The Fable of the Critical Control of Freedom of Thought

 Once upon a time, not too long ago, a political party could think what it wanted, propose ideas it espoused and work to make the world a better place. But sadly those days are now the things of fairy tales.

Now you see it is not the right of polical movement to come up with ideals, hold them steadfast and work to making them take shape in society. No, now, even here in the UK, it is they who have the biggest crowdfunded legal fund who pull all the strings.

Yes sadly even if for years you thought your party's vision was that nobody should be enslaved by conformity, a small group of people, critical of changes in our society that are in the early days of being enshrined by law, will jump upon you at ever utterance of progress.

They believe they they should have the freedom of speech to speak their minds, even if what is on their mind is to make everyone conform to their ideal. They will challenge you from entering their spaces even though this has been established in law. They want to call you by a name you no longer use, without ramifications. They want to label you by whatever term they want to use and not what you want others to use for you. Indeed they say that you asking to be called what you want, labelled as you want is an intrusion on their liberty up with which they will not put.

Thus it have come to pass that through some legal challenges those critics of change have got their hate filled, harmful agenda recognised as a system of belief and those views are protected under law in certain circumstances. However, once judgement, while it does not give them carte blanche to express those views without restriction is actually not how they see it. They see the limited extent that one judgement has been made in their favour as validation that what they think is correct. It certainly isn't a pleasant way of thinking, it isn't kind, it isn't gentle. 

When any dare to challenge them they harrass and pile on. Allies of those impacted can be called all manner of slurs when they raise their heads above the parapet to defend those they attack and dismiss. Names like mysogynist, homophobe and when defending children who they attack paedophile is also thrown into the mix.

Yes what I am talking about is those who self identify as gender critical. In reality I will call them what they are transphobes. They have an irrational fear of trans women it would seem trans men are not the subject so much of their vitriol. They want everyone to only use the public toilets, changing rooms of the sex they were assigned at birth. So they start to challenge women cis or trans who look a little masculine. Heaven helps them if they get their way and trans men actually start to enter women's facilities and they get challenged about being where those critics have been campaigning for them to be.

But the sad thing is that apparently political thought is now dead. A political party that stands for liberal thought, that has long stood up for the underdog and the oppressed now must kowtow to those who express gender critical tought. This is the new watered down code of conduct on transphobia from the party I hold dear.

Well when like me you are someone who responds to a large number of  government consultations basing those responses very much on the thoughts laid out in the preamble to our constitution. When I also base my votes at oonference on those same ideals. When many of my speeches and answers to questions on doorsteps or in hustings also hark back to that document, I know where I stand. I know I shall not be moved. I too have a belief, a belief that the preamble to our constition sets out goals for  a liberal future.

Yes in a liberal society you can be critical of things, but when that criticism causes harm, maligns whole sections of society and is in fact intolerant rather that critical it does not have a place within liberalism. It is facism, it is thought control rather than freedom of speech of expression. When you cry defamation at anyone who questions you critically. When you slur and harrass anyone who questions someone on their motivation to the extent it takes hours to check on their notification. They you are in the business of subverting freedom and enslaving others to your conformity.

And that destopia is something I do not want to see come to be.

Other takes on this: 

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LGBT+ Liberal Democrats

I want to be proud of what we couldn't do in Government

Yes as Liberal Democrats we now have a record in Government nationally. We have to admit there are some things that as the junior partner of that Government we were unable to prevent, but there were other things that without us would not have been achieved.

However, that is our record in Government and enough people will have written or have yet to write about those achievements. What I want us as Liberal Democrats to focus on are the things from our 2010 manifesto that we were unable to achieve in Government because the conservatives would not want us to.

Why should I do that?

Simple the reason is it shows that we are our own party, not one that can be absorbed into either the Conservatives or Labour, or even fit nicely in alongside the Greens. Sure there are components of what we as Liberal Democrats stand for that all three of those parties listed can agree with and that goes for the SNP and Plaid Cymru as well, there are even elements that Euroscpetic UKIP can agree with Europhile Lib Dems over. But the raison d'être that makes Liberal Democrats tick is the thing that would infuriate any of the other parties.

