{"id":1549,"date":"2026-04-25T14:06:22","date_gmt":"2026-04-25T13:06:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/undod.cymru\/?p=1549"},"modified":"2026-04-25T14:09:30","modified_gmt":"2026-04-25T13:09:30","slug":"y-gwir-yn-erbyn-y-byd-rhyddid-barn-ac-etholiad-y-senedd","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/undod.cymru\/en\/2026\/04\/25\/y-gwir-yn-erbyn-y-byd-rhyddid-barn-ac-etholiad-y-senedd\/","title":{"rendered":"&#8221;The Truth Against the World&#8221; &#8211; Free Speech and the Senedd Election"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><em><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">&#8220;We<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> may learn our duty from the conduct of the oppressors of the world. They know that light is hostile to them, and therefore they labour to keep men in the dark. With this intention they have appointed licensers of the press<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">.\u201d\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">During the recent Reform-inspired clamour around various issues of Free Speech and censorship, my mind has on more than one occasion turned to the Welsh Philosopher <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/aeon.co\/essays\/remembering-the-18th-century-radical-dissenter-richard-price\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Richard Price<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> and his essay, <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/oll.libertyfund.org\/titles\/price-a-discourse-on-the-love-of-our-country\"><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">A Discourse on the Love of Our Country<\/span><\/i><\/a><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">.\u00a0 <\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Published in 1789 at the outbreak of the French Revolution, as Europe railed against the authoritarian rule of Kings, it launched the <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/academic.oup.com\/book\/36674\/chapter-abstract\/321700770?redirectedFrom=fulltext&amp;login=false\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Revolution Controversy<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> provoking Conservative Edmund Burke to respond with his famous <\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Reflections on the Revolution in France.<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">In his discussion of the grounds of patriotism, Price (a great friend of Benjamin Franklin, by the way) states that first among our \u201cchief blessings\u201d is the truth. He reflects that access to knowledge and ideas that constitute the truth are vital for any country, in order to avoid governments that are little more \u201c<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">than contrivances for enabling the <\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">few<\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> to oppress the <\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">many\u201d.<\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Price\u2019s writings, as so many from the Enlightenment period, remind us explicitly why freedom of speech emerged as one of the touchstones of modern democratic society.\u00a0 The world of the 17th and 18th century was one where censorship was the norm, where holding certain religious beliefs could risk one\u2019s life, and where the ruling classes closed down dissent to maintain their authority.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Those like Price who sought progress and freedom understood that this would be impossible without the opportunity for people to learn about the possibilities of reform, constitutional government and connected ideals. Progress required freedom of speech and freedom of the press in order for ideas to circulate.\u00a0 \u201c<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Ignorance is the parent of bigotry, intolerance, persecution and slavery\u201d he said. \u201cInform and instruct mankind; and these evils will be excluded.\u201d<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_1551\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-1551\" style=\"width: 300px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-1551\" src=\"https:\/\/undod.cymru\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/price-300x235.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"300\" height=\"235\" srcset=\"https:\/\/undod.cymru\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/price-300x235.jpg 300w, https:\/\/undod.cymru\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/price-1024x802.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/undod.cymru\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/price-768x601.jpg 768w, https:\/\/undod.cymru\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/price-1536x1202.jpg 1536w, https:\/\/undod.cymru\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/price-1568x1227.jpg 1568w, https:\/\/undod.cymru\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/price.jpg 1680w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-1551\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">A portrait of Richard Price by Pontycymer artist Kevin Sinnott<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Given these historical origins, it may seem counter intuitive that it is political figures on the Right who have recently been waving the flag for free speech. By and large, of course, they have been railing against objections to their racism, intolerance and demonisation of immigrants.\u00a0 And according to many of those who have promoted the principle of free speech, they are perfectly right to insist on being given a hearing.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The most recognised 19th century advocate John Stuart Mill insisted that what we would now call \u2018hate speech\u2019 and other unpopular opinions should not be subject to the law, partly on the off chance that there may be some truth in them, but more importantly so that falsehood be exposed and the truth be challenged. He feared truth becoming a \u2018dead dogma\u2019 and so its vitality and meaning should be tested and renewed.