Hold on there, the uk has far more liberal laws that the us, can you give any examples? Btw you can film anything here, including arrests. Only issue is if they think you are making a film to aid terrorists, but the police have had a very hard time using that. Also don't forget that the uk is crawling in cctv, so the police are bound to be filmed anyway!

The UK has abolished self defence, compromised the legal protection against double jeopardy, and lifted many restrictions against government agents entering one's home. Political speech is less free as in the United States as well. There's also the sizable DNA database, and the CCTV itself (which is still controlled by the government, and hence on the other side of the table from any recordings made by citizens).

I agree the UK has been going in the wrong direction on civil liberties, but your post is too much FUD, which is ultimately harmful to our cause.

> The UK has abolished self defence,

The most recent cause celebre on this was a robber being given permanent brain damage after escaping the scene of the robbery. The attack was not self defence, and frankly, the brothers who joined in the attack got off very lightly indeed.

In reality, reasonable force in defending oneself and others is allowed, and is interpreted by juries, so how can you possible argue self defence has been "abolished?"

> compromised the legal protection against double jeopardy,

Only in the event of important new evidence, i.e. DNA that couldn't be done at the time due to lack of science. Not ideal perhaps, but you have to draw a line somewhere, and smarter people than you or I supported it.

> lifted many restrictions against government agents entering one's home.

Any more details on this one, citation/statute?

> Political speech is less free as in the United States as well.

The HRA mostly fixes that although there is not an inalienable right to free speech. Since there isn't in the USA either, are you sure it is measurably less free?

> There's also the sizable DNA database

Declared illegal by our highest court, and currently being fixed by the government in the proposed Freedom (Great Repeal) Bill, as is ID cards, right to protest and so on.

> and the CCTV itself (which is still controlled by the government, and hence on the other side of the table from any recordings made by citizens).

CCTV is generally controlled by local shopping centres or business associations, or local councils. I recently visited our local council CCTV control room and was interested to discover they actually won't let the police into the viewing room, except for a specific operation (which has to authorised by the chief of police and the head of the CCTV stuff on the council). They will report crimes to the police, but the police cannot trawl or watch their system. So, I really don't see what the problem with CCTV really is. It watches the public, but so could a council employee up a hill with a telescope. It remembers, but only for a limited time, and so could the same council employee with a pencil and paper.

The biggest argument against CCTV is it is a total waste of money, doesn't reduce or deter crime, and is not backed up with any proper evidence of efficacy whatsoever.

I agree the UK has been going in the wrong direction, but I don't think it is as bad as you say, and I am offended by the continual denigration of the UK compared to America, as if America was the capital of human rights and civil liberties, and we still have the star chamber.

Also, you didn't mention the most worrying thing of all - the powers the police have been using to prevent climate change protest. Regardless of your views on climate change, the fact public resources have been so heavily diverted to protect commercial interests worries me much, much more. That way fascism lies.

The funny thing about America is that we actually got all of our civil liberties from English tradition. America and the UK share the tradition of the English common law, and a lot of the reforms the UK has seen (including the erosion of double jeopardy) would be unthinkable in America.

That said, there seem to be promising signs that the new Con/LibDem coalition is putting things in the right direction. It's encouraging that you folks threw out the Labour party, and it's more encouraging that you seemed to do it for many of the right reasons. (I feel comfortable saying things like that because I have a feeling many British people feel the same way about us and the Republicans.) Of course, it remains to be seen whether the new boss is really any better than the old boss.

I don't really mean to denigrate the UK. The UK's done things in recent years that are very worrying. They're probably par for the course for European countries, but given the traditions of civil liberties we share, a lot of us have higher expectations for the UK.