[IanFromHKG]

Martyn, I hadn’t seen your comment when I posted my last comment (must be something to do with the timezone difference, I seem to get these posts a few minutes late! LOL)

His remark was ill-advised for various reasons. It was unnecessary, it was provocative, and most of all it contained a veiled (sorry) criticism of security procedures. We all know that criticising security procedures in an airport is a hazardous affair. Accordingly, I consider his remark ill-advised.

[DisgustedofSwieqi]

Becky

You are entitled to your own opinion, but when you say Mr Jones is guilty of aggravated harrasment, the facts available do not support your view. Ian’s post shows why.

To the letter of the law, you are wrong.

[NTarrant]

Becky, it is not about having a different view. But you have continued to dodge the questions Ian and others have asked as to why you have that view.

Ian I agree it was ill-advised, perhaps a bit like saying something about having a bomb.

[IanFromHKG]

Yes, Becky, I am a lawyer, but just so you know I am not (and have never been) a criminal lawyer (all the legal stuff I quoted took me a couple of minutes to look up with the aid of Google, and did not come from my training or careeer – I work for a bank!). I do, however, have a great respect for people’s rights and freedoms, and for any legal system that protects them. If I thought Mr Jones’s conduct was criminal in any way, I would have been advocating his prosecution as vociferously as I am currently advocating his innocence (at least of criminal activity – I still think he was ill-advised or, to put it another way, stupid). Those rights and freedoms, incidentally, include the freedom to make stupid (but not criminal) remarks without fear of being illegally detained, intimidated, and threatened. The fact that Mr Jones suffered all three of those consequences is, to my mind, the real crime here, and I see that treatment as being vastly more serious and worrisome, and deserving of our censure, than his question.

You are, of course, entitled to take the opposite view, and I specifically (and I want to make this very clear) do not think it is “wrong” of you to have a view that differs from mine. I can also see that one could regard Mr Jones as being the author of his own misfortune. However, I stick to my guns, and say that his treatment at the hands of officialdom was both morally and legally wrong, and should be of far greater concern than his own ill-advised conduct.

You are, of course, right to say that there may be more to this than meets the eye. However, I am sceptical – not least because I cannot see that Mr Jones would be making a public scene about this if he felt that his conduct was, or could be seen in the light of public opinion as being, criminal. Again, we can agree to disagree about this. I suspect the other thing we may have to disagree about – but I am only making suppositions here since you have still failed to answer my original second question – is the culpability of the security officials who tried to force Mr Jones to make an apology that he felt was unwarranted by depriving him of his liberty and making threats against him.

[MartynSinclair]

Ian, I think we could waste a lot of time debating a person’s right to ask a question, unless we have a transcript of not only the EXACT question but also the tone of the question.

Mr Jones has reported the question he asked, I would be pleased to hear exactly WHAT question was heard and in what tone.

Then perhaps we can come to some conclusions.

Your views have been most interesting, especially as you have owned up to being a lawyer……………!

[esselle]

Looks to me as though this was a pretty typical chip on the shoulder type who is always looking for intent of some kind, even when in reallity it is not there. An innocent remark gets seized upon, and escalated, at which point worker solidarity appears to have resulted in a very quick entrenchment of views. Those in “authority” could not loose face by backing down, so they ramp the thing up by calling others to join in and fight their corner. The police officer involved clearly did not see anything substantive in the argument, so the easy climb down is the “compromise” followed by a bit of grandstanding. The folk in charge at LGW must be mortified that something like this could have been “created” on the back of a massive over-reaction. Let’s hope Fireman Sam pushes them.

[craigwatson]

Im in danger of sounding like VK here, but could we have less of the “could of'” and a few more “could have” please. It hurts my head reading that.

On a seperate point, a couple of posters earlier on made suggestions that they were’nt racist as “they were married to a dutch national” and in a seperate post that they were Irish. Neither of these has anything to do, one way or the other with racism as they are all the same race, that being caucasion. All they were discussing was multiculturalism.

The only reason I brought this up is the fact that to have a hope of stamping out racism people must know what is is to begin with.

[IanFromHKG]

Martin, you are quite correct that someone can hear something that wasn’t said – in the sense that remarks can be interpreted, or misinterpreted, in ways that are quite different from what was intended. The tone, of course, is very important. However, the words are important too. Since we weren’t there, we can only rely on the reports and on educated guesses about the rest. I still don’t see criminality in what was said, at least according to the reports,but of course Becky is right to point out that there may be more to it (again, though, I am sceptical).

I, also, would love to see a response by LGW. I would also like to think – at least based on my own (mis?)interpretation of the events – that it would include an apology for the way Mr Jones was treated. I suspect, however, that I will be disappointed…

As to owning up to being a lawyer – I rather thought I might come in for more flak for working for a bank!! As if that wasn’t bad enough, it is an American bank. I sometimes feel like a ready-made victim for hate crime, in the current world!!

