Bite the Ballot: The Nathan Barley of Political Engagement

In 2005 a sitcom was launched, co-written by Chris Morris of Brass Eye and The Day Today fame.  It focuses on a character, Nathan Barley, who is an incredibly overrated fashion conscious manchild. He only gets attention because he self-promotes through digital channels and is perceived to have the necessary ‘street cool’. The show, it seems, was well before its time as we now have a living, breathing case of life imitating art in the form of ‘Bite the Ballot’.

‘Bite the Ballot’ describes itself as “a not for profit organisation that empowers young people to speak up and act, to make their votes and opinions count.” Further down in its blurb we find something I’m sure was actually lifted from a Nathan Barley script – “Our core values when engaging those furthest away from politics are to be unconventional, inclusive and bold.”

They present themselves as studiously neutral. Which sounds nice given their current big hitting scheme is “Leaders Live”. The idea behind this is that they deliver questions to the main political leaders in the UK ostensibly provided from the general public via social media. In practice, most of the questioning occurs through an audience panel that is supposedly representative of the UK’s “youth”.

And it is the panel where this farce becomes completely unstuck. 

The second episode of “Leaders Live” featured Nigel Farage. The “representative” audience panel picked by supposedly “neutral” Bite the Ballot engaged in a solid hour of abuse, belittling, heckling and verging on violent interrogation of Farage. The role of the chair, Rick Edwards, during this episode appeared to be to primarily emulate Helen Keller as best as he could. 

The apparently in built anti-UKIP panel hostility was obvious to many who were commenting live at the time as well as the majority of the commenters on the archived Youtube video. The belligerence and bias was worse even than the most partisan BBC selected audience for Quisling Time I ever recall seeing. It was more embarrassingly (albeit unintentionally) self-parodying than Harry Enfield and Paul Whitehouse’s send up of the latter too.  

One only needs to watch the previous episode, with the Green Party’s Natalie Bennett to see the shocking divergence in the panel’s behaviour towards the two leaders. She was given a relatively easy time on the questions front, only really corned twice (e.g. on the performance of Brighton council) and even then she was treated with good manners and respect throughout. The panel seemed to like what she had to say, but then that’s easy with the Greens because they can promise spending on all and sundry without having to account for it. And of course this particularly appeals to the young and inexperienced who are more likely to opt for idealism and less likely to ask how one earth the Green’s apparently bottomless spending bonanza can be financed. 

A parody of panels

Who was on the panel for the Nigel Farage episode? That’s the million dollar question. It’s also one that ‘Bite the Ballot’ singularly fails to answer. Nowhere on their site or on the youtube channel is a list of the participants, never mind any biographies. This information is just a teensy weensy bit important.

As a result I had to piece together (occasionally making mistakes) who was actually present and their backgrounds. It is, frankly insane, that I had to do this. It is part and parcel of modern broadcasting that viewers are informed as to who is being questioned and who is doing the questioning. Not in this case though. 

So, who took part? Amongst those participating and including almost everyone who actually spoke on the panel I’ve been able to determine the following:

Piers Telemacque (@Pierschickenboy)
A vice-president of the NUS and active anti-UKIP activist.  You can see him here using crayon (how appropriate) to express his hatred of the party. He continues the proud tradition of NUS representatives in being thick and obnoxious. In between his slews of abuse towards Farage he claimed that Farage had worked for “Wall Street”. No, really. I’m sure there’s a bright future ahead for Piers in the greasy poleclimbers club that is the NUS and just like his predecessors will be willing to sell anyone out to get what he wants when he’s sick of being a bag carrier and useful idiot. 

Kenny Imafidon (@KennyImafidon)
Charming chap this one. Even more belligerent than Piers. He’s currently “Special Advisor on Youth Policy”. How did he achieve this august position? That makes for uncomfortable reading. Turns out he used to be a thug in a London gang. Ended up in the dock for murder. He was  however acquitted. Oh, that’s OK then?

Maybe not. It turns out the imprisoned murderer and accessory were actually his friends and part of the same gang. As he himself said, it “could have easily been me”. Oh dear. It is following this that events become truly bizarre. It appears that our establishment inexplicably decided that he needed special treatment,tea and biscuits. This gang-banging thug was elevated by our establishment, with money, education and status poured on him to become effectively an establishment selected “Community Leader / Representative” type. I’ve genuinely never seen anything like it.

Myles Dyer (@MylesDyer)
An employee of the Guardian.

Nothing else really needs to be said.

Mawaan Rizwan (@MawaanR)

A BBC employee. He’s a “comedian” apparently.

Another embarrassing belligerent on the show, this chap being the one who apparently really hates rich people with large houses.

Again, what more need be said. 

Russ Haynes (@monkeywithagunn)
Another “comedian”. This fellow was possibly the most belligerent of the lot and I genuinely thought he was going to get out of his seat to get at Farage at some point. He went heavy on the race card.

Rebecca Brown(?) (@beckie0)
Current/recent university (under)graduate. Massive youtube following – the largest of the lot as far as I can tell. I found a ‘Google hangout’ with some of these people discussing participating in ‘Bite the Ballot’ from 2013 where she made it clear she had not had any interest in politics until recruited by this organisation. She appears to be a relatively harmless youtube narcissist and was one of the politer panel members. 

