It's About Liberty: A Conservative Forum
Topics => Radical Islam/GWOT => Topic started by: IronDioPriest on June 23, 2011, 12:21:08 PM
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The totalitarian Left used the strength of the courts in a raw attempt to silence this man through intimidation, and he refused to back down. Let's hope and pray that the boldness and courage of Geert Wilders will not be in any way muffled by this experience.
The world needs leaders like him. The matter has now been settled. He can offer more of the same boldness, and openly attempt to persuade others politically to his way of thinking. I would fully expect this legal victory to ignite a wave of others who have heretofore been too afraid to go through what he was willing to go through. I would also expect a fatwa.
Geert Wilders ACQUITTED of all charges in "hate speech" trial (http://www.nytimes.com/2011/06/24/world/europe/24dutch.html?_r=2)
PARIS — Geert Wilders, the fiery right-wing Dutch politician, was acquitted on Thursday of hate speech charges by an Amsterdam court, which found that his inflammatory comments about Muslims were protected by rules governing discourse in a free society.
Mr. Wilders, 47, had faced a possible one-year prison sentence on five charges of inciting hatred and discrimination against Muslims. He has become an important force in Dutch politics, making provocative statements including comparing the Koran with Hitler’s “Mein Kampf” and calling for an end to Muslim immigration.
Mr. Wilders also made a short film, “Fitna,” in 2008 that portrayed Islam as inherently violent, and he joined Newt Gingrich in New York last year to oppose the building of an Islamic community center and mosque near the World Trade Center site.
But the presiding judge of the Amsterdam District Court, Marcel van Oosten, found that while offensive, Mr. Wilders’s actions were protected speech. In dismissing the charges, Judge Oosten described some of Mr. Wilders’s comments as “rude and denigrating” and others as “on the edge of what is allowed,” Radio Netherlands reported.
Mr. Wilders’s supporters clapped as the judge concluded his remarks.
The verdict had been expected as prosecutors themselves had called for his acquittal, arguing that the statements were directed “against a religion as such and not against individual persons or a group of people.”
Under the case law of the Dutch Supreme Court and the European Court of Human Rights, it was not possible to convict him, G. J. Alexander Knoops, a Dutch lawyer and professor of international criminal law at the University of Utrecht, said in an e-mail. But the Muslim organizations that brought the case won a Court of Appeal ruling that it should go ahead over the objections of the prosecution.
“The judgment is in line with the case law of the European Court on Human Rights,” Mr. Knoops wrote, “which in 2010 held that only when certain statements incite to violence, there is a role for criminal law.”
“The same approach is taken by the U.S. Supreme Court,” he added, for example in cases involving the Ku Klux Klan.
The court gave the plaintiffs 14 days to appeal, but Mr. Knoops said the complainants had little ground for such action: “In our system, only the prosecution can appeal a judgment,” and that is “highly unlikely.”
Ties Prakken, a lawyer who represented immigrant and antiracist complainants, agreed that “there is no appeal possible in the Netherlands,” and said she would instead bring the case to the United Nations Commission on Human Rights in Geneva, accusing the Dutch government of failing to protect people from incitement to discrimination or violence.
“We have a reasonable case,” Ms. Prakken said, adding, “there is some case law in our favor there.”
“It’s not only an acquittal for me,” The Associated Press quoted Mr. Wilders as telling his supporters, “but a victory for freedom of expression in the Netherlands. Fortunately, you’re allowed to discuss Islam in public debate and you’re not muzzled in public debate. An enormous burden has fallen from my shoulders.”
The original judges in the trial were ordered to step down in October after Mr. Wilders’s lawyers argued that the jurists were biased against him.
Ms. Prakken said she was concerned that after Mr. Wilders’s court victory, he would take a more bold public stance.
“He’s poisoned the atmosphere,” she said. “It’s normal now to say in the Netherlands that the immigration experiment has failed. The climate has worsened, and he is both one of the instigators and one of the symptoms. It’s not like it was 20 years ago.”
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Yeah well, a fatwa if issued, carries about as much weight as the opinion of this multi-culti/diversity/pc cult-loving zombie Prakken! Both can get stuffed!
As for Prakken's desire to go slumming at the UN, how typical for a cult-loving zombie to think that outfit trumps any nations sovereignty!
She is a pile of useless DNA...
As for Geert, fire up the presses!
::thumbsup::
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“He’s poisoned the atmosphere,” she said. “It’s normal now to say in the Netherlands that the immigration experiment has failed.
The truth hurts, don't it? ::mooning::
It’s not like it was 20 years ago.”
::facepalm::So true. 20 yrs ago we didn't have to worry about being blown to bits or shot.
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There were the Vikings then
there was the Dutch East India Company
who were among other things demonstrative representatives
of Dutch political and cultural dominance.
Now, it's diversity.
(sigh)
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“He’s poisoned the atmosphere,” she said. “It’s normal now to say in the Netherlands that the immigration experiment has failed. The climate has worsened, and he is both one of the instigators and one of the symptoms. It’s not like it was 20 years ago.”
Naw, it couldn't be that the immigration experiment really has failed.
The real travesty here was that Wilders was put on trial in the first place. He was essentially tried for criticizing government policy. "Hate speech" was just the excuse.
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“He’s poisoned the atmosphere,” she said. “It’s normal now to say in the Netherlands that the immigration experiment has failed. The climate has worsened, and he is both one of the instigators and one of the symptoms. It’s not like it was 20 years ago.”
Naw, it couldn't be that the immigration experiment really has failed.
The real travesty here was that Wilders was put on trial in the first place. He was essentially tried for criticizing government policy. "Hate speech" was just the excuse.
But as long as hate anything is on the law books it will get used just like the race card whip it out when nothing else fits.
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Now all he has to worry about is some flea-infested towel-head trying to bump him off .
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Ms. Prakken, how's that traditional libertarian atmosphere that allows things like doob bars been working out for you, lately?
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I just wish he would come here and run for office! ::whatgives:: ::whoohoo::
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I just wish he would come here and run for office! ::whatgives:: ::whoohoo::
Really. The whole "native born" thing is no longer an issue, right?
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I just wish he would come here and run for office! ::whatgives:: ::whoohoo::
Really. The whole "native born" thing is no longer an issue, right?
We know one aspect of the guys life and were ready to elect the guy. ::confused::
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I just wish he would come here and run for office! ::whatgives:: ::whoohoo::
Really. The whole "native born" thing is no longer an issue, right?
We know one aspect of the guys life and were ready to elect the guy. ::confused::
At least he's anti-Muslim, in contrast to our current POTUS. So yes, that's an improvement.
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I just wish he would come here and run for office! ::whatgives:: ::whoohoo::
Really. The whole "native born" thing is no longer an issue, right?
We know one aspect of the guys life and were ready to elect the guy. ::confused::
At least he's anti-Muslim, in contrast to our current POTUS. So yes, that's an improvement.
I wish that was the only problem with our TOTUS!
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I just wish he would come here and run for office! ::whatgives:: ::whoohoo::
Really. The whole "native born" thing is no longer an issue, right?
We know one aspect of the guys life and were ready to elect the guy. ::confused::
At least he's anti-Muslim, in contrast to our current POTUS. So yes, that's an improvement.
I wish that was the only problem with our TOTUS!
Right, TOTUS. I stand corrected. ::doh::
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Running for office at home and winning, that's the ticket.
One giant win for civilization.
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I just wish he would come here and run for office! ::whatgives:: ::whoohoo::
Not me. He's good right there, doing what needs doing for his own country, because he's not what we would call conservative here in terms of the gay agenda.