Garry Potter And The Same Old Nonsense, David Backhim [the mitten read aloud txt] 📗

if it weren’t so ridiculous. Someone needs to remind the Muslim separatists that if they have misgivings about the administration of law and order and justice in infidel Britain, they can always take their chances in the arab states, north Africa, not to mention certain Muslim-dominated states of the Middle East and Pakistan where their collective record on human rights leaves even more to be desired than the imperfect administration of justice in the ‘police state’ of Britain.
This must not be perceived in the well-worn, tiresome terms of a rabid racist. Indeed, it is most regrettable that anybody who expresses concerns or even constructive criticism about the Muslim community is immediately scorned as a white supremacist. The tragedy is that until Britain ’s Muslims take a full role in contributing to their new country without divorcing themselves whenever it suits them, the far right in the British National Party will reap the benefits of increasing anxieties about the mentality and behaviour of British Muslims. Britain ’s Muslims must learn to be more tolerant of dissent, which is part and parcel of life in a free speech society. Our new citizens must be willing to listen to non-Muslims’ anxieties, and seek to address them. Wouldn’t it be good if British Muslims were prepared to enlist in our armed forces and police service? Continuing failure to do so only arouses the suspicion that British Muslims do not approve of our country’s rule of law and our foreign policy. This then begs the question of how can people ‘settle’ in a country where they are at loggerheads with that country’s requirements?
I would like to finish by paraphrasing the late John F.Kennedy by stating that British immigrants, most notably Muslims, should not ask what their country can do for them, but what they can do for their country. A continuing failure to address this question only serves to increase alienation and racial tension, which racists, of which I am emphatically not one, will take advantage of.

BLACK PEOPLE
I must confess that I am opposed to any further immigration to London . There are far too many people moving to the capital from Belfast , Dublin , Glasgow , Manchester , Newcastle , Prague , and Warsaw . They come to London , steal ‘our’ jobs, claim benefits, and before you know it, they will be opening their own corner shops. It must stop immediately. No seriously, I do admit to having previously been apprehensive of the flood ( according to the British press) of Commonwealth immigration that has ‘swamped’ Britain over the last five decades. However, on reflection, I must congratulate the successive Conservative and Labour governments for their open door policy. If it had not been for the foresight of many politicians in past years, Britain would end up with about two medals in the Olympics – one for cycling, and one for rowing. Black power, I say.
Have you ever wondered why black men are so much better at sprinting? I think that I have discovered the answer. Young black men spend their teenage years being chased by the police, so that by the time that they reach their twenties, they are experts at sprinting. It must be fun being a black person in Britain. I mean at night, when you walk along the pavement and you see one or two black youths approaching from the opposite direction, you think ‘well, I think I’ll cross the road and take no chances’. It must be amusing for black people to see all these terrified whites criss-crossing the road at night.
I once went for a job interview in a Brixton reggae shop. The proprietor asked me if I was a racist. I said yes I am. Before I could say another word, the ex-Jamaican threw me out. If he had let me finish my sentence, he would have discovered that I cannot stand white people.

THE MYTH OF IRISH REPUBLICANISM
I actually have enormous respect for such ‘bogeymen’ as Gerry Adams, Martin McGuinness, Mitchel McLaughlin, and even po-faced Gerry ‘Securocrats’ Kelly. For all their chequered past and controversial curriculum vitae, these individuals and many others in Sinn Fein are very competent politicians, articulate, intelligent and very capable administrators. One only has to observe the increasing popularity of the Shinners in recent elections to recognise that more and more people (albeit within the Roman Catholic ‘nationalist’ community) respect Sinn Fein as a bona fide political party that is dedicated to representing their voters and embracing, perhaps through gritted teeth, devolved democracy in Northern Ireland.
How times are changing dramatically: the DUP contemplating sharing power with ‘fenians’ and Irish republicans governing the six counties from within the confines of Stormont, the bastion of Ulster unionism. One’s head could be forgiven for spinning at the ‘historic’ turn of events in the two steps forward, one step back peace process.
My own sympathy, as a British republican, takes its’ cue from the socialist tradition of Irish republicanism as pioneered by Easter Rising martyr, James Connolly. I also accept that the Irish tricolour, an infamous symbol in the ‘north’, is as much orange as it is green, which demonstrates the apparent desire of Irish republicans to unite the erstwhile polar opposites, admittedly within the context of a thirty-two county state. Clearly, Sinn Fein strategy is now tailored towards building confidence in the sceptical unionist community that Irish nationalists and northern loyalists can govern together, so that one fine day Protestants in the six counties will come round to the belief that sharing power in a Dublin-based government would not be such a bad thing after all, especially given the mixed record of direct rule ministers, not to mention the fact that the Roman Catholic church’s stranglehold in the Republic of Ireland is much less firm than it notoriously was. Republicans could massively help their cause however by displaying a greater tolerance of parades, shedding their ‘not in my backyard’ territorial stance, whilst also making their own areas less of a cold house for Protestants by removing murals and flags which might render the Falls Road a tourist attraction but which collectively are not making the area very user-friendly for anyone other than Irish republicans. Both republicans and loyalists have a shared responsibility to de-militarise their territories.
What spoils Irish republicanism for me are the cleverdick comedians and liberal writers in England and the American-Irish who have misty-eyed perceptions of Irish republicanism. Is it no coincidence that the only major films about the conflict in Ireland, north and south, have been movies that seem to portray the poor, oppressed, loveable leprechauns of Irish republicanism suffering injustice at the hands of those big, bad, bloody, brutal British. ‘Flicks’ such as In The Name Of The Father, Michael Collins, and When The Wind Shakes The Barley would have you believe that only one community has ever suffered during the conflict. I look forward to the day when the Neil Jordans of this world shoot ( no pun intended) a film covering the atrocities at Ballykelly, Enniskillen, Warrenpoint, and Warrington . Yes I know that one person’s terrorist is another person’s freedom fighter, but there is nothing remotely glorious or heroic about exploding bombs in chip shops or shopping centres which kill women and children. Such ‘freedom fighters’ are on a par with paedophiles – or maybe this is an insult to child molesters.
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Publication Date: 07-01-2009

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