John (surname?) (@JazzaJohn)
Another youtuber and LGBT campaigner as far as I can tell. Came across perfectly reasonably on the show. 

 Hannah Witton (@hannahwitton)
Another social media narcissist.
Current/recent university (under)graduate

Jamal Edwards (@jamaledwards)
Millionaire rapper. So, yeah, “representative”. Spoke during the Natalie Bennett interview previously but as far as I can recall did not ask a question of Nigel Farage. Which is probably just as well as the remainder of the panel appeared to be going on for a full on ‘soak the rich’ attack and things could have got awkward quite quickly especially if Nigel knew who he was otherwise….
I originally mixed him up with Kenny Imafidon – primarily because information was so thin on the ground about the panel I was resorting to comparing still images after confirming Jamal was on the show. 

Ben Hanlin (@benhanlin)
Magician. Employee of ITV (noteworthy especially in this case as this whole enterprise was arranged with ITV as a partner). 

Tom Harwood (@tomhfh)
Probably the single most neutral representative panel member I’ve been able to identify so far.  Follows the usual Youtube narcissism pattern but has a following comparable to many people I know myself on social media who have just been around for a while. 

Lucy Moon (@meowitslucy)
Another youtuber. Her twitter timeline makes it clear she’s another serial UKIP hater. She’s also noticeably more narcissistic than the others going by the evidence there and she’s only 19 (the majority of others seem to be in their 20s upwards). Not good. She was the most ill-tempered of the female panel members.

There are a handful of others I’ve not had the time to track down yet (so far its 11/15 – though only 14 of those appeared on the episode in question). However, as far as I can tell I have managed to include everyone who asked questions from the panel on the Farage episode.


Where was everyone else?

Where they weren’t diehard lefties and UKIP haters (that covers the people who spent most time heckling, interrupting and abusing) the panel members were major social media narcissists and/or media luvvies. Are these really the people who are most appropriate to be representing the UK’s “youth voice”? If there could even be said to be such a thing? Where were the political right wingers, the young people working in trades, armed forces, front line services? Why do only graduates, youtube personalities and “comedians” get to speak? You know – where’s the missing 50% of British youths who did not go to university and also did not become youtube superstars plucked from obscurity?

How desperately unfunny must the “comedians” on the panel be if all they can do in this situation is effectively act as simple hostile hecklers? Speaking as a fan and regular attendee of the London comedy circuit I can’t imagine any of the performers I’ve seen behaving like this. Even if they were out to undermine Farage they would have prepared some funny zingers rather than behaved like two year olds on the verge of tantrums, violence or both. 

A full third were committed UKIP haters and there are question marks over several of the others. It was a shockingly biased panel and the aggression towards Farage was left completely unchecked. It’s worth noting that all of the ethnic minority panel members who spoke up were persistently interrupting and belligerent. If your goal was to portray the young left-leaning members of the UK’s BME communities as know-nothing, belligerent gobshites then this episode was a major success. GREAT JOB guys!

It would appear to most of those commenting on ‘Bite the Ballot’ youtube videos that, as commenter ‘Venimus Vidimus’ put it, the panel

“were chosen because they're simple minded, desperate to be liked, malleable, sycophantic, photogenic, glib and left-wing (the latter trait being a direct result of the former traits).”

The boss weighs in 

As if it wasn’t already enough of a Nathan Barley episode with the student left drama queens and social media narcissists on the panel, the “Big Boss” of ‘Bite the Ballot’, Michael Sani, has since written about the panel make up. He has in turn delivered the very quintessence of exactly the kind of purified, distilled, thoughtless idiocy that seems the characterise these kind of enterprises and was mercilessly mocked in Nathan Barley. 

It is at this point that the mutual masturbation circle now turns into a full on circular firing squad.

In case they have a sudden injection of sense and delete the piece, I’ll quote you the section I consider most apposite:

“On the first: yep, I agree. At times, even I was calling for Rick to step in to keep control of people’s emotions – but to be fair, it was arguably the hottest debate we’ve ever seen with Nigel. It was refreshing to see people’s emotions on show, especially from this age group. One thing’s for sure – it’s becoming harder and harder to say ‘Young people don’t care’: because last night they proved they do. And now we build upon it, collectively.

Before I go into how, let’s address the idea of our unrepresentative audience. The audience was selected because of the networks they represent – many of whom have thousands of fans, followers and subscribers. You name it – they have them. These debates are pilots. We are trying to find a format where the few can represent the masses, and we are consistently perfecting the model because – like with everything BTB – we are not afraid to try, reflect, then try again. Yes, one member of the audience, Myles, has a day-job with a certain left-leaning print media house, but he didn’t mention that during the event, and more importantly, he brought in the views of his YouTube, Twitter and Facebook subscribers. That has always been the aim.

As for the chap from NUS, yes, it’s disappointing that he’s posted rude, anti-UKIP pictures on his social profile. He was supposed to be in a position of representing a mass of students. The thing is, we all have to work and support one another here. NUS need to be clear on what is – and is not – acceptable for their officers; and from BTB’s side, we need to think about how we brief audiences ahead of these debates so they don’t lose their electricity (and protect us from being picked apart).”

Holy non-sequiturs and complete-lack-of-self-awareness Batman! Would you like a dirty dripping contempt salad and a side order of sneer with your order, sir?

