As for direct action, I am in favour of direct action – but the people taking it would have to have some organic connection to the workers on the show, lest we alienate people who could be huge allies.

As for asking the trades unions to tackle the BNP and this not necessarily constituting a “No Platform” policy, well you are right of course. As you will hear in Marxist circles, “No Platform” is a tactic, not a principle. I would say, however, that the tactic of challenging BNP appearances in the mainstream media and is pretty effective.

While I was at university, a radio station invited the BNP to appear on air. The radio station was using SU property at the time, and the President of the SU subsequently barred the interview. Rightly so, because SU policy – democratically chosen – was “No Platform”. In the ensuing debate, despite the reactionary role of the local student papers (crewed to the brim with tossers) and the national media, the elected representatives of the SU council, in a packed meeting, endorsed “No Platform”.

This is the sort of praxis I endorse: pontificating the theory online is fine, but subjecting it to the self-organisation of workers (in this case, students) is also necessary. This is what is lacking with UAF: the anti-fascist groups have not taken the next step, to organise local opposition, including pro-active measures to combat the causes of fascism.

Sorry, didn’t mean to imply that you were saying the BBC had an optino to no-platform (dunno, upon reflection, why I even wrote that bit).

“I am the trades unions to force the issue with the BBC – and these carry infinitely more authority in the eyes even of many BNP supporters, who often come from Labour backgrounds.”

Now this I can agree with. But I don’t think it necessarily constitutes a no-platform policy: the Trades Unions could do lots of things to draw attention to the horrors of the BNP, whilst saying “but by all means, let Griffin take the stand and show the world what a horrible little toe-rag he is”. Indeed, this might be even more effective if pre-empted by a concerted TU effort to expose him and his ilk for what they are.

Note that Griffin has an amazing aptitude for making himself look shit. Even on the debate-free zone of QT, he will probably put his own foot in his mouth. A big TU campaing ahead of this would probably make this more likely, because it could generate concrete, publicly-known charges for him to deal with on the night. So I guess my reply here, is, “why do you think the TU option works better with no platform than with?”

“Whether or not the average BNP supporter will take it as an affront should “their” representatives not be permitted to appear is something that can be handled in multiple ways other than simply allowing the BNP to appear.

I’m sure BNP supporters would be equally gratified if we banned immigration, but we’re not going to so they can live with it – meanwhile we can do other things to win them back.”

It’s surely about scales and degrees, and in turn tactics though? There’s a big difference between granting Griffin a platform and ending immigration! The former seems like a plausibly sensible strategic decision as part of a longer game – the latter would be a wholesale self-defeating capitulation. Saying we won’t do the latter so we shouldn’t do the former is bogus, given the asymmetries in play.

My piece went up much faster at LibCon than expected so no need to wait till tomorrow for my thoughts (i’m sure you were lying awake in anticipation, ahem). Mr Monkeyfish is being nice, as usual…

Incidentally, Miller 2.0 needs to do the odd blogpost here now that TCF is soaring up the wikio numbers.