It’s worth bothering to get angry at Express scum
You know and I know that today's Express front page
is pretty unpleasant. The headline itself is misleading - it's not just 'asylum if you're gay' but then you knew that already - but it's the story below that turns something with a whiff of prejudice into something deeply nasty.
Home secretary Theresa May, a Conservative, yesterday welcomed the decision not to deport gay asylum seekers back to a life of suffering prejudice and abuse. (Most decent human beings welcome it too - though it makes New Labour look as illiberal as, well, New Labour really were, I suppose; in their rush to placate stinking tabloids like the Express and look tough on immigration, they forgot about actually caring about other human beings.) So the Express don't want to quote her directly - they want to find a Tory who disagrees.
When you need someone to slag off immigration and there's a deadline looming, who you gonna call? Philip Davies!
Conservative MP Philip Davies said: “It’s a dangerous game to play to go down this line because it’s quite feasible that this could offer an ideal line of defence for someone who wants to try to avoid being kicked out of the country, whether it is true or not that they are gay."
What should we have then? Gay tests? Or should we just send these refugees back to a life of misery and hatred, just in case someone might be pretending to be gay? Hey, what does it matter if people are sent back, eh?
One of the men in the case – known only as applicant “T” – had appealed against a decision that he had to return to Cameroon, where gays can be jailed for up to five years and where he had been attacked by a mob after he was seen kissing a male partner. Applicant “J” had been told he should behave discreetly in Iran, where homosexual acts can be punished with public flogging or execution.
Flogging, jail, execution? Pah! We might let a few more brown people in the country - horrors!
Oh and of course, MigrationWatch are involved. Every time there's any story about anyone doing anything remotely humanitarian towards people who face awful situations back in their homelands and who have ventured many thousands of miles to escape the hatred, up pops MigrationWatch to blow a gasket and go "wurrrrgh forrins!" - and here they are:
MigrationWatchUK chairman Sir Andrew Green warned: “This could lead to a potentially massive expansion of asylum claims as it could apply to literally millions around the world.
“An applicant has now only to show that he [or she] is homosexual and intends to return and live openly in one of the many countries where it is illegal, to be granted asylum in the UK. The judges are no doubt interpreting the letter of the international convention correctly but the consequences are potentially huge.
“The principle of asylum is, rightly, widely supported but it should be a matter of domestic law. It is high time that we reviewed our adherence to an international convention drawn up nearly 60 years ago in entirely different circumstances.”
He 'warned'. No he didn't. He came out with the same rubbish as ever, justifying sending people back to a life of torture and despair if it saves us having a couple more foreigners in our beloved ruddy country. So there might be millions more applicants - really? Or not? Because it's not, as Andrew Green says, a case of simply proving you're from a country where homosexuality is illegal - you have to prove you yourself are at risk of jail, torture or execution. That was the case with the two men allowed to remain in Britain yesterday. To assume that everyone from any country would be simply waved through is to assume a lot of things - or, you could speculate, to try and misrepresent a perfectly reasonable situation to stoke up fear against immigrants.
You have to see the Express's front page in context. They've come out with thinly veiled racism and xenophobia so many times now it's hard to know where to begin - and even this week there was a load of garbage about swimming pools being apparently forced to black out their windows 'because of Muslims' - but it was rubbish. Today's story isn't just some accidentally bad bit of reporting - it's deliberately bad. They aren't smart enough to try and provoke a reaction that garners them publicity for their paper by doing this; but they are dumb enough to think they can get away with thinly-veiled drivel like this... because they get away with it pretty much every day. Why bother doing it properly when you just get away with it all the time? Why bother being fair? Why bother at all?
But then you might ask why bother getting angry about it. "It's just the Express," people often say to me. "Everyone knows it's rubbish, why do you bother writing about it?" Well, I get angry because I can't not get angry. It's worth bothering to get angry because every single person who protests about crud like this is a little victory against this kind of scum-sucking filth polluting the national papers. It taints the press as a whole, not just the Express, with the stain of prejudice and can't-be-bothered non-journalism. Sure, we can't change anything - we can't make the PCC do anything, because it's not set up to do anything - but maybe that's not the point. Maybe that's not the point, at all.
