Is the BNP Racist? : The British National Party
If you enter the question “is the BNP racist ” into the Google search engine, and click the “I feel lucky” button, it will take you to the first result in the search. At present this is an article on the BNP website which attempts to justify the British National Party’s position. The same happens if you type “is the BNP racist” into the address bar of a web browser by mistake.
You can find the article here (*)
The British National Party Argument
It is a curious article, because it does not attempt to show that the BNP is NOT racist. Rather the argument is that organisations concerned with one community or race – and the British National Party piece lists fully 32 of them – must themselves be the placed in the same category as the BNP, and are therefore racist for anyone who wishes to describe the BNP as such.
The list runs the whole gamut from the National Black Police Association and Sunny Hundal’s Asians in Media website, to the Board Of Deputies of British Jews and the Jewish Telegraph. a newspaper with a Jewish readership (Jewish Telegraph), to the Action Group for Irish Youth). That is, if the BNP is racist then so is the Jewish Telegraph; and if the Jewish Telegraph is not racist, then neither is the BNP.
Unfortunately for the BNP, the Jewish Telegraph does not argue that the rights of non-Jews should be restricted; the Black Police Association does not seek to further the advantages of “Black” officers by preventing “White” officers from joining the police force; and the Asians in Media or Red Hot Curry websites are information services with particular audiences.
So these organisations *are* in a different category from the BNP, and the comparison is a smokescreen.
Moving on to the document which defines the BNP, in Section 2 of the “Constitution of the British National Party“, the BNP:
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Bars from membership people who are not of an “Indigenous Caucasian’” racial background.
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Published a weird definition of what “Indigenous Caucasian” that means, based on people from various “Ethnic Folk Groups” being allowed to be members of the BNP. Examples are “The Anglo-Saxon-Norse Folk Community” and “The Anglo-Saxon-Indigenous European Folk Community”. These are not defined anywhere, and the BNP has supplied no measurable or scientific definition of these “groups”, or any basis for claiming that there is any validity behind the claim.
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A claim to rely in Law for those definitions on a Race Relations Act case from 1983 in the House of Lords that resulted in a school being told that they couldn’t exclude a Sikh Boy from their school because his traditional long hair and turban would “accentuate religious and social distinctions in the school”. The text of the case is on the Human and Constitutional website of Columbia Law School. This is the relevant segment from the BNP Constitution:
“Membership of the BNP is strictly defined within the terms of, and our members also self define themselves within, the legal ambit of a defined ‘racial group’ this being ‘Indigenous Caucasian’ and defined ‘ethnic groups’ emanating from that Race as specified in law in the House of Lords case of Mandla V Dowell Lee (1983) 1 ALL ER 1062, HL.”
Further, the British National Party states that:
The BNP unashamedly addresses itself to the issues and concerns of the indigenous British population, and because it seeks to ensure that British people remain the majority population in this country. Opponents point to the fact that the BNP has an all-white membership, and that we address issues concerning white people.
Is the BNP racist? Yes
The BNP claims that it is defending the interests of “white” people, and concerns itself with the interests of the “indigenous” population, while its own definitions which form the platform for that policy are (being generous) incoherent at best. It does not explain how it can implement such a distinction without a rational basis. Yet it maintains a ban on “non-white” people from membership.
The fact that the groups identified in the graphic above are all black or Asian is another tell-tale of the underlying BNP philosophy.
So, is the BNP a racist party ? It seems to me to be an open and shut case – yes.
(*) If you link to the article I mention, I recommend linking to it using http://www.bit.ly/bnpracism/, which does not give the site any promotion in Google.
Categories: All WW, Blog Platform, British National Party (BNP), Campaigns, Comment, News - Current Affairs, Political Blogging, Politics
Is the Pope a Catholic? Come to think of it, that’s another group with restrictive membership terms, as is Islam and Judaism; i.e. you have to accept the creed – as you do, in fact, to be a member of any political party. That from a party, the BNP, that claims Jesus would have voted for it – well, as we know, Jesus was ‘white’, too, wasn’t he? [Ironic, in case you wondered.]
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Thanks for the visit
The particular point that got my goat was the spurious comparison with the Jewish Telegraph, which is hilarious.
I only spotted the appeal to a failed case from 25 years ago in the Constitution this time round – surreal. There can be definitions “in law” in a lost case, but even so…
btw enjoy your blog from time to time.
Matt
Matt Wardman´s last blog post..BBC Question Time Thursday 11 June 209 Twitter Archive
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I think they should send all those “indigenous Caucasians” back to the Caucasus.
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“Is the Pope a Catholic? Come to think of it, that’s another group with restrictive membership terms, as is Islam and Judaism; i.e. you have to accept the creed – as you do, in fact, to be a member of any political party.”
