Tag: freedom of expression

Ohio Journalist Goes on Trial for Sending Picture of ‘Shrek’s Penis’ to GOP Lawmaker — Faces Up to Six Months in Prison

An Ohio political blogger will go on trial Thursday for allegedly sending a state lawmaker a picture of Shrek with an erect penis.

D.J. Byrnes, 39, publisher of the Ohio political newsletter The Rooster, has pleaded not guilty to misdemeanor telecommunications harassment over the bizarre exchange with Republican State Sen. Jerry Cirino.

The saga began after Cirino gave up his bid to become president of the Ohio Senate.

Byrnes, a committed leftist who nicknamed Cirino the “Young Mussolini,” allegedly sent him a taunting message celebrating his political setback.

“Good to see you finally made your humiliation public, Young Mussolini. THE PATRIOTS CAUCUS sends its regards!!!!!!!!!!!” Byrnes wrote, according to court filings.

“I don’t know who this is but I am certain you are a moron,” Cirino responded.

Byrnes allegedly sent the senator a digitally altered image depicting the famous green ogre fully nude with an exposed and erect penis.

Keep reading

The Supreme Court Won’t Save ‘Let’s Go Brandon’ From the School Censors

Two Michigan middle-school boys wore sweatshirts bearing three words that contained no profanity: “Let’s Go Brandon.” School administrators made them take the shirts off anyway because everybody knew what the phrase meant.

Now the Supreme Court has decided not to get involved.

The justices declined Monday to hear the students’ First Amendment appeal, leaving intact a divided Sixth Circuit ruling that allowed Tri County Area Schools to treat the slogan as vulgar speech. A denial of review doesn’t mean the Supreme Court endorsed that reasoning. It does mean the two students lost their last chance to overturn it in their case.

From the Associated Press:

The school told her sons to take off the sweatshirts she bought them for Christmas in 2022.

Lower courts upheld the ban, finding the veiled vulgarity of the phrase allows schools to ban it. It functions as a stand-in for “F-— Joe Biden.”

The woman’s attorneys argued that the decision wrongly gives school officials wide latitude to squelch political speech based on their personal ideas of what is vulgar. The phrase itself doesn’t contain any swear words or sexual implications, they said.

The school district urged the justices to reject the case, arguing that messages with lewd implications have no place in school, even if they touch on political topics. There has been evidence that some students wore clothing that read “Make America Great Again” or had messages supporting President Donald Trump, a Republican who lost the 2020 election to Biden, a Democrat.

Keep reading

FAFO: Students at UC-Berkeley Facing Deportation After Celebrations of Charlie Kirk’s Death Sparked Interest of State Department

Some students at UC-Berkeley are now facing the possibility of deportation after the State Department took interest in some celebrations of the death of conservative activist Charlie Kirk.

OOPS.

This kind of disgusting behavior has been documented at more than one college or university. It’s not enough for the left that Charlie Kirk was killed, they feel the need to keep kicking his dead body as well.

The College Fix reports:

Event at UC Berkeley mocking Charlie Kirk memorial draws scrutiny from State Department

A group of UC Berkeley students who celebrated the anniversary of Charlie Kirk’s death have caught the attention of U.S. State Department officials.

Spokesman Tommy Pigott told The College Fix in a statement via email that “people in the United States on visas are guests in this country, and we will not tolerate people here on visas who break our laws, support terrorism, or unlawfully incite violence, which ultimately led to the horrific assassination of an American.”

“That is not only common sense, it’s an essential component of our national security. If that wasn’t the policy under the previous administration, it should’ve been, and it is now under the Trump administration,” Pigott said.

At issue is a Sept. 10 event on the one year-anniversary of Charlie Kirk’s death. Initially, members of Turning Point USA, the conservative campus group founded by Kirk, gathered to solemnly mark his death.

They had a large portrait of Kirk along with posters about “freedom and American patriotism,” according to the Daily Californian student newspaper.

At the event, John Paul Leon, president of TPUSA at UC Berkeley, reportedly said: “You don’t have to agree with everything he said, but when you support the literal political violence and action against this man, that is an act of moral depravity.”

Keep reading

Burchett Plans to Block Socialist Chevalier from Congress over Flag Desecration Post

Rep. Tim Burchett (R-TN) said he plans to block New York Democratic Socialist Darializa Avila Chevalier from being seated in Congress if she wins the Nov. 3 election, citing a resurfaced post in which she said she wiped her hand on an American flag.

