RainAndSadness
Administrator
- Jun 12, 2018
- 2,084
So there has been an update on Kenneth Law's criminal case and as a result of that, the same journalist who wrote several BBC articles[1][2][3][4] on this community suggested on his Twitter account that the police should take "action" against the "founders and admins" despite there being no evidence for any crimes that have happened on this forum and in relation to the legal proceeding surrounding Kenneth Law.
It's pretty clear he refers to us getting arrested given the context of this Tweet. What else would he mean with legal action, in this context? And this sentiment, that law enforcement should just arrest random people who haven't done anything illegal explains why his articles lack journalistic objectivity. He took the fixer pill, in other words - he has adapted the fixer narrative that we should all be thrown in prison, not because we have actually committed any crimes but because we're a 'bad forum' and that alone, in itself, is apparently enough reason to just crack down on innocent people. Interesting, isn't it?
Like, Kenneth Law hasn't even been found guilty yet. All these allegations are still to be proven in a court of law and have nothing to do with our forum btw, yet this journalist here just suggests under that report 'hey, why don't we arrest more people? How about these admins here, they're bad guys too, running a controversial forum - that certainly must be illegal'. This is highly problematic and it's not a good look for a journalist. Again, a journalist is supposed to be somewhat objective and I think it's definitely not the job of a journalist to suggest who should get thrown in prison, because that's what he is implying here, especially when he can't even demonstrate that any of us committed any crimes. And it is concerning when a journalist who reports about very important issues casually suggests that goverments take action against a fundamental right such as freedom of speech and freedom of expression because that's what this forum is about, that's what we have been criticised for.
Like, you would think an experienced journalist like this one would have a better understanding of how the law works - but it seems to me that he just wants the police to crack down and just casually arrest people he doesn't like regardless of the presence of any criminal activity, he is literally on the same rhetorical line as the fixers now, just demanding that everyone gets arrested, again in total disregard of any laws or any rights, just because "forum bad"... it's pathethic. And again, he isn't doing that on a private Twitter account where he'd express personal opinions, he is doing that on his account that is used to reach out to people for his stories and where he linked to the previous articles about our forum - it's mainly used to prepare and post his own journalistic work.
So just to summarize again what's happening here: the same guy who wrote several articles smearing and slandering us, not portraying us in a fair light, not reaching out to one single member of our community to provide a balanced point of view, blatantly calling a community of thousands of members pro-suicide without explaining why, now suggests there should be action taken on individuals (not the forum!) and you wonder why these articles are one-sided as hell? This person simply isn't interested to dive into very complicated ethical discussions around this forum and has become the mouth piece for those who want this forum gone. It's really that simple. Again, he held most of the conversations in these articles not with people who are actually affected by suicidal thoughts and therefore members of this forum but with people who were affected by people who had suicidal thoughts and acted on them - so people who are in a very bad emotional state and who are not very good picks for level-headed approach to relevant ethical questions surrounding this forum, including suicide and the right to die. These are valid and important questions we need to address in the 21th century but it seems to me it's more important for this journalist to just demonize a forum with 40k members instead of answering these question. No, he'd rather have goverments take action on us to silence the conversation, that's how uncomfortable it makes him. And this approach is intellectually bankrupt.
So much for journalistic objectivity. This is very immature behavior but it proves Angus doesn't know what rule of law even means - so let me clue you in, Angus. It means citizens are protected from arbitrary crackdowns when there is no evidence that a crime has happened. It's supposed to protect citizens from unlawful state action, such as arresting people because they run a controversial forum. Interesting concept, isn't it? It's actually quite common in democracies all around the world, you should check it out. You could also look into the legal forumla nulla poena sine lege, also known as "no crime without law", which means you can only get punished if you commited a clearly specified crime that existed at that time. Running an online forum doesn't constitute a crime where I live, even when the content is perceived as controversial and that's quite honestly the only claim you can make in this case. There is no crime, therefore there is no action to be taken. And that's why we have been able to operate this forum for over 5 years now.
And "this guy in Canada as been charged so why doesn't the police just randomly arrest a few more people who are in some way related to a suicide forum with controversial content?" is not a sound legal suggestion nor does it indicate you have a solid understanding of the law. And moral outrage like "this has to be illegal somehow" is also not a sound basis to intitiate a criminal investigation into someone.
And you know, I still consider myself an innocent and law-abiding citizen despite the prejudgment of the media. And if someone ever was to accuse me of a crime, I'm confident my innoncence would be proven in a court of law - that's how it ususally works. And Angus also seems to forget that the "founders and admins" live in different jurisdictions anyway with very different laws, so who is supposed to take action anyway if no law has been violated? It's absurd. It looks like Angus is under the impression that the UK police can just walk into other jurisdictions with completely different laws, arrest people and put them in prison without any legal procedures or a hint of evidence that a crime has even been committed by these specific individuals?
