The British Justice Secretary, Chris Grayling, has drawn attention to new tougher sentencing for people found guilty of posting threatening messages online. “We must send out a clear message,” he said. “If you troll, you risk being behind bars for two years”. But what he didn’t say was that the police would only go after trolls who threaten violence or organised harassment. Vulgarities, crudenesses, spite and general bullying all rate down the pecking order owing to lack of police resources to investigate gross comments made online.
Russian hackers (allegedly) can hack American companies at will. The Chinese seem to know American military secrets before the American military does. Why then is it difficult to locate these disagreeable louts and bullies in America and take them to court? Trolling should be illegal (which would, incidentally, catch political bullying too). The idea of free speech was fine before the invention of the internet. The law should now catch up with modern life and “out” the anonymous bullies and put them back in their boxes. As in Britain there are not the resources to catch all the nastiness, but a few high profile arrests could prove salutary.
Epicureanism teaches respect for views put forward in good faith, and deplores anonymous bullying. This blog does not try to hide the identities of contributors, nor of my own. I welcome constructive and polite debate from people who disagree with me.
BBC Question Time finds it hard to get female guests, because of the vitriol they know they would be subjected to afterwards. There’s a risk that “the mob mentality” is stopping gentle souls entering the debate at all – leaving behind only those with big egos, and skins so thick that even valid criticism simply bounces off them. As a result, life is getting a little worse for us all. (from an article in The Week).