Burchett told the New York Post he intends to make the move when the new Congress convenes in January, using a simple-majority vote to prevent newly elected lawmakers from being seated before they take the oath of office.

The Tennessee Republican argued the flag comment is disqualifying for anyone about to swear the oath.

“You take an oath to uphold the Constitution, and and [sic] you’re pretty much disavowing it right there. I just think we’ve lost our compass,” he said.

Burchett called the comment an affront to his own family’s military service. His father was a World War II Marine, and his maternal uncle, Roy Hicks, was wounded shortly after D-Day battling German forces in the Normandy hedgerows. The congressman keeps the flag that covered Hicks’ coffin in his Knoxville office.

“I’m looking at a 48-star flag that hung on my uncle’s casket and [he] died fighting the Nazis, and then see somebody going to get elected to Congress in New York who said they use that flag for a napkin,” he said.

Burchett said he will offer the motion whether Republicans hold the House or fall into the minority. The congressman flew with President Donald Trump on Air Force One to Tennessee last week.

Chevalier, who faces Republican Jomo M. Williams in the general election, made the comment in a December 2019 post on X that has since been deleted: “I forgot to get napkins so I just wiped my hand on the American flag behind me.” She later said she regretted it.

The 32-year-old Democratic Socialist upended five-term Rep. Adriano Espaillat in the primary for the 13th Congressional District, covering northern Manhattan and the western Bronx, after an endorsement from New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani. She co-founded a group that once described itself as “fighting for the total eradication of Western civilization,” and maintained a deleted account that hyped communism and Marxism. Asked whether she is a communist, she said, “I’m not. I’m a democratic socialist.”

The plan faces long odds. GOP operative John Feehery, a former senior House leadership aide, said the chamber could not function under such a standard.

“If we refused to seat folks in Congress who said things that we strongly disagreed with, nobody in the House would be seated,” Feehery said.

The Constitution makes each chamber the judge of its members’ elections and qualifications. The Supreme Court ruled in 1969 that the House had exceeded its authority in excluding Rep. Adam Clayton Powell (D-NY), who had been duly elected and met the constitutional qualifications for office.

Keep reading

Founder of British Flag Flying ‘Raise the Colours’ Campaign Charged with 14 Offences

The creator of the campaign to raise British and English flags across the country to protest against illegal migrants being housed in hotels at taxpayer expense has been charged with 14 criminal offences, including using “threatening, abusive or insulting words”.

Thames Valley Police said on Sunday evening that Ryan Bridge, 45, of Blackwell has been charged with 14 offences relating to alleged incidents between January 31 and March 31 of this year in Oxfordshire.

According to GB News, Bridge was the founder of the Operation Raise the Colours campaign, which began last year in opposition to the government policy of taking alleged asylum seekers and placing them in hotels across the country at taxpayer expense.

The police force said that Bridge was charged with seven counts of using threatening words or behaviour to cause harassment, alarm or distress and three counts of using threatening, abusive or insulting words or behaviour with intent to cause fear of, or provoke, unlawful violence.

He was also charged with two counts of racially aggravated intentional harassment, alarm or distress, one count of racially aggravated fear of violence, and one count of common assault.

Thames Valley Police said that they had decided to submit the case to the Crown Prosecution Service following a review of the evidence, witness statements, and video footage.

It comes as the left-wing-run Birmingham city council that they plan on spending around £2.6 million to remove British and English flags from the streets of the UK’s second city.

According to the Daily Telegraph, around 20,000 flags were raised by members of the public on street infrastructure as a part of the Raise the Colours campaign.

The decision to spend millions removing the national flags comes despite the Birmingham currently being in around £3.5 billion in debt, the most of any local government in Britain.

Meanwhile, in Oxfordshire — where the campaign begun — secured an injunction in July to bar anyone from attaching flags to lampposts or to pain the flag on the road.

Those who breach the injunction against raising the flag face potential prison sentences, fines, or even having assets seized, the BBC reported.

The Liberal Democrat leader of the Oxfordshire City Council, Tim Bearder, said at the time: “This is a welcome judgement. We’re very pleased with the result… This sets a legal precedent and will hopefully deter people in not just Oxfordshire but around the country from partaking in this criminal activity.”

Keep reading

Portland Women’s Sports Bar Boots Patrons over ‘Pro-Women’ Shirts

A group of patrons was ejected from The Sports Bra, a Portland bar that shows only women’s sports, on Sunday for wearing XX-XY Athletics apparel, according to video the group posted online.

