I am so glad to see Jewish groups in Europe leading the way to restrict speech and to send people to prison for jokes.
A Belgian court sentenced controversial French comedian Dieudonne M’bala M’bala on Wednesday to two months in prison and a 9,000 euro ($9,534) fine for making anti-Semitic jokes during a comedy show in 2012.
Dieudonne, known for his use of jokes based on ethnic stereotypes, has repeatedly been convicted of racism in France and fined for hate speech. He insists he is not anti-Semitic.
The court in Liege found the comedian, known by the stage name Dieudonne, had spread racist ideas by making discriminatory, anti-Semitic and holocaust-denying remarks in the 2012 gig in nearby Herstal, a court spokeswoman said.
He was not in court on Wednesday.
Judges said that the remarks, made in front of an audience of 1,100 people in the town of Herstal, were clearly calls to hatred and violence. By calling on Christians and Muslims to unite to kill Jews, he had incited genocide.
He was also ordered to pay for the entire text of the judgment against him to be printed in two leading French-language Belgian newspapers.
In March, he was given a two-month suspended sentence for condoning terrorism in a Facebook post shortly after Islamist attacks that killed 17 people in Paris in January.
He was later fined 22,500 euros for a jibe against a radio journalist in 2013, suggesting that hearing the broadcaster speak made him think of Nazi gas chambers.
The comedian, who began his career with a Jewish sidekick in the early 1990s, is credited with inventing the “quenelle”, a downward Nazi-like salute.
Originally active with anti-racist, left-wing groups, the Paris-born son of a Cameroonian father and French mother began openly criticizing Jews and Israel in 2002, and ran in the European elections two years later for a French pro-Palestinian party.
France prepares for war against online hate speech
France’s government is looking to adopt a tough new stance on online racism, anti-Semitism and other hate speech that would allow authorities to shut down offending websites amid a recent rise in hate crimes in the country.
Justice Minister Christiane Taubira has said she will push for legal reforms that would help French authorities crack down on racism and anti-Semitism online in much the same way they do with paedophilia. The proposals include empowering French authorities to shut down websites hosting content that is deemed illicit without prior court approval.
“Crimes recognised in public spaces must also be recognised as such on the Internet,” Taubira told a French Jewish student group on Sunday, echoing other recent statements on combating terrorism. “Our challenge is to find the most appropriate responses, but we are determined to wage an unmerciful battle against racism and anti-Semitism on the Internet.”
The declaration of war against online hate speech has raised questions about possible violations of civil liberties and the curtailing of due process as France struggles to find a way forward after a wave of deadly violence and anti-Semitic hate crimes in the country…
Last week more than 250 tombs were vandalised by a group of teens at a Jewish cemetery in eastern France, sparking what appeared to be copycat acts in other non-Jewish cemeteries in Normandy and the Pyrenees in the following days.
Amid the compounding tensions, and real fears over the radicalisation of young people via the Internet, Taubira and other authorities want the legal means to counter racism, anti-Semitism and Islamist extremism on the web. But blocking ubiquitous online hate speech could be a thorny task for officials.
Some people are applauding France’s aggressive approach. The Simon Wiesenthal Center, an international rights group researching the Holocaust and hate crimes, says it has observed a steady rise in racist and anti-Semitic speech online since it began studying the phenomenon 20 years ago. The increase has been exponential since the advent of social media platforms like Facebook and Twitter.
“France’s efforts must be congratulated,” Shimon Samuels, who heads the center’s Europe office, told FRANCE 24. “If child pornography and paedophilia have no place on the Internet, if advertising for things like alcohol and tobacco are controlled because they are considered noxious to children, then what about hate?”
Samuels downplayed the dangers of curtailing free speech or privacy as a result of Taubira’s proposed reforms. He pointed out that nowhere are free speech laws an unlimited privilege, and that we constantly forfeit our right to privacy to online advertisers without batting an eye.
“I see this as a way of ultimately protecting civil liberties,” Samuels said. “Of course the measures need to work within the framework of the law, of course there has to be oversight so that they are not abused. A healthy debate is arising about freedoms, but that is part of democracy.”
It is unclear whether France will get what it wants from other countries and the Internet giants, with whom it has clashed in the past. In the meantime, it has launched an Internet site where citizens can report worrying content to police, and launched a multimedia campaign to expose the recruiting methods and myths used by jihadists.
Samuels and O’Loughlin agree that more also needs to be done on the education front.
Parents in both Jewish and Muslim communities need to be better informed about the kind of content children are encountering on the Internet, and be encouraged to have frank – even uncomfortable – discussions with them about what they see, said Samuels.
O’Laughlin said people who have become blasé about the vitriol they encounter regularly on the web need to be woken from that stupor and given the tools to identify and report online hate speech.
Justice Minister Christiane Taubira
