Egyptian Charged For Threatening Facebook Post

An anonymous reader writes "The Egyptian Military Prosecution has charged 26-year-old activist and blogger Asmaa Mahfouz for allegedly defaming the country's ruling generals and calling for armed operations against the military and the judiciary. Mahfouz, a prominent activist, was accused of using Facebook to call for the assassinations of Supreme Council of Armed Forces (SCAF) members and certain judges."

Newsflash: Freedom of Speech has limits.

[intellitech]

Freedom of Speech typically does not permit incitement to violence.

Furthermore, inciting harm to powerful leaders, regardless of motivation or full intent, is probably not wise (and especially so in an unstable nation). And, if you follow through and do so, you best make yourself hard to find, and go completely off grid. Otherwise, you'll likely be caught, and you'll find yourself in a very uncomfortable situation, to say the least.

Freedom of Speech does not protect all speech. It only permits speech that can hurt people’s feelings, but it does not permit speech that can cause objective harm to people’s bodies, possessions or liberty.

Source (for more in-depth reading on the subject): http://www.themoralliberal.com/2011/02/18/on-freedom-of-speech-and-incitement-to-violence/ [themoralliberal.com]

Re:The post wasn't a threat

[Derekloffin]

You're right, it was a veiled threat... Sadly I can see that actual verbiage being seen as a threat. Predicting violence is the same kind of thing you hear out of your stereotypical mobster muscling a store owner for protection money. In a place like Egypt, making statements like that on the net is just asking for trouble.

Re:Fascists, or?

[Nick Ives]

Calling for the assassination of unelected generals who are engaged in an opposition purge as part of a revolutionary strategy isn't evil or immoral.

Extremism in the defense of liberty is no vice, and moderation in the pursuit of justice is no virtue!

Re:Newsflash: Freedom of Speech has limits.

[Anonymous Coward]

Sounds a little too vague to me to constitute an illegal threat.

Are you basing that on one particular translation or on a sound understanding of the subtle nuances of Arabic?

Re:Newsflash: Freedom of Speech has limits.

[cheekyjohnson]

Which probably is a good thing.

I don't know about that. Letting them make exceptions as they please (instead of creating an amendment or going through the proper procedures) isn't wise, in my opinion.