Lawfare: the use and abuse of law to fight for freedom

‘Something’s wrong, change the law’ epitomises the approach of many to social change. And few can doubt that social change has often walked in step with legal reform. Maya Forstater, Harry Miller and Allison Bailey have all won court cases recently that have clarified the law against illiberal and censorious trends relating to free speech and equalities legislation. But is there a danger that today’s social reformers are focused on Lawfare, the use of law to change society, as a short cut to taking the public with them?

Should the law reflect a popular consensus, or can it be used to ‘improve’ the consensus? Is seeking legal protection against egregious examples of, for instance, workplace cancel culture, a remedy or an evasion? What are the pros and cons of using the law courts as allies of liberty?

Speakers
Maya Forstater - executive director, Sex Matters
Luke Gittos - criminal lawyer; author, Human Rights – Illusory Freedom
Jeremiah Igunnubole - barrister; legal counsel, ADF International; former senior crown prosecutor, Crown Prosecution Service
Sarah Phillimore - barrister; campaigner, Fair Cop; member, Bad Law Project
James Tooley - vice chancellor, University of Buckingham; author, The Beautiful Tree

Chair
Jacob Reynolds - partnerships manager, Academy of Ideas

This debate was filmed and edited by WORLDwrite volunteers at the Battle of Ideas Festival in October 2022. Please subscribe to our YouTube channel and hit the THANKS button to help us film and edit further imp[ortant debates.

[roxee]

Yes, it’s all very well to argue that problems should be addressed first by the demos engaging in debate before resorting to the law, but when the politicians ignore what the demos is saying, when university administrators don’t require academics to engage their critics from both within & without their field in debate, and when the press won’t provide a platform to good faith dissenters of the latest orthodoxy to air their arguments so that the public can judge then what choice is there but the court? Engaging in law-fare to defend rights already in law is only necessary to the degree it’s being used because the house is on fire - that is the political, academic & media institutions we rely on to inform us about issues arising and for debate to resolve them have failed us.

[FirstLast-rbzj]

Bespoke law, almost the privatisation of law and a lack of accessibility for civil law are real problems. One of the origins for this is in contracts. Quite often all kinds of consumer rights, all rights are waived in contracts even though you can't actually do that. Companies go along with it anyway and when that happens there's little recourse available in law. The hate speech limitations are a problem because hate speech ends up being whatever they say it is. I've quite often encountered cases of hate speech and when I object to that I find myself being penalised for hate speech. Terms such as hate speech become meaningless when it can be arbitrarily decided reducing it to a matter of purely who holds power over who and is willing to abuse it to their own ends. Hate speech was not meant to protect groups from criticism or being unpopular which is the form that woman raised. Hate speech was originally intended for quite severe speech, usually grossly and clearly defamatory calling for some extreme unjust action which is probable to come about, typically requiring a platform which carries some authority. On the transgender issue, the application of hate speech has been to compel speech, to order people to lie to spare the feelings of a select group. That is, a kind of inverse defamation. The enforcement of fallacious complement toward a group based on a group evaluation that said group is somehow special and deserves superior treatment over others.

[elijahmalachi-dieker]

Matthew 19:12 Eunuchs that are born that way are transgender. Eunuchs made that way by others were abused. Those that choose to live like Eunuchs for the sake of the Kingdom of heaven are bisexual people that choose partners in the same sex but opposite in gender.

I'm Elijah of Malachi 45-6 and Matthew 17:10 says before the return of Jesus that Elijah must come and restore all things. That means my job is to restore truth to scripture and I have the final say in what the Bible says.

The Great Tribulation started September 1st and anyone saying that same-sex marriage is a sin when it is not will experience more and more torments until they either accept truth or die.

I am the Messenger of Malachi 3 1 and I pave the way for the Lord.