Gay haters banned from the UK

[andrewjarmitage]

Please explain such banning of freedom of speech.

Quite agree, Fjp. If people come here and actually incite violence (such as in a sensitive situation, in front of a baying crowd, saying let's go and rip their lungs out), that's one thing. I wonder and have blogged about it a lot on Pink Triangle just who's going to be next. Is the British government trying it out on foreigners first? I probably would share little of Geert Wilders's politics, but I support his being allowed to come to the UK to show his film and discuss it with members of the House of Lords. But, of course, our PC Home Sec barred him.

[sudanese]

When i first read about this ban law - a few moths ago - it sounded bizarre and still it does ..

I thought of it as a pretentious and ( showy ) thing , rather than a policy that its maker really thinks it will help - for example - in decreasing the rates of hate crimes and violence . I think i should read more thoroughly about the people on the ban list to have a better understanding of this issue .

The reasons why i think its a wrong decision have already been mentioned on this thread .. Freedom of expression , and i would like to add that i don't think there is any one on earth should declare OFFICIALLY that some opinions are Officially wrong , i am not an anarchist though , but i think criminal codes cover dangerous and serious crimes , and most judges will be able to decide where free speech ends , and where advocating violence starts .

[marshlander]

The admittance of anyone to any country is at the whim of the authorities. The only reason we are discussing this is because the UK government decided to publish its banned list.

I may find the policies and behaviour of some governments reprehensible, but that does not confer the right on me to go to that country and put things "right" ... whatever my own country's government seems to think!

Were I to go to Iran, for example, and openly express my abhorrence of the treatment of gay men I could rightly expect to be met with all the resistance their legal system affords. I don't know the deeds of most of the names on the list, but I cannot see any good that might come from having the Phelps family attempt to build their particular Jerusalem here.

No one is banning free speech in these instances, just the freedom to enter the country.

[marshlander]

... I probably would share little of Geert Wilders's politics, but I support his being allowed to come to the UK to show his film and discuss it with members of the House of Lords. But, of course, our PC Home Sec barred him.

I admit I was puzzled by this decision too. Wilders is an elected representative in a neighbouring EU country. Despite his stance on Islamic militants I can't see what was so wrong about members of the upper house trying to get a bit of a grip on what we could be dealing with here. It is decisions like this that show the UK government in poor light. This makes interesting reading Geert Wilders - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Picking one of the other names on the list, Stephen Donald Black, why should he be allowed into the UK? He was the Grand Wizard of the Ku Klux Klan, a member of the US Nazi Party and was caught red-handed on a boat loaded with ammunition preparing to invade the sovereign island of Dominica, justifying his actions as making up for the failure of the US government to protect US interests!

To put this discussion in a perspective which has been missing till this point
"The United Kingdom Home Office have, from August 2005 to 31 March 2009, excluded 101 individuals from the UK for having "engaged in unacceptable behaviour". Of those, 22 were excluded by the Home Secretary Jacqui Smith between 28 October 2008 and 31 March 2009. On 5 May 2009 Jacqui Smith publicly "named and shamed" 16 of those individuals. As well as these individuals, other people are or have previously been banned from or refused entry into the United Kingdom."
(taken from List of individuals banned from entering the United Kingdom - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia )

I love a good conspiracy theory as much as anyone, but in the main I don't think this is primarily about freedom of speech, although the inclusion of Michael Savage on the list is arguably less well-advised and might make it appear so.