Well, that’s not strictly true is it. Anyone can become a Christian or a Muslim; a Hindu or a Sikh; a Buddhist or a Baha’i; yet, as far as I know, one is not considered halachicly Jewish unless one’s mother is/was Jewish. Therefore, if the BNP deny membership to fellow human beings based on an impossible to change, biological criterion and are deemed racist…what does that make Orthodox Judaism?
As one who wishes the BNP well I get agitated by their forlorn efforts to dodge the charge of racism. This word originated in Communist circles in the thirties and has a single purpose and that is to discredit nationalists. Any attempt by the BNP to avoid being tainted by this pejorative is thus destined to failure. A better tactic is to ask why is racism a bad thing and to demand that lefties who condemn British nationalists also condemn Israelis, Indians, Japanese, Chinese et al.
If we weren’t saddled with the tainted term racist we could allow that the BNP could more fairly be described as nativist.
yet, as far as I know, one is not considered halachicly Jewish unless one’s mother is/was Jewish. Therefore, if the BNP deny membership to fellow human beings based on an impossible to change, biological criterion and are deemed racist…what does that make Orthodox Judaism?”
All you are saying about Judaism is that you can’t be considered racially Jewish unless you are racially Jewish, which seems sensible. You can now, as you could in the time of Ruth, convert to Judaism as a religion.
In fact, it’s even more complicated, as the state of Israel claims to be THE Jewish state, but the state itself mixes up the definitions. While specifying what appears to be a racial identity for Jews who wish to become citizens, they then exclude Jews who have converted to Christianity (but not those who have converted to atheism).
Anyway, if the BNP statement was simply that you can’t be considered ethnically caucasian unless you are ethnically caucasian, that would be fine – and the equivalent to the comment about Jewishness. The problem is trying to say that white Americans of German descent, whose families haven’t set foot in Britain in 10 generations, are more British than people born here to parents who were born here to parents who were born in Jamaica.
From an outside perspective, it just seems like someone has come up with quite a convoluted way of defining “us” and “them” without just settling on skin colour.
Wind back to the 1940s and 50s, when you would see “No Blacks, No Irish” signs in B&Bs, the Irish were definitely outsiders threatening the “native” way of life in England.
Go to Glasgow with a plummy English accent or Ascot with speaking mainly Moldovan and you’ll see how far Caucasian unity will get you.
Wind back a bit further and it was the French threatening John Bull. Further still and you had successive invasions of Angles, Saxons, Normans etc etc.
Depending on you definition of Caucasian, Jews, Russians, Portuguese, Greeks might all qualify. If any of those groups pitched up in large numbers, you would get the reaction which brings people to the BNP.
It is all well and good to have a viewpoint which says something like: “Things seem to have changed in this country. There are groups which were not previously here which are culturally and near-ancestrally different from me. Their presence will directly and indirectly affect the culture and life I have grown up considering normal. Arguably certain cultural traditions and viewpoints should be encouraged or privileged. Norms of behaviour are not being followed. At the lower end of the economic scale there will be conflict for resources. I don’t feel that our society and government is correctly prioritising resources to deal with that change and conflict”
We can then look at what people feel the problems are and work out to what extent those opinions are justified.
Dressing it up based on arbitrary “race” divisions is nonsense.
You can say “we were here first”, but you can pretty much always find someone with a prior claim, and after 2 or 3 generations, a lot of the distinctions can disappear.
Someone has come up with an easy answer to a very complex question, then spent an excessively long time fabricating a meaningless justification for it.
Muslims killed by Labour + Tories + G.W.Bush = 800,000. Muslims killed by the BNP = None. The BNP always opposed the war. I think I know who the racists are: though of course they have sleazy millionaires behind them, and speak with posh Oxbridge accents, which makes bombing an Arab country to smithereens for its oil, sort of O.K.
the BNP are disgusting..the foreigners do not come and take our homes and jobs…what the factory jobs that the lazy weed-smoking youths refuse to take???
yeah becuase they are decent and hardworking and they are given a chance.if we want to go live and work in another country we have freedom to and when i went to portugal they treated me so well..they love everyone who is not from their country so it makes me sick that british people can be so cold and just declare this OUR COUNTRY.it is a free world.People can come and go..and to be honest..i cannot wait til i get as far away from this selfish,racist place as possible.
SICK .
A Party that wants to bring back the death sentence for child sex killers and murderers.
A party thats wants to look after old age pensioners!
British jobs first!!Lots of people made redundant at my company,now many jobs filled with foreign temps!
Graveyards dug up for car parks for mosques!
vote BNP all the way!!!
“A Party that wants to bring back the death sentence for child sex killers and murderers.