“It was refreshing to see people’s emotions on show”

- Yes, wonderful. Portray the representatives of “the youth” as ignorant brutes determined to get their way through shouting others down, along with a distinct implied violence. And even the boss was calling for the chair, Helen Keller (sorry – Rick Edwards), to notice something was up and step in. But he did nothing of the sort. Why?

“let’s address the idea of our unrepresentative audience”

- The “idea” of an unrepresentative audience. Got that? It’s just an “idea”!

“The audience was selected because of the networks they represent”

- The “networks” many of them represented were followers of a social media narcissist. In case you’re unfamiliar, Michael, with what narcissism entails, the narcissist does not “represent” their following.  They expect to bask in their reflected glory from sycophants. 

“We are trying to find a format where the few can represent the masses, and we are consistently perfecting the model because”

- This is just pure delusional talk. There is no model or format at work here beyond pulling in a social media circle jerk. The folks you picked represent some quite specific cliques and you’re excluding, at a minimum, 50% of the UK’s “youth”.  I fear that by “perfecting it” you mean pull in people who have more followers and shares on social media. I don’t think you understand the meaning of “representation” here, Michael.

“Yes, one member of the audience, Myles, has a day-job with a certain left-leaning print media house, but he didn’t mention that during the event”

- Ooh. A “certain left-leaning print media house”. There’s not even a hint of contrition here is there? I can almost feel “Boss Man” Michael’s sneer in his words. And you also appear to be frighteningly oblivious to the fact, Michael, that it is definitively your responsibility to inform your viewers of such details.

- I think the Guardian’s Myles Dyer has realised there’s trouble ahead as he is currently busy clowndancing in the youtube comments making out that he’s actually a really neutral, reasonable guy. One glance at his twitter timeline during and just after the event though and anyone can see the real picture: One of Myles revelling in so much backslapping over his perceived success in ‘operation get Farage’ that it’s amazing he hasn’t taken time off to see a chiropractor. 

“and more importantly, he brought in the views of his YouTube, Twitter and Facebook subscribers. That has always been the aim.”

- And there you have it. It’s all about the hits…sod accuracy, representation, bias…Never mind the fact that the bulk of followers are likely to subscribe to a similar viewpoint thereby exacerbating the bias even further.

“As for the chap from NUS, yes, it’s disappointing that he’s posted rude, anti-UKIP pictures on his social profile. He was supposed to be in a position of representing a mass of students.”

 - Right. Because you had no idea that this is what he was all about. And the very idea of NUS reps actually representing the mass of students rather than the speech-code obsessed authoritarian harpies? Hoho – pass the smelling salts, please dear!

“NUS need to be clear on what is – and is not – acceptable for their officers;”
 
- Pretty much anything acceptable to the far-left goes at the nutty NUS. Including opposing motions against ISIS initiated by (Muslim) Kurds because of  - er - “Islamophobia”. 

“and from BTB’s side, we need to think about how we brief audiences ahead of these debates so they don’t lose their electricity (and protect us from being picked apart).”

- Translation: we need to ensure our biased selectees know how to obscure their biases from easy discovery!

This all simply beggars belief. “Boss man” had the opportunity to pull back from the precipice. Instead he hits the accelerator pedal and flies straight over the cliff, smashes into the rocks below and bursts into flames.

No acknowledgement of an issue, no contrition and no prospect of rectification at all. The ostensible goal of this “neutral” organisation is to teach and inspire young citizens about politics and voting. If the mission here was to teach young people the lesson that, in UK politics, you can expect to be unashamedly and outrageously deceived right from the very start, then this has been an absolutely stellar success.

The cat is out of the bag now, Michael.

You had a duty of care to inform the audience. You failed spectacularly.  

The most important currency in politics is trust. Once it is gone it can take a generation to win it back. ‘Bite the Ballot’ have demonstrated that they are wilfully biased. Worse, they have clearly expressed that they simply do not care that they have been outed and intend to carry on as before. Notice also the lexical register that Michael Sani uses. It is very childlike, blasé and pompous. It reminds me very much of how Russell Brand happily masturbates his own ignorance and anti-intellectualism in his own inscrutable writing. And this man is the “Big Boss”. God help us.

Tories should be wary

There’s no love lost between myself and the Tories. However in spite of my general dislike of the party and my specific issues with Cameron himself, I do not think he or they deserve to be put through this idiotic farce. Dave is so far the only party leader to have not confirmed a date with ‘Bite the Ballot’. In all seriousness I think, now the outright bias of the show is on full view, that he would be wise to withdraw. 

It is arguable that Cameron could be in for even worse treatment than Farage. Why? Because the visceral hatred of UKIP and Farage from this lot is what I would refer to as “fashionable hate”. It has become a popular past time, to impress your mates and be seen to make the correct noises for herd approval to claim to hate UKIP even if you know little about them and even less about the issues they raise. Yet there is something that is somewhat fleeting here.

The tories on the other hand face what I would call “institutional hate”. Despite not even having been born when Thatcher was still in power, many of this lot seem to uncannily pop out of the womb with a built in hatred of her and need to blame the country’s current ills on a prime minister who has been out of power for decades. You know how it goes. Everything is Fatcher’s fault, innit bruv? You instinctively support manual frackers (miners) but inexplicably hate and fear hydraulic fracturing. The tories were so evil they even caught the Teletubbies going for a poo. They had the Brighton bombing coming. The Falklands was worse than Iraq. And yes, the Belgrano was a fucking cruise liner.

