Although the great survivor and campaigner Harry Leslie Smith passed away last November at the age of 95, his social media presence continues, his Twitter feed now curated by one of his sons. And like his father, he sees through the cant, shallowness and hypocrisy of self-appointed media “personalities”, calling out those who would support the rich and privileged 1%, while pretending to care about the 99% they disdain.
So it was that the Harry’s Last Stand Twitter feed came across yet another not at all racist, honestly, swipe from tedious self-promoting TalkRADIO host Julia Hartley Brewer, who was not at all bereft at being blocked by shadow home secretary Diane Abbott, but wanted to make as much capital out of it, for the benefit of Herself Personally Now.
“Just discovered that the Shadow Home Secretary has blocked me. I mock her when she’s done something worthy of mockery but I’ve never abused her. So she is blocking a journalist simply because she doesn’t agree with my views. A taste of what’s to come if she ever gets into power?” Journalist? JOURNALIST? Fer-fer-fer-forget that one.
What Ms Hartley Dooda does may qualify as propaganda, but, sure as the earth is not flat and gravity is real, it ain’t journalism, whatever the pretence. HLS said so. “Sorry to break it to you but you're not a journalist or even a muckraker, just a well connected, entitled, shitty human being that has a soap box where you promote hate, inequality, ignorance to try to keep the rich wealthy. Moreover, you are the taste of the banality of evil”. Ouch!
Ms Hartley Dooda wasn’t going to stand for that. So she sat down instead, and retorted “It’s always good to get advice from people who are actively campaigning to put an anti-Semitic, terrorist-loving Communist into Number 10 [Harry’s Last Stand]. I bow to your greater morality and kindness”. Three whoppers for the price of one!
Wasn’t that a teensy bit defamatory? Might the target of her bile sue? “I’ve invited Jezza to do just that. Happy to defend and win that case”. In her dreams. And how about she actually respond to what was said? “It wasn’t an analysis. It was just his political prejudice spewing out”. In the world of Hartley Dooda, her opinion and fact are as one.
Meanwhile, HLS responded to her: “It wasn't advice, just a statement of fact. You're not a journalist. But what you are is an opportunist who has made a pretty penny by peddling hate and rancour against people who are doing their best to make better societies. Your attacks on [Greta Thunberg] says it all”. Accurate and concise.
The spirit of Harry Leslie Smith does indeed live on, inspiring others to call out the shallow, self-centred, ignorant, prejudiced and privileged. Journalists listen and learn. But like the arrogant man, Julia Hartley Dooda does neither. In her mind, she already knows everything about everything, and so does not need to listen, nor to learn.
And the perverse media world she inhabits rewards those attributes handsomely. As one Tweeter told HLS, “Her necklace would probably pay off your debts”.
Julia Hartley Dooda does talk a complete load of dooda. But you knew that already.
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1 comment:
Harry's book Don't Let My Past Be Your Future is a terribly harrowing read but a timely and wonderful warning of what is likely to happen in this country if decades of corrupt far right policies remain. There are no more excuses.
Harry's basic decency stands in VERY sharp contrast to the likes of forehead-knuckling cowering cowards and propaganda clerks like Hartley-Brewer. The woman is rotten to the core.
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