My tram experience woman arrested

[Tigerman]

Well I believe these guys at least have been
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-15688513

Sorry Funk... I cannot view the video. I'm just wondering how/and why the law works in the UK. If the woman on the tram is guilty of causing alarm, harassment or distress, or of inciting a riot, I would think the guys in the photos I posted are at least equally guilty of the same charges?

[Chris]

You shouldn't be punished by the law just for saying something racist. Freedom of speech, after all.

Becoming a laughingstock and a social outcast is ample punishment for those who make ignorant, racist comments like she did.

[superking]

There is a difference between expressing your views on immigration policy in an ineloquent way and saying that no black people can consider themselves British. Which is what she was saying. If you are born in the UK to black parents who themselves were born here to black parents then in what way are you a foreigner who needs to go back home to use her language?

People have the right to publicly express their views on immigration policy as loudly and as poorly as they like here in England and good for them. What they should not be allowed to do is express to other people in public that they do not have the right to consider themselves as British, or even at a push English, because they are black in colour and that they should therefore go back home. And expressions like go home you fucking blacks are acts of public offense. Black people who are born here ARE home. And the same holds true for Asians, Indians, Italians etc who are descended from immigrants but who were born here. Her contention was that anyone who isn't white and of English decent (whatever that means to her) should fuck off home. That is both stupidly ill thought and offensive and should therefore be curtailed as some form of idiotic offensive speech or public disorder. It's the same as a Taiwanese person demanding in public that everyone who isn't aboriginal Taiwanese needs to get the fuck off the island. Sure that isn't threatening, but it's really an offensive thing to be shouting on public transport. I can't tell a police man to go fuck himself, so why should a member of the public be able to tell other members of the public to fuck off?

I believe that shouting obscentities in a confined public space does break some civil decency laws.

What was funny was the person behind her who was about to jump up when she said "Go back to nig..." and then sat back down when she managed to say the full thing, "Go back to Nicaragua or wherever it is you lot come from." Had the N word come out all sorts of shit would have rained down. Also nice to see her confronted by another English woman saying "Shut the fuck up or you will wake my baby. I am English, what have you got to say to me? Nothing!"

[Steviebike]

EDIT: bit of a double post Superking pretty much said what I said! Superking

If she is lucky she will receive a public disorder sentence which ranges from Act5 to Act6 (6 being riot).

Her words alone are enough but, it is fairly clear to see the aggressiveness in her statements. It is a right to be able to express your views but, they have to at least have so some understanding and compassion. None of those qualities are shown.

She is also responsible for the child with her and the language is not acceptable in front of the child (of that age). Her views are entirely narrow-minded and do not take into the account the diverse ethnicity Britain has today. With some of those ethnic groups being 3rd generation and therefor British in origin and an ethnic heritage, there should be no question as to where those people belong.

[Nuit]

The woman has her defenders:

http://thebritishresistance.co.uk/the-editor/1432-emma-west-truth-or-racial-harassment
http://whitereference.blogspot.com/

Finally, one 34-year-old White British lady from New Addington in the Croydon area of London ... had all she could take, and cracked under the relentless strain of forced diversity and multiculturalism

Whilst not condoning her actions, it is worth thnking about what happened in the moments prior to the video. Most such incidents I've been witness to, have an initial trigger. It's hard to imagine that she simply got on the tram and started to spout all that nonsense.

[sandman]

The woman has her defenders:

http://thebritishresistance.co.uk/the-editor/1432-emma-west-truth-or-racial-harassment
http://whitereference.blogspot.com/

Finally, one 34-year-old White British lady from New Addington in the Croydon area of London ... had all she could take, and cracked under the relentless strain of forced diversity and multiculturalism

Yeah, most people are aware of these British Nationalist/skinhead rant sites. Of COURSE she has defenders among such scum, but they're hardly representative of anyone but a tiny vocal minority.

[Steviebike]

The British Defence league! Bloody hell. That isn't a good group of people, just another name for the National Front, Nazis, racists and so on.

As far as something triggering her remarks, yea sure. A total and misguided upbringing? And one her child can look forward to.

[superking]

Most such incidents I've been witness to, have an initial trigger. It's hard to imagine that she simply got on the tram and started to spout all that nonsense.

This is a very valid point. The video did not express what caused her to rant on like that. Could have been drugs, booze, a really shitty day, losing her job to a foreign worker, maybe someone fell on her, or smacked her child on the head with their bag (this happens to me ALL the time on the train) god knows. This is something one should always bear in mind. People can explode unexpectedly and we have no clue why. All we can do is apply a rule of thumb to the behaviour that allows us to carry on with our existing model of how the world works which is a prominent subcomponent of the super-ordinate category shit I have decided that is true based on the stuff I have seen and thought about.

No matter what the cause though, her verbal expression of release was offensive and grounds for arrest for civil disturbance.

[Tigerman]

A High Court judge has ruled that people should not be punished for hurling obscenities in public because such words are now so common they no longer cause distress. ... Mr Justice Bean upheld the appeal of a defendant who was convicted for repeatedly using an expletive while being searched by police. The judge ruled that officers heard the term in question too frequently to be offended by it.

Anyway, this seems to be the applicable statute:

Harassment, alarm or distress.

(1) A person is guilty of an offence if he—

(a) uses threatening, abusive or insulting words or behaviour, or disorderly behaviour, or

(b) displays any writing, sign or other visible representation which is threatening, abusive or insulting,
within the hearing or sight of a person likely to be caused harassment, alarm or distress thereby.

(2) An offence under this section may be committed in a public or a private place, except that no offence is committed where the words or behaviour are used, or the writing, sign or other visible representation is displayed, by a person inside a dwelling and the other person is also inside that or another dwelling.

(3) It is a defence for the accused to prove—

(a) that he had no reason to believe that there was any person within hearing or sight who was likely to be caused harassment, alarm or distress, or

(b) that he was inside a dwelling and had no reason to believe that the words or behaviour used, or the writing, sign or other visible representation displayed, would be heard or seen by a person outside that or any other dwelling, or

(c) that his conduct was reasonable.

[ChewDawg]

Even when people opposed immigration policy in the UK in the past, as Enoch Powell did in the 1960s, they often got punished politically (as Powell was by the Conservative leader Heath (removed from his position and never spoke with Heath again).

I think this woman's racist rant was wrong, but why martyr her by the press exposure/publicity that a charge brings? If it was an immigrant on the bus chanting religious slogans or swearing about the less than ideal conditions in some parts of the UK (high unemployment, chav culture) or rioting as happened in the past year or so, would there be such outrage? No, you'd have political commentators on the BBC crying crocodile tears over the lack of opportunity etc.

Multiculturalism has the capacity to strengthen a country with diversity but it has to be done properly in countries that have histories of mass immigration (e.g., US or Canada) or slowly in countries that don't. In Europe, relatively homogenous societies are unused to mass immigration and having a more hierarchical, elitist, and uncommunicative government that hasn't fully listened to the people on this issue doesn't help.