ER Editor: Writer and journalist Alain Soral (real name Alain Bonnet), as French people well know, used to live in France where he achieved notoriety for making some pretty bold claims, which some readily took to be ‘anti-semitic’. We will leave the reader to read between the lines. Soral is very forthright, analytical and intelligent. And no doubt rude.
And he’s gay, a fact not mentioned in reports of his alleged homophobia.
Elon Musk has waded in on his behalf. From Le Media en 4-4-2, this:
This sentence triggered a wave of reactions and incomprehension. Alain Soral received notable support, that of Elon Musk. The billionaire, head of Tesla and X (formerly Twitter), expressed his point of view by commenting on an article posted by Richard Hanania.
“What he wrote was certainly crude, but to make it a criminal offense…?”
Switzerland sentences a journalist to 60 days in jail for calling a journalist a “fat lesbian.”
NBC News trumpets it as a great victory for civil rights.
Don’t forget who these people are, and what they would do to you if they had the power. pic.twitter.com/IQUh5oa405
— Richard Hanania (@RichardHanania) October 4, 2023
Indeed, Elon Musk is not the only one to be stunned by this affair which raises questions about freedom of expression and the proportionality of penalties. Some Internet users denounced a “double standard,” comparing this case to that of personalities like Pierre Palmade (ER: French actor, who uses hard drugs in sexual encounters), who caused a car accident (causing a miscarriage in a female passenger) while under the influence of drugs without spending a single day in prison. And what about the magistrate in Dijon, Olivier Bailly , who had offered his 13-year-old daughter, on the internet, for sexual relations. The court sentenced him to a suspended sentence and allowed him to retain custody of his daughter.
It is important to note that the insult in question can be condemned. However, the severity of the sentence raises questions. Is it an appropriate punishment, or is it a political sentence designed to bring down a man?
See this from Swissinfo.ch — Far-right essayist jailed in Switzerland for homophobic remarks
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Swiss Writer Sentenced To 60 Days In Jail For Calling Journalist A “Fat Lesbian”
Submitted by BlueApples
With Switzerland being the home of the technocratic vanguard tasked with ushering in new world order totalitarianism in the World Economic Forum, the recent sentencing of a Swiss-French writer for what could best be described as a thought crime should come as no surprise.
Writer and social commentator Alain Soral was handed a 60-day jail sentence for chastising a critic of his after he took aim at their body image and sexual orientation. Soral lashed out at the journalist by calling them a “fat lesbian” among berating them with more vitriolic criticism. A Swiss court in Lausanne determined that Soral’s scornful remarks constituted criminal acts of defamation, discrimination and incitement of hatred. The sentenced ultimately handed down to Soral was a cruel irony, even more surreal than any satirical polemic social commentary he could have written.
Translation: Alain Soral sentenced for calling a journalist a “fat lesbian
Il avait traité une journaliste de «grosse lesbienne», Alain Soral a été condamné ➡️ https://t.co/gZxqPujpLQ pic.twitter.com/tiOctGe2GL
— Le Parisien (@le_Parisien) October 2, 2023
Soral’s remarks occurred two years ago when he took aim at Catherine Macherel, a journalist who prided herself in using her platform to advance her advocacy for LGBT causes. The polemicist turned to Facebook to air his grievances in a video in which he described Macherel as “unhinged” for her activism. His remarks resulted in his arrest, conviction, and sentencing to 3 months in prison in April 2021. Soral’s sentence was one of the first to follow sweeping Swiss legislation in 2020 which criminalized homophobic statements by broadening the scope of existing laws against discrimination to extend its protections to people on the basis of their sexual orientation. However, Soral was initially able to escape the prison time handed down to him following a successful appeal in December 2022, instead only receiving a fine as punishment.
While Soral was initially able to evade a conviction, prosecutors were relentless in their pursuit by instigating a further appeal which would ultimately lead to the maximum sentence the court could hand down. That six month prison sentence exceeded the original three month prison term he faced. The decision to penalize Soral under the full force of the law was applauded by LGBT groups across Switzerland as a testament to the success of the country’s criminalization of free speech. “This court decision is an important moment for justice and rights of LGBTQI people in Switzerland,” said Murial Waeger, co-director of the lesbian activist group LOS. Waeger would go on to opine that “The conviction of Alain Soral is a strong signal that homophobic hatred cannot be tolerated in our society.”
While Soral’s conviction serves as a blueprint for the weaponization of the Swiss justice system again critics of LGBT groups, the writer is somewhat of an easy target considering his controversial past and already checkered criminal record. Before moving to Switzerland, Soral was sentenced to one year in jail 2019 in his native France for an illustration he made in 2016, Soral was charged for a cartoon he published in the notoriously satirical newspaper Charlie Hebdo. His contribution to the polemic publication was featured on a page titled “Chutzpah Hebdo” which bore an illustration of Charlie Chaplin in front of the Star of David asking “Shoah, where are you?” in a play on words the court ruled was a criminal act of Holocaust denial. Although Soral was sentenced to a year in prison, he failed to show up to court for the sentencing, instead announcing his plans to appeal the conviction before seeking refuge in Switzerland.
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Ultimately, the controversies which led to Soral fleeing France would follow him to Switzerland. Amidst expanding legislation across the whole of Europe leading to thousands of arrests for remarks made on the internet deemed to be hate speech, it appears that there is nowhere on the continent that Soral or any dissident challenging the narratives approved by the ruling elite can find safe haven in any longer.
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Source
Featured image, Alain Soral: Keystone / Laurent Gillieron
Featured image, Elon Musk: 20min.ch
Published to The Liberty Beacon from EuropeReloaded.com
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