NOVARA'S CENSORSHIP HYPOCRISY

Marxist media outlet Novara Media had its YouTube channel temporarily deleted on Tuesday.  A statement put out by Novara at 11:40 said the action had been carried out by YouTube without 'warning or explanation'.  Less than three hours later Novara reported that the channel had been reinstated 'following a deluge of support from across the political spectrum'.

Novara's Michael Walker

Novara has an impressive following on YouTube with almost 170,000 subscribers.  It has a similar number of followers on its Twitter account, with smaller followings on Facebook and Instagram.  Novara's impressive social media counter-campaign against YouTube's ban attracted support from far and wide - not just from far left Labour MPs such as Richard Burgon, John McDonnell and Nadia Whittome, but also from opponents such as Conservative MP David Davis, Reclaim's Laurence Fox and broadcasters Julia Hartley-Brewer and Maajid Nawaz.  The latter had previously sought legal action against Novara's co-founder, but still found it within himself to condemn YouTube's action.  Even The Spectator's Turnpike column expressed 'solidarity'.

However, while the centre and right appeared to unite with the left against big tech censorship, it had been duly noted that Novara itself did not express feelings of solidarity when big tech came for their opponents.  The bulk of the criticism was levelled at Novara's head of video, Gary McQuiggin, who deplored YouTube's action in the following tweet.

Critics then deluged McQuiggin and his comrades Ash Sarkar, Michael Walker and Bastani with a screenshot of something he had tweeted last year...

McQuiggin has since deleted this tweet, but fortunately the internet doesn't forget.

Novara's double standards can also be applied to Ash Sarkar who has previously defended cancel culture and was also one of the main organisers of the protests against President Trump's visit to the UK in 2018.  She also welcomed his ban from Twitter, telling Unherd: "It’s a good thing that Twitter is able to just kick him off".

It appears that censorship is perfectly acceptable for the left when it's the right that is on the receiving end or things they simply don't like or agree with.

Click below for a clip in which Sarkar is asked about cancel culture for an Australian TV show.

Author Douglas Murray was among those who took exception to Novara's double standard, writing on Twitter: "These communists didn’t seem to have a problem when Big Tech came for Milo Yiannopolous, Katie Hopkins etc.  Because the hate-mongers at barely-known ‘Novara media’ thought Big Tech only came for their counterparts.  Now it’s their turn.  Funny old world".

Aaron Bastani responded directly to Murray with the following astonishing tweet.

That is quite a statement coming from a communist and one which appears to be ignore established history altogether.  Even his quote from Rosa Luxemburg is a misnomer.  The Polish Marxist made a number of quotes relating to freedom and democracy, but that apparently did not stop her from supporting the 1918 November Revolution which sought to overthrow the German government.

Like Bastani, Luxemburg never got a taste of state power.  We all know what happens when communists take power, regardless of how they get there or what they said prior to the event.  Freedom becomes mute, democracy dies.

That is the reality of communism.  The history of one-party communist states such as the Soviet Union, China, Cuba, Vietnam and North Korea does not lie.  The same cannot be said for Bastani.

BEEB DELETES ANTI-WHITE TWEET

The BBC has deleted a video clip from one of its Twitter accounts after a backlash.  The disgusting clip features two young women making derogatory remarks about white women using the racial slur 'Karen'.  Karen is the female equivalent of 'gammon' and refers to middle-aged white women who are characterised as racist.  The irony of racially profiling a group and then accusing them of racism is lost on both these girls and also, clearly, the BBC.

In the clip (see below) the presenter Sadia Azmat asks her two correspondents: "How can white women not be Karens?"  YouTuber Amelia Dimoldenberg begins the discussion by declaring that they need to 'educate' themselves and 'read some books'.  History lecturer Dr Charlotte Riley then joins in and says white women need to stop being 'defensive about their whiteness'.  Finally the pair decide that white women 'should get out of the way' and 'leave'.  The clip then cuts off as they both snigger.

If they truly believe there is such a thing as 'white privilege' then one might argue that these two middle-class white girls are using their own privilege as a platform.  The sneering of the left towards people who don't share their views has become more tangible in recent months, harking back to the post-referendum belittling of Leave voters as 'thick' and 'racist'.  The arrogance displayed by the BBC in broadcasting such views caused dismay as the clip went viral.

Tory MP Ben Bradley was so incensed he announced that he was cancelling his TV licence.

