Church and State blog: The freedom of speech: An unprecedented four recorded blocks on access to our Church and State website today as we work on an important article about religion and freedom of speech (WITH UPDATE 14/1/2017)

Tuesday, January 03, 2017

The freedom of speech: An unprecedented four recorded blocks on access to our Church and State website today as we work on an important article about religion and freedom of speech (WITH UPDATE 14/1/2017)

I have been blogging non-access to our Church and State website since 26 July 2016 with all sorts of graphics (the graphic above is on US time). I have just updated the link below with these four additional blocks today (UK time):

91st 3 January 2017, 6.25am
92nd 3 January 2017, 2.04pm
93rd 3 January 2017, 7.18pm
94th 3 January 2017, 8.52pm

UPDATES

95th 4 January 2017, 5.59am
96th 4 January 2017, 9.42am
97th 5 January 2017, 11.38pm
98th 6 January 2017, 2.10am
99th 8 January 2017, 3.29pm
100th 8 January 2017, 7.07pm
101st 8 January 2017, 10.20pm
102nd 9 January 2017, 3.46am
103rd 9 January 2017, 4.05pm
104th 12 January 2017, 1.15pm
105th 12 January 2017, 3.26pm
106th 14 January 2017, 12.47am
107th 14 January 2017, 6.34am
108th 14 January 2017, 9.14pm

13 December 2016: The blocks on access to our Church and State website continue unabated (WITH UPDATE 14/1/2017)

This is the important article by one of our Honorary Associates, Prof. Paul Cliteur, that Declan and I have been working on all day:

The Rudi Carrell Affair and its significance for the tension between theoterrorism and religious satire

Prof. Cliteur is Professor of Jurisprudence, Leiden University (the Netherlands) and author of The Secular Outlook - In Defense of Moral and Political Secularism. His material is simply outstanding; absolutely the best we have come across in years of research. We are extremely proud of our Paul Cliteur category, which we are currently developing. It is a gem. All the articles in the category are written in a straightforward and easy-to-read manner. His lengthy article above is written from a liberal perspective and is a masterpiece. It is also alarming for anyone who cares about liberal democracy and freedom of speech.

'Let me recommend an important web site churchandstate.org.uk. Operating out of London this well-designed and exciting web site covers church-state, population, climate change and other issues. Check it out.' - Edd Doerr, President, Americans for Religious Liberty

Church and State

MAYOR OF LONDON RSI PROPERTY
DAY 406 IN A WEEKLY PERIODIC TENANCY
SUBJECT TO A SECTION 21 NOTICE

(SEE PARA. 3 BELOW)

1. Our 308 Honorary Associates include 20 Nobel Prize laureates. Declan and I are engaged in a project that deals with the publication of issues significant to social policy in a number of key areas, e.g., climate change, population, futurism, atheism, and free speech. Established as Network for Church Monitoring, a non-profit company limited by guarantee, our main publication, found at the website, Church and State, calls attention to subjects, not the least which have been critical of the interaction between religious and secular institutions. We have been the target of numerous threats and actions, e.g., the former resulting in threats to Declan's life, and the latter, which have led to vandalism. The various incidents are on record with the police and other official agencies.

2. There are no less than 63 Nobel Prize laureates on the Church and State website from 20 Honorary Associates, eight articles, nine book excerpts and 33 petition signatories. (For example, one Nobel laureate signed our Nobel petition in support of human embryonic stem cell research and gave us permission to excerpt from one of his books.) Our list of associates also includes 18 US National Medal laureates, and six Turing Award laureates (the equivalent of the Nobel Prize in computer science). We have published one article and excerpted from the books of seven members of the British House of Lords. And there are 31 knighted professors on the site from 13 Honorary Associates, one book excerpt and 21 petition signatories. These figures are despite the never-ending assault on our email (this link reveals the targeting of our emails to, among others, a close colleague in Washington, DC as well as space advocates and Nobel laureates).

3. This is Day 406 for us living under the threat to life of a 'no fault' eviction by Peabody Trust.[1] We live in a Mayor of London's Rough Sleepers Initiative (RSI) property. Peabody's appalling new terms of tenancy have forced us into an unstable weekly periodic tenancy that poses a threat to Declan's life and inhibits our ability to exercise our rights. Declan accumulated quite a history with the Housing Ombudsman Service before he received the Ombudsman's decision not to investigate a referral from Lyn Brown MP on jurisdictional grounds. The Ombudsman was asked to consider whether or not our tenancy has been renewed like for like; and whether, if not, it should be in light of the landlord having accused us of not signing a like-for-like agreement. The Equality and Human Rights Commission will not accept a referral of discrimination from Ms Brown, the Commission's helpline (EASS) having grossly distorted the complaint against Peabody. We no longer have pro se access to the courts (see next paragraph).

4. This eviction matter came before District Judge Ruth Fine at the Central London County Court on 30 June 2020, when both counsel for St Mungo's (the charity in effective control of our tenancy) and Declan presented their positions. Declan lost the case and was ordered to pay £1,850 in costs. A publishing colleague in America cleared these costs within 24 hours of my blog post about this hearing for strike out on a related issue that was the essence of the claim, i.e., that St Mungo's would take a phone call to confirm that we are clients of the Mayor of London's RSI programme. Within a week of the hearing, St Mungo's had agreed to take this phone call for us both, the Court having ruled that they were not obliged to do so despite our circumstances. This time we escaped bankruptcy (counsel for St Mungo's asked for £3,407.50 in costs), but consider that to seek pro se access to justice in the courts has become far too dangerous for us. Declan currently has before the Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman the decision of the Information Commissioner that allows St Mungo's to continue processing coercive support plans without our knowledge or consent and that also poses a threat to his life.

5. When it comes to traffic, we have had 10.7 million hits in the past three years on Facebook; however, I left the platform on 13 March 2021 for one year rather than risk being banned for life. It is indisputable that with any sort of level playing field Church and State would have far exceeded 2.5 million hits last year. In addition to a large variety of blocks without explanation, Facebook had so severely restricted our Page's distribution by October 2020 that it was almost as good as an unpublished page.[2] Currently, we are up to their 85th block since 1 December 2015, and as usual without an explanation. This block records as one half of their 3rd double block in the first five weeks of this year that lasted 60 days. Our traffic has also been curtailed by over 2.5K blocks on access to Church and State since 26 July 2016, including 29 full distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks since 17 May 2019 that have lasted for as long as 54 hours at a time.[3] About 70% of our hits are from Americans.

"This is precisely the hard hitting kind of response needed to clarify the unfair way Facebook is treating your highly reputable site." Don Collins, Founder, International Services Assistance Fund, Washington DC

Last updated: 26/06/21

_________________________

[1] Once a fixed term has elapsed, the landlord has the option to seek eviction even if the tenant has upheld their obligations in full (though of course the landlord must still apply for and obtain a county court order).

[2] 17/10/20: We have permission to publish this ISAF letter of 30 September to Facebook COO Sheryl Samberg. Facebook has so severely restricted our Page's distribution since 4 September that it's almost as good as an unpublished page

[3] Since October 2019, we have been defining a full DDoS attack as having such a high volume of up to 4-minute blocks on access to Church and State that we don't bother recording them all.

Church and State blog

Tuesday, January 03, 2017

The freedom of speech: An unprecedented four recorded blocks on access to our Church and State website today as we work on an important article about religion and freedom of speech (WITH UPDATE 14/1/2017)

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