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green73
12-09-2013, 08:10 AM
A sandwich shop owner endured eight hours of questioning by police and had his computer seized for three weeks – after making tasteless Nelson Mandela jokes on the internet.

Neil Phillips, who runs Crumbs in Rugeley, Staffordshire, says he was also finger-printed and DNA-swabbed after officers received complaints about what he insists were harmless gags.

In one online post, the 44-year-old wrote: 'My PC takes so long to shut down I’ve decided to call it Nelson Mandela.'

Mandela, the former South African leader, and Nobel Peace Prize recipient, died on Thursday, aged 95.

Mr Phillips was arrested at his home on September 10 and was taken to a police station where he was quizzed about the postings on the Rugeley Soap Box website.

He said: 'It was an awful experience. I was fingerprinted, they took DNA and my computer.

'It was a couple of jokes, Bernard Manning type.

'There was no hatred.

'You can question the taste, but they’re not hateful. I told the police they got plenty of "likes". What happened to freedom of speech?

'I think they over-reacted massively. Those jokes are "out there", anyway.

'When they took my computer, I thought, "what the hell are they looking for?" To be questioned would have been over the top, never mind arrested.'

cont.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2520662/Neil-Phillips-quizzed-8-HOURS-police-Nelson-Mandela-Twitter-jokes.html

aGameOfThrones
12-09-2013, 09:22 AM
In one online post, the 44-year-old wrote: 'My PC takes so long to shut down I’ve decided to call it Nelson Mandela.'


Lol

JohnM
12-09-2013, 09:27 AM
One of the comments posted at the end of the article was very good.


"I knew Nelson Mandela and he would have smiled at such jokes and would have been appalled at the police action - it's the sort of heavy handed police state type action that he fought against for so many years."

See also this article from Spiked:


On the ‘long walk to freedom’, the UK appears to be doing a U-turn. Two cases reported in the past couple of days are a reminder that Brits can be locked up for saying the wrong thing online.

The Daily Star reports the case of a man arrested and held for eight hours for making two jokes about the then seriously ill Nelson Mandela. Neil Phillips from Staffordshire was arrested after a complaint to the police by a local councillor. He was eventually freed and has not been prosecuted for the comments due to ‘lack of evidence’. Nonetheless, the idea that merely making a joke online should require the attention of the local constabulary should be shocking. The fact that the story isn’t really that surprising is a measure of how much free speech has been called into question in recent years.

Another case involves social-media comments made after the recent accident in Glasgow, in which a police helicopter lost power and crashed into a busy bar, The Clutha. A 16-year-old boy has been arrested and two other people have been reported to the police for their comments about the crash. According to The Sunday Times: ‘Frank Mulholland, the lord advocate, has issued an operating instruction telling procurators there is to be a “strong presumption in favour of criminal proceedings” where it appears offences were motivated by “a hateful reaction to the events at the Clutha bar”.’

The Scottish crackdown seems to come under the 2012 Offensive Behaviour at Football and Threatening Communications (Scotland) Act, a thoroughly draconian law that provides for imprisonment for up to five years simply for saying something the authorities decide is ‘sectarian’ - or even the mere singing of popular folk songs by football fans. While working-class football fans, much maligned by the political and chattering classes, have been the initial target of the law, it’s no surprise that once the authorities were given a draconian new power, they have enthusiastically gone looking for other people to apply it to.

Social media represent an important new way of raising ideas and expressing thoughts. But instead of giving us greater freedom, the powers that be have used the internet as a way of making an example of anyone who dares to express what is regarded as an unacceptable opinion. Whatever you may think about making bad jokes about a dying man, or vicious comments about accident victims, such comments should not be grounds for imprisonment. The authorities even have the backing of the ‘dead tree’ media, too. Glasgow’s Herald newspaper has declared in an editorial that a ‘hard line on internet comments is welcome’.

It is truly perverse that when politicians and commentators are waxing lyrical about Mandela, a man who fought for freedom in South Africa, people can be arrested for making a joke or a rude comment in the UK - and get the backing of members of the media when they do so.


http://www.spiked-online.com/newsite/article/locked_up_for_making_bad_jokes_online/14394#.UqXjrPRdW9A

ClydeCoulter
12-09-2013, 09:39 AM
'When they took my computer, I thought, "what the hell are they looking for?" To be questioned would have been over the top, never mind arrested.'

To say the least. "Kick it off, let's move forward"! :mad:

osan
12-09-2013, 09:48 AM
cont.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2520662/Neil-Phillips-quizzed-8-HOURS-police-Nelson-Mandela-Twitter-jokes.html


But note the remaining delusion of the poor limey bastard as he goes on (rightly) about freedom of speech while cowering and pleading on the issue of hatred.

We also hold the right to hate. I guess in merry England (gag) hate has been made illegal.

Well, as usual I am hard pressed to squeeze the least sympathy for such people - they allow this to be done to them. They acquiesce to it by remaining silent so long as it is someone else getting shanked up the butt. Then they have the temerity to complain when that which was OK to do to others is turned upon them. Mr. Gander, meet Ms. Goose.

