Public Meeting "Fascism: What it is and how to fight it"

cork | rights and freedoms | event notice Saturday January 21, 2012 18:25 by Paul McAndrew - Cork Against Fascism corkagainstfascism at gmail dot com

Get BNP Nick Griffin's invitation to speak at UCC withdrawn

Nick Griffin has been invited to speak at a "debate" at UCC on Feb 23rd.
We need to get that event cancelled.
Public event · By Cork Against Fascism Tuesday

Where
Room G19, Kane Building, UCC

Speakers include:

Joe Moore - Cork Anti-Racism Network
Eileen Hogan - Applied Social Sciences Department
Dr. Tracey Skillington - Department of Sociology
And a speaker from Greece, active in the Cork Against Fascism
campaign, will give an overview of the situation on the ground with
the organised far-right in Greece

TimeTuesday
Tue 24th Jan, 19:00 until 22:00

if fascists get organised in Cork, non-white and LGBT/queer people will be attacked

Nick Griffin has been invited to speak at a "debate" at UCC on Feb 23rd.
We need to get that event cancelled

"Fascism: What it is and how to fight it"

Is Free Speech at stake?

Those organising the "debate" have defended the invitation of Nick Griffin as an act taken in defence of free speech. However, the issue here is not free speech. The BNP through the internet and elected positions have plenty of opportunities to spread their repugnant ideas. The question is whether it is appropriate or desirable to offer him a platform to address an audience.

Proponents of the invitation argue that Griffin will be defeated by the magnificent oratory of his fellow debaters, leaving him disgraced and exposed, traumatised by his defeat. For this argument to work you have to assume that Griffin and the BNP are not used to losing votes in debates. Does that seem likely? The BNP lose practically all their public debates yet keep coming back for more. Perhaps they are not interested in the outcome of the debate so much as the small minority who might support their views? Perhaps they are more interested in recruitment and organisation than polite debate?

The real question here is not about free speech but about organisation. The BNP are hardcore British Nationalists, but that does not make them uninterested in events beyond their own border - they are all happy to promote similar views to their own elsewhere and clearly see the hostility to immigration in some circles in Ireland as a chance to aid the establishment of a sister organisation here. Indeed, Simon Darby, a leading member of the BNP in England, told the evening herald last year that 'there is nothing that I would like to see more than an Irish National Party representing the interests of the Irish people' (http://www.herald.ie/news/bnp-plans-irish-wing-to-oppos....html)

It is incredibly naive to believe that Griffin and the BNP won't use this platform as an opportunity to organise and recruit, especially given their stated desire to organise here. A BNP sister organisation in Ireland would mean an increase in violence and intimidation of LGBT people, immigrants, travellers and anti-racist activists. The murder of Stephen Lawrence shows what can happen if even a handful of violent racists are able to organise. Simply put, an abstract commitment to free speech should not take precedence over people's right to safety and to freedom from violence and intimidation. The invitation should be withdrawn immediately.