Don’t do it to yourselves. Yes there will be mass hysteria by the self-righteous New Left, but their teeth grinding and childishness will only prove the point.

The children of Orwell and Huxley

One final issue that really bugged me. Because this attempt at imitating Nathan Barley was struggling to be so in touch with the supposed social media zeitgeist, all the panel participants were glued to their spyphones and tablets. The occasional full frontal shot of the panel was actually quite unnerving. When they weren’t send spittle flecked tirades Farage’s way, they were looking down with crooked necks at the miniature portals in their laps.

At any one moment the majority of the audience was simply not paying attention. In human communication terms this is a significant step backwards and not a practice that should be actively encouraged. ‘The Youth’ have become inheritors of the worst of both Orwell’s and Huxley’s fears. Continually policed Newspeak (and, increasingly, prudery too) combined with hypnotising, addictive yet numbing behaviours of performance and approval carried out via devices that are used to spy on us. 

If you want a vision of the future, imagine a social media network’s glow from a backlit display occupying a dulled, distracted, inattentive human face, forever.

"Whataboutery"

Brendan O'Neill has an interesting piece up today about the double standards that the pro-Gaza activists appear to have with regard to Western links to violence in other lands.

The long story short is O'Neill points out that the pro-Gaza activists can claim that they largely ignore other, and much worse, violence such as that perpetrated by ISIS on the grounds that the West isn't backing it, unlike Israel. He then presents events in Ukraine as a prima facie case of Western involvement and responsibility for instigating conflict and tremendous loss of human life, not to mention displacement, then asking activists why they ignore that case.

I can't say I'm that convinced by O'Neill's argument even if I recognise it has substantial force. And in any case, its the first part that bothers me more. There's plenty of relevant 'whataboutery' to be had where these burning hypocrites are concerned.

As I commented over there,  I've got an even better bit of 'whatabouttery' - what about George Galloway?

The speech code anal retentives went into mass bladder-bursting conniptions over the possibility that Jeremy Clarkson might have muttered a bad word under his breath on an unaired clip somewhere (an audio sample by the way, we must remember, that required expert help to clarify).

Yet Galloway says something in public, on a podium to a substantial audience and on camera that is utterly hateful about an entire people and what happened?

Tumbleweed.

Again.

Speaking of "bladder bursting conniptions" the latest outrage is apparently Garnier sending free products to female IDF soldiers. The outrage has been so substantial and quick that Garnier have been forced to apologise. No, really

The campaign, of course, is headed up by none other than George "No dogs or Jews round here" Galloway.

Sometimes its hard to believe that we're not all here for the benefit of some cosmic surreal yet brutal planet sized sit-com.

You can support the Open Rights Group...as long as you're not white and male

UPDATE 3 (27/03/12) - Jim Killock, Executive Director of ORG responds in the comments (Comment #10). Response is as expected - no condemnation of Nishma's views. My response follows in comment #11.

UPDATE 2 (26/03/12): Nishma Doshi responds on twitter. Comment #8 below.

UPDATE 1 (26/03/12): Mealy mouthed response from and twitter exchange with ORG advisory board member Owen Blacker added - comment #7 below.

I'm done. I've absolutely had it with attempts to work with the activist left in this country. No more.

The Open Rights Group held its conference 'Orgcon' yesterday. It's a hub of activity and interesting talks for anyone interested in the crucial issues facing us in the digital realm in general and with regard to the internet in particular. ORG have worked for many years now to raise awareness on issues such as the Digital Economy Act and ACTA and have run many campaigns to get people involved. These are causes that affect everyone and there is good reason for people of all political persuasions to get involved.

You might be reading this and passively wishing I'd included links to ORG and their useful summary pages on the Digital Economy Act and ACTA. That was a conscious choice not to and I won't be doing so again for the forseeable future. Tomorrow I will be cancelling my donations to them.

Let me tell you why.

For many years now quite a number of us on the libertarian right have made attempts to reach out to the broad left on issues of common concern. In my personal experience it was mainly for anti-war actions and campaigns. In every single case there would be at least one person amongst the left-wingers who would say that we "weren't allowed" to join them, and worse. I've known of so many attempts to hold out the Olive branch - and all from the right-libertarian - that have been rebuffed, and often with menaces.

I know this kind of attitude has put many of my libertarian and libertarian-leaning Tory friends off ever going to events run, or largely dominated, by lefties just for this very reason, even if the case for common cause is compelling and possibly necessary for any chance of victory. One of the clearest examples of shooting themselves in the foot in recent memory was in the battle over AV. The lefties refused to work with Farage and UKIP on this despite common cause. As a result the case for AV was seen largely as something exclusive popularised by the Guardian reading metropolitan lefty elite. And people were, it seems, right to think that. This is not to say had they made common cause the vote would have been won, but I suspect the pro-AV vote would not have been so embarrassingly small either, and the turnout perhaps a little better (and the debates from the AV side less childish too).

