Time to answer Alex

As previously trailed, it's time to answer (angry) Alex.

1) The BNP might try to put forward a public-friendly face now, but by most accounts they've simply hidden the baseball bats and knuckledusters away for a few years - I'm sure they'll be back (if they aren't already). The reason people tend not to link to them is because they /are not/ simply a group of people with strong conservative values; they are racist Nazi-worshippers. I'm totally serious when I suggest that they admire Hitler.

So what? People wander around with Lenin and Che Guavara on T-shirts and I don't wander over and—much as I would like to—punch them in the face. I generally attempt to point out that they are wearing the image of a mass-murderering Communist shitbag, and ask them what the hell they think they are playing at. I generally find that asking them if they'd wear a t-shirt displaying Hitler, whether they'd feel so comfortable. They often reply that the image of Che or Lenin is "iconic" and they seem to think that this wins the argument.

And that's when I punch them.

The BNP might be a bunch of knuckle-duster-weilding scum, or they may have decided that playing politics is more effective. This is where Griffin has been so clever: by playing down—or even (possibly) eliminating?—the naked violence aspect and coming up with policies that, on the face of it, seem reasonable to the average Joe (where beating up Pakis may induce distaste) they have, in fact, made large inroads into local politics in some areas.

2) Notice how much media coverage these attacks get, when 99.9% of racist attacks are whites on minorities; you previously mentioned media bias, and that's it right there. I think you've been bought into the sensasionalised claim that these attacks are common. If you interested in tackling racism, do not look to Islam, look to British culture, because that's where most of it is.

OK, a couple of points here. The first murder that I posted was of a white man by some drunk Pakistanis. Now, it could be argued that, because they had assualted one other Asian man that night, that there was no racial element. However, since when has a racist attack been siomply about the colour of someone's skin? What if that Asian man was a Sikh? There have been a number of incidents involving Sikhs and Muslims, and the fact that another "Asian" man, who could also be Chinese, Malayan, etc., was attacked does not necessarily mean that none of these attacks were racially motivated. I simply fail to understand why the murder that these people—one of whom shouted, "We have killed the white man. That will teach an Englishman to interfere in Paki business"—committed could possibly be construed as anything other than racial. We have convicted whites of racially-motivated murders on far less evidence.

The last three mentioned are "minority on minority" murders, if you like. British citizens were murdered by other British citizens because of an alien belief system. Young men and women have been brutally murdered because of this adherence to a foreign faith. And there may well be only a few cases, but I will bet you that more "honour killings" happen now—whether in hard numbers or as a proportion of the population, or even as a proportion of the BME population—than happened, say, thirty years ago.

3) (A question more than an objection)
Why does the EU rob the Brits of a right to self-government more than a British government robs Scotland/England/London/wherever their right to self-government? Drawing the line between Britain and Europe is totally arbitrary. (I suspect you'll simply agree and argue that we should abolish states entirely and all run on a giant free-market, which is of course another matter).

Any group of people has to be organised. There are some things that free markets do not do well (prevent people from starying, for instance). The bigger the area to be organised, the less efficient becomes the organisation. There are problems of scale and distance. Therefore, we split these areas up into smaller areas. There is a practical reason.

EU Serf comments thusly:

We have a cultural, social and historical connection to the rulers in Westminster however, which despite their many faults gives them a legitimacy that the alternatives do not have.

Chris follows with this:

Size isn't really the issue, it can be any size so long as there is enough binding force to bind it together as a nation. A nation is more than a territory. A single language, religion, culture, history, figurehead, national myth or even just a common enemy can do this.

They are both right. And to pretend that there is any meaningful difference in culture between Scots, English and Welsh is just foolish. There is, however, a significant difference between British and French culture.

However, my problems with the EU can be covered quite simply:

• Nation states exist. They have governments who must try to do the best for their people or else they will lose their power. This competition between nations is healthy, and helps to stimulate growth through innovation. The EU stifles this.


• The EU tries—or tries to appear—to serve many masters which means, in fact, that it can serve none. Even were we to dissolve all of the states in the EU, there would still be problems of regionalisation. We have this problem in a country as small as Britain; over a much larger area, the scale of the problem becomes multiplied many times.


• Governments can be voted out, and their policies changed. The only body in the EU that can initiate laws is unelected; they cannot be removed. Even when the Commission resigned en masse under Santer, many of the people involved retained their jobs, even the egregious Kinnock. Even when some did not, the substantial aim and functioning of the Commission remained unchanged.


• Few enough people voted for Labour this time around; no British person has ever been given a vote on the existence, personnel or direction of the Commission, the signing of Treaties or our membership of the EU (note: not the EEC). This means that it has no legitimacy for the Brittish people.


• The EU costs a large amount of our money, which we have no say in the spending of. Money which could be better spent in this country by our elected officials or, even better, returned to the people from who it was taken, who will make best use of it.


• Competancies, i.e., powers, handed to the EU at one point, by nation states, can never be regained, without leaving the EU. These powers are controlled by the (unelected) Commission.


• I am, roughly, a free-market libertarian: the EU's policy of economic micromanagement runs directly contrary to these views. And yet I have no say in its direction.


• The EU is unnnecessary. Countries can, and have in the past, make their own treaties, with each other, for the mutual gain of both.


• The EU's micromanagement of economies, and vast swathes of red tape, stifle trade and business and thus makes us all poorer. This translates to real tragedies on a personal level.


• The EU also tries to micromanage on a social level. This makes it as fascist as the current Labour government. However, we can change our government: we cannot change the EU, its structure or its (meaningful) personnel.


• I'll say it again: the Commission, the only body in the EU that can initiate laws, is unelected.

That'll do for now. There's a lot more, but those points summarise my basic position.

Don't get me wrong, all of these attacks are awful, and do indeed deserve heavy punishment. But its a question of emphasis; yet more 'oh us poor disadvantaged white people' would be hilarious if it weren't so sickeningly self-absorbed.

Self-absorbed? I don't quite get this. What I am complaining about is the blatant double-standards employed by establishment, where white, male, middle-class natives of these islands are the Untermenschen. Who cares whether the one case mentioned above has had disproportionate media attention: the fact is that, I believe, the murderers were let off the hook because they were not white; they were not treated equally under the law.