You may recall my entry on that nutcase Terry Jones, the American pastor who threatened to burn a copy of the Koran. Well, it emerges this week that he's been forbidden from entering Britain by the Home Office. I wasn't even aware that he was coming here in the first place, but he had evidently been planning to speak to a "right-wing group" (BBC's words) called 'England is Ours' at a rally in Milton Keynes. Just what we need - nutters like him preaching to large numbers of the converted about the 'evils' of Islam. That'll really help inter-faith and race relations in this country. I freely admit to knowing nothing about them, but I suspect the aims and likely membership profile of a group calling itself by such a reactionary and insular name would not fill me with warm and fuzzy feelings either.
I wouldn't usually condone the quashing of the right to freedom of expression, but in this case, I'm happy to make an exception. Abu Hamza was prosecuted, among other things, for stirring up racial hatred, so it's only right that the opposite end of this particular extremist spectrum should be prevented from doing the same thing. The danger that impressionable and/or ignorant people may listen to such extremism is too great to allow it to be heard, frankly.
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