A couple of friends I'd mentioned the Orgcon to had already declined on the grounds that they didn't want to end up in an argument with left-wingers who would tell them that they were 'evil' and not welcome and blah blah blah. Yeah, you know the rest. But I thought I'd give it a go. I've been a supporter of ORG and their work for some time so now I'm based back in London I thought I'd finally make it to one of their major events.

Unfortunately I groaned almost as soon as I joined the - very long - queue to get in to the conference. Being the gregarious kind of chap I am I decided to start getting to know the people nearby in the queue. An older bloke behind me was ranting to a friend - I was about to say 'hi' but paused to listen first. He claimed, first, that the cuts on pensions would be 'given to the bankers at Canary Wharf' and second, claimed he had met a "right wing sociologist" whose secret task was - apparently - to "destroy the working class". It was a classic facepalm moment and I wondered if I was going to make it through the day without putting someone's head through a window.

Fortunately throughout the day I met a handful of friendly left leaning people with whom I found a lot of common ground. Interestingly they were generally older and also not UK natives. The two keynotes - by Cory Doctorow and Lawrence Lessig were particularly good and well worth watching when they go online. (I'm sorry I refuse to post links and give ORG traffic from this blog). Particularly notable was an argument made by Lessig - he made it clear that it was a mistake to regard these issues as left/right in any way and that the only division that mattered was those within the political class and those without. I thought he was very clear on this. Apparently not.

In the early evening most of the attendees went to the pub. Three libertarian pals joined me at the pub, though (lucky for them) two had to leave a little earlier at which point the two of us left retired to the back room of the pub to continue drinking and chatting.

It was then I encountered Nishma for the third time.

When she breezed in, whilst chatting to my friend, I passively noticed how the group of (white, males) reoriented around her and she became the centre of attention. That's nothing new in left-activist circles as I've observed over the years, though it is relevant for what was about to pass. Despite lots of fine rhetoric about being open minded and the women not wanting to be "objectified", that soons slips when it suits and I witness a ritual even more painful than most I've seen after 13 years of looking after nightclubs full of drunk idiots. I do honestly wonder how many of the men get laid in these circles and how dull their sex lives must be.

Anyway, I digress. Nishma was ranting loudly about Tory bastards this and Tory bastards that and at one point turned to the two of us and asked something about hating right wingers. I said 'well, there's two of us right here'. A stunned silence ensued until one of her compatriots said "libertarians". At which point she seemed to relax slightly. (The underlying implication being that whilst we had some credibility in their eyes, Tories were not allowed full stop! As many of you know there's no love lost between myself and the Tories but I still find much of the left attitude towards them utterly repugnant not to mention often completely wrong).

She then proceeded to tell us how libertarianism "excludes women of colour" (how?) and how everything was the fault of us evil white men. My (female) libertarian friend, to her eternal credit, then leapt to my defence and pointed out what a hypocrite Nishma was. Nishma then came out with the classic line we're all used to now that it isn't racist or sexist if it's white men we're talking about. Both of us started laughing at which point she also then said "and then there's colonialism too". The mutual recriminatory exchange only got worse from then on until she flounced out of the room.

At this point something inside me just gave. I'm done with putting up with this, or just putting it to one side for the perceived greater good. She was surrounded by four (white) men who - as per fucking usual in these groups - just passively accept this offensive concentrated bullshit. But of course they do - they all want to get into her pants and its hard work when the odds are 4 to 1 and they have to pay lip service to not "objectifying" her and taking their licks as "evil white men". If they were confident men and not emasculated craptivists they would have done one of two things - either i) backed up her position or ii) told her to stop being so offensive to almost everyone present and shut up. They did neither. They made a very quick exit, with one muttering "I'm getting out of here!". Fuck 'em. They're welcome to their sex starved lives of constantly having to self-flagellate for being white and male and beg for approval.

Now here's the second important bit:

Nishma Doshi is the Community and Events Organsier at the Open Rights Group.

She's responsible for PR, outreach and is the main point of contact for many people with ORG. As such she's very much a bona fide spokesperson for the organisation and just not some random nutter amongst the supporters.

As I mentioned, earlier I'd ecountered her already at least twice that day. She'd already said something offensive about everyone in the room being "white males" at one of the workshops but I let it slide again in the interests of getting something out of the session. No more. Other greatest hits from this white hot intellect included - in response to her being asked why she thought Boris Johnson was corrupt, it was because "he went to Eton" and during the "hacktivism" workshop she shared her - barely out of teens years of experience - clue for working out who the police informants and undercover agents were. They're socially awkward apparently. This was said to a room full of techie geeks.

With someone this openly bigoted, dogmatic, sexist and racist, following the usual cultural marxist script in such a sensitive position at ORG it is reasonable to assume that her views are at least passively tolerated.

Well that *is* intolerable to me, especially after having promoted and supported ORG for so long and joined in on their various campaigns.

So I'm sharing this blog with all of my libertarian and right wing friends and asking them to share further and boycott ORG unless and until Nishma Doshi no longer works for them and they release an official statement to the effect that they apologise and do not endorse her views and that people of all political persuasions (and white men) are welcome to get involved. I will be cancelling my donations to ORG tomorrow and writing them a formal letter explaining why and what it will take for me to consider ever associating with them again in future.

