WELL I LARFED

The Regressive Left and the Death of Satire

Did you hear the one about.....

 The motion before a ‘left wing’ conference proposing that Daesh be recognised as a legitimate anti-imperialist resistance movement? What about George Galloway, the Bernard Manning of the far left, attending an ‘anti-war’[sic] protest at the same time as tweeting support for the indiscriminate bombing being conducted by Putin in Syria? No, that one past you by, then what about ‘anti-war’ website that compared Daesh Jihadi fighters to members of the International Brigades, or the one about the Paris massacres being about France reaping the fruits of its imperialism? Admittedly the last was a particularly sick joke, though when it came to the slaughter of Charlie Hebdo staff no comment was too cruel or brutal for the ranks of the regressive left, indeed the sickest joke of all was the voice of self styled ‘progressive liberals’ providing apologia for the murder of cartoonists and the literal slaughter of satire and satirists.

Satire, could not, Tom Lehrer once opined survive the awarding of the Nobel Peace Prize to Henry Kissinger. Lehrer didn't know the half of it. For how could he have envisioned students demanding ‘safe spaces’ where these delicate souls could, like day old chicks, huddle for security, no nasty ideas being allowed inside. This led to the grotesque comedy of the ‘no-platforming,’ i.e. newspeak for censorship, of Germaine Greer the greatest living feminist for being ‘transphobic.’ The grandchildren of the Oz trial defendants now demanding censorship.
Dennis Neville & Anderson
After the Oz Trial
 Though to appreciate the full flavour of the grotesque ‘safe space’ ideology one needed to witness events at Goldsmiths University in London, where Mariam Namazie the founder and leader of the Council of Ex-Muslims, was booked to speak at the University’s Atheist and Humanist Society on the topic of “Apostasy and Free Speech in the Age of ISIS.” After first attempting to block the speech by asserting that a speech by Ms Namazie would “be a violation of [Goldsmith’s Islamic Society’s] safe space,” had failed, these delicate souls of the Islamic Society sought to disrupt the speech with tactics familiar to anyone knowledgeable about the history of the Nazi Brownshirts.
Mariam Namazie
Funny yeah, wait for you haven’t yet heard the punch line yet, for after the event the Islamic Society thugs were offered support by Goldsmith’s Feminist and Gay and Lesbian societies, and following a complaint by the Atheist group about the attempted disruption of the speech, the University authorities found in favour of the Islamic Society. Laugh, I nearly vomited.
 This event was incidentally videoed and, despite attempts by the university to have the video taken down, presumably on the grounds that seeing its students behave like Nazi Brownshirts might not represent great publicity, it is available here.


The election of Jeremy Corbyn to lead the Labour Party however eclipsed all else in the satire stakes. Here was an event beyond the imagination of a PG Wodehouse or GK Chesterton. Corbyn, the standard bearer for the Stop the War Coalition [sic], panellist on the Iranian Propaganda Channel Press TV,- a state that, amongst other things,  imprisons Trade Unionists, – friend of Hamas, Hezbollah and the IRA, a man happy to share a platform with anti-Semites and Islamists, apologist for Putin, blaming Russian aggression on NATO, became the leader of the once great Labour Movement. Satire breathed its last and ceased upon the midnight with much pain.
Corbyn with George Galloway on Press TV

Corbyn’s team was soon supplemented by the addition of the Stalin apologist Seamus Milne, to the great acclaim of Lindsay German and the other luminaries of the We hate the West Movement, henceforth WHTWM. The privately educated Milne though did not feel alone for long in coming from such a privileged background as the head of the newly created Momentum, a sort of Corbyn private army, is ‘the privately educated son of a property tycoon, whose father had the wealth to fund a home in Primrose Hill, a wife, children, and allegedly a couple of mistresses on the side,’ a certain Mr James Schneider.
James Schneider
 Now Mr Schneider has a new toy to play with, he can play act at being Leon Trotsky without any of the attendant risks, -ice pick murders being a rarity in the wealthier parts of London and the Home Counties. Certainly he will not be faced with the Bedroom Tax, the Benefit Cap or a JSA sanction. For these are the concerns of lesser mortals unburdened by the task of creating the great revolutionary future.

So all in all this year has been a blast. You will however forgive me if, as we say goodbye to 2015, I now stop laughing. Too much dark humour can be bad for the human spirit and corrodes the soul, whilst the extinguishing of hope is, in the end, no laughing matter

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