Media commentators belittle moments when the general public get annoyed with their masters in the papers. Oh look, they say. People got wound up by something silly what a columnist done - look at the horrible sheep all trying to censor the freedom of our beloved Her Majesty's Press. Except that isn't the case at all. It's legitimate to protest, to criticise, to demand better standards, especially in a free market where people can choose to buy or not to buy - and to advertise or not to advertise. What do Express advertisers think of having their products next to borderline racism and nastiness on a daily basis? Do they care? Should they care? Does it matter? It's a good thing to get angry when people bend the truth, distort reality and lazily trot out the same old faces time and time again to fit a narrative of - for example - immigration is out of control. That's not censorship, that's freedom to get angry.
And so I demand my right to get angry with the Express. Lazy, bad journalism, wheeling out the same tedious rentaquotes to back up the immigration scare story, misrepresenting the facts just to provoke a reaction. It's rubbish, and it's not wrong to call it out as rubbish.
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July 8th, 2010 - 09:20
It’s quite simple. If someone claims asylum on the basis of his homosexuality, he should be asked to prove that he is that way inclined, by doing bumsex on either Philip Davies MP or Andrew Green. I’m sure they will be delighted to help in sorting the genuine cases from the chancers.
July 8th, 2010 - 09:25
Damn right! The day people stop getting angry is the day we give up on the concept of a fair, open minded and objective press that we can really be informed by.
July 8th, 2010 - 09:30
Well put. I wonder sometimes how much more pleasant our lives and this country would be if the tabloid press put as much effort into accentuating the positive as they do into spreading lies and stirring up hatred.
A lot, at a guess.
July 8th, 2010 - 09:43
Thanks. This is a brilliant post, as ever. I believe that if we work towards a more humane society that treats victims of abuse compassionately and works to dispel stereotypes about things like homosexuality and religion, we will be more successful and prosperous as a result. In the end, we will export these virtues back to the world by dint of our success and then people like migration watch will have nothing left to get worked into a lather about. I know this simlifies the issue somewhat and makes light of a number of issues surrounding integration, but it feels intuitively right to me.
July 8th, 2010 - 09:47
I’m not denying that this story is appalling and poorly researched (they missed out on a trick when they failed to mention that most countries where homosexuality is punishable by death are Muslim ones. They could killed two birds with one stone, Muslim intolerance plus gay bashing), but we could be missing out on the main point here.
The Express could be going for two goals. Be outrageous, offend people and then get talked about (if that’s the case then mission accomplished).
Or they could be appealing to the homophobes in their readership. This country is a far less tolerant place for gay men and women than it would like to admit, and going by my experience and that of my friends, attacks on gay men are on the increase in London at least.
Don’t be fooled into thinking these are the view of a small portion of the loony right in this country, in my experience it doesn’t take much to push people down a gay-hating path.
July 8th, 2010 - 09:51
You seem surprised.
July 8th, 2010 - 09:55
They’re fucking despicable. But then we knew that already.
July 8th, 2010 - 09:58
Absolutely agree. It is important to expose this malignant rubbish
July 8th, 2010 - 10:44
Well said! I think all papers (and their consumers and advertisers) need to continuously examine the standards and ethics that they are promoting. It’s a shame that the rags that require some serious soul-searching the most are also the least likely to do so. So maybe it is time for an external crackdown, at least where accuracy and addressing the public interest is concerned.
Really enjoy your blog, thanks!
July 8th, 2010 - 11:20
The angle they’ve taken on this story is beyond deplorable. Truly vile.
Is the sub headline about Kylie concerts and multi-coloured cocktails actually attributed to someone or have the Express just picked two gay clichés at random? Let’s face it, the average Express reader is at least well into their 60′s. Perhaps the Express fear that they may interpret ‘gay’ by its more archaic meaning. This must be clarified by throwing in a couple of banal characterisations, so the readership definitely understands that they mean “one of those”.
