Link: Bel is thinking ...: Nick Griffin - the right verdict.

Bel responds in a thoughtful, intelligent way to the Nick Griffin verdict. I worry about where we go from here.

As a libertarian, I would leave the likes of Griffin free to say what he likes, however disgusting. Just as I would leave Muslim misogynists and anti-semites free to say their foul piece. In both cases, I disagree with what they say, but I defend their right to say it.

The members of Britain's white working class feel they are damned whatever they do. They are constantly told they are racist, whether they know it or not - whether they feel it or not. Multiculturalism and its "race relations" gestapos are generating ill-feeling where there was little or none. In consequence, many will silently delight in Griffin's acquittal who have nothing much in common with him.

How far wrong can a democracy go, that fascists can - without irony - chant "freedom" outside a courtroom as one of their number is acquitted? How far wrong can it go that their vile leader can speak of the "the enormous gulf between the ordinary, real British people and the multi-culti fantasy world our masters live in" - and strike a chord in many hearts? We have been playing with fire - and we are going to get burned.

It seems Gordon Brown thinks of changing the law, but he will not secure convictions as long as the institution of the jury remains. I believe that we are now seeing a form of "criminal equity" - a phenomenon whereby juries acquit those charged under laws of which they disapprove, regardless of an individual's guilt or lnnocence. I therefore fear that New Labour and Blue Labour will increasingly attack the institution of the jury, perhaps the last remaining element of our system in which we can have faith. There were juries before there was democracy. They have proved better guarantees of our liberties than has Parliament.

To abolish juries would drive a further wedge between rulers and ruled. It would tell us all that our leaders believe we can't be trusted to do justice. It would prove that they believe we are intellectual and moral inferiors - not only to them, but even to our medieval ancestors. That too would play to the BNP's strengths.

We don't need to tinker with "hate speech" laws until they force those we dislike into silence. We need to let them speak freely; to let them condemn themselves by their own words. We need to show confidence that truth will prevail. There is no need to fear the expression of false ideas.

It is utterly ridiculous to make a martyr out of a man like Nick Griffin. It is both ridiculous and counter-productive. To spend hundreds of thousands in an attempt to silence him, has made him seem much more important than he is. To pay him the further compliment of repeatedly changing the laws to pursue him, would make a hero out of someone marked by the gods as a loser.

Just as stupid as "hate speech" laws are more severe penalties for "hate crimes". A man is no more dead if killed for his skin colour or sexual preference. Murder is murder and every man's death diminishes us. If you punish a criminal more for the identity of his victim, you are saying that other victims are less important. That is already what many of the white working class think the Government and judges believe. That may be one reason why they are turning to the BNP.

Enough of affirmative action. Enough of "positive discrimination." Enough of laws against hate speech and hate crime. Let us treat all of our citizens fairly before the law, regardless of race or creed. Let criminals be judged and punished, not for what they say, but for what they do.

Let's do it now, before the BNP has more triumphant days like today.