Thursday, 29 May 2008
Broadening the dinner party list
The Guardian switched into its finest sanctimonious mode yesterday when it emerged that Richard Barnbrook, the BNP's man on the London Assembly, has a blog hosted on the Telegraph's blogging platform, "My Telegraph", which he'd used to "Blame the Immigrants" for crime in the capital.
So kudos to the Torygraph's Shane Richmond for coming out fighting:
Jews who support Israel are "false Jews", Condoleezza Rice is an "Aunt Jemima on the Bush plantation" and Robert Mugabe's regime in Zimbabwe is no worse than that of Ian Smith. These are just some of the views that can be found on the Guardian's Comment Is Free website. [...]While the Telegraph's position is that readers should be free, within the law, to express their views, the Guardian's censors meanwhile eliminate as many as one in ten posts, which they consider to be unsavoury.
So should we infer that the following posts, which can still be read on Comment Is Free, are endorsed by The Guardian:
In an article on the site in March, Guardian readers railed against Israel and "Zionists", their codeword for 'bad Jews'. Of nearly 500 comments posted on the article, almost 10 per cent were edited or deleted by Guardian moderators but that still left room for readers to complain that "no Jew can do any wrong", accuse the US of "murdering" al Jazeera journalists and describe Britain as a "murderous, nasty country" that has killed "more Muslims than Israel".
He goes on in a similar vein.
I broadly agree with the Telegraph's view; people should be free to propound their views within the law, and while no newspaper is obligated to give the BNP a platform, neither are they under any obligation to silence their legimitately expressed opinions.
But it does point, too, to a wider issue; as old media struggles to come to terms with "interactivity" and readjust to the new reality in which drink-sodden fools like me can use blogs as a platform for their erratic political views, they're going to come face to face with some opinions they don't like. Comment is Free, and its band of commenters of all political stripes, is a sometimes sickening but often hilarious exemplar of this principle; to watch Mahdi Bunting or Martin Jacques' latest offering thrown to a slavering mob isn't always pretty, but it is valuable nonetheless if it reminds Guardianistas (or Telegraph columnists, for that matter) that there is a world outside their tiny, right-on chattering-class bubbles.
My swearblogging colleague Prodicus put it best, in response to yet another howl of Guardian disappointment in Gordon, when Jackie Ashley wrote this on Monday:
A perfect chancellor would have seen some of it coming sooner. Perhaps it would have been better to hold more money back for hard times. But almost nobody was against the desperately needed extra cash for schools and hospitals when Brown found it. Everybody wanted to let the good times roll. Consumers and voters of every party - we were all at it.
Quoth my sweary countryman:
Oh, wait! I know who you mean! You mean YOU! You, and Polly, and Andrew, and all the rest of the Guardian luvvies who right now are packing for Tuscany or getting a well-deserved soaking in Hay on Wye. That's your 'everybody'. Your friends! The Guardianistas!
You need to broaden your dinner-party list, Jackie. Include some of the people you patronise, you overpaid, arrogant, insulting, blinkered, out-of-touch, know-nothing-actually, socialist, collaborating, casually-vicious, pathetic, crap-scribbling producer of utter fucking arse-gravy.
Well, quite. I might not want to have the BNP's Richard Barnbrook to dinner, but there's no point hiding your head in the sand and pretending he doesn't represent the views of a large swathe of the public. It is always better to engage with these people than pretend they don't exist.
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"...pretending he doesn't represent the views of a large swathe of the public..."
Except, of course, he probably doesn't. The rise in support for the BNP is mainly down to the increasing hysteria about them from the hated chattering classes in the 'Gruaniad' and 'Indy'.
It's a giant 'fuck you!' from the electorate, not a 'hmm, this chap talks some sense'...
Except, of course, he probably doesn't. The rise in support for the BNP is mainly down to the increasing hysteria about them from the hated chattering classes in the 'Gruaniad' and 'Indy'.
It's a giant 'fuck you!' from the electorate, not a 'hmm, this chap talks some sense'...
Can I suggest "narrow swathes" of BNP supporters if that makes any sense...? While sympathetic to JuliaM's point, I suspect that where the BNP has won a few seats (e.g., Burnley, Oldham), a fair number of voters were actually saying 'hmm, this chap talks some sense.' That may have been allied to a wish to say 'fuck you' to established parties seen as abandoning working class voters, but I'm still left with the feeling that although the BNP weed isn't really spreading across the country and remains far from any kind of breakthrough, it has managed to deepen its roots in one or two places, regardless of chattering class mindspew in the Grauniad and elsewhere.
PS - it should be more widely known that both Nick Griffin and Gordon Brown have a glass eye. I don't think it's shared, despite their joint problems with the vision thing.
PS - it should be more widely known that both Nick Griffin and Gordon Brown have a glass eye. I don't think it's shared, despite their joint problems with the vision thing.
The Guardian, in 2004, ran an op-ed article under the name of Osama bin Laden. Obviously BNP no, mass-murdering Islamofascist terrorist yes.
"I suspect that where the BNP has won a few seats (e.g., Burnley, Oldham), a fair number of voters were actually saying 'hmm, this chap talks some sense.'"
Interesting. Do you think a stronger Conservative option, or even a maverick anti-immigration Labour MP, would have changed the size of the BNP vote there...?
Interesting. Do you think a stronger Conservative option, or even a maverick anti-immigration Labour MP, would have changed the size of the BNP vote there...?
"the Guardian's censors meanwhile eliminate as many as one in ten posts, which they consider to be unsavoury."
Not strictly true. The Guardian's moderators eliminate or edit posts which are reported to them via the "[Offensive? Unsuitable? Report this comment.]" link after each post.
Not strictly true. The Guardian's moderators eliminate or edit posts which are reported to them via the "[Offensive? Unsuitable? Report this comment.]" link after each post.
I must take issue with the blatant Guardianreaderism displayed here Mr. E.
As a Guardian reader I have actually suggested that people should vote BNP on the grounds that a couple of BNP members in Parliament would bring the main parties to heel and stop them allowing policy to be made by the political correctness police.
I have also proposed we deal with youth crime by sending the little bastards to a remote peat bog where, supervised by big blokes with fierce dogs they will spend 10 hours a day digging holes and filling them in again.
Hardly typical namby pamby liberalism, but then I'm a northerner.
As a Guardian reader I have actually suggested that people should vote BNP on the grounds that a couple of BNP members in Parliament would bring the main parties to heel and stop them allowing policy to be made by the political correctness police.
I have also proposed we deal with youth crime by sending the little bastards to a remote peat bog where, supervised by big blokes with fierce dogs they will spend 10 hours a day digging holes and filling them in again.
Hardly typical namby pamby liberalism, but then I'm a northerner.
"The Guardian, in 2004, ran an op-ed article under the name of Osama bin Laden"
Yes, and today, just one day after criticising the Telegraph for allowing Richard Barnbrook to use their blog hosting facility, they have an opinion piece by Fidel Castro.
Yes, and today, just one day after criticising the Telegraph for allowing Richard Barnbrook to use their blog hosting facility, they have an opinion piece by Fidel Castro.
...describe Britain as a "murderous, nasty country" that has killed "more Muslims than Israel"
What's wrong with that? Seems like a pretty accurate description to me.
What's wrong with that? Seems like a pretty accurate description to me.
especially as the media in London must take a large part of the blame for the BNP in London getting a seat.
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