The European Commission is attempting to restrict the fundamental freedoms of European citizens in order to combat dissent, to introduce controls on freedom of speech and conscience that may prevent any protest against such lawlessness. It does so under the pretext of fighting hate speech and hate crimes, by introducing a new common crime area – hate speech and hate crimes based on artificial and arbitrary criteria such as “gender identity”.
The new ideologized document is based on the Istanbul Convention, under the pretext of combating violence it introduces into the legal system of signatory states the concept of gender, according to which femininity and masculinity are arbitrary issues. According to the Convention, gender should ultimately be considered a fluid category, depending on a person’s subjective feelings.
The Istanbul Convention is an ideologized document that contradicts many of the fundamental laws of the member states. Its provisions also violate Article 48 of the Polish Constitution, which guarantees parents “the right to raise their children in accordance with their own beliefs.” Countries such as Hungary, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Lithuania and Latvia have not signed the document. The Bulgarian Constitutional Court has formally declared the Convention unconstitutional, while the Polish Court is in the process of examining its compliance with the Fundamental Law.
The framing of “gender” as a social construct leads to the relativization of biological sex. If society loses the ability to distinguish between women and men, combating violence against women becomes an unenforceable obligation
– reads the Bulgarian CT ruling.
The European Union directive, which implements the Istanbul Convention, was introduced through the ordinary legislative procedure. This means that member states are deprived of the right of veto. This is an attempt to introduce the Convention in EU countries bypassing the democratic path.
We do not agree with it!
The European Commission has approved a proposed directive that operates with vague terms that allow for any interpretation. The draft document itself reads that its purpose is to combat the alleged problem of “incitement to violence and hatred on the Internet on the basis of certificate or socio-cultural gender, in particular misogynistic incitement to hatred or violence, this Directive establishes minimum standards relating to the definition of the crime of this type of cyberviolence and the penalties for it.” The European Union is attempting, according to gender ideology, to artificially introduce a division between “certified” and “socio-cultural” gender. One must recall that sex is an entity sharp and clear enough, the attempt to introduce ideological terms into the legal order will only harm the citizens of the member countries and the standards of freedom of speech and conscience.
Let’s not allow censorship!
The European Union is trying to impose on its members the introduction of a new common crime area, which will be a de facto assault on civil liberties guaranteed not only by their Constitutions, but also by the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights and the Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms. Eurocrats want to force member states to introduce a system of penalties for “hate speech” and “hate crimes.”
What freedoms are at stake?
Freedom of speech
Freedom of assembly
Freedom of religion
Freedom of conscience
They want to take away our freedom and ban us from protesting.
We do not agree with this!
The concept of “hate speech” is alien to the legal order of many EU member states. As the examples of Western countries show, it is a concept-clever used to gag the mouths of people who do not share the left-liberal vision of Europe. This results in their elimination from public debate.
Today, freedom of speech is being taken away under the guise of fighting “hate speech” in the following cases. And tomorrow?
In 2004, Swedish pastor Ake Green was sentenced by a court to a month in prison for delivering a sermon in which he criticized sexual immorality in accordance with the tenets of his church. The conviction was overturned on appeal.
The trial of Finland’s former Interior Minister Päivi Maria Räsänen, who was accused of “hate speech” allegedly committed by quoting a passage of Scripture regarding the approach of Christian teaching to homosexual practices, began in January 2022.
Rev. Prof. Dariusz Oko, who published a text in the German scientific journal Theologisches on the problem of pedophilia in the Catholic Church, was also charged with inciting hatred in 2021. In it, the Polish clergyman called the homosexual lobby involved in covering up pedophilia a “parasite” on the Church, which a German court deemed “hate speech.” He was initially sentenced to a €4,800.00 fine for his criticism of pedophilia, but in the end the court did not find the scientist guilty.
Michael Hess, a politician for the Swedish Democratic Party, was fined by the court for “hate speech.” The case took place in 2014, following the publication of his newspaper commentary on women who were raped in Cairo’s Tahrir Square. Hess wrote that “the link between rapes in Sweden and the number of migrants from Middle Eastern and North African countries is widely apparent.” In May 2015, the Court of Appeals overturned the conviction.
Stand with us in defense of freedom of conscience, speech and freedom of expression before they are taken away from us by a new totalitarianism. Sign the petition to the Council of the European Union!
In order to protect the values fundamental to a democratic society, such as freedom of speech, freedom of assembly and freedom of conscience, we are addressing a petition to the Council of the European Union, and calling for the rejection of an ideological document that can be used to fight political opponents.
Dear members of the Council,
as supporters of freedom and the free exchange of ideas, we are concerned about the draft directive with the perverse title: “on combating violence against women and domestic violence.” This document is an attempt to implement the assumptions of the ideologized Istanbul Convention, which has not gained democratic support from a number of European countries. The attempt to implement its provisions at the EU level is an assault on European democracy.
The directive aims to introduce a new common crime area into the legal order of member states, which are to be the crimes of “hate speech and hate crimes.”
The content of the document, moreover, indicates another hidden purpose of this regulation. The implementation of the initiative proposed by the European Commission would result in a real threat to such values as freedom of speech, freedom of assembly, freedom of conscience and religious freedom, guaranteed by the Constitutions of the member states and, in addition, by the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights and the Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms, which are the main pillars of the protection of fundamental rights in the European Union.
This contradicts the principle of subsidiarity, as the Community’s member states already have adequate legal regulations to combat the promotion of hatred.
The experience of countries that have adopted legislation to “combat hate speech,” demonstrates this to be a serious threat to freedom of expression throughout the European Union, as evidenced by the numerous abuses in the common courts of many countries such as Sweden and Germany.
The document itself states that an important reference point for its creation was the Istanbul Convention, which is a controversial document. A convention that did not meet with the approval of a number of member states should not be pushed through the back door by European institutions. This is how Europeans should read the approval of this ideologized document in the ordinary legislative procedure that prevents sovereign member states from using their right to veto.
We do not agree with the attempt to implement the ideologized directive into EU law. We also do not agree with any restriction of freedom of expression and the construction of a politicized legal system aimed at eliminating views that differ from the left-liberal mainstream.
We demand that the proposed directive be rejected.
Citizens of the European Union
