"Protesters who wear masks could face arrest, up to a month in jail and a £1,000 fine under proposed measures that human rights campaigners claim are pandering to “culture war nonsense”.

Police in England and Wales will be given the power to arrest people if they are wearing face coverings at specific demonstrations, the Home Office has said."

Been a bad 18 months or so for privacy in the UK. Online Safety Bill passed, the right to take strike action curtailed, people in receipt of benefits (including disabled people) will soon (as from 2025) have their bank accounts open to the government, the right to protest curtailed and now this.

  • li10@lemmy.ml
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    92
    ·
    9 months ago

    I see no hope for this country. Things are just getting worse and worse every year, how long can this keep going?

    It’s pretty bad now, but I seriously worry what things will be like in 20 or so years.

    • Milk_Sheikh@lemm.ee
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      22
      ·
      9 months ago

      Tories on a any% speed run to the government from Children of Men, while the left is worried about which way Kier decides to lean that afternoon

    • soviettaters@lemm.ee
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      3
      arrow-down
      16
      ·
      9 months ago

      People hate on the US all the time, but the first amendment is very unique when you consider how other countries are curtailing people’s right to protest, practice their religion, etc.

      • Leraje@lemmy.blahaj.zoneOP
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        26
        arrow-down
        1
        ·
        9 months ago

        An argument that might carry weight if you weren’t setting up hotlines for people to snitch on anything or anyone vaguely LGBTQIA+, removing books from libraries, allowing huge orgs to buy political favour, enslaving people in for-profit prison systems etc etc etc.

        • soviettaters@lemm.ee
          link
          fedilink
          arrow-up
          3
          arrow-down
          32
          ·
          9 months ago
          1. Kids shouldn’t be coerced into being gay.
          2. Yeah lobbying sucks I agree
          3. If people don’t want to have to work in prison then they shouldn’t commit crimes.
          • irmoz@reddthat.com
            link
            fedilink
            arrow-up
            26
            arrow-down
            1
            ·
            edit-2
            9 months ago

            Kids aren’t being “coerced into being gay”. That’s a batshit statement right there.

            Also, slavery is always bad. End of story. Putting any leeway in there is disgusting.

          • Restaldt@lemm.ee
            link
            fedilink
            English
            arrow-up
            15
            arrow-down
            1
            ·
            edit-2
            9 months ago

            Kids are not coerced in to being gay any more than geese are

            Lobbying sucks

            We are just ignoring the litany of false accusation and arrests of innocent people forced into modern legal slave labor?

            Better hope you never piss off the wrong cop or can afford a good personally retained lawyer if you do

          • jmankman@lemmy.myserv.one
            link
            fedilink
            arrow-up
            4
            ·
            9 months ago

            For the crime of homelessness, you are sentenced to a just lifetime of servitude in a for-profit prison. So righteous.

      • spacecowboy@sh.itjust.works
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        18
        arrow-down
        4
        ·
        9 months ago

        lol you Americans thinking your little piece of paper written centuries ago makes you better than other countries is cute.

        Your country is not the beacon of freedom you pretend it is.

      • li10@lemmy.ml
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        9
        ·
        9 months ago

        Pretty good if actually mattered.

        It’s a talking point that’s only upheld on political whim, which defeats the entire purpose of it.

  • illi@lemm.ee
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    84
    arrow-down
    3
    ·
    9 months ago

    So if someone doesn’t want to get sick for being in a huge crowd, they get arrested? Truly genius.

  • z00s@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    76
    arrow-down
    1
    ·
    9 months ago

    Remember remember the fifth of November,

    When Guy Fawks took the fall.

    Be sure to wear your mask from now on,

    They can’t arrest us all

    • DessertStorms@kbin.social
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      2
      ·
      9 months ago

      Was just setting up my viewing for the rest of the evening, and ironically enough, it’s on tonight! 9pm on Quest (and again on Quest +1) .

      So at 9 I’ll be watching the last episode of Miners’ Strike 1984: The Battle for Britain, then V for Vendetta at 10… Good inspirational viewing.

  • ryan213@lemmy.ca
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    75
    arrow-down
    1
    ·
    9 months ago

    Hmm…I wonder which political spectrum the current government belongs to…

    • Kaboom@reddthat.com
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      3
      arrow-down
      22
      ·
      9 months ago

      Whatever gets them votes. Actual conservatives would at least pretend to care about the economy.

