I recall the Anti-Nazi League from way back in the seventies. I didn’t like them then and I don’t like them now. My abhorrence of this nasty bunch has nothing to do with thinking that Nazis are good eggs – they aren’t. However, the Anti-Nazi League works on a principle of not allowing their political opponents a platform from which to speak.
BNP leader Nick Griffin has been pelted with eggs and forced to abandon a press conference outside Parliament.
Dozens of protesters disrupted the event, which follows the British National Party winning its first two seats in the European Parliament.
Chanting anti-Nazi slogans and holding placards they surrounded Mr Griffin as he was bundled into a car.
Apparently they also kicked his car and scuffles broke out. Be clear here, these people are not democrats, they do not believe in free speech. They are as much an enemy of liberal democracy as the people they are protesting about. A pox on both their houses.
Members of Unite Against Fascism, a new group supported by trade unions and MPs from all parties including Tory leader David Cameron and veteran left wing campaigner Tony Benn, said they wanted to “defend democracy” against what they regard as the “fascist” and “racist” policies of the BNP.
Fine. Then let him speak and be condemned by his own words.
I hold no brief for Nick Griffin and the BNP, but I defend absolutely his right to lay out his stall and be judged accordingly. The Anti-Nazis would deny us that freedom – they believe that they are the ones to make that decision on our behalf. Freedom of speech means allowing people to express opinons that you find repugnant. Unite Against Fascism in preventing Griffin from speaking today behaved just like the fascists they are.
The wishes of ‘anti-Nazis’ are the same as the Nazis in the end – suppression of free speech.
Hang them; hang them all.
Pelting with eggs is common assault and hence Wrong and Bad, but does a belief in freedom of speech compel one to avoid non-violently disrupting, shouting over, chanting at, and generally annoying Nazis? I’m not convinced it does.
If the government were to use its legal monopoly on force to disrupt, annoy, &c the Nazis, *that* would be a restriction on freedom of speech.
There is no right in free speech to avoid hearing people you don’t really want to hear in public. If the BNP (like other lefties, demented religious freaks, chuggers and so on) are a nuisance to you, just walk past them.
Attacking them physically and stopping them making them points makes a) you look like a div and b) denies them their right to speak.
It does when it prevents that person from being heard. This group took it upon themselves to decide for the rest of us what we may hear. They have no mandate to do this and in doing so they are the very thing they claim to be against.
“The Anti-Nazis would deny us that freedom – they believe that they are the ones to make that decision on our behalf. Freedom of speech means allowing people to express opinons that you find repugnant.”
Indeed. They are two sides of the sme coin, both authoritarian nutjob parties/organisations who should be shunned by all right-thinking people.
“…does a belief in freedom of speech compel one to avoid non-violently disrupting, shouting over, chanting at, and generally annoying Nazis?”
Only if you are worried that you don’t have the argumentary powers to take them on in a public forum and defeat th…
Oh.
Yes, I can see your problem.
Having just seen a boorish organiser of the anti-BNP mob on Channel Four News, I found him just as obnoxious as Griffin, and perhaps a bit more so.
Given that Griffin and his chums would cheerfully murder me for being Jewish, I don’t particularly care about his right of free speech. But what annoys me about this incident is that they’ve managed to make him look a victim without actually damaging him in the slightest. If these wankers had thrown grenades rather than eggs then at least there might have been some point to it! OK, only half serious – an innocent person could have been hurt. Throwing grenades is a really bad idea. M’kay. But really, let’s not get too indignant about Griffin’s eggsecution.
I thought better of you than that. Allowing free speech for those with whom we agree is easy. The real test is do we allow it for those with whom we not only disagree, but whose views we find deeply repugnant? If you don’t care about Griffin’s free speech, then you don’t care about anyone else’s either. It’s all or nothing, there is no in-between, you either value free speech or you don’t.
Agree with the rest of your point, though.
I thought better of you than that
And I would have thought better of you not to take that remark out of context. I said “Given that Griffin and his chums would cheerfully murder me for being Jewish, I don’t particularly care about his right of free speech”. If someone believes I have no right to exist, then I see no reason why I should accord him any privileges whatsoever. It’s called the right of self defence. I don’t accept your absolutist position that free speech is all or nothing. It quite plainly isn’t.
I didn’t take your comment out of context – far from it. Freedom of speech is absolutely an absolute. You either allow it for everyone or you do not believe in freedom of speech – no grey areas, no in-betweens. Clearly from your comment, you don’t. That disappoints me.
It’s an opinion. He has every right to hold and voice whatever opinions he likes – as do you and I. I defend unequivocally his right to hold and voice those opinions, no matter how obnoxious, no matter how abhorrent. That is what makes me better than him. If he decides to act on that opinion, that’s another matter entirely.
The only way to deal with extreme views is to allow them to be aired and rebut them. Censorship is not self defence. And what we saw yesterday was censorship applied with thuggery – and it wasn’t the Nazis carrying it out. My enemy’s enemy is most definitely not my friend. The Anti-Nazis are as nasty and repressive as those they seek to oppose. They are the same under the skin.