Saturday 24 May 2014

Did Brave Frenchmen Die in Vain? More UKIP incompetence...


If you are going to hijack our shared history to support your narrow-minded xenophobic messages, the very least you could do is make an effort.  

When UKIP decided that it was okay to use the graves of men who died on the Somme under the headline - "They Fought and Died to Keep Britain Free from Foreign Invasion and Control by Foreign Powers" - at the very least, you would expect them to use a photograph of British war graves.

Instead, they used an image from the BBC website:

These are graves from the Australian Imperial Force cemetery just outside Flers...  So not even a British cemetery.  In fairness, the AIF cemetery contains 2,811 British, 402 Australian, 163 French, 84 New Zealand, 68 Canadian, and 27 South African graves.  So it would have been possible to find a photograph of British graves within the AIF cemetery.  But - ironically given their anti-foreigner stance - the picture is of the graves of French solidiers who, whatever else they were fighting for, were assuredly not fighting to keep Britain free from foreigners!

UKIP seems to be picking up where the BNP left off - presumably in an attempt to woo former BNP supporters.  In the 2009 European election, the BNP used an image of a Battle of Britain spitfire to attack Polish immigrants, but failed to notice that the spitfire had Polish insignia.  It is worth noting that in the dark days of 1940, Britain owed her survival to the Commonwealth, French and Eastern European pilots who volunteered to fight for her cause.  Moreover, Britain only ended up on the winning side because millions of foreigners joined the allied armies.

The way UKIP stirs up racism and xenophobia while pretending their views are reasonable is objectionable. I am disturbed that they legitimate the racist views of a highly unpleasant minority of my fellow citizens.  And I am appalled that UKIP refuse to condemn racism and xenophobia among their supporters.  But most of all, I object to the fact that they are incompetent in their xenophobia.  

At the very least, when you are trying to employ the imagery of the two World Wars, try to choose an image that doesn't remind everyone that were it not for the sacrifices of millions of men and women from more than 100 countries around the world, Germany would have won!

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