Julia Hartley-Brewer

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Thanks

Untoward said:

But I'm a free speech extremist, I think people should be able to insult each other if they want,

I also believe in free speech.

People have the right the to say whatever mean things they want.  And other people have the free speech to respond tell them that they're being mean.

You can't defend the right for one group's free speech, and then tell another group that they don't have the free speech to complain about it.

I personally think that saylng you value the life of one person over another, particularly including a person's minority status in between other words that appear to be intended as insults, is damaging and doesn't help promote equality or understanding. 

It's also telling that the man this lady was siding with has just been arrested for human trafficking. 

Junk ideology.

I don't use Twitter but found the Tweet in a newspaper story about it. It wasn't even remotely offensive. People are so sensitive these days and desperate to be a victim.

To be honest I don't think people should consider it an insult to call an autistic person autistic. Why is that where everybody's mind goes? If Julia says she would rather not be autistic, that's perfectly understandable and she should be allowed to say that.

But I'm a free speech extremist, I think people should be able to insult each other if they want, even use the R word, I don't care. Words only have power because people fear them. I don't want "autistic" to become another victim of the euphemism treadmill - a bad word that you can't say and that gets an anodyne replacement until that too is forbidden.

Worrying what others think of you, especially strangers and people you haven't met, is a path to self-inflicted unhappiness. Some people even seem to seek out such things, just so that they can make a fuss and claim they are offended.

You can't control the behaviour of others, you can only control your response. Unhappiness, taking offence, getting upset, these are creations of people's own minds and unfortunately we have 2 generations of people who have been taught to be perpetual victims and that their childish tantrum justifies forcing everyone around them to alter their behaviour.

Society has become extremely selfish as a result. We are beginning to live with a thought police governed by feelings, where the biggest crime is causing someone else to feel a negative emotion.

Stephen Fry said it best back in 2005, that if someone says they're offended, the best reaction is "so what". Unfortunately I think he has fallen to the regressive left mind virus too now. It seems unstoppable.

The kindest thing would be to teach people resilience so that they can handle the real world, instead of trying to change the real world and control what people say in order to ensure nobody ever comes across something that causes them to have an emotional overreaction. University students can't even read books from 40 years ago now without needing trigger warnings and people are trying to ban books and get professors fired for what is basically modern day heresy against the new religion.

She's an idiot and we shouldn't even be talking about her. I saw her on question time and she made my blood boil. 

Media these days has to resort to extremes. It's gets everyone fired up then it'llbe virtual fish and chip paper tomorrow. All be forgotten about in a day as something else comes along. 

m.youtube.com/watch Russell Howard sums it up nicely.

Addendum. So I've read a bit more. Firstly, why did she delete it if it was used factually as she said and not as an insult?  Secondly, I only found out yesterday who the third person in all this was and his track record (not greta or brewer but the other one). I think what's more shocking is that she seems to be siding with someone like him.

Thank you for saying this.

And I don't think what she has tweeted is something that people are just complaining about or becoming easily offended by.

Being autistic and trying to find your way in a majority NT world and having someone use autism as a negative connotation isn't great, and hasn't made me (and I suspect, many others) great.

What has confused me, is that the lady said in her tweet, that explained why she deleted the original one, was that she used the word autistic only because Greta wrote it in her bio.

Greta also has in her bio that she is a 'climate justice activist' but the lady didn't use any of those words to describe Greta in her original tweet.

Just my opinion, but I don't think it is cool or nice to do something like that and then justify it with the reason she did. I don't have twitter, but saw what she said from another social media platform, and didn't think it was nice to use autism as an insult.

Just wanted to get that out as it bothered me. 

Again, thanks for posting! 

***Just like people say that people are entitled to free speech, people are also allowed to be hurt by others comments. Someone could be a lot more resilient to worse things they have had to put up with, but I feel like at some stages in life and where you are at with dealing with certain things in your life, peoples comments can hurt.

In my opinion, I don't think it is because they are easily offended or looking for ways to be offended. The comments simply hurt them because they are vulnerable. If someone is upset by something, let them be upset by it in order to move forward. Is this not how resilience is built?

I have seen many examples where people are (for lack of a better term) fishing for things in order to be offended, so i can agree to an extent, but I equally feel, generalising people who are hurt or offended by things, are automatically looking to be offended or blowing things out of proportion could be harmful. 

What I've hear about prisons, they don't sound very safe! Especially to the ND.

We have become a nation of complainers; and easily-offended nitpickers.

Censoring such tweets will only fan the flames of antagonists. They'll only end up more determined to stir the pot.

The Media are also responsible; as they keep the focus - intentionally - on divisive issues.

The only place with guaranteed safety is prison.

I did read it, she has deleted it and now tweeted an excuse that is no better. She is just digging a deeper hole.

There'a a reason why guns-for-hire like Hartley-Brewer, Morgan, Clarkson, Farage & co are so deliberately incendiary, and it's a reason beyond their obvious vanity and self-righteousness: they seek to undermine caring souls like Greta & Marcus Rashford in order to protect the monied status quo. Their endless controversy is just a variation of the tabloid mindset that publishes disgustingly inciteful headlines like 'Black woman seeks compensation by playing the race card!'...it's designed outrage which is meant to keep the wealthy in riches and to rile the perennially underpaid (i.e. most UK workers). Conscientious people like Greta threaten to derail the gravy train, and so they are targeted by ever-obliging lackeys such as JHB.

What a shameless, embarrassing way to make a living; no matter how much money they make by flogging their cheap controversy, they can never buy back their souls.

There are some other questionable tweets as well but looking at the presenter line up I doubt the powers that be would care. Looks like she’s edited her tweet but the explanation is a bit half arsed, doesn’t seem like a very nice person. I personally found Greta’s tweet hilarious but it seems people are embarrassing themselves now by not wanting her to have the last word