For those who do not know ‘astroturfing’ is creating an organisation that looks like a grass roots one but has merely been created by a political campaign or commercial entity. It’s not a popular ground up entity or campaign, but a chimera created to give the appearance of being a popular movement. The definition of the word ‘astroturfing’ in this context is given by Dictionary.com as:
(usually lowercase) the deceptive tactic of simulating grassroots support for a product, cause, etc., undertaken by people or organizations with an interest in shaping public opinion:
In some countries astroturfing is banned, and this includes sponsored blog posts.
An ‘astroturfing’ campaign is really the best way to describe the group ‘LGBT against Islamophobia’ and some of their recent actions. They are an organisation that sounds as if the are big, but are merely a few extremely deluded Leftist fraggles. They work under the umbrella of ‘Unite Against Fascism’, a group that has a noted blind-spot when it comes to Islamic fascism. A chapter of the ‘LGBT against Islamophobia’ has allegedly set up in the North East and are giving the false impression that they are bigger and more popular than they really are.
A brief look at their LGBT Against Islamophobia Facebook page shows a dearth of ‘likes’, only 47 at the time of writing, which is tiny for such a supposedly large regional group. Furthermore, an examination of the pictures doesn’t exactly paint the picture of a well supported group. They can’t even keep a coherent presence on a Pride march in Newcastle upon Tyne and they could only find a few members for a photo-op afterwards. Now either this is a massive group and most of the members decided that it was party rather than politics time, or this is a small group with big mouths. My money would be on the latter. I know from personal experience that it’s pretty easy to keep a group of thirty to fifty like minded souls in roughly the same place on a march, including a Pride march, so why did their members get, in their own words ‘all spready outy’? Is it because they have considerably less than fifty active supporters?
The reason for the sudden, Facebook page was only created this month, appearance of North East LGBT Against Islamophobia becomes a little bit clearer when you read a particular story of theirs. It appears that they are trying to counter the #WeStandWithOrlando silent walk to take place on July 23rd in Stockton on Tees. This event is being put together by LGBT people who are not of the idiot Left, but instead by individuals who understand the threat that Islam poses to LGBT people.
Also the #WeStandWithOrlando walk organisers are not going to shy away from naming the ideology, Islam, that murdered 49 people at a gay nightclub in Orlando Florida, in June 2016. Naming the ideology that murders gay people is something that LGBT Against Islamophobia would very much not like to happen and they are being supported and publicised by, who else, the mendacious grievance mongering taqiyya artists of Tell Mama. What a surprise – Not. Tell Mama would also like Britons to ‘not see the Islam’ when the followers of Islam indulge in their all too common habit of mass murdering people. Here’s Tell Mama’s tweet to their supporters to support this LGBT Against Islamophobia group. They are doing so probably because they both share the same aim of stopping people from highlighting the violence and hatred that Islam contains and also engenders in its followers.
Please SUPPORT & Join this page: https://t.co/rxg7utcZe6 in relation to this event hijacked by the far right: https://t.co/zem2TRfQTH
— TellMAMAUK (@TellMamaUK) July 21, 2016
It seems that ‘LGBT Against Islamophobia’ itself is also not a widely supported or long standing organisation either. A drill down into the organisation‘s blog shows it as only being set up in February 2015. Most of this group’s activity seems to be comprised of screaming their political lunacy at various Pride events in the UK. They were set up at a meeting held in the socialist bookshop Bookmarks in London and their members appear to be the usual adherents of the Trotskyist far Left. They certainly have no moral or political problem with being seen with Socialist Workers Party placards and in one of the Prides, I believe it was at London Pride, they seemed quite happy to be surrounded by such objects.
Founding meeting of LGTBAI at Borders bookshop in London
This group doesn’t seem too bothered about SWP associations do they?
I have no problem in describing this group as a small, barely supported Socialist Worker or other Trot front group and one that most definitely fits into the category of an ‘astroturf’ organisation. They are, I would hazard a pretty good guess, a group whose views are miles away from the views of the average gay or bisexual person in the street. Groups like this are dangerous to LGB and T people because they lie to them, and tell them that Islam is a religion of peace and not to be scared of it. This is an almost criminally dishonest thing to say to people who are, and will be at increasing risk of attack, by homophobic Muslims. It’s wrong to tell people that a threat doesn’t exist when it clearly does. Groups such as ‘LGBT Against Islamophobia’ are also troubling for the wider society as they can be mobilised by the likes of Tell Mama to disrupt or drown out on social or other media, the LGB and T voices that ask hard questions about the ideology of Islam. The non-gay media and the more leftist side of the gay media help to publicise lies told about Islam by the likes of ‘LGBT Against Islamophobia’ and give them a credibility that they do not deserve.
Not every man or woman who, either all the time, or some of the time, fancies their own sex, is a card carrying member of the idiot LGBT Left There is a true diversity of opinion among LGB and T people, a diversity that groups like ‘LGBT Against Islamophobia’ wish to deny exists. This tiny group of hard-core socialist clowns want to stop YOU from exercising your right to an opinion not on minor matters, but on deadly serious life and death ones. Personally I don’t think they should be able to silence dissenting opinion by shouting down those of different view, but that’s what they do and want to continue to do. All sorts of groups of like minds exist in the gay world from gay swimming, gay classic car restoration, gay football, gay community history and yes, politics. Some of these groups are small local ones, as is the #WeStandWithOrlando organisation, and some are larger. However, I doubt that few if any of them, would stoop so low as to pretend to have wider communal support than they did, which is what LGBT Against Islamophobia are doing, and certainly not for such a base reason as Trotskyite politics. This lot are a truly mentalist example of far left wingery, and they almost as politically deluded as the Jews for Jeremy organisation. LGBT Against Islamophobia are just a small group of moonbats who think their view should be imposed on everyone else who doesn’t define as strictly ‘straight’.
The LGB and T Left, including those associated with LGBT Against Islamophobia, should hang their heads in shame at what they are doing, and that they are giving a free pass they to the murderously homophobic ideology of Islam. However I’ve long since stopped expecting shame from such people. This is because for them the socialist cause is placed above every other consideration, even that of preventing another Orlando. Someone who thinks like that and who is quite prepared to throw LGB and T people under the Islamic bus in order achieve their twisted ideological goal, must surely be someone constitutionally incapable of the emotion of shame.
I would like to conclude this piece by asking as many people who are able to support the #WeStandWithOrlando event either by attending or sharing details about it even sending good wishes.
We stand with Orlando silent walk on the 23rd July 2016
https://www.facebook.com/events/829284707206511/permalink/843954292406219/
Links
Previous article from here about the We Stand With Orlando silent walk and how the march’s opponents shot themselves in the foot and inadvertently helped to publicise it
The Facebook page of the UAF aligned ‘LGBT Against Islamophobia’ group
LGBT Against Islamophobia’s blog page