A CALL TO ARMS: London Atheist & Secularist student societies under attack

I know on occasions in the past I've asked you, dear readers and fellow bloggers to share something widely that needed wider exposure. Well this situation desperately requires that wider exposure and all the help we can provide, especially as the mass media are notably silent on the issue - very likely because of a self-censoring trend itself inspired by fear of what has befallen others.

As far as I'm concerned, a Rubicon has been passed here in British civil society. Our rule of law and civility has been tested on the litmus of Islamists getting their way through threats and censorship backed by threats and has been found wanting. And it has been found wanting where one of our supposedly safe and hallowed institutions is concerned - the free-thinking (or so we are told) university campuses of Higher Education. This has to be nipped in the bud, now.

You could be forgiven entirely for not having a clue what I'm talking about. So far the most prominent coverage has been in two Sunday comment pieces here and here.

Three separate University Atheist / Secularist student societies have come under attack from islamists. The two milder cases are those at UCL and the LSE.

Alex Gabriel summarises events well so far:

"What’s happened since the Jesus and Mo business started? Well: I’ve been told I’ll be beheaded. Rhys Morgan’s been told in more detail that he’ll be killed. Atheists at UCL have worried their parents will be attacked. Atheists at Queen Mary were told they’d be hunted down if they insulted Mohammad, including their president Jen Hardy who’s feared for her life in the last few days. Maryam Namazie made it sound like this wasn’t unusual in her line of work. All this, and LSESU have the cojones to say it’s Muslims they’re concerned about? If anybody currently requires a safe space, it’s us."

That's right. The worst event so far as been at Queen Mary two weeks ago - students had organised a talk on 'Sharia Law and Human Rights'. An Islamist thug turned up (with help apparently), filmed members of the audience and threatened violence against them if he heard of any "insult to the prophet".

Having now spent some time with the Queen Mary students to find out first hand what happened I can tell you that these kids are feeling not only scared, but also very isolated. Not only do the various students unions involved in these debacles appear to be uncritcially taking the Islamist side against all reason, demanding that the Atheist, Secularist and Humanist societies censor themselves or - in the case of LSE - face expulsion from the Union, but I've heard a number of them asking 'where is the left'?

The police have apparently told them that the worst that will happen is that the individual in question (never mind his mates waiting outside, or those who opened the fire doors in the hall so their pals could get in, or the two who were shouting, demanding to know "who drew the cartoons") is that he'll get an £80 fine. Apparently they can't take it any more seriously because the threat was prefaced with an "if" - i.e. 'if I hear the prophet has been insulted'. What complete and utter arseclownery from our Police Farce. No wonder things are continuing to race downhill at rapid speed in Tower Hamlets. I mean - why on earth would the students be scared, it's not as if there are recent precedents eh? (And with regard to Tower Hamlets itself - let's not forget this litany of shit)

Worse, one of the students discovered a forum where the "brothers" were discussing this intimidation. Whilst there are some calls for restraint, there are plenty of posts on there to send a chill up your spine - "who gave these kuffar the right to speak?" - anyone? To preserve people's anonymity and to also preserve this fuckwittery for posterity and hopefully future police investigation with a police force worth the name not compromised by politically correct Fabianism I have created a resource page with archived pages so there is no need to visit the forum itself (please avoid clicking on the links within the archived pages themselves as you'll end up at the Muppets' forum).

Well - it will come as absolutely no surprise to many readers of this blog  - it seems "the left" is either taking its default position of head in the sand, or worse - in several cases, siding with the Islamists against the students. One of the few noble exceptions to this is Harry's Place - who have kept a careful and critical eye on the ever worsening Islamist problem in the UK and in London (Tower Hamlets) in particular. What's more they attack this issue from the left and represent to me all the good things I thought the left were supposed to represent when I first took an interest in politics at the tender age of 18 many years ago - the same age a lot of these students are who are on the receiving end of this bullshit.

So - I want to appeal to my fellow bloggers - please spread the word on these incidents as these kids are being let down by ALL of the institutions that are supposed to protect them and help them - the police, the media, even their own student unions. And also, PLEASE help to publicise the rally next week in support of these students and anyone else who wants to maintain the right to free expression and NOT be violently threatened as a result.

Enough of student hypocrisy already.....

I've had enough of hearing ignorant and self-serving arguments from students and the NUS regarding the future of higher education funding.

After attending the various actions to support Julian Assange over the last week I was bitterly disappointed to notice the almost complete absence of students. At the most important event - the hearing on Tuesday, there were barely 100 people. We virtually had a journalist bodyguard each and I ended up giving four (four!) interviews as a result. The spirit of '68? Don't make me laugh! Students are rioting, being violent, destroying property and causing massive disruption in the name of completely misunderstanding the nature of the Browne Review proposals. We hear disingenuous claims that this is about standing up for poorer students who won't now go to university (the Browne review is actually much fairer for students from poorer backgrounds) or that the violence is justified because of the supposed 'violence from the state in ruining future students life chances'. Their self-serving articulation of arguments based on ignorance is frustratingly transparent.

