They absolutely do not believe in freedom of speech or expression. Quite simply, they became convinced that allowing someone to express opinions they strongly disagree with would: 1) perpetuate the injustices and evils they see in society, including racism, poverty and exploration of the poor, sexism, homophobia, etc. 2) seriously hurt people, particularly members of the oppressed class.

That is pretty much their point of view. So, NO, they don't really believe in freedom of speech. But since taking a stand like that would not look very nice, as fundamental individual freedoms are still highly regarded qua principles in Western societies, they instead opt for relativizing and redefining the terms. So they'll justify censorship and coercion by saying XYZ is not really contemplated by freedom of speech, but is actually "hate speech" and hate speech has no rights, etc etc.

Leftists in my country have also moved towards this type of radicalism. It indeed is the "new wave"; they don't see any need to tolerate "white supremacists", "bigots", "fascists and nazis" (yes, the irony). It's the way things are going to be from now on, so get ready for it. They don't care about individual rights; they care about social classes and the "oppressor" can't have the same rights to speak as the "oppressed".

W.r.t. the UK, I don't have any first-hand experience. But speaking as someone who lives in a third world country, it is my impression that the UK is going to the shitter. Your "conservative" government sucks, and the fact that someone as delusional as Jeremy Corbyn managed to "revitalize" the LP and win so many votes is extremely worrying. The social-democratic obsession of the European people will be their demise.

Miguel wrote:

They absolutely do not believe in freedom of speech or expression. Quite simply, they became convinced that allowing someone to express opinions they strongly disagree with would: 1) perpetuate the injustices and evils they see in society, including racism, poverty and exploration of the poor, sexism, homophobia, etc. 2) seriously hurt people, particularly members of the oppressed class.

That is pretty much their point of view. So, NO, they don't really believe in freedom of speech. But since taking a stand like that would not look very nice, as fundamental individual freedoms are still highly regarded qua principles in Western societies, they instead opt for relativizing and redefining the terms. So they'll justify censorship and coercion by saying XYZ is not really contemplated by freedom of speech, but is actually "hate speech" and hate speech has no rights, etc etc.

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I think you're right about this, there seems a general lack of awareness about the dangers inherent in it though. It was the strategy behind Soviet and other Marxist-Leninist censorship, justified in the same terms, more or less. Ironically some of the justifications given for the restrictions on freedom of speech even sound like the kind of discourse you could find coming from the authoritarian right. I had to read a fair amount of Portuguese stuff produced under their 1926-33 military dictatorship and under the Estado Novo, and it starts to sound relevant if you adjust the terminology a bit.     
 

Jeremy Taylor wrote:

Personally, I wouldn't mind if the government was banning genuine far-right, like neo-Nazis. However, they seem to have taken up the usage of left-liberal activists and media outlets, like the BBC, and started to label a huge swathe of people far-right. I know little about the three stopped this time, but one (Lauren Southern) of them, at least, didn't seem far-right to me, whatever else she is.

I'm not sure why this has been happening. But I have also noticed that there seems to be a shift going on in the definition of what counts as far-right, so that it is moving away from 'traditional' Nazis, Fascists and so on and is becoming much broader. The problem is then confusing this expansively defined far-right with the old style one, and that nothing similar seems to be happening with the left and the far-left labels.

Besides, these policies are equally applied. Left-wing radicals aren't targeted to the degree.

This is possibly linked to the assumption that popular hate and violence is mainly a problem with the right wing. It is present in some way even in the anti-hate laws in that politically motivated/ideological hate is not included in the laws even though it definitely exists.

One of the many problematic issues with the British government's attitude to its own citizens expression, is the law enforcement resources devoted to policing it. A few years ago one county suggested that people might want to investigate their own burglaries, but there's plenty of time and money to investigate offensive things said on Facebook or Twitter, or even polite expressions of political and social beliefs. Similarly, it can take dozens of minor convictions (up to and including muggings and burglaries) to end up in prison, but hate speech and crimes, of a similarly minor extent (like throwing bacon at a someone wearing a headscarf), can easily see you sent down for a first offence. A few years ago, Peter Hitchens wrote an article in which he compared the sentence given to someone who had made racialist remarks on twitter, and who was given the better part of a year in prison, to a female drug addict who was finally getting sent to gaol after more than 200 convictions for things like shoplifting, drug possession, and burglary. The person who made the racialist remarks was quite vile. He had gloated when a black footballer had collapsed on the pitch, and you could argue what he did should be illegal. But to send him to prison for months for a first offence, when this isn't generally done for common assaults, thefts, and burglaries, is absurd.

As far as the issue of police resources goes I can see that trying to police hate speech will be a drain on resources or a distraction from the more usual core police activities especially if they are supposed to monitor online activity. In purely practical terms it would maybe make more sense to centralise this kind of policing in an organisation whose officers specialise in it and do it full time. 

It might be thought that inflicting severe penalties in a small number of extreme cases will discourage others from engaging in the behaviour quite effectively if the cases are publicized enough. This is possibly true but there seem obvious freedom of expression implications in the light of vaguely written anti-hate laws and if too many prosecutions like this are actually brought. (Policing of 'hate' becomes a kind of ideological policing of ideas as opposed to policing the equivalent of public order offences).

With the internet, things like Facebook and Twitter, a more proportionate response to people who post tasteless or offensive stuff would be to ban them from using the platforms.