CAN I ask? What exactly is ‘hate’, beyond the easy definition of an intense dislike? I hate pain (who doesn’t?) but does that constitute sadophobia? Is stating the bleedin’ obvious likely to instil irrational fear of some weirdo with a cellar full of manacles, whips and a barbed-wire mattress? Crack on, mate (pun intended).
I raise this on the metaphorically scourged back of a desperate Keir Starmer’s attempt to cleave support by sneaking his whimpering ‘Anti-Muslim Hostility’ definition through the back door. It’s not-a-law that will undoubtedly be enforced like one by equally culturally craven Chief Constables. Ironic, as the House of Lords votes to rid us of Non-Crime Hate Incidents.
But back to that hate definition. I hate the medieval practices of many Islamic traditions. I hate their subjugation of women and of gay people, I hate their halal, and I truly hate their extremist leaders’ eternal determination to eradicate Israel from the face of the planet and to subjugate all non-Muslims before them, as instructed by their Prophet and his adherents.
Is that hate speech? Can I expect Plod’s knock at the door? I’d call it an eminently understandable expression of extreme dislike towards beliefs that I consider have no place in a civilised, democratised, egalitarian society. Isn’t that simple social discourse?
I mean, it isn’t as if I’m fixated on Islam. Sure, I could name a handful of Muslims I would love to meet down a darkened, un-CCTV’d alley – but that’s got nothing to do with their supposed faith. I equally have Muslim friends I’d fight to defend down that same alley.
But if we’re throwing the hate label around, let’s see how many coppers I can get queueing down my drive. Let’s talk the covid years. I ‘hate’ Boris Johnson, Matt Hancock, Chris Whitty, Patrick Vallance, and farther afield America’s evil Anthony Fauci, New Zealand PM Jacinda Ardern, Australia’s Victoria state premier Dan Andrews . . . I could go on.
With mention of the vile Ardern, I don’t care if that sees the misogyny police joining the queue at my front door. Indeed, I think if I ever came face to face with Rachel Reeves or Angela Rayner, I’d be hard-pressed not to spit on the floor in front of them. Call it Diversity, Equity and Inclusion if that floats your boat. Keir Starmer? No, not the same level of loathing, strangely. He’s a pathetic, wimpy, desperate and manipulative nondescript. I’d like to slap him gently with a week-old, ponging kipper – preferably in front of a crowd of thousands – but then I suspect I’d pass him a handkerchief to dry his shamed tears once he got off the stage. I know. I’m a big softie at heart.
No Muslims there though, so I suspect no hate-crime threshold crossed. But why is hating politicians for their corrupted and damaging actions against their own citizens any less than expressing the same anger at an ideology that has led to the deaths of millions of innocents down the centuries and demands ever more?
I know what I think. That the Starmers, Polanskis, Ed Daveys and kin are desperately afraid of their own craven hypocrisy being revealed for what it is. It’s not even the Muslim votes, it’s their already abject surrender to a cult that quietly smirks at their rank subservience and which knows they will happily squirm and wriggle and take the knee before Islam, rather than be revealed for what they are – treasonous cowards. Starmer is far more likely a product of our deeper problems than the architect of them and such as I can understand this Anti-Muslim Hostility legal flim-flam: I’d suggest it’s just his latest scrambling attempt to claw a way out of an ever-deepening hole.
How should we respond? The only way we can, by saying what we see, condemning it where appropriate and fronting up to this barely disguised attempt to undermine our ancient rights as patriotic Britons. As for perennially/professionally offended Muslims? If you don’t like it, there’s no shortage of places you can go. That’s not hate speech, that’s a kindly meant suggestion! But we all know you won’t, not while the British people continue to be betrayed by their pathetic ‘leaders’.
