Anarcho-tyranny in the UK

Confidence in British justice is at a record low

There is a running online joke that court cases in Britain invariably involve either paedophiles receiving suspended sentences for possessing 10,000 indecent images, or people being sent the jail for two years for posting something offensive online.

There is certainly some truth to the stereotype, which contributes in a small way to Britain’s international reputation as a cautionary tale. A country which helped birth liberalism, and spread liberal institutions around the world, is seen by some as a darkly amusing anarcho-tyranny. The authorities will try to force you to cut your vegetables with a blunt knife, while the state treats criminals with endless leniency.

William Frederick Yeames’s Defendant and Counsel (1895)