Get a clue?.
I am British, born and bred.
I am ex-armed forces.
I am a conservative opposed to mass immigration, political correctness and extremism.
I have lived and worked all over the UK.
I follow passionately my own nation’s politics ans current affairs.
And most importantly, I have known people on the far right, from the NF in the 1980’s to the EDL now. Think you are the only one?.
The fact that you welcome that they were/are football hooligans is symptomatic of your romantic notions: you have never clearly been in the middle of hooligans on the rampage, a group who then and now have no qualms about kicking in the heads of any innocent civilians in their midst, irrespective of what hooligan group they are. English national hooligans, Manchester United hooligans, Chelsea, Welsh, minor club hooligans, they all behave in the same way. I assume you know that as well as fighting each other, hooligans will terrorise the public.
I know. I have been there: caught in the middle of it AND seen it close up from safety. So I find your romantic notion of a football hooligan laughable and pathetic. If you lived in Britain, and have seen the damage and violence in general caused by football hooligans over the last 40 years, you’d have an even less starry-eyed notion.
The fact that you bash me and other British freepers (all of whom are conservative, anti-islamic extremism, anti-mass immigration, pro-american and anti-leftist) as apologists when we criticise the EDL is equally arrogant. Did you even think for a second that we, as people who are actually British and see the EDL up close, might be right, might have a better grasp of what they actually are?.
You and I agree 100% that Islamic terrorism is the biggest threat today. You and I agree that leftist violence is a major threat and gets condoned and apologised for. BUT that ipso facto dosent make the EDL, or BNP, or Combat 18 et al heroes or right.
The EDL ARE a group with racist and anti-semitic links, members and background. You may not want to hear that, the guys you know may deny it, but the actual facts when you scratch the surface are there...
I know the BNP are bad, are there links between them and the EDL?
You are speaking hatefully about some good friends of mine. People I seriously doubt you know or care about but happen to be honorable men whom I respect.
You make a lot of assumptions about people you don’t know and give no one the benefit of the doubt. That’s why I say “get a clue.”
Riots? For all you know, I might have participated in a few during my time and had my head clubbed a time or two. Those EDL boys are FORMER hooligans who have learned to channel their energies.
If the people in the UK don’t want some of those chaps and they want to re-locate, I’d be happy to sponsor a couple. They might provide the missing ingredient on the US right.
The left always has a crowd of burly thugs join in their actions. What do we have? Largely grandparents who yell loudly but limp their way to and from a meeting.
And if you think physical altercations aren’t in the future of American politics, then who is being naive?
And if you generalize and pass judgment like that in public, you will attract some wicked attention sooner or later.
I’m preaching self-defense. The lefties practice aggression.
At least here we have the Tea Party, made up of average citizens who are willing to take the heat, and are getting results as evidenced by the November elections and the left’s fear and hatred of us. Where is your Tea Party? Where are your “conservative” citizens willing to take a stand? Until you have a movement like that, the EDL will flourish. Is the average Brit so afraid of being labeled a “racist” that they’ll hide in their homes instead of working for change?
I second your view that the romantic notion of hooliganism is pathetic. Speaking as someone who ended up in the hospital due to EDL thugs, there is nothing good or admirable about them.