A party thats wants to look after old age pensioners!
British jobs first!!Lots of people made redundant at my company,now many jobs filled with foreign temps!
Graveyards dug up for car parks for mosques!
vote BNP all the way!!”
… and a Party with a racist constitution.
Which, incidentally, is so focused on and controlled by the wishes of the National Chairman that he could change all those policies you love without giving you the slightest say.
See here.
That one will be a the top of Google presently, too.
Strange how all those protesters at the BBC,were nothing more than louts,not a peaceful protest at all.
Yet tried to “push” their views on others!HOW ironic.
They made themselves look very stupid!
Plus, the carefully selected audience on question time.
Claimed to be a broad selection of the public…I think not!!
>@Mark
Thanks for your reply.
>Strange how all those protesters at the BBC,were nothing more than louts,not a peaceful protest at all.
I have not backed the tactics though I back their right to demonstrate. The programme was not prevented.
I don’t think you are in a position to complain about that, bearing in mind the number of BNP members and senior party figures with convictions for violence, or who have expressd support for violence.
>Plus, the carefully selected audience on question time.
>Claimed to be a broad selection of the public…I think not!!
Evidence for that?
Rgds
Matt Wardman´s last blog ..Three gay teenagers are on death row in Iran: please help to try and save them
I think you will find cameron has backed certain clubs known for violence against BNP members!
Selective audience? yes very much so.For a start I would of thought an age group from 18 to 80 and not all 25 would have turned the light bulb on.
Lets have a question time “roadshow” around Britain instead of London!
The support for the BNP would shock the Queen “Windsor” formaly known as saxa Coburg Gotha..who’s now jumped on the political”racism” bandwagon.Some people won’t listen to another opinion,they just shout “racism” for a sympathy vote!
The German saxa Coburg Gotha name was dropped by the Royal family.
Why? Well er…is wasn’t British was it!!
>I think you will find cameron has backed certain clubs known for violence against BNP members!
Can you give me quotes and citations?
>Selective audience? yes very much so.For a start I would of thought an age group from 18 to 80 and not all 25 would have turned the light bulb on.
I don’t think that’s sustainable, as the BBC were reported as specifically letting BNP supporters/members into the audience, and taking care to exclude anti-fascist demonstrators.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2009/oct/20/bnp-question-time-studio-audience
http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/standard/article-23756472-question-time-audience-vetted-for-anti-fascists.do
>Lets have a question time “roadshow” around Britain instead of London!
The support for the BNP would shock the Queen “Windsor” formaly known as saxa Coburg Gotha..
>The German saxa Coburg Gotha name was dropped by the Royal family.
Why? Well er…is wasn’t British was it!!
er .. Let’s put that in context.
The Queen was born a Windsor, so she wasn’t formerly known as anything else.
The fanily name change from Saxe-Coburg Gotha to Windsor was in 1917 in the middle of a war between Great Britain and Germany; it was a political move.
>who’s now jumped on the political ”racism” bandwagon.
When? Citation?
>Some people won’t listen to another opinion, they just shout “racism” for a sympathy vote!
It’s pretty clear that the BNP constitution is both racist – until changed – and logically incoherent.
Rgds
Well,if you think it’s racist,then that’s your point of view!
I respect other peoples veiws.
However they are not mine.
I do find it funny that today’s lunchtime news,Gordon Brown has called another meeting on immigration.
Even the newsreader commented”isn’t this because of the huge interest in the BNP”!
Yes, the family name was changed from saxa coburg gotha to Windsor.
Obviously it was political.
It was a “German” name,and we were at war with the Germans!
Thats why German sheperd dogs were renamed Alsations,which is french…a political move!
A Wilsdorf and Davis watch does not have the same ring as a Rolex watch…Perhaps rebadging would be a better term.
regards mark.
[ Ed: allowed through to indicate one type of comment I usually spam]
Good for him! Exterminate every last muslim! No muslims = no terrorism!
So people want to belong to a group the same as themselves? Big flippin deal. The conspiracy is why this was ever a problem in the first place.
As long as youre not hurting anybody else, you have every right to want to belong to a group of your type, both in heritage and culturally.
Is it racist for the Japanese to have a Japanese-only political party? Are the Polynesians, who have only populated parts of polynesia for a few thousand years, not indiginous to Polynesia? Do they have the right to turn an inlfux of white settlers away if they chose to do that by means of forming a natives-only party? Can you imagine these same left-wing fascists condemning the Polynesians for doing that?
Of course humans group together with their own type, PROOF of this is if you look around at any so called multi-cultural society. Its normal, its natural, the only thing weird and abnormal is a 30 year long idea that we should be ashamed of it if we are white. That time is coming to an end. And the PC brigade are shaking in their boots