It is the things that we couldn't get into a programme of Government with the Conservatives that make us not Conservative poodles. The manifesto we decided to put out for the last election was lacking in the conviction, as many radical ideas and a clear liberal agenda of those in the past. We were positioning for Government not position for liberalism.

That is what I want our party to be proud of our policies that other parties want to shy away from. Those policies that are based on need, science, making society fairer for all not one group or another. Only the Liberal Democrats can look past the demands of the richest that the Tories bow to, or the Unions that Labour still kow-tow to no matter how much they claim to have changed. We do however stand up for business and the workers. Realising that one needs the other and vice versa but that there should be opportunity for everyone to get on with their life unencumbered by too many constraints.

When looking at who to lead us forwards as a party while both candidates are truly liberals, I want the one whose prime objective is to make us liberal first and as a result give us a voice in Government, not aim for a voice in Government as the prime goal diluting our liberalism to appeal to both Tories and Labour.

In recent days I've seen too many of the Normtroopers say that they want to be led back into Government without any mention of liberalism. If that is your aim join the Tories or Labour and have an easy ride into Government. The reason I got into politics was to stand up for liberal values. Looking at what the current Government is doing on welfare, refusing to accept refugees who risk their lives from resettling here, accelerating removing the wind farm subsidy, restoring the snoopers charter and forgetting the "Northern Powerhouse" when it comes to trains shows that there needs to be a liberal voice.

That liberal voice needs to appeal to the many people who basically share our liberal values. That liberal voice needs to reach out to them so that local candidates and activists can get alongside those people on the doorsteps and harness that renewed enthusiasm for our party. That voice needs to connect to the people about the things on their hearts.

I know that voice in the one that Tim Farron can give our party and make us strong again. Strong in our values, strong in our liberalism and as a result strong in our council wards, devolved Governments and Westminster.

The new ethical quagmire for journalists

Before today, even if you happened to live in Braintree, the chances are you hadn't paid much attention to the career of the Minister for Civic Society, Brooks Newmark. But now we all know his name.

It appears that a journalist has ensnared him to show a picture of him in his Paisley pyjamas which revealed rather more than most people should reveal in a clothed picture but a great deal less than some of the pictures recently leaked from iCloud.

The fact is that the married, father of five, who is MP for Braintree has resigned from his Government post on the eve of his party's conference. But the only person that this story may have been of interest to would surely have been his wife, and even then we cannot prejudge the nature of the marital relationship between the Newmarks. There are all sorts of possibilities that such a relationship may have been totally okay with this. They may be in a consentual open marriage. It may be that the marriage is beyond repair but they are staying together for the sake of the children and/or his or her career. It may of course be that his has done this against her wishes and without her knowledge and he is in deep trouble with the woman he married who still loves him.

The only reason that this could have been a public interest story is if there were anything illegal going on, or he was being hypocritical in his behaviour and his speeches in Westminster. If the journalist was entrapping him because of something illegal that Newmark had previous on why not take that evidence to the police? The reason of course is that there wasn't anything illegal, this male journalist impersonated a young woman to entrap the MP to get a story for the weekend of party conference.

The ethics of our journalists were under trial over phone hacking and this is a new depth. Posing as someone they are not to entrap either through text messages, or maybe online, into revealing images that could damage such people's careers. In other words impersonation, entrapment and then blackmail like releasing the story. New depths appear to have been sunk to to gather this story.

Journalists are not law enforcement, judge and jury of people's actions. Nor are they the arbitrator and curator of people's private lives. As when numerous ordinary people tweeted at The Last Leg on the issue of nude selfies, many more ordinary people are actually doing exactly what Mr Newmark did. Many of them will be readers of the newspaper this journalist works for. Some of them will undoubtedly be married to someone who isn't the recipient of that text or photo share via Skype, a website or email. But unless a law is being broken what they are doing or what Newmark was doing isn't actually illegal. It may not be part of your normal daily behaviour, it may be behaviour that you do not consider participating in but that doesn't make you the moral compass for everyone else.

