Southport Stabbings - Enter The Bigots

Sometimes, the most patient and rational people have difficulty making sense of seemingly random horror. So it was in the aftermath of a multiple and indeed fatal stabbing attack yesterday in the coastal town of Southport. A dance and yoga class with a Taylor Swift theme, followed by bracelet making, for six to eleven year old girls, was interrupted by a knife-wielding attacker.

The class, held in the first week of school summer holidays, was fully booked, with 25 children attending. Some adults tried to put themselves between the attacker and the kids. Many were injured, some seriously. Two of those little girls later died in hospital. Several are in a critical condition. Police detained a 17-year-old, who has been charged with murder and attempted murder.

Inevitably, speculation about the identity of the suspect began. Any consideration for the families of the dead and injured soon went out the window, as a number of malicious and wholly untrue claims were made, mostly to satisfy the warped agendas of a deeply unappealing convocation of intolerant racist bigots. The reality was that the suspect was British.

He lived in Banks, which is up the coast towards Preston, and was originally from Cardiff. So he was not a “migrant”. He had not come here on a dinghy from France. This detail was not allowed to enter for the likes of Stephen Yaxley Lennon, who styles himself Tommy Robinson, managing to dispense his thoughts while out of the UK attempting to avoid justice.

After he saw the claim “My two youngest children went to holiday club in Southport for a day of fun only for a migrant to enter and murder / fatally wound multiple children”, Lennon showed that his commitment to “Journalism” did not extend to bothering to verify his chosen sources.

“Nobody can say they weren't warned, I've been warning about this for years. I said this 3 days ago … We knew it was coming, our government knew it was coming, close our borders now, deport all these wrong’uns”. He later trolled the Counter Terrorism Policing feed: “Maybe you should interrogate every f*cker that's coming in on those boats! Because they keep continously [sic] murdering innocent members of the British public”. And it got worse.

Anthony Fowler, a former Olympian no less, also let his bigotry show. “Please tell me why our Government let some sick, demented feller from Syria into our country … Like he just stabbed eight children at a Taylor Swift dance class … Poor kids on a holiday camp dancing … and some Syrian feller’s walked in and stabbed kids. Horrible”. Not a migrant, not Syrian.

But typical of the speculation swirling around. Meanwhile, Lennon’s pal, amateur failed kidnapper Danny Tommo, was calling for unrest. Perhaps. Searchlight Magazine noted “Tommy Robinson's right hand man, Danny Tommo, real name Daniel Thomas, has posted a hate-filled video on You Tube tonight, calling for riots in British cities if the 17-year-old assailant in the Southport stabbings turns out to be a migrant”. But he wasn’t a migrant.

Someone who should have stopped and thought, but never does, was the less than crafty Darren Grimes, who wibbled “Today children were murdered. Today in Parliament MPs called for more ‘refugees’ to be allowed in and to bring their families. I cannot tell you how much I detest them”.

Or as they say in Aberdeen, Whit A Twaat. Former chief prosecutor Nazir Afzal pointed out “The horror in Southport is heartbreaking. My only thoughts have been with the families, they are ALL that matter. As for the conspiracies - Merseyside Police confirm the suspect was born in Cardiff, not ‘a migrant who arrived by boat last year’ - 17 yr olds cannot be named by law”.

And Lizzie Dearden, someone else who Lennon maliciously lied about, and then aggressively doorstepped (welcome to the club), reminded us “professional journalists abide by the legal restrictions in play at times like this, but the general public don't know about them and bad faith actors don't care … It’s a perfect storm for misinformation and it happens time and again. Something needs to change”. Hello Muskrat, Zuck and the rest.

The Southport stabbing was a terrible thing. Please don’t make it worse.

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