The UK’s Orwellian Crackdown On Free Speech Could Be Headed Our Way

When several children were stabbed to death while attending a Taylor Swift-themed dance class in the UK late last month, British politicians and media outlets immediately went to great lengths to absolve themselves of any responsibility. They declared that decades of unrestricted mass migration couldn’t possibly be the reason that three young girls were dead, and many more were critically injured.

The fact that the alleged killer was born in Britain to Rwandan parents who somehow ended up in Britain, the government insisted, was completely irrelevant — and only far-right extremists would say otherwise. And as I outlined earlier this week, British politicians threatened to arrest those “far-Right extremists” for “hate speech” and “misinformation.” As protests and riots broke out all over the country, the government promised to punish anyone who suggested that maybe open borders were a bad idea.

But the problem with punishing wrongthink is that it does nothing to address the underlying problem. You can throw every single “Right-wing commentator” in the Tower of London for saying that mass migration has deadly consequences, and they’ll still be right. And children will continue to be targeted because of the barbaric ideology that Europe’s leaders have deliberately imported from the third world.

As if to prove that point, on Wednesday, authorities in Vienna arrested two suspects who were planning a terrorist attack at Taylor Swift’s concerts that were originally scheduled for this weekend. The concerts have been canceled, apparently because the threat remains high. One of the suspects is reportedly a 19-year-old who pledged allegiance to ISIS. The police are apparently looking for at least one additional suspect. Bomb-making materials are involved. Beyond that, we’re not sure exactly who these suspects are at the moment, because the authorities won’t say. Watch:

According to that report, Vienna now has a “track record” of being a “breeding ground” for the Islamic State. What’s not stated in that news report is what could possibly explain this troubling rise in terrorist incidents like this in Austria. This is a country that used to be known as the birthplace of classical music and strong coffee. And now they’re a breeding ground for ISIS? How did that happen? What got into all these Austrians?

It’s a mystery wrapped in an enigma. What’s unstated in that report is that an awful lot of foreign nationals have poured into Austria over the past few decades from countries like Montenegro, Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, Chechnya, Turkey, and Somalia. And some of these migrants are doing things that Austrians don’t generally do. Just a few months ago, for example, a 14-year-old ISIS sympathizer from Montenegro was arrested in Austria with a knife and an ax that she allegedly planned to use in a terrorist attack. How did a 14-year-old terrorist from Montenegro get into Austria? Who knows. The media doesn’t care.

Reporters aren’t even allowed to bring up any of this immigration because it might lead people to conclude that more immigration isn’t always a good thing. In fact, in the UK, even suggesting such a thing can now land you in prison.

Here’s England’s “director of public prosecutions,” a guy named Stephen Parkinson. He wants Britons to know that if they so much as retweet anything that “insults” the foreign nationals who are living illegally in their country, then the full force of the law will descend on them. Watch:

BREAKING: UK authorities will round up and charge citizens who RETWEET any material deemed as "inciting hatred" pic.twitter.com/p2j0nazREc

— End Wokeness (@EndWokeness) August 7, 2024

Aside from the accent and the language, it’s a clip that might as well be from North Korea. Instead of having teams of police officers deporting some of the illegal aliens who are living in Britain — which would actually accomplish something productive — the British government is spending its time scouring Twitter, looking for retweets they don’t like. Apparently, even people who write “RT’s are not endorsements” in their bio won’t be spared. If you retweet something that Kier Starmer thinks is naughty, then you’ll go to prison.

Of course, Stephen Parkinson left the standard vague on purpose, so that no one knows where the line is, exactly.

Take this quote from The New York Times, for example: 

More British Muslim men have joined ISIS and the Nusra Front than are serving in the British armed forces.

Would a statement like that qualify as inciting “racial hatred?” It happens to be a factually true statement, as unbelievable and incredible as it may seem. And it may lead people to conclude that Britain’s immigration policy isn’t the best. So can someone retweet that or not?

No one knows. It’s a completely subjective standard that’s clearly designed to terrify people into submission. They don’t just want to make people afraid to speak their mind. They also want to make people afraid to agree with someone else who speaks their mind. They’re going several layers deep in order to censor dissent, as all illegitimate regimes do. Pretty soon they’ll be rounding up the family members of anyone who “likes” a tweet criticizing Keir Starmer.

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If this were happening in any other third-world country, the State Department would immediately condemn this as a flagrant abuse of human rights. The UN Security Council would hold a meeting. We might even invade so that we can spread freedom and democracy. But because Britain is (supposedly) already a first-world democracy that sits on the Security Council, no one will say anything.

Britain, like Canada, has descended very sharply and very quickly into totalitarianism. The government can tolerate the murder of children. It can’t tolerate criticism — or retweets of criticism.

The rapid collapse of both Britain and Canada raises the obvious question of whether (and when) a similar collapse might happen here. And there’s one clear indication it might come sooner than we think.

Yesterday I spoke at length about Tim Walz, who’s repeatedly lied about his military service record. His lies have been exposed, for the most part, because of free and open discussion on social media. And there is no doubt that, if he gets to the White House, Tim Walz will do everything he can to shut down those discussions. He said as much in 2022, during an interview with MSNBC. Watch:

Tim Walz: “There’s no guarantee to free speech on misinformation or hate speech and especially around our democracy” pic.twitter.com/4pNBwb8Su7

— Matt Wolking (@MattWolking) August 7, 2024

“There’s no guarantee to free speech on misinformation or hate speech and especially around our democracy.” 

That line, by itself, should have disqualified Tim Walz from getting anywhere near the vice presidential shortlist. It should have disqualified him from continuing to serve in the government of Minnesota in any capacity. In a serious country, he would have been impeached and removed from office.

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But Tim Walz wasn’t impeached. He didn’t suffer any consequences whatsoever. He was barely even criticized. On some corners of the Internet, people reacted to that footage by saying Tim Walz must have failed high school civics. But that’s not what that clip shows. We can assume that Tim Walz knows that the First Amendment protects “misinformation” and “hate speech” and even criticisms of “democracy,” whatever those things mean. Indeed, if the first amendment does not protect so-called hate speech and so-called misinformation, then it doesn’t protect anything. After all, something is labeled misinformation if some people — especially powerful people — claim that it is untrue or inaccurate. And something is labeled “hate speech” if some people — especially powerful people — claim that it is morally repugnant and offensive. So if the First Amendment does not cover misinformation and hate speech, that means we are free to say anything we want, as long as it’s not something that powerful people consider wrong, inaccurate, offensive, or outrageous. Which is to say, we do not have free speech or anything approaching free speech.

Tim Walz knows this. He’s not the smartest guy, but he’s smart enough to understand the basic argument here. The real takeaway, then, is that he just doesn’t care. He understands that the First Amendment is just words on paper. The Soviet Union had a constitution guaranteeing free speech, too. Canada and the UK have charters that supposedly protect freedom of expression. But the constitution and the charters don’t matter if no one cares about what they say.

This is the trajectory we’re on. A decade ago, no one in the UK thought the police would ever show up at their door because they retweeted someone else’s political commentary. Now it’s the reality of living in Britain.

The insidious thing about this kind of censorship is that, by the time it takes hold, it’s too late to actually do anything about it. Protesters inevitably turn to violence, which in turn leads to more censorship and more crackdowns. This is the cycle that leads to a country so unstable and so dangerous that it can’t even host a Taylor Swift concert.

Reasonable people look to Europe as a cautionary tale. Tim Walz sees a blueprint.