Monday, January 14, 2008

Muzzled (Again) in Finland

Update: Tundra Tabloids has now posted about the Tomashot story.

Tomashot is a Finnish blogger who has just been convicted of “incitement against a national group” (in Sweden it would be hets mot folkgrupp). I can’t link to his blog, since he was required as a part of his sentence to take it down.

The case seems to resemble that mounted against Mikko Ellilä last year, only in Tomashot’s case the government pushed it all the way through a trial.

Our Finnish correspondent Sludge reported the verdict in our comments this morning. I managed to find an online report in Finnish, and KGS of Tundra Tabloids translated it.

Tomashot is quoted by Turkkilaista Tuumintaa as saying:

Tuusula circuit court found me guilty today of incitement against a national group. My sentence was a fine of €850 and all of my web pages were ordered to be closed down. Even though I insisted that my pages which were part of the factually based “News From Finland”, which publishes news concerning the crimes committed by immigrants and should be spared, they were also ordered to be closed down as well.
- - - - - - - - -
The verdict was exceptionally harsh financially, nor do individuals with families have the money to spare for such a thing. According to the directive, I am to keep my web pages permanently closed. During the trial, I was left with the feeling that everything had already been judged beforehand. I believe that I explained my case and my position in a reasonable and acceptable manner, for which I was slapped with a verdict based on such a weak charge, just because I dared to have a different opinion by bringing the stark realism of multiculturalism for all to see.


KGS says he will have more on this later, so keep an eye on Tundra Tabloids.

The list of suppressed bloggers will soon become too long to post. The trend is accelerating.

I know that Belgium, Britain, Canada, Israel, Sweden, and Finland are countries that have been affected. Which one will be next?


Eyes said...

Off topic, there's an Ezra Levant HRC petition over here:

Kafir_Kelbeh said...

We seem to be surrounded...

Although I know you want us to "play nice" in the comments, if you are to be "muzzled" for your, as well as our, comments...

How is that Free Speech?

That's Bull, and Y'all Know It.

If it ever gets to that stage here, I'll testify on behalf of any comment I've made here (promise).

That's what the "Disclaimer" is for...I know to what I'm agreeing.

Daath said...

Actually, Ellilä is going to trial as well... Tomashot's case is, of course, even more disgusting, as the man wasn't apparently even punished for what he wrote, but providing a page to which people could post their (often racist and low-brow) writings, and building a rather inconvenient collection of newsitems documenting the increasingly ugly warts on the face of brave new multicultural Finland.

The legal ground is pretty interesting. According to State Prosecutor Mika Illman's interpretation of this incitement law, "slander" includes "basically truthful statements with intent to slander". I haven't yet had opportunity to study the Tomashot case papers, but it seems that the burden of proof was shifted on the accused in this case. Understandable; proving an intent to slander is just as impossible for prosecutor as proving the lack of it to accused.

On other news, new Minority Ombudsman has been seeking authority to hit people with administrative sentences for incitement to hatred, bypassing the courts altogether. Stay tuned for more news from the Absurdistan of North.

Michiel said...

Perhaps we should come up with a bloggers fund to assist with legal charges and fines in such obvious political inspired legal matters. Not sure how to go about it though. It seems to me this is in the interest of the various blogger hosts as well. They are sometimes charged for what is posted on blogs.

CarnackiUK said...

Meanwhile, Susanne Winter, a candidate for the FPO Party (in the Austrian town of Graz) is being threatened with prosecution for claiming that Mohammed married a 6-yr-old and suffered from epileptic fits:
Spiegel Online
A spokesman for an Austrian muslim association said that the claims had 'no basis in fact'.

So will she be able to read out extracts from the Koran in court?

Jesus Christ Supercop said...

The police in Finland recently started to censor the Internet by giving ISPs a blacklist of sites that allegedly contain child porn and other illegal things. It's voluntary for the ISPs, which apparently means there's zero legal oversight and the police can put anything they want on the list. I have been blocked four or five times while trying to access completely legal websites, and others have had similiar experiences.

I'm sure they'll start restricting access to "hate speech" sites soon.

Vlad Z. said...

I'm sorry for the lack of freedom in Finland, Austria, England, other European nations, as well as Canada.

Sadly these are a logical extension of the socialist systems of these countries. It's a small step from over-arching control of commerce to over-arching control of opinion.

Once you have accepted the idea that the state knows best, and should be 'in charge' of everything from child care to death it's hard to exclude speech.

At least in America we have both a culture of disrespect towards authority, outrageous news organizations from the original Mercury of H.L. Menken to Matt Drudge to the National Enquirerer, and the First Ammendment to the Constitution.

This hasn't stopped the leftists from trying to follow the excellent example of our their sisters in Ottawa, but it's prevented them from succeeding to date.

There is much to fix everywhere in the west, but nations in Europe may not have a chance. If communication is controlled, regulated and people can be fined into poverty for merely exposing the truth then how will things be fixed?

Perhaps a real "Bill of Rights" (not the 200 pages of crap in the Lisbon treaty) would be a good place to start.

In America where the right and left disagree on almost everything there is still a deep respect for freedom of speech on both sides, though some on the left have moved to acceptance or championing the Euro model of government controlled opinions.

I wish the Europeans well in their struggle to achieve basic civil rights in their homelands, and to wrest control of the government, press and future from the gang of Socialist / Progressive thugs who have siezed control over there.

bernie said...

Since speaking the truth about Muslims will earn you punishment in Europe then I suppose telling lies about Jews should garner you a reward? Oh, sorry they've already done that with the Nobel Prize for Arafat and Jimmy Carter.

sutsum said...

Why don't they start sending there posts to a third party secretly under an alias and have it published on a blog in the USA.

Call it 'Illegal Blogs from Europe' or something.

It could be organised by country and alias.

Dymphna said...

Your URL went over the margins of the blog. When that happens and someone happens to open an individual post, it looks like it's not there because the long URL has caused it to slide waaaay down the page.

Please see the template at the end of each post. It shows you how to put your URL in so people can just click on it.

In this case, it would be,

A copy of the Tomashot website can be found here:

Tomashot website

And if you're not certain you did it right, just hit preview first to click on your link.


Oh, another thing -- given the spotty performance of blooger, it's always a good idea to hit Control C before you publish. Just in case blooger eats your comment.

Dymphna said...


Great minds think alike. I've been pondering the same thing myself. I mean we already have lots of guest posts, so it could be done conceivably. At least as long as no one was using google mail to send their contraband.

IOW, there are email issues to address. I know nothing about encryption.

sutsum said...


In a few ways this could be used powerfully to our advantage.

1. People in Europe will realise that these blogs are illegal. If this doesn't get them looking sideways at their governments, I don't know what will.

2. It will have a much more alluring quality, in that it will be 'illegal', 'underground', etc. This quality is simply a gift and could not be bought with even the most expensive marketing campaign.

3. Lastly, they can still blog.

I am no tech guru, but there must be a way to thwart this government oppression. Ie. they could write the article, save it to a disk and download it on another computer to be sent to a friend in another country. Who then sends it to the blog.

Censorship is ultimately self defeating. Why not use this to our maximum advantage.