The tweet itself was deleted the same day, but at the time of writing the clip remains intact as part of the podcast in which it was originally broadcast.  The podcast is entitled 'No Country For Young Women' and has in recent weeks featured discussion surrounding the Black Lives Matter movement and identity politics.

Dr Riley calls herself a 'feminist historian of twentieth century Britain' and teaches at Southampton University.  She is currently writing a book entitled Imperial Island, which 'tells the story of how ordinary people’s lives have been shaped by the messy, complex, brutal and surprising history of British imperialism'.  You just know that is going to be one long essay on how all that is wrong in the world can be blamed on our ancestors.  In addition to her BBC contribution, Riley also co-produces podcasts of her own, alongside fellow feminist and socialist lecturer Dr Emma Lundin.

Dr Charlotte Riley

It's not clear if Riley is a Labour member, but she cites the history of the Labour Party as one of her interests.  She is followed on Twitter by a number of Labour MPs including Apsana Begum, Harriet Harman, Dave Lammy, Clive Lewis, Siobhain McDonough, Alison McGovern, Charlotte Nichols and Rachel Reeves.

O'BRIEN'S GLOATING BACKFIRES

LBC Radio's James O'Brien turned his smug dial up to eleven when Nigel Farage was made surplus to requirements last week.  Farage doesn't want to discuss his 'amicable' departure from LBC Radio, but the fact that it happened in the same week that Farage spoke out about the Marxist reality of Black Lives Matter is perhaps too much of an amazing coincidence.  O'Brien greeted the news with a gloating tweet that read simply: "We got our station back".  Unfortunately for the supposedly never wrong presenter the tweet created such a wave of disgust that the controllers over at LBC's TalkRadio competitors must have been rubbing their hands with glee.

It's been speculated as to what O'Brien meant by his tweet, particularly as LBC retains prominent Brexiteers such as Iain Dale and Nick Ferrari.  However, O'Brien is not keen on discussing it and he deleted the tweet amid the backlash that followed.  Now some of his supporters are claiming that the tweet never existed in the first place and is a conspiracy.  The problem for them is that screen captures are so easy now (the above screencap appeared on the Metro newspaper website).

Ironically many of the same people crying 'conspiracy' to defend O'Brien were the same ones clamouring to support James in his assessment of the Google Churchill conspiracy.  On Sunday afternoon O'Brien sneered...

The photo was restored at around 11:12 in the morning, coincidentally after a huge backlash to the extent that the story appeared on several right-leaning news sites including The Sun and MailOnline.  Bear in mind that O'Brien didn't comment on this until almost three hours after Churchill's photo had been restored to the Google wiki frame.  O'Brien's supporters swiftly took to their Google search engines and posted screenshots to show Churchill's image back in its place and exclaiming that the whole story had been made up!

What's also quite interesting about O'Brien's tweet is his reference to "people with no discernible talent" and "far right lies".  Many people only became aware of the missing Churchill image because of one of O'Brien's own colleagues.  Late on Saturday night Maajid Nawaz tweeted his concern about the missing image and re-visited it in several tweets.

Was O'Brien directly addressing Nawaz as someone with 'no discernible talent'?  If so, that's a bit awkward.  Also, why is expressing concerns about the missing picture somehow 'far right'?  Nawaz himself can hardly be referred to as 'far right', not since he renounced Islamism and went on to represent the Liberal Democrats and fight racism equally on all sides - as it should be, James.  Instead of referring to Britain's greatest heroes as 'dead white supremacists' and legitimising attacks on living white people perhaps you could learn a thing or two from a man with 'no discernible talent'.

RMT CHIEF SUSPENDED

Steve Hedley (left)

The assistant general secretary of the RMT trade union has been suspended after posting Facebook comments in which he said he would be "throwing a party" if Boris Johnson died.  Steve Hedley also wrote that he hoped "the whole cabinet of Tory bastards get it too".  Hedley's comments were made earlier this week during a discussion on his Facebook page about the PM having been taken into intensive care.  He was later condemned by senior figures in the RMT, including the union's president Michelle Rogers and his boss, the general secretary Mick Cash.  Hedley has now been suspended from his job, a role that reportedly pays a £100,000 salary.

A spokesperson for the Rail, Maritime and Transport union said: "Following a meeting of the union's National Executive a decision has been made to suspend Senior Assistant General Secretary Steve Hedley with immediate effect while a formal investigation takes place into his conduct".

