barnbrook is a nutter

It's hardly surprising that, in allowing a BNP councillor - Richard Barnbrook - to write a comment piece for their website, The Daily Telegraph has invited upon itself a storm of criticism. There are plenty who can and will make a good case for allowing this odious man to express his views and be judged openly on them, but none of that stops the piece itself being a hateful and rather shocking article to be published in a mainstream news outlet. What's frustrating is that looking at it now I'm fairly certain it's been significantly edited since I read it this morning; so it's not quite as offensive now. But only just. Anyone else able to confirm this?

Either way, the article is also ridiculously - hilariously - badly written. Here's a sample.

"Even SAS men get affected by Post Traumatic Stress. But our British young people are a resilient lot. They will get over it and the best thing they can do is supress it and move on. The last thing they should do is start going to those disgusting lefty therapists for counselling to relive the trauma. Look at that word "therapist" the rapist....and that is what they do....the rape of the mind."

I suppose I'm a bit more shocked at the reactions of the commenters, and by the decision to let so much of what they say stand. On the other hand, as readers of Comment is Free will know, these online debates invariably draw the participation of cranks. Nevertheless, the quality of debate is staggeringly low. I shan't be switching papers any time soon.

enoch is back

Should I feign surprise that in the brave new world of this 21st century, in an England where politics is irreversibly dominated by the liberal collosus which is Dave Cameron - the man who has single-handedly banished intolerance from the newly touchy-feely Conservative Party - the likes of Nigel Hastilow continue to evoke the name and the policies of the hated Enoch Powell? No, I shan't - it really couldn't be more predictable.

A day or two after Hastilow - who was a prospective parliamentary candidate for the Tory party - published his ill-conceived article and came very close to endorsing the racist demagoguery of Powell, the journalist and would-be politician has been hauled over the coals by the fearsome Caroline Spellman and has handed in his resignation. The Tories, meanwhile, are exposed once more as precisely the 'nasty party' that Theresa May warned them they were becoming.

What makes this story interesting, of course, is not that yet another Tory is so bone-headed as to once more open this familiar can of worms, nor that Hastilow will be a great loss to the electorate (he won't), but rather that the fault line between Cameron's leadership tone and his own supporters is once more so clearly highlighted. Over at Conservative Home the mood is predictable - lots of people willing to criticise Hastilow for poor judgement but very few willing to themselves decry Powell's speech. Why? Because they believed him then and they believe him now.

Plenty of Labour voters do, too, I suspect, and Liberals also. But the relationship between Conservatism and xenophobia goes far deeper than any comparable links in the other British parties. People 'become' Labour because they appreciate their links with the working classes, or because they admire their liberalism, or because they support social justice. There are certainly racist Labour voters, but it's very hard to imagine that they became Labour voters as a consequence of their attitude towards foreigners. Yet for a great many people their dislike of immigration (just like their dislike of Europe) is a central plank in their identification with the Conservative Party. Cameron tries hard to convince us that this bond is broken. This plainly isn't so.

In the office today I had a long chat with a (tremendously nice) Tory, who has campaigned and stood as a Conservative candidate, and while he shook his head that Hastilow so openly stood up for Powell, he was quick to reassure me that "what he said in public is exactly what every Tory says to core voters on their own doorsteps". For him, mentioning the 'rivers of blood' was a huge tactical mistake, and a misjudgement because the country has so clearly moved on from Powell's speech in '68.

But even in that context, he told me that "what Powell said was acceptable in public then, but it isn't now". This kind of myopia is typical of the modern Conservative, because it fails to appreciate – indeed it blindly refuses to remember - that what Powell said in '68 was so far from acceptable then that Ted Heath immediately sacked Powell from the cabinet. The world has changed, yes, but not from a world where racism was acceptable to one where it is not.

The world has changed in the sense that Powell's words (which were just as unnaceptable then as they are now) have been proved to be not just inflammatory, or insensitive, or politically unsound, but profoundly wrong. Cameron must do more than just persuade the country that he understands this. And he has to do more than persuade the country that his fellow-travellers in the Tory party feel the same. He must actually bring about this change. And this is an impossible task.

The Tory footsoldiers don’t want to change. And every time someone does what Hastilow has done, and every time Cameron condemns them for it, they will make his battle all the harder and his sinking yet more inevitable.

nick broomfield and slavery

I'm really keen to see Nick Broomfield's first feature film, Ghosts - Broomfield is one of our finest film makers and he's taken on a fascinating subject, as Stephen Newton points out in chastening prose on his blog:

"I'm not easily moved to tears, but Nick Broomfield’s Ghosts did that trick. They were tears of shame. It’s a film that shows that imperialism is alive and well and that the relatively luxurious lifestyles we enjoy come at a high price to be paid by those who born into foreign poverty.

These illegal Chinese immigrants did the jobs British people would rather not, for wages British people would not accept. They found themselves in meat factories (and we’re reminded that cruelty extends well beyond our treatment of other human beings); tempted into prostitution; working the land. Always they are treated with contempt."

Make sure you read the rest of his post, and take particular note of his mentioning the Morecambe Victim Trust Fund, which has raised £1,306.39 towards the £500,000 needed to clear the victims’ debts. I've just donated*. To quote Stephen again,

"As you dig into your pocket for some spare change, remember how relatively easily you earn your money and how much harder – and more expensive – life would be without the cheap labour of illegal immigrants."

*clarification: I've just tried to donate six times, and each time it refuses to let me, stating that it's not recognising the security code I type in. Either I'm being subconsciously stingy and typing it in wrong on purpose, or there's a problem with the site at the moment. Well, I'll keep trying - hope it works for you.