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THERE WAS A time when village idiots existed in a sort of blissful isolation, howling gibberish in the corners of dive-bars while the other patrons avoided eye contact.
‘Harmless’, we used to call them.
They are harmless no more. Through the miracle of the Internet, formerly solitary oddballs have been able to communicate in a virtual human-centipede of nonsense.
Genuine concerns about housing and public services get blended with outlandish conspiracy theories and become something grotesque.
Did you know Hilary Clinton has been using a Hamas tunnel under Blessington to spike the reservoir with Covid vaccines? Sorry, I just made that one up myself.
In both the UK and Ireland, this bewildering alliance of hopped-up simpletons and far-right opportunists have taken to the streets. Mobs of hooligans waving English flags have clashed with police across British cities. Their actions were vicious, their motives incoherent. An alien observing Earth from space might have thought that after centuries of colonising other countries, the English had finally invaded themselves.
The catalyst for the riots was the murder of three children in Stockport and the misinformation that surrounded the tragedy. Like a deranged moth drawn to the bin fire that is Trumpism, Nigel Farage couldn’t resist helping to spread the misinformation that the killer was an illegal immigrant who’d arrived via boat.
When challenged on where he’d got his information, an unapologetic Farage cited Andrew Tate, a man with the looks and journalistic credibility of a boiled egg with a beard and sunglasses drawn on. That the story was proven to be untrue didn’t matter to the Reform UK leader or the thugs encouraged to cause chaos.
Reality has splintered and people are free to identify with the shards of information that suit them best.
Perhaps the most freakish development of our new world is the nascent courtship between some British loyalists and so-called Irish ‘patriots’. The sight of the ‘Coolock Says No’ brigade waving tri-colours alongside Union Jacks at an anti-immigration rally felt like a scene from an alternative dimension where the Troubles never happened.
United in hate, together at last to defend borders that neither side can agree on the location of. When facts are optional, history can be rewritten and deformed.
I was in Manchester at the height of the disorder in Britain. I moved through the city centre slowly as police moved on the dregs of the demonstration. The afternoon was humid, the air tacky with pollutants and sweat. Over my shoulder, I was surprised by a Dublin accent.
“I don’t want my kids learning about Islam in school”, the voice slurred.
Turning to take a look at the man and his friend, I couldn’t tell if they’d been part of the racist horde or if they’d been just day-drinking and got carried away. My mind raced with questions.
How could an Irish immigrant in Britain decry multiculturalism and keep a straight face?
If the self-proclaimed defenders of English culture were out to scare away foreign terrorists, how would they feel about having an Irishman in their ranks?
The clacking sound of a police horse’s hooves on the pavement pulled my attention away from the Dubliner. A group of teenage boys bolted across the square, their black hoodies pulled tight as they squawked excitedly, like a murder of crows. I kept my head down and kept moving.
The unrest has simmered down since then. Far-right rallies were abandoned last weekend in the face of massive anti-racism marches and tough police crack-downs. People directly involved in the rioting are being threatened with prison sentences of up to 10 years. What’s striking is how strident newly-elected Prime Minister Keir Starmer has been about the speed and strength of sentencing and arrests after the riots, something that couldn’t have been said for the Irish government after similar events at home.
For now, the racists have been moved off the streets and kicked back into their fantasy worlds online. Safe from the searing light of the real world, they can now stew, peddle weird lies, and reorganise. This represents the real challenge for governments – how to keep the tech companies accountable for the incitement to hatred that is spread on their platforms.
There are questions to be answered too by the politicians who allowed the public discourse on immigration to become so poisoned. It is no coincidence that the country’s poorest areas endured the worst lawlessness. As public services crumbled and the cost of living spiralled, the Conservatives made a choice to refocus our attention on migration.
Whether it was legal immigrants from the European Union or asylum seekers on rubber dinghies, the UK government spent the last decade talking about little else. Yet the numbers kept going up, with European labour getting replaced by workers from the Commonwealth. In effect, government created an imaginary problem, then failed to solve it.
No doubt many Tories will have been horrified by the anarchy they watched unfolding from the safety of their tastefully decorated Tudor homes in the leafy South. Brexit was supposed to be a terrific jape after all – the Northerners weren’t supposed to take it all so bloody seriously. But race-baiting has consequences. The men in crab-red trousers must face up to what they’ve done to their country, too.
Peter Flanagan is an Irish comedian and writer. You can find him on Twitter @peterflanagan and Instagram @peterflanagancomedy.
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