Update Buzzfeed appear to have unearthed the Twitter account that the journalist used to flirt with a number of Conservative MPs. This is looking a lot more like a honey trap what was set far and wide.

Alliance Party censors criticism

One of the stories of yesterday's debate on Equal Marriage (I know there are more but I've yet to work out how to write this up) in the Assembly at Stormont was the non-appearance of three of the eight Alliance MLAs and the vote of one against the motion.

The Alliance are often called the Liberal Democrats sister party here in Northern Ireland and it often comes as a shock to many both in Alliance and the Lib Dems in the rest of the UK that I am not and have not ever been a member. Earlier this year when the Alliance abstained on the issue in Belfast City Council I openly attacked the Alliance Party, the so-called liberal and self-tagged leading change party, for not living up to either of these monikers. I got slapped down in the public forum of Facebook by their MP Naomi Long for not allowing them time to come up with a party policy position.

Since 1 September there has been a party policy position, it actually reads incredibly close to the motion that was up for debate in the Northern Ireland Assembly yesterday, even with the measures to ensure legal protection for faith groups to make their own position on what they should do. While my own MLA voted in favour and I meet my own Alliance Councillor at the demonstration in support for the motion, the party was seen by many to have failed them.

The biggest failing being in the seat that Naomi represents and Stormont actually sits in East Belfast. It returned two Alliance MLAs in 2011 neither of whom, Chris Lyttle and Judith Cochrane, were present to vote on this issue leading change for LGBT equality. Kieran McCarthy from the neighbouring Strangford constituency was also missing. Trevor Lunn the Lagan Valley MLA voted against meaning.

According to Hansard Mrs Cochrane and Mr McCarthy were both in the chamber both before and after this vote, though Mr Lyttle may have been absent from the house on other business. Update Chris Lyttle on Saturday did release a statement saying that ill health and personal reasons kept him from the chamber for a number of key issues including this. While is personal opinion in the tradional one man one woman his elected role gives him pleasure to support the decision of party council.

There was overnight a lot of criticism on the Alliance Party's Facebook page. Today there is none!

It has all been removed, but it hasn't been answered. Those four votes could have brought the vote up to one vote, indeed knowing what was going on behind the scenes those in support of the motion thought it was that close with about half an hour to go and were looking for one or two more votes.

I'm a liberal but I don't think the actions of Alliance this morning are very liberal. It may be that someone at party HQ thought it would in some way help the party to hide all the criticism, it just makes people angry and more sceptical of their party's liberal credentials.

Last night I asked Naomi Long on Facebook:

A few months ago you told me off for saying the Alliance Party had failed on Equal Marriage in Belfast City Council vote. You said you needed time to form policy.

Well today one of your colleagues and three of your MLAs were missing in action (including both from your constituency). Can I now say that some of the Alliance Party have failed on this without having my head chopped off?

I too have yet to get a response, but I know some within her party agree with me about this. Update she has since responded saying that her position is that as overwhelmingly endorsed by party council.

Update here is Stephen Farry speaking about this on The Nolan Show this morning.

Update 2  It may well be that the Alliance Party had read this blog post as the wording seems to address this post directly. This afternoon on Facebook they wrote the following.

Earlier today the Alliance Party removed a number of posts containing grossly offensive and obscene language. However due to a miscommunication in the attempt to remove these posts, a number of others were mistakenly taken down and the Party would like to apologise for that oversight. The Alliance Party does not believe in censorship and welcomes constructive debate on our Facebook site.

However, the first comment sums it up, the first is from former Chief Executive of the party Gerry Lynch

I didn't see any offensive language. If there was, it was buried deep in one of two very lengthy comments threads. Is there a problem with admitting you screwed this one up, and can we have an explanation for yesterday's debacle?