury contamination

    1 vote
    1. [6]
      cge
      Link Parent
      It isn't, and at this point, I'm starting to feel more strongly, as with my other posts regarding your activities, that you are either trolling or being intentionally inflammatory while remaining...

      Not sure what the policy ought to be on clickbaity titles versus copying the title of the content submitted - hopefully my editorial in the brackets is sufficient. :P

      It isn't, and at this point, I'm starting to feel more strongly, as with my other posts regarding your activities, that you are either trolling or being intentionally inflammatory while remaining nominally civil.

      You're posting a video that you admit is clickbait, and then editorializing the title even further. You feign an attempt at objectivity by enclosing everything in language like "as far as I can tell" and "may need to be verified," while posting claims with no regard for objectivity or evidence. The post by @Evolution on this page strongly suggests, however, that there are considerable complexities to this case that you aren't disclosing: of course, you will likely say that it's just "unclear" or you just "didn't know."

      There are others here who hold similar views to you without either intentionally trolling or unintentionally flamebaiting. I don't disagree with having you here to discuss your views, but please consider the way that you do so.

      16 votes
      1. [5]
        Mumberthrax
        Link Parent
        The title of the video on youtube itself is clickbaity - but the content is not. I didn't know what to put as the title on the post, so i just copied the title - then realizing it was clickbaity...

        The title of the video on youtube itself is clickbaity - but the content is not. I didn't know what to put as the title on the post, so i just copied the title - then realizing it was clickbaity decided to expand with the bracketed editorializing. I'll remove this post if you can recommend a better title to submit it with.

        1 vote
        1. [4]
          DanBC
          Link Parent
          That video features an expert who says "I don't even know what the facts are". That's not a great start. I don't quite understand the point of posting the video. The question is "can they do...

          That video features an expert who says "I don't even know what the facts are". That's not a great start.

          I don't quite understand the point of posting the video. The question is "can they do this?", but the video answers this with a clear "yes". It then gives a clear description of why they do it.

          What is the point of posting this video? Is it to start a discussion about differences in the US vs English legal systems?

          9 votes
          1. [3]
            Mumberthrax
            Link Parent
            to me it is a surprising event, and newsworthy - this is the news ~ so i submitted it. If you do not think it is a good video, or not appropriate to submit, then there's no obligation to vote or...

            to me it is a surprising event, and newsworthy - this is the news ~ so i submitted it. If you do not think it is a good video, or not appropriate to submit, then there's no obligation to vote or comment on it. If you just want to say "this is shit. you're shit for posting it, I'm going to post all over tildes how shitty you are for posting this", /r/news is over there.

            1. DanBC
              Link Parent
              Your choice of tags, your editorialising of the title, your lack of a simple websearch to understand before posting, and your "just asking questions" demonstrate your bad faith in posting this.

              Your choice of tags, your editorialising of the title, your lack of a simple websearch to understand before posting, and your "just asking questions" demonstrate your bad faith in posting this.

              5 votes
            2. Luna
              Link Parent
              Personally, I'd be a bit adverse to linking videos here, as articles can be easily updated as new information comes out but YouTube videos can only be updated in the description (and nobody ever...

              Personally, I'd be a bit adverse to linking videos here, as articles can be easily updated as new information comes out but YouTube videos can only be updated in the description (and nobody ever reads that unless they're looking for links). In addition, your editorializing calling Tommy Robinson a reporter is a bit rich...that's like calling Alex Jones an investigative jouranlist. Tommy Robinson only cares about pedophiles that are Muslims, he doesn't talk about white Christian pedophiles.

              4 votes