No need to speculate that the UK government "might" one day become the bad guys: they already arrest over 30 people a day for speech that offends the prevailing political orthodoxy.
Everyone should read the case of the IT consultant getting arrested in the UK because he posted a photo of him doing some target shooting during a trip to the US: <a href="https://www.lbc.co.uk/article/consultant-arrested-linkedin-shotgun-florida-5HjdNhP_2/" rel="nofollow">https://www.lbc.co.uk/article/consultant-arrested-linkedin-s...
Stories like this quickly put to rest the idea that everyone who gets arrested must actually deserve it. The bar for posting content that violates the law is very low.
There was also the tragic story of the Cambridge professor who was completely unqualified and had a fake life story. When journalists would get close to the story he would report them to the police for harassment to spike the stories.
I don't know about that case, but the bar is as low as it can be anyways. Hapless UK police are willing to play attack dog for nearly anyone.
Someone got arrested and intimidated by police because they criticized someone with even only a modicom of authority: <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2025/mar/29/parents-arrested-by-hertfordshire-police-for-complaining-about-daughters-school" rel="nofollow">https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2025/mar/29/parents-arre...
Imagine getting six police officers sent to your house and spending 11 hours at a police station for causing "disharmony" by disagreeing with how your daughter's school operates in a WhatsApp group. In a sensible country that might've been a phone call or a single officer stopping to chat and defusing the situation if police decided to get involved at all.
* The Police admitted their obvious error and paid £20k in damages: <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c4gz1qy30v5o" rel="nofollow">https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c4gz1qy30v5o
* This bizarre case has nothing to do with "speech that offends the prevailing political orthodoxy" (root comment).
If you look for examples of the police arresting people for stupid and unjustifiable reasons, you can find them in lots of countries, including the US. For example, here is someone being arrested in Kansas for clapping too loudly during a meeting: <a href="https://www.kbtx.com/2026/07/27/teacher-arrested-repeatedly-clapping-favor-data-center-opponents-during-city-commission-meeting/" rel="nofollow">https://www.kbtx.com/2026/07/27/teacher-arrested-repeatedly-... It's absolutely right that this sort of thing is reported and it's right for people to be outraged about it. However, I'd be cautious about drawing overly sweeping conclusions about the UK from such cases.
Yeah, but in the UK it's systemic and on a national scale.It would be less obnoxious if they were really good at fighting regular crime, but they are atrocious at that.
So yes, we might not be so dreadful compared to Hicksville, US or some craphole country like India,but that's a very low bar for the police of a G5 nation.
Absolutely go ahead and make sweeping generalisations about the state of the police in the UK. It's all true (except if anyone claims they are systemically racist, or some other clickbaity nonsense).
What exactly are you saying is systemic and on a national scale? I certainly don't think the specific news story we're talking about is typical. That's why it was widely reported and why the Police had to admit their error.
Basically every week there's another story that makes it onto the news about yet another outrageous apprehension. 60,000 arrests or so over the last couple of years IIRC. What's disgraceful is that for years the police whined that they didn't have enough resources because of Tory budget cuts, something which I can personally attest, and then you get this...
Looks like 1200 people in the last year. 1200 / 350e6 = 3.4 micromorts.
By comparison, getting out of bed at age 45 is about 6 micromorts.
The UK have about 13,000 arrests per year over social media etc. Without litigating all 13,000 of them for validity, that's about 185 microliberties.
Birth control is about 1-5 micromorts.
So you're 30x more likely to be arrested for a social media post than death by getting out of bed, and 55x more than being killed by police. And it's in the same range as taking birth control.
Realistically, these are population estimates. Your actual risk of dying by police is highly correlated with the number of violent interactions you have with them. If you're a getaway driver or a bank robber vs SW developer, you probably have significantly different risk profiles.
On the other hand, edgy social media posts are potentially much more diffuse across populations.
>The UK have about 13,000 arrests per year over social media etc.
