Don’t Menshn People Of Colour

Yesterday, campaigning groups Hacked Off and Avaaz marked Culture Secretary Karen Bradley’s “consultation” on Section 40 of the Crime and Courts Act and Leveson Part 2 with a protest outside the DCMS on Parliament Street in central London, which turned out not to be as straightforward as it seemed thanks to a strike by workers who staff Tube stations. Zelo Street was on hand to witness proceedings.

(c) Doc Hackenbush 2014

And definitely not on hand was (thankfully) former Tory MP Louise Mensch, now with very little to do following her getting sacked from her own website, the sub-Breitbart dustbin of speculation and Fake News Heat Street. But as she is still a News Corp Vice President, if only of paperclips, Ms Mensch knew which side her bread was buttered: if this was a protest in favour of Section 40, it had to be not merely opposed, but ridiculed.

So she took to Twitter, and in her own inimitable fashion, opened mouth and inserted boot in no style at all as she trilled “And by ‘protestors’ we mean seven old white blokes with beards, three girls in Chelsea tractor troos and nobody of colour #Section40”. Well, I don’t do beards, there was hardly anyone who did, and she missed several others. Moreover, her “nobody of colour” was not only demeaning, it was plain flat wrong.

This was confirmed when Hannah Mian - who is in the centre of the photo on which Ms Mensch was commenting - decided to speak up. “I am in this photo and I am a person 'of colour' Louise” she pointed out gently. So would Ms Mensch concede that she loused up on this occasion? Ah, but all you Zelo Street regulars know the answer to that one: the first rule of being Louise Mensch is that you are never, ever in the wrong.

And so back came the reply “No Hannah, no you are not”. For reasons best known to Ms Mensch, she included Hannah Mian’s Twitter photo in that reply. But she remained plain flat wrong - Ms Mian was in the middle of the photo. OK, she wasn’t facing the camera at the time, but it has to be said once more, she was there. Perhaps now the Honourable Member for the distant constituency of Manhattan Upmarket would yield.

Er, no she wouldn’t. Instead, Ms Mensch doubled down on her idiocy. So after telling Ms Mian that she was not a “person of colour”, someone who was allowed to become an MP - this has to be stressed, Tory selection people - Ms Mensch added “unless you count unfortunate  blue eyeshadow”. Er, hello, what is this, amateur night at the Foot-In-Mouth Lack-Of-Racial-Awareness oasis? Someone out there had seen enough.

That someone was Alex Winters, who describes himself as the “Welsh one from Cbeebies” (not on my viewing list, but Ms Mensch may understand that better), who summed up the mood of incredulity and exasperation with “Mensch, you're a grade A imbecile”. Louise Mensch started out dutifully kicking Hacked Off on behalf of her Murdoch masters, but ended up confirming she is not just Barking, but has overrun the buffer stops at Upminster.

But good of Rupert Murdoch to get one of his VPs to boost the Hacked Off and Avaaz campaign. If he’d like to assign Louise Mensch permanently, it’d be much appreciated.