Just Kemi Badenoch not at all understanding the justice system and basically supporting the ‘free speech’ rights of a racist who incited violence following the Southport incident last year.

12 hours ago, Suedehead2 said:

Much as I despise the Tories, I never thought I would see the day when their leader supported someone who openly called for people to be burned alive. I clearly underestimated the depths to which they would sink.

All those people were treated unfairly and none should have a spent a day in prison for words online. So it’s not surprising they have a lot of support. We saw with Trump if you abuse the law to punish your opponents it always backfires. They denied bail to 50 yr old women with no criminal history and manipulated them into guilty pleas then gave outrageously excessive sentences purely for being angry at one of the most despicable crimes in British history

Calling for people to be burned alive whether aloud or on the internet is unacceptable. She knew exactly what she was doing and the lack of empathy for others with those hateful words was sickening.

My colleague used to work with the woman in question and said she was a nasty piece of work in person as well so the parasocial ‘free speech’ hero worshipping is quite jarring to see.

17 minutes ago, Jade said:

Calling for people to be burned alive whether aloud or on the internet is unacceptable. She knew exactly what she was doing and the lack of empathy for others with those hateful words was sickening.

My colleague used to work with the woman in question and said she was a nasty piece of work in person as well so the parasocial ‘free speech’ hero worshipping is quite jarring to see.

Every single day online people say extreme things and extreme events trigger 100 times the amount.

To jail people with no criminal history for online posts is pretty absurd in itself at worst it’s a fine but when you add the amount and the way it was done then it’s basically a huge scandal.

They give bail to child rapists (who often flee the country) https://www.echo-news.co.uk/news/23349535.synergy-essex-bail-southend-child-rapist-fled/

But they didn’t give bail to 50 yr old woman for a Facebook post deleted after 40 minutes or something? So now you’re coercing to plead guilty by giving a choice you stay in prison for maybe 1 year+ until a trial or plead guilty and hope to get out soon. That’s not how a court system should operate. The sentences were ridiculous you can find genuine harmful crimes with not even half the sentence.

The only reason people support it is because they view her as like far right racist so she deserves whatever it’s basically dehumanisation to justify a kangaroo court. A guy just stabbed a child 108 times and tried to decapitate this innocent little girl and the response should not be to be angry at some random angry on Facebook. It’s completely misplaced.

Ironically people say they’re against a death penalty and prison shouldn’t be punishment but rehabilitation how do you rehabilitate someone who said it was the heat of the moment I deleted it 30 minutes later? They already rehabilitated themselves.

Let’s say tomorrow some neo nazi reform voter puts a nail bomb in a gay bar and kills a bunch of people if some people out online I hope reform voters burn or reform voters should all die would they deserve 3 years in prison? Of course not. It’s just an angry reaction. It’s barely a criminal offence.

1 hour ago, T Boy said:

Just Kemi Badenoch not at all understanding the justice system and basically supporting the ‘free speech’ rights of a racist who incited violence following the Southport incident last year.

Seems to reflect those who like to downplay the whole thing by saying "people are getting locked up for tweets".

No, if you're actively encouraging people to set fire to a hotel, you deserve to face the consequences.

I think context is important, she incited extreme violence at a time of racial unrest. At the time some of my non-white colleagues were so terrified about these riots that they had to plan alternate routes to get home. She knew exactly what she was doing. It isn’t simply a case of a harmless little tweet and delete, the damage was done, she knowingly incited violence that hundreds of thousands of eyes saw. You’re responsible for what you put out there. Also, a lot of headlines were just running with that part, she engaged in countless other examples of racism on social media and on WhatsApp too. She even said she’d lie about “a mental health card” to get out of it, even if she did plead guilty in the end.

There’s a precedent for this too, two men were jailed in the 2011 riots for inciting hatred on Facebook. So not just a cruel move from her but a silly one.

The justice system isn't perfect but I personally don’t have sympathy for someone with a pattern of racist behaviour calling for migrants to be burned alive at a time of racial unrest. So unbelievably cruel and dangerous no matter what your views are. The softening of language towards her in the media or online as ‘caregiver’ or ‘mother’ is eyeroll worthy.

Anyway, will leave this here and agree to disagree in case it’s getting too off topic from the Tories, shame their leader is defending this hate speech indeed.

Connolly pled guilty to incitement and served her sentence. The amount of time the right wing spends trying to relitigate our court system is embarrassing, almost as if they don't care about justice when they're on the wrong side of it (reader: they don't). They hear some halves of the story, convince themselves she was put in prison for social media posts divorced of any context and then start saying 'you can't apply laws to us because what we imagined her doing wasn't actually that bad'. She'll probably grift it into a bit of right-wing relevance over the 'injustice' anyway.

The Tories turning into a Reform tribute act, aping their lines, as indeed Connolly has become a bit of a talisman for the right to scream at and point 'injustice', will further put them into irrelevance.

7 hours ago, Liam Sota said:

Every single day online people say extreme things and extreme events trigger 100 times the amount.

To jail people with no criminal history for online posts is pretty absurd in itself at worst it’s a fine but when you add the amount and the way it was done then it’s basically a huge scandal.

