#amwriting #tommy

Welcome to Merrye Olde England...

The story of the week has been the release of Tommy Robinson, or to those with no respect for preferred pronouns, Stephen Yaxley-Lennon.

As a casual observer I, like everyone, assumed that there was some legal basis to his being imprisoned. I mean, in Merrye Olde England it is surely not possible to assign a barrister, give them ten minutes to acquaint themselves with their client and the facts, then have a trial lasting four minutes, in which the said barrister, despite not knowing what the charges were, pleads guilty on behalf his client and then went straight to mitigation: all in four minutes

This wasn't a magistrates court, or the trial of some black fella looking askance at the planter's daughter.

Yet apparently that was what happened.

But thankfully, two or three days later, after the reporting restrictions had been lifted, we had the media to fill in the details. And thank goodness that the did, and we could all rest easy in our beds knowing that this was all quite normal and nothing to worry about.

Not only did we have experts rolled out to fill in the details, but we got to find out all kinds of other things too. But more important than learning the facts of the case, we could sit a deck chair in the backyard and spectate, as endless hobby-horses were dragged out and flogged for the amusement of the dwindling media audience.

Tommy was either a hero akin to Robin Hood or literally Hitler. The crux of the issue was free speech or it wasn't. It was about climate change - ok I made that one up, since as we know climate change is now a feminist issue, and therefore nothing to do with the alleged rape of thousands of girls and boys.

Of course what wasn't addressed was anything touching on what might loosely be described as adult.

By which I mean that the issue of grooming is somewhat more complex and difficult to address than gangs of swarthy men descending to carry off their booty in the manner of the Arab slavers of yore. But then it is not that long ago that to mention the Arab slavers of yore would have caused out-rage among many of the same people whose reflex whenever grooming is merely whispered is to invoke the dark Lord of derailment, Jimmy Saville.

No, what must not be dealt with is the complexities of the issue, and one must never mention the Muslim girls and boys mixed up in all of this, it is far simpler to boil everything down to whether or not you are a racist.

And of course Tommy is a racist. We know this because he was protesting when to do so proved you were a racist; countless editorials in such places as the Guardian said so, numerous and various politicians echoed this. This whole myth of #asian #rape gangs was just a talking point for the BNP.

Besides it was New Labour New Britain, and we had more important things to concern ourselves with, like making the disabled stand on chairs to see if they really were incontinent and not simply taking welfare from immigrants.

It was all rather like Channel 4 had never made the film Rita, Sue and Bob Too. Which does deal with many of the issues thrown up by the grooming scandal; albeit in a light-hearted manner. You know, little things like teenage sexuality - that sort of thing.

So back to the present.

Perhaps the least surprising reaction to judgement of the Court of Appeal is the lack of anyone taking a deep breath, and pausing to reflect upon the implications of a barrister being assigned a client, having ten minutes to familiarise themselves with the case, before pleading guilty to an unspecified charge during a hearing lasting four minutes.

Yes, I know I have mentioned this before. And I shall no doubt say it again, since it is the most shocking aspect of this case.

And one that cannot be disputed, unlike whether or not Tommy was forced to live on tuna, or the prison mosque was opposite his cell, or that somehow freedom of speech is under threat in Merrye Olde England because we opted not to go down the OJ Simpson path and have cameras in court-room.

My personal favourite myth is that Tommy was the first to highlight the issue of #muslim #rape #gangs. Which is about as true as Alex Jones swinging the Brexit vote, or indeed that Brexit didn't have Lexit, but that somehow the left can have the nationalised railways of Lexit without leaving the EU.

Anyone who has watched Tommy's address to the Oxford Union is well aware of his version of events.

Oh I know, I know, he is a football hooligan, and a fraudster, and for some reason his being briefly a member of the BNP is suddenly of great importance. The shadow debate on Twitter, that has been running at thousands of tweets a day since he was gaoled  but never trended, has made this perfectly clear.

However, what those #ignoring Tommy Robinson by endlessly tweeting about him and trolling his supporters don't address, is can it really be right for Crown Courts to act in the manner they did?

I realise we live in the age of #punchanazi. But is that really the role of judge?

Perhaps we shouldn't be surprised that the journalists who attended the #trial should have defended the proceedings. It is somewhat of a cheap shot, but does anyone really believe journalists competent? The sales figures certainly suggest they don't, so one should praise them for living up to expectations.

Anyway, it will be interesting to see what happens at the retrial.

Obviously one question will be, how it is possible to have a fair trial given the level of prejudicial reporting on the matter, and the sheer amount of mis-information.

Another will be what he will be charged with, given the comments of the appeal judges with regard to the content of the Facebook recording. Clearly they considered the reason for his being there of a questionable nature, which perhaps it is

Still it has given people something to talk about - apart from the weather - which has been rainy since St Swithins day since you ask....

Oh well back to going blind on cider with me old squeeze Rosie.