There’s something obviously broken in the Conservative response to Lee Anderson. At first it seems almost comedic. But then, as you peel away the layers, it becomes increasingly disturbing.
This morning, LBC’s Nick Ferrari asked immigration minister Michael Tomlinson the same question multiple times and every time he did so he got the same baffling harebrained response. Anderson had said that Muslim London Mayor Sadiq Khan had “given our capital city away to his mates”, then insisted that “Islamists” had “got control of Khan, and they’ve got control of London”. On Saturday night, the MP lost the Conservative party whip.
Why did that happen, Ferrari asked. “It was wrong,” Tomlinson replied. Why was it wrong? In response, Tomlinson seemed to completely break down. “What Lee said was wrong and as a result of what he said, the whip was removed from him.” This played out several times. It’s wrong. Why? Because it’s wrong. It was as if we’d fallen into a perpetual logic loop, sentenced to living out the same moment over and over again. Eventually, Ferrari simply ended the interview, saying: “Michael Tomlinson is a minister of state for illegal migration, unable to answer a question.”
It’s part of a trend. Kay Burley was receiving similar answers on Sky the previous morning, this time from transport secretary Mark Harper. “Was it racist?” she asked. “Well it was wrong,” he answered. “In my book, wrong is a strong word.” Burley looked unamused. “But it’s a different word to racist,” she said. Again, the process played out several times. Again, infinity beckoned.
Incredibly, even this is a hardening of the previous government position. When Anderson originally lost the whip, the statements put out by government figures emphasised merely that it was because he failed to apologise. Apologise for what? It wasn’t clear. It actually took an entire media cycle before the comments hardened to the word “wrong”, which is ultimately just another way of refusing to clarify exactly what his crime was. Downing Street is now intent on holding the line at that formulation.
It’s extremely foolish. When journalists sense a weakness they will remorselessly exploit it. As soon as they can tell that you’re not willing to answer a question, they will ask it over and over again. Although admittedly, it doesn’t take a genius to figure it out. Even a child knows that saying something is wrong without being able to say why is not a tenable position.
It is also extremely telling. Why won’t they use the words? Why won’t they simply say it’s racist, or Islamophobic? The answer is unsettling and important. It is because Islamophobic thought is key to the modern far-right and that it has now contaminated the mainstream right as well. To start challenging that, to start really addressing it, is to threaten a moral reckoning on the Conservative party. It is to force it to address its ever-closer relationship with the dirtiest elements of right-wing thought.
Since the 9/11 terror attack, a fear and hatred of Islam has dominated far-right rhetoric. Muslims are cast as an invading force, undermining Christian civilisation from within – an alien people plotting the sabotage of the nation-state. It is a near-parallel example to the antisemitism narrative in Europe in the 1920s and 1930s. It even comes complete with near-parallel conspiracy theories. In the early 20th Century, the fabricated Protocols of the Elders of Zion convinced many people – including those who should really have known better – about a Jewish plot for world domination. Today, the Great Replacement Theory claims that liberal politicians are intentionally transporting non-white, predominantly Muslim voters to the West in order to replace their traditional white working-class support.
These views galvanised the populist right. Hungary’s Viktor Orban engages in precisely these ideas. He claims that his administration “prevented the Islamic world from flooding us from the south”. Refugees arriving in Europe are typically referred to by government officials and the press as a “raid”, a “conquest” and a “penetration”. Some 45 per cent of Hungarians polled in 2018 believe Muslim leaders have a secret plan to conquer Europe and make it an Arabic continent. Italy’s Georgia Meloni and Matteo Salvini engage in the same type of rhetoric, as does the US’ Donald Trump, Holland’s Geert Wilders and France’s Marine Le Pen. This is the standard message of the far-right and the populist right, which has been used for nearly a quarter of a century.
It is the rhetoric that Suella Braverman was flirting with in her original Telegraph article on Islam, which triggered Anderson’s comments. It ostensibly focused on the pro-Palestine demonstrations we’ve seen since the start of the war in Gaza, but the language and the frame played into the same far-right sense of an invasion and takeover by an alien civilisation. “The truth is that the Islamists, the extremists, and the antisemites are in charge now,” she said. It is the same as the rhetoric which far-right activist Tommy Robinson has used in the past and which saw him called a “hero” by Steve Bannon last week, while former Conservative prime minister Liz Truss stood next to him, without issuing a single word of objection.
This is why the Government doesn’t want to use the word Islamophobia. It’s why Conservative figures are desperately trying to minimise Anderson’s comments. It’s why Jacob Rees-Mogg calls them “infelicitous”. It’s why deputy prime minister Oliver Dowden insisted Anderson was not “intending to be Islamophobic”. It’s why the Express is fighting a desperate rearguard defence on its front page this morning with the headline: “Get him back! Tories rally round ‘race row’ Lee Anderson.”
Because if the Conservative party really took a hard line on this issue, it would have to start withdrawing the whip much more widely, starting with a former home secretary and a former prime minister. It would have to shine a light on its own political movement and the slimy, ugly things it found there.
If we really took Islamophobia seriously – if we treated it with the same gravitas as antisemitism – the foundations of the British right would start to come asunder. The similarity between the base assumptions of the far-right, the populist right and the mainstream right would become clear.
That cannot be allowed to happen. It would make Rishi Sunak’s life difficult. So instead, we have ministers uttering ludicrous nonsense about things being wrong because they are wrong. Because to do otherwise would reveal the extent of the radicalisation of the Conservative party.
The disturbing reason why Tory MPs won’t use the word ‘Islamophobia’
3
0
27.02.2024
There’s something obviously broken in the Conservative response to Lee Anderson. At first it seems almost comedic. But then, as you peel away the layers, it becomes increasingly disturbing.
This morning, LBC’s Nick Ferrari asked immigration minister Michael Tomlinson the same question multiple times and every time he did so he got the same baffling harebrained response. Anderson had said that Muslim London Mayor Sadiq Khan had “given our capital city away to his mates”, then insisted that “Islamists” had “got control of Khan, and they’ve got control of London”. On Saturday night, the MP lost the Conservative party whip.
Why did that happen, Ferrari asked. “It was wrong,” Tomlinson replied. Why was it wrong? In response, Tomlinson seemed to completely break down. “What Lee said was wrong and as a result of what he said, the whip was removed from him.” This played out several times. It’s wrong. Why? Because it’s wrong. It was as if we’d fallen into a perpetual logic loop, sentenced to living out the same moment over and over again. Eventually, Ferrari simply ended the interview, saying: “Michael Tomlinson is a minister of state for illegal migration, unable to answer a question.”
It’s part of a trend. Kay Burley was receiving similar answers on Sky the previous morning, this time from transport secretary Mark Harper. “Was it racist?” she asked. “Well it was wrong,” he answered. “In my book, wrong is a strong word.” Burley looked unamused. “But it’s a different word to racist,” she said. Again, the process played out several times. Again, infinity beckoned.
Incredibly, even this is a hardening of the........
© iNews
visit website
login
who are we?
contact us
qosheapp
Toi Staff
Gideon Levy
Belen Fernandez
Mort Laitner
Rami G Khouri
Ali Fathollah-Nejad
Nikkei Editorial