July 8th, 2010 - 11:30
Dan – unbelievably, they’re from the judge’s comments. He was making a (reasonable) point about stereotypically gay things people should be free to do, but you have to wonder what he was thinking when he came out with that…
July 8th, 2010 - 22:25
Jamie: This was one sentence, quoted out of context, in a judgement running to forty-six paragraphs. Lord Walker and Lord Collins agreed in full with Alan Rodger’s reasoning. The full paragraph reads -
“At the most basic level, if a male applicant were to live discreetly, he would in practice have to avoid any open expression of affection for another man which went beyond what would be acceptable behaviour on the part of a straight man. He would have to be cautious about the friendships he formed, the circle of friends in which he moved, the places where he socialised. He would have constantly to restrain himself in an area of life where powerful emotions and physical attraction are involved and a straight man could be spontaneous, impulsive even. Not only would he not be able to indulge openly in the mild flirtations which are an enjoyable part of heterosexual life, but he would have to think twice before revealing that he was attracted to another man. Similarly, the small tokens and gestures of affection which are taken for granted between men and women could well be dangerous. In short, his potential for finding happiness in some sexual relationship would be profoundly affected. It is objectionable to assume that any gay man can be supposed to find even these restrictions on his life and happiness reasonably tolerable.
It would be wrong, however, to limit the areas of behaviour that must be protected to the kinds of matters which I have just described – essentially, those which will enable the applicant to attract sexual partners and establish and maintain relationships with them in the same way as happens between persons who are straight. As Gummow and Hayne JJ pointed out in Appellant S395/2002 v Minister for Immigration (2003) 216 CLR 473, 500-501, para 81:
“Sexual identity is not to be understood in this context as confined to engaging in particular sexual acts or, indeed, to any particular forms of physical conduct. It may, and often will, extend to many aspects of human relationships and activity. That two individuals engage in sexual acts in private (and in that sense ‘discreetly’) may say nothing about how those individuals would choose to live other aspects of their lives that are related to, or informed by, their sexuality”
In short, what is protected is the applicant’s right to live freely and openly as a gay man. That involves a wide spectrum of conduct, going well beyond conduct designed to attract sexual partners and maintain relationships with them. To illustrate the point with trivial stereotypical examples from British society: just as male heterosexuals are free to enjoy themselves playing rugby, drinking beer and talking about girls with their mates, so male homosexuals are to be free to enjoy themselves going to Kylie concerts, drinking exotically coloured cocktails and talking about boys with their straight female mates. Mutatis mutandis – and in many cases the adaptations would obviously be great – the same must apply to other societies. In other words, gay men are to be as free as their straight equivalents in the society concerned to live their lives in the way that is natural to them as gay men, without the fear of persecution.”
Placed in context, it is clear that the remark was flippant and intended to provide light relief in an appeal dealing with persecution and the fear of death by reason only of one’s sexual preference.
July 9th, 2010 - 09:09
This is a really intelligent, reasoned, sensitive, principled statement from the judge. It makes me feel a bit ill that the Express can selectively quote from it to create such a poisonous front page. Even more shame on them.
July 8th, 2010 - 11:33
YES. Thank you for writing this. I read this blog every day, and get angrier with each article; to care about these things can feel completely pointless and masochistic, but this post illustrates perfectly why it’s so important not to ignore them. It is important to argue against the steady stream of racism and homophobia and complete lack of humanity from these papers – this stream of bile is often (rightly) derided and trivialised, but in doing so it is unwittingly tolerated. Your blog makes a real difference.
I’m sorry if this is slightly incoherent (and if you or anyone else feels I’ve hijacked this post to write a thank you which belongs elsewhere!) but it is a thank you that’s long overdue!
July 8th, 2010 - 11:35
“Is the sub headline about Kylie concerts and multi-coloured cocktails actually attributed to someone or have the Express just picked two gay clichés at random?” – Dan
It was something the judge said – fairly stupidly, in my opinion, given that it would clearly be picked up by lazy reporters as a gift of a quote to make their ill-informed, bigoted points.
July 8th, 2010 - 12:23
In calling out the vicious rubbish, you make those of us who read what you write stay attuned. Were it not for voices like yours we’d become indifferent, normalised to this tosh, and so pulled further into acting as if those opinions were acceptable.
In writing this stuff, you keep other peoples bullshit detectors switched on, and collectively that helps to rein in these opinions in wider society.
July 8th, 2010 - 13:20
At least if the asylum seekers are gay they won’t steal all our wimminz. Unless they’re lesbians. But don’t lesbians only exist on Big Brother?
I enjoyed the crude “They must be free to drink multi-coloured cocktails”… two others at once – gays and asylum seekers! Those gays and asylum seekers over there. Them. Not us.
