by Laura Lai/ Comment
During the recent campaign for
the European elections there was an incident involving most probably an
opponent of BREXIT and the President of the new BREXIT Party, Nigel Farage, the
later being attacked with a milk shake. Furthermore, on 13th of June
2019 – almost a month after the BREXIT Party won the European elections in the
United Kingdom – a British comedian, Jo Brand, told the audience in a comedy
show:
‘I’m kind of thinking why bother
with a milkshake when you can get some battery acid? (Laugther) I’m not going
to do it. It’s pure fantasy, but milkshakes are pathetic. (Laughter)’
And to this particular way of
thinking and of fantasizing reacted the British Prime Minister Theresa
May, comedian and podcaster Konstantin Kisin on BBC Breakfast program,
Nigel Farage in an interview for The Sun, and many other people calling
the Nigel Farage radio show on LBC, where a young man, a victim of an
acid attack, was invited to speak in the very beginning of this show. Jo Brand
apologized and the British Metropolitan Police stopped investigating this ‘inflamatory’
joke for many Britions, as incitement to violence.
However, the
questions remain: Wasn’t it freedom of speech in a democratic country? Does
freedom has limits? If it does, what that might be? Can anybody claim that it
can assess the harm already done by suggesting such an idea? How could such a
substitute for the milkshake have crossed somebody’s mind, when politicians
are traditionally attacked with eggs to express disapproval? Isn’t it democracy
that encourages the difference of opinions and toleration of all kinds of
diversities, and discourages any form of violence?
I subscribe to those considering
this joke as being a bad one and not funny at all, although on the spot there
was an impressive laughter from the audience. To my opinion this joke had no
place either in an already long-time boiling British society on the issue of
BREXIT or in an already violent world, which does not need inspiring ideas on
ways to harm somebody with whose views we may happen to disagree. Therefore, I
do not think that milkshakes are pathetic. In general, I think it is pathetic
to be a human being – as opposed to an animal – meaning endowed with reason and
with ability to speak, to be educated and blessed to be born both in a
democratic society and in such a technological era and not to be able to
formulate logical, coherent, competing and very articulate counter-arguments in
a democratic political competition, but to lower your human dignity to throwing
to people, especially that people communicate each other their agreements and
disagreements through speech.
There
is no doubt that freedom of speech is the core of all democracies. This bad
joke of a British comedian brings back to public attention this old question of
freedom of speech. I recall that in 2006 a Danish cartoon writer was attacked,
a few years later the French cartoon writers were murdered. United Kingdom,
Denmark, France these are all examples of old democracies. Indeed, according to
the theory of democracy, any censor attempt of a state makes the state less
democratic.
But
I would first pause on what freedom is, in general. Although every time I had
to choose – as a political science student – between political history and
political philosophy, I have always chosen the former for its character of a
constantly unfolding story, I have never missed any of the political philosophy
classes. I actually have never missed any of my political science classes. I
remember that at some point one of the courses was about John Rawls – American
Professor of Political Philosophy at Harvard University – political
philosophical ideas.
His idea was that
each individual is free in a democracy, but that one’s freedom should not
prevent somebody else from enjoying its right to freedom. It is quite hard to
apply such an idea in day-to-day life, when a smoker has its rights on a
terrace and so is a non-smoker, for example. And it is challenging in finding a
working solution for both sides. Democracy recognizes the rights of both,
accommodates both views and requires discussing to find a working solution. Therefore,
according to my understanding of Rawl’s view the individual itself need to
establish some lines not to cross, in order for somebody else to enjoy its
freedom, but the democratic state can also settle some guidelines – a set of
laws – and establish whether or not a line was crossed. In the case of Jo
Brand’s joke, the British Metropolitan Police wanted to investigate this joke
as ‘instigation to violence’ because the United Kingdom as a state has laws
against instigation to violence.
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