That's the figure (slightly inflated) for arrests under both the Malicious Communications Act 1988 and Communications Act 2003. That's not reasonably described as arrests for 'social media' etc. It's quite likely the the majority of those arrests have nothing to do with content that people post on social media.
failbuffer · · focus · HN ↗
[1] <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/steveforbes/2025/09/09/people-are-being-thrown-in-uk-prisons-over-what-theyve-said-online-can-free-speech-be-saved/" rel="nofollow">https://www.forbes.com/sites/steveforbes/2025/09/09/people-a...
Aurornis · · focus · HN ↗
Stories like this quickly put to rest the idea that everyone who gets arrested must actually deserve it. The bar for posting content that violates the law is very low.
There was also the tragic story of the Cambridge professor who was completely unqualified and had a fake life story. When journalists would get close to the story he would report them to the police for harassment to spike the stories.
chmod775 · · focus · HN ↗
Someone got arrested and intimidated by police because they criticized someone with even only a modicom of authority: <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2025/mar/29/parents-arrested-by-hertfordshire-police-for-complaining-about-daughters-school" rel="nofollow">https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2025/mar/29/parents-arre...
Imagine getting six police officers sent to your house and spending 11 hours at a police station for causing "disharmony" by disagreeing with how your daughter's school operates in a WhatsApp group. In a sensible country that might've been a phone call or a single officer stopping to chat and defusing the situation if police decided to get involved at all.
foldr · · focus · HN ↗
* The Police admitted their obvious error and paid £20k in damages: <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c4gz1qy30v5o" rel="nofollow">https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c4gz1qy30v5o
* This bizarre case has nothing to do with "speech that offends the prevailing political orthodoxy" (root comment).
If you look for examples of the police arresting people for stupid and unjustifiable reasons, you can find them in lots of countries, including the US. For example, here is someone being arrested in Kansas for clapping too loudly during a meeting: <a href="https://www.kbtx.com/2026/07/27/teacher-arrested-repeatedly-clapping-favor-data-center-opponents-during-city-commission-meeting/" rel="nofollow">https://www.kbtx.com/2026/07/27/teacher-arrested-repeatedly-... It's absolutely right that this sort of thing is reported and it's right for people to be outraged about it. However, I'd be cautious about drawing overly sweeping conclusions about the UK from such cases.
FridayoLeary · · focus · HN ↗
So yes, we might not be so dreadful compared to Hicksville, US or some craphole country like India,but that's a very low bar for the police of a G5 nation.
Absolutely go ahead and make sweeping generalisations about the state of the police in the UK. It's all true (except if anyone claims they are systemically racist, or some other clickbaity nonsense).
foldr · · focus · HN ↗
FridayoLeary · · focus · HN ↗
Jtarii · · focus · HN ↗
hex4def6 · · focus · HN ↗
In the UK, they can't force you to speak, but not answering questions can be interpreted as evasion / "adverse interference".
They do not need a warrant to search your phone. Not providing them with a PIN can be a separate charge, with up to 2 years imprisonment.
They can hold you up to 36 hrs if the police decide so. Up to 14 days without charge under modern broad "anti terrorism" laws.
Jtarii · · focus · HN ↗
Also note the absence of large scale destructive anti-police riots in the UK over the past decade.
hex4def6 · · focus · HN ↗
The UK have about 13,000 arrests per year over social media etc. Without litigating all 13,000 of them for validity, that's about 185 microliberties.
Birth control is about 1-5 micromorts.
So you're 30x more likely to be arrested for a social media post than death by getting out of bed, and 55x more than being killed by police. And it's in the same range as taking birth control.
Realistically, these are population estimates. Your actual risk of dying by police is highly correlated with the number of violent interactions you have with them. If you're a getaway driver or a bank robber vs SW developer, you probably have significantly different risk profiles.
On the other hand, edgy social media posts are potentially much more diffuse across populations.
foldr · · focus · HN ↗
That's the figure (slightly inflated) for arrests under both the Malicious Communications Act 1988 and Communications Act 2003. That's not reasonably described as arrests for 'social media' etc. It's quite likely the the majority of those arrests have nothing to do with content that people post on social media.