Five patrons were removed from the Northeast Portland establishment after a server said other customers had complained about the shirts, according to footage that passed 6 million views on X. Amy Sousa, one of the women in the group, posted the clip.

A server told the group to leave, citing complaints from other customers.

“There are people that are in here that are uncomfortable with those shirts, and so I’m asking y’all to leave,” the server said in the video. “If I have to call authorities to get y’all removed, I will, but I don’t want to do that.”

One patron pushed back. “There is nothing wrong with these shirts! What is wrong with these shirts?” the patron said. The server replied that she had already fielded complaints.

The bar defended the ejection in an Instagram post Monday. It said the group entered wearing “apparel with messages advocating for the exclusion of trans women from sports” and was given the choice to cover the messaging or leave. “To be clear: trans girls are girls, and trans women are women,” the bar said.

XX-XY Athletics is a sportswear brand founded by former gymnast Jennifer Sey that says sports should be separated on the basis of biological sex. The name references the chromosomes of women and men.

Hours earlier, the same group was removed from the Portland Thorns’ NWSL match against the Washington Spirit at Providence Park. A Thorns spokesperson told OutKick the fans were removed for “distributing unapproved materials,” a claim Sousa disputes.

“We did not distribute any materials,” Sousa said. “They are lying about us.”

The confrontation follows a similar incident last month, when the WNBA and the Atlanta Dream admitted security was wrong to make a mother and daughter cover XX-XY shirts worn in support of Indiana Fever guard Sophie Cunningham, whose ESPN comments opposing “biological men” in women’s sports touched off the debate.

The video drew a split reaction online.

Keep reading

Enes Kanter Freedom Files Federal Lawsuit Against Chicago Sky and City of Chicago After Ejection Over “Woman” T-Shirt — Demands Jury Trial

Former NBA star and human-rights activist Enes Kanter Freedom has filed a federal lawsuit after he was ejected from a Chicago Sky game for daring to wear a shirt stating a basic biological fact.

The 15-page complaint was filed Wednesday in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois.

Freedom named Chicago Women’s Basketball Operations, LLC, the company operating the Chicago Sky, the Metropolitan Pier and Exposition Authority, and the City of Chicago as defendants.

The lawsuit seeks injunctive relief and damages and demands a jury trial.

Freedom announced the legal action on X:

“Just filed a federal complaint.

“I’m taking legal action over my ejection from the @chicagosky game while peacefully exercising my First Amendment rights.

“My T-shirt did what the whole @WNBA apparently couldn’t: define a woman.

“No threats. No violence. Just biology. And somehow, that required a security escort.

“You don’t have to agree with my speech, but you don’t get to silence me for it.

“I will not be intimidated. I will not be silenced. I will continue to stand for women and defend free speech.”

Keep reading

Britain’s Biggest Council Pushes Two-Year Jail Term For Flying National Flags

Britain’s largest local authority has gone to the High Court to stop people hanging the Union Flag and the St George’s Cross from lampposts, with campaigners warning that a breach could mean up to two years behind bars.

Birmingham City Council filed the application this week as the latest move in a year-long war on “unauthorised attachments.” The attachments in question are the flags of the country. The penalties being threatened include prison, unlimited fines, and seized assets.

Protesters who fly the Union Jack from lampposts could criminal proceedings if the injunction is granted.

Former Metropolitan Police detective Peter Bleksley called it what it is. “It’s absolutely scandalous!”

The Free Speech Union described the move as “truly mental.”

Keep reading

BURQA LAW: Portugal Begins To Enforce Ban on Face Coverings in Public Spaces

Those who breach the law face fines ranging from $175 to $3,500.

In Portugal, President António José Seguro has enacted a law that bans face coverings in public spaces.

The legislation is seen as targeting Muslim women who wear burqas and niqabs.

There are exemptions for health, professional, artistic, or weather-related reasons.

Face coverings are also permitted in places of worship, diplomatic missions, and on aircraft.

Keep reading

Japan Approves Legislation That Criminalizes Desecrating the National Flag

Respect the flag – or else…

Right-wing Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi keeps charting her conservative course, implementing her agenda unconcerned with the inevitable whining from the liberal media and the leftist opposition.

Yesterday (17), it was reported that the Japanese Upper House of Parliament passed legislation ‘criminalizing the desecration of Japan’s national flag’.

The legislation counted on the support of parts of the opposition, despite ‘concerns’ that the measure would ‘infringe on freedom of expression’.

The approved law will punish anyone who ‘publicly damages, removes or defaces the flag’ in a way causes ‘extreme discomfort or disgust to others’.

Keep reading