Back to the future

The message from a mature man wearing a Leninist cap is “I’m stuck somewhere in the past.” Cap and man say: “We’re bucking the current trend for ‘progressive’. Going forward we’re going backwards.”

if the cap fits

I’m all confused.  Onwards and downwards. I wonder if we’ll reach the 1930s by the 2030s. I hope not. Look out! 

Some things move on. Take the Guardian. In the olden days when Leninist caps were cool everyone used to love the Manchester Guardian. It sounds as if it was properly progressive back then, but it stagnated. Strangely there’s been a faint whiff of ‘progressive’ in the air at the Guardian recently. Well, not in the actual Guardian. In the readership.

When they publish a truly awful piece, the below the line response isn’t undiluted antisemitism any more. (Oddly, that crowd seems to have migrated to the Telegraph) 

So although the Guardian carries on publishing flattering articles about members of Hizb ut-Tahrir, they now receive a bloody good hammering below the line. That’s what I call progress.

What’s your opinion of Maajid Nawaz? Good guy, or not quite sure?

Well, he was a member of Hizb ut-Tahrir, but he’s moved on. So much so that he’s co-created Quilliam, and has had a big hand in formulating David Cameron’s new invisible crackdown policy. 

Not everyone is willing to trust people who wake up one day and say something unexpected. Some of us are suspicious and a bit traditional. A bit conservative. For example when a man announces he’s now a she, the progressive way is to accept it just like that. It’s the rule. Some of us are inclined to be a bit stick-in-the mud and we can’t get used to it.

However, Maajid Nawaz says he has seen the light, and he has made a pretty convincing case. In special circumstances involving the Guardian and a dirty trick he certainly deserves the benefit of the doubt.

 You can read all about it here and if you like, you can observe it being played out on Twitter.

Apparently a Guardian commissioning editor named Nosheen Iqbal laid a trap for Maajid. She wrote to Quilliam, offering him a wonderful opportunity to publicise his dedicated work in her wonderful Guardian G2 supplement.

Nosheen was aware of Maajid’s contribution to the government’s policy on extremism, and she disliked it. So she rashly Tweeted a negative remark about Maajid, perhaps to reassure the Twitterati that she didn’t approve of the crackdown, just in case anyone thought she was a disloyal Muslim or something. Otherwise why make an unforced error.

In order to prevent Maajid stumbling upon the bad Tweet she asterisked the middle ‘a’s so that it wouldn’t show up in a search. Sneaky, eh? He wouldn’t spot the Tweet and he’d go blithely ahead with the interview thinking she was on side. Given the fawning nature of the invitation why wouldn’t he?

 “Maajid’s consistently dedicated work to combat extremism and the increased public awareness around Quilliam Foundation following the PM’s speech yesterday, would be great to build on that momentum and flag up the crucial work being done behind the scenes.” 

Did you think the Guardian would represent Maajid and his good work fair and square? Or just fair?

‘Course not. They did a hatchet job, and what’s more they made extensive use of derogatory gossip from anonymous sources, which, as was pointed out by ‘Jacobinism’, is against the Guardian’s editorial guidelines.

Hypocrisy is rife. Who could forget Mehdi Hasan’s fawning  letter to the Daily Mail. 

If it’s the kind of thing journalists do these days, all we can do is defend ourselves online, which is what Maajid Nawaz did. He posted a point-by-point  rebuttal on Facebook, which also received quite a lot of attention and made the Guardian look pretty bad.

Nosheen Iqbal got found out. Pretty obvious she would be. What happens when you do stuff like that? As one Tweeter put it “U get cort”  What did she do then? Tweeted of course. 

 “Bored now. Whine amongst yrselves”

That little combo of text speak, arrogance and insult epitomises Twitter, the Guardian and people with heads full of crap, all rolled into one. 

Since we’re talking about the Telegraph as well as the Guardian, when I first heard that Peter Oborne had quit, I fleetingly thought Oh, I might get the Telegraph again now. But no. If you look at the  online antisemitic and ignorant below-the-line comments, you feel there must be something nasty in the Telegraph woodshed.

propaganda for primary schools

Look at this article about pro-Palestinian material that is being included in education packs. Nothing much wrong with the article itself.

