'You can't say that' I told my daughter, over her harmless observation that young men at the Olympics celebrate diving off a springboard the way we might celebrate finding a cure for cancer.

'You can't say that' Channel 5 told Christopher Biggins, as they kicked out of Celebrity Big Brother for making a gag about Hitler.

It turns out there are an awful lot of things you can't say these days.

'You can't say that' Channel 5 told Christopher Biggins (pictured), as they kicked out of Celebrity Big Brother for making a gag about Hitler

Biggins dressed in a Nazi uniform as part of a BBC Knowledge documentary, which emerged following his exit from the Celebrity Big Brother house

Unsurprisingly, viewers wanted to know what Biggins actually said. He told me, word for word, on his way out of the house – still in disbelief.

It would seem he made a passing quip in the bathroom to his Jewish housemate. 'You better be careful or they'll be putting you in the showers and taking you to a room'.

But Channel 5 doesn't need you to know. Someone felt like a victim. That was enough.

Ok, not in terribly good taste and a mortified Biggins has been the first to admit as much.

But enough to get him kicked out, held up as a figure of national revulsion and turned into a showbiz pariah?

Whatever happened to just saying sorry for a mistimed or misplaced word?

It's a live 24/7 reality show for heaven's sake. There's no chance to rewind or edit out an off-colour remark.

More worringly, a naff reality show is the perfect mirror of where we are in today's society. 'Hate crime' is out of control.

It would seem Biggins made a passing quip in the bathroom to his Jewish housemate. 'You better be careful or they'll be putting you in the showers and taking you to a room'. But Channel 5 doesn't need you to know. Someone felt like a victim. That was enough

I am told one of the contestants, Katie Waissel, felt sufficiently upset by the incident to go off to chat to Big Brother. (Either that or she figured out a smart way to get the favourite off the show)

It doesn't matter what was said. It doesn't matter what words were used. The victim's perception is the deciding factor.

According to Hate Crime Operational Guidance, no one should question this perception.

You just need to feel hated. And I am told one of the contestants, Katie Waissel, felt sufficiently upset by the incident to go off to chat to Big Brother. (Either that or she figured out a smart way to get the favourite off the show.)

This is not about CBB. As we have agreed, the programme is a load of old rubbish. (And I was in it.)

What this is about is far more serious. It is the silencing of thought and speech. Where words have become more dangerous than a banana skin, where opening your mouth to speak your mind is unwise. Where typing thoughts online is as risky to your personal freedom as robbing a bank or smashing a little old lady in the face in her home.

Just this week, a Manchester man was sentenced to 180 hours unpaid work and a 12 month community order for posting comments judged to be 'grossly offensive' to Muslims.

Police officers turned up at his house at 8am and carted him off under arrest. For a few lines on Facebook.

Stephen Bennett reportedly went on to the Greater Manchester Police's Facebook page and posted comments deemed grossly offensive such as 'Don't come over to this country and treat it like your own. Britain first.'

It is not what was actually said that matters. The 'perception of the victim is the defining factor – the victim does not have to justify or provide evidence for their belief'.

What galls people more than being silenced, more than Biggins being removed from a stupid game-show for making a gag, more than the loss of freedom of speech and thought, is the sense of injustice

Even when nothing hateful was actually said to the victim, police must record a hate crime if the victim perceives it to be so.

Two things then. First, the 'victim' label. Give an some people this badge and they'll wear it more proudly than their 10 metre swim badge when they were at school.

Kids used to say I want to be a firefighter or a doctor. Go to colleges today and they will all tell you I want to be the biggest victim of them all.

Because in our new perverse world of molly-coddling, safe spaces, insurance, ambulance-chasing and cash for sadness, being a victim is the trump card to everything. The new alcoholic. The true survivor.

My name is Geraint. And I am a Welsh Victim.

Secondly, these self-styled victims don't need evidence to justify themselves. They just need to feel hated.

I am sure I am hated on a daily basis by an entire army of idiots. My Twitter feed would probably triple hate crime overnight if I was simple enough to report it.

But sticks and stones and all that.

Hate me all you like. But you have my cast-iron guarantee you will not find me trying to report hate on a naff website set up specifically for the cause.

'True Vision', paid for by your taxes, is one such website where you can report hate. Anonymously, if you like. No evidence required. And it feeds into hate-crime statistics. Another dumping ground for sad saps who want to gain points towards their Victim badge.

This follows in the Doc Martins of the Everyday Sexism website where self-indulgent women go to share with a receptive audience the outrageous misogyny they have suffered that day.

Or Tell MAMA a site set up to support victims of anti-muslim hate.

They read this column more closely than my own mother, looking for victims they can alert to the support they now need.

Websites like this perpetuate the myths that spawned them. All this indulgent hot air and nonsense helps victims to rise up. Like dough, proving itself.

And it is given crust and substance by this new nebulous law for hate crimes.

Not only do you not need evidence, but police cannot question your feelings. The prosecution does not need to prove hatred as a motivating factor behind the offence.

I could quite literally stand in the street and stare at someone, and if they felt like a victim, that would suffice.

And if hate-crime numbers weren't already being pushed up by Generation Snowflake and the Angry Antagonistas, they are now being pulled up by new hate-crime targets which need to be fulfilled.

New targets are not about reducing hate crime. They are geared around increasing the opportunities for victims to report it and for officers to act sensitively around it.

The hate crime operational guidance says

Targets that see success as reducing hate crime are not appropriate,' as this won't 'motivate managers' to 'promote positive recording' or 'increase the opportunity for victims to report'

Less policing. More ballet-dancing with the Dark Arts.

I am sure you have all heard about the increase in hate crimes post Brexit. The liberal left has had a field day with it.

'You can't say that' I told my daughter, over her observation that young men at the Olympics celebrate diving off a springboard the way we might celebrate finding a cure for cancer

It's a narrative the Remain camp would love you to buy into. I'd suggest the police have used Brexit as a platform to fulfil their race-hate reporting targets.

Of course nobody should downplay the hurt caused to those who are attacked and abused. The number of hate crimes recorded by the cops has grown year by year. Six years ago, there were 42,255; in 2014-15, there were 52,528

But this intense focus on meeting targets has blown these figures out of the water.

Police report a five-fold increase in hate crime since Brexit. True Vision says the weekly average has risen from 63 hate-crime incidents to 331.

According to the Home Office, of all the hate incidents in England and Wales, 8% are burglaries. In 1% of cases, someone actually nicked a bike.

Hate crime is the new double yellow lines, with a vast army of ticket inspectors incentivised to search out offenders.

Except the yellow lines aren't clearly marked. And you don't even need a car to get a ticket.

Remember: no evidence, no questioning, no proof required.

If the law were defined more substantively, hate crime would be a myth. An illusion.

What galls people more than being silenced, more than Biggins being removed from a stupid game-show for making a gag, more than the loss of freedom of speech and thought, is the sense of injustice.

Not only for the victims of thousands of REAL crimes which go unsolved every day. The burglaries that are no longer attended by police and the thefts which are ignored — let alone the slapped hands for shoplifters.

But bias clearly at play.

If you are perceived as a minority in the way the Muslim community is (try telling that to native Brits in Luton or Leicester), I would assert that your victim card is worth twice that of a white British man.

If you want to preach in the street, criticise western women for their dress, banish Christians from a swimming pool — that is acceptable.

But try reversing that — talk favourably about Brexit, criticise the hijab, state 'Christian Only Cricket' — and you don't stand a chance.

I would assert that hate crime has not risen post Brexit.