I’ve been following the recent spat between Tim Worstall, Devil’s Kitchen and Richard Murphy with detached amusement – in part because Worstall and DK are more than capable of holding their own against a buffoon such as Murphy. While it provided some light entertainment, it seems that Murphy has now called it a day, but not without finally underlining the point that he is insufferably pompous in the process.
What I have noticed is that like some of his fellow travellers, he engages in sneaky smear tactics but would prefer them not to come winging back. Take this particularly unpleasant little dig, for example:
He tries to engage as a reasonable person on this blog, and then goes back to his own blog, hurls abuse and waits for his sycophants to come back with ad hominem, crude and sometimes blatantly inappropriate comments, all of which, I am sure, fuel his ego, but more sinisterly, fit into a pattern of political behaviour most commonly associated with the far right. The BNP work in this way, for example. I’m not suggesting Tim has anything to do with them, or their racist opinion, but Nick Griffin also seeks to appear reasonable in public debate, but relies upon working his audience of thugs behind-the-scenes and in his own domain to secure his support.
Oh, dear… He’s not suggesting that Tim has anything to do with the BNP, oh, no, not at all. So why raise them then? Why engage in the very tactics he claims to abhor? Oh, and had he bothered with the most basic of research, he would realise that the BNP are not of the far right, they are of the authoritarian left.
Murphy is labouring under a confusion (I’m being generous here, so bear with me); that of the difference between what a web-master may allow on his site and freedom of speech per se. As a web-master, Murphy can edit, delete or censor as he pleases. It’s his place and he may apply his rules. However, when he claims that he does so in the name of free speech, he is being disingenuous – indeed, he is factually wrong.
Freedom of speech is messy, it can be nasty and people will say things that those of us who consider ourselves in the mainstream find deeply repugnant. If we seek to stifle it, then we engage in censorship – we do not support free speech. As a young child, I was taught by my father that freedom of speech means allowing people to say things we don’t like, no matter how unpleasant. A free society allows the communists and the Nazis a platform to promulgate their ideologies freely and uncensored. In so doing, we keep them in the light, we are able to tear them down with reason and logic and we can see them for what they are.
This means that I support Richard Murphy’s right to spout his nonsense as we can see it for what it is; the histrionics of a pompous fool who knows not what he says.
In closing, he makes the point so much better than I could:
I have allowed more comments on the four comments that proceed this on, not because I think them appropriate, for I do not: they are, without exception, offensive
I suggest that you read them. They were all without exception making perfectly reasonable points. If Richard Murphy is offended, then he has a remarkably thin skin.
I have allowed them to be posted because they show the complete contempt of the far right for others.
Ah, yes, like Neil Harding, Murphy accuses those who disagree with him of coming from the “far right”. Any credibility (okay, it wasn’t much to start with) he might have had up until this point evaporates.
In this case John Christensen wrote based on his family’s experience of being abused; of how the language of abuse led in turn to thuggery, and in this case to genocide
That experience has been trivialised here
Indeed it was; by John Christensen.
Not one of those who has commented here has condemned Rory Meakin for saying abuse was of little consequence
Yeah… well… This is what Rory actually said:
There will always be someone who will claim “offence” at pretty much anything anyone might say. Which is why it is of little consequence.
Either Murphy has difficulty following plain English or he is being deliberately disingenuous. Let’s get something straight here – there is no right not to be offended; which is pretty much the essence of Rory’s point.
Instead I note the delight all take in the freedom to abuse, for that is what is being promoted by those who comment.
No, it is not. What people have pointed out – repeatedly – is what I have said here, that you either value freedom of speech or you do not. Murphy does not.
I am appalled, but the eviudence [sic] has been laid clear. The dividing line is apparent.
On this we can agree. On the one side; is the light, on the other; the forces of darkness that we thought defeated with the collapse of the Berlin wall.
On the matter of fruity language, it has a long history in politics. Get used to it and grow up.
I occasionally delete a comment on my ‘blog that is either clearly spam or the ramblings of a madman, but apart from that I leave the openly abusive ones, just to remind myself what I am up against. I don’t see why RM makes such a song and dance about it.
I’m pretty much the same. If a comment is simply gratuitously offensive and adds nothing whatasoever to the debate, then I will likely as not zap it – but then, I make no pretence that this is enhancing freedom of speech; it is simply applying my comments policy.
Ritchie was well and truly trumped by Worstall and is too immature to accept it. The idea that Tim is “of the far right” or on the “fringes” is so laughably absurd no one in their right mind could take it seriously.
DK and Obnoxio yes, but Tim Wortall? Abusive? When?
He isn’t of course, which makes the whole hissy fit so amusing.
I wish these guys would come up with something new.
Anyone who disagrees, call them ‘racist/Nazi/bigot’ and imply, or often claim outright, that they are from the BNP.
Take a comment, twist it, and insist that everyone condemn it. Anyone who refuses must be racist/nazi/bigot/BNP. Keep on and on about that one twisted, out-of-context comment to distract from any other issues and ignore references to the actual comment.
Insult someone, keep going until they insult back, and then play ‘victim’.
They all use exactly the same technique. It hasn’t changed in years. Is there such a thing as an imaginitive socialist?
Imaginative socialist – an oxymoron, surely?
I dunno.
I think that even a gratuitously offensive comment adds something to the debate in the sense that you have to ask yourself a) Are you simply wrong or b) Have you not explained something properly?
Put this into the context of Neil Harding – he wonders why he is the subject of so much abuse. It doesn’t occur to him that even the most patient and calm correspondent will lose patience when something is explained over and over and he still doesn’t grasp it or continues to twist it and construct more straw men. So, I’m inclined towards (a) mostly.
The last time I deleted an abusive comment was one made by a drive-by troll on the Max Mosely post. Clearly he didn’t like my stance. Fine, so make a comment to that effect. Simply heaping abuse without adding anything at all to the debate is trolling and I don’t tolerate trolls. I had explained myself fully, and I wasn’t wrong – it was a matter of opinion rather than a matter of being factually right or wrong.