There was a massive ‘nontroversy’ recently which drew out hordes of liberal, left and religious virtue signallers into the internet sunlight. Once there, they flaunted their allegedly hurt feelings and pushed their ‘narratives’. But rather than bark at the moon, this chorus of grievance mongers, naive clerics, dodgy Islamic groups and cardboard cutout Lefties, instead ululated over an artticle by the Spectator writer Rod Liddle.
The cause of this episode of the screaming abdabs were comments by Mr Liddle that come the next election that wondered how many extra Tory seats could be gained if idiots and extremists and those who put feelings before facts, just didn’t vote. Mr Liddle’s article had a go at the students who elected Rosie Duffield as Labour MP for Canterbury, a woman who has used Parliamentary priviliged to allege, or rather smear, her ex partner as a ‘domestic abuser’. He also made a comment that it might be better for the communal Islamic vote to stay at home and hoped that there was a day in the Islamic calendar that promised hellfire to anyone who voted on that day. This comment was aimed at the Islamic extremists and separatists that often do not seem to vote for the good of the community as a whole, but merely for the candidate, usually Labour, that will engage in the most political fellatio with Islam.
I don’t think that Rod Liddle has really done anything wrong here. I also would like to see the brainwashed students, the women who blindly vote for any candidate with a vagina and a dislike of men along with the bent Islamic vote factories taken out of the electioral equation as well. Although I see Mr Liddle’s article for what it is, which is comedy, I must admit that it would be interesting to see the make up of the House of Commons without those members who have been voted in by morons .
What Mr Liddle was not doing was saying that certain groups should have the franchise removed. This was the inaccurate picture of Mr Liddle’s article disseminated by the mainstream media and by groups including the Muslim Council of Britain and the Tell Mama organisation. These organisations, see Tweet below and here, whinged on about ‘Islamophobia’ and condemned Mr Liddle for what was quite plainly a joke.
The mainstream media seems to have bought wholesale the whines, lies and emoting by the two abovementioned groups on the subject of Mr Liddle’s article. They also played up the ‘Muslim disenfranchisement’ line without seemingly going to Mr Liddle’s original text and finding out that the vast majority of his article relates to the ongoing meltdown in the Remainer camp. ‘Muslims’ were just one group that Mr Liddle aimed his comedic ire at.
I must admit that even I, somewhat of a cynic about the mainstream media, was shocked by the difference between the howling about ‘Islamopbobia’ by the Press, and the reality of the article itself. The article was not about disenfranchising Muslims, not at all, it was merely wondering what would happen if on election day various bunches of ill informed tossers stayed at home? As others have said, this comment is no different from a Leftist commentator saying that maybe elections should be held only while the quiz programme Countdown is being shown in order to stop the elderly Tories voting.
Both the media and the various groups of Islamic grievance mongers have been guilty of misrepresenting Mr Liddle’s article and this has encouraged others, who also may not have bothered to go and read the original article, to speak without possibly checking their facts. Some of those screaming about this article on social media are people who really should know better than to rush to judgement about an issue. In particular I speak of Rabbi Charley Baginsky of Liberal Judaism who rushed out a statement condemning Rod Liddle for his ‘Islamophobia’ and ‘misogyny’.
Personally I think that Rabbi Baginsky has made herself look more than a little foolish by her rushed statement. Any reasonable person reading the original article would have seen that Mr Liddle was aiming his ire not at Muslims per se, but the sort of pious and exteme Muslim who might be put off voting if the election was on a day of particular Islamic religious significance. He wasn’t having a go at the liberal Muslim or the secular Muslim or the ex Muslim, he was going after the nutcases. Also, Mr Liddle was not being ‘misyogyistic’ to take aim at Rosie Duffield. He was only commenting about how it is likely that her very slim 187 majority over the Tory Julian Brazier was down to the student vote and that the vote for her was primarily driven not by factual issues but by blind and bovine emotion. I believe that Rabbi Baginsky may have forgotten the advice given in Proverbs 25 : 8 about the questionable wisdom of rushing to judgement. Sometimes such activities have the habit of rebounding on the person who has done it.
In this case the intense whining about this article from the various Islamic grievance mongers, the left wing press and Rabbi Baginsky, has merely alerted people to the existence of the article and we are now seeing the reality of this piece set alongside the various lies and obfuscations about it. I was not intending to buy a Spectator this week but I did primarily because of the fuss that was kicked up by the virtue signallers. I’m glad I did get a copy of the magazine because the actual article itself is quite different in tone from the short excerpts that have been put out from it. I would not be at all surprised if the Spectator picked up a few more sales this week because of the fuss which makes the decision by Spectator management to cuck out to the Left and Islam by editing Mr Liddle’s article on the web edition so much more sad. If they’d stood their ground they could have gained a better prize in the form of more sales.
I don’t think that Mr Liddle really did much wrong here, he merely wondered what would happen if the lefty wankers stayed at home. That’s not disenfranchsing people, it’s only recognising that there are some who vote the way they are told to vote and others who vote for base emotional reasons rather than being thoughtful about their choices at the polling station.
The attacks on Mr Liddle by the Islamic grievance mongers, the religious Left and the secular Left really do show that the only ‘diversity’ that these groups hate is the intellectual and viewpoint diversity exhibited by Mr Liddle.
Postscript
I would most heartily recommend Sargon of Akkad’s take on this story and the subsequent actions of the various whiners who popped their heads over the parapet regarding this story. You can watch his video via the link below.
Not wishing to detract from the salient points well made but it’s Liddle, not Liddel.
Thanks for that. I have corrected it. Sorry for the error.