So we’ve got this nonsense doing the rounds at the moment,
usually from so-called Far-Right sites and groups:
For those of you who don’t know, Lee Rigby was a fusilier in
the army who was murdered in 2014 by two extremists, one of which is serving a
whole life sentence in prison, and the other serving 45 years. Henry Vincent
was stabbed to death last week when he broke in to someone’s home; the man who
killed him was arrested, released on bail and was told that no further action
would be taken.
Now let’s clear the facts up, starting with Lee Rigby:
The memorial to Mr Rigby was set up outside the Royal Artillery
barracks where he was murdered, and the council did indeed take it down. It is
not true that the council removed the memorial to Mr Rigby because it was
deemed “unsightly.” In actual fact, it was taken down at the request of Mr
Rigby’s family. To honour his memory, a plaque planned to be installed at St
George’s Garrison Church, opposite the barracks.[1]
The council also said that far-right groups were using the
shrine for their own causes, and had threatened council workers for going about
their job. Given the nuisance that supporters of these far-right groups made of
themselves during the trial of Rigby’s murderers, they don’t do much to endear
themselves to any cause worth supporting.[2]
They appear to be using this tragic event as a way to reinforce their own
ideologies.
Moving on to Henry Vincent:
Flowers have gone up as a tribute to a man who, whatever
else he was, was a father and a partner. Members of his family have put up the
flowers. It could be argued that this was a deliberately caustic act, given the
circumstances of Mr Vincent’s death. At the time of writing, these flowers have
been pulled down four times by members of the local community, and been
replaced by the family each time. The police are now in attendance, to provide reassurance
to local residents.[3]
Let’s be clear on this last point - the police are there to keep the peace; to
make sure this dispute between Mr Vincent’s family and the local residents does
not result in violence, criminal acts or public order disruptions. They are not
there for the express purpose of defending a shrine. So it is wrong to say that
the cops are backing the memorial.
What’s actually going on is that whoever has created this
macro has taken two unrelated incidents, and twisted the facts to suggest that
it’s somehow more important to defend the memory of a career criminal than a
war hero. The “facts” it presents are manipulated at best, and false at worst.
And yet I’ve seen it shared on my Facebook feed at least twice in one day, with
angry reactions. The best I can say about it is that some of the comments at
least recognise that what the macro is saying simply isn’t true.
I’ve been seeing a lot of, and have very little patience
with, macros created to support a point, usually a heavily debated and complex
issue, boiled down to two sentences devoid of all context but the picture it
was shared with. The point these macros make are more often than not absolutely
meaningless, and they serve little purpose but to say more about the people
creating and sharing them than any message they purport to share.
This is somehow even worse. Whoever created this nonsense
has done so with the intention of supporting a so-called “Far-Right” cause,
making it seem as though authorities do not care about British values, or what
it means to be British, or take any pride in being English, or whatever the
rhetoric is. The truth is that these were both tragic incidents, and while the
purportrators of these crimes may arguably have got what they deserved, the
incidents also have the ramifications of bereaved families and people for whom
life will never be the same again. To take such instances and turn them into a
nonsensical point to support an out-dated and bigoted cause is crass, idiotic
and should be ignored.
