Remember when Britain used to lecture other countries about democracy and free speech?
Our leaders wagged their fingers at China, Iran, or North Korea and said, ‘That’s not how a free society behaves!’
Well, someone should hand Westminster a mirror, because the reflection isn’t looking very democratic anymore.
Britain has reached a point where people can be arrested for causing ‘anxiety’ online.
A mother received 31 months in prison over a deleted tweet. A woman battling cancer was visited by police in her own home and told to apologise because someone disagreed with her post. A man was detained in the dead of night simply for tweeting a meme that said ‘F*** Hamas’.
This is the reality of modern Britain: a country where speech is policed, humour can be treated as a crime, and the law bends to the sensitivities of the easily offended.
It’s not just ordinary citizens.
Father Ted creator Graham Linehan and Telegraph columnist Allison Pearson have also faced police attention for online comments. Nearly 12,000 Britons are arrested every year for ‘offensive online messages’, though most are never charged. The process itself has become the punishment and serves as a warning to the rest of the country to stay silent.
Even the official Gov.UK Twitter account joined in recently, posting: ‘Think before you post.’
Think before you post. https://t.co/sgqCErb4AC
— GOV.UK (@GOVUK) August 8, 2024
It sounded less like friendly advice and more like a threat, the digital equivalent of a policeman tapping a truncheon on your shoulder.
Just when it seemed things couldn’t get more Orwellian, along came the Online Safety Act.
Marketed as a way to protect children online, it has become a full-blown licence for censorship.
Under its powers, SpongeBob SquarePants videos have been blocked, Spotify playlists censored, migrant protest coverage restricted, and even speeches by elected MPs hidden from view.
Britain now has government-approved speech and government-approved silence, the kind of control we used to condemn in authoritarian regimes.
And the intrusion doesn’t stop at speech. Enter the Brit Card, a shiny new mandatory Digital ID, promoted as ‘efficient and convenient’ and supposedly designed to stop illegal working. Except Britain already has National Insurance numbers that do that job… Illegal working continues because the government refuses to enforce its own laws. The Brit Card isn’t about efficiency, it’s about control.
Once introduced, it will touch almost every aspect of life. The government has suggested that you won’t be able to work without it, even if you have a passport and NI number, and you may even need it to buy alcohol. It will become the backbone of employment, healthcare, travel, and more, and it can be switched off at the click of a bureaucrat’s mouse.
And this comes from the same government that lost laptops, leaked NHS data, and emailed the names of Afghan allies directly to the Taliban. These are the people now demanding access to every citizen’s personal information, promising, of course, that they’ll ‘keep it safe’.
Step back. You can be arrested for a meme, censored for your opinions, tracked through a Digital ID, and threatened for causing anxiety, all under the comforting guise of ‘safety’ and ‘progress’. We used to look at authoritarian regimes and think, ‘At least we’re not like them’. Now, the difference is barely visible.
And if that weren’t absurd enough, the same government that wants to police your thoughts now wants to police your soft drinks. At Nando’s, new ‘High Fat, Salt and Sugar’ rules mean customers are limited to one glass of full-fat Coca-Cola. Just one. Across town, Wetherspoons no longer offers refillable hot chocolate for the same reason.
It’s comical, the final act of the nanny state’s takeover. From your tweets to your table, the government has decided you cannot be trusted to think, speak, or even drink for yourself.
You’d almost be forgiven for mixing up Britain with North Korea.
