Anti-feminist’s threats excused because Norwegian court doesn’t understand how blogs work

Eivind Berge

Remember Eivind Berge? The proudly and virulently “anti-feminist” Norwegian chap whose contributions to the blogosphere include denying the existence of female rapists because he totally would’ve loved it if a teacher had molested him as a teenager, and that women are horrible selfish harpies ’cause they’re the sole gatekeepers of the world’s reserves of teh secks, among several other nuggets of classy brilliance? Ah, thought you would.

Well, I haven’t paid him any mind since Personal Failure pointed me in his direction for that aforelinked blog post, so it’s news to me – of the entirely unsurprising sort – that dear sweet Berge has apparently been naughty boy. As in, he’s openly blogged about his titillation at the idea of police officers being murdered as a coup against the evil feminist-sympathizing overlords, or something. And for some reason, local law enforcement took notice [Google translation of original Norwegian article]:

There were items including Police Security Service said were calls to the police homicide and specific threats, which triggered the arrest of Berge three weeks ago. Some of the most controversial statements was:

• "I wish men as a group the police inflicted such losses that the community was forced to calculate that the most hateful feminist laws are worth enforcing"

• "Do malice that even a Norwegian cop hell is killed. How should it be done when the cops come to your door "

• "(...) attack on the police is something that blends in 100 percent of everything I stand for. Other supports murder I did not. "

Berge also wrote that he "planned" to attack a policeman with a knife on a Saturday evening at Torgallmenningen in Bergen, and in police questioning, he confirmed that he supports the killing of police officers as a tool in the fight against male feminists.

- He has encouraged and glorified the killing of policemen. The police see this as an immediate threat . We feared that he would do serious of threats within a short time, said police lawyer Rudolf Christoffersen of bt.no after his arrest.

Previously, Berge has also attracted attention by seeming to give support to Breivik.

"I had no idea that a formidable activist named Anders Breivik Behring already for years had been a meticulous planning of an attack that would show the world what the Vikings are made of," wrote Berge, who later denounced the attack and Utøya stressed that there were police officers his aggression was directed against.

Cute, ain’t he?

Interestingly, though, the court case against him is apparently in trouble, as the court seems to believe that writings posted to public websites that anyone in the world can access at any time for free are somehow not “made public”. Glyn Moody at Techdirt tries to make sense of the court’s rationale, though without much luck. And as a result, there’s a growing likelihood that the murder-encouraging walking moral cesspit that is Berge will walk free.

Now, I don’t think a random twerp like Berge poses much of a threat to anyone but the poor neurons of those who read his bilge. But then, every single lunatic who ever shot up a public place was no more than a random twerp at first, either. The man clearly has enough issues to make any psychiatrist wet themself; something tells me letting him roam free, considering not only these latest outbursts, but also his years-long track record of endless glorification of thuggery, might not be the best call.

You know, I wish I could say it wasn’t often that potential matters of life and death rested on a criminal court’s technological (il)literacy.

Tags: Eivind Berge • Norway • Glyn Moody • Police Security Service • Anders Breivik • anti-feminism