As the last remnants of the motley convocation of saloon bar propper-uppers otherwise known as UKIP prepare for leader Adolf von Batten’s Nuremberg-style victory rally in London tomorrow, yet more unfortunate news has emerged about Stephen Yaxley Lennon, who styles himself Tommy Robinson, who will be playing Goebbels to Batten’s Führer. The latest problem for Lennon is his past visits to Sunderland.
The former EDL head man had visited the Wearside town to lend his support to a campaign against more of those Scary Muslims™. It had been claimed that a young woman, who cannot be named for legal reasons, had been attacked and perhaps even kidnapped and sexually assaulted, by men alleged to be of Turkish origin. The Police had investigated but had not charged anyone. So in waded Lennon.
It was the usual schtick: the cops would not protect Our Women from Them. They were importing Very Bad Behaviour. But what some may not have noticed is that one of those organising the protests, and who spoke alongside Lennon on at least one occasion, has a track record not merely of race hatred, but actual Nazism.
Billy Charlton ((c) Sunderland Echo)
As the Sunderland Echo has reported, “A protester who spoke alongside Tommy Robinson last year stirred up racial hatred during a series of public speeches, it is claimed. William Charlton's protest talks spread hatred against ‘immigrants, Asians, black people and the police’ and caused a rise in a city's racial crime and disorder, jurors have heard”.
There was more. “Newcastle Crown Court heard the 53-year-old, who is known to friends and supporters as ‘Billy’, spoke along with Tommy Robinson at one of the organised protest events, where a woman had to be ‘escorted away for her own safety’ for carrying a placard that said ‘rape does not have a race’”. Free speech, for Lennon and his pals, does not apply to those who disagree with him. And Charlton has other significant previous.
The same Billy Charlton on the Sun front page ...
Billy Charlton became briefly infamous as the man in the blue Nike top who featured on the front page of the Murdoch Sun the morning after the EU referendum. The inmates of the Baby Shard bunker had not checked who they had put on the front page, but others had: Charlton had been captured on camera standing behind a Combat 18 banner.
Combat 18 is a neo-Nazi organisation; the 18 comes from A and H, the 1st and 8th letters of the alphabet, being the initials of Adolf Hitler. The referendum was in June 2016. The protests which Lennon attended did not start until September. He had ample opportunity to do his research on Charlton; whether or not he did so, he still spoke alongside him.
... and, at right, supporting Combat 18
Worse, as the court report notes, “The court heard videos of Charlton's speeches, which got up to 50,000 views, were uploaded onto Facebook and picked up by ‘Rebel Media’”. If so, that’s another horrendous research fail by Lennon. Unless he knew about Charlton’s past and did it anyway, which would make it even worse.
As the prosecutor observed during the trial, “85 per cent of people suspected or accused of sexual offences in the Sunderland area are white”. But not only did Stephen Lennon ignore that fact, he spoke alongside a known neo-Nazi.
But he’s not a racist, honest. And if you believe that, you’ll believe anything.
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Highly appropriate that Charlton appears on the front page of the Scum.
ReplyDeleteAfter all, it IS the Nazi in-house comic.