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UK’s “Online Safety Act” OFFICIALLY grants MSM permission to publish lies

UK’s “Online Safety Act” OFFICIALLY grants MSM permission to publish lies

Welcome to the UK where it’s now official government policy that you CAN’T publish “misinformation”, but The Guardian, the BBC, Disney and Netflix CAN.

Yes, it’s true – the recently signed “Online Safety Act” brands the publication of “false information” a criminal offense punishable by up to a year in prison…

…unless you’re an MSM outlet, when it’s totally fine.

Think even the corrupt & bloated criminal class that rules over us would never dare be that blatant?

Take a look at section 179 making it illegal to publish false information with intent to cause harm:

…and then look at section 180, which exempts all MSM outlets from this new law :

…and that’s without even getting into OfCom’s “select committee”, or how they choose to define “misinformation” (s. 152)

Welcome to the modern definition of “freedom of speech”, where the MSM are directly and explicitly permitted to “knowingly publish false information with intent to cause non-trivial harm”, and you can be sent to jail for a year for calling out their lies.

Oh, and it looks like our friends across the pond might not be far behind. The Big Tech Senate hearings started yesterday, and social media executives are already throwing their support behind the new “Kids Online Safety Act”.

With the EU’s own Digital Services Act coming into force later this month, and all the focus on “misinformation and disinformation” at Davos two weeks ago, we can see the real crackdown on internet free speech is about to kick into gear.

Good times.

For a more in-depth break down of what exactly the “Online Safety Act” is and how it works, you can read our article from last September.

People in UK Who Post “False Information” About Vaccines Could be Jailed For Two Years

People in UK Who Post “False Information” About Vaccines Could be Jailed For Two Years

New law criminalizes “knowingly false communication.”

Coolpicture via Getty Images

People in the UK who post “false information” about vaccines online could face two years in prison under a new law.

Yes, really.

The Online Safety Bill, described as “the flagship legislation to combat abuse and hatred on the internet” has faced fierce criticism from civil liberties groups for its broad overreach.

The law would create a “knowingly false communication” offence which, according to the Times, “will criminalise those who send or post a message they know to be false with the intention to cause “emotional, psychological, or physical harm to the likely audience”. Government sources gave the example of antivaxers spreading false information that they know to be untrue.”

Given that authorities have deemed all kinds of information about the pandemic and vaccines “false” that later turned out to be true, this is a chilling prospect.

For example, claims that vaccines are not fully effective in stopping the spread of COVID-19 would have once been deemed “false,” but that position is now a proven fact.

The bill would also change the current stricter standard of “indecent” or “grossly offensive” content to the much broader definition of “harmful effect” when deciding if a post or a message is criminal.

This is more in line with UK hate speech laws that determine whether an act of hate speech or a “hate incident” has been committed not on the basis of whether or not it actually happened, but on the basis of the supposed victim feeling like they’ve been targeted.

“The new offences will include sol-called “pile-ons” where a number of individuals join others in sending harassing messages to a victim on social media,” reports the Times.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

American Totalitarianism and the Culture of Fake News

American Totalitarianism and the Culture of Fake News

American Totalitarianism and the Culture of Fake News

American citizens have a problem telling the difference between facts and opinion. That’s the finding of a recent survey carried out by the respected Pew organization.

It was found that only a quarter of the people polled were able to correctly distinguish between a factual statement and an opinion claim. In other words, the majority of those Americans surveyed wrongly believed that information presented to them purporting as facts were indeed facts, when the information was actually merely a subjective claim or opinion.

For example, when an opinion statement like “democracy is the best form of government” was read to them, most of the respondents defined that as a fact. Only some 25 per cent of the more than 5,000 people surveyed by Pew could correctly differentiate between facts and subjective statements.

Moreover, as the Reuters report on the study, put it: “They tend to disagree with factual statements they incorrectly label as opinions, Pew said.”

The latter tendency suggests that Americans are easily misled by false information, and perhaps more disturbingly, that they are closed-minded towards information that challenges their prejudices.

This commentary is not meant to unduly denigrate American citizens. It would be interesting to see what the results would be from a similar survey conducted in Europe, Russia or China.

Regardless of not having such a comparison, however, the Pew study indicates that there is a significant cognitive problem among US people in being able to assess facts from opinions. Given that opinions can be easily manipulated, misconstrued or mendacious that in turn points to a problem of American society being vulnerable to so-called fake news.

US President Donald Trump has almost singlehandedly coined the phrase “fake news” when he rails against news media which are adverse to his personality and his Republican party politics.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

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