An apology is owed to the McWhirter family
David Baddiel, Alun Davies, and the BBC all owe an apology to the family of the late Norris McWhirter for an outrageous slur against a dead man, and to the Freedom Association for describing them as a 'slightly posher version of the BNP.'
Hat tip to Dan Hannan and Cranmer for pointing out that comedian David Baddiel, while promoting a short film he had made about a visit by Norris McWhirter to his old school, made some entirely inappropriate remarks on Alan Davies's show on BBC radio Five Live on Saturday.
The interview begins just after 1 hour and seven minutes into the two hour slot if you follow this link to BBC iPlayer. The comments to which Dan and Cranmer have taken offence - rightly, in my opinion - begin 1 hour 23 minutes and 35 seconds into the BBC iPlayer segment.
There is no doubt that the late Norris McWhirter, who with his brother Ross started the "Guinness Book of Records" and was involved with "Record Breakers," did have strong political opinions: he was Conservative parliamentary candidate for Orpington in 1964 and 1966, and founded the "Freedom Association."
However, his views were within the political mainstream, and he was a libertarian right winger, not an authoritarian one.
In other words, he believed in a small state, low taxes, light regulaton, and personal liberty, which he wanted to defend against both overmighty state institutions and overmighty trade unions. He believed in the rights of the individual, including the freedom of unpopular minorities to go about their business without interference from the authorities: he was the sort of right winger who is genuinely committed to civil liberties. Not the kind of extremist who wants to deport people whose skin is the wrong colour.
Comparing Norris McWhirter to ultra-nationalists such as Mosley's British Union of Fascists or the BNP is both wrong and highly offensive to anyone who knew the man. This would have been the case even had he not spent the best years of his life, during World War II, fighting against Nazism and Fascism in the Royal Navy. Between 1943 and 1946 Norris McWhirter served on escort duty in Atlantic and then aboard a minesweeper in the Pacific.
Baddiel described the Freedom Association as "sub-BNP, kind of a slightly posher version of the BNP." Alan Davies asked Baddiel if Norris McWhirter was a "Brown shirt with Mosley or whatever they were called." David Baddiel replied that "I have no idea and I wouldn't like to slander him" - an admirable sentiment, and a great pity he didn't have that thought about forty seconds earlier.
Allowing this sort of smear to go out on public broadcast, for which anyone who wishes to listen to terrestial TV in this country is required by law to pay through the licence fee, is not appropriate.
Hat tip to Dan Hannan and Cranmer for pointing out that comedian David Baddiel, while promoting a short film he had made about a visit by Norris McWhirter to his old school, made some entirely inappropriate remarks on Alan Davies's show on BBC radio Five Live on Saturday.
The interview begins just after 1 hour and seven minutes into the two hour slot if you follow this link to BBC iPlayer. The comments to which Dan and Cranmer have taken offence - rightly, in my opinion - begin 1 hour 23 minutes and 35 seconds into the BBC iPlayer segment.
There is no doubt that the late Norris McWhirter, who with his brother Ross started the "Guinness Book of Records" and was involved with "Record Breakers," did have strong political opinions: he was Conservative parliamentary candidate for Orpington in 1964 and 1966, and founded the "Freedom Association."
However, his views were within the political mainstream, and he was a libertarian right winger, not an authoritarian one.
In other words, he believed in a small state, low taxes, light regulaton, and personal liberty, which he wanted to defend against both overmighty state institutions and overmighty trade unions. He believed in the rights of the individual, including the freedom of unpopular minorities to go about their business without interference from the authorities: he was the sort of right winger who is genuinely committed to civil liberties. Not the kind of extremist who wants to deport people whose skin is the wrong colour.
Comparing Norris McWhirter to ultra-nationalists such as Mosley's British Union of Fascists or the BNP is both wrong and highly offensive to anyone who knew the man. This would have been the case even had he not spent the best years of his life, during World War II, fighting against Nazism and Fascism in the Royal Navy. Between 1943 and 1946 Norris McWhirter served on escort duty in Atlantic and then aboard a minesweeper in the Pacific.
Baddiel described the Freedom Association as "sub-BNP, kind of a slightly posher version of the BNP." Alan Davies asked Baddiel if Norris McWhirter was a "Brown shirt with Mosley or whatever they were called." David Baddiel replied that "I have no idea and I wouldn't like to slander him" - an admirable sentiment, and a great pity he didn't have that thought about forty seconds earlier.
Allowing this sort of smear to go out on public broadcast, for which anyone who wishes to listen to terrestial TV in this country is required by law to pay through the licence fee, is not appropriate.
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