There are many very serious issues that the students would be turning their attention towards if this really was about resisting vicious government policies or authoritarianism more generally. Issues for which I would be much more sympathetic regarding violent or destructive civil disobedience - to name just a few examples: i) the future of the internet, investigative journalism and anti-authoritarian truth-telling at stake with the reaction to Assange/Wikileaks, ii) the fact that a third of scots are now in fuel poverty, iii) the fact that the country will have a catastrophic energy deficit in 2015 iv) the fact that the majority of working age adults in the UK are illiterate and/or innumerate, v) the continuing destruction of British sovereignty and its economy by our successive quisling governments integrating us even further with the EU or even vi) that Britain has been party to the deaths and torture of tens of thousands of people in Iraq.

But no.

Instead we have the most breathtaking hypocrisy. (Make sure you read this before viewing the video below).

So I decided to create an Angry German Kid parody of Aaron Porter, president of the NUS to vent my spleen. As is de rigeur for these types of videos - bad language throughout:




Thanks to the folks who produced the inspirational previous tranche of downfall and angry german kid videos, especially the Derek Draper version from whom I borrowed a joke that is simply too good to pass up on for the purposes of this video.

The next step for climate sceptics....CONTINUE FIRING!!

The back of the IPCC and with it the alarmist case for "global warming" has been broken.

This has yet to filter out into general awareness, however it seems the MSM (MainStream Media) is finally starting to swing behind the sceptic cases (for there are many, many issues with the "consensus", not all of which sceptics agree on - and indeed, as it should be). Currently the Daily Mail, The Express, The Telegraph and The Times are all sticking the boot in. Good. Its long overdue and thanks to climategate and the resulting flurry of activity from sceptics acting as good citizen-journalists and citizen-scientists the true extent of the IPCC, and their quisling supporters', deceit is being laid bare.

We barely missed what could possibly have been history's most colossal fraud perpetrated on the people of the planet, with attendant devastating consequences for freedom and prosperity. Yet the wounds already inflicted are grave. Most of what was good, remaining in the left, has been filleted and hollowed out by so many left wing groups jumping on the bandwagon and giving it up wholesale; I don't think they'll ever really be able to recover from this. Neither will all of the genuine environmentalists, whose very legitimate concerns about human impacts on the environment will now never be addressed or taken nearly as seriously as they should. Everyone will just remember the incredible Big Lie that almost was CO2 based anthropogenic global warming. Its a shame it morphed into a big left-right battle, but that was because, despite a mere handful of noble exceptions (Counterpunch, Spiked, for example), the left wing groups wanted it that way.

The list of consequences already endured could go on and on (the likelihood that the lights will start going out in Old Blighty by perhaps 2015 not the least among them....). But that wasn't the point of this post (though it will be of a later one).

Instead, I wanted to dedicate my very first effort at video editing to all the brave and noble people who have dared to challenge the "consensus" over the last few years - particularly those who began asking questions many years before I did.

I have found increasingly recently that scenes from an old sci-fi series, Babylon 5, have increasingly resonated with me in response to current events, and think I will be making some carefully edited videos later from the series to represent what is happening to us now.

So I cut a clip below that indicates what the climate sceptics should do next. The warship, and the crew aboard, in the clip represent the climate sceptics who were responsible for breaking through the enemy lines. They're going to continue taking hits from all angles while the beast dies (in the clip - significantly - these hits are coming from the Earth's "defence grid" which has been turned, by a thoroughly corrupt and authoritarian World government, on the population of the Earth itself). The captain (Sheridan) in charge of the warship states clearly what needs to be done next, despite continuing to soak up massive hits:

"CONTINUE FIRING!!!"

The Path and The Way

Yea unto you I say for it is The Path and The Way. The One True Dictum of the Holy Portly One, Marx, may Peace Be Upon His Name. For his Holy Word is timeless and unchanging.

Followers of THE LORD need no understanding of modern financial systems - for these are the edritch and wicked constructions of mere men. One Unchanging Philosophy to encompass all possible future eventualities is all. Since the passing of our Lord, nothing new exists under the Sun and ALL innovations and changes in social relations were predicted and anticipated by our Bearded deliverer. We have no need to change our opinions when new facts arise, for there are no new facts. OUR LORD has seen and predicted all. Everything that occurs is simply a recapitulation of his teachings.

The instrument of Satan - CAPITALISM - is everywhere and everywhen. Ill defined, vague and mysterious, it evades the gaze of OUR LORD in the hearts of men. Given shape and clear definition only when that definition suits our followers' purposes. The fact that it has many varied definitions in many varied contexts is simply a mark of its true and eternal EVIL.

Yea witness the transubstantiation of the truly pious one's ego: Verily, it is the holy mystery how one's ego can transcend the False Consciousness and Historical Materialism that afflict all who are non-believers. The pious are raised up from this substrate by their Faith. It is at once a veil for non-believers, how a faith in collectivism is combined with the holy trinity of Me, myself and I, and how I AM RIGHT. The wisdom of crowds, like CAPITALISM, is truly evil when it does not fit our preconceived notions.


Yea, the Pious may join OUR LORD in the atheist heaven, where all the calculators go when they die. Ye are commanded to turn the other cheek to naysayers who point out that parts of THE LORD's written commandments contradict one another. Scribbles in The Holy Communist Manifesto only APPEAR to contradict the Holiest of Holies, the Testament of Das Kapital, because they were written through the flawed hands of man. For OUR LORD did sacrifice himself for our sins by sitting on the dole and writing endless manuscripts, suffering so terribly as he was pampered by the very elite who are the agents of SATAN. TRUE BELIEVERS can interpret what THE LORD really communicated, though ineffable, through the power of faith and may cast down any who have not read every single tedious line after tedious line in every single endless monologue after endless monologue as unfit to speaketh ill.



