Read on Twitter
1./ A thread. The Scottish Parliament was at its best and worst on Tuesday debating the Hate Crime Bill. The fine summation by @DAJCameron reminds us it has already lost the trust of the public who smell something dodgy about its attempt to police free speech. Why would they not?
2./ They've watched the recent behaviour of the SNP leadership and other "cancel culture" extremists like @patrickharvie. When respected women MSPs met in Holyrood to discuss single sex rights he denounced the meeting as "a platform for transphobia." https://www.scotsman.com/news/politics/patrick-harvie-accused-smear-over-claim-parliament-was-platform-transphobic-hatred-1740616
3./ It was one of many blatant attempts to close down debate during the SNP's last legislative debacle, the proposed Gender Recognition Reform as @JohannLamont (one of the MSPs he trolled) reminded the Chamber in a wonderful takedown. Never argue with an ex-teacher from Glasgow
4./ It's precisely because there was such an intemperate misuse of accusations of hate during the consultation on GR Reform that this Hate Crime Bill has become so suspect. Harvie responded by claiming he too had been the recipient of hate accusations
5./ Err...isn't that the point? If this Hate Crime Bill had already been passed his detractors might have used the legislation to accuse HIM of a hate crime. In fact if misogyny had been included in the Bill there would probably already be a Crowdfunder raising money for a case.
6./ Harvie claimed there's a commonsense view about what's hateful. But the GR Reform debate proved there isn't. If the Bill had already been law his opponents might have had to defend themselves in a court and as @JohannLamont pointed out the fear of this would stifle debate
7./ That's because extreme trans rights activists like him insist on denouncing as hateful the very starting points of the other side's argument. Take "gender Self ID" which means effectively if a man say he's a woman he must automatically be recognised as such. It's insane
8./ Since no one's allowed to ask for a gender certificate that means encouraging self-ID effectively allows any bloke to enter single sex spaces. It's an unintentional loophole that male (non-trans) predators could easily exploit. But even to point this out was labelled bigotry.
9./ A reasoned debate would have seen proponents of the Reform provide practical solutions to a problem of their own making. Instead accusations of hate were used to avoid the subject and @ForwomenScot and @ALLIANCELGB were (inevitably) accused of transphobia.
10./ The same ridiculous accusation has just been levelled against @RosieDuffield1 who merely liked a tweet saying "only women have a cervix". Pink News claims this left constituents "listless", a headline so bad it suggests its subscription to Roget's Thesaurus must have lapsed.
11./ In this atmosphere of witch-hunt and silencing of opponents the assurances of @HumzaYousaf that the Bill will not penalise free speech and that the bar for prosecution for Hate Crime will be high are just not believable; and the public have grasped that instinctively.
12./ And the behaviour of his SNP colleagues such as @MrJohnNicolson proves there's a strain of intolerance, self-righteousness and vindictiveness in his party that this Bill could empower. The Bill is also being used as a Trojan Horse to redefine important terms.
13./ Take the section referring to sexual orientation (Part 3, Section 14). Here the SNP have used the opportunity to rewrite in law the definition of heterosexuality. My straight mates out there may care to know that you're no longer attracted to the 'opposite' sex.
14./ No. According to @HumzaYousaf heterosexuals are "attracted to a different sex". Bisexuality becomes a word salad of "attracted to both persons of the same sex and persons of a different sex". This has been done because 'opposite' would suggest there are just two sexes.
15./ That's almost a hate crime on its own nowadays; or it is in the minds of gender identity activists who argue there is a "sex spectrum". This govt claims hate crime is its priority then loads its own Hate Crime Bill with unscientific baloney about sex. Talk about hypocrisy.
16./ The Bill also includes the term non-binary people, but never defines non-binary. You have to laugh. On the one hand they've removed binary sex while at the same time adding non-binary. What on earth can non-binary mean if there is no one who is binary?
17./ For all the fine contributions in this debate, this Bill is an embarrassment; a shoddy, dangerous, illiberal mess that's being used to advance strange culture war obsessions. Scotland's national Parliament deserved better. This Bill has to be stopped.
Clips are from Scottish Parliament TV. You can watch the whole debate here: https://www.scottishparliament.tv/meeting/debate-hate-crime-and-public-order-scotland-bill-september-9-2020
