By Ben Pensant
It’s safe to say a hell of a lot has changed over the last twelve months. We’ve seen Lord Jezza go from godlike PM-in-waiting with a bright future to godlike jam-maker without a party to piss in. We’ve watched a crank separatist movement intent on destroying capitalism evolve into a crank separatist movement indulged by the most rabidly capitalist industries on earth. And we’ve looked on in awe as brave US voters replaced an ageing white male who spends his days talking rubbish on the internet with an ageing white male who spends his days trying to remember what he went into the kitchen for. But despite all the monumental upheavals we’ve endured it’s comforting to know that one thing remains resolutely the same: Rob Liddle’s unstoppable ability to make fully grown adults cry like broken eggs.
Indeed, from urging brave Islamic extremists to blow themselves up to suggesting elections should be held on days when Muslims can’t vote, vile Liddle has spent his entire career inducing fear, outrage, and salt-free tears in that niche group of leftists who are incapable of spotting when someone is taking the piss. Otherwise known as ‘pretty much every progressive on Twitter’. Ah, Twitter, that glorious fun-free arena where every single utterance from problematic pundits is taken literally before being copied, pasted, and pored over in an orgy of outrage by people who invariably haven’t read the offensive column they’re oh so wounded by.
Needless to say, Liddle’s latest assault on decency was his most objectionable yet. And when I say ‘latest’ I don’t mean ‘newest’, or ‘most recent’, or any other fascist term we’re forced to use to denote something that happened a few days ago. No, his latest indiscretion was committed in 2012, causing such shockwaves it took a whole 8 years for some courageous bottom inspector to accidentally dig it up while tearfully Googling Liddle’s other latest assault on decency, a nasty column he wrote in The Scum last week which savagely mocked teachers for thinking they’re the most important people on earth.
So once this fortuitous spot of offence archaeology had weaved its magic it was all hands on deck, the campaign to inform everyone that Liddle once made a joke left-wing commentators didn’t like in full swing. As you might guess, the charge was led by Corbynite crusader OJ Jones, the Millennial Marie Whitehouse who not only wakes up offended but is permanently outraged in his sleep – just ask the fascist milkman OJ reported last week for calling him a ‘woofter’ during a particularly fraught fever dream.
The contents of Liddle’s disgusting column have been well-documented by OJ and co, so I won’t dignify his diatribe by quoting it, which is relatively easy as I still haven’t read it. Suffice to say, creepy Liddle began by stating he gave up on his dream of becoming a teacher because he couldn’t guarantee he wouldn’t ‘shag the kids’. Yes, really. This would be sickening enough comment if he’d actually meant it, but what made it even more objectionable was the fact that he was joking. See, Liddle is one of those deplorable alt-right beasts who think it’s perfectly acceptable to make jokes about anything, regardless of what Guardian columnists think. Typical. Just look at his name – if he had any class he’d be called Rod Waitrose.
Fortunately OJ played a blinder, becoming particularly enraged when Liddle’s reprehensible Punch editor Freddy Gay took to Twitter to make another ‘joke’ which creepily suggested Liddle has form for kiddy-fiddling and the right-wing rag’s staff are always trying to stop the Nazi nonce fulfilling his depraved desires. (Hilarious stuff, Freddy. I bet Nish Kular’s shitting himself. NOT!) Thankfully OJ kept his nerve, doggedly persevering in his usual joyless manner, clearly enraged that Liddle isn’t on Twitter and was no doubt sitting at home laughing his stubby paedo cock off at all the self-righteous fury caused by a silly column he shat out when David Cameroon was still a thing.
And on it went, OJ spending his day opportunistically raging about all the other vile stuff Punch has published, most of which he condensed into fun-sized, out-of-context soundbites designed to traumatise his loyal followers, safe in the knowledge that none of them will bother to actually read the offending articles. All of which positively buzzed with OJ’s trademark hypocrisy as he cheekily lambasted the magazine for sometimes printing dodgy content despite the fact that the publication he writes for has published numerous columns in support of jihadism, most of them written by OJ’s good friend Seamus Milne.
Which highlights a fundamental difference between OJ and brutes like Liddle. While that bigoted buffoon is too busy lounging around in his underpants wanking off to old episodes of Grange Hall to try and shut down the Guardian for printing objectionable opinions, OJ goes the whole hog, refusing to simply ignore things he finds unpalatable in favour of demanding his arch enemies ‘face the consequences’ for making jokes he doesn’t like. Which is where Liddle’s ugly sister Julie Birdshit entered the fray, steamrolling into the divine Ash Starkers’ mentions to ask her how old Mohammud’s first wife was when he murdered her.
Of course, she didn’t actually say ‘murdered’, she typed ‘married’. But we all know what she meant, her intention crystal clear: to spread the foul lie that just because the dashing Muslim fisherman occasionally took a well-earned break from spreading love and happiness to enslave and massacre people that somehow means he went around killing spouses. We see you.
