Should we be manning the barricades as a new generation of Blackshirts takes over the country? According to reports in yesterday's newspapers, "almost half the country would back a far Right party" that dissociated itself from violence and fascist imagery.
The reports - based on the results of a poll of 5,054 people conducted by the anti-fascist organisation Searchlight - stirred up a good deal of shock-horror as, I suppose, they were intended to. Searchlight is a campaigning organisation. Saying "Eek! Look out! Fascists! They're everywhere!" is - not to impugn the good work they do - slightly the point of its existence.
When you look at the question that this 48 per cent figure ("almost half the country", natch, rather than, say, "less than half") answered yes to, the story unravels. These interviewees were asked whether they would "definitely support" or "consider supporting" a non-violent political party that "wants to defend the English, create an English parliament, control immigration and challenge Islamic extremism".
Are these the four key indicators of fascism? "Defend the English" is an almost meaningless phrase - and could just as easily cover the people who bore on about celebrating St George's Day or campaign for authentic Cornish pasties as neo-Nazi boot-boys. The creation of an English Parliament is no more than the logical conclusion of New Labour's wet-blanket plans for a succession of regional talking shops. To "control immigration" was the stated aim of all three main political parties at the last election (well, duh: I challenge you to find the party that stands for abolishing passports and throwing the borders wide open).
And how many people do you see sticking up for Islamic extremism? The aspiration to "challenge" it is hardly a mark of the far Right, unless we're to imagine jackbooted hordes marching in lockstep down Whitehall threatening "firm words and a searching dialogue".
My guess is that 52% were put off supporting this blandly centrist imaginary political party only by the thought of finding unctuous English Assembly Members in cheap suits on their doorsteps at election time.
It is only by wilfully interpreting these things as code-phrases for "send them home", "outlaw Islam" and "kill all the Welsh" do you arrive at the idea that 48% of people would vote for fascists given the chance. And, of course, it's bollocks: they wouldn't and they don't.
A poll on actual parties of the Right gets conducted, for real, and with a much larger sample size, every time we have an election. The BNP is a far Right party that doesn't use fascist imagery and does its best to dissociate itself from violence - and its share of the vote remains more or less what it has always been: that is, pathetic.
London Evening Standard
February 28, 2011
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9 comments:
A very sensible article.
'Should we be manning the barricades',.........people the barricades, surely!!!!!
The BNP is a far Right party that doesn't use fascist imagery
Their youth wing uses the odal rune.
44 seconds in here
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XzlGbP3bQGo
This symbol was the insignia of the 7th SS "prinz eugen" division during the War and has long associations with fascism.
its share of the vote remains more or less what it has always been: that is, pathetic.
Why does it have 2 MEP's sittiong in Brussels then?
Just under 1 million votes two years ago for a bunch of closet nazis, cranks and Holocaust deniers will always be cause for deep concren.
Those voters haven't gone away.
Yup, the Observer's headlines were worthy of a tabloid.
Come to think of it; Observer, tabloid, not much difference really.
'Should we be manning the barricades',.........people the barricades, surely!!!!!
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I just lol'd my pants.
No one thinks that the BNP is going to win tomorrow, however their danger does not lay in what they are but their what they can become. There is a burning resentment in the white working class and the potential in what the BNP can become is apparent. They have the potential to tap into that and i believe they will do so if we are not careful.
There is a soft support for the BNP, most people will not suupport them because they are told not to do so by the MSM. Many people i know and work with (in the Royal Mail) support their views but wont vote for them because they are told they are extremists.
There is a growing acceptance of intolerance to the islamic community and a deep suspicion betwen the races. All it takes is one EDL march in the wrong area to ignite the flames of communal violence in which the only winners will be the BNP.
Dont despise the BNP because thay are in a slump, the situation could turn around in a flash and they will become a real threat. Situations evolve at a tremendous pace and i think we are too complacent
EDL LEADERSHIP FINALLY DISSOCIATES ITSELF FROM THE ENA (EXCEPT ROBERTA MOORE): -
http://1millionunited.org/blogs/blog/2011/02/27/edl-leadership-finally-dissociates-itself-from-english-nationalist-alliance/
"There is a growing acceptance of intolerance to the islamic community and a deep suspicion betwen the races."
So how did we get to this situation, and hence how do we reverse this? I think it all started with 9/11 being blamed on the Muslim community. Before 9/11, Muslims were just another group of people that everyone got along with, and Islam was just another religion. All this changed when the American media started their Islamophobia campaign to justify invading Afghanistan and Iraq, and then the British media jumped on the American bandwagon, which set everything else in motion. The economy made things worse, obviously.
I think we should remind people of how things used to be before 9/11, and before the economy started collapsing. We should try to rebuild community relations to the way they were back in the late 1990s and pre-war 2000s. We should be using that period, of which most people have fond memories, as the model of society we want to get back to. Back then, it really didn't matter AT ALL what race you were - people were people. So I think the best response to the far-right's claim that multiculturalism "cannot" work is to remind people that it WAS IN FACT WORKING PERFECTLY until a just few years ago, and therefore can work again as soon as we stop letting the media and the far-right plant fear in our heads.
Of course the crashing economy makes things harder for everyone, but what the far-right never mentions is that their approach won't help the economy, all they will do is transfer all the suffering to the immigrants. Instead of telling people to go through the hard times together, they want to teach us to betray others for our own benefit.
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