With the rise in violent crimes in the past few years, the lawmakers in the UK (and Canada, and the US, and elsewhere) need to get their heads out of their asses.
They're so busy worrying about hypothetical violence that might happen because someone said something mean on the Internet that they're ignoring millions of cases of actual violence being perpetrated against people in the real world.
The cynical part of me thinks the reason is that they know people who say mean things on the Internet aren't a threat so it's much nicer and easier to look like you're doing something by going after them. You don't need to worry about anyone shooting back, you don't need to worry about them fighting back, they're just people saying things on the Internet! You don't even need to leave your office until you make the arrest!
They're so busy worrying about hypothetical violence that might happen because someone said something mean on the Internet that they're ignoring millions of cases of actual violence being perpetrated against people in the real world.
The cynical part of me thinks the reason is that they know people who say mean things on the Internet aren't a threat so it's much nicer and easier to look like you're doing something by going after them. You don't need to worry about anyone shooting back, you don't need to worry about them fighting back, they're just people saying things on the Internet! You don't even need to leave your office until you make the arrest!
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Especially since it isn't like any of it is causing taxes to go down or debts to stop accruing. Government is at historic highs in terms of the amount of economic activity going on, yet despite making up so much of the world, they're doing so much less that's actually useful for common people...
That sort of thing is why I'm not strictly libertarian. Producing a public good that improves the sustainable quality of life for everyone is a positive thing I've seen make everyone's lives better regardless of ideology. It's easy to say the market will provide the solutions, but it they don't because there's a more efficient allocation of limited capital, where efficient means return per dollar. Thing is, what is profitable is not necessarily what is good or what is beneficial for people. The most profitable things are playing magic tricks with money in the stock market, which produces nothing of value.
You're right, and it happens every time. When you read the history of a lot of authoritarian regimes, that's what they do -- they use the freaks to get their foot in the door and those same freaks are always the first against the wall because they're no longer useful.