News Archive

07/08/2024 Blackshirt Pogroms Roam the Streets

As you all may know, last week in Southport a children's dance class was attacked. Three children were killed and eight more injured, as well as two adults. Despite the attacker being fairly quickly identified as Axel Rudakubana, a then 17-year-old born in Cardiff to Christian parents, misinformation was quickly and maliciously distributed on social media alleging him to be a Muslim immigrant. In the wake of this, islamophobic and racist riots have broken out across the country, with rioters shouting and displaying racist and islamophobic slogans, throwing bricks at residential homes and attacking black and brown people on the street. They have also attempted to set fire to a hotel containing asylum seekers, multiple mosques, and have burned down multiple community stores and a library. The mainstream media have been frustratingly lukewarm on these riots, referring to them as "pro-Britain protests" and focusing on the effect on police. ITV and the BBC in particular have avoided using the term 'Islamophobic,' and have used inflamatory language to desribe peaceful count-protestors. One memorable passage came from the BBC Breakfast programme's Ben Thompson: "In Bolton, anti-immigration protestors were confronted with a group of up to 300 people shouting 'Allahu Akbar' or 'God is Greatest.'" This framing shows clear prefrence for the racist rioters, presenting them in the softest possible light while casting as much suspicion as possible on their victims.

Now, this is of course nothing new. The most conspicuous thing the news doesn't mention by treating this as a spontaneous event is the years and years of anti-immigration rhetoric that they have spread and legitimised, which has no doubt played a large part in radicalising so many people to this proto-fascism. The BBC is especially complicit in this, with all the 'concerns' they report people to have about migrants.

02/08/2024 Ridiculous Olympic Boxing Non-Controversy

This week the media has been roiling with outrage over the Olympic boxing match between Imane Khelif and Angela Carini. Carini abandoned the match after 46 seconds, in her words to "preserve her life." Carini reached the last eight in the women's 57kg category, while Khelif went through to the 66kg finals after this match. Although both women are cisgender, Khelif's stature has led various media figures to speculate that she's secretly transgender, and thus supposedly has an unfair advantage. This is just factually incorrect, of course, but it brings to light the connection between misogynie and transphobia, where any woman not meeting a particular physical standard of femininity is accused of being trans, and therefore 'a man.' Also of note is the fact that natural advantages are widespread in sports, and usually not of note. Nobody complains about Michael Phelps' arm-span or Tacko Fall's height, despite both of these being natural advantages in their respective sports.

Also, the extent to which supposedly serious news organisations are taking seriously the idea that Imane Khelif is trans is... unsurprising, but disturbing. It seems that the majority of news media is perfectly happy to report blatant falsehood as if it were fact, if it serves the dominant anti-trans narrative.