The horror story of the BNP’s success is not over

Chris

Calling the BNP racists isn't lazy. They're racists.

Anne Wotana Kaye

I am not a member of the BNP, nor have I ever been. I am neither a member of any political party in this country. However, as a believer in free speech, I am in favour of all parties having the right to stand and represent those who wish to vote for them. One can hardly expect that tin-pot, would be dictator Brown to support this view. He is of the ilk of the so-called Anti-Facist League who wish to silence UK Patriots whilst supporting those who would push Sharia Law onto this still, but barely still free land. I have a rather cynical solution, which the BNP could adopt, but I believe they are not politically canny nor intellectually overly bright. Still, that puts them in the middle of the British Political League tables. They can always agree to accept members of any shade of complexion and any religion or race thus swelling their ranks. In this way, they could accidently create a putch, coming in as a good second or third in a general election.

Noa Zrk

"Looking at Westminster's response to the BNP so far, I'd say the horror story of their success is far from over".
No surprises there Fraser, I'd back the BNP to do extremely well in the General Election and have half a dozen MPs'; None of whom will have led the country into two wars on false pretences, created discriminatory laws against the majority of the population, bankrupted our public finances, or fiddled a penny on expenses and will genuinely represent the views of their constituents. If I was a BNP MEP, or MP, it's I who would be holding my nose in the overpowering stench and hypocrisy of the Westminster midden.

Bob. H

The electoral support for BNP is a clear sign of a vile racism which we cannot help but see everywhere today.
The vile racism I am talking about is that which our Members of Parliament and our intelligent elite has against the historic peoples of Britain and of England in particular.
Voting for any of the main parties just guarantees more of the same, a public loathing of all which we hold dear and important, and even more laws designed to eliminate this nation in favour of EU or sharia laws.
I will never vote for the traitorous main parties again. My vote will most certainly be for UKIP, until I see a repentant Tory Party having the guts to say, "we are sorry, were dishonest when we took this nation into Europe".

Simon

Well done Fraser I see you've already attracting support from people claiming to be "UK patriots". Must be a proud moment. What has The Spectator come to.

UK Seacole Patriots

Simon.

And your point is?

DavidDP

These Labour MP's are their own worse MP. The BNP and stupid nasty racists, but this isn't the way to stop them.

Oh, and Fraser, just so you know - the BNP's vote actually declined in the last elections. The idea they are on some sort of march isn't really borne out by the facts, thank the Lord.

Olaf Rye

Whenever I hear BNP policy, I wonder if there is any difference between what they espouse and that supported by the ordinary political hack that believes that the state should administer and manage all aspects of our lives, apart from their overtly racist position. If anyone took individual liberty seriously in this country, we would not see the BNP nor their slightly more benign ideological confederates that support the state and use its apparatus to champion their own ideological positions. The BNP is definitely a product of the Left.

Peter Rodger

"Nick Brown tabled a deplorable motion in the House of Commons"

Nick Brown is a far nastier individual than Nick Griffin IMO...

Diogenes

What, please, is "un-British", or indeed in any way objectionable, about being anti-EU?

TomTom

Why not simply ban all political parties and make membership a criminal offence ? They are simply gangster organisations seeking to steal public funds to enrich themselves and pay off their friends.

History is littered with groups of the self-interested seeking to steal from the public setting up private groups - akin to Mafiosi - and stealing private property and in some cases whole countries.

The political parties in Europe lack legitimacy and exceed their mandates...they are criminal conspiracies and seem only able to recognise this feature in parties which they resent for highlighting issues they prefer to ignore.

In essence Politics is Theft, a Quasi-Religion to sustain Kleptocracy

Tiberius

Fraser, you identify the problems, but may I ask what you would expect from the mainstream parties in policy terms to neutralize the rise of the BNP?

Austin Barry

Parliamentary niceties aside perhaps we should be more concerned with whether the BNP is tooling-up by encouraging the EDL as its de facto sturmbteilung militant wing?

Fearless Frank

Why stop at MEPs? Go the whole hog and ban any MPS who might be elected! That'll show 'em!!
In fact, why not just ban all MPs fom any party that isn't Labour - it's about time people learned that anyone whose views are not popular in Westminster will not be represented there.

James J

So why is Scottish, Welch or Irish nationalism OK but British nationalism an evil beyond the descriptive powers of the Trendy Classes?
The attempt to suppress British or English nationalism is doomed to failure just as suppressing nationalism always has been.
Like the EU, mass immigration fails a Cost Benefit analysis as far as the majority of the electorate are concerned.

JohnAnt

Most Members are 'of the view' that, for example, they've been unfairly criticised over the expenses scandal.
Most Members are of the view that they deserve bucketloads of our money.
So their viewpoint on anything isn't much of a guide.
Away with them.

Glyn Holford

So Nick Brown, failed Agriculture Minister, and one of the rather unpleasant coterie who encircle the worst chancellor and PM in living memory, wants to ban from the HoC an elected MEP. Speaks more about him than Griffin. Rather like the unlamented and over promoted teacher, made famous by her-sisters-spare-bedroom-when-she-had-a-grace-and-favour-house, Home Secretary and Mr Wilders. Odd how these Socialists are so authoritarian is it not?

Labour by desire and incompetence has lost control of our borders. As they have lost control of the economy, again by deliberate policy and incompetence

And when those disobliging voters eventually twig this and turn against them?

IH

Of course they are a product of British racism (not everyone wants to live in a multicultural Britain). it's just that when you ask anyone about the BNP they daren't say they support them for fear of being hung drawn and quartered.

They are commonly known as far right wing but they are definitely a product of the left, that is why they are scooping up Labour votes.

I happen to agree on a couple of their policies which are not far short of a few Labour policies and I am waiting for the moment some high profile person comes out and supports them, but I won't hold my breath.

john

I listened to BBC's Any Questions today, and listened to predictable comments from the panel.
The BNP are a vile, despicable, etc party, but should be debated to show how vile and despicable they are. ( And, by implication, how vile and despicable are the white working class people who vote for them ).
I was disappointed to see Tory MP Grant Schapps(?) taking this line, instead of putting the case more strongly for more effective controls on immigration.
The BNP will wither on the vine if the Tories in government pay attention to the issues that worry all of us:
Uncontrolled immigration, welfare abuse and low level crime and misbehaviour.

sandra

The BNP at the moment officially represent 1 million voters - And there are millions out there who are unsure whether to vote for them or not, but the way things are going in Westminster more people will come out to vote BNP unless issues are addressed!

They are a force to be reckoned with !!!

pete-s

Smith banned Wilders and was proved wrong by the courts. N Brown wants a legitimate BNP banned from Parliament. Labour are as usual clueless.

Liz Brown

As far as i recall, the BNP hasn't blown anyone up in either Britain or Northern Ireland. I beloeve that the IRA/Sinn Fein has seats in Parliament - tho they don't choose to sit there, albeit, that doesn't stop them claiming their allowances. So who then is the greater evil? and perhaps Nick Brown might care to look more closely at that little anomoly...........

Verity

Anne Wotana Kaye – They have already said they are changing their constitution so they can accept members of any ethnicity. So that’s a dead issue.

Noah Zrk – Well said! Who would want to mix around in the company of Jacqui Smith, Harriet Harman, Jack Straw, Gordon Brown, who’s been ordered to pay some money back to the taxpayer, house flipper Michael Gove and all the other little squealers at the trough, their sly fingers in the citizen's purse and pocket?

This is typical of the self-regarding main parties, which have deserted the electorate in order to please themselves, pat themselves on the back for being so "inclusive" and plot how to order a few more things from the John Lewis list before the axe falls.

Like Bob H, above, I won’t be voting for one of the main parties. My vote will 98% go to UKIP, but if they keep on victimizing a perfectly legally constituted party I’ll bloody vote BNP to help give the two main parties and the MSM a bloody nose.

This reminds me of all the faux outrage about Geert Wilders, with people styling him a “racist” (islam is a religion, not a race) while the Islamics were screaming abuse at him and holding up signs saying they were going to take over Britain.

Chuck Unsworth

Let's be clear, Griffin and his colleagues are where they are as a direct result of being elected. As such their expressed views are the expressed view of a proportion of the populace. Nick Brown is a lazy idiot. If he believes that banning the BNP is the answer, where does he stop? How does he feel about the more extreme Black or Muslim political groupings?

'Horror Story'? I don't think so. Let's get real about this. If you seriously disagree, don't ban, engage. Now, is Nick Brown prepared to get off his well-upholstered backside and open the dialogue?

Anne Wotana Kaye

There is an excellent autobiography by Somalian born Ayaan Hirsi Ali, called "Infidel". This brave and intelligent woman has great respect for Wilders, and only scorn for the so-called anti-rascist, anti-fascist liberals, who make a cottage industry of being pro-Islam. If it does nothing else, this book should convince doubters that fascism is indeed an extreme left wing movement.

TGF UKIP

"The BNP success is a sign not of British racism but of the failure of Westminster parties." No, Fraser, it's a sign of the failure of the whole sodding lot of you villagers.

