From one of my favorite readers--sometimes known as "a retired cop friend of mine" (although it bears noting he also served as a police detective)--on his assessing an EU proposal to make terrorism, armed robbery, rape, and racism (including "Islamophobia") and xenophobia crimes throughout the EU, which, by the way, has been expanded to include North Africa and the Middle East.
He writes:
From Merriam-Webster's Online Dictionary:
Main Entry:
xe·no·pho·bia
Pronunciation:
\ˌze-nə-ˈfō-bē-ə, ˌzē-\
Function:
noun
Etymology:
New Latin
Date:
1903
: fear and hatred of strangers or foreigners or of anything that is strange or foreign
From your BLOG:
"...A proposed European Arrest Warrant lists a number of crimes, including terrorism, armed robbery, rape, and racism and xenophobia, which are punishable throughout the EU. The European Arrest Warrant requires that anyone who is charged by a member state under the listed group of offenses (which could cover just about anything) may be arrested by the authorities of the issuing state within any other member state. The accused must then be transited for trial to the issuing state within ten days, without any interference, judicial or otherwise, by the executing state..."
Dear Diana,
Let me see if I understand this one (I'm quite sure that I do):
The E.U. intends to create what police detectives call a "boiler-plate" arrest warrant, in which thoughts and emotions ("unreasonable" contempt, hatred, anger and fear) will become crimes as serious as terrorism and rape, punishable within the member-state that issues the warrant - according to the member-state's current law.
Yup.
George Orwell must be chain-smoking somewhere right now - and drinking scotch whiskey by the litre. Would that I were there with him, cigar and glass in my own hands.
I have this feeling the Great O would be speechless, too.