The BNP's Nick Griffin on Question Time, what are your thoughts?

[overmydeadbody]

link here

"..what..? why shouldn't i be able to listen to him on national TV....

he is the leader of a legal political party, he has every right to be on TV.....

you need to look up democracy...think you've forgotten what it means..."

That last dig is richly ironic coming from an apologist for fascists, but I will elt it pass.

The point is that Question Time is not an open mic show like X Factor where insignificant people can make it big; it is about a two way process where figures who already command respect and the mandate of a significant swathe of the population get the chance to expound upon their views and, at the same time, are held directly accountable to the audience, who represent the electorate.

Just being the leader of a legal political party (itself questionable for Griffin) does not give an automatic right to appear on TV, any more than having ridden in a donkey derby gives the automatic right to commentate alongside McCrirrick at Epsom.

If you want to listen to Griffin, I suggest you write a letter to Live and Kicking to see if they have five minutes of dead time to fill.

Split hairs or state facts DP?

I think they should be on becuase much as people fear its a chance for them to spread the word of their shite, thankfully people on QT who try to do that often get pulled apart; as a party they should be scrutinsed at every opportunity, and QT is a good way of doing that.

At the moment they are allowed to exist somewhere between acceptance and the shadows: MEPs but closed conferences, soundbites wuithout explanations..... they should be forced into receiving exactly the same level of policy scrutiny that all the ther mainstream aprties get, becuase that is when people will start to see the lack of substance rather than blurbs about 'decent people' and nationality.

I am hoping the audience is full of able, motivated people to grill them- my realdear is that it will be full of BNP supporters who knew when to call for a seat.

Well said Daftpunk! You've really thought that through.

If only That's Life came back on air you might get on TV yourself.

Good point, would MIFLAW object to a Green Party MEP being on Question Time?

I don't that there's any logical argument for his exclusion that wouldn't also exclude other people who we would want to see on there, well other than him being a ignorant muppet.

MIFLAW .

"Good point, would MIFLAW object to a Green Party MEP being on Question Time?"

If I'm honest, it wouldn't fill me with joy ... but then, on the other hand, it's not a party largely composed of convicted criminals, its legality as a party has not been challenged, and it does not have core policies that push legality to the very extremes, so I would find it easier to be stoic about.

MIFLAW - you are just displaying your ignorance.

The BBC's charter means that a political party does indeed have the right to airtime once a certain threshold of voting levels is achieved. This is why the BNP have been allowed to make Party Political Broadcasts in the past. The BBC is obliged to broadcast them.

OK so they ahven't amended their constitution yet- just copied from their website

'SECTION 2: MEMBERSHIP

1. The British National Party represents the collective National, Environmental, Political, Racial, Folkish, Social, Cultural, Religious and Economic interests of the indigenous Anglo-Saxon, Celtic and Norse folk communities of Britain and those we regard as closely related and ethnically assimilated or assimilable aboriginal members of the European race also resident in Britain. Membership of the BNP is strictly defined within the terms of, and our members also self define themselves within, the legal ambit of a defined ?racial group? this being ?Indigenous Caucasian? and defined ?ethnic groups? emanating from that Race as specified in law in the House of Lords case of Mandla V Dowell Lee (1983) 1 ALL ER 1062, HL.'

So they are illegal. You can't bandy phrases such as theya re a legalparty because - erm - they are not.

Personally I was rather enamoured by thier claim to have a range of sensbile polices. In whose opinion? Ah yes theirs PMSL- everyone thinks their won opinions are sensible surely?

Nick Griffin is more than the "leader of a legal political party", he's the leader of the party that received the 6th amount of votes in the last election.

That number of votes must also mean that he has "the mandate of a significant swathe of the population", who I hope are uninformed protest voters who just might sit up and listen to the party they voted for.

If the BNP is the cut of point of "significance" then that means that the only parties we'll ever see on Question time would be the Conservatives, UKIP, Labour, Lib Dem and Green.

As I've said earlier the BNP play two main cards, "victim" and "they're to blame". Trying to ignore him while letting other clearly less significant parties and individuals have their say plays right into the hands of that first card.

miflaw...i am happy to discuss things with anyone on here, even with people who don't agree with a word i say......but i have to know they are fairly intelligent and have a bit of savvy..

otherwise they are just wasting my time...

i wont be wasting a second more of my time reading your posts.... i suspect you are a fool.

"it's not a party largely composed of convicted criminals, its legality as a party has not been challenged, and it does not have core policies that push legality to the very extremes"

OK well there are some points that we could argue about his exclusion upon.

Trying to claim that he's insignificant when Question Time have clearly set their significance threshold at the "Will Young" level really just isn't the way to go.

By QT's standards he's significant.

By any objective political standard he's significant.

