Gransnet forums

News & politics

Labour MP's harassment

(562 Posts)
POGS Thu 03-Dec-15 12:56:04

For a while now there have been reports of Labour MP's being bullied, harassed by left wing activists. They have been threatened with deselection, sent photos of dead babies to put pressure on them to vote on Syria etc.

Yesterday during the Syrian debate many Labour MP's made reference to this happening and Labour MP John Mann called for Cameron to apologise for his words but also said the Labour front bench should also apologise for the harassment the Labour MP's were recieving. Labour MP Stella Creasy literally left the debate to go to her office as the staff were receiving phone abuse and there were anti war campaigners causing them harassment. This point will be refuted by those who attended so we must all make our own decision as to whom we believe.

I mentioned in posts last night how disgusting I think this behaviour is on the Should we bomb Deash/IS thread. I genuinely feel very sorry for the Labour MP's and to be honest I think there is going to be more trouble ahead if the Labour Party do not back their MP's a little harder than has happened so far.

What gives people the right to assume their opinion , their view should not be doubted, not debated and must be adhered to or they resort to threatening behaviour. It is not democratic and I agree with those MP's and commentators who believe this wave of activism is a backward move for the Labour Party..

Ana Sat 12-Dec-15 21:25:44

Plus, the author of that piece, Gordon Duff, says (in a recorded interview)

“About 30% of what’s on Veterans Today is patently false. About 40% of what I write is at least purposefully partially false. Because if I didn’t write false information I wouldn’t be alive. I simply have to do that.”

Ana Sat 12-Dec-15 21:18:34

Perhaps you should have read the comments after your link to the Veterans Today article which you posted on the 'Should we bomb Syria' thread.

www.veteranstoday.com/2015/12/07/coalition-air-attack-hits-syrian-army-base-16-dead/

Rather more nasty than, wouldn't you say?

durhamjen Sat 12-Dec-15 20:56:19

Perhaps you should read the comments after the article, Ana.
An awful lot of the Telegraph readers appear to have taken it seriously. Dd I say that Telegraph readers are stupid.........?

Ana Sat 12-Dec-15 19:26:58

OFGS don't be ridiculous! At no point does the article say 'he said' and it was published before the event. Do you really think Telegraph readers are so stupid? hmm

durhamjen Sat 12-Dec-15 19:23:41

A much more appropriate Churchillian quote would be "A lie gets halfway round the world before the truth has a chance to get its pants on."

That applies to Eloethan's post as well. Not everyone reading that Telegraph article would realise it wasn't what Corbyn said. I bet some Telegraph readers would even now be slagging off Corbyn for what he said about the Labour party and parliament.

thatbags Sat 12-Dec-15 19:08:45

I don't think Bloodworth was quoting what Churchill said about StW. As you say, how could he? He was using something Churchill said to illustrate his point.

Having listened to that exchange between them, I find that I think both of them have taken a point of view and cannot see anything in between. It strikes me as black and white thinking again, with no subtlety and no allowance for things like human error. One man's word against another's, so I'll take neither of them as gospel and carry on learning about both sides of the issues.

rosesarered Sat 12-Dec-15 19:07:44

Who knows? maybe he does secretly think along those lines.

Eloethan Sat 12-Dec-15 19:00:34

Ana It seems you think that the article in the Telegraph, which contains the following diatribe dressed up as a representation of Corbyn's views, is an example of good journalism - I don't:

" At which point the leader of the Labour Party will rise to his feet and begin his address to the Stop The War Christmas fundraiser. And he will say the following:

“To the Labour Party – the party I lead – I have this message. Screw you. To the members of Parliament I lead I have this message. Screw you. To those hundreds of thousands of Labour Party members and former Labour Party members who didn’t vote for me, I have the same message. Screw you. And for the millions of people who voted Labour at the last general election, and who yearn for a Labour government, I have a very special message. Screw every single one of you.”

