The EDL: fact and fiction
by Jamie Bartlett
I spoke at an event a couple of weeks ago where it was widely agreed that the far right in Britain represents an equal threat to the UK as al-Qaeda. On the terrorism circuit, many people find it quite cultured to pronounce the English Defence League is somehow comparable to al-Qaeda inspired terrorism. That they are, in effect, two sides of the same coin. To be sure, the English Defence League appears to be an emerging force. It has held a number of relatively high profile rallies, some of which have turned ugly. Numbers appear to be increasing. The group claims to be non-violently confronting Islamo-facsism, but the darker end of its membership looks more like a combination of football hooligans and neo-nazis. Everyone has become obsessed by them.
Yes the rise of far-right movements is worrying (the EDL rejects that label), but it is no al-Qaeda. It does not seek to murder innocent civilians as strategy. It does not seek to undertake terrorist attacks in public places to create maximum publicity and damage. It is not part of an international terrorist group which - according to intelligence - is seeking nuclear and biological weapons. It does not seek to destroy Western democracies.
Hannah Arendt once noted that the Democratic Administration in the US framed the cold war in the same way as it did the second world war (had she been alive, she'd have seen that the early Global War on Terror was treated like a new cold war). Arendt deduced from this an inability “to confront reality on its own terms because they [the US government] had always some parallels in mind that ‘helped’ them to understand those terms.” Let's not make the same mistake here.
Bob
This is a false polemic. I don't think I've ever heard anyone claim that the EDL are the equivalent of al-Qaeda. I was at a seminar last month at which Jamie spoke - I suspect that's meeting he's referring to - and nobody put forward any such argument.
The comparison that was made was between terrorist plotters inspired by al-Qaeda and far-right activists like this or these.
It should be added, though, there is no brick wall separating the hooliganism of the EDL from more violent neo-Nazism, as this case illustrates. Both Hannington and Heaton were active EDL supporters.
Bob
Damn. The links didn't work. Here they are:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/7469180.stm
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1271652/First-picture-The-neo-Nazi-terrorist-planning-poison-Jews-Muslims-deadly-ricin.html
http://www.clickliverpool.com/news/national-news/129615-liverpool-court-to-sentence-race-hate-nazis.html
sajid riasat
Hello
Interesting points Jamie but you seem to have overlooked the multitude of people that have been arrested, convicted and imprisoned for preparing to engage in acts of terror against British Muslims.
www.dailymail.co.uk/.../Ex-BNP-member-obsessed-guns-explosives-turned-home-bomb-factory-jailed-11-years.html
etc
etc
etc
SAjid
Jon
"It does not seek to murder innocent civilians as strategy. It does not seek to undertake terrorist attacks in public places to create maximum publicity and damage"
Nor did the NDL. Didn't stop Breivek.
Not a fan of drawing a distinction between the EDL as a group and its supporters as individuals. Nor am I a fan of simply passing of the more violent and extreme of the EDL as the "darker end of its membership". They are usually prominant core supporters.
Many of its supporters, including prominant activists and those involved in other groups routinely post online about murdering Muslims, Asians, immigrants, the EDL's opponents, etc. And not thier strategy? Well, they aren't going to advertise it on the net are they? The EDL don't instruct people to committ crimes and violence, but they do subtely encourage them to do so, through contructing and promoting a worldview that can only logically end in extremism, and greater probabiliy of violence.
And perhaps on the reasons why the EDL has not yet fully embraced violence is lack of access to weapons and bomb making equipment. I atended a recent conference on the EDL - with yourself in atendance - and one of the points raised was that Breviek had the ability to do what he did because of his farm - cover, and a legitimate reason to obtain the ingredients of his device. Point being, that the EDL not routinely killing people more to do with different circumstances than mindset or 'strategy'.
And no, al Qaeda and the EDL are not the same. But they share many similarities in thier worldview; and since when did al Qaeda become the benchmark to measure other groups against? That there exist differences between the EDL and al Qaeda (by which I mean the worldview, not 'a group') does not mean that the EDL is less worrying a threat. Nor did groups like the IRA seek to "destroy Western democracies". al Qaeda itself is not a strategic challange - it is a security challange. To human life and liberty. And so is the EDL. And we don't have to sit around and wait for terrorism and murder to acknowledge that.
Its not about drawing paralells between the two in an attempt to understand. Its simply a rejection of the fallacy that movements can not be compared.
"It does not seek to undertake terrorist attacks in public places to create maximum publicity and damage"
Yet the movements is happy to undertake other forms of violence, some falling just short of terrorism, in public places to create maximum publicity and damage. Perhaps if British based al-Qaeda inspired militants could get 1500 at a demonstration they wouldn't find a need to kill people. Woudn't change the nature of al Qaeda.
You cannot judge a movement based solely on its tactics and strategy. Not least when those tactics and strategies can change at any moment. And especially when that movement is actively attempting to change the environment to such a degree that such strategies and tactics of violence and mass murder become seen as necessary and just. In this regard, the EDL is actively attempting to promote intergroup conflict in order to legitimise violence. They often speak of 'Race Wars', "Rivers of Blood" and Civil War.
And ask an opponent of the EDL - someone like me who has been directly threatened - the difference in consequential terms between al Qaeda demonising its opponents as Apostates, and the EDL demonising its opponents as traitors and communists, etc. Same methodology.
Jon
Just to add, I'm not saying that the EDL are the equivelent of al Qaeda. Just that similiarites in worldview and methodology do exist and they can not be easily dismissed.
But regardless of similarities and differences, the EDL continue to be a serious problem. Both in isolation and in relation to wider issues.
John
Al Quaeda and the EDL havw a similar world view? Interesting idea
One wants Sharia a primitive law based on 7th century male dominated views advicating women not being equal under the law and gays and apostates being murdered being implemented throughout the world including the UK.
The other exists soley on the basis that it does not want any of the above, especially not in the UK
Carl
A well put claim, that to have a one size fits all attitude to criticising people we don't like obscures the debate, and fundamentally hurts those who are against fascism the most.
I've discussed this at length here and here , but look forward to hearing more Jamie.