The Daily Mail reports that Hedley also compared Boris Johnson to fascist dictators including Hitler and Mussolini.  When a friend pointed out that Boris was a human being, Hedley apparently responded: "Hitler, Mussolini and Franco were human beings too - would you use the same argument for them?  I take it it doesn’t extend to Hitler who killed millions but it does to Boris who helped kill 130,000 through Tory austerity policies".  He is then said to have posted the following statement: "Would those who are feeling sympathetic to Boris Johnson (partly responsible for 130,000 deaths by helping implement Tory austerity policies against the most vulnerable in society) because he’s human extend that sympathy to mourning Thatchers death as she had a family too?  If the answer is yes where if anywhere along the continuum do you stop Pinochet, Franco, Mussolini, or even Hitler?"

Prior to his suspension Hedley gave an interview to LBC Radio in which he discussed various issues with presenter Maajid Nawaz.  However, when Nawaz raised the topic of Boris Johnson the interview turned sour and Hedley hung up the phone.  Listen below.

An Irish republican originally from Londonderry, Hedley has history when it comes to vicious remarks towards Conservatives.  In a 2016 interview, again with LBC, he stated: "I think all the Tories are an absolute disgrace, they should be taken out and shot to be quite frank with you".  He wasn't suspended from the RMT then, or the Labour party.  Also deemed acceptable at the time was a picture he posted to his Facebook account in which he brandishes an automatic rifle whilst on a trip to Russia.

Steve Hedley in Russia

The Soviet cap badge he is wearing alludes to Hedley's passion for hard left politics.  A vehement supporter of Jeremy Corbyn, he is frequently pictured making raised fist salutes and has repeatedly called for the overthrow of capitalism.  He supports the prosecution of British troops and politicians over Bloody Sunday and has referred to Hugo Chavez as a 'great leader'.  In 2017 he tweeted an image of two Tory effigies hanging from a bridge in Manchester.  Last year he posed for a picture with his daughter at the grave of Italian Marxist hero Antonio Gramsci.  Another picture on his Facebook page shows him in his office surrounded by communist regalia, including a poster of Che Guevara and a bust of Lenin.  It's not clear if this is the same bust that sat on the office desk of one of his other idols, former RMT general secretary the late Bob Crow.

Also unclear at this present time is whether Hedley will face any action from the Labour party over his latest outburst.  He was previously suspended from the party in 2016, not for calling for the death of Tories, but for the comparatively innocuous crime of labelling Corbyn critics 'right-wing traitors'.  He was readmitted to the party in March 2017, but last November he was reportedly being probed again, this time over allegations of anti-Semitism.  Video footage of Hedley that emerged around that time showed him screaming abuse at a Jewish activist.  The footage was originally taken at a meeting in 2011 where Hedley was giving a speech entitled 'Palestine's fight for freedom'.  Hedley refers to the heckler as "a disgrace to the Jewish people" and a "modern day Nazi".

Hedley is also a staunch defender of the expelled former Labour MP Chris Williamson.  He has also voiced support for Marc Wadsworth, a Labour activist expelled from the party in 2018 over an alleged altercation with Jewish Labour MP Ruth Smeeth.

Steve Hedley (centre) pictured with Labour's John McDonnell

Steve Hedley (centre) pictured with Labour's Ian Lavery and Rebecca Long-Bailey

Steve Hedley's office door

MAAJID HUMILIATES BASTANI

Aaron Bastani and Maajid Nawaz

Commie journalist Aaron Bastani was forced into a humiliating apology last weekend over a tweet in which he labelled radio presenter Maajid Nawaz a 'former terrorist'.  Last December Bastani had responded to Nawaz's criticism of Jeremy Corbyn by tweeting that Nawaz was "literally a former terrorist".  Nawaz was once a member of the Islamist group Hizb ut-Tahrir and served time in an Egyptian prison for his membership.  However, while the group is banned in many countries it is not considered a terrorist group in the UK and is not proscribed here.
Nawaz took legal action following Bastani's tweet and sued for defamation.  Last Friday Bastani issued the following public apology, including a commitment to donate to Nawaz's counter-extremism group Quilliam.

Bastani is the co-founder of hard left media outlet Novara Media, the same organisation that employs Ash Sarkar.  He espouses his own brand of communism, something he calls 'fully automated luxury communism'.  It is as daft as it sounds.

You may be familiar with Maajid Nawaz from his weekend slot on LBC Radio or regular appearances on Sky's The Pledge.  Having turned his back on Islamism he went on to form Quilliam, a think tank opposed to Islamist ideology.  In recent years Nawaz has become highly critical of the hard left and has called for a national inquiry into Muslim grooming gangs.  Much of his Twitter activity on Friday and Saturday was dedicated to rubbing Bastani's nose in it.  Glorious.