"Obviously, Jeremy Corbyn won’t use those exact words.......... But his message could not be clearer: “I don’t care what the voters think. I don’t care what my colleagues think. I don’t care what my party thinks. These are my real friends. And if you don’t like it, screw you................”

durhamjen Sat 12-Dec-15 18:57:12

Probably because it was there before it was removed. Nobody has denied it being there, just that it was not written by StoptheWar, which is why it was removed.
However, Nineham said that Stop the War does not support Assad, quite a few times, which is what Bloodworth accused him of, and did not support Russia in the Crimea, which they were also accused of, and lots of other things. I'm not sure why he used a paraphrase of a speech by Churchill to condemn StoptheWar, either. That was a ridiculous soundbite.
Should I really find out what Churchill did say, or should I just think that Churchill would not have been able to say anything about StoptheWar as it only started in 2001.

thatbags Sat 12-Dec-15 14:19:40

Just listened to this between Chris Lineham and James Bloodworth. Lineham didn't deny that the stuff Bloodworth said was on the StW site was there. Why?

Brilliantly chaired, btw. Well done that woman!

thatbags Sat 12-Dec-15 13:52:04

But not if they've removed some of the articles.

durhamjen Sat 12-Dec-15 13:27:44

stopwar.org.uk/index.php/news/for-the-avoidance-of-doubt-the-positions-of-the-stop-the-war-coalition

durhamjen Sat 12-Dec-15 13:26:06

You could just read Stop the War's website if you want to know what they really think.

stopwar.org.uk/index.php/news/andrew-murray-s-speech-at-the-stop-the-war-fundraiser-dinner

thatbags Sat 12-Dec-15 12:05:35

But isn't that free speech? The best way to oppose bad ideas and misrepresentations is to argue with them, isn't it, not to effectively censor? Or have I missed something?

StW website could limit comments if there is too much abuse, but if the articles really support what they believe and stand for, why remove them?

I don't get it.

Anniebach Sat 12-Dec-15 12:04:36

Jen, great writing again from Michael Rosen

Anniebach Sat 12-Dec-15 12:02:10

Because too many read and still choose to misrepresent what was written and use as a personal attack on Corbyn?

thatbags Sat 12-Dec-15 11:51:29

To prevent misunderstanding, I'm saying you may well be right about the misrepresentation, dj, but in that case removing the articles doesn't make sense to me.

thatbags Sat 12-Dec-15 11:50:07

If the articles that have been pulled off StW's website have been misrepresented in other media, why have they been pulled? Wouldn't it have been better to leave them in place so everyone could confirm, by reading them themselves, that they have been misrepresented?

durhamjen Sat 12-Dec-15 11:47:03

stopwar.org.uk/index.php/news/the-assault-on-stop-the-war-is-really-aimed-at-jeremy-corbyn

There is a Stop the War rally outside the BBC headquarters at noon today.
I assume it will be on the news.

durhamjen Sat 12-Dec-15 11:38:09

I have just read the article about Israel, and Falk is not talking about physical war with guns and bombs. It is a mental war he is talking about. Again, another misrepresentation of an article on Stop the War's website. That's three that have been misrepresented, both in the press and on here. I have read Matt Carr's article as well. It's typical that people just take little bits out of a whole article and use them to justify their opinions, rather than reading the whole article.
I expect it of the right wing press.

Time magazine yesterday said that Angela Merkel is their person of the year, because of her leadership on everything from Syrian refugees to the Greek debt crisis, with her stance to Putin included in the praise.
However, second was al-Baghdadi, and third was Trump.
I do hope you are going to criticise Time magazine with equal fervour.

Another poem by Michael Rosen.

stopwar.org.uk/index.php/multimedia/poetry-spoken-word/michael-rosen-it-is-the-war-party-that-has-a-reputation-problem-not-stop-the-war

Ana Sat 12-Dec-15 10:43:43

I'm still trying to find the 'insulting and infantile language' in the Telegraph article...confused

Anniebach Sat 12-Dec-15 08:51:51

I am more troubled that some labour MP's attended an arm trades dinner , not as many as Tories but they attended

Iam64 Sat 12-Dec-15 08:45:32

Thanks for the link bags. JC's continued links with this organisation bothers me and I'm sure, many other Labour voters.

thatbags Sat 12-Dec-15 07:09:11

Article here about a third article taken down from StW website. Its headline was "Time to go to war with Israel" by Richard Falk.

Stop the war. Go to war. No real difference! hmm I'm glad Caroline Lucas dissociated herself from the organisation and I wish Jeremy Corbyn would do likewise.

Eloethan Sat 12-Dec-15 01:14:04

I think the Floyd article demonstrates that some of our supposed "values" are a little warped when they involve fomenting unrest, destabilising democratically elected governments and installing pro-western "puppet" leaders, simply for our own economic ends - as if those that own the resources do not have the right to have control over them.