Apparently he can stay.As part of a concerted drive by Tory London Mayor Boris Johnson opinions, that disagree with government policy, are to be banned within the capital's metropolitan boundaries.
Having previously described Those Who Hold Opinions Different From Him as "nauseating", the Mayor announced today, "As part of a pilot project which we intend to implement across the UK irrespective of the success, or otherwise, of this pilot: I am pleased to declare London is now a Different Opinion Free Zone."
He went on, "Opinions are like drugs. There are good drugs, made by pharmaceutical giants for profit, and there are bad drugs, the ones that make you feel good. In the same way, there are opinions which are similar to mine or Ordinary Dave Camerons or even Nick Clegg and they are good. But there are also bad opinions which are different to mine. And it is those bad opnions that we wish to remove from the city's streets."
The mayor continued, "We will be utilising the full force of the Law against these bad opinions as the Law can be relied upon to have the same opinions as us. We will also be using hired thugs whose opinions we can buy, known as Police or bailiffs, to enforce the removal of these bad opinions. There is no room for bad opinions inside the heads of Londoners. Let me be absolutely clear: if your opinions are not on the Right then you are wrong."
It was not possible to gauge reaction on the streets of London as anyone our reporter attempted to engage either flat out ignored them, swerved out of the way with a shake of the head or, where they did bother to speak, mumbled something about being "in a hurry".
Labour's response was to claim that they had intended to enact the "Anti-Bad Opinion" laws as part of this parliamentary term had they been re-elected and that Boris Johnson was just stealing their ideas. As usual.
Independent groups have questioned how it is that the mayor thinks he can control "whats inside peoples heads, innit". But when the Iraq War WMD example was cited, they replied, "Oh. Ye." For his part, Boris has dismissed rumours of special units, known as "Thought Police", being set up as, "Ridiculous."
2 comments:
I am just a humble simple American and know not of the ways of you Brits.
I can actually understand evicting squatters from a public park. However, are the powers that be REALLY banning freedom of speech?
Hi Nazz, without getting into an argument about ownership of the soil underneath your feet, there is a bit of a contradiction in terms of evicting people from a PUBLIC park. And no, they wouldn't dare ban freedom to protest outright - so they will do it by stealth: ban gatherings of more than five people, evict protesters from public spaces, kettle protests, intimidate protesters with FIT teams and such like... the list goes on. No need to ban it outright - just make it incredibly difficult/awkward/legally dubious/etc.
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