Those evil men who suggest that OUR LORD stole many ideas from the consort of Satan, ADAM SMITH, should have their tongues removed. OUR FAITH guarantees our righteousness in this cause for we have never read An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations. We have been told by the Acolytes of the Lord that it is worthless and meaningless and should be consigned to the Memory Hole. We KNOW what it contains without having read it, or the work of Lucifer's followers derived from its false wisdom. Rumours that some apostates have fallen from grace after reading SMITH and finding that he in fact criticises many of the things we fear are FALSE. Followers of THE LORD who have stood, open mouthed, whilst reading the passages of the evil text damning Corporatism have read words FALSELY IMPLANTED. For our one and Eternal Lord was in fact a TIME TRAVELLER, and Satan's Consort, IN FACT, stole ideas from THE LORD, twisting them and mixing them with lies.

For ALL Authoritarian measures are RIGHT and JUST when delivered in the name of OUR LORD. We believe in Collectivist thinking, however WE the pious and followers of the Holy One KNOW WHAT IS BEST FOR YOU. The superiority of our Egos over that of the chattel non-believers and less pious is another of the holy mysteries.


Our favoured methods are continual repetition of dogma - said loudly enough and often enough, the incantations of OUR LORD, can cast out even the most single minded demon, causing them to walketh out of the room. Other weapons acceptable in Our Lord's sevice are Ad hominem and argument by association. In trying times, carefully targeted use of the following unholy words can be used to discredit or, in suitably dogmatic company, even destroy enemies of THE LORD: "Tory", "Loon", "Conspiracy Theorist", "Capitalist", "Elitist".

Lo are these methods no more frequently applied than on that giant shoutbox known as the Intardnets. We have come to fear the unregulated and unfettered terror that it is. For it has come to pass that its nature is in line with our mortal enemies. Oh horrors.

We could not possibly contemplate sincere and open debate with the demons - especially in scholarly and peer reviewed journals, as good scholarship is a tool of the establishment. Instead we will produce poorly edited and researched pamphlets and manuscripts. Fear not though brothers and sisters, for we can keep OUR LORD's Orthodoxy alive and intact through only interacting with people who already agree with us on backwater bunker sites where no one dares disagree on substantive points. If persistent demons appear we can easily gather a posse comitatus to strike down the offenders using the holy methods enshrined above and if that does not work then removing their tongues comes very naturally.

In fact we have warriors amongst us who, like our LORD, sit on the dole and churn out thousands of pointless posts on insular internet forums, lecturing a small group of people who already largely agree with us. Taking succour from the state while agitating for its destruction is a terrible burden to bear and these brothers are truly saints to the cause.

When there are no other enemies to strike down we pious and Righteous are compelled to turn to one another. For the Lord dictated that, as a property of evil is that it eventually turns in upon itself, all who seek succour in the teachings of the Lord must fight one another until those who are the most RIGHTEOUS and RIGHT win and ascend to OUR LORD's knee. Others, the faithless, who engage in such internecine warfare are engaging in SOCIAL DARWINISM, those of the faithful however, who fight one another over tedious differences are carrying out the Good Lord's work. We become UNLIKE our enemies by becoming just LIKE them. It is truly cunning wisdom. And ALL of our faults can be lain at the feet of the beast of CAPITALISM, for we can take no responsibility for ourselves.


Our enemies, though they appear to regularly share the same concerns and interests as us, are naught but DECEIVERS. Those unlike us can be identified most often with seductive whispers about the greatest sin - PROPERTY. Whilst we have been cast down into the pit of sinners, all of us have original sin - wearing flesh suits, we the faithful struggle with and bear the burden. For although we must BEAR the burden of property, suffering as we do, in order to satiate those evil, hated biological mechanisms, we do so WITH KNOWLEDGE OF THE TRUE WORD OF THE LORD.

For PROPERTY is in itself evil, and when also acquired directly through the blood, sweat and tears of effort, through the hated body, is therefore EVIL SQUARED. And when exchanged for tokens of mutual value with one another, becomes EVIL CUBED. Our enemy CAPITALISM therefore prospers through the despicable mechanisms of being born into a human body, creating value with one's efforts and exchanging PROPERTY with one another with tokens which - whatever form they take - will always be the work of the devil.

Eventually the most pious and just will wear shirts made of their own hair. For we can alleviate the burden of the original sin of PROPERTY through discerning the difference between de jeur and de facto property. There are NO awkward questions, or tricky issues for the faithful in considering this evil for we simply turn the other cheek once more. There is NO slippery slope between 'de facto' and 'de jeur' because we sayeth so. If all arguments fail us we can reinvoke our faith in THE COLLECTIVE which will spontaneously produce the RIGHT answers for us in the future, so we meek and humble followers need not answer these questions now. Property is only OWNED temporarily by those who are using it. Therefore when I sleepeth I have no property. And verily there are NO thieving bastards, because all belong to the collective and it is good.

So speaketh the Prophets of the LORD. Aperson.

*('Amen' is sexist and therefore FORBIDDEN).