My wife is in England all the time. She says it is a ghastly place, all the charming architecture and Hyde Park notwithstanding. And dangerous, to boot. Far more so than the USA, on the whole.

Dr.3D
12-09-2013, 09:59 AM
So what law/s did he break?

JK/SEA
12-09-2013, 10:12 AM
So what law/s did he break?


you need a law?

how about...'failure to conform with the popular sentiment of the day law'

satchelmcqueen
12-09-2013, 11:25 AM
he has a good joke there.

if this is the standard that will get one arrested, i will go ahead and say i will be the comedian who is arrested after each of my shows. coming in 2014 bitches!!!!

Christian Liberty
12-09-2013, 12:09 PM
But note the remaining delusion of the poor limey bastard as he goes on (rightly) about freedom of speech while cowering and pleading on the issue of hatred.

We also hold the right to hate. I guess in merry England (gag) hate has been made illegal.

Well, as usual I am hard pressed to squeeze the least sympathy for such people - they allow this to be done to them. They acquiesce to it by remaining silent so long as it is someone else getting shanked up the butt. Then they have the temerity to complain when that which was OK to do to others is turned upon them. Mr. Gander, meet Ms. Goose.

My wife is in England all the time. She says it is a ghastly place, all the charming architecture and Hyde Park notwithstanding. And dangerous, to boot. Far more so than the USA, on the whole.

Of course you have the right to hate, but he was trying to disavow accusations of racism. Which, of course it wouldn't be criminal in any way if he was a racist, but he still doesn't want to be known as one. I can respect that.

dannno
12-09-2013, 01:32 PM
Lol

I'm not sure I understand the joke, is it because he was really old when he died :confused:

What was the other joke :confused:

Czolgosz
12-09-2013, 01:38 PM
LOL @ the Subjects. Morons.

osan
12-09-2013, 03:58 PM
Of course you have the right to hate, but he was trying to disavow accusations of racism. Which, of course it wouldn't be criminal in any way if he was a racist, but he still doesn't want to be known as one. I can respect that.

Meh... I accept it, but do not esteem it. The issues of "hate" and "racism" are irrelevant and I would stand on that. But that's just me. I am not big on playing someone else's game. I tend to couch things in my terms and make the others dance to my tune and not the other way around. I find it to be generally advantageous.

For example: if someone were to say to me, "you're a racist", my response would not to be to cower and shiver as I frantically cast about for ways of proving I was not. I would either ignore them or say, "so?" If they have a point beyond mere and amateurish attempts at intimidation, let them make it clearly and explicitly. Otherwise I politely and obliquely recommend they shut the fuck up and get out of my face. I never play their game, except by personal fuck-up, and that happens only rarely anymore. Even then I usually recover myself quickly and proceed to pound them ever so politely into the dust, pretty much up to their eyeballs. I've gotten too old, smart, and cranky to put up with anyone's shit anymore. I heartily recommend it.

angelatc
12-09-2013, 04:17 PM
I'm not sure I understand the joke, is it because he was really old when he died :confused:



He 'was on his deathbed for 6 months or so.

dannno
12-09-2013, 04:21 PM
He 'was on his deathbed for 6 months or so.

Oh ok.

Anybody know the other joke?

surf
12-09-2013, 05:21 PM
Oh ok.

Anybody know the other joke?
what kind of wood doesn't float?











Natalie

youngbuck
12-09-2013, 05:24 PM
'When they took my computer, I thought, "what the hell are they looking for?"

http://www.truecrypt.org/

green73
12-09-2013, 06:26 PM
what kind of wood doesn't float?








Natalie

That is HORRIBLE. I am like the biggest Natalie Wood fan, and you, sir, just offended me off the earth. I'm writing my Congressman. You're lucky you don't live in the UK!

69360
12-09-2013, 07:31 PM
So what law/s did he break?

He was in the UK, they don't have as much freedom of speech as we do. Probably suspected of violating one of the anti-hate speech laws.

green73
12-09-2013, 08:52 PM
He was in the UK, they don't have as much freedom of speech as we do. Probably suspected of violating one of the anti-hate speech laws.

Yeah, welcome to the nebulous world of "we decide on an how we feel" basis for caging people.

RickyJ
12-09-2013, 09:09 PM
Put him in the arena with the hunger game kids. How dare him speak his mind, who does he think he is, an elite?

Origanalist
12-09-2013, 09:11 PM
Where's RepublicanGuy when you need him?

chudrockz
12-09-2013, 09:16 PM
That is HORRIBLE. I am like the biggest Natalie Wood fan, and you, sir, just offended me off the earth. I'm writing my Congressman. You're lucky you don't live in the UK!

I don't even get it. Like, at all. Explanation?!

Origanalist
12-09-2013, 09:17 PM
Stupid ignorant people who question the significance of what Nelson Mandela achieved have clearly never seen his 'I Have A Dream' speech.

Dr.3D
12-09-2013, 09:25 PM
Stupid ignorant people who question the significance of what Nelson Mandela achieved have clearly never seen his 'I Have A Dream' speech.
Yes, they obviously lack content of character.