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Post by frankiegth on Oct 21, 2009 17:09:27 GMT
Tomorrow night.
Do you think he should appear on the long running prog?
I believe he should. We live in a democracy (allegedly) and there is a set down criteria for appearing on the show which depending on your POV sadly/fortunately the BNP now fulfill. Let him appear as is his right to (under BBC rules) and hopefully he/BNP will be exposed for what they are.
I think the reason the BNP have gained the votes is because a lot of working class people are feeling alienated/marginalized/ignored/taken for granted, call it what you will by the major mainstream parties. And while they don't neccessarily agree with the BNP as such they vote for them out of frustration and as a protest.
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Post by Sultan of Cannock- SRFC on Oct 21, 2009 18:07:33 GMT
My insticts are totally against BNP- after all i have a Chinese wife!
Reluctantly i agree that the appearance should go ahead. Banning gives them a kind of twisted legitimacy in that they can claim to be "martyred" and that the establishment is scared of their "truth"
Hopefully the idiot will be hoisted by his own petard. My late Father advised me that sometimes it was better to keep quiet and let people think you're a fool than to speak and confirm it beyond all reasonable doubt.
Go for it Griffin, prove it beyond all reasonable doubt then just disappear along with the rest of the dinosaurs, like them you're 65 million years out of date!
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Post by ambersalamander on Oct 21, 2009 19:45:42 GMT
I agree with you both, but let's not forget that Griffin is so well media-trained and practised at spinning his political views into something much more palatable, he may prove to be an exceptionally slippery one. It'll be interesting to watch. Shame I'll miss it.
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Post by Sultan of Cannock- SRFC on Oct 21, 2009 19:58:47 GMT
I shan't be watching - i'd be liable to put my foot through the screen and we can ill afford a new telly at the moment.
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Post by coops on Oct 21, 2009 20:37:29 GMT
I agree with you both, but let's not forget that Griffin is so well media-trained and practised at spinning his political views into something much more palatable, he may prove to be an exceptionally slippery one. It'll be interesting to watch. Shame I'll miss it. So well media trained that he managed say that he thought three very well respected Army Generals should be tried for war crimes you mean? It's rather ironic that a party that does not agree with free speech should be allowed on QT in the name of free speech but there you go. Hopefully the audience will ask the right questions and Dimbleby will keep the debate from straying to Griffin's stronger points.
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Post by robotsmfc on Oct 21, 2009 20:39:18 GMT
I trust that Dimbleby will be able to embarass him at least once with the way he makes ducking and weaving politicians give a straight answer.
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Post by DazaB_WCFC on Oct 21, 2009 22:37:18 GMT
The only thing that banning the BNP will do is to help the BNP. And in any case, one reason (among many) that I don't support the BNP is becuase I believe in freedom of speech. It would be poor form if I was to say that they shouldn't be allowed on simply becuase I totally disagree with them. People say, well they'd ban you from speaking out against them if they were in power... In that case, the moral highground is mine!
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Post by thevicar on Oct 23, 2009 12:11:08 GMT
To be honest, I didn't feel like last night generated anything helpful. From my perspective it proved what I already knew, Nick Griffin is an odious little toad who lies to people in an attempt to use their fears and failings to advance the cause of fascism in the UK. But then I'm a reasonably well educated middle class white guy from London.
Whether the set up last night would have convinced potential BNP voters of the nature of the leader and party is less clear to me.
The line 'an almost totally non violent Ku Klux Clan leader' did seem to be a step in the right direction of exposing such a bloody stupid world view.
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Post by Col ISIHAC. on Oct 23, 2009 12:51:45 GMT
The programme was never going to be objective enough to prove anything at all!
Thanks to the advance publicity and the weighting of the general discussion, the whole thing was skewed to the point of being pointless. Everyone is aware of Griffin's political stance, we all know that he leads the one remaining right wing party in the UK - and the others on the panel, those asking the questions and the lefties who generated so much publicity on the day added nothing to what we know in that regard.
So, what we are still wanting to know is how the BNP would tackle things like climate change, redirect indirect taxation, enable parents a real choice of schools for their children, promote wider use of public transport, fat cat pay, you know; the sort of thing that QT generally has fruitful discussions about.
The BNP had every right to be invited to appear on the programme - the BBC were right to insist upon editorial control. But we are no further forward in terms of an objective conversation. Everyone jumped on the Bash the BNP bandwagon last night. Not necessarily a bad thing, but the way it was done just played into that party's hands!
It is a fact that the BNP has support - and the support is based upon the views that all its opponents love to spout and deride. So, while that support is based upon just one element of extreme politics, it WILL grow. Given a generation, the BNP and Lib Dems will be equal in terms of their representation in Parliament. Stopping it requires a little more common sense.
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Post by robotsmfc on Oct 23, 2009 14:10:45 GMT
I think it's unfair to say that "everyone jumped on the bash the BNP bandwagon". Obviously the 4 other panel members were going to be vary anti-BNP, and it was obvious that most of the audience would also be generally against them. I agree that the debate wasn't a very fruitful one though in terms of issues raised. On the Conf North forum at the moment anyone who dares to suggest that last night wasn't a deliberate anti-BNP hatchet job is getting told to stop being patronising leftists who think they're better than everyone else
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Post by amberaleman on Oct 23, 2009 21:57:51 GMT
I agree with most of what's been posted above.
The show turned into a bit of a circus, but they say there's no such thing as bad publicity and it's already looking as if it's done the BNP more good than harm. Maybe that's the price we have to pay in a liberal democracy. But the people who may end up paying that price are not white middle class folk like most of us.
I've been frustrated by the political left's campaign against the BNP, which seems to be based on the twin premises that if you throw enough mud then most of it will stick, and that suppressing views they despise is preferable to exposing them as immoral and incoherent. The TV footage of furious protesters storming police lines outside Television Centre was hardly an impression of people occupying the moral high ground.
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Post by coops on Oct 25, 2009 13:52:30 GMT
On the Conf North forum at the moment anyone who dares to suggest that last night wasn't a deliberate anti-BNP hatchet job is getting told to stop being patronising leftists who think they're better than everyone else I've stopped using that forum, I really don't like the views of some of the people on there, I'm too tempted to use the C word on the racist Wilsons. *EDIT* "Wilsons"!! Love it!
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Post by robotsmfc on Oct 25, 2009 13:56:26 GMT
Seconded.
Thankfully most of them don't know this place even exists.
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Post by DazaB_WCFC on Oct 25, 2009 14:36:47 GMT
You have to realise that with that forum, anyone who talks sense or has a brain is seen as a threat and they're jelios (sic) of you'ze.
I think that one has to sink to their level to get anything out of there. (OR at least the level of certain people - there are many decent people on there too which is why I will still post on there.)
and being a Worcestershire cricket fan I'm very good at sinking.
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Post by Col ISIHAC. on Oct 25, 2009 19:51:21 GMT
Ha! Coops fell foul of our built in word association machine!! ;D
(Edited - just to point out that the singular in this case would have got you "See You Next Tuesday"!)
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