They give bail to child rapists (who often flee the country) https://www.echo-news.co.uk/news/23349535.synergy-essex-bail-southend-child-rapist-fled/

But they didn’t give bail to 50 yr old woman for a Facebook post deleted after 40 minutes or something? So now you’re coercing to plead guilty by giving a choice you stay in prison for maybe 1 year+ until a trial or plead guilty and hope to get out soon. That’s not how a court system should operate. The sentences were ridiculous you can find genuine harmful crimes with not even half the sentence.

The only reason people support it is because they view her as like far right racist so she deserves whatever it’s basically dehumanisation to justify a kangaroo court. A guy just stabbed a child 108 times and tried to decapitate this innocent little girl and the response should not be to be angry at some random angry on Facebook. It’s completely misplaced.

Ironically people say they’re against a death penalty and prison shouldn’t be punishment but rehabilitation how do you rehabilitate someone who said it was the heat of the moment I deleted it 30 minutes later? They already rehabilitated themselves.

Let’s say tomorrow some neo nazi reform voter puts a nail bomb in a gay bar and kills a bunch of people if some people out online I hope reform voters burn or reform voters should all die would they deserve 3 years in prison? Of course not. It’s just an angry reaction. It’s barely a criminal offence.

Perfect encapsulation of the above not caring about justice when it's about people one supports, like an automatic whataboutism generator (including poorly sourced local news court stories that likely boil down to poor funding for overloaded magistrates courts). The country was on the brink of some very serious violence and the harsh crackdown on anyone trying to start something probably saved much worse things from happening last summer.

8 hours ago, Liam Sota said:

All those people were treated unfairly and none should have a spent a day in prison for words online. So it’s not surprising they have a lot of support. We saw with Trump if you abuse the law to punish your opponents it always backfires. They denied bail to 50 yr old women with no criminal history and manipulated them into guilty pleas then gave outrageously excessive sentences purely for being angry at one of the most despicable crimes in British history

This line which I've seen a couple of times from you is really fucking wrong, because the logical outcome is essentially that we should not apply laws when the defendant is political. The current right-wing across the globe have a huge habit of screaming persecution when their morally bankrupt leaders inevitably fall foul of the law in one way or another, and listening to their acolytes and not acting would in fact create the very two-tier justice system they claim exists. We need a functioning justice system to punish them accordingly - the failures of the American system to punish Trump as he should have been led to his comeback.

11 hours ago, Liam Sota said:

All those people were treated unfairly and none should have a spent a day in prison for words online. So it’s not surprising they have a lot of support. We saw with Trump if you abuse the law to punish your opponents it always backfires. They denied bail to 50 yr old women with no criminal history and manipulated them into guilty pleas then gave outrageously excessive sentences purely for being angry at one of the most despicable crimes in British history

She pleaded guilty. There were other equally hateful, racist posts on her phone that were not reported. Why are you supporting someone who called for people to be burned alive?

10 hours ago, Liam Sota said:

Ironically people say they’re against a death penalty and prison shouldn’t be punishment but rehabilitation how do you rehabilitate someone who said it was the heat of the moment I deleted it 30 minutes later? They already rehabilitated themselves.

There were other, equally hateful, comments on her phone. She sems to have had so many "heats of the moment" it's surprising she hasn't spontaneously combusted.

"Purely for being angry" is a really crass minimisation of what happened here.

59 minutes ago, Suedehead2 said:

She pleaded guilty. There were other equally hateful, racist posts on her phone that were not reported. Why are you supporting someone who called for people to be burned alive?

As explained she pled guilty in a way that was a complete disgrace for modern day Britain. Ones who didn’t plead guilty often got found not guilty. Just recently a guy who said slit their throats in the streets was found not guilty. So I’m sure they knew if people had bail and time to assess they’d probably plead not guilty and be found not guilty that’s why they refused them bail and put them in a situation where pleading guilty seemed like the quicker way to get out. A total hit job and I’m surprised there isn’t massive lawsuits.

4 hours ago, Iz 🌟 said:

Connolly pled guilty to incitement and served her sentence. The amount of time the right wing spends trying to relitigate our court system is embarrassing, almost as if they don't care about justice when they're on the wrong side of it (reader: they don't). They hear some halves of the story, convince themselves she was put in prison for social media posts divorced of any context and then start saying 'you can't apply laws to us because what we imagined her doing wasn't actually that bad'. She'll probably grift it into a bit of right-wing relevance over the 'injustice' anyway.

The Tories turning into a Reform tribute act, aping their lines, as indeed Connolly has become a bit of a talisman for the right to scream at and point 'injustice', will further put them into irrelevance.

Perfect encapsulation of the above not caring about justice when it's about people one supports, like an automatic whataboutism generator (including poorly sourced local news court stories that likely boil down to poor funding for overloaded magistrates courts). The country was on the brink of some very serious violence and the harsh crackdown on anyone trying to start something probably saved much worse things from happening last summer.