You must have noticed by now that the two subjects which invariably draw most posts on this website are Europe and the BNP (climate change would almost certainly draw even more but that's a subject you prefer not to go near.) Indeed, Mr Blackburn's recent post on the Equalities Commission and Griffin drew 72 comments.

What is almost invariable too is the resent from many Coffee Housers for the disdainful and sniffy way you villagers always write about the BNP, a perfect example of which is your post above and the final para in particular.

Our country has been stolen from us and it would seem that it's only Griffin who will articulate this, not your precious Dave nor anyone else in your damnable village.

Jez

I've honestly seen this sort of article coming for quite a while Fraser- from you anyway.

That thing in front of you, that you keep banging your head on;

It's called a brick wall.

Now try to imagine that same brick wall away from the world you frequent, into an old Mill Town district with a massively expanding demographics time-bomb sat adjacent to it.

Once it goes, so goes your way of life, your culture and your childrens future in the way a working class Yorkshire / Lancashire family would want for them.

I've voted BNP since the riots up here- and i will continue to do so, this will be until my family and have to leave or something changes for the better.

Being realistic, I think it's going to be the former.

Tyler Durden

The BNP is revolting?

Or are we the people in open revolt! We need a Wilder's to emerge from you establishment lot, or the BNP will have to do, or if you ban it, then it's on the streets with the EDL!

McKenzie

If a working class person had said all that I would be confused. But your colours are shining through like the markings on a stick of Blackpool Rock. I should imagine your target audience is squealing with delight. The BNP will of course not win the general election, it looks like the Tories will. You are going to have a long way to fall buddy. No point getting emotional, it's plain fact. I will be back to remind you though.

David Ossitt

The BNP; vile evil racist low life thugs!

No; a political party who’s members hold some opinions that the majority find very offensive.

But also a political that holds other opinions that the majority totally agree with.

Until the main three parties recognise this as a fact, and start listening to the electorate, the BNP will continue to prosper.

egh

All this froggified posturing and nose-holding. How about clearing the resident garbage out of Westminster? Then the People (and maybe even the BNP) will show them what really smells.

Their own trick of rubbing other people's noses in it is bestial and unworthy of those who are trying to set things right. Perhaps, instead, we can begin to re-establish the system of Justice and Rights that they have systematically destroyed - and put them to the first Trial.

Julian Boulter

Up front - my wife is S Korean, I am not racist. But is it any surprise that the BNP is gaining ground? 2.4m unemployed, 2.6m on other benefits. Imported Filipinos (not EU at last count) replacing all the electrical wiring where I live. How can that happen?

Stephen Tyler

Well, I am a member of the BNP and I am neither a racist nor uneducated. I accept that there are people who think multiculturalism is good for Britain and I suppose they will continue voting for the parties that have foisted this ideology on us for the last 50 years. But for those of us who think multiculturalism has been disastrous for Britain, the only remedy is the BNP.

Verity

Anne Wotana Kaye - Aayan is from Somalia, but her family moved to Kenya when she was a child. Nevertheless, they were still Muslim and arranged a marriage for her in Canada and bought her an air ticket. She had to change planes in Amsterdam, but she never boarded the ongoing flight.

She asked for asylum in Holland, but it was iffy, because she wasn't fleeing Somalia, where she hadn't been since she was a small child, but an arranged marriage.

Anyway, she did get asylum and, because of her facility in languages started helping abused Muslim women. As we know, she was Theo van Gogh's partner in the making of the film (I think) called "Infidel".

She became a Dutch MP and her outspoken opinions about Islam earned her several death threats and 24-hour police protection. She had a treadmill in her apartment because she could never go out, except when accompanied by the police to Parliament. Even when she fled to the United States, where she now resides, Holland continued to provide police protection for her for quite some time. If I'm not wrong, she works for the think tank American Enterprise Institute.

This lady is extremely opposed to Islam, and she knows it from the inside.

Noa Zrk

Jez.
Absolutely on the money with your comments here. As the song goes "..its the rich wot gets the pleasure. The poor what gets pain..."or some such. One thing entirely to live as one of the Chetterati in London, sternly upholding post empire liberal values at the expense of those who have to live next to or in increasingly hostile third world ghettoes where where English is not not spoken and aggressive ethnic 'British' youths threaten you with violence for being in their territory.

Expat 44

Any member of Parliament , and any party, that can attract enough votes to be legally elected, is entitled to the full facilities of the Palace of Westminster.

It is called Democracy.

If we ever get slide back into the King George III and John Wilkes situation, then it shows that liberty is, once again, in serious trouble. We seem to be living in dangerous anti-libertarian times.

The vote of the people is sovereign, whether 'bien pensents', the metropolitan elite and the Establishment like it or not.

Over the years many have died to uphold this principle.

I don't agree with many of the BNP's policies or ideas; but I uphold their right to exist - as any true Democrat must.

God forbid that Britons should ever live in a State that 'licences' political parties, and, by extension, individuals freedom of political belief.

Bill Rees

"Griffin is there mainly on white working class votes".
I really don't think you get it!
Because of my profession I meet a lot of working class people, and because of my lifestyle I mix with a lot of middle class people.
The most vehement supporters of the BNP, in my experience, are the middle classes, but they will only admit it when they feel sure they aren't going to be revealed to the wider world as BNP supporters.
A lot of people who think deeply about the problems facing this country today seem to have concluded that the BNP offers a solution, if only as a protest vote.
Islam is the cause of all this, and the sight of Muslim demonstrators outside Parliament threatening the life of Geert Wilders merely reinforces the disquiet that many middle class people feel.
I'm still a conservative supporter, but the party needs to address this issue, and has to show that it won't tolerate Islamic fascism if it is to draw many voters back into the fold.

Any Colour but Brown

Fraser,

before using some of the epithets, that are strewn around your article, I suggest that you go and live in somewhere like Bradford for a couple of months.

My guess is that you'd go home as a member of the BNP.

And before you stick your nose in the air and deny it, I think that, in this case, you're a eunuch giving advice on sex. You don't understand the reasons for people supporting parties like the BNP, because you never leave your ivory tower.

Jez

Noa Zrk;

Cheers.

There's a massive gulf getting wider and wider.

No answers. No compromise from the people who've caused this.

Tonight, another assault by the liberal elite toward the BNP;

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/politics/article6879563.ece

The electorate and i don't see it as an assault against the personalities, organisation that the mainstream media have fought with since their student days.

I see it as them trying to silence anyone who wants to stick up for me being able to bring my kids up, in the area of my choosing within a British way of life.

Straight right. 100%!

J Law

“I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it.” - Voltaire

The people voted in Nick Griffin as is there right, is Nick Brown against freedom of speech?

Rob C

I read many of the above comments with a mixture of alarm and amusement. I'm not racist either and don't agree with many of the comments on immigration, but I do firmly believe that those wishing to reside in the UK should live by our laws and not import their own. I'd also like to export some of the work-shy in their place - but that's another issue! I do believe that most of those voting for the BNP aren't racist either - they are perhaps not as politically aware as some of us and perhaps just victims of spin. (The same could be said of many Labour voters!)

'Fringe parties' like BNP, UKIP, Respect, The Greens etc all gain in popularity when the mainstream players choose to ignore or under-estimate issues that are important to the electorate. The Greens were probably ahead of the curve on many environmental issues and, but for lunatic fringes and bad press from the likes of Greenpeace, would probably have fared better, sooner. It's the out-of-control 'Express Train' to EU integration and the associated feeling of helplessness that is, amongst other things, fueling the support for the likes of the BNP. And the major parties still don't get it! I deplore most of what the BNP stand for, but if they were the only party to put the brakes on the EU gravy train then sadly, I have to say I'd vote for them. I'm probably much more trusting/naive than most and thus David Cameron will still get my vote, but if he fails to reign in EU federalism then he certainly won't next time around. Like most people, I don't care how he achieves it, nor the 'legalities' of it, we must reverse the current moves to further integration. I have never voted to become an EU citizen rather than a British one and until I have, I will never accept an 'EU president' as my head of state or representative. I see the EU as an invasion by stealth/cunning and no different in outcome to that a war. Our political 'leadership' may well have underestimated the British people if they think we will just roll-over and accept it. Democracy & Freedom were hard fought/won over a long time and shouldn't so easily be discarded. Labour seem to believe that parachuting in Brit into the top job will pacify the electorate - it won't - least of all if that Brit is that egotistical little p**** Bliar!

Rob C

P.S. Whatever anyone thinks of the BNP, if they are elected then they have as much right to be in parliament as any other party. If we ban them then we are ignoring the problem of why they are elected - much better to listen to the concerns of their voters and address them! I find Gordon Brown's policies and beliefs just as damaging as Griffin's and yet he's allowed in parliament. Oh, and he wasn't elected to his job...

Moraymint

"Some of their views (anti-EU, anti-mass immigration) are that of the mainstream in Britain but find no Westminster representation ..."

Yup, that's about it really.

And here's me, a polite, professional, middle-class bloke thinking that I'm also anti-EU and anti-mass immigration. And nobody in Westminster represents me either.

Scary when you think about it.

Summer

"I find them wholly loathsome, genuinely racist and fundamentally un-British."

