A terrifying story from the UK last week, and the US is involved, though only to an extent, the underlying theme of the case is ringing louder and louder in our own country these days. A bit of background: two racist shmucks in England ran racially intolerant websites promoting their twisted ideology and as such were charged with “inciting racial hatred” by disseminating such information via the Internet. The duo then fled to the United States, landing at Los Angeles International Airport, where they attempted to claim asylum due to political persecution. A U.S. immigration judge denied their claim and since then the two have been jailed for their “crimes” back home in jolly ole’ England. The British judge stated that “Such offences as these have, by their very nature, the potential to cause grave social harm.” And a police official in the arresting locale added: “Inciting racial hatred is a crime and one which seems to occur too regularly. This kind of material will not be tolerated as this lengthy investigation shows.”

Now on the surface I do agree—very strongly—that racist, homophobic, sexist, etc. statements/material are immoral and work against the very fabric of our common humanity; that said, if someone’s personal philosophy holds true to such sentiments one should not be legally persecuted and thus, prosecuted for believing as such. There is an ongoing debate in our own country in regards to Hate Crime legislation. And I, being the ardent purveyor of civil liberties, draw much ire from my, at many times LESS liberal, friends who think that my stance against such legislation is a bit batty.

My thought process is always as such: any crime, be it intimidation, battery, murder, etc. are heinous and should be punishable under a court of law in and of themselves- if hatred is a motivating force, then said crimes should be deemed motivated and the level of their degree and thus punishment be enacted accordingly. However, such philosophies themselves should NOT be prosecuted in a special manner for solely existing in and of themselves. For this is nothing more than prosecuting a belief, a way of thinking, a philosophy. How can a country that holds its first tenant upon which its political house is built as being the freedom of speech and ideas while at the same time asserting some sort of regulation over the way in which its citizens think? I know I’m begging the question, but in this case, how can one not?

This reminds me of the Obama Administration’s plan to hold certain “War on Terror” prisoners indefinitely, and moreover, continue to hold some of those individuals after they had been acquitted of the crimes for which they were accused. On the surface, again, this appears to work out of the public good as does the aforementioned legislation. But what if these powers were abused for political gain or control? What if the personal philosophy that you held was suddenly subject to the government-backed scrutiny and crackdown as we are seeing in Iran? What would stop any administration from deeming those who believe “X” as being threats to national security and thus deciding to neutralize the problem by indefinitely detaining you, outside of traditional and Constitutionally sound methods of trial and imprisonment? Again not for a crime that one HAS committed but rather for a crime that one has yet to commit or furthermore, and more irrationally so, a thought process that is designated by the government as being “dangerous”? Again, is this not at its core the reason that we have all been so enraptured by the tribulations of the Iranian dissenters?

Progressive political pundit, and a beacon of sorts in my book, Rachel Maddow had a fantastic segment on just this. She called out the administration for considering such methods of detention as being fodder closer related to the stuff of science fiction than a realistic approach to Constitutionally sound methods of prosecution. Wasn’t this whole idea of returning to the rule of law one of the reasons that many, myself included, voted Obama into office?

In the clip, Maddow references author Phillip K. Dick’s The Minority Report, which was turned into a film starring Tom Cruise and directed by Steven Spielberg. The narrative follows an officer in the “pre-crime” unit which arrests individuals for offenses they’ve yet to commit. Clearly Mr. Dick was prophetically referencing the danger of such government action. How long before we see the implementation of a “thought police,”- see Orwell’s  1984? You don’t think Cheney would have adored having such methods at his fingertips before the election of 2004? What happens if Obama leaves office and a stringently conservative administration once again holds the reigns, or heaven forbid, my president takes a turn for the totalitarian worse?

The bottom line here is that while, yes, we need to help build a society that rejects extreme, hate-filled belief systems, we cannot do so by forcing those members of society that adhere to such tenants to comply via political persecution and the threat of indefinite imprisonment.

And further, we can’t simply jail folks just based on the idea that those harboring said feelings COULD commit a crime motivated as such. These sort of actions will be the end game to the freedoms that form the foundation of our political culture and idenity as a nation. I don’t hold much in this world to absolutes, or try not to at least, though the one area in which I do is in that of personal liberty. Without stringently protecting our right to think and believe that which we choose, we will assuredly find ourselves soon marching to the orders of tyrants and criminals.