Fascists

[DanaC]

Ahhhhh finally they got 'em bang to rights! A very brave journalist went under cover for 6 months infiltrated the far right fascist party BNP and used a secret camera and mike to catch many of them, including several councillors and indeed their leader Nick Griffen espousing race hate and anti Islamic propoganda. One of them gave a speech to a group of sympathetic racists in which he referred to "coloured" asylum seekers as cockroaches. Their leader Nick Griffen claimed that Islam was taking over the world primarily by raping white women.......and then the piece de la resistance, one of them, who had been questioned regarding racial violence in the riots two years ago but gotten away because his victim wasnt sure which one of the crowd had kicked him unconcious, bragged about his role in the attack, exclaiming how he felt "fucking fantastic" as he looked down and saw his shoes were covered in blood.

Brave guy to spend 6 months being their new member. At one point a particularly vicious BNP member almost caught him in a pub toilet, changing the tape in his recorder......" what ye' doin?" he asked through the toilet door....." you CIA? eh? FBI? heheheh I'm watchin you!".........

Perhaps evenmore brave than the journalist was the guy who helped him infiltrate. A fella called Andy. He'd read all the press hype about the UK being swamped with bogus asylum seekers and in a desire to do something about it, had joined the BNP..... Whilst a member he saw how they worked. He became painfully aware of the levels of deciet and subterfuge they used. The tactics they employed. He realised he had been lied to and that the stuff he'd read in the papers was the result of lies and propoganda and was dismayed .......The BNP were not a democratic party. They do not believe in the democratic process they make that quite clear in the film. They engage in guerilla tactics during election campaigns, such as putting out leaflets full of lies but not bearing any BNP insignia which could get them prosecuted or disqualified......They engaged in violent intimidation of their opponents and those who campaigned for them. In short Andy's eyes were opened.......This is where he showed his true colours. For many such an eyeopener would lead them to leave the party and close the door on that chapter of their life.....But not this guy. Instead he kept quiet, worked at his position and progressed up the chain until he was in a position to affect the party's choices on who stood for election in the various council elections. ...All the while he was acting as a mole. He had contacted the Trade Unions Council , and passed information to them as and when he was able to.....He filtered the candidates in such a way that the one's most likely to get a seat did not get selected and those most likely to right royally fuck it up did......Eventually Searchlight put the undercover journalist in touch with Andy and he assisted him in the making of the film. Given the extreme violence these people routinely engage in I think this guy deserves a damned medal. What a risk he took in order to bring to the attention of the Brtish public the nature of the sheepskin clad wolf in their midst.

Well done guys Hopefully the police will be able to make this stuff stick. Three of them face a possible 7 year sentence ( including the party leader, a man who had already been prosecuted for inciting racial violence and also been engaged in violent attacks himself )and one of them, the one who admitted on camera to the savage beating of an Asian man faces a potential 15 year sentence for grievous bodily harm with intent.


Undercover

This programme was shown last week. Apparently several key members of the BNP have been questioned regarding their involvement and released on bail

[jaguar]

I thought the one going 'but I just wanna kill some fucking pakis' was the icing on the cake. I'm glad someone did it beofre they gain even a sliver of credability. You can put the thug in in a suit but he's still a thug.

[Catwoman]

Do you think it will actually make a difference to BNP supporters though? Won't they just be even more incensed and determined? The documentary has broken down the barriers of secrecy and made people like us all the more outraged, but do you think it will actually instigate change within the party and its supporters?

[DanaC]

There are many people who have accepted the BNP change of face over the last few years. A combination of their "respectable" face and the attitude of the press and the labour party has left a lot of people believing they can be angry about immigration without it marking them as a racist. If such a thing was not enormously beneficial to the BNP in making them electable they would not have gone to such enormous trouble in making themseles appear to be non racist. They put a lot of matderial out which claims not to be racist and claims to "tell the truth" and a lot of people swallowed this. Enough people swallowed it for them to get elected to many council seats ......But many of the people who voted for them did so because they belieevd the volte face the party had done on certain issues. Many of those same people who felt comfortable vioting Nick Griffen's little bunch in would not have been comfortable voting for a 70's style NF....How do we know this? Because if they had felt comfortable voting for outright fascism thenthe BNP would not have beenn subject to massive internal division over the issue. Nick Griffen and his cadre are the modernising force within the party, they have had to fight to get their way. The party was split almost down the middle over whether to continue the fight in their usual manner or to make themselves more electable to the public by changing their face. Nick Griffen won that battle but not without a tough fight and lot's of losses. Many of the BNP did not want to put out the line that Indians are ok......many of them dont like the line that BNP is not racist. Many of them would be quite happy( as that programme showed) to return to the old days of paki bashing and zero electoral success.