Well that is a very good discription of today's Labour party. And indeed many of their cheerleaders in the media who say nothing about Muslims from Pakistani backgrounds waving signs about 'taking Britain over', whilst continuing this vile verbal abuse aginst the BNP. Why are you not all putting the same amount of effort into calling for the criminal MP's to step down and call a general election. That would do a whole lot more good for the country than this continued fixation with the BNP going on television and what Ms Tory Represenatative (who only got the title because she was Muslim) should wear!!

However, I notice on nearly every BNP article that now appears with comments that there is a growing number of people who are willing to stand up for the BNP's right to speak and have their views; that Frazer is exactly what I would expect from British people!!

PS A genuine racist thinks that their race is superior to others and backs that up through actions. My understanding is the the BNP think that Britain is where British rather than another, foreign, culture should flourish and be superior. And that to let foreign cultures flourish and grow here to such a large extent is detrimental to British culture and thereby British people. A minority of people may believe in the former definition (including many people of the Islamic faith, although that is not a race) but a majority of people in the world would believe that their own culture should be the superior one in their own country - but not in someone elses. So what is so vile about the BNP pray? It seems to me they hold a majority world view on this issue!

Wilhelm

Frazer Nelson squeeeeelds from the rooftops

Well what do you expect from the pavlov dogs of The National Union of Journalist sheep.

All togethor now bah bah.

Fraser, a little helpful tip for you, try looking at the readers comments,you are alienating the readership.

Its not wise thing to do, kid.

daniel maris

I am not sure that BNP are that big a threat - but mass immigration, the Shariah propaganda, the welfare dependency culture, unemployment and handing over the streets to criminals certainly ARE.

If the big parties tackled those issues then the BNP would be consigned to oblivion.

wrinkled weasel

With breathtaking hypocrisy Parliament is prepared to allow in a murdering bastard to ooze his oleaginous self-justification for bombing HM government through its hallowed portals, but not somebody with armed only with a democratic mandate.

I think the morality of MPs may need some fine tuning.

Wilhelm

Fraser Nelson lives in Twickenham far far away from the '' joys '' of the multicultural ghetto.

Funny that, isnt it ?

Dave Wright

I'm middle class and they've got my vote.

Jade

NEWSFLASH....The 'big' parties ARE NOT going to 'tackle' the main issues.
They just want the power.
I WILL NOT be voting for any of them.
Top of the ballot paper to you

Zonked

As a son of immigrants I am convinced that Labour have done more damage to black men and woman than Nick Griffin could ever achieve, even in a thousand years. Walking through Harriat Harman’s Peckham constituency brings real sadness at the blighted lives. Labour needs the BNP. It needs bogeymen to sell the lie that it is the party that will unequivocally lead the fight against them. When people are drawn in to the debate and (quite rightly) defend the BNP’s democratically earnt rights I can’t help feeling they are paying into this game.

I vote Conservative because I believe in the notion of the free individual. I want to be free to work, earn money, pay fair tax’s, choose where I live. I also am an optimist; I think people are intrinsically decent and state intervention is no substitute for that.

I would love to see the Conservatives taking the fight to the BNP; arguing on an agenda of values that would resonate across the ethnic divides. Yes it would damage Harriat Harman more than Nick Griffin, but it would show that a genuine democratic alternative existed for those people who currently feel disenfranchised.

mostly harmless

does any one know how much the BNP will pay for voluntary repatriation? As it's one of their policies it might be useful to know the potential cost to the tax payer

Verity

Rob C writes: "I'm probably much more trusting/naive than most and thus David Cameron will still get my vote, but if he fails to reign in EU federalism then he certainly won't next time around."

If there’s a "next time round". Within five years, elections may have been "harmonised" along Continental lines, with our ancient system and customs being dumped in the cause ein Volk.

Interesting, Rob C, that you misspelled "rein in".

Verity

Daniel Maris, there is also the problem of the Gramscis/Marxists/Trots not providing children with education. They are teaching them "communications skills" and "not playing with sharp objects" and "understanding transsexuals" skills. But not reading and writing skills. Not deductive reasoning skills. Not science skills. Not the glorious history of our country. Not the literature of our country. But "understanding why Mikey has two daddies" skills.

Why?

Need one ask?

Verity

Wrinkled Weasel - Well put, sir!

Verity

Zonked, I would also like the BNP to field ethnic candidates. For example, that Sri Lankan postmaster who absolutely refuses to serve anyone in his shop who won't speak English. Even at a cost to his business. He has his point to make. The BNP should grab that man.

And with the BNP widening its membership net, there will be immigrants and children of immigrants who embrace the values and traditions of Britons, as immigrants throughout time have embraced the culture they hope to live in or were born into, and might like to stand for Parliament.

The BNP should see if they can give them that chance.

It is the malignant socialists who are set on derailing human nature. They can't. But they'll never stop trying ... especially now the Brave New World of growing babies in test tubes has arrived, thanks to commie "Baroness" Warnecke.

Destabilisation. Control.

terence patrick hewett

If Cameron does not sort the country out, then the next stop will be UKIP and the BNP. The main political parties do not realise the danger they are in.

Roy Smith

Neither should their success be over. It would do the Westminster circles a power of good to have half a dozen or more BNP members to mix among their sort. It needs them. Just as this topic is needed in these blogs and elsewhere to let it be known the powers-that-be have been asleep and horribly misjudged. They have been slumbering on, oblivious of all but their own pet theories and blind selfrighteousness.

biggestaspidistra

I like Fraser. I think he's an extroadinarily bright, uniquely gifted journalist. Was a little disturbed to see him become giddy in close proximity to Cameron at the Manchester conference but he's only human. There's a lot to think about here Fraser, many posters with views opposed to your own speak from experience and with a voice of integrity. I'm particularly struck by Jez's comment at 9:49.

biggestaspidistra

meant Jez at 7:39

Herbert Thornton

Fraser may consider that the BNP's success is a "horror" story. Maybe it is, to him, and it certainly seems, from the frenzy of mud-slinging that he and the rest of the establishment have recently begun, that he and they are in a real state of panic.

The truth of the situation is that the real horror story is the pig-headedness and venality of the establishment and of both the Labour and Tory Parties. They are clearly entirely happy to facilitate the submission of Britain to bad, undemocratic government from Europe, not to mention the general destruction of all decency and common sense and their replacement by the sick dictatorship of political correctness. And as if that were not bad enough, they are not just supine, but defend and encourage the insane rate of immigration of undesirables, especially the Islamic component of it, which unless stopped and reversed, is certain to lead, in due course, to the even worse fate of subjection by Islam.

In light of this, the rising tide of support for the BNP is not just understandable - it should be welcomed. We should all pray that it will rise sufficiently, and soon enough, to secure a decent, civilised life for our children, grandchildren and generations after them.

Fergus Pickering

Well of course the BNP are racists. So what? Is it against the law to be a racist? Oh, yes it is. Bloody silly law, don't you think? It's like Holocaust Dednial. Why shouldn't you deny the holocaust if you want to? Why shouldn't you assert the earth is flat, that socialism works or that man-made global warming is a fact. Free Speech means free speech for everyone except those who would incite murder, mayhem or the overthrow of the state by force of arms. Racism is neither here nor there.

alex

this obsession with racism....oh dear me the bnp are racists! well so are the labour party, their view of ethnic british people very much mirrors the bnp's view of muslims. alan clarke, a tory, once praised adolf hitler, and said black africans living in britain should go back to bongo bongo land, yet nobody thinks he or the tories are a threat to british democracy. my point is this; liberals don't for one second think, nor fear, that the bnp may be undemocratic just because of a few nasty statements about immigrant communities, this fear of the bnp and other so-called far right parties, comes from the fact that millions of ordinary ethnic british people, (and europeans,) of all classes, are beginning to wake up to the lies and corruption that has marked western society since the end of the second world war, these elites fear that their power is being put back into the hands of voters, rather than the self-appointed lobby groups for special interests and the socialist-dominated international foundations, such as the ford foundation, rockefeller, carnegie, etc, who are the real power behind the thrones of goverment. i am a supporter of the bnp, and i have nothing against black people or asians or jews, but i do not think that these ethnic/cultural goups have a right to lord it over ethnic english, scottish, welsh and irish people in our own indigenous land. we have the right to exist and flourish without the rest of the world ordering us about or forcing themselfs and 'their' religious and cultural norms upon our native society. if that makes me racist, then i am a proud racist. and so is everybody else in this world, because we are at heart, all tribal beings.

David Skitmore

Fraser just a few words the Britain you talk about as been the 'most tolerant country on earth' that's gone, you use words like loathsome when describing the BNP.
Last week talking to a old left-wing socailist friend he said to me that the only thing he hate's more then the tories was a black tory i have never hard any BNP supporting friends say anything as vile as that.

David Skitmore

Another point frazer it's the vile and 'loathsome' Labour party and it's disastrous social engineering experiment that's to blame for the rise of British nationalism not Mr Griffin.

L BUCK

So glad to see those muslims waving their banners at Wilders,more votes for the BNP i think

Jade

Herbert Thornton...EXACTLY!!!
Can not be said often enough.
From what I have heard(from Nick Griffin) the BNP WILL
STOP immigration,
Get out of Europe.
Throw out the illegals who are in our jails
Begin to build up our manufacturing sector.They do not want the British economy to be dependent on banking or retail from imports. Does that sound like a horror story?

