Billy Bragg. Again

[PurgatoryOfPotholes]

Billy Bragg saw some Holocaust memorials today; the type known as a Stolperstein, which literally translates as stumbling block. They are made by hand, and each one is to a specific person or household; it bears their name and is placed to mark the last place they were known to been voluntarily, before they were taken.

They are heartbreaking things, but some feel their placement in pavements is disrespectful to the people whose lives they seek to memorialise. So they are banned in some German towns and cities. That's not an argument I've ever had an opinion on, because it's not my place.

However, I never saw this coming. This is how Billy Bragg has reacted to seeing them today. He's used them in an argument about flipping trans activism. How low can you go?

Billy Bragg, tweet 1: Yeah, like white supremacists can argue that they’re not anti-Black, they’re just pro-white. And guess what? They also complain that, for taking that view, they’ve been subject to a smear campaign for years.

Other Person: Desperate argument but oh kaaaay.

Billy Bragg, tweet 2: I’m in Hamburg atm In the pavements are small brass plaques bearing the names of Jews who lived in the building opposite the plaque who were murdered by the Nazis. That began with people deciding they could define someone by their biology alone.

Followed to a wikipedia link about the purpose of a Stolperstein

Billy Bragg being repugnant

@ChagSameachDoreen
I don't blame you, it's stomach turning. Brag seems desperate to make himself relevant and it is shocking that he is prepared to co-opt the suffering of those murdered during the Shoah to do so.
Try not to left the twerp upset you, he really isn't worth your thoughts. 💐

Fuck me, he's just said that those 'those angry with' him should click on his handy link which has more information about the holocaust.

He's said that. He's actually typed that out. And addressed it to all the Jewish people who commented explaining why his comment was so offensive.

Fucking hell. The narcissism of this man to tell Jewish people to read up on the holocaust.

You'd think he'd have learnt from Ken Livingstone's experience of trying to teach (Jewish) grandmothers to suck eggs...

Shit, he actually has.

And he's becoming ever more explicit with the implication that the Nazis were correct to think that Jews were biologically different...

Billy Bragg's tweet: Those angry with me for pointing out the potential dangers in seeking to define what rights a person has by their biology alone, rather than by universal principles, should read this article from the US Holocaust Memorial Museum
article from the US Holocaust Museum

Bragg, STFU. Just shut up.

@Thelandedgentry You are confusing legal, tenurial and social heritability with biology; and I think it's best left there tbh.

Has the left always been this anti-semitic?

Palestinians are "people of colour" and Jews are "white oppressors". Yeah, beats me, too.

BB certainly has. What a nasty little man he is. This is from 2018:

SINGER Billy Bragg has accused Jews of “pouring petrol on the fire” by attacking Jeremy Corbyn in the anti-Semitism row.
Bragg, 60, an ally of the labour leader said the Jewish community had “work to do” and must shoulder some blame for the fallout.

Of course, despite the "progressive left" loving Palestine they wouldn't actually want to live there: i.redd.it/zho65kcmrs071.jpg

I doubt Palestine is very trans-inclusive. Israel, on the other hand, entered (and won) Eurovision with transwoman Dana International over two decades ago.

He's clearly senile.

I think that a lot of the left also forget about the existence of the minority who are Palestinian Christians.

I think it fucks with their brains or something, like the scribbly crayon cartoon.

Yes narcissist.
The other tweet started with something like "I'm in Hamburg right now, stood on a street where..."
As if...hey everyone it's Billy here to school you all again in the ways of the world, listen up guys, you won't know this but...

I remember when he used to come up north, he'd head straight for the 'cultural community centres' and then march with a big gang of men into town. Stand on the town hall steps preaching to even more men, never a woman in sight

Well, Billy saw his first Stolperstein today and he's the great Billy Bragg! If he didn't know about them before, how could any of us proles know about them without being told?

Fucker.

But it certainly does lend an extra dimension to the ongoing debate over whether they are a counter-productive form of memorial, because they are set into the ground and you literally can step on them; I mean, Bragg has been trying to walk all over Jewish people on Twitter all evening.

Billy is a bit odd about men.

In this interview about his participation in the Being A Man festival at the Southbank Centre, Billy said

“I think men need a place where we can talk about things that are a problem,” Bragg explains when asked why he was so keen to be involved. “I don’t think any man who’s watched the news since Christmas can feel comfortable with what’s been going on with Operation Yewtree, with Lord Rennard, with those men who were convicted in Peterborough. I look at the TV and I despair for my 20 year old son.

Those men who were convicted in Peterborough? They were this grooming ring.

Right, poor men, they need a space to work it all out .

He couldn't give a shit about the victims of grooming gangs. Neither does Owen Jones.

Thank god we're more progressive now and we categorise people by personality and not biology. If ever some extremist government announces they are rounding up women and putting us in camps, I'll just say, 'Actually, I'm called Bernard and I like watching the darts and drinking Special Brew.' I'm sure that'll work.

(Shit-for-brains doesn't seem to realise that feminists are the polar opposite of Nazis in that we are against biological essentialism. We don't attach an innate personality to biology; we appreciate that biological differences don't automatically mean personality differences. Jewish people being recognised as a distinct class wouldn't have been a problem had that class not been dehumanised by negative, culturally-generated stereotypes. We recognise that women are a distinct biological class and we don't want sexists like Billy to redefine us by the stereotypes that belittle us.)

I'll never forget it. Was some by-election or general election involving that hideous little antisemite Corbyn. Bragg stood in front of the town hall surrounded by screaming chanting flag waving (ironic for a man who hates his own country's flag) men. Men men men, toxic masculinity as far as the eye could see.

I think that probably he's not really all that smart.

Or he's led a very sheltered life, or both

'He has also likened LGB alliance to white supremacists because of the absence of T. Yep, a straight man lecturing same sex attracted people on who they should include in their groups."

I thought it came out during the AB trial that over 70% of the members of the LGB alliance were straight.

Did anyone see that episode of AbFab in which Edina has to retrench and Saffron says she needs to get a smaller car rather than her limo, and doing her own shopping from the supermarket rather than Harrods? This will be cheaper to run etc. etc. etc. Edina buys an extremely small sports car, and events lead her to going to court and paying an enormous fine - the whole thing being driven by her own impenetrable narcissism and lack of self awareness. Her own inability to see and understand her own narrow mindset.

At the end, being seriously out of pocket, she turns to Saffron as says "That smaller car was a bit of a false economy, wasn't it darling?"

I sympathise with Saffron - Edina is wrong on so many levels that you don't know where to start. Same with Billy Bragg. Same with the far left across the board. So many assumptions which are unconsidered. What does he mean by "define by biology"? Is he suggesting that GC arguments are saying that women, as human beings, are nothing but their biological characteristics, and that they can either have women's rights or human rights but can't have both? What is the relevance of the white supremecist argument? Is he really comparing Jewish concerns on antisemitism to the burbling inanities of the white supremacist movement?

Where do you start with such nonsense? Which bundle of thoughtless gunk do your start dismantling first?

They also conveniently "forget" that a lot of Jews are brown and black (Ethiopian Jews) but nope according to them all Jews are white.

That applies more to the right. Especially the ' Christian' right. The people who send missionaries to Palestine ffs

Bragg, 60, an ally of the labour leader said the Jewish community had “work to do” and must shoulder some blame for the fallout.

This is all we need to know about this man. He’s a deranged, repugnant individual.