Shame on You, England

No less an authority than John Cleese once said that the worst insult you could hurl at an Englishman is to tell him he has no sense of humor. We imagine that South Yorkshire judge Jacqueline Davies has received many such insults over the last couple of days, after ordering convicted "Twitter Terrorist" Paul J. Chambers to pay a nearly $5,000 fine.

If you haven't followed the case, the facts are these: In January, Chambers planned to travel to Northern Ireland to visit a woman he met online. Upon arriving at Robin Hood Airport--

(DIGRESSION: "Robin Hood Airport"?!? EOD)

--Chambers found all flights grounded as a result of weather. An avid "tweeter," Chambers then posted the following message to his followers: "Robin Hood Airport is closed. You've got a week to get your [expletive] together, otherwise I'm blowing the airport sky high!!"

Now, this is what we in North America call a "joke." Admittedly, it lacks a certain knee-slapping quality that we find in our finest humorists, but still we would expect a country that prides itself on its sense of humor--and on its finely-tuned sense of irony--would pick up on the subtle, almost Wildean undertones present in Chambers' quip. Unfortunately, the authorities saw no humor in the post; instead, they saw imminent danger. Police arrested Chambers at his place of employment, which quickly became his former place of employment. He was convicted of sending a menacing message over a public telecommunications network. He moved to Northern Ireland to live with the woman he planned to visit on that January night (some happy ending there, we suppose), but was subsequently fired from another job when his criminal record was discovered.

Since his conviction, Chambers has become a cause celebre among the Twitterati and free-speech advocates everywhere. He has spawned a Twitter topic, #I am Spartacus, where people from around the world can proclaim themselves fellow "Paul Chamberses" and announce their intention to blow up the landmark of their choice. In that spirit, although we refuse to tweet, we would like to proclaim our intention to blow up time itself (we got the idea from "Doctor Who"--nasty Daleks!) if Paul Chambers' conviction is not overturned!

Postscript: Has it not occured to anyone that if someone were actually planning a major terrorist attack, he or she would be unlikely to announce it on "Twitter"? Facebook, maybe, but Twitter?