Frank Leader

The BNP are a party I would never want to see in power. They have up to now not been responsible for or associated with any assissinations. Unlike David Miliband's grandfather who was involved with a group who assissinated Ztar Nicholas in the Bolsivic revolution.

Joe Broughton

I find it particularly odd that the media are convinced that the BNP gets it's support from the underclass and poor. It is very misjudged. I come from a solidly middle class background and have traditionally been a Tory with liberal leanings. I shall be voting BNP as shall many of my friends. It would appear to be the only option. I am lucky enough to live in a village far from the horrors of mass immigration but I am patriotic enough to be deeply concerned for my fellow English, Irish, Scottish and Welsh brothers who have to fight out a daily existence with Poles, Africans and everyone else who the government has dumped on them. The next election is going to be sobering.

MikeF

As you say Britain is the possibly the most tolerant country on Earth. But the point is that much of official policy on 'race relations', as they used to be called, is based on the opposite premise. In other words the great majority of the UK population are depicted as little more than a series of pogroms waiting to happen and that nothing stands between a fragile peace and racist mayhem except the superior sensibilities and vigilance of a self-defined multi-culturalist elite. That insulting and patronising premise is why people vote BNP.

As such the BNP will not go away as long as official policy and attitudes remain the same. To put it bluntly socialist/left-liberal 'anti-racism' is not the antithesis of the BNP's 'racism'. It is simply its inversion. Frankly there is nothing a panic-stricken left would like more in the run-up to an election in which they might yet be obliterated than the opportunity to run with an 'anti-fascist' scare. The fact is that 'Unite Against Fascism' really means 'Unite to Preserve Your Own Desperate Belief That You are Morally Superior to Most Other People'.

What is required instead is 'non-racism' - a comprehensive approach to these issues that couples light-touch legislation, sure overt discrimination shold be illegal, with a positive assertion of traditional British values and customs - not least freedom of speech and equality before the law. Get that and we might actually move forward to something better than we have now.

Austin Barry

It used to be that we thought MPs were honest people doing their best for altruistic reasons. Given that presumption maybe they were right and that immigration was a good thing. Now that we know they are a gang of self-serving crooks all their pious homilies and strategies collapse into a heap of rank, steaming nonsense and we live with murderous Islamism, gangsta'd inner cities and multi-tribalism. A complete mess. The principal oddity about the BNP is why it does not attract more votes.

The Puppet Master

If Alastair Darling can move from being a Trotskiyite to a Labour MP, then I see no reason why the BNP cannot move from its roots in fascism to becoming the party of English nationalism.
If Scotland and Wales can have nationalist parties, then I don't see why we can't.
Having lived in Kuwait and having visited Pakistan, I do not want Islam to be allowed in Britain. I see no reason why Mosques should be allowed and I'd like to see the Koran banned. I think this is reasonable, many muslim countries ban Christianity.
If Griffin can move the BNP from being judged solely on the race issue and present other concerns long ignored by the main parties, then the BNP could grow very quickly. It probably won't happen for a few years though, not until the current belief system is shattered by Gordon's debt crisis.
If the BNP proposes to dismantle Labour's totalitarian state, they'd have my vote.

macumazan

The problem is simply that the BNP represents political health. Policies that have demonstrably failed are increasingly being rejected by the electorate and the elites are belatedly recognizing that the source of their power is failing. No wonder the opposition to the BNP is so visceral! When political forces realign themselves in Great Britain, as is inevitable, historians will wonder that the political realignment took so long and why it was was the occasion of so much unpleasantness. The BNP policy is obviously correct and it is the only party offering repatriation of immigrants as a serious option. When it is seen as a genuinely serious political option by the native British, the political scene will change overnight. The Spectator ought to be urging the adoption of BNP policies rather than name-calling from its affected holier-than-thou position of what is actually nation-destroying liberalism.

daniel maris

It's difficult to debate when threads get infested with so many BNP agents and clones.

However, to my mind this is all crystal clear:-

1. The BNP is not British or nationalist. It has at its core a Nazi cadre who are racist and totalitarian ideologues. To the extent that they don't reveal this in their party policy they are simply deceiving the public and looking to take a free ride on the democratic bus to power. Nazis were never German or Austrian or Dutch or Norwegian nationalists and they are not British nationalists. They are Aryan nationalists. They probably think no more than 10% of the British population are deserving of the Aryan tag. The rest are fit only for service or extermination according to Nazi ideology.

2. Anyone who is not a racist ideologue but supports the BNP is a complete and utter fool. I can't imagine there are too many of those among the Spectator readership - so I think these "I'm not a racist but I'm supporting the BNP..." post are probably from BNP clones.

3. However, BNP are not the real problem. It's not a question of, as Fraser Nelson claims, "tackling the immigration debate". It is a question of tackling immigration per se and also tackling the effects of previous immigration - where the politicians have failed to pursue strong integrationist policies.

4. We need to address in radical fashion the related problems of education, welfare dependency, youth crime and youth unemployment. We need as a society and as a state to ensure young people have access to paid employment (both permanent after education and temporary at a younger age); we need to break up the gangs that infest many of our communities and back the law-abiding; we need to remove welfare dependency and the irrational income signals the current system sends out; and we need to develop a much more effective education system - beginning with restoration of school discipline through a variety of measures.

The fact is that because we have only a very weak democracy with nothing like the Swiss referendum system, we are unable to express ourselves very effectively. Our oligarchic system means the main parties have been able to ignore these vital issues. I think probably only UKIP comes close to fitting the bill since we will never get control over our borders as long as we are in the EU. They will probably get swamped in a General Election - but if you feel these issues are important they may be the only rational choice.

robert

Racism is something that brings us together. All races exhibit racism, and therefore it is something we should, to borrow a phrase from the au courant bureaucratspeak, "celebrate".

drakes drum

Rob C. I read with interest your contributions. You are obviously an intelligent man so I pose to you this.

Cameron has won the general election. Unfortunately the Lisbon Treaty has been ratified as the Czech President signed the documentation some months before the general election.

Cameron, during the campaign promised that he would re-negotiate certain parts of the treaty and people believed him.

At the first meeting of the Heads of Government which is presided by the new President of the European Union, Anthony Blair, Cameron is told in no uncertain terms that he cannot re-negotiate anything.

He is reminded that all former nations are now citizens of the United States of Europe and if Cameron continues to cause problems he will be refused permission to attend any future 'Heads of Local Administrations' meetings (as the new body has been re-named!) President Blair may call. He will also be told he will not have a seat in President Blair's Cabinet.

He is reminded that the EU has the authority, signed by Her Majesty the Queen after Prime Minister Brown had signed the Treaty, to force a local general election in the former United Kingdom to be held, and because of their opposition to the EU the Conservative Party, Ukip, BNP, are all banned from standing in that election!

Far fetched? read the EU Constitution as allegedly ammended by the Lisbon Treay!!

I believe that you, Rob C, like so many people have been conned by Cameron and both Labour and Liberal Democrat Parties.

Once the Czech's sign then our fate is sealed and nothing can be changed! End of story. End of England.

Rhory Fraser

Why is being racist un-British and since when exactly?

Until VERY recently, Great Britain's character was fundamentally imperialistic and nationalistic, a belief system founded on ideas of not just racial identity - 'this island race' etc - but racial superiority and our God-given right to bless the natives of the world with British culture and institutions.

Since the end of Empire and the backwash of mass immigration, we have simply lost self-belief and been taught not only to abandon but revile our former identity.

But please namesake, don't pretend that being liberal and progressive is somehow fundamentally British.

Jade

Joe Broughton..DITTO!
I listened(doing the ironing)to Nick Griffin with Adam Boulton and he answered EVERY question calmly,rationally and said EXACTLY what the British VOTERS wanted to hear. While they do that,the main parties can shout racists all they want.
If this was the business world,this would be the healthy competition they are forever advocating.Makes the slackers UP THEIR GAME.
Smear tactics are not working any more so I would suggest the main parties to TELL US IN ENGLISH WHAT ARE YOU GOING TO DO ABOUT THE EU AND IMMIGRATION?
All of a sudden the economy can 'look after itself' for a while.We all believe the main parties are troughers and have led us so far into Europe WITHOUT our say,we do not believe them anymore.They are in REAL danger of ALL BEING OUT OF POWER.
The people ARE at last standing up for themselves and it has NOTHING to do with being a racist.

logdon

The BNP get a hearing and our so called opinion formers, leaders, MP’s and defenders of democracy work themselves into an apoplectic, red faced lather.

Similarly, Geert Wilders, lets not forget a democratically elected MP, is described as a racist extremist by ditto above, ‘opinion formers, leaders, MP’s and defenders of democracy.’

Meanwhile I’ve extrapolated comments from the banners brandished by bearded, beturbanned and hate filled young British Muslim males, who let’s face the truth here, would just love to see him as the writhing victim of one of those internet posted, horrifically sadistic ’jihad video’s’ which obviously fascinate them so much.

“Islam will dominate the world. Freedom can go to hell."

