One of the most unpleasant aspects of the last Labour government was the illiberalism that saw it create over 4000 new criminal offences. However, it's becoming clear that, in this regard, Labour was merely reflecting a censoriousness culture. Take these examples:
- two men were jailed for four years for (unsuccessfully) using Facebook to try to incite a riot.
- The London Philharmonic Orchestra has suspended some musicians for merely writing a letter
- a man has been imprisoned for trolling.
To these cases we might add the disproportionately hostile reaction to Johann Hari's activities. His sins were small compared to the crimes of, say, serial drunk-driving or being Toby Young, and perhaps indicative of a troubled mind rather than malevolence. And if you don't like his journalism, the solution is not to make a fuss, but to not buy the Independent - a feat which 99.7% of the British people perform each day.
What interests me is: why is there this intolerance? I suspect there are three separate things.
One is technophobia. From Mary Shelley writing about the frightening power of electricity to people sheltering from wi-fi in West Virginia, some people have been scared by the power of new technology. Judges, who have never been comfortable with modernity, merely continue this pattern. In believing Facebook to have occult powers, they treat its misusers far more harshly than they would idiots making comparable remarks in the pub.
Another thing, which applies to the Hari case, is a mix of tribalism and envy. Rightists celebrate the embarrassment of an opponent, whilst Leftists - bizarrely - envy Hari his job. Both lead to a loss of perspective.
There is, though, something else which links all these cases. They corroborate my fear that we have lost the conservative disposition - the recognition that the crooked timber of humanity does bad and silly things and that we should tolerate this. In its stead is the belief that people should conform to an ideal of buttoned-up, restrained respectability. So the LPO expects - contrary to centuries of evidence - musical ability to coexist with sensible political opinions; judges expect that Facebook users will not be hotheads; and the Twitterati convinces itself that columnists should somehow have standards higher than those of mere shills. And when reality hits these silly ideas, the response is an outrage comparable to that of Victorian ladies whose delicate sensibilities have been offended.
And in all this, toleration and liberty are lost.