A tribune from MP and President of the National Gathering, Marine Le Pen

The National Assembly will consider, Thursday, June 7, the proposed law "on the fight against the manipulation of information", wanted by Emmanuel Macron. National Ruling MPP Marine Le Pen is strongly opposed to this. 

"It is asked whether freedom of the press is advantageous or prejudicial to a state. The answer is not difficult. It is of the utmost importance to retain this use in all states based on freedom: I say more, the disadvantages of this freedom are so small compared to its advantages, that it should be the common law of the universe, and that it is appropriate to authorize it in all governments, " said Denis Diderot. I would likeEmmanuel Macron ponder these lines, while the members of his own majority are preparing to significantly reduce our freedom of expression, information, and perhaps opinion.

"The intention of the legislator here is not reprehensible in itself; slander, defamation and lies to be fought. But the legislative arsenal in force was already largely sufficient "

Thus, the Assembly walkers, supposedly Liberals, defined "false information" as a "Allegation or imputation of a fact lacking verifiable elements likely to make it likely". If this proposal is passed, the most essential values ​​enshrined in our Constitution, and, more profoundly, the values ​​of democracy, will be flouted. As defined in the bill, "false information" covers a far too broad scope; let's say it, liberticide. Concerned at times by this definition of facts as varied as the revelation of the existence of Mazarine in the early 1980s, leaks on surrender of the Francisque to François Mitterrand at the hands of Marshal Pétain, the Watergate, the first articles devoted to Jérôme Cahuzac's account in Switzerland, not to mention all the religious texts; even, going back in time, the rotundity of the earth would have been, at certain moments of our history, a false information! At the time of their broadcast, all these historical events that we now take for granted were well and truly "Devoid of verifiable elements likely to make them probable".

The intention of the legislator here is not reprehensible in itself; slander, defamation and lies to be fought. But the legislative arsenal in force was already largely sufficient; the crime of false news constituting a press offense provided for by law since 1881, which is interpreted particularly harshly by the courts. On October 19, theAFP and 20 minutes were elsewhere sentenced for public defamation, due to the publication of a dispatch concerning the Panama Papers whose title suggested the implication of the National Front. The only and only condemnation of the presidential campaign! Proof is made that false information is not treated lightly by the courts. So, why legislate at all costs? At the Ministry of Culture, it was sworn in February that the subject was not to define what was false news. In fact, a technical law, which could have cleverly attacked the problem of the algorithmic "filtering bubbles" that condition the users of social networks and alienate more and more our critical sense, the law relating to false news is ideological, and , to use terminology in vogue, paradoxically "illiberal".

From a fight in good faith against the true misinformation, which can be guilty of even the most presentable media, to an indirect censorship, there is only one step that seems here briskly crossed. Two problems seem to me to cause immense confusion. First, as we have seen, the liberticidal definition of "false news". Then the different administrative and legal procedures. In order to overcome the supposed shortcomings of the 1881 Freedom of the Press Act, considered as not permitting a sufficiently rapid withdrawal of online content, the law provides for the possibility of appeal against false information "Likely to alter the sincerity of the upcoming vote", in case it is broadcast "In a way that is both massive and artificial"before the judge hearing the application for interim measures. The district court of Paris will be given the extremely difficult task of saying in a very short time if information is false, then must in the wake and, in less than 48 hours, request the removal of the content incriminated, the dereferencing the site that propagated it and disabling accounts that relayed it on social networks. This procedure is unreasonable. Note also that this law will also apply in referendums ... What drifts to predict!

"This law could be detrimental to the quality and plurality of information, a vital resource in an over-connected world"

As if all this were not enough, the legislator will endow the Higher Audiovisual Council (CSA) with exorbitant administrative police powers. The audiovisual regulatory body, whose president is appointed by the President of the Republic, sometimes in an opaque manner, will be given the capacity to "Prevent, suspend or terminate" broadcasting a television "Under the influence of a foreign media". I endorse the statement of the Consultative Commission on Human Rights, for whom "The extent of the administrative police powers thus entrusted to the CSA threatens to undermine the pluralism of the media, even less so justified that the penal code already offers the means to pursue acts representing violations of the fundamental interests of the Nation" ". Yes, this law could be detrimental to the quality and plurality of information, a vital resource in an over-connected world.

Infantilization of the French. Restriction of fundamental freedoms. Legislative inflation. Burden of courts. This bill has almost no major design flaws and should outrage the entire political class. Moreover, it is grafted on an administrative ecosystem, media and digital already strongly liberticide, where senior officials do not hesitate to publicly rejoice on the social networks of censorship of Facebook pages ordered by other senior employees now employees GAFAM, or show their joy when essayists are convicted on appeal for comments of opinion on television. It is therefore to be feared that the law on the fight against false information could serve as a weapon of political repression pure and simple, becoming a tool of censorship. revealing its proposals for reform of the public audiovisual sector, Françoise Nyssen has not made a secret of her desire to see the emergence of media supposedly "Engaged" who would "The mirror of our differences", in order to fight against the ideas of some French people that she described as "Highly reactionary", before sending a wink to Delphine Ernotte, whose partisan political commitment is well established. The government's plan is clear: to control the debate of ideas on the public service.

Attached to the essential elements which found France and the Republic, among which I place freedom above all, I will oppose this law of struggle against "false information" so badly thought. On the contrary, I propose to include freedom of expression and digital freedoms in our Constitution. With this text, members of the majority engage in a path incompatible with democracy by mortgaging freedoms that we thought, probably wrongly, definitively acquired.

Source: ©  The bill on "false information" is liberticide - Causeur

Le projet de loi sur les “fausses informations” est liberticide – Causeur added by RichardA on 7 June 2018
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