"Shariah the true solution. Freedom can go to hell."

"Shariah for the Netherlands. Islam will be superior.”

And when interviewed this is what these charmers have to say.

Abu Mousa : 'What he says deserves the death sentence under Islam.'

Sayful Islam: ‘Mr Wilders should be tried in an Islamic court for insulting the Prophet. We need to put this dog on a leash.'

And Wilders, whose 17-minute documentary Fitna, features verbatim verses directly lifted from the Koran alongside corresponding images of the September 11 and July 7 terrorist attacks, response?

'I am very proud that people - even if they totally disagree with me - can use their democratic right to protest.'

'I have a problem with the Islamic ideology, the Islamic culture, because I feel that the more Islam we get in our societies, the less freedom we get.'

'I am not extreme, I am not a racist.'

Get that? 'The more Islam we get in our societies, the less freedom we get.'

Comparing this with, “Islam will dominate the world. Freedom can go to hell”, who in their right mind could argue?

Moral inversion has reached it’s apogee. We have descended into such a pit of relative value excuse and apology that objectivity has descended into black Orwellian farce.

Capitulation in the face of extreme Islam is now the ne plus ultra of western thought. The islamic steamroller is flattening all before it from the UN Goldstone Report to British policewomen donning burkas. There is literally nowhere left to hide from this monstrous onslaught.

If the BNP causes consternation amongst those who would hurl our very existence to the tender mercies of this expansionist creed, good!

We are approaching an eleventh hour of dimming lights all over Europe. Yet again.

If the BNP creates a counter, bring the bloody thing on.

Now.

Winter

@ Summer

"PS A genuine racist thinks that their race is superior to others and backs that up through actions. My understanding is the the BNP think that Britain is where British rather than another, foreign, culture should flourish and be superior. And that to let foreign cultures flourish and grow here to such a large extent is detrimental to British culture and thereby British people... So what is so vile about the BNP pray? It seems to me they hold a majority world view on this issue!"

You are hideously, tragically mistaken.

They go to some lengths to hide it around election time, but the core of the BNP's belief system is the pseudo-science of racial determinism propounded by Adolf Hitler. Nick Griffin has talked of being an avid reader of Mein Kampf from the age of 13, and the party's original founder liked to dress in full NAZI uniform. At a recent BNP "red white and blue" festival, a Gollywog doll was burned symbolically, and a supporter was recorded saying "Let's go into the town and get a real one". That is the core vote of the BNP.

This is why non-whites cannot join the party, and the BNP thinks Britain should be a purely white country, and so BNP policy is that non-whites should be repatriated. Firstly they say they would offer monetary incentives, and also make them second-class citizens under the law (as in Apartheid South Africa), and if all that didn't work they reserve the right to try other methods, as yet unspecified.

To find out what a political party believes, the best thing to do is read what its leaders say. They don't draw attention to their core beliefs, but they do state them publicly here and there in their published material - you just have to read beyond the campaign leaflets designed to pull in the casual voter. Try visiting their online shop called Excalibur, which has a section of books called "Race and Science".

Can anyone honestly imagine Britain without any of its leading black or mixed-race personalities? Sir Trevor McDonald seems more recognisably British than most of the disgusting white binge-drinkers that live near me. And sport has produced a wealth of black British national treasures over the years like Denise Lewis, Linford Christie, Daley Thompson, and a host of footballers and boxers.

By all means campaign for controlled immigration, as it seems undeniable that it would probably have a detrimental effect on communities due to clashing cultures and ghettoisation. And feel free to campaign for the English language - as if it needed a campaign; it's probably going to wipe out all other languages over the next century, for better or worse.

But to vote BNP is to commit an unforgivable crime of wilful ignorance. They are not the voice of common sense, but the voice of madness, wearing a disguise designed to dupe the small minority of voters who don't bother to investigate the actual recorded beliefs of the politicians they vote for.

On the other hand, if you too enjoy reading Mein Kampf, identify yourself with Oswald Moseley, think Winston Churchill took the wrong side in the war, are a friend of the KKK, a denier of the "Holohoax", a eugenics enthusiast, a white supremacist, a skinhead... oh, and, by the way, you also want a return to the economics of the 1970s, as if to prove your idiocy... then the BNP might just be the party for you.

Why not let your neighbours know how you feel about the special destiny of your race by visiting the BNP's online shop and buying a T-shirt featuring a cartoon of a polar bear in sunglasses, with the slogan "It’s Cool to be White"? £10 plus £2 P&P. Allow 14 days for delivery.

Wilhelm

Logon

You missed out the sign '' Behead all infidels and kuffirs.
What I want to know is where was Unite Against Facism not demostrating against the islamofacists or is it they just loathe English caucasions of the BNP.

That Weyman Bennet of the Unite Against Facism is not the sharpest knife in the drawer, just google a photo of him.

Look up Barenakedislam website, its a muslim beheading website, charming.

Chris cooper

I think secretly Journo's like fraser nelson love the BNP ! Do a google search for BNP & you will find hundreds of articles about them on an almost daily basis !!.. It gives them something to write about !

Hepworth

"The skinheads he represents".
A very silly comment you obviously have not a clue as to the makeup of the BNP.
Didn't the leaked membership list give you a hint?
Research your subject or stop telling lies.

Jyzzia

horror story!!!! having Rod Trendy Liddle fiddle while Rome burns is a horror story.
You should rename Spectator "Trendy Talk"

Taqqya

Jizzia is right. I don' think I've ever managed to make it all the way through any Rod Liddle piece. In fact, I don't even make the attempt any more.

chris cooper

"Horror story" ? I think its a Terrific story,best thing to happen in british politics for decades, perspective is a wonderful thing is it not :) ..
Anyway be grateful for them, I mean how else would Jouno's & the media in general fill there "newspaper" columns ?

Frank S

BNP, UK Islamists, Sinn Fein. Which is the most loathsome? Which is the most dangerous? It all depends on your timescales, and imagined future impact of these odious groups. But I cannot find any way to get the BNP into first place!

Anne Wotana Kaye

Frank Leader: Frank, one sees that David Milliband in metaphorically carrying on his vile grandfather's work, but in this country.

Anne Wotana Kaye

Frank Leader: Frank, one sees that David Milliband in metaphorically carrying on his vile grandfather's work, but in this country.

daniel maris

Logdon -

Well as I said...there are a lot BNP clones here.

Anyone who looks into Wilders' statements and actions can see he is not a racist. His Freedom Party for instance is open to people of all ethnic backgrounds in the Netherlands. The BNP has a racist bar on membership by non-"white" Britons.

If you are telling me you can't see the difference then we'll know you are a BNP clone.

daniel maris

Frank S. -

I agree with you. I'd put Islamists in poll position. Not least because there are probably about 200,000 committed and active Islamists in this country and probably not more than one tenth that figure of committed BNP nazis.

Sinn Fein were never any threat to our democracy or our culture - at least not on the mainland. Obviously for people in Northern Ireland it was a different matter.

Snowman

Daniel Maris 12.47 & Winter 1.58

Listen, this runs as a blog, stuff your pseudo-lib indoctrination pap. We’ve heard it for years, it scares far less than the true horrors of the expenses scandal, the return of Lord Mandy, and the other stuff associated with the current lot. Am grateful though for the tip of the T-shirt with the white polar bear. I’ll buy one, sounds cool.

Can anyone honestly tell the difference between Labour and Tories policies on the four domains that bother the vast majority of people - immigration, law and order, Europe and the multi-culti creed. I bet you even Fraser can’t. What’s the point agonising which one to vote for, then? The BNP’ solutions are different, visibly different, and close to what the bulk of the populace think. I admit I’d very much prefer if there was a party without the baggage of both left (nationalise everything that moves) and right (we are the super race) extremes. There ain’t, the BNP will have to do.

Guinevere

Furthermore on the left/right debate: The BNP is a white supremacist party, with a tiny veneer of British nationalism as an 'acceptable' cover. Anyone who has looked at them closer knows how close their links to international white supremacist organisations are - your '14-wordists', the whole lot. Their core membership is low-educated city dwellers with very little interest in true British history, tradition or customs, and the number of practising pagans and witches and atheists among their ranks also show that they are essentially anti-Christian. So what may seem appealing to the 'disempowered' working and middle classes quickly evaporates when the true BNP emerges. If they ran this country their infighting and lack of knowledge would run the place into ruin within minutes - consider the example of what has happened to many of their elected councillors, they haven't exactly accomplished much.

TGF UKIP

6.50 pm and 89 comments registered so far, and most demonstrating again, Fraser, that the gap is not just with your NoW readers, it is with your Coffee Housers as well.

The simple fact is that the BNP is a left wing nationalist party whereas all your major parties are instinctively "One Worlders" (to use Verity's phrase) and would regard a description of being nationalist as pejorative and none would be more horrified by such a tag as your lot.

Next World Cup Summer the streets will be full of cars carrying the cross of St George with the mainstream population demonstrating again that it is indeed nationalist and patriotic. As usual there will be much disdainful sniffing and mockery from the village which finds such instincts wholly alien and obnoxious. That's why there's such a gap and that's why the BNP will continue to prosper and regard for the main parties to shrink.