But are they the same “they” who “have to turn off our radios”, for some reason that bewilders and upsets the Express journos? Are gays turning off our radios? Or asylum seekers? Or gay asylum seekers? Do they want to keep Kylie FOR THEMSELVES???
Also the obligatory “Footballers continue to live lives, despite not having won World Cup” front page news.
Front. Page. News.
A.r.g.h.
July 8th, 2010 - 14:11
This headline is ridiculous, is it wrong that I’ve been inclined to complain to the Press Complaints Commission? http://www.pcc.org.uk/
July 8th, 2010 - 18:32
Nice juxtaposition of why-o-why luddite article about analogue switch off and chance for their tech savvie readers to win some cutting edge shit!
July 8th, 2010 - 19:41
A similar story was run in the Daily Star today. The comments were unanimously against the Star’s editorial. I understand the comments were later removed and disabled.
July 8th, 2010 - 20:34
Jesus Mother Fucking Christ.
You remember when you were a kid and they told you that the school bullies were the ones who would never get anywhere in life? Well they were wrong. Most of the worst bullies go into journalism.
A generalisation? Perhaps. But if the Express is going to wallow in generalisations they should put up with it when the tables are turned on them.
July 9th, 2010 - 08:33
Somehow we managed to get a response out of Peter Hill on this one…
http://rentist.co.uk/?p=1008
July 9th, 2010 - 09:14
Totally agree with your points – great post.
In response to Suva: yes, this is true – there are lots of people in this country who harbour homophobic views, and yes this scum-reporting lights their touch paper. But that’s why it’s even more important to react against it so those people see, and realise, that these view points are unacceptable. They can’t be left to feel that their views are somehow vindicated by this appalling nonsense they read.
July 9th, 2010 - 11:28
No self doubt allowed. Keep blogging.
July 9th, 2010 - 11:31
I complained to the PCC…
I also went to the ‘contact’ section of the Express and sent this email to every single email address on there….
Hi,
Following the cover story the Express ran yesterday (‘NOW ASYLUM IF YOU’RE GAY’) and the delightful online story today by Leo McKinstry (‘NOW BEING A FAN OF KYLIE WINS YOU THE RIGHT TO ASYLUM’), I am curious how you feel about working for the Express?
Those of you with a picture next to your email in the ‘contact’ section look like reasonable, open minded people so it surprises me that you work for the Express. I appreciate that we all need to work for a living, and you have bills to pay just like anyone else, but earning that money by working for what is effectively a hate-mongering organization must feel strange no? When decent human beings who happen to be gay are beaten up because your employer has fueled the hatred amongst ignorant people by misrepresenting the facts do you consider resigning?
The lazy, highly inaccurate reporting of your fellow journalists (and I use that term loosely) is extremely impressive, and it is with this in mind that I felt compelled to lodge a complaint with the Press Complaints Commission. I’m an extremely busy person and have never lodged a complaint so I hope that puts into context how upset I am by these stories.
Please don’t think the Express deals in ‘news’. It deals in inciting hatred, be it on the grounds of race or sexuality (the Express specializes in both). The opinions expressed are utterly appalling and, frankly laughable. Except it’s not funny when people’s welfare and the right to live in peace is in the balance.
I suggest you take a look at this blog to regain some sort of balance to your lives:
http://enemiesofreason.co.uk/2010/07/08/its-worth-bothering-to-get-angry-at-express-scum/
Kind regards.
July 10th, 2010 - 14:21
I like Sir Andrew’s comment: “This could lead to a potentially massive expansion of asylum claims as it could apply to literally millions around the world.
An applicant has now only to show that he [or she] is homosexual and intends to return and live openly in one of the many countries where it is illegal, to be granted asylum in the UK.”
Yes. Yes, that might even be the point of the worldwide refugee regime in the first place. I imagine in 1951 he would have claimed that “An applicant only has to prove that he is a democracy activist and intends to return and live openly in one of the many countries where it is illegal.”
I really, really, really want a MigrationWatchWatch. Their pseudo-science, weird assumptions and distortions are widely-accepted because there is no group with their connections and PR that can publicize debunking of their migration myths, with the result that they become mainstream. It’s very worrying
July 12th, 2010 - 10:56
well said.