Lily Allen’s Shocking Naivety

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I quite like the pop singer Lily Allen. Not her music, you understand, just her. She is roughly the same age as me and I have always found her pleasantly, if also unconventionally, attractive.

Now, with such irrelevant information out of the way, I must say I was stunned, though not surprised, by the news that Allen had been reduced to apologising for her country during a visit to the notorious Calais ‘Jungle’ migrant camp last week.

In case you’ve yet to hear of this incident, Allen, faced with a war-weary Afghan teenager, declared that she was ashamed of Britain for not letting in the teeming hordes currently massed (illegally) on France’s Northern coast, making these remarks through a veil of tears and tear-dampened blonde hair. Later, in conversation with the British press, Allen remarked (presumably seriously) that she would even be prepared to have a refugee stay with her at her personal residence in England.

The UK backlash against Allen’s remarks has been predictably harsh. In the right-leaning papers, critics have lined up to pour cold water on Allen’s dippy sentiments, as well as to explain that the singer knows little to nothing about the realities of the Calais crisis and its multiple backgrounds.

“(Allen) was merely repeating the canards of her arty liberal chums” Zoe Strimpel wrote in the Telegraph “who – despite never venturing outside their own intellectual and social cosmos – are sure that everyone who doesn’t see the world as they do, and especially anyone who voted for Brexit, is a bigoted fool. To reduce the web of direness behind the ongoing migration surge to a simple matter of Western culpability is plainly idiotic. It shows painfully limited understanding of the catalogue of political and human horrors that predated, and indeed motivated, Western intervention in Afghanistan and Iraq…And to weepily lay the situation in Calais purely at Britain’s door was a severe misfiring of sentimentality. Crying in the face of human suffering is one thing. But crying on national TV while telling the audience that their country – merely by trying to control its borders – is cruelly causing the misery of innocents is quite another.”

Personally, I was less struck by Ms Allen’s weak grasp of the political-economic background of the migrant crisis than with her shocking naivety in relation to the religion of Islam and the nature of those currently attempting to force their way into the British Isles. For a young, beautiful Englishwoman such as Allen to offer to take in young (almost always male) Muslim refugees displays a terrifying disregard for her own safety. Can you imagine (do you even need to imagine) what would happen if Allen allowed a 16-20 year old Afghan male to move into her personal residence? True, we cannot say for sure, but I don’t believe it is bigoted of me to speculate that sexual advances would almost be made by the new arrival – and that, should they be rebuffed, sexual violence might well follow.

What will it take for our best and brightest to understand that they are being conned by the lowest elements in the human species? What will it take for Western women to understand that the weeping masses huddled in tents along the French coast are not like the Jews who fled Nazi Germany; that they are rather wolves imitating sheep; devils imitating angels? What will it take?

Several commenters under the articles reporting Allen’s comments in Calais have delighted in speculating the fate that would await her should she follow through on her deranged offer of sanctuary. I don’t believe we should be so cold-hearted. Allen is a good person. She has simply fallen victim to a dangerous lie peddled by a negligent, dishonest media. The blame, should Allen’s words inspire some young girl to expose herself to danger, lies ultimately with them.

D, LDN

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The End is Nigh?

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The news that Sadiq Khan (the Muslim son of a Pakistani bus driver) has been elected Mayor of London hasn’t exactly gone down well with the British people. Here is a representative reaction cropped from the comment section of a popular right-wing newspaper:

“Bye Bye London. It was nice knowing you. Can’t believe what’s happening to this country.”

Here’s another – “We’re doomed. This is the end. We knew it was coming. Shame on those who did nothing to stop it. I used to love visiting London as a kid. I won’t bother doing that now. Tragic.”

And here’s one more – “Hardly surprising. There are no English people left in London. It’s part of Pakistan now. Used to be such a lovely city.”

It would be easy – and conventional – to label such responses hysterical and exaggeratedly doomly. That is exactly how they are being framed by the liberal press. But are they really an overreaction? The answer is complex.

As Mayor of London, Mr Khan will have very little political power. The position of Mayor is almost entirely bureaucratic, with the functions of the office largely confined to issues like transport, museum fees, rubbish disposal and recycling. Despite that, few positions are more symbolic than the Mayoralty of our Capital.

When the man or woman who replaces Barack Obama visits London, he or she will be required to meet with Khan as a matter of tradition. There is no way around it. For the President to refuse this meeting would be loudly condemned by both ends of the spectrum of political acceptability. And this applies to all foreign leaders who visit the UK, including the premiers of China, France, Israel, Canada and India.

Mr Khan will often be the first living thing a foreign leader will encounter upon visiting the United Kingdom. He is the welcome mat; the red carpet; our best Sunday suit. This is one reason to be worried, for being an official representative of a major nation provides Khan with enormous ‘soft’ power.

Should Donald Trump enter the White House this coming November, he will be expected by his electors to follow through on promises he made over the election season. And most notable among these promises, at least for people of our political persuasion, was the promise to close the borders of the United States to all practitioners of the Muslim faith. While this policy was and is enormously popular with the American public (and the British public, for that matter), it will be very difficult to enact without setting off an organised wave of condemnation from leaders across the world. As to whether this makes any difference to President Trump depends to a large extent on how influential Muslims are in other Western countries. It matters little or nothing if the Sultan of Brunei decries the President from his little, irrelevant fiefdom. But it does matter if a certain Mayor lobbies the UK government to bar the US President from London, a city which hosts a massive proportion of the world’s economic and political get-togethers.

As Mayor, Mr Khan will have high-level access not only to the government, but also to the monarchy. The Queen herself will be expected to meet with Khan on occasion to discuss all manner of topics, ranging from economic matters to the status of foreign leaders. While the Queen, like Mr Khan, occupies a largely ceremonial position, it is nevertheless invested with considerable emotional importance. The Queen’s viewpoint (expressed, for example, in the annual Christmas Day speech) is taken a million times more seriously than the view of a commoner. Will Khan seek to influence the Queen? It isn’t exactly far-fetched to predict that he will.

Finally, we must also consider the effect that a Muslim mayor of London will have on our national-cultural identity. London is the most important site in the British Isles – the place where the economic, political and cultural elites reside and make their decisions. Though citizens of other areas might begrudge the idea, London still leads the way in setting the cultural tone for the rest of the United Kingdom. In what way will having a Muslim mayor change London’s cultural self-concept? Again, we don’t know, but this must be considered.

I do not personally believe the election of Sadiq Khan means Britain has succumbed to Islam. It is simply a sign that London’s British identity is slipping further into the multicultural gunge. I’d love to suggest a way of halting this decline, but I’m not entirely sure there is one.

D, LDN.