      • admiralteal@kbin.social
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        0
        ·
        9 months ago

        Why? Conservatism is about preserving traditional values and traditional power structures not the economy.

        If you actually care about the economy that means you care about progressing a more effective and efficient state for the benefit of the people. Afraid that makes you a progressive which the conservatives assure us they aren’t.

        • Kaboom@reddthat.com
          link
          fedilink
          arrow-up
          0
          arrow-down
          2
          ·
          9 months ago

          Well if they were conservative and cared about traditional values, they wouldnt have let in so many migrants.

          • LookBehindYouNowAndThen@lemmy.world
            link
            fedilink
            arrow-up
            0
            ·
            edit-2
            9 months ago

            What “traditional values” are you talking about?

            We’re a nation of migrants; you don’t get to rewrite history because it makes you mad.

            The first immigration law passed in this country was a process for naturalization; it doesn’t get more traditional than that.

  • Skullgrid@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    59
    ·
    edit-2
    9 months ago

    Fake beards, wigs , sunglasses and presumably face paint should be ok

    Stay safe protestors. Leave id and phone at home, don’t hold anything that could be interpreted as a weapon, and carry a “your rights” card to help you remember what to do if the police try to take away your freedom.

  • lemmyreader@lemmy.ml
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    42
    arrow-down
    1
    ·
    9 months ago

    Is the UK turning into a dictatorship or an undeveloped country ? How is independent press doing over there ?

    • rmuk@feddit.uk
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      24
      ·
      9 months ago

      dictatorship or an undeveloped country

      Right-Wing Government: why not both?

    • Leraje@lemmy.blahaj.zoneOP
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      24
      arrow-down
      2
      ·
      9 months ago

      More like fascist-adjacent. And we started the process of underdeveloping ourselves when the fascist-adjacent leaders persuaded the terminally ignorant that Brexit would be great when it was obvious it was going to lead exactly where it is leading right now.

        • maynarkh@feddit.nl
          link
          fedilink
          arrow-up
          14
          arrow-down
          1
          ·
          9 months ago

          I guess it’s better than the UK for now, and there have been no attempted fascist coups for quite a few decades now. Even if we’re totally glass-half-empty, the EU is at least slamming on the brakes on the descent, while the UK is tearing their brakes off, and the US is deliberating whether using the brakes would hurt rich people.

  • Dran@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    39
    ·
    9 months ago

    It’s like they think V for Vendetta was a blueprint for how to run a utopia.

    • Leraje@lemmy.blahaj.zoneOP
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      14
      arrow-down
      1
      ·
      edit-2
      9 months ago

      You’ve got to understand the ‘average’ British psyche at this point in history. The majority simply don’t care that people they see as troublemakers and/or scroungers are having their rights dismantled. They lack the empathy to give a shit for these people and they lack the foresight to see that it’ll be their rights gone one day too. What stirs the average british gammon off their collective arses these days is the rumour there might be an immigrant in a hotel somewhere or that a drag queen exists.

      • TengoDosVacas@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        6
        arrow-down
        2
        ·
        9 months ago

        You described all of the western world since the passing of the US’s 1996 Telecommunications Act which gave all the radical fascists free rein to spread nonstop fascist propaganda over thousands upon thousands of talk shows and now through the internet.

        The only reasonable response is violence.

  • Vendetta9076@sh.itjust.works
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    35
    arrow-down
    3
    ·
    9 months ago

    Man its like the UK is an authoritarian shit hole or something. Y’all need weapons and resistance. And no, I’m not American before someone asks.

  • erranto@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    26
    arrow-down
    3
    ·
    edit-2
    9 months ago

    I have never seen a cucked nation like the UK in the world before. u guys have no resistance what so ever ! the french should have bought you some freedoms a few centuries ago.

    • Leraje@lemmy.blahaj.zoneOP
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      13
      arrow-down
      1
      ·
      9 months ago

      It’s not even that - the people this is directly affecting (for now) are the people who, if they raise their head above the parapet, it’ll get shot off - the people least able to protest. 95% of the country are not lacking resistance, they’re lacking empathy and foresight. They show plenty of resistance to media driven culture war bullshit like immigration and LGBTQIA+ issues.

  • Chaotic Entropy@feddit.uk
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    15
    ·
    9 months ago

    Well that should put us back on track as a nation, practical solutions for our modern problems. What a relief.