Member

I can see that an entrepreneurial country such as the UK might develop a flourishing free speech underground cafe and bar culture, but driving freedom of expression underground is the hallmark of totalitarian, repressive cultures. On my last visit to one such country, where I was giving university guest lecturer courses on late 19th and 20th-century British political history, I was advised to avoid the word “democracy” in public discourse. Later, the sponsor of the series explained that it was fine to speak freely on any subject in a setting such as a dinner in a restaurant; indeed, that was par for the course. Are we, in what has been a free country, to introduce a law that may lead to restrictions undreamed of even by totalitarian regimes?