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">His \u2018Harm Principle\u2019 did however draw the line at speech that could cause immediate physical endangerment, such as inciting an angry mob to attack a corn dealer (or a hotel full of asylum seekers, for example).\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><b>Reform\u2019s \u201cSupport\u201d for Free Speech in Wales<\/b><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The run up to the Senedd election has exposed some of the tensions in Reform and the hard right\u2019s invoking of free speech. The most obvious case was the Students\u2019 Union at Bangor University, where a debating society rejected a request from Reform to address them.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">While Reform were quick to try and frame it as the University banning them from the campus, the fact of the matter was that they invited themselves and were subject to a caustic rejection, and did not appreciate a group of students freely expressing their views on the party.\u00a0 Not only did they subsequently attempt to frame it as a case of censure, they followed up with a <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/nation.cymru\/news\/uproar-as-reform-policy-chief-threatens-to-defund-welsh-university\/\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">threat to defund Bangor<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> if elected.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">This may have been a kneejerk reaction and a typically populist idea aimed at gaining traction with their base, but their instincts are instructive in this regard.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The erasure of the boundaries between institutions of civil society such as Universities and the state is typical of authoritarian overreach, and any ideological policing around issues such as who a debating society must host constitutes direct interference with respect to freedom of association and freedom of expression &#8211;\u00a0 a signal to other actors in civil society about the potential costs of challenging government (note Reform\u2019s worrying proposals for <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/www.bbc.co.uk\/news\/articles\/ceqww40gv19o\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">dictating history to our museums<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">).\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Their apparent championing of free speech and their general tendency to undermine it is striking in other respects.\u00a0 Their attempt to pour cold water on questions around Dan Thomas\u2019s residence in Bath led to him declaring he would only be engaging with friendly media over a cup of tea to clarify the situation. No proper clarification ensued, and in the main we have been left to reflect on how this mode of engagement with the free press has echoes across the Atlantic.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">And only this week, their \u201ctop\u201d candidate for Caerdydd Ffynnon Taf made a rather amusing if slightly concerning fuss about his MA project on the output of the nation.cymru news website. Despite the Daily Mail being the most read news outlet in the country, he is apparently so concerned about the impact of Nation\u2019s focus on Plaid Cymru and \u2018the entire Welsh media landscape\u2019 being biased, that he\u2019s apparently recommending state intervention through a review of Welsh media coverage. So much for freedom of the press<\/span><b>.\u00a0<\/b><\/p>\n<p><b>Trumpist<\/b><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Threatening Universities, discrediting certain media figures whilst cosying up to others, and decrying certain outlets is all very reminiscent of Trumpism, of course. And it is connected to a wider, darker and more unsettling <a href=\"https:\/\/www.bostonreview.net\/articles\/jason-stanley-what-mill-got-wrong-about-freedom-of-speech\/\">attack on the truth<\/a> making it far harder to discern, whilst presenting themselves as the anti-establishment purveyors of political reality, as it truly is.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Various global forces fuel conspiracy theories and scream fake news whilst simultaneously attacking those truths that built modern social and liberal democracy. And they have set about building a social tyranny through social media and their bots that Mill himself would have regarded as a potentially more powerful oppressor than any tyrant (and demonstrates the <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/www.bostonreview.net\/articles\/jason-stanley-what-mill-got-wrong-about-freedom-of-speech\/\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">limits of his ideal<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> of a market place of ideas where they are notionally given an equally reasonable hearing).\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Of course in this respect we must acknowledge the equal tendency of the left in stigmatizing, excluding and censorship, building up a despotism of custom (so painfully exposed by <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/www.opendemocracy.net\/en\/opendemocracyuk\/exiting-vampire-castle\/\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Mark Fisher<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> with respect to social media) &#8211; which ultimately undermines their own attempts to counter the hard right.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">There are signs however, that the scales are beginning to fall from people\u2019s eyes with regard to Trump and his British cronies, and there\u2019s a growing realisation their politics is more generally riddled with the tensions present in their discourse on free speech.