Further reading

Nawaz Calls For Grooming Gang Inquiry

Novara Editor Insults Our Troops

Free Stuff... For Everyone!

NAWAZ CALLS FOR GROOMING INQUIRY

"The fear of racism or the fear of so-called Islamophobia must never be an excuse to allow under-age girls to be raped and abused in this way".  That's just one of many quotes from a blistering monologue delivered by LBC's Maajid Nawaz today.  Unlike the mainstream media and their persistent and inaccurate description of grooming gangs as 'Asian', Nawaz was not restrained from telling it exactly how it is.  Coming from a Pakistani Muslim background himself, he had no hesitation in condemning his own community for the industrial scale rape of English youngsters.

"Don't tell me that their Muslim identity had nothing to do with this.  I have lived and breathed this community all of my life.  I can guarantee you that it's not the cause but a factor in the way in which these girls was treated was the culture of these men and as part of that culture is their religious attitude towards non-Muslim".

(Maajid Nawaz)

Calling for a national inquiry to be held, at one point Nawaz directly addressed the "woke left" and did not hold back.  Watch below.

24 SAY NO TO CORBYN

The Guardian has published an open letter from 24 prominent figures stating their opposition to Jeremy Corbyn.  The list includes actors, writers, journalists, historians and TV presenters.  Their main beef is the rise of anti-Semitism on Corbyn's watch.  It's doubtful anyone would recognise all 24 signatories if they passed them in the street, so we've put their main professions in brackets.

The full text:

The coming election is momentous for every voter, but for British Jews it contains a particular anguish: the prospect of a prime minister steeped in association with antisemitism.  Under Jeremy Corbyn’s leadership, Labour has come under formal investigation by the Equality and Human Rights Commission for institutional racism against Jews.  Two Jewish MPs have been bullied out of the party. Mr Corbyn has a long record of embracing antisemites as comrades.

We listen to our Jewish friends and see how their pain has been relegated as an issue, pushed aside by arguments about Britain’s European future.  For those who insist that Labour is the only alternative to Boris Johnson’s hard Brexit, now, it seems, is not the time for Jewish anxiety.

But antisemitism is central to a wider debate about the kind of country we want to be.  To ignore it because Brexit looms larger is to declare that anti-Jewish prejudice is a price worth paying for a Labour government.  Which other community’s concerns are disposable in this way?  Who would be next?

Opposition to racism cannot include surrender in the fight against antisemitism.  Yet that is what it would mean to back Labour and endorse Mr Corbyn for Downing Street.  The path to a more tolerant society must encompass Britain’s Jews with unwavering solidarity.  We endorse no party.  However, we cannot in all conscience urge others to support a political party we ourselves will not.  We refuse to vote Labour on 12 December.

Antony Beevor (historian)

William Boyd (author)

Simon Callow (actor)

Frederick Forsyth (author)

Peter Frankopan (historian)

Nick Hewer (TV presenter)

Tom Holland (historian)

Ed Husain (writer)

Terry Jervis (writer and TV producer)

Dan Jones (historian)

Oz Katerji (writer and journalist)

John le Carré (author)

Suzannah Lipscomb (historian)

Joanna Lumley (actress)

Fiyaz Mughal (inter-faith activist)

Maajid Nawaz (radio presenter)

Ghanem Nuseibeh (business leader)

Tony Parsons (journalist and broadcaster)

Trevor Phillips (writer, Labour member)

Janina Ramirez (historian)

Sathnam Sanghera (journalist)

Dan Snow (historian and TV presenter)

Jimmy Wales (internet entrepreneur)

Fay Weldon (author)

A Labour spokesman was later quoted by the Guardian:  "It’s extraordinary that several of those who have signed this letter have themselves been accused of antisemitism, Islamophobia and misogyny.  It’s less surprising that a number are Conservatives and Lib Dems."  One signatory expressed his dismay at the Labour response.

This is an extremely dangerous response by @UKLabour to our Guardian letter- a fifth of us who signed this letter are Muslim, and yet Labour says of us because we called for people not to vote for Corbyn “Islamophobic”. Why bring Islamophobia?#LabourAntisemitism pic.twitter.com/HUqFx5chdg

— Ghanem Nuseibeh (@gnuseibeh) November 15, 2019

The campaign against Corbyn is sure to grow ahead of the election, especially seeing that the party is now creeping up some of the polls.