Many would be happy, but that attitude was very nearly the deathknell of their movement during the 80's and Nick Griffen knows it. As long as they can pretend they are merely one more political party who happens to be tough on immigration they will gain seats in elections. The electorate however has always proved reluctant to vote in violent anti democratic revolutionary fascists. Many people who recently voted for the BNP to protect their "britishness" were also deeply opposed to Hitler and the nazi creed. You really only have to draw that connection forcefully and many of their supporters would jump ship. Certainly the proportion of their votes which came from disollusioned tory voters would be horrified by out and out fascism.

[wolf]

They might see this film as Britain's Fahrenheit 9/11 and discount it as propaganda. It's all in how it's edited.

[Catwoman]

Which can only be a good thing. But how can those with an anti-asylum bias be so astoundingly stupid not to realise that this issue merely touches the surface of what the BNP stands for? I don't think people are that ignorant, and BNP's PR suggesting they are not racist simply allows the supporters to appear issue-voters and cloak their inherent racism. Polarising the BNP may help it lose 'mainstream' support, but only because the underlying fascism has been revealed, not because it exists.

[DanaC]

The thing is Cat, the BNP put out leaflets and so forth which are out and out lies. A lot of people believe these lies. I know this because I have had some people repeat back to me as fact lies which they cold only have gotten from BNP propoganda or the right wing press. Lies such as "Asylum seekers get everything. They get a house, they get a free mobile phone, more money than a native brit and a 4 grand car!"

Many of the people who are so afraid and angry about the asylum issues are afraid and agry because theyve been lied to. Those people would not necessarily feel moved to support a fascist party if they had not been fed that crock first. Andy , the fellow who acted as a mole for 2 years discovered the extent of their deception and also their violence. He wasmoved to do something about it. This was a man who was so angered and fearful over asylum issues that he joined the party. If he can have his eyes opened and withdraw support for theiur views why not others? Others less involved, people who felt that the BNP were merely a very right wing party who werent afraid to tell the truth......Many people who voted BNP only did so because of their new respectabole, electable face. We know this because we know how unsuccessful the old outright fascist party did in the past. You can measure the success of the BNP alongside the reforms Griffen instituted.

[Catwoman]

Yes. I have heard many such things repeated back to me. Think we all need to be educated about asylum seekers. It is ignorance that breeds fear, and it is this fear the BNP plays on. A brave and vital job by the journalists.

[evansk7]

And in the same week, we see footage of asylum seekers rioting in a - UK-taxpayer-funded - facility in England, while awaiting the processing of their application. They attack UK police, and destroy UK property (property which I, as a taxpayer, have helped purchase) on UK soil. And still we'll process their applications and accept some of them.

I can't help but feel that half the anti-asylum sentiment in the UK would evaporate if a little more visible justice was done. In the case of people like this, why do we not simply send them back to whatever oppressive state they came from and let them take their chances. Clearly they're not interested in living by the laws of this country, and they're not interested in being "good citizens" - so why do we seemingly turn a blind eye to the fact that we've got more than enough undesirable criminal elements already, and send them packing?

If we made the process more transparent, perhaps people wouldn't feel so badly done by and the BNP's support would be significantly less strong.

[Catwoman]

But British tourists do just that on holiday in every country in the world! Should you be refused an Australian visa because your mates got a bit drunk and rowdy one night in Sydney? UK citizens do more damage to their own country than any battered asylum seeker.

I agree that any action needs to be transparent - people are so ill-informed. Of course they could make the effort to find out for themselves. but there is no engagement with any political aspect in this country, so it's no surprise political opinion is constructed by soundbite threats and images.