Noa Zrk

Guinevere: "The BNP is a white supremacist party, with a tiny veneer of British nationalism as an 'acceptable' cover". They sound uncannily like those darlings of the International Left, the ANC, to me; who argue and implement a policy of black supremacy, euphemistically known as positive discrimination on the basis that its acceptable to discriminate against all Whites because they are the minority non-indigenous ethnic grouping. But its not acceptable for the BNP to argue for the ethnic interests of the majority in the UK. Why is that?

Robert Marchenoir

Im afraid I don't get Mr. Nelson's point.

First, he says that the BNP success is not a sign of British racism.

Then, he argues that the BNP is really about opposing mass immigration, and that this is a "mainstream" view in Britain. By that, I presume he means it's legitimate to hold such a view.

But finally, he says that the BNP is "loathsome, genuinely racist and un-British".

What he fails to tell us is where he sees any racism (and un-Britishness) in the BNP, apart from its opposition to mass immigration. Or what he means exactly by "racism".

This ridiculous intellectual dance, which has been going on for ages all over the West, really means one thing : the chattering classes cannot hide any longer that the majority of the people is fed up with immigration.

Therefore, while giving lip service to them, they refuse to admit the consequences and take the harsh measures that would be called for -- thus the "racist" defamation. The BNP (and Front national, and Vlaams Belang, etc) are right ; except the elite deny them the right to say so. The hypocrisy is staggering.

Is it that hard to aknowledge one's mistake, and utter those simple words : Enoch Powell was right ?

daniel maris

Snowman -

Well I think I can spot some BNP clones here. People flying under false colours. I really don't believe Spectator readers (or rather the vast majority) are that thick as to vote for an ideological racist and statist party when they oppose Nazi totalitarianism and know it would be a disaster for this country.

I think Spectators who are rightly concerned about mass immigration, the free ride being given to Shariah by the establishment, the EU takeover, welfare dependency, and streets given over to criminals - will either fight for policy changes within the Conservative Party or vote UKIP. Only a poor confused and deluded minority will consider voting for the BNP.

So I just think all the BNP propaganda here is coming from BNP members or voters rather than regular Spectator readers. I think we can tell that from how quickly people like you resort to personal abuse rather than argument.

Snowman

Doesn’t the futility of the argument about the true nature of the BNP - rightwing, leftwing and all that - hit you in the eye?. They can’t and won’t get a look in in the current first-past-the-post electoral system. Even if the two major parties were to screw up even more than they’ve messed up till now, the British electorate will never go for NG and his lot in numbers needed to form a government. And rightly so, too. The only value of the BNP seems to be in that the size of the popular vote they can cobble up may, just may, convey the message loud and clear to those who govern us that the country has had enough of the experiment in which moral relativism, multi-culti, political correctness and all the other pseudo-liberal pap rule. The top-down engineering of human souls never did and never will work.

logdon

daniel maris
October 18th, 2009 6:37pm

BNP clone?

Obviously you didn't read my post or you would hesitate to hurl the ad homimem.

And if BNP clone is the best you can do, forget it.

I was rooting for Wilders and it seems to have escaped your attention that all the abuse the BNP attract is replicated when talking of him. Last week on QT an audience member talked of racist Wilders. Smith used similar language when denying entry.

The BNP serve a purpose right now and that's to get everyone talking. The argument raging over on Melanie's blog has attracted enormous response.

Are you suggesting debate is a bad thing? That your kneejerk reaction should shut down all conversation?

Griffin is now deciding to allow blacks into his party. Could I, as a white non Muslim join the MCB or MAB or Hizb ut Tahrir. Or the Black Police Association?

That's the difference, buddy. Equality is equality whichever way you frame it.

Anne Wotana Kaye

This blog forum has certainly received maximum interest. I only wish the same iterest could be generated in Spectator readers concerning the vile Support Sharia Law demos due to take place on October 31st all over the UK. Naturally, their allies and defenders the Anti-Facist League will misguidedly be there. How I wish we, the civilised ordinary voters of different parties, could be there too defending democracy and our way of life. Just to be there and hold a flag. But no, too much apathy, the couch, the beer and the TV will have a greater pull. Thus will civilisation finally die. Not with a roar, but a whimper.

Holly

Fraser.
"Whose fault is it that Griffin was elected in the first place"?....erm....let me think....Politicians and journalist like your good self,who have backed to the hilt the afore mentioned...so get off your high horse.
The media in this country over the last decade have supported everything that has gone on and are now acting all moral and affronted.
You were duped, made to look stupid for falling for the lies/spin and happily reported/printed every smear that was churned out by Blair,Campbell,Draper,Mandy,
Brown & the rest of them.
So don't be too hard on yourself,you were not alone in your crusade to tell us the merits of Labour and the faults of everyone else.Just a shame you were ALL wrong!
Yet STILL you do it...only this time with the BNP.It is irrelevant what the media or journalists say, we WILL this time make our OWN decision, based on what the BNP say, NOT what the media and journalists say.After all you lot were sooooooo wrong about New Labour.Your judgement was flawed and now we pay for it.I will vote in my usual way..for now!

Augustus

It seems to me that the main question that the BNP would have to answer in any debate is: How can you be a party purporting to be capable of waging mainstream politics (i.e. a party capable of attracting more than just fringe voters) without having truly abandoned your core convictions? The erstwhile National Front was a truly evil Fascist party. Can such a party really morph
into a credible populist party by kicking out a few extremist members, put a Cambridge
educated leader as its mouthpiece, and then be taken seriously? The swastikas may be gone, but the the old devotees may still be
waiting in the wings.

epicene

re BNP "their views (anti-EU, anti-mass immigration) are that of the mainstream in Britain but ... Their racist views have no traction "? A non sequitor surely? Their racist views have plenty of traction "out there in the electorate" but,for pusillanimous politicians, to co-opt an old phrase, it's "..a far away country of which we know nothing.." and care less.
The political enarques are not failing to represent them, they have no WISH to do so, why would they?

daniel maris

Logdon -

No, I did read your post. And that's why I said what I did.

"I was rooting for Wilders and it seems to have escaped your attention that all the abuse the BNP attract is replicated when talking of him. "

So? Wilders isn't a racist ideologue. The BNP is stuffed full of racist ideologues.
That's the difference. As I said before, Spectator readers are a pretty intelligent bunch and I don't think many of them could fail to see the difference. The fact that you and others seem unable to spot the difference makes me suspicious. The idea that BNP activists wouldn't come on open blogs like this to pose as supporting the BNP from different angles - some racist, some nationalist, some populist - is frankly naive.

"Last week on QT an audience member talked of racist Wilders. Smith used similar language when denying entry."

Yes. So what? He's not a racist. The BNP core leadership (often hidden from view) is - extremely so. It's a Nazi front.

"The BNP serve a purpose right now and that's to get everyone talking. The argument raging over on Melanie's blog has attracted enormous response."

That's exactly the sort of thing a BNP activist posing as a concerned elector would say.

"Are you suggesting debate is a bad thing? That your kneejerk reaction should shut down all conversation?"

No. Happy to debate all the issues - even more happy to debate BNP activists who show themselves, but you won't get many of those here.

"Griffin is now deciding to allow blacks into his party. Could I, as a white non Muslim join the MCB or MAB or Hizb ut Tahrir. Or the Black Police Association?"

Well I don't support racially defined organisations so you are addressing the question to the wrong person. But I note that the BPA reference, though justified, is the one Nick Griffin always comes out with when defending the BNP ban (in the past).

"That's the difference, buddy. Equality is equality whichever way you frame it."

Hmmm..."buddy" is definitely one of those BNP words. You see it a lot on BNP related stuff.

daniel maris

Snowman says:

"Doesn’t the futility of the argument about the true nature of the BNP - rightwing, leftwing and all that - hit you in the eye?. They can’t and won’t get a look in in the current first-past-the-post electoral system. Even if the two major parties were to screw up even more than they’ve messed up till now, the British electorate will never go for NG and his lot in numbers needed to form a government.And rightly so, too. The only value of the BNP seems to be in that the size of the popular vote they can cobble up may, just may, convey the message loud and clear to those who govern us that the country has had enough of the experiment in which moral relativism, multi-culti, political correctness and all the other pseudo-liberal pap rule."

Well this is classic Mein Kampf stuff - Nazis as a receptacle for protest votes. But why should non-Nazi democrats vote for Nazi totalitarians who will swiftly dismantle democracy if they ever get the chance and introduce horrific policies based on violence and coercion?

I've no time for Nazis and I've no time for Shariah. End of story. Only the mad, bad, thick and deluded vote for BNP. Long may that remain so.

Feel free to tell us which category you fall under.

W Smith

The tremendous amount of comment in today"s media about BNP,Nick Griffin et al might indicate that the political climate is changing from being laid back to intent interest in change.If this is true then the next election could well show increased voter involvement which might be supportive of independents and smaller parties who could send the establishmentarian parties into oblivion.No wonder that the status quo troughers,quangoers and men of power are shaking in their boots and sending their minions in the media,the unions and churches to blackball,ostracise and tarnish the policies and reputations of all those who see and say how misguided is this poor little country.

logdon

daniel maris
October 19th, 2009 1:46am

Hmmm..."buddy" is definitely one of those BNP words. You see it a lot on BNP related stuff."