Becky, just to make it clear, I have no personal animosity towards you. Indeed, you must be aware that I have defended you in other threads and heavily criticised others who have treated you unfairly. However, you made a very serious charge against Mr Jones, which I felt was unjustified, and ignored what I felt was a much greater wrong. Laws are there to be used, not abused, and I do not feel that public rhetoric calling for people to be “banged up” without proper justification is acceptable (and I hope I have shown that you did not have justification under the law). You are free to disagree with Mr Jones, and also with me. That is your right. You would, no doubt, be horrified if your expressoins of opinion on this subjject led to you being intimidated and detained without due process. Yet your comments were, legally speaking, more wrongful than Mr Jones’s – they were highly defamatory. However, he WAS detained, and threatened. You still don’t seem ready to acknowledge this, or that it was far more wrong than any action that he took. That’s a shame…

[ChrisBuda82]

Ian who can take your passport off you in the UK?

We live in Big brother world now it sad, what if the guy said look she got a big **** would he been taken away? Thought we lived in a free world to say what you like but its not.

[RichHI1]

Ian_from_HKG thanks for bringing some sanity to this thread.

[BeckyBoop]

Ian, thanks for your posts and your support where applicable.

I cant believe even after all of this still havent answered your question. I have even reread the story several times over but it still hasnt clicked. So will have to say i dont know the answer to it, probably because i have not fully understood the question the facts in the case or even both. So i will take your word for it as you are an expert in these things.

I still see his comment being racist as it caused another person distress and should not be tolorated, if it was intentional or not. I am surprised the security lady being in such a job would be a bit more tougher with this sort of thing. I should point out that I see people making racial remarks about people from different ethnic origins all the time where i live and often get rubbish in the post from right wing groups. Its really sad to have to live in a country that some people just cant accept people of different faiths and blame them for all problems.

For the record I cant explain things like some of you lot because i dont have degrees and that sort of thing and please try not to use such big words or long explanations with me, i can be a bit slow 😉

[IanFromHKG]

ChrisBuda, take a look at the last page of the Notes on pages 3 and 4 of “your” passport and you will see that it doesn’t belong to you at all – it belongs to HM Government “and may be withdrawn at any time”. However, it should also “not be … passed to an unauthorised person”. In this situation, were the security people authorised to withhold Mr Jones’s passport? I strongly doubt it, but could not quote you chapter and verse – I am not that kind of lawyer (so to speak). I would be highly sceptical of any public official other than a policeman or member of the Home Office taking my passport away, and somewhat sceptical even if it was one of them.

Freedom of speech is a double-edged sword. My own philosophy on these matters is along the John Stuart Mill line – people should be free to do (or say) whatever they like so long as it doesn’t cause undue harm to others without their consent. That, however, is only a philosophy and it isn’t the real world. The key, in the real world, is setting a reasonable dividing line to define the acceptable limit of harm. That’s tricky, the line isn’t always drawn in the right place. We are all free to disagree with the law, and say that it is wrong (or that it is an ass) and should be changed. However, and this is a very strong part of my philosophy, if you don’t like the way the law works you do NOT take it into your own hands, you lobby to change the law. Saying people should be “banged up” simply because you don’t like something they said is unacceptable UNLESS the law says that their conduct was criminally punishable by imprisonment (or you are conducting a reasoned campaign for a change in the law). Otherwise, our system becomes trial by the mob and that is not how the law should work.

[IanFromHKG]

Becky, I am not an expert by any means. I understand legal concepts, but this is not my area of law. However, I am (as you may have guessed) very passionate about the rule of law. My law degree, due to a quirk of history as much as anything else, is actually in “jurisprudence” – which can be translated as the philosophy of law. I explained a little about my own philosophy of law in my last post. Let me elaborate a little – the law should be a shield, not a sword. When people start using it as a sword, they are not using it, they are abusing it. If you think the law should be used as a weapon, beware – it would be double-edged, and could be used against you. Imagine you were making your posts in an airline lounge, that someone came up to your desk right now, challenged you for wrongfully describing Mr Jones as a criminal, insisted that you apologise even though you feel your opinion is justified, took away your passport, escorted you back through security control, and said you would not be allowed to fly unless you made an apology that you felt was unwarranted…. how would you feel? Because that is the world you are advocating, Becky.

In fact, it’s worse than that. You said in your last post that Mr Jones’s comments caused distress and should not be tolerated. I cannot help thinking that, given that he felt his remarks were defensible, he would be distressed by your posts. Does that mean you should be “banged up”? No, of course it doesn’t.

NOW do you get it?

[BeckyBoop]

Ian,

YES I now understand.

Thank for your time and patience with me today.

Love,

Becky xxxx

[DisgustedofSwieqi]

Becky

You might also wish read this link, which will explain the title I chose for the thread

http://www.softpanorama.org/Skeptics/groupthink.shtml

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