New Zealand First

It has been reported that police have recently visited Renee-Rose Schwenke about a so-called 'offensive' social media post she posted. Not threatening, not inciting violence, just that it allegedly offended someone. If this report is true, this is '1984 thought-police' level overreach. It should seriously frighten every New Zealander who believes in freedom of speech. This is not about whether this particular post was offensive or not. There will always be personal responsibility and consequences for people voicing their opinions that are viewed by some as tasteless or gormless or offensive - but those consequences should not be by way of a police visit. No one has the right to not be offended, nor do they have the right to be protected from having hurt feelings. In fact it is precisely the right to be able to offend which is the foundation of freedom of speech in our country. This has happened overseas with more regularity where social media posts, opinions, views, expressions, and even jokes are now deemed offensive by some authoritarian power and have been met with threats from police, arrests, or even convictions in court. We never thought we would see this happen here and it has a chilling effect on where we are going as a country. As Oliver Wendall Homles Jr said, freedom of speech also comes with responsibility of speech - you cannot falsely yell 'fire' in a crowded theatre without there rightly being a consequence. We already have laws around 'responsibility of speech' ranging from defamation to incitement of violence, and that is important - but people's freedom to have their own free opinion is something which should be aggressively defended. We don't all have to agree with each other's opinions, but we should all fight for each other's right to have them. This is the essential foundation of our free democracy. If we start to accept this kind of overreach by police to curtail individual freedom of speech, our democracy will fall into the type of totalitarian oblivion that will destroy our country.