Is it now? As far as I am aware 'buddy' has a US origin. What part of 'British' in BNP do you not understand?

Your posting is a classic of sweeping generalisation, but why get facts in the way of frothing platitude?

And on the subject? BNP clone? Another sweeping generalisation. You do love them, don't you?

I have never voted BNP nor will I but I stand by my statement on free speech which you are intent on shutting down by hurling accusations with no evidential back up.

Here's how Melanie Phillips, obviously no BNP fan herself, describes the attitudes you obviously subscibe to, in todays Mail.

'His appearance is being treated by the chattering classes as the biggest showdown since Attila the Hun's rampage through Gaul was halted by the Roman general Flavius Aetius in 451AD.'

I think it covers it quite aptly.

Geoff Miller

By putting up a QT panel consisting of a black American revisionist, a Pakistani Muslim peer and the crooked Dhimmi Jack Straw whilst at the same time the Left Wing rent a mob to lay siege to the BBC and the South African Peter Hain tries to get Griffin banned just goes to show the panic gripping the undemocratic/unrepresentative elements in British society.

Not one decent native British person on the panel to oppose Nick Griffin.

It just shows how under represented and disempowered we are in our own country.

Funny that; and it won't be lost on the audience.

Good luck Nick.

You've got them on the run.

If any mainstream Party had stood up and honestly resolved the problems of mass immigration, multiculturalism, Islamism, terrorism, immigrant crime and racist violence, political correctness, our broken society and dumbed down education system there would be no BNP. Lets not also forget the unwanted wars and the hundreds of dead BRITISH soldiers.

They have created the BNP by ignoring the most important issues concerning the native British people.

Now, at last, the people have a Party that actually represents them.

All the name calling in the world won't stop that.

The BNP isn't a racist Party - just the ONLY party that cares for native Britons.

Peter

The hysteria over any publicity for the BNP might be self-fulfilling but only because people are running scared of democracy. The big question is why is the BNP attracting votes in large volumes. The answer is that none of the other parties has or is addressing the grievances of those voters.

Until they do and whether or not the BNP gets the platform it deserves, in a democracy, it will continue to scare intelligent people who should know better.

I find most of their agenda repellent but they cannot and must not be gagged.

Col Bloodnokk ex MI5

the BNP's vote actually declined in the last elections

DavidDP

Not exactly . the figures are:

Euro 2009 943598

Euro 2004 808200

an increase of 17% methinks though sums were never my strong point.

Bloodnokk

The Bunker
Hindhead

logdon

"Geoff Miller
October 19th, 2009 12:08pm Report this comment

If any mainstream Party had stood up and honestly resolved the problems of mass immigration, multiculturalism, Islamism, terrorism, immigrant crime and racist violence, political correctness, our broken society and dumbed down education system there would be no BNP."

Perfect.

This actually is the thrust of Melanie's article I referred to earlier.

Maris's abuse of anyone daring to suggest that the BNP fills a void none of the mainstream parties will address is the classic and juvenile student debate, cry 'waycist' tactic.

It's sole intent is to assume the false superiority of the moral high ground, thus reducing any counter argument to blind bigotry. And kill debate stone dead.

He hurls ad hominem accusations of the mindlessly cliched ‘BNP clone’ straw man variety preferring to rely on the cloying blanket of mindless political correctness.

In his little world there is no nuance, no equivocation. It boils down to, either or. If you happen to believe in the privilege of free speech and the democratic ideal you are a ‘BNP clone’. How ridiculous can it get?

The BNP really is an example of the Newtonian theory of, for every force there is an equal but opposing counterforce, in their case British nationalism versus the growing imposition of the Shariah.

If you happen to live in some well tended leafy suburb or in the countryside Islam will have little or no impact. However if dwelling in major inner cities and their orbital surroundings it’s a different tale. This is the febrile territory where the BNP buttress is at it’s highest.

PC obsessed councils offer no help. None of the three major parties will stick heads over the parapet. Who can the white working class turn to when in need of political, cultural and moral support?

Both Mark Steyn and Bruce Bawer have deliniated the problem of the Islamisation of Europe. Neither are swivel eyed racists, they tell the tale with alacrity and a clear eyed view of what is actually happening. Both have been castigated, banned, sued and all the rest of the tricks in the fascist armoury of censorship. Yet despite all of this they emerge as our defenders. Up to now the only party in sync with these authors would seem to be the BNP.

Maybe we should have a simple poll in Britain comprising of two choices of stark reality.

In influence which would you prefer to be most dominant in British politics and culture?

One: Shariah law.

Two: The BNP.

Both extreme. Both nudging reality in our polarised society. And the ridiculousness of it all? That this argument is going on in a sovereign state, once the most dominant in the world and now reduced to debating whether Britishness is now valid in Britain.

logdon

It's not just innBritain

Sweden: 'Sweden's biggest threat'

The headline for the article is "The Muslims are our greatest foreign threat", though this was probably thought up by Aftonbladet. The Local decided to headline its article "Islam 'Sweden's biggest threat': far-right leader". But Åkesson doesn't actually say either.

In his article Åkesson rejects the idea that Islam is similar to Christianity and points out that Muslim youth are radicalizing. The article ends as follows:

Twenty years ago, I think that most Sweden would have found it difficult to imagine that Islam would become Sweden's second largest religion, that Swedish artists who criticize or joke about Islam would live under constant death threats, that a dozen Muslim terror organizations would establish themselves in Sweden, that leading Muslim representatives would make demands about imposing Sharia laws in Sweden, that Swedish county councils would use taxpayer's money to circumsise fully healthy little boys, that Sweden would have the most rapes in Europe and that Muslim men would be highly over-represented among the perpetrators, that Swedish pools would introduce separate swimming times for men and women, that Swedish municipalities would consider introducing sex-segregated swimming classes in the schools, that the freezer sections in our grocery stores would offer ritually slaughtered meat while Swedish preschools would stop serving pork, that Swedish schools would introduce new vacations to celebrate the end of Ramadan while Church graduations would be banned in more and more schools and so forth.

All this is today a part of Swedish reality. The question is how it would look a few more decades from now, when the Muslim population, if the current pace continues, will multiply in size and many of Europe's major cities, including Malmö, would almost certainly have a Muslim majority.

The multicultural social elites might see this future as a colorful, interesting change for a Sweden and Europe, which all too often denies ever being 'Swedish' or 'European'.

As a Swedish Democrat I see this as our greatest foreign threat since WWII, and I promise to do everything in my power to change the trend when we go to the polls next year.

Snowman

Daniel Maris at 9.05

my sincere apology if you felt insulted. I blame Nature for making me a trenchant bastard. Reading the list of your wishful thinking, you know the ‘we need to address in radical fashion…’ I just exploded. I shouldn’t have, and I’m sorry.

Daniel Maris @ 1.55

It goes ‘mad, bad, and sad’. You’ve forgotten the ‘sad’ category of those you feel pity for, Daniel.

On the plus side: The profound, deep searching, all embracing comparative historical analysis that you serve now resonates with me as if a blindfold has lifted from my cataract infected eyes. Weimar Republic = current Britain, the BNP = NSDAP, Adolf = NG (well, except for the tash), and to crown it all, the Nazis gained power through protest vote. Unique take, but so convincing.

As the one of impaired vision quipped ‘we shall see’.

Grimly Fiendish

You had better hope that the BNP get a voice in the HOC or that someone at least steals their ideas and acts on them. Better to have politicians deal with the concerns of the people (immigration, over population, enclaves, the louder minority voice, removal of our culture through PC, etc etc,) than have the people do it.
I believe the current bet on blood on the streets stands at 3 years. 2012 anybody?

On a final note, if the BNP get in then it was at least due to votes cast by the people of this country unlike Brown.

daniel maris

Logdon employs the old false choice argument - which would you prefer: Sharia or the BNP. Well the choice is actually Sharia or Nazism. And I don't want either thank you very much, just as I wouldn't have wanted either Communism or Nazism in the 1930s. Democracy is difficult and sometimes slow to respond. But compared with the disasters of Nazism, Communism or Islam I would rather we stuck with democracy.

Now if the argument is "only the BNP can deliver an end to mass immigration" I don't believe it. I think UKIP could as well - a perfectly legitimate democratic party.

As to who will tackle Islam, let's be honest and recognise that the Nazis have always had warm relations with Islam as they did during the second world war. Hitler considered that Germans should have embraced Islam as a fine martial creed - a better alternative to Christianity in his eyes.

I very much doubt the BNP would do much about Islam. It would probably be quite happy to have Islamic enclaves in our big cities.

Patricia Shaw

The sight of you - Nelson - pointing the Racism Insult at anyone but yourself is a step too far.

Until the day when The Spectator - which YOU edit, takes meaningful steps to muzzle the appaling race hate your chosen bloggers, such as Phillips, use this site to peddle, YOU will always be the poorer for it, and guilty of the worst kind of hypocrisy.

logdon

"daniel maris
October 19th, 2009 7:12pm Report this comment

I very much doubt the BNP would do much about Islam. It would probably be quite happy to have Islamic enclaves in our big cities."