It's very concerning that a journalist of your age, who has worked for the BBC for a long time, doesn't even understand basic concepts. But it's very obvious this person isn't to be taken seriously by anyone, they haven't even addressed any of my criticism in my thread addressing the BBC. Why doesn't this surprise me...
It's pretty clear he refers to us getting arrested given the context of this Tweet. What else would he mean with legal action, in this context? And this sentiment, that law enforcement should just arrest random people who haven't done anything illegal explains why his articles lack journalistic objectivity. He took the fixer pill, in other words - he has adapted the fixer narrative that we should all be thrown in prison, not because we have actually committed any crimes but because we're a 'bad forum' and that alone, in itself, is apparently enough reason to just crack down on innocent people. Interesting, isn't it?
Like, Kenneth Law hasn't even been found guilty yet. All these allegations are still to be proven in a court of law and have nothing to do with our forum btw, yet this journalist here just suggests under that report 'hey, why don't we arrest more people? How about these admins here, they're bad guys too, running a controversial forum - that certainly must be illegal'. This is highly problematic and it's not a good look for a journalist. Again, a journalist is supposed to be somewhat objective and I think it's definitely not the job of a journalist to suggest who should get thrown in prison, because that's what he is implying here, especially when he can't even demonstrate that any of us committed any crimes. And it is concerning when a journalist who reports about very important issues casually suggests that goverments take action against a fundamental right such as freedom of speech and freedom of expression because that's what this forum is about, that's what we have been criticised for.
Like, you would think an experienced journalist like this one would have a better understanding of how the law works - but it seems to me that he just wants the police to crack down and just casually arrest people he doesn't like regardless of the presence of any criminal activity, he is literally on the same rhetorical line as the fixers now, just demanding that everyone gets arrested, again in total disregard of any laws or any rights, just because "forum bad"... it's pathethic. And again, he isn't doing that on a private Twitter account where he'd express personal opinions, he is doing that on his account that is used to reach out to people for his stories and where he linked to the previous articles about our forum - it's mainly used to prepare and post his own journalistic work.
So just to summarize again what's happening here: the same guy who wrote several articles smearing and slandering us, not portraying us in a fair light, not reaching out to one single member of our community to provide a balanced point of view, blatantly calling a community of thousands of members pro-suicide without explaining why, now suggests there should be action taken on individuals (not the forum!) and you wonder why these articles are one-sided as hell? This person simply isn't interested to dive into very complicated ethical discussions around this forum and has become the mouth piece for those who want this forum gone. It's really that simple. Again, he held most of the conversations in these articles not with people who are actually affected by suicidal thoughts and therefore members of this forum but with people who were affected by people who had suicidal thoughts and acted on them - so people who are in a very bad emotional state and who are not very good picks for level-headed approach to relevant ethical questions surrounding this forum, including suicide and the right to die. These are valid and important questions we need to address in the 21th century but it seems to me it's more important for this journalist to just demonize a forum with 40k members instead of answering these question. No, he'd rather have goverments take action on us to silence the conversation, that's how uncomfortable it makes him. And this approach is intellectually bankrupt.
So much for journalistic objectivity. This is very immature behavior but it proves Angus doesn't know what rule of law even means - so let me clue you in, Angus. It means citizens are protected from arbitrary crackdowns when there is no evidence that a crime has happened. It's supposed to protect citizens from unlawful state action, such as arresting people because they run a controversial forum. Interesting concept, isn't it? It's actually quite common in democracies all around the world, you should check it out. You could also look into the legal forumla nulla poena sine lege, also known as "no crime without law", which means you can only get punished if you commited a clearly specified crime that existed at that time. Running an online forum doesn't constitute a crime where I live, even when the content is perceived as controversial and that's quite honestly the only claim you can make in this case. There is no crime, therefore there is no action to be taken. And that's why we have been able to operate this forum for over 5 years now.
And "this guy in Canada as been charged so why doesn't the police just randomly arrest a few more people who are in some way related to a suicide forum with controversial content?" is not a sound legal suggestion nor does it indicate you have a solid understanding of the law. And moral outrage like "this has to be illegal somehow" is also not a sound basis to intitiate a criminal investigation into someone.
And you know, I still consider myself an innocent and law-abiding citizen despite the prejudgment of the media. And if someone ever was to accuse me of a crime, I'm confident my innoncence would be proven in a court of law - that's how it ususally works. And Angus also seems to forget that the "founders and admins" live in different jurisdictions anyway with very different laws, so who is supposed to take action anyway if no law has been violated? It's absurd. It looks like Angus is under the impression that the UK police can just walk into other jurisdictions with completely different laws, arrest people and put them in prison without any legal procedures or a hint of evidence that a crime has even been committed by these specific individuals?
It's very concerning that a journalist of your age, who has worked for the BBC for a long time, doesn't even understand basic concepts. But it's very obvious this person isn't to be taken seriously by anyone, they haven't even addressed any of my criticism in my thread addressing the BBC. Why doesn't this surprise me...
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