[evansk7]

Originally Posted by Catwoman

Should you be refused an Australian visa because your mates got a bit drunk and rowdy one night in Sydney?

No, but equally after that incident should my mates be entitled to the protection of the Australian government if they think the UK govt is persecuting them?

[Catwoman]

Depends on the severity. If they were at risk of torture in this country for expressing anti-government sentiment and their destructive behaviour abroad was merely a reaction to their frustration, then of course they should be offered protection. It is only the 'bogus' seekers that should be sent back, but I think the actual quantity of such refugees is largely overplayed. Britain can (contrary to popular opinion) and should sustain the reintroduction of persecuted individuals into civilised society. And yes we can afford them. Britain is the highest paid country in the world.

[evansk7]

It is only the 'bogus' seekers that should be sent back

And the ones who demonstrate a strong probability of spending the next 15 years of their life in and out of jail at the UK taxpayer's expense.

These guys are waiting for their asylum applications to be approved. They ought to be on their very best behaviour, EVER. If rioting is that, then I don't see why we want them... why not spend the time and resources we'd invest in them into people who behave appropriately instead?

[Catwoman]

From today's Independent:

(quoting Nick Griffin) "The programme has given us a terrific boost. We've had thousands of calls from people and we've had loads of new members as a result."

[DanaC]

I would just point out that the treatment of Asylum Seekers who have reached the end of their appeal process and are due to be repatriated is appalling. The security personnel are unsympathetic bordering on abusive. The conditions within the ariport based centres are shabby, there is no natural sunlight, no windows, people are oftne inthere for many months, those that have been there a shorter span are often shunted from centre to centre across the country and contacting them ( a necezssity for their legal representatives etc) is made deliberately difficult. On top of that the vast majority of the people held in those centres are not in fact bogus asylum seekers who are beiung sent back but other people who should be helped and welcmoed who are instead just dragged off into custody.

My mother works with refugees and asylum seekers. Due to an administration cockup involving a case of mistaken identity one of her colleagues , who happens to be an asylum seeker himself and who was awaiting the results of his appeal having done everything that was asked of him, along with his sister who had just been given permission to seek employment ( asylum seekers have no right to work for a long time) were both arrested. Five in n nthe morning the police arrived at their house and arrested them both, slapped em in cuffs and then held them for several days in a police cell. Having tried to explain that he has every right to be in the country and having provided paper work and testimonial evidence to back him up they then proceeded to shunt him around to 6 different centres. They held him for 21 days and his sister for 15. Despite the fact that there were people in touch with the Home Office from week one it still took three weeks to get him out....Now that he is out he has to report to a police station 20 miles away twice weekly with a sign on time of 9 am, which for someone relying on public transport takes hours.

In the three weeks they held him he was subjected to humiliating medical procedures and checks, was cuffed evey time he was moved, and lost about 2 stone in weight. He had stopped shaving and showering because the showers were so filthy and only had cold water, and besides he had sunk into a deep depression. This was a lad who had been srupulously clean prior to this.

This is the story of a lad and a girl who both have excellent English, friends amongst various useful organisations and the money to hire a half decent solicitors firm to act on his behalf. What chance the majority of the inmates many of whom speak no english and have no idea how to access legal aid. The people in those centres are usually the most tragic and bedraggled of the lot. The people most in need of our help and they are instead treated like criminals and thrown into a prisonlike environment with no windows and helicopters overhead 24 hours a day. Given the oppression some of them have fled this cannot be a kind thing to do.

Whilst in custody Imran sank into a depression and the advice he was given by those in whose care he languished was "if you have a problem, talk to the walls, they might listen"

So.....a desperate group of people get thrown togeter iinto a desperate situation, having escaped God knows what they are treated like the scum of the earth , persona non grata.....Poor bastards I dont blame em one bit. Maybe if the people taking care of them had thought to treat them as people instead of a contagion to be cured we wouldnt have such a response.

When he tried to complain about the cuffs he was told, "what do you expect? you're illegal"

He was freed a few days ago very quietly. Just one day someone came in and said "right you can go". Thats it.No redress. No apology for having made such a mess of things and holding for no good reason someone who had every right to be where he was.