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Comment by aguaviva

So you're wildly exaggerating, then.

Both by equating the number "imprisoned" (which suggests an actual conviction and jail term) with the number simply "arrested". The distinction is important, because when I did check a source, it suggested that the vast majority of convictions under existing statutes resulted in fines rather than jail sentences.

And then by conflating the UK's legislation (which, whatever you make of it, is essential non-political, and covers forms of communication that most people would agree are basically "harmful" even though they would be opposed to a ban on them) with the restrictions in Russia, which are of course highly political (as indicated by the article you linked to), and not related to protecting anyone from harm in any meaningful sense.

That is: the UK's idea of harmful speech is that which promotes "terror, hate, fraud, child sexual abuse and assisting or encouraging suicide". Whereas in Russia, per one of your articles, it's stuff like this:

    Anastasia Bubeyeva shows a screenshot on her computer of a picture of a toothpaste tube with the words: “Squeeze Russia out of yourself!” For sharing this picture on a social media site with his 12 friends, her husband was sentenced this month to more than two years in prison.
Do you not see a major, categorical distinction here?
parent aguaviva 1 year ago

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