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You’re fired! But why?
Here are some of the words of Maxine Peake in her interview with Alexandra Pollard in The Independent. Sharing the article and praising Peake cost Rebecca Long-Bailey her job as Labour’s Shadow Education Secretary:
“We’ve got to save humanity. We’re being ruled by capitalist, fascist dictators. It’s entrenched, isn’t it? We’ve got to the point where protecting capital is much more important than anybody’s life. How do we dig out of that? How do we change?”
Sounds like a good aim. Sounds like a couple of good questions. Nothing here that shouldn’t be shared.
“Sin is but a word,” says Thomas [a character in the film Fanny Lye Deliver’d, in which Peake starred], an imposter of the rich to get poor men in order.” “Well,” says Peake, “if you talk about the formation of religion, it’s about control isn’t it? And with what’s happening in America at the moment, it’s about financial control. It’s about keeping the poor in their place.”
If you “Like” this, and share it, and make a positive comment about it (“Maxine Peake is a gem” I think it was), there’s no reason why you should get the sack. Peake’s view on religion is quite common and has a lot going for it. She went on:
“I don’t know how we escape that cycle that’s indoctrinated into us all. Well