And thus by this ludicrous statement you skewer any rational argument.

logdon

Delingpole nails it.....

I’m glad that the BNP’s Nick Griffin is appearing on Question Time

October 20th, 2009

Well I’m sorry, but I am. I’m glad for various reasons, some of which have to do with freedom of speech and the democratic right of political parties which have won seats in local councils and in Europe to be represented on Britain’s main political debating programme.

Mainly, though, I’m glad because of the discomfiture it has caused among the chattering-idiot classes. Though personally I despise the BNP – as I do all parties of the left – the people I despise only marginally less are the ones who go round boasting about how incredibly outraged they are about how disgusting and wrong it is that Nick Griffin is appearing on Question Time.

“I don’t think you have ANY idea about how incredibly, amazingly un-racist I am,” runs the subtext of their boasting. “I am SO unracist that if I’d been around 250 years ago, do you know who I would have been? William Wilberforce, that’s who. Except if I’d been William Wilberforce I wouldn’t have stopped with banning slavery, no sirree. I would have made anti-race-hatred of any description so completely compulsory that there wouldn’t be a single piece of race hatred anywhere left in the world by now. We’d all be like ebony and ivory, living together in perfect harmony, side by side on the keyboard, just like on Stevie Wonder and Paul McCartney on a piano. Only more harmonious than that even. Races and creeds wouldn’t exist any more. We’d all have skins made up of whatever colour you get when black and brown and white and yellow are all mixed together. A sort of beigey ecru, maybe. Cos that’s how anti-racist I am!”

Minnie Ovens

What Mr Frazer and his colleagues in all the media don't seem to understand is that this anti aggregated anti-BNP rant gives a great amount of publicity to Griffin.
People are looking at the BNP because they have no where else to go. All three parties have deliberately ignored the electorate over the uncontrolled immigration, at least three million since 1997, and that may just cover illegal immigration as well.
They ignore any pleas to save our country from Europe and, akin to The Spectator, regard Europhobia as an irritating side show.
Yes, the BN is racist but for many people it strikes a chord because it stands for many things in which the electorate believe.
There is an arrogance present in three Estates. Their demeaning attitude towards the people and their views; the furious and desperate anger they display that people should have contrary views from themselves plays into the hands of the BNP.
There is every chance that we are heading for a hung parliament unless Cameron listens a bit harder.
He should look, for instance, at the comments upon Mary Riddell's article today in the DT.

Minnie Ovens

What Mr Frazer and his colleagues in all the media don't seem to understand is that this anti aggregated anti-BNP rant gives a great amount of publicity to Griffin.
People are looking at the BNP because they have no where else to go. All three parties have deliberately ignored the electorate over the uncontrolled immigration, at least three million since 1997, and that may just cover illegal immigration as well.
They ignore any pleas to save our country from Europe and, akin to The Spectator, regard Europhobia as an irritating side show.
Yes, the BN is racist but for many people it strikes a chord because it stands for many things in which the electorate believe.
There is an arrogance present in three Estates. Their demeaning attitude towards the people and their views; the furious and desperate anger they display that people should have contrary views from themselves plays into the hands of the BNP.
There is every chance that we are heading for a hung parliament unless Cameron listens a bit harder.
He should look, for instance, at the comments upon Mary Riddell's article today in the DT.

JONNY

I have been looking at the BNP
Minnie Ovens.
He or It was on Channel 4 just now.
Having too far an easy go of it against a feeble John Snow.
And if you say I have nowhere else to go after that - all I can say is you are a truly demented lady.

Snowman

Johny @7.48

Well then, prey tell us where do you go or, more to the point, where have you been going for the past twelve years, will you please.

daniel maris

Logdon quotes me:

"I very much doubt the BNP would do much about Islam. It would probably be quite happy to have Islamic enclaves in our big cities."

And comments:

"And thus by this ludicrous statement you skewer any rational argument."

Well this shows either incredible naivety or a certain disingenuous.

BNP has at its core Nazism. Nazis have always had an indulgent view of Islam. Hitler praised it as a creed, stating that such a martial ideology would have suited the Germans well. Nazis made common cause with Muslims across the Middle East. There was a Muslim SS Division. Yasser Arafat's uncle, the Grand Mufti, actively promoted the extermination of the Jews and was privy to the programme. After the war many Nazis found refuge in the Middle East in countries like Egypt. Post war, Neo Nazis have expressed a visceral hatred of Israel , second only to that of Islamic extremists and have co-operated with them actively in all sorts of ways, but especially in terms of propaganda effort. Both Nazis and many in the Muslim world are keen on holocaust denial (or sometimes holocaust celebration).

I think a BNP Nazi government would be very interested in building relations with countries like Iran and would be unlikely to expel millions of Muslims from the UK. It would be more interested in persecuting Jews, lefties and the like.

JONNY

Snowman -do try to be comprehensible.
I can't understand what your mispelt message is trying to state.

daniel maris

Minnie Ovens -

UKIP provide a perfectly respectable anti-immigration anti-EU party. I find it strange you don't mention them but are promoting the Nazi BNP.

Logdon - You quote Delingpole who,whilst amusing on many subjects, is fundamentally unsound on all things political - as is another Spectator contributor Taki notable for his fondness of the Wermacht and dislike of virtually just about any Black person of note.

Re-read Delingpole's article. It's completely vacuous, North London dinner party stuff. There's no analysis of the BNP, free speech principles or anything else. Pure posing.

Archie

So Mr. Nelson,do pray tell what part of Bradford or Huddersfield do YOU livein? Or is it Leicester, perhaps, or Rochdale?

Avudale

It's quite simple really.

The BNP are a legitimate, democratically-elected political party, elected under the PR system favoured by Europe.

Get out of Europe and we rid ourselves of the BNP.

Of course the main parties still need to address the issues that led to a million votes for the BNP, namely immigration and the mass influx of Muslims.

Sticking your head in the sand is not a very good idea in those circumstances.

sandfly

I haven't lived in the UK for forty years but I'd be a potential BNP supporter. As a keen reader of history I understand the possible consequences but so what... why have the socialists (and toffs) conspired to destroy the respectable working class. These were the best and most loyal group of people imagineable who have been, to a large degree, destroyed by the doctrinaire scum who hijacked the Labour Party.
Where do you turn when no one will listen?

logdon

Maris parades his knowledge of Nazi/Islam links then equates the BNP with Nazis thus coming to false conclusion that the BNP are closet Islamists.

Oh what little knowledge leads to?

Using this stretched analysis Churchill was a Nazi as were Battle of Britain pilots. Both are utilised by Griffin who is now under fire from generals horrified at this linkeage.

Marris, you mean well but do try to get facts right before hurling yourself into an abyss of misinformation.

Merlyn

Guinevere, so the BNP are made up of witches and pagans?
Oooooh, I think I'll join!
Merlyn

Merlyn

This country wants to be hospitable but also wants to be taken care of in the process rather than be strangulated by a parasitic draining influence that leaves it physically and emotionally exhausted.
That is why the BNP is important, it calls for the host to be defended first.

R. Aiken

In the world of the blind the one eyed man is King.
No, not The PM.
Now that we have had the farce, promoted as 'Question Time,' the real debate can begin.
An expose' of metropolitan arrogance from a non representative audience out of 'politically correct' central casting.
I had hoped to be spared, although deep down knew we wouldn't, a selected ethnically disproportional audience.
Dimbleby's contempt for Griffin was was par, for a BBC Grandee, but the sheer one shovel ordure heaped on Griffin from the panellists was embarrassing. The only good thing to emerge was confirmation that jack Straw is as pathetic as I had always thought him to be since observing him as a student rabble rouser in the sixties.
Not one question was asked from a representative of my background/class. i.e.
Middle aged, middled class, white & as far as demography goes, normal!
Then again, I live in the countryside, so obviously my views count for little to the metropolitan elite.
I can't stand Griffin's views but he touches on deep feelings,albeit prejudicial ones, that need addressing, by the so called 'main parties.'
All of whom have failed to speak up about what is good & needs to be preserved in our culture, not least for those of us who have families, stretching back many hundreds of years [or thousands in my case according to DNA],who have contributed to the progress of this nation. It doesn't make me superior but it does give me the right to question the direction of the country that I have paid taxes to for 30 years & my ancestors for generations before.
If those arriving now or from the recent past can understand that, then fine. But there seemed little understanding of that last Thursday evening on TV.
It's time for the main political parties to stand up, state where they stand on immigration, cultural values & how they see UK PLC. in the future.

Ralph Musgrave

The most odious piece of deception perpetrated by the smarmy liar lawyers at the top of the Labour Party is here: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1222769/Dishonest-Blair-Straw-accused-secret-plan-multicultural-UK.html

Herbert Thornton

The rise of the BNP is not a horror story. It is a story of hope.

The horror story is the Labour conspiracy (and the Tory nonchalance at it) to swamp Britain with the tide of undesirable immigrants and the campaign by the establishment including London journalists to cover the treason up & try to trivialise it, and to do their utmost to defame and demonise the BNP.