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Nick Griffin on the BBC
Oct. 23rd, 2009 01:13 pmFor those outside the UK who haven't heard, there's a party in the UK called the BNP, whose leader is Nick Griffin. Everyone has their own views on the BNP, but let's say they talk a lot about keeping Britain 'safe' from immigrants, keeping Britain for its 'indigenous population' (i.e. white), and they're against gay rights, women's rights, and human rights for quite a lot of people.
Nick Griffin was on the BBC's big political and current affairs programme last night. There were protests outside the BBC on the night, various people have spoken up against it during the week leading up to the programme, and there's generally been a lot of outrage about the BBC letting him appear. The thing is, sure, he's clearly a racist, clearly a bigot in many ways, but he's also been elected to parliament by the people of this country. In a democracy, we have elected representatives, and however much the people who didn't vote for them think they're arses, they still have the rights afforded to all elected representatives. I'd rather never hear from Gordon bloody Brown again, but both he and Nick Griffin are MPs and are therefore equally allowed to speak.
Out of all of this, though, is that most of the comments are from people who say that 'people' (read: 'people who aren't me and who aren't very bright') will be influenced to vote for the BNP because of all the publicity the party is getting. Well, okay, that's the way the world works. If these poor, easily led, unknown 'other people' see something in the BNP they like, then the other parties should damn well sort themselves out and make it clear that actually what they have to offer is better. Quit whining about it. If you don't like where our society is going, then bloody well do something about it. Stop poking at the bigot simply because he's an easy target. Yes, he's a bigot. We get it. And what have you done about our massive debt, huge levels of unemployment, problems in the NHS, the wars we're fighting, the way our armed forces are treated, the bigotry ingrained in UK society against women / LGBT people / disabled people, our use of energy, the way we source our food, how we work with other countries, and on and on? We are not a nation of fools; we can see what's wrong with the country.
Great, well done, government, you've had a week where people were whining about the BNP and the Royal Mail and where you were the good guys. But you're not, you've screwed up, so just get on with fixing things. Enough with the misdirection - it's not big and it's not clever.
Nick Griffin was on the BBC's big political and current affairs programme last night. There were protests outside the BBC on the night, various people have spoken up against it during the week leading up to the programme, and there's generally been a lot of outrage about the BBC letting him appear. The thing is, sure, he's clearly a racist, clearly a bigot in many ways, but he's also been elected to parliament by the people of this country. In a democracy, we have elected representatives, and however much the people who didn't vote for them think they're arses, they still have the rights afforded to all elected representatives. I'd rather never hear from Gordon bloody Brown again, but both he and Nick Griffin are MPs and are therefore equally allowed to speak.
Out of all of this, though, is that most of the comments are from people who say that 'people' (read: 'people who aren't me and who aren't very bright') will be influenced to vote for the BNP because of all the publicity the party is getting. Well, okay, that's the way the world works. If these poor, easily led, unknown 'other people' see something in the BNP they like, then the other parties should damn well sort themselves out and make it clear that actually what they have to offer is better. Quit whining about it. If you don't like where our society is going, then bloody well do something about it. Stop poking at the bigot simply because he's an easy target. Yes, he's a bigot. We get it. And what have you done about our massive debt, huge levels of unemployment, problems in the NHS, the wars we're fighting, the way our armed forces are treated, the bigotry ingrained in UK society against women / LGBT people / disabled people, our use of energy, the way we source our food, how we work with other countries, and on and on? We are not a nation of fools; we can see what's wrong with the country.
Great, well done, government, you've had a week where people were whining about the BNP and the Royal Mail and where you were the good guys. But you're not, you've screwed up, so just get on with fixing things. Enough with the misdirection - it's not big and it's not clever.
