Man becomes first person convicted of sexism under new Belgian law

Article here. Excerpt:

'A man has been convicted of sexism in a public place for the first time under a new law in Belgium.

A court in Brussels fined him €3,000 for insulting a police officer because of her gender, Le Soir reported.

It comes as France prepares to create an offence of street harassment, described as “sexist and sexual outrage”.
...
The driver was found guilty of three charges: contempt of a police officer, making threats and sexist remarks in public, and a serious violation of another person’s dignity because of her gender.

He was warned that if he failed to pay the fine, a prison term of a month would be imposed.'

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Europe is still Europe. Free speech isn't guaranteed. It's just a question of WHAT is prohibited speech under the law. Most monarchies have some degree of prohibition against dissing the monarch though what constitutes that and how much it's punished varies. Through European history, saying or doing this or that has been forbidden for whatever reason. I am not sure in what other countries aside from the US that free speech rights have been aggressively maintained like they are here.

I won't deny this guy's behavior was very rude and also sexist. Is showing sexist attitudes or making what are felt to be sexist remarks so offensive though that they should be jailable? Here in the US, you can talk smack about POTUS's mama and it's legal. However doing so constitutes fighting words and POTUS could punch you for doing so. But is your smack-talking ass jailable for it? No. In most other countries, talking smack about the chief executive's mama is jailable. One big diff. betw. the US and other countries.

So it's within European tradition to jail ppl for spoken offenses. Not American tradition. I'd only suggest to Europe, Belgium specifically, that opening up the breadth of jailability as they have is a pretty big move. And I also wonder... will men insulted for being in a traditionally female occupation receive such aggressive defense? Or will non-policewomen?

I have a feeling about the only ppl who will see the protective effects of this law are female cops. But who knows. Cops are quick to arrest men accused of wrongdoing by women. Vindictive gfs/ex-gfs, etc., all over Belgium have a new arrow in their quiver. Upset at your SO? Accuse him of being sexist. Easy enough.

Of course you can also try accusing him of DV. That works, too.

And some ppl still think life-like female sex droids somehow won't be popular.

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