This line which I've seen a couple of times from you is really f***ing wrong, because the logical outcome is essentially that we should not apply laws when the defendant is political. The current right-wing across the globe have a huge habit of screaming persecution when their morally bankrupt leaders inevitably fall foul of the law in one way or another, and listening to their acolytes and not acting would in fact create the very two-tier justice system they claim exists. We need a functioning justice system to punish them accordingly - the failures of the American system to punish Trump as he should have been led to his comeback.

‘Harsh crackdowns probably stopped something big happening’ basically admitting they made an example out of people then credited themselves with restoring order rather than a protest of misinformation going nowhere with bored people looting Greggs was fizzling out and instead they undermined the whole legal and justice system to attempt to make a point. Not caring about justice? The irony with that one is insane. Anyone justifying a new mother being taken from her child for 3 years over a Facebook post is quite frankly losing the plot and lost in a world of they vs them. I certainly find it hard to view how anyone can claim to be empathetic and support that too. Very selective empathy perhaps. And we should apply laws we should not politically prosecute. The stuff against Trump was a joke. Paying a prostitute from 10 years ago that wouldn’t happen if it were anyone else. Exaggerating property prices just a common occurrence. But you justify it by saying the letter of the law it’s like listen to rational talking heads. They all say they were trumped up charges. It backfires and that’s what you’re seeing with the Lucy Connolly stuff though there are many others her case is only big as she’s a Tory councillor or something. We have a million comparisons of sentences and charges. Britain is seen as a joke when pedophiles get no time and others are doing 3 years for tweets.

25 minutes ago, Hassaan said:

"Purely for being angry" is a really crass minimisation of what happened here.

Why are you acting like Lucy Connolly stabbed multiple children hundreds of times? She wrote a damn tweet or Facebook post. Have some perspective

1 hour ago, Suedehead2 said:

She pleaded guilty. There were other equally hateful, racist posts on her phone that were not reported. Why are you supporting someone who called for people to be burned alive?

Isn't the theory she pleased guilty, because otherwise, if there was a trial, it means the prosecution would have been able to share her enitre social media history, that would have painted her as even more of a knob? She was an idiot that got what she deserved.

Let her have her 5 minutes of fame. I understand why people are annoyed and I do get Liam's point, that we do all say stupid stuff and don't always mean the full intentions, but ultimately this was a bit more than one tweet from my understanding. And I also do think you have to show some form of accountability for your action, of which she showed zero. It's like when people are racist to football players on social media - there is no need for it.

Liam, do you actually know anything about Lucy Connolly? In this thread you have described her as a 50 year old woman (she’s only 42) and a new mother (her daughter is 13)

9 hours ago, Liam Sota said:

‘Harsh crackdowns probably stopped something big happening’ basically admitting they made an example out of people then credited themselves with restoring order rather than a protest of misinformation going nowhere with bored people looting Greggs was fizzling out and instead they undermined the whole legal and justice system to attempt to make a point. Not caring about justice? The irony with that one is insane. Anyone justifying a new mother being taken from her child for 3 years over a Facebook post is quite frankly losing the plot and lost in a world of they vs them. I certainly find it hard to view how anyone can claim to be empathetic and support that too. Very selective empathy perhaps. And we should apply laws we should not politically prosecute. The stuff against Trump was a joke. Paying a prostitute from 10 years ago that wouldn’t happen if it were anyone else. Exaggerating property prices just a common occurrence. But you justify it by saying the letter of the law it’s like listen to rational talking heads. They all say they were trumped up charges. It backfires and that’s what you’re seeing with the Lucy Connolly stuff though there are many others her case is only big as she’s a Tory councillor or something. We have a million comparisons of sentences and charges. Britain is seen as a joke when pedophiles get no time and others are doing 3 years for tweets.

Connolly: sentenced after pleading guilty to distributing material with the intent of stirring up racial hatred. Also as T Boy says, not as you describe.

Trump: convicted on falsifying business records on all counts and the legal system quite honestly went super light on him because of his political stature, which is the real crime. Those convictions are now suspended and he should have been charged and convicted for treason after Jan 6th.

The phrasing of 'seen as a joke where pedophiles get no time' just tells me you don't know anything about court or the legal system, and are reacting to headlines. The British justice system is extraordinarily busy and underfunded and isn't perfect but it's dealing with thousands of cases each year, and most go through fine.

Let's focus on what the government is doing about sentencing, things I agree with, remove short prison sentences (prevents people from becoming career criminals in a prison environment), increase community punishments and focus on the right incentives for behaving well:

https://www.theguardian.com/society/2025/aug/24/labour-abolish-most-short-prison-sentences-england-wales

meanwhile the so-called shadow justice secretary, to keep this vaguely on-topic, isn't saying anything about sentencing, but is showing up outside protests against asylum seekers and at migrant camps to show off how personally cruel to desperate people he can be to the Reform voters he's opportunistically trying to sway.

10 hours ago, Liam Sota said:

Why are you acting like Lucy Connolly stabbed multiple children hundreds of times? She wrote a damn tweet or Facebook post. Have some perspective

Where she called for people to set fire to a hotel.

I don't know why you're dismissing that as just anger like she's a 6 year old with no control over their emotions.