However I've got to close by saying that he and his party are vile examples of humanity.

www.guardian.co.uk/media/2009/oct/20/nick-griffin-question-time

[pats miflaw manfully on the shoulder]
Now I have who exactly the audience is to worry about. Why can't we e-mail questions?
[sulks]
I'm going to bow out for a bit, my head is beginning to ache!
Thanks for putting up bearing with me.

Agree scarlet.

If we ignore them and ban them, then we push them underground. Apart from that, I am genuinely interested to actually hear NG speak. I want to know if everything I read about them is true. They are more easily debated if we actually give them the chance to put their opinions across.

He has spoken before on the radio.When the bnp 'list' was leaked to the press and the demographic of members was analysed he did say that the majority then was'older uneducated white male' who was either in a gang or a loner was something he hoped would change!He sounded an idiot then so I doubt much has changed

I lived and worked in an area where the BNP was always around, stirring up racism, even attaching themselves to the cause of ww2 veterans.

I remember National Front marches up our high street.

Years ago it was the policy of media organisations to deny the BNP a political platform - by appearing in the newspaper- so as not to give them any legitimacy as a political party. I think it was NUJ policy too...

This hasn't worked. As other people have pointed out, the BNP is now electable and the media has to give them due coverage to as not to be accused of bias. It also gives the media the opportunity to expose them as the bunch of yobs they are.

I'm looking foward to cementhead Griffin fielding quaestions on the economy, NHS, climate change, education..

"MIFLAW - you are just displaying your ignorance.

The BBC's charter means that a political party does indeed have the right to airtime once a certain threshold of voting levels is achieved. This is why the BNP have been allowed to make Party Political Broadcasts in the past. The BBC is obliged to broadcast them."

I have not displayed any ignorance.

I said that being the leader of a political party does not grant an automatic right - and this is true. As you yourself point out, there is a threshold.

Secondly, party political broadcasts are, indeed, a right once said threshold has been passed. Appearance on Question Time is not. It is by invitation.

Instead of insulting me, just let me know if you are struggling to read what I have written and I will type it in capitals for you.

Daftpunk. "i suspect you are a fool."

Suspect away.

But I KNOW you are a bigot.

There will always be insecure people with extreme ignorant views who in spite of being seriously disliked and disagreed with by the majority have the skin of a rhino to match their brain. NG is just another.

I also stand by my point that election to the European Parliament alone is not the mark of a political party that genuinely represents the popular vote. Such elections are not comparable to our national elections because they use Proportional Representation and because many people do not turn out to vote in them, distorting the importance of parties such as the BNP.

If, in spite of this, they can only manage two Euro MPs (I will wager that the Greens got more than that), I would say that they do not deserve this level of exposure.

Out of interest, when are UKIP (apparently, 4th or 5th, rather than 6th) next on the show?

Am not sure when they are next on, but UKIP were on last week.

Squeezy

Genuinely surprised.

But thank you.

UKIP's been on Question Time on a number of occasions, I know that they were on back in June too.

Ditto Badger.

I am hoping that someone asks NG about the Spitfire/Churchill/ww2 imagery they are using. I thought that as they are quite similar in stance to the Nazi's in 20's/30's and as a country we were fighting against that and invasion that it is a bit of a daft piece of pr to use. I expect I am being a bit dim!
The BNP scares me a fair ammount, if you look at european history I think I am correct in thinking that Hitler snuck hi way into power and then bullied everyone else out!

As a country we went to ww2 to protect ourselves and those being persecuted which is exactly what NG and the BNP are intending to do so what would stop the rest of Europe deciding we were a threat and therefore doing something about it?

So back to the original question - I think that this would be better at a more suitable time so that relevant questions could be asked and the whole nation could see what a complete twat (even if intelligent) he really is.

Lets face it there are a lot of people who just vote without knowing the full policies of the party that they are voting for and if some trad labour/tory voters have gone in this direction this could be why (not saying that they have). I think part of the problem is that a fair amount of people just don't seem to give a damn anymore and this is born out with the fact that people just don't bother voting.

For this reason, I will vote and it won't be for the BNP whatever happens on QT

The Nazi parties rise was complicated and even I don't understand the full ins and out, however it's not as simple so as to say that they tricked their way into power. In the last election in pre war Germany they got 43% of the vote.

A part of what he did do though was to bully his way into power. Nazi thugs played a major part in destabilising Germany and Hitler played the Victim and Blame cards. People then voted for him because he seemed to be promising the order that they wanted, and because he offered an easy explanation and an easy fix for the problems of the nation.

Once in power he kicked the ladders down behind him and turned Germany into a Dictatorship.

Fortunately Nick Griffin is in no way as sharp a political operator as Hitler, however watch how hard he's playing the victim card right now. The blame game is never far behind either.

Brawls with anti-Facist demonstrators are also something that plays right into his hands. Nick Griffin's goons are but petty imitators of the military trained thugs that the Nazi's had to call on but he is trying similar tactics. After all, they were proved to work with a society that's not that different to our own.