None of which was remotely surprising as Julie has been justifiably loathed by all decent people for some time, mainly due to her racism, transphobia, and penchant for calling liberals naughty names. Her hatred of Remain voters is well-documented, and few of us will ever forget her brutal response to the report of a damaged six-year-old boy called Rufus tearfully telling his mother the day after the referendum that he was ‘scared of the future’: “That’s probably because you’re called Rufus”. Sickening.
But ‘Mohammad murdered Mrs. Muhammud’ wasn’t the only libelous claim Julie was propagating. For as well as smearing the peace-loving warlord as a lady-killer, she was also deliberately spreading the demonstrably true myth that Muhammad (PBHU) had a child bride. Luckily Julie got the wrong wife – it was actually missus number four who was a kiddy, you thick racist – which meant Ash, OJ, and everyone else spitting feathers over Ms. Birdshit’s vile query could ignore her point and instead focus on accusing her of racism for asking why a joke about having sex with schoolkids is beyond the pale but worshipping an affable imperialist who got hitched to a 9-year-old is perfectly acceptable.
Which it obviously is, especially when that affable imperialist is a Muslim. Because as we all know, pointing out that a Muslim has committed a crime is a crime in itself. Which is why the whole delicious spat saw liberal Twitter once again transform into a pop-up blasphemy court, as hordes of principled leftists gleefully went to bat for a far-right religious ideology whose prophet would wipe them and their sinful lifestyles off the face of the earth if he were around today.
Hilariously things got even worse for Julie as she was swiftly dropped by her publishers, who pulled the plug on her forthcoming book about woke lynch mobs by caving into a woke lynch mob. Bravo! This was followed by Ash politely telling everyone that the publisher’s decision had nothing to do with her and she, like, totes wasn’t bovvered by what Julie said, so totes not bovvered that she was considering legal action to prove how totes not bovvered she was. It’s refreshing to see that despite being one of the only ubiquitous left-wing commentators with a sense of humour, Ash is as capable of joyless, censorious grandstanding as her white male pals. Go girl!
But the best thing about her subtle threat was its cheeky timing, as the whole episode saw her and OJ’s timeline’s stuffed with adoring fans repeating the evidence-free claim that Liddle once punched his pregnant girlfriend in the stomach. This claim, of course, is one of those glorious things that didn’t happen but are regularly quoted as fact by people on social media who haven’t bothered to read up on them. The very lifeblood of progressive Twitter, the Liddle claim resurfaces every time he writes something ghastly, earning its place alongside such classics of the genre as ‘Woody Alan married his daughter’, ‘Child porn was found in Michael Jackson’s house’, and ‘Prita Patel once ate a paperboy’s face off for slamming her garden gate’.
(FAO newbies: Please beware that the internet is also ram-packed with bad lies, ie the ones circulated by right-wingers. These include ‘Gavin Esther called Leave voters village idiots’, ‘Sadiq Caan said terrorism was part and parcel of living in a big city’, and ‘Jeremy Corbyn was a secret KBG agent with knives for fingers who once set off a stink bomb at the Cenotaph’. It goes without saying that these things that didn’t happen need to be denied and reported as vigorously as those other things that didn’t happen are swallowed up and disseminated. Unless you’re one of those losers who think all misrepresentations are bad and should be challenged regardless of what pointless tribe you belong to. In which case kindly stop reading this blog immediately and throw your self off the nearest skyscraper. Thank you x.)
The Liddle claim – a favourite of Ash’s Novaru teammate Aaron Pastrami – is regularly repeated online with confidence, despite the fact that there is no evidence for it having happened. Indeed, neither Liddle’s floozy nor the investigating officers have ever claimed it did. In fact, what actually happened was explained by Liddle’s victim years ago:
Thankfully very few people know the full story, and those who do have zero interest in telling it to anyone. Needless to say, I urge everyone who clicked on the above link to erase its contents from their memories forthwith. Because Liddles’s self-hating mistress – now his self-hating wife – can bleat on about how her evil husband never assaulted her all she likes. It won’t wash. Dunno if you’ve heard, luv, but times have changed. As anyone who’s read the #MeTo rulebook knows full well, ‘Believe Women’ doesn’t mean ‘Believe ALL Women’.
The great thing is, when you think about it, the idea that Liddle punched his pregnant wife in the stomach and was let off with a caution is so illogical it could only be believed by someone who either hasn’t researched the incident or is incredibly stupid. Luckily, the brave freedom fighters who repeat it haven’t thought about it, haven’t researched the incident, and invariably have shit for brains. Phew!
Fortunately for them, Liddle has no interest in either Twitter or suing people, which leaves us free to libel him with impunity. Because there’s nothing more satisfying than knowing something someone once said has been blindly accepted as fact by people who spend their lives lambasting tabloid readers and Leave voters as fake news-guzzling dupes.
A great week all round then: a TERF scalped, a paedo exposed, and a few days of blissful outrage to take our minds off the never-ending fear of being killed by a deadly flu that 98% of people recover from. Lovely. Now if you’ll excuse me I’m off to rummage around in Toby Jones’s New Spectator columns from 2011 to see if I can find evidence of him bragging about beating up prostitutes while dressed up as a disabled. Happy hunting!
Shame...Shame...Shame...Shame 