Bloody Nasty People but incredibly stupid
It would not be fair to publish the names of all 13,500 (far) right-thinking folk whose names were leaked by a disgruntled former British National Party sorehead last week. I’m actually feeling sorry for them. I might send them a seasonal card – White Christmas, perhaps? Then again, perhaps I won’t, but you can. The list can be found on a simple Google search. This raises serious questions of morality and free speech. Many BNP views are dubious, repugnant and downright daft – ditto their members – but people should be allowed to hold them without ridicule or intimidation unless they cross the line into criminal ‘activism’. In which circumstances they should be apprehended by the police, preferably one who isn’t a BNP member, and tried by a judge who isn’t one either. Proscribing political party membership, publishing lists and organising witch hunts plays into the hands of the authoritarian right wing – which dwells on the Left Wing of the Labour Party and the Right Wing of the Tories. Next we’ll be voting for identity cards with the capacity to record racial characteristics, religious and political background and subject people to profiling, spy on them or detain them on the grounds that they might be a threat to the commonwealth. That could never happen, could it?
