Hard Hat Area, or Protect Your Head of State

Silencer

Silencer

Night Watchman
Staff member
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Watch out, I'm going to post links in Polish.

Today, the District Attorney in Elbląg (Elbing) discontinued the investigation against a 50-year old resident, who sent out e-mails with caricatures of our President, Lech Kaczyński. The man was charged with disrespecting the head of state, which is forbidden by the Constitution.

The charges were dropped after the attorney decided that Polish and EU law permit a citizen to express his views, even if they are not keen of a head of state.

Some of the mail sent featured two ducks, saying "Now, dear voters... Kiss our rear parts!" (A wordplay od Kaczyński, think "Dukakis" spelled with a "ck".)

Initially, the man was charged following a report by a resident of Wroclaw (Breslau), who is also famous for tracking pedophiles online.

This was considered as an attempt to execute political repressions and limit the freedom of speech. Shortly after the elections, a website [url]www.spieprzajdziadu.com, which featured caricatures of the president-elect, was shut down.[/url] "Spieprzaj dziadu" translates to "Buzz off, bum!", and was a phrase used by the Presidents brother, also a politician and president of the ruling party, when a resident approached him when he was exiting his car.

One alias for an satiric Easter e-card featuring ducks was also short-lived, but it survived, because it was hosted on an American server.

I wonder, am I currently living in a country on the brink of an orwellian totalitarism, or is it a common trend to limit free speech? Is one allowed to talk low of the head of state where you live? Are offshore servers the only option for free speech? Americans, Italians, Britons - what do you say?
 
We sure can. In Canada here it's not as bad as in the good old US of A. Hell, down there, during elections, the running candidates rape each other over coals in TV ads. And it's all legal. As long as you don't accuse them of breaking the law, you're good to go.

Once, good old President Bush was accused of hating blacks, on national TV, by a celebrity. Sure the whole country gasped in unison, but nothing ever came of it, except a lot of exposure on local entertainment shows.
 
forddieselguy said:
Once, good old President Bush was accused of hating blacks, on national TV, by a celebrity.
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You mean Kanye's "Bush doesn't care about black people" remark? Heh, yeah it basically turned into a big joke. I'm sure there's more extreme examples though. I believe Charlie Sheen recently stated that the government was directly responsible for 9/11.
 
forddieselguy said:
We sure can. In Canada here it's not as bad as in the good old US of A. Hell, down there, during elections, the running candidates rape each other over coals in TV ads. And it's all legal. As long as you don't accuse them of breaking the law, you're good to go.
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Hah! Well, I'm not talking about candidates smearing shit on each other, because that's pretty much normal, but rather the common man expressing his dismay. The runner-up for president might have actually lost, because one PM accused his grandfather of having been in Wehrmacht during the war (the German Armed Forces, for goodness sake!)

Also, do politicians with a criminal record get elected often? Because we've recently gotten a vice-premier here with a court sentence :D
 
but rather the common man expressing his dismay.
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Sure can, as long as it's not considered a "hate crime".
Most racial comments are like that, and it can get pretty serious.

Also, do politicians with a criminal record get elected often?
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I don't think so. You've got to be sqeaky clean, I think, to even run for office.
 
Wow. A friend of mine has got family in Canada.

He'll probably emigrate soon after I show him this thread.
 
Also, do politicians with a criminal record get elected often? Because we've recently gotten a vice-premier here with a court sentence :D
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I think a politician who is suspected of crime should be suspended from any public office pending the trial and if found guilty he should never again be allowed to even apply for any public office.
I mean we know that some of the "politicians" who "lead" us are corrupt but at least they manage not to get caught, or any file that contains charges brought against them suddenly vanishes shortly followed by the tragic suicide of the prosecutor who dared utter such infamous slander :roll: . We live in a democracy! Yay!
 
And about a hundred more currently going on, half of his party is in debt, reaching 1,400,000 zl owed, and they abuse their power to protect their stolen (as in: not paid for) goods (harvesters etc.).

When do we rebel and cap their asses?
 
Apparently never, certainly not in the near future; after stealing year-round the *politicians* decide to be generous on several special occasions like Easter, they give out some crappy plastic bags containing trinkets (a ball point pen, a lighter, a small flag and a balloon like you get at Mc donald's you get the picture) on behalf of the party(whichever they are all the same since the same corrupt politicians just move from one party to another in order to maintain the power, pretty much like a hooker jumps from truck stop to truck stop to get clients). Or fro the 1st of May they may give out 2 or 3 mici (meatballs cooked on a barbecue) and a beer (draft and hence watered down like hell) and these little acts of *charity* seem to make things right and their popularity rises. Sometime I tend to agree with the remark "nice country, stupid people" as far as my homeland is concerned.
 
Centrum.cz said:
... The ultra-conservative minister and honorary chairman of a radical youth organization notorious for assaulting Jewish university students and violence against Ukrainians in Lvov before WW2, intends to introduce military order in schools. The Polish education system should pay more attention to religion and put an end to sex education. In addition, he doesn't shy from controversial preemptive measures such as censorship and the blocking of "immoral" web sites.

As a devout Catholic patriot, Giertych intends to push for a ban on Sunday shopping and "build a centralized state of which the Catholic church will be the main symbol" and the European Union the chief enemy. ...

(source in Czech)
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Gazeta.pl said:
Elsewhere in his op-ed, [Warsaw city council member] Wierzejski shows no mercy for Western politicians either [who are supposed to be attending some kind of gay pride march in Warsaw]. "And I don't care some German politicians are supposed to come (...) They're not serious politicians, they're just fags. (...) If they get a beating, they won't come again. A faggot is by definition a coward."

(Source in Polish)
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Although I don't put much stock into Czech media, if any of this is true, I can only wish you good luck.
 
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