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">His war on Iran has exposed them in all their stupidity, venality and swivel-eyed narcissistic and violent hypocrisy. Farage\u2019s apparent immunity to critique is wearing thin: the promise of Brexit\u2019s economic dividend is in tatters; likewise exposed are its consequences in terms of the immigration boom and a UK denuded of the ability to \u2018send the boats back\u2019; Farage has also now rowed back on his wild claims around re-opening mines and the blast furnaces in Port Talbot.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">It must be said, and in light of the latest Senedd polling, that in some ways one can\u2019t blame massive sections of the electorate for being led down the garden path, given that they have been so explicitly ignored, and that the political class has since Tony Blair spent a huge amount of time and effort manipulating their media relations and messaging (and just making stuff up like Iraq\u2019s Weapons of Mass Destruction) &#8211; so much so that on one level we now take it as a given that it&#8217;s mostly an attempt at distorting reality and denying people\u2019s intellect and everyday experience.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><b>Plaid\u2019s Prospects<\/b><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Plaid, the main opposition to Reform in Wales, have the culture and the authenticity to avoid the worst of this (although can someone explain why Lindsay Whittle, hero of Caerphilly, is not on their every campaign video?). However, they are not immune.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">To pick one prescient, local example to me, the Plaid-run council of Carmarthenshire is currently trying to close village schools in its heartlands under the banner of what they call \u2018modernization\u2019.\u00a0 Building new area schools, or seeking new ways of organising the provision of existing schools might plausibly be \u201cmodernizing\u201d &#8211; closing schools at the earliest opportunity and shipping little children miles down the road is clearly not.\u00a0<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">And yet they persist with this sort of dissembling mealy-mouthed bunkum that we\u2019ve all had a guts-full of and that has driven people into the arms of Reform. When language loses its meaning we should all be alarmed.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-medium wp-image-1552 aligncenter\" src=\"https:\/\/undod.cymru\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/Taliesin-202x300.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"202\" height=\"300\" srcset=\"https:\/\/undod.cymru\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/Taliesin-202x300.jpg 202w, https:\/\/undod.cymru\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/Taliesin.jpg 336w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 202px) 100vw, 202px\" \/><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">In addressing this situation, and indeed reflecting on the election run in, Plaid could do worse than look to a somewhat more ancient hero than Richard Price. As Reform continue in their attempt to sunder political truth from its moorings and create their own disorientating, paradoxical and hate-laced reality, it is arguably time for Plaid, its PR machine, and its poets, to channel the figure of Taliesin and engage in their own \u201cmyth-making\u201d of a <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/huwl1oyd.medium.com\/matters-of-the-spirit-what-next-for-wales-4f98f326bec1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">positive and liberatory kind<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">We need a language that moves beyond the morbid discourse of managerialism. Memorably deployed by the novelist Emyr Humphreys in his <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/waleslitexchange.org\/books\/the-taliesin-tradition\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">literary history of Wales<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">, Taliesin provided the archetype for Welsh survival with his shape-shifting abilities.\u00a0 The bard embodies the perpetual recreation of Welsh identity &#8211; in the face of English assimilation &#8211; through the strength and vigour of its verbal power.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">If ever there was a time that Cymru needed to create a new truth from the furnace of poetic inspiration (to paraphrase Gwyneth Lewis\u2019s Millennium Centre verse),\u00a0 to liberate itself from the fetters of contemporary discourse and redefine the language of politics, then this is it.\u00a0 As Price\u2019s contemporary, and our greatest salutary myth-maker once said, \u201cY Gwir yn Erbyn y Byd&#8221; &#8211; The Truth Against the World.<\/span><\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>&#8220;We may learn our duty from the conduct of the oppressors of the world. They know that light is hostile to them, and therefore they labour to keep men in &hellip; <\/p>\n<p class=\"link-more\"><a href=\"https:\/\/undod.cymru\/en\/2026\/04\/25\/y-gwir-yn-erbyn-y-byd-rhyddid-barn-ac-etholiad-y-senedd\/\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading<span class=\"screen-reader-text\"> &#8220;&#8221;The Truth Against the World&#8221; &#8211; Free Speech and the Senedd Election&#8221;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":11,"featured_media":1550,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1549","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-heb-gategori","entry"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.2 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>&quot;The Truth Against the World&quot; - Free Speech and the Senedd Election - undod<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/undod.cymru\/2026\/04\/25\/y-gwir-yn-erbyn-y-byd-rhyddid-barn-ac-etholiad-y-senedd\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_GB\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"&quot;The Truth Against the World&quot; - Free Speech and the Senedd Election - undod\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"&#8220;We may learn our duty from the conduct of the oppressors of the world. 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