How Britain is Trying to Destroy Free Speech – Of Americans 

ANALYSIS – United Kingdom, the cradle of modern democratic government, is eradicating free speech of its people and attempting to extend that censorship beyond its borders to anywhere in the world, including the United States.

This as the UK police commissioner for London's Metropolitan Police threatens to extradite American citizens from the U.S., and even jail them, over online posts: ‘We'll come after you.'

“We will throw the full force of the law at people. And whether you're in this country committing crimes on the streets or committing crimes from further afield online, we will come after you,” Metropolitan Police Commissioner Sir Mark Rowley told Sky News.

This draconian crackdown on social media is particularly shocking to critics because the British government wants to jail citizens of other countries.

A Sky News reporter asked Commissioner Rowley to further explain his warning, “when it comes to dealing with people who are whipping up this kind of behavior from behind the keyboard who may be in a different country?”

Rowley answered by telling the reporter, “Being a keyboard warrior does not make you safe from the law.”

British authorities seem particularly irked that, to their deranged minds, high profile figures “the likes of Elon Musk” have been “whipping up the hatred” in the UK.

Musk recently made headlines for criticizing the Labor Party and Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer's response to the riots over the past week, suggesting the UK is headed toward “civil war.” 

He also responded to a video of someone allegedly arrested for offensive online comments with a question, “Is this Britain or the Soviet Union?” 

Joe Rogan echoed the sentiment in his podcast.

Starmer's spokesperson said there was “no justification” for Musk's comments, adding that social media companies “can and should be doing” more to combat misinformation.

Using recently passed ‘extremism' statutes, and ones before that, Rowley said: “You can be guilty of offenses of incitement, of stirring up racial hatred, there are numerous terrorist offenses regarding the publishing of material.”

“All of those offenses are in play,” he added, “if people are provoking hatred and violence on the streets, and we will come after those individuals just as we will physically confront on the streets the thugs and the yobs who are taking — who are causing the problems for communities.”

Sadly, suspicion of free speech in Britain is shared by its two largest parties (and some smaller ones), but it has deeper roots in Labour.

This is why, despite the current hyper push to curtail speech under the new Labour regime, the groundwork was set a few months ago under the conservative of government Rishi Sunak.

The New York Times reported:

Britain's government published a new definition of extremism on Thursday that it intends to use to cut ties or funding to groups deemed to have crossed the line, but which critics fear could curtail campaigners' rights and curb free speech.

Michael Gove, a senior cabinet minister, said in a statement that the move was intended to “protect democratic values” by being “clear and precise in identifying the dangers posed by extremism.”

Some advocacy groups and legal experts greeted the announcement with concern, warning that it could affect the rights of those deemed by the government to meet the definition. The only way to challenge such a decision is likely to be through the courts.

The initiative has also stirred a wider debate about how, before a general election that must be held by early next year, British politicians choose to deal with domestic tensions that have risen since Hamas's Oct. 7 attacks on Israel and Israel's subsequent bombardment of the Gaza Strip. Hundreds of thousands of people have attended pro-Palestinian demonstrations in London and, according to the government, there has been a significant rise in both antisemitic incidents and anti-Muslim hate cases.

Still, even before the details of the new extremism proposals were made public, they had provoked criticism from three former Conservative Party home secretaries, responsible for national security.

They correctly warned against using ‘extremism' to crush legitimate political discourse.

And we see now exactly what they meant. 

The opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the positions of American Liberty News.