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Manifesto Club campaign: Free speech

Speaking our mind We believe that free minds and free tongues are the lifeblood of a healthy public culture, and the pursuit of enlightenment. We believe that people should be free to explore ideas that others find distasteful or wrong. Above all, we believe that censorship is a cowardly tactic, a replacement for argument and persuasion.




- THOUGHTCRIME IS NOT CRIME!

Update: on 17 June 2008 Samina Malik, the 'Lyrical Terrorist', won an appeal against her conviction under the Terrorism Act in November 2007. This is good news and shows the value of campaigning on such issues, but it's a rather technical victory: the political assumptions behind Malik's conviction, in particular the idea that people should be criminalised for having certain kinds of opinions, are still prevalent and need to be challenged (however obnoxious or nihilistic those opinions might be).

At the Manifesto Club, we will continue to make the case for free thought and free speech not simply as abstract principles, but as living realities. This is central to all our other campaigns for a radical and people-centred new politics, from opposing detention without charge to arguing for a commonsense approach to child protection and vetting.

As Samina Malik awaited a sentence for writing poems about jihad, the Manifesto Club put in a word for free speech. Read the statement from Josie Appleton; see the Facebook group, Thoughtcrime is not crime. See also Manifesto Club member Shirley Dent's column in The Times

Three monkeysTuesday 26 February, CLUB NIGHT: Thought Crime - from the Lyrical Terrorist to Beenie Man
At the end of last year BBC Radio 1 provoked widespread derision for its decision to bleep the words 'slut' and 'faggot' from the Pogues' Christmas hit, 'Fairytale of New York'. Within hours the song could again be heard uncensored, a decision justified by the BBC on the basis that there was no 'negative intent behind the use of the words'. Read more...


- NO TO 'NO PLATFORM'

The Manifesto Club supports students across Britain who are calling for the abolition of 'no platform' policies in student unions. We believe that no speakers should be denied a platform on principle, however objectionable their opinions, and that universities should not be afraid of argument.

See commentaries from students for free speech: Oxford, Sussex, and UEA.

NEW: Luke Gittos from Sussex updates their free speech campaign

- A NEW DEAL FOR PUBLIC DEBATE, a Manifesto Club Thinkpiece, by Josie Appleton

Accusing your opponent of causing you offence is a cowardly tactic. We should avoid this trap, and celebrate the virtues of open and fair argument.

Download Thinkpiece (pdf)

- SPEAKING OUR MIND A Manifesto Club blog, with a year's worth of observation and reflection on everyday free speech issues. See an archive of blog posts.