Angry Mob

Since the death of Lucy Meadows Richard Littlejohn – chief amongst the guilty parties who monstered her so publicly – has written not one word in defence of his actions or in apology for his attack. Instead, he has continued to attack people just as before. For example, WPC Kelly Jones is suing a suspected burglary victim for damages after she after allegedly tripped over a kerb, hurting her left leg and right wrist during the investigation. Littlejohn wades in claiming that ‘WPC Kelly Jones is not fit to wear the same uniform as a proper copper’ and that:

WPC Jones is an especially appalling example of a breed of so-called public ‘servant’ who, to invert John Fitzgerald Kennedy’s famous phrase, asks not what she can do for her country but what her country can do for her.

And he isn’t finished there, either:

Off-duty, she’s not much of a poster girl for the police. Visibly overweight with unkempt hair, she looks less like a policewoman and more like one of those ferocious female members of the ‘travelling community’ engaged in pitched battles with Plod at illegal camps such as Dale Farm.

It’s just typical Littlejohn, attacking those who do not have any hope of responding – not exactly the brave warrior holding those in power to account that his website makes him out to be.

In between the normal personal attacks he has also found time to speculate that half of Romania already lives in the UK and that they’re a one-nation crimewave, as well his classic confusion between ‘weather’ and ‘climate’ – in which the recent cold spell is used as the final proof that global warming is ‘lunacy’ and the product of ‘bovine stupidity’. The irony.

Speaking of irony, he also spends a column ruminating on April Fool’s stories in newspapers, wondering why ‘Every year newspapers go to elaborate lengths to spoof their readers on April Fools’ Day’ when ‘Looking at the papers, it’s increasingly difficult to distinguish fact from fantasy’. One of the few slithers of truth in a Richard Littlejohn column is, of course, entirely unintentional – and rather amusing considering he’s been responsible for some fine work of fiction down the years being passed on as fact. Remember, for example, when he claimed that ‘Haringey [council] hired someone to give hopscotch lessons to Asian women’. Turns out, no-one could ever find any evidence for this, but Fullfact discovered that ‘it later transpired that the public money had been given to the Hopscotch Asian Women’s Centre, a well-respected voluntary organisation that deals with domestic violence, language and integration issues in Camden, which neighbours Haringey’.

Littlejohn’s latest column decides to bemoan the fact that ‘now it’s a crime to hate the Sex Pistols’, which is actually Littlejohn commenting on the fact that:

[The Greater Manchester Police are] becoming the first force to extend ‘hate crime’ status to those with ‘alternative sub-culture identity’. In future, these groups will be granted the same special treatment as racial, religious, gender identity, disabled and sexual minorities.

Which seems fair enough, presumably because such attacks rely on how someone looks or what they are perceived to be – like racist or homophobic attacks. As usual, whenever Richard Littlejohn talks about someone who looks a bit different he invokes his ‘friend’ ‘Black Mike’ who ‘always jokes when he spots a Sid Vicious lookalike gobbing his way down the High Street: ‘Gi’ us a stick and I’ll kill it.’’

Which, presumably, is the sort of response that has made the GMP think that such hate crimes need to be formally dealt with as such. So, Littlejohn unintentially undermines his own argument. However, worse is to come because, of course, Littlejohn’s never really sure about what he has written in the past – and God knows his readership isn’t intelligent enough to call him up on it. You see, he decides to talk about the ‘tragic death of 20-year-old Sophie Lancaster, who was attacked along with her boyfriend in a park in Bacup, Lancs, by a mob who took exception to her goth clothing and stark make-up’.

The Daily Mail reported on the trial of the attackers in 2008, noting that:

A gap year student was kicked and stamped to death and her boyfriend left fighting for his life by a gang of drunken teenagers just because they were dressed as Goths, a court heard yesterday.

Just two months before this trial Richard Littlejohn had written about another couple who dress and act differently:

Much hilarity at the tale of the woman who describes herself as a “human pet” and her keeper, thrown off a bus in Yorkshire for being weird.

Tasha Maltby – runaway winner of this week’s Here We Go Looby Lou award – goes round the streets of Dewsbury on a dog lead.

Naturally, ever the serial recycler, Littlejohn invokes his friend:

My Geordie mate, Black Mike, would take one look at her in her absurd “Goth” outfit and remark: “Gi’ us a stick and I’ll kill it.”

Which, given this is pretty much what happened to Sophie Lancaster, Richard Littlejohn looks even nastier than he normally does. He really doesn’t understand what a hate crime is, even when he writes down an example:

When her owner – er, fiancé – Addams Family lookalike Dani Graves tried to take her on to a bus, the driver stopped them, saying: “We don’t let freaks and dogs like you on.”

And what did this couple have the gall to do? Well:

The couple complained that it was a “hate crime”.

Presumably, judging someone for what they wear / how they behave is just as bad as judging someone based on their skin colour or nationality. Tutting inside your own head about what someone is wearing is one thing, calling them ‘freaks and dogs’ and chucking them off of a bus is another. You could say that’s crossing the line between merely thinking something is a little odd to committing a hate crime. It’s a barrier most of the population don’t seem to have an issue with, so what Littlejohn’s issue with hate crimes is, I don’t know.

Anyway, back in 2008 he continued:

Where it really ceases to be funny is when we learn that the couple live in a council house, on benefits, spend all day in the pub and plan to start a family – maybe that should be a litter – which we will be expected to pay for.

Why should the taxpayer support their soppy, self-indulgent “lifestyle” – let alone pay them to bring puppies into the world?

His pithy conclusion?

They should be neutered

It therefore bus me somewhat that years later Littlejohn dares to talk in respectful tones about the death of Sophie Lancaster – especially when she is used solely as his normal ‘isn’t is tragic… BUT’ device.

Hate crime exists, it needs to be recognised and treated as such. Ironically, hacks like Littlejohn who regularly flirt (being overly generous to him) with the language of hate crime and invoke ‘friends’ like ‘Black Mike’ actually make it more likely that other police forces follow suit.

And, of course, Littlejohn’s premise that it is now illegal to ‘hate’ things / people is completely stupid. He is evidence enough that hating people is very much legal – and indeed can be very rewarding when you hate professionally for a newspaper. I think what the police are trying to stop is when hate crime is directed at individuals in a threatening way or when people are physically assaulted, which I think most people agree is fair enough (indeed, arguing the opposite seems very anti-social – supporting my whole ‘buying the Daily Mail is an anti-social act’ idea).

Of course, Littlejohn could be offering up a genuine complaint, best summarised by paraphrasing Stewart Lee: ‘You can’t even write racist smears on people’s houses in feces anymore, it’s political correctness gone mad!’.

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