F* me, this is bad:

*****

https://nitter.net/RnaudBertrand/status/2073404032790753492#m

Arnaud Bertrand @RnaudBertrand
3h
This is properly insane: quite literally the worst example of censorship I've ever heard of anywhere.

I checked the actual ruling (which you can see here: https://courthousenews.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/07/r-v-staatsanwaltschaft-saarbrcken-cjeu-judgment.pdf ) and, to be clear, it isn't just censorship in the conventional sense - blocking access to a website or removing content from platforms - this is the criminalization of information relayed by private citizens, with prison sentences attached.

And the most insane aspect if that it does NOT matter if the information relayed is accurate or not. It just matters that it originates from RT or other media outlets banned in the EU.

In other words, truth isn't a defense anymore in the EU, it literally doesn't matter. It's purely based on the identity of the speaker.

The ruling is actually explicit about this: the regulation, quoted by the Court says that the prohibition applies to "any content," and they draw no distinction based on what the content actually says. If it originates from banned outlets, it's banned.

It is, quite simply, a complete unraveling of the entire post-Enlightenment legal and philosophical project where entire generations of Europeans fought to move from "who says it" to "is it true" as the operative question.

Think about the absurdity of it: if RT publishes a video saying the sky is blue and you share it on a publicly accessible website in the EU, you'd fall within the scope of this ruling, making you liable to criminal prosecution.

Completely and utterly absurd. But that's the EU today for you 🤷

*****

The judgement builds from a case in Germany when a group of 3 individuals shared some footage of RT on their own channel back in 2023. Freely available, but with options for donations which in the court's mind made them liable as professional 'operators'. Didn't catch what their sentence was, but the document notes that:

'anyone who infringes a prohibition on broadcasting, transmitting, disseminating or providing services laid down in a directly applicable legal act of the European Communities or of the European Union, [...] is to be liable to a custodial sentence of three months to five years. [...] a person acting in a professional capacity [...] is liable to a term of imprisonment of at least one year.' (pp.4-5)

As with the previous rulings against RT, such as the Ofcom ban that I covered, no reference to the specific content or whether it was true or propagandistic in nature. Sufficient that it was from an outlawed source.

Seems that, in losing this war, the EU states and the west more generally is going to come down hard on their own citizenry to make sure they don't start to ask too many awkward questions, such as why it's costing them so much to eat & heat their homes, why manufacturing and the wider real economy is going down the toilet, what happened to Nordstream, and why arms companies are taking so much of their taxes to make hardware that immediately gets destroyed on the Ukrainian front line, along with the cash that goes directly into the pockets of the corrupt oligarchs in tht country.

Expect the UK courts to follow suit in due course - never ones to be out-fashed by anyone, the c**ts - in which case we'd better hope they don't start looking through the TLN archives!

jeers jeers jeers,
I