I know I said this isn’t all going to be about The Labour Party, but…. I’ve got a feeling I’m going to saying that a lot. Maybe it’s what I should have called the site. Maybe not. I’m guessing there’s going to be a lot of sites called that.
Oh well. Today’s exciting instalment is called “It’s all gone a bit Billy Bragg”. Now then, you’ve got to assume Billy’s a smart bloke. You might not like his politics, but you’ve got to assume he’s bright. And you’ve got to assume he knows about decent behaviour.
Decent behaviour goes like this. If you upset someone and you didn’t mean to upset them, you say “I’m really sorry for upsetting you. I didn’t realise what I said was so distressing and really the last thing I wanted to do was upset you and I’m really sorry”.
Decent behaviour does not go like this. “I upset you, but you’re wrong to be upset and let me tell you why”.
Billy has boxed himself into a corner, a corner so tight he can’t do that most basic thing. He can’t take a step back, look at what’s said from a bit of distance and think “Ah… I might have misjudged this one”. So he just digs and digs and keeps on digging.
“If I dig long enough, I might find the plot cos I seem to have completely lost it”.
A few days ago, Billy posted this:
There’s all shades of wrong here. What does it even mean? Am I more loyal to Israel than “to the interests of” England? Is this some kind of Norman Tebbit cricket test? I wouldn’t have thought that’s who Billy would want to associate with, but maybe that’s who he is now. It’s been said before that the Far Left and the Far Right aren’t so different. We all change.
Given that Israel doesn’t play Test cricket, maybe he means “Who would I vote for in the Eurovision Song Contest?” In fairness to Bill, I don’t know. I was happy Israel won the last one, but that chicken song isn’t going to appear on a Spotify playlist anywhere near me. I’m not sure how I would show “loyalty” to either Israel or England.
And what does it mean “the alleged priorities of Jews worldwide”? I genuinely have no idea what that means. I’m guessing it’s some kind of reference to a global Jewish conspiracy. And, by the way, when it comes to the global Jewish conspiracy, I’m not saying there is and I’m not saying there isn’t. The first rule of Fight Club, you know.
The whole thing looks a bit deranged. It sounds a bit mad. A little bit… like he’s stressed.
So yesterday Britain’s three leading Jewish weekly newspapers belied the old joke about “two Jews, three opinions” by all having the same leader and each other’s logos on their front pages. “United We Stand” was the head and in the copy they spoke of “the existential threat to Jewish life in this country that would be posed by a Jeremy Corbyn-led government”.
Newspaper editorials are designed to make the reader think. They’re designed to make you question. That’s their job. An existential threat. Maybe. Who knows? Well, Billy knows.
and says, quite reasonably, “how are we supposed to conduct a reasonable debate about antisemitism in such a febrile atmosphere”.
To Billy, this is a reasonable question. But it’s only a reasonable question because of where you’re standing. From where I’m standing, it looks a bit different.
From where I’m standing… the thing is we’re not supposed to conduct a reasonable debate about antisemitism. We don’t need a reasonable debate about antisemitism. Billy – and his wing of the Labour Party – are the only people who want a “reasonable debate about antisemitism”.
No, we don’t need a reasonable debate about antisemitism. What we need is for you to just be quiet for a bit. What we need is for your party to try to remember it’s Her Majesty’s Official Opposition and start bloody opposing.
And if we’re going to have “a reasonable debate” maybe it should be about why you and your party are so obsessed with Jews.