Steve Uncles, the top candidate for the English Democrats in the South East region has decided to pick an argument he feels he has a reasonable argument of winning – on the basis that his opponent died a couple of years ago. In a forum post entitled “Fun with bloggers who hate their County [sic] ‘England’” he writes:
You may recall the “self hating” blogger – Chris Lightfoot, who in 2004, “went off on one” just because he got a leaflet through his letter box with an England Flag on it.
18 Months ago the poor lad Committed Suicide – that’s what happens when you hate your own country, you have no identity, no focus – nothing.
I vaguely knew Chris Lightfoot, firstly as a blogger and then in a professional and social capacity I met up with him on a couple of occasions. I liked him, and am pretty disgusted at seeing his name being rubbished in this way – especially by a serial political failure such as Steve Uncles. So let me clarify a few things:
1) Chris’s blog is still online and you can see for yourself if he or Uncles, to use the latters’ phrase, “went off on one”. It should be noted that his argument with the English Democrats was not primarily in their use of the flag but in their anti-immigration policies and support for victims’ justice. He referred to them as “quasi-fascist.” When it comes to flags, he pretty much condemned all parties equally.
2) I don’t know the full story about why Chris committed suicide and nor would I wish to pry. What I do know is that it took place three years after this incident and that his dislike of flag waving nationalism (which I happen to share) was not a preoccupation of his.
3) Uncles goes on to ask “Do you believe the SNP (Scottich [sic] National Party ) are racist biggots [sic]?” Well personally speaking, not particularly, no, although I do deplore their tendency to flirt with it when it suits their political agenda. They also don’t pursue regressive zero-immigration policies of the kind that the English Democrats’ espouse.
4) This whole “self-hating” stuff has been lifted directly out of the emic debate about zionism. It is a daft debate there and an even dafter debate in the context of English nationalism. What’s more, what could be more self-loathing than defining your identity on the basis of flag-waving and land? By definition it is a call for the very sublimation of the self in favour of the herd.
There is something irredeemably vile about someone who tries to make political capital out of a suicide. Worse, even, than someone who buys the odd duck house on expenses.
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