Up to two years in prison
It’s now in the news. The Times:
A prominent feminist has been charged with a hate crime for alleged homophobic and transphobic social media posts.
Marion Millar, 50, from Airdrie, was charged under the Malicious Communications Act for tweets published in 2019 and 2020. If convicted she faces up to two years in prison.
The messages investigated by officers are understood to include a retweeted photograph of a bow of ribbons in the green, white and purple colours of the Suffragettes, tied around a tree outside the Glasgow studio where a BBC soap opera is shot.
Two years in prison for that?
Peak Stalinism.
It is one [of] at least six tweets reported to Police Scotland. The nature of the others is unclear. Millar, who owns an accountancy business, was bailed to appear at Glasgow sheriff court on July 20.
Has Police Scotland ever prosecuted anyone for sending actual violent threats to women on Twitter?
Marion Calder of For Women Scotland, which campaigns for sex-based rights, said it was “incredibly disappointing” that police had chosen to press charges. “Women won’t wheesht,” Calder said. “These charges are a fundamental attack on our human rights. We still have the right to free thought and the ability to speak our minds.”
The right but not, it seems, the freedom.
A report was made to police after a Twitter user, who was identified as a PhD student in Coventry, published a picture of a machinegun and tweeted: “Making a nice list of terfs tweeting @WomenWontWheesht because she needs target practice.” The message was removed for violating Twitter rules.
That’s a very opaque paragraph. What is “after” meant to convey there? Is there a connection between the machine gun tweet and the report to police? If so, what is the connection?
Police Scotland confirmed that a 50-year-old woman had been arrested and charged in connection with online communications offences. A spokeswoman said: “She has been released on an undertaking to appear at court at a later date. A report will be sent to the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service.”
Well, I hope they laugh a scornful laugh and throw the report out.
I think we’re going to need more ribbons.
Maybe every GC feminist in the world should tie a suffragette ribbon around their trees. I for one will be doing so as soon as I can get the ribbon.
Have to admit I am extremely leery of the concept of “hate crime laws.” For this very reason. It is a path for weaponizing ideologies.
seriously, though, for our U’K. commenters: does posting here mean that you have committed a crime?
Interesting question.
My guess is no, for now, because commenting here isn’t tweeting.
But on the other hand…Marion didn’t have an enormous number of followers when David Paisley who hates women went whining to the police, so…who knows. I can’t begin to understand why she has been charged for this, so I just do not know.
Hang on. She’s being charged under the new law, brought in a mere 2 weeks ago, for tweets from 2019 and 2020? I think my what-the-fuck-o-meter just exploded.
No it’s not under the new law. Who know Scotland was already this godawful?! But it is. (I saw people who know saying that. I forget who, but they know.)
Ah of course, the Malicious Communications Act, it’s right there in the bit that made my mind boggle. It’s just a coincidence that it’s happening right after the Scottish Government declined to include misogyny in its hate crime bill.
The fact that the Malicious Communications Act has been around since 1988 just makes it all the more clear that nobody gives a shit about the 38 million metric fucktons of “DIE TERF!!!” tweets floating around the internet.
My only hope is that the judge is a sensible person and (1) dismisses the case as a waste of the court’s time, and (2) awards substantial damages to Marion Millar and against the police.
Each time I read something like this I think it can’t get any worse, and then I learn that it can. It was the same during the orange loser’s presidency: every time I thought he couldn’t get any worse he showed that he could.
But it could be argued that it’s a public communications medium. I’d say it’s possible but unlikely.
Well, surely not. Either the misogyny law has emboldened a few individuals or this is political in a broader sense. Given what we know of the poliss officer behind all of this, I suspect the former.
Oh, I should say – and INAL – that the new law might have had something to do with it, since the charge includes a hate crime aggravator. Perhaps that wouldn’t have been possible without the new law, I’m not sure.
A C-B @8
Guided by the “tragedy and farce” trope, my reaction is closer to that captured by Tibor Fischer in “Under the Frog”:
latsot @ 9 – yes – I didn’t mean probably no because comments on a blog don’t count, but rather probably no because comments on this blog are far less conspicuous than Twitter.
Ophelia,
Yeah, I get that. I’m just saying that ‘public’ is open to interpretation. As, apparently, is the ‘high’ threshold for criminality specified in the Malicious Communications Act.
Personally, I’m not worried, whether I ought to be or not. For one thing, I say far worse things on Twitter all the time than I do here.
And to prove it, I have no qualms about posting a link to this video by the brilliant MrMenno:
https://video.twimg.com/ext_tw_video/1400769360264896512/pu/vid/720×1280/LIj2Vm56dgBLDKHD.mp4?tag=12