Hacker News Reader

Stop radicalization by limiting free speech and spying on everyone's communications? That's similar to what America did with McCarthyism. Communism is arguably more deadly and harmful than Islamic extremism but we accept it as a tolerable non-thought-crime today. Why can't people accept Islamic extremism in the same way? What happened to the idea of freedom of political thought?

View on HN

> spying on everyone's communications

Facebook and Google already do that — it's part of their business model. What makes you think it's better when unnacountable corporations do it than when accountable governments do it?

The UK is not America. There is no absolute guarantee of free speech here. Inciting and glorifying terrorism is illegal. No one cares about thought crimes. They care about innocent people being mown down by lorries and children being blown up at pop concerts.

You can argue that forcing social media to police itself won't be effective at reducing terrorism and the spread of islamic extremism, but if it is effective, it seems perfectly reasonable to me.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com