by Bruce
Bawer
Originally published by
Gatestone Institute
§ The swiftness with which injustice was meted out to
Tommy Robinson is stunning. No, more than that: it is terrifying.
§ Without having access to his own lawyer, Robinson was
summarily tried and sentenced to 13 months behind bars. He was then transported
to Hull Prison.
§ Meanwhile, the judge who sentenced Robinson also ordered
British media not to report on his case. Newspapers that had already posted
reports of his arrest quickly took them down. All this happened on the same
day.
§ In Britain, rapists enjoy the right to a full and fair
trial, the right to the legal representation of their choice, the right to have
sufficient time to prepare their cases, and the right to go home on bail
between sessions of their trial. No such rights were offered, however, to Tommy
Robinson.
The very first time I set foot in London, back in my early
twenties, I kicked up into an adrenaline high that lasted for the entire week
of my visit. Never, in later years, did any other place ever have such an
impact on me -- not Paris, not Rome. Yes, Rome was a cradle of Western
civilization, and Paris a hub of Western culture -- but Britain was the place
where the values of the Anglosphere, above all a dedication to freedom, had
fully taken form. Without Britain, there would have been no U.S. Declaration of
Independence, Constitution, or Bill of Rights.
In recent years, alas, Britain has deviated from its commitment to
liberty. Foreign critics of Islam, such as the American scholar Robert Spencer,
and for a time, even the Dutch Parliamentarian Geert Wilders have been barred from the
country. Now, at least one prominent native critic of Islam, Tommy Robinson,
has been repeatedly harassed by the police, railroaded by the courts, and left
unprotected by prison officials who have allowed Muslim inmates to beat him
senseless. Clearly, British authorities view Robinson as a troublemaker and
would like nothing more than to see him give up his fight, leave the country
(as Ayaan Hirsi Ali left the Netherlands), or get killed by a jihadist (as
happened to the Dutch filmmaker Theo van Gogh).
On Friday, as reported here yesterday,
the saga of Tommy Robinson entered a new chapter. British police officers
pulled him off a street in Leeds, where, in his role as a citizen journalist,
he was livestreaming a Facebook video from
outside a courthouse. Inside that building, several defendants were on trial
for allegedly being part of a so-called "grooming gang" -- a group of
men, almost all Muslim, who systematically rape non-Muslim children, in some
cases hundreds of them, over a period of years or decades. Some ten thousand
Facebook viewers around the world witnessed Robinson's arrest live.
The police promptly dragged Robinson in front of a judge, where,
without having access to his own lawyer, he was summarily tried and sentenced
to 13 months behind bars. He was then transported to Hull Prison.
Meanwhile,
the judge who sentenced him also ordered the British media not
to report on his case. Newspapers that had already posted reports of his arrest
quickly took them down. Even ordinary citizens who had written about the arrest
on social media removed their posts, for fear of sharing Robinson's fate. All
this happened on the same day.
A
kangaroo court, then a gag order. In the United Kingdom, where rapists enjoy
the right to a full and fair trial, the right to the legal representation of
their choice, the right to have sufficient time to prepare their cases, and the
right to go home on bail between sessions of their trial. No such rights were
offered, however, to Tommy Robinson.
The
swiftness with which injustice was meted out to Robinson is stunning. No, more
than that: it is terrifying. On various occasions over the years, I have been
subjected in person to an immediate threat of Islamic violence: I have had a
knife pulled on me by a young gang member, and been encircled by a crowd of
belligerent men
in djellabas outside a radical mosque. But
that was not frightening. This is frightening -- this utter
violation of fundamental British freedoms.
From
one perspective, to be sure, Robinson's lightning-fast arrest, trial, and
imprisonment should not have come as a surprise. "There has been a
campaign to 'get Tommy' -- or what looks remarkably like it -- for some
time," a source in the UK, whom I will call "L", told me late
early Saturday morning.
The
apparent justification for Robinson's arrest is that he was on a suspended
sentence. In May of last year, he was taken into custody while reporting from
outside a courthouse in Kent, where another group of Muslim defendants was
being tried, also on "grooming" charges. That arrest was also
unjustified. At least, however, Robinson was given a suspended sentence. This
time, presumably, it was determined that the mere act of reporting yet again
from outside another courthouse amounted to a violation of the terms of his
suspended sentence.
The
official cynicism here is obvious. L made a vital point: that often, when one
of these "grooming gang" trials is being held, the extended families
and friends of the defendants stand outside the courthouse and "heckle and
intimidate" the rape victims as well as their families
and supporters. "I've had reports of children as young as five throwing
stones at victims' families," L said.
"This
intimidation by extended community groups also involves going around to houses
and harassing people." She has even heard of witnesses for the prosecution
who have needed police protection to use a rest room inside a
courthouse. Needless to say, this heckling and harassment is rarely
reported on and never punished.
One
potentially positive aspect of this ugly turn of events is that it turned heads
that should have been turned long ago. L noted that many of her Twitter
contacts "were tweeting that they didn't necessarily support Tommy in
general but were appalled that someone reporting these [grooming] crimes was
arrested." Some of her acquaintances, she said, "are stunned and in
despair." On Saturday, thousands of Robinson's supporters rallied in
Westminster. But will such public protests make any difference? One British
ex-policeman reacted to
Robinson's incarceration with a video urging his fellow countrymen not just to
march or rally but to join Ann Marie Waters' party For Britain and do for
freedom of speech in Britain what UKIP did to get British out of the EU.
L
had more interesting information to offer. While Robinson is being punished for
drawing attention to Muslim rape gangs, the Sikh Awareness Society, which has
also reported on these "grooming" trials, is left alone. "They
are a godsend," said L, "because they pull no punches yet don't seem
to get the intimidation that people like Tommy get." Of course -- British
police would not dare arrest a bearded man in a turban. L also mentioned an
imam who was arrested recently, only to be let go by police after "a large
group of supporters demanded his release." At least one police officer
acknowledged that the imam had been freed because otherwise "they would
have been facing riots all around the country." L summed up British
authorities' current approach to the Islamic situation as follows: "they
have lost control... and are simply going for those who they think will make
the least fuss. The classroom bully has terrorised the teacher into punishing
the kids who are bullied."
One
assumes that the officials think that perpetrating this kind of injustice will
somehow keep the peace. If I were one of their number, I would not be so
certain. The people at that Westminster rally on Saturday were angry. How many
other British subjects share their anger? L expressed concern that this summer
in Britain may turn out to be quite restive. Well, maybe that is all for the
good.
For
my part, I cannot for the life of me fathom why not a single prominent or
powerful individual in all of the United Kingdom has come forward to challenge
the mistreatment of Tommy Robinson – and thereby stand up for freedom of
speech.
Is
the whole British establishment a bunch of cowards? I suppose we will know the
answer to that question soon enough, if we do not know it already.
Bruce Bawer is the author of the new novel The Alhambra (Swamp Fox
Editions). His book While Europe Slept (2006) was a New York Times bestseller
and National Book Critics Circle Award finalist. His other books include A
Place at the Table (1993), Stealing Jesus (1997), Surrender (2009), and The
Victims' Revolution (2012). A native New Yorker, he has lived in Europe since
1998.
See also: Petition to Free Tommy Robinson