The Telegraph is not promoting this NUT / children’s education charity 'Edukid' teaching resources pack. “My name is Saleh” .

In fact Camilla Turner is flagging it up as dodgy.  

 “ Writing in the pack’s foreword, Christine Blower, the NUT general secretary, explains the project was “inspired by a union delegation visit [to the Palestinian territories] in 2013”.

I’m sure that NUT visit was most inspiring. Blower’s not just the NUT general secretary, she’s also a member of the PSC . The NUT is actually in league with the PSC and they’re obviously proud of it.

“This year again Palestine was centre stage at the National Union of Teacher’s annual delegates conference in Harrogate during the Easter weekend. “

This propaganda is utterly unacceptable. Are they going to get away with that Nicky Morgan?  Are there cracks in your crackdown? The Telegraph was right to flag it up. However, below the line you’ll see a fine crop of virulently antisemitic comments from the current Telegraph commentariat. Did they migrate from the Guardian? Did they expect a good reception at the Telegraph and know their comments won’t be deleted.

The Telegraph quotes Tom Wilson from the Henry Jackson Society: 

"We need to be more vigilant about the politicisation of British classrooms”.

Someone accused the Henry Jackson Society of being pro-Israel.  Imagine that! Not fair, Miss Blower!! If you’re pro Israel you shouldn’t be entitled to defend Israel!   You’re excluded from the discussion on the grounds that you’re pro-Israel!   

Of course, according to the Telegraph’s below-the-line zeitgeist, if you’re a prominent member of both the Palestinian Solidarity Campaign and the NUT you’re entitled to put emotive pro Palestinian/ anti-Israel propaganda into your education resource packs, but if you support Israel, you’re not even entitled to speak out against it.

The rise of Hitler started in this way. We’re going backwards at an alarming pace. It looks like we could reach the 1930s before 2030.

Update.

I saw this this morning. NUT pulls “one-sided” literature on Middle East following heavy criticism

There was a parliamentary delegation to Israel recently led by Sir Eric Pickles, which makes a change from MPs telling us about their trips to Gaza or visits to the Middle East organised by CAABU.

 “It comes after former communities secretary and current chairman of Conservative Friends of Israel, Sir Eric Pickles MP, said the union had “well and truly crossed the line” with the initiative, which it promoted in schools across the UK. 

 Pickles said: “The NUT have well and truly crossed the line as to what is acceptable with this appalling document. It’s reference to ‘Jews’ as opposed to ‘Israelis’ is particularly objectionable. I would suggest this pernicious document be withdrawn immediately.” 

“Andrew Percy MP concurred, saying: “The NUT’s attempt to justify its indefensible document by saying they work with the Holocaust Education Trust is utterly derisory.”He added: “As a former history teacher, if any of my students produced such a biased piece of work they wouldn’t have expected to pass.”

The (temporary) withdrawal of this pack is bound to be attributed to that all-powerful Jewish Lobby.

The Express uses the word “forced” in its headline.

“Teaching union is forced to withdraw anti-Israeli 'propaganda' from British classrooms” 

The Express’s headline writer decided to put the word “propaganda” in quotes and use the word “forced”. They could have said:  'NUT withdraws biased resource pack.'  

“The Charities Commission said it was set to investigate Edukid to see if the children’s education charity had breached any of its regulations.
The Department for Education said that the law was “crystal clear” in that all political discussions in school should be “unbiased and balanced.” 

“Teachers should only use teaching materials which are suitable for their children and we trust them to decide which resources to use in their lessons,” the DfE said at the time.Initially, the NUT defended itself against accusations of anti-semitism and producing political propaganda by saying that it worked “with many organisations, including the Holocaust Educational Trust”. 

But after 24 hours of uproar and lobbying by campaigners, the union performed an about turn and acknowledged that the books and videos could be breaching impartiality rules.”

Update 2. 

My goodness. 

Talking of G2, the Guardian brings you progressive art. 

I wonder if Nosheen Iqbal was one of the commissioning editors who selected this unique piece by conceptual artist Gillian Wearing, ‘best known for video artworks like Sixty-Minute Silence, her Turner prize-winning film in which 26 men and women stand in front of a camera, dressed in police uniforms, doing nothing.’

You can win a print!