to think that it's unacceptable to frighten someone's DC even if you think they're a nasty bigot?

[OTheHugeManatee]

I just saw this story about protesters forcing Nigel Farage and his family out of a pub where they were having lunch.

I don't really like Farage's politics. But I support his democratic right to hold those views. AIBU to think hounding him and frightening his DC during a family lunch is unacceptable, illiberal and frankly nasty, whatever you think of the things he says?

So, Hackmum, the only journalist actually there, and from a reputable paper (whether or not anyone likes The Guardian, we know it's honest) doesn't mention children. Thought that may well be the case.
Thank you.

Blimey, hackmum, that does tell a very different story.

I too have heard the reports that Farage's children weren't there. Do I think this protest (all two minutes of it as an interlude froma more positive event) a good thing for them to do? No. Do I think they are "scum", as Farage says? No, of course not.

Farage - a clown in almost every other respect - is a genius at painting himself as an anti-establishment outsider and man of the people when he is as thoroughly establishment as they get. This is just more of the same, a man whose policies (and colleagues) are based on wanting to hound and victimise other people, painting himself as the poor hounded victim.

#JeSuisNigel.

He was chased around by a bloke dressed up as gay donkey- not machine gunned to death.

Does it matter?

Well clearly it does matter. If he'd been killed that would be something VERY different.

But either it's ok to 'chase' politicians around their local when they are off duty with their family on a Sunday lunchtime. Or it isn't.

What Arsenic said. As I said before, I am not a huge fan of Farage's politics. But I find it really disturbing that some believe his views to be so abhorrent that they have concluded it makes him an exception to normal rules of courteous debate, such that it is acceptable to harass him at a family occasion while off duty. Because his views aren't that abhorrent. They just aren't. And even if they were it is not justified.

By all means picket UKIP rallies. But disrupt his family life? Seriously, we as a culture haven't behaved like this since religious heresy stopped being a punishable crime. We have a centuries old tradition of individual conscience being inviolate, which includes - has to include - those whose consciences disagree with that of the moral majority. I feel like I'm seeing that tradition collapsing before my eyes, as more and more people start to act as though freedom of speech and conscience is subordinate to the obligation not to utter views deemed immoral discriminatory. Do we really, truly believe that's ok?

He came into a pub I was in recently and about three quarters of the other customers quietly got up and walked out. Much more effective in my opinion. Sadly it only made the
local press because it wasn't sensational enough.

YANBU it is disgusting

OTheHuge His children weren't there. Nobody disrupted his family life. Nothing happened to anyone bar him. I agree that those there shouldn't have jumped on his car. However, no children present.
Other than that, I'm sorry, his views are that abhorrent. They just are.

I haven't said at any point that it was OK to disturb his wife's lunch Arsenic, but trying to compare it to a lynching or the Charlie Hebdo massacre is just fucking offensive rubbish.

All this hyperbole and whinging gives me far less sympathy for him tbh. Bring back John Prescott and his right hook.

I haven't compared it to a lynching or the Charlie Hebdo nassacre Saucy

I expect he wants a police escort in future to make himself feel important
he's offered protection on a Regular basis and has always turned it down.

Glad to see this thread - was thinking the exact same thing. For once the guy is right - they are scum, scaring children like that and using thuggery against free speech.

Dawndonna What is your source for saying the children weren't there? The BBC says they were.

He's a public figure and he was in a public place where his children may or may not have been also. He gave up his right to an anonymous private life when he entered public life. Freedom of speech works both ways and those protesters were exercising their right right to freedom of speech.

It is unfortunate for his children that their Dad has chosen to be such a controversial figure but calling the protesters scum is ott. I don't see any reports of the protesters approaching his children which definitely would be out of line. How the hell has Farage emerged looking like a victim. His propaganda machine worries me, anyone know whose behind it?

I don't think he does look like a victim.

But the protestors do not emerge as reasonable people.

The Guardian eye witness account seems plausible- it includes the car bonnet jumping incident.......

The point I'm trying to make is a serious one, about how we conduct political debate. I accept that many people find Farage's views deeply unpleasant and generally I'm inclined to agree. But I just don't believe that exempts anyone from the duty to conduct debate with him in a measured way, and to stop short of subjecting him and his family to harassment while off-duty. Because he has done nothing wrong in holding the opinions he holds. Really, he hasn't.

If we abandon the principle that says no matter what someone's views, we debate ad rem rather than ad hominem and leave people's private lives out of it, what then? What happens when we find that the same principle - holding certain opinions disqualifies you from being treated with courtesy as a fellow human being - to your opinions? I'm not going to invoke Godwin's Law, because that would be hysterical, but I really think the importance of this shift in popular morality can't be overstated. It should be a point of absolute principle that basic courtesies hold, no matter what someone's opinions; that people can be called to account for how they behave based on their opinions, but that simply holding an opinion cannot and must not be punished.

Well it would be unacceptable, but neither the protestors or the pub staff saw any children with him.

If they were with him then how frightening is a conga of people in fancy dress?

Yes Manatee. To everything you said. It is upsetting that not everbody sees it that way, frankly.

What about Marine le Pen?

Does she get to eat lunch en famille in a public space where she can sit and spout her evil racist views over the coq au vin?

The trouble is, while free speech etc etc, it is very important equally that people espousing such dangerous and damaging views are held to account and are held up to ridicule.

They have every (legal) right to shout "send the darkies home" in public, but if they have that right, others have the equal and far more important right to protest and force them out of public spaces.

No one ion public life can separate the personal from the public. Eat lunch at home.

I am not in favour, on the whole, of protesters about anything taking their protests to people's homes rather than their places of work. I don't think anyone is a legitimate target by due of being related to the primary target, however much of an arsehole that primary target is. That said, I'd rather have this discussion based on what these protesters actually did rather than what Farage says they did, as they seem to be two separate things.

The trouble is, while free speech etc etc, it is very important equally that people espousing such dangerous and damaging views are held to account and are held up to ridicule.

That's exactly what needs to happen. In the public arena.

Not by invading a family lunch.

(I'm not sure the whole gay donkey thing was very successful anyway, TBH.)