> BREAKING: The ICE agent who shot and killed Renee Good in broad daylight has been identified as Jonathan Ross by the Minnesota Star Tribune. I think today is a great day for Johnathan to be indicted!
If anyone is wondering, it would still be a good day : )
But I'm at least grateful to live under a regime that needs to break its own laws to do this, and so such charges can be dismissed by courts that follow the law, even if they don't apply consequences to the offending officials. Compare that to the UK where more than 12k people were arrested for social media posts in 2023 alone and where it is fully permitted under the law with great discretion and supported by the courts.
It's a bit like "my husband is better than yours because he doesn't beat me as hard", but it's something.
If you make a bomb threat or threaten to kill someone else over social media, you really should get arrested and prosecuted because that isn't an exercise of "first amendment rights".
This isn't a "freespeach" argument, this is the actual text of the actual constitution. This is the actual literal reason that line is included in the bill of rights. It is explicit constitutional law that the government cannot punish you for criticizing the government.
There are a ton of exceptions to our right to free speech, but this is not one.
no repercussions from the government, yes, people should be free to write whatever they want
12K is just a ridiculous number and indicates that the UK indeed has a free speech problem. I don't think that in my country there were more like ~ 20 actual arrests over the same problem during the same period.
Even if you agree with prosecuting people for speech, why exactly would you arrest them and drag them to prison/jail? Even here in Europe, this is a sort of offense that usually results in a suspended sentence or a fine, and a physical arrest is absolutely unnecessary, unless there is a good suspicion that that person is going to harm some concrete people at a concrete time.
In a more liberal country, even if prosecution over an utterance takes place, it usually happens without arrests, simply by asking the culprit to come to a police station and explain themselves, later the same in front of a court. There just isn't any need for physical restraining of that person, it is just intimidation.
I think a lot of people assume by default that other European countries have fewer (or less egregious) arrests for social media posts just because the American right isn't boosting the relevant stories. But if you Google, you'll find some pretty wild instances of arrests for social media posts in lots of other European countries. Here are some examples.
In Spain you can be arrested for insulting the King: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pablo_Has%C3%A9l [No, he didn't just insult the King, but that is one of the crimes he was charged with.]
In Germany you can be arrested for being rude about civil servants: https://www.aa.com.tr/en/europe/german-police-raid-home-of-s...
In France, you can be convicted (not just arrested) for posting a non-doctored photo that makes some policemen look bad: https://www.amnesty.ie/france-criminal-conviction-for-a-twee...
In the Czech Republic, you can be convicted for making rude posts about Ukranians: https://www.newsendip.com/in-czech-republic-two-men-guilty-o... And if you're a communist, that's too bad, because it's illegal to express support for communist ideology (on social media or anywhere else).
In Italy, you can be fined for mocking the President's height: https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/italian-journalist-orde...
All of these (with the exception of some of the non-King-related charges in the Spanish case) are pretty clearly instances where someone would not be arrested – and would certainly not be convicted – in the UK. But you won't find out about these cases from Elon Musk's X feed. And of course, people do get arrested and jailed for social media posts even in the land of the free, from time to time:
https://edition.cnn.com/2025/12/17/politics/retired-cop-jail...
See also this article for some more context on the '12K' claim: https://www.standard.co.uk/news/tommy-robinson-uk-speech-cla...
State AGs seem to have collectively shrugged. But theoretically, a state charging a federal officer with unlawful conduct is precedented.
The States need to grow a pair and start arresting these agents who break the law.
It’s a big club, and we ain’t in it.
Detaining is not something I really understanding, but from what I have read it is using restraint of some sort without arrest and not really something police seem to have any special powers to do (whereas their powers of arrest are greater than those of other people).
It’s called a Kavanaugh Stop. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kavanaugh_stop
If I was her, I would be launching a multi-million dollar lawsuit against the government for a violation of constitutional rights.
Doxxing has many forms, and I agree that she did nothing wrong by citing the news source with the officers name, and offering her opinion. They did not detain or arrest her, and she agreed, and even invited them to speak with her.
This whole thing is a non-story.
> Yes, it was an attempt to intimidate her
You've answered your own question
Meanwhile, the crook in charge keeps doing everything he can to keep his cronies rich, at the expense of the planet's climate. Those who voted for him continue to remain utterly uninformed of the tornadoes and floods they sow.