Not quite sure where the end of October went

.. because, despite the date appearing on the top of this item, I'm actually putting fingers to keyboard on 3rd November and the last post I made on here was eons ago!. In truth, I did start to write a post on the specified date but for various reasons didn't get to finish it... so instead, I'll open November's batting with it - and hope my readership approve of my green attitude towards recycling hehe.

What I got worked up about this time was the fuss about the BBC's Question Time which included the leader of the BNP, Nick Griffin.

I'd like to state right now that I find this guy's (and his party's) political viewpoint absolutely abhorrent, and to give them credit, it came across loud and clear that everybody on the panel and most of the audience shares my opinion. What I found distressing was not his presence so much as it didn't seem to me that any of the representatives of the major political parties seemed able to see beyond their disgust for him and what he stands for and realise just what a dangerous person he is. I use that word very carefully, because I am very firmly of the opinion that he and his pals are a major threat and one which the more liberal political movements need to take very seriously indeed.

Packing the studio with people calculated to be on the opposing side to Mr Griffin, although understandable, was monumentally stupid and an act of cowardice on the part of the BBC, I would suggest, as all it did was play into the man's hands and hand him the opportunity to claim the exercise was a 'witchhunt' (which indeed he later, unsurprisingly, did). All we actually saw was everybody ganging up on Mr Griffin (rightly of course), but as a result I doubt whether anybody watching who might be tempted to support the man would have had their minds changed on the fundamentals - rather the opposite in fact. It would have been a substantially more interesting and valuable exercise if the Beeb had found a few more BNP members or general supporters to form some of the audience; then a reasonable and more even-handed debate might have ensued - which just might have exposed the BNP to be the repulsive organisation it in fact is. All we saw really, was evidence, as if any more were needed, that we DO NOT live in a country where free speech is tolerated - and if anybody is under any illusions about that just remember that if you make a statement which is judged to be inciting racial hatred you are liable for prosecution. In saying that I am not saying it is desireable that anybody DOES promote racial hatred, but rather that we cannot pretend we have free speech when we clearly do not and in some ways we might be a more healthy (and certainly less internationally hypocritical) society if we were more able to tolerate listening to views we find repugnant. See my comments further below on this one...

Part of my unease about the whole BNP/Nick Griffin shebang stems from the fact that if media representations are to be believed I know exactly what section of society Mr Griffin and his party colleagues are targeting, where their main support lies, and which buttons they are pressing to hit that target audience: I know, because I grew up amongst it. I am not talking about the skinhead, 'bovver boy' element traditionally associated with the BNP (or the National Front as it was known in those days), although admittedly there were a fair few of those around my neighbourhood when I was a child, but rather the largely honest, 'salt of the earth' working-class people who form the majority of the communities in which the BNP have had their successes lately.

Naturally, in discussing my youth, I am talking about the 1970s and 80s which, as anybody who has seen episodes of Life on Mars will know was culturally a rather different place: these days even 'ordinary people' - who from experience largely didn't (and still don't) raise an eyebrow at the casual racism and sexism back then - know there's a general feeling of unease if they start making too many unfavourable statements about coloured people, immigrants or 'stupid women'. However - and make no mistake about this - in private they still come out with viewpoints that would make Nick Griffin laugh all the way to Downing Street - AND HE KNOWS THIS which is probably why he was grinning like an ape at certain points this evening. I'm afraid the overwhelming impression I received from the rest of tonight's panel is that our mainstream politicians are delusional enough to believe that the majority of people in this country have swallowed the equality message wholesale and to be frank, this frightens the pants off me.

WHY they so obviously think this is beyond me; given that we now, to our shame, have two BNP MEPs and over a hundred councillors you think they would have twigged there is a problem and at least given some indication they mean to do something about it. Votes should after all, speak much louder than ever they or the repulsive Nick Griffin ever could. However, to me, they still seem hell bent on carrying on down the road which had created the environment where people feel so disillusioned with the mainstream political parties they feel there is no other choice than to vote BNP. To quote one of my favourite films - The American President - (which, by the way, isn't quite the lightweight chick-flik it might at first seem but does ask some fairly heavy questions amongst the Michael Douglas/Annette Bening generated froth) the way you get votes is to take people who are 'ordinary', who can perhaps remember with nostalgia better times, and then you scare the hell out of them so that they turn to whatever ideology you are peddling as an comforting alternative to the status quo. Nick Griffin and his foul party are past masters of this particular little ploy: they tell people that don't have a job or are on low wages, don't have adequate housing etc etc that the reason they are suffering is because the naughty government has let all the 'immigrants' in to take away the said jobs, money and houses from the honest hardworking British. Where have the BNP had the majority of their successes? - where there are large concentrations of minority groups and immigrant populations in working class areas.

The bottom line of all this is that I believe the political classes should wake up to the fact that the traditional 'working class' haven't changed their opinions very much in the last 40 or so years and they are still pretty bigoted when it comes down to issues of immigration and race. I would suggest the fact that for various reasons we've allowed the lentil-knitting mob to have their way and grab media attention with their over the top politically-correct initiatives has been the biggest factor ensuring the 'working classes' haven't been nudged into holding rather more tolerant views: because present your average blinkered working-class Brit with some of the off-the-scale garbage these people come out with almost guaranteed to result in blank incomprehension at best, and a stream of abusive invective at worst. Ultimately, and this is the uncomfortable fact a lot of people don't like facing, Brits, of whatever class, are generally inclined to be rather racist anyway; whether this is down to having been an imperial power in the not too distant past I wouldn't like to say, but in that sort of climate I'd argue shoving luvvie-generated material around willy-nilly in front of a largely pretty poorly-educated populace is calculated to merely generate ridicule rather than enlightenment and, more importantly, leave the door open for bigots such as Nick Griffin who are prepared to peddle a more superficially attractive ideology.

Whether Nick Griffin and his pals SHOULD be allowed to have their say is another matter which I touched on briefly above. I would argue that they indeed should - if only because by exposing their ideology to the light of open examination will it be shown up to be the nonsense it is. Make something secret, illicit or 'underground' and it initially becomes more attractive; that's human nature, unfortunately. Also, I'd like to believe we should be more inclined to free speech than we are; to again refer to The American President, the character Michael Douglas plays makes the point that we cannot just point to the flag, celebrate it, and say we are 'free' - we have to realise that real freedom is allowing people to revile and burn that flag if they so wish. Even if this means having to listen to views we find offensive or bigoted: such ideologies aren't going to just disappear if we merely deny people the right to voice them.

Unfortunately I don't have a suggestion as regards what we can DO about all this; again as in many of my rants, I would suggest the underlying problem is down to the lack of an enlightened, but realistic, educational philosophy in the UK. Solve that one, and we just might find a few other things are a lot easier to handle... in the meantime politicians in the mainstream parties need to get out on the streets in the BNP stronghold areas and confront the myths they are peddling; engage in open and honest debate. Not with more politically-correct, media-massaged information but with a bit of bald truth, however uncomfortable that might be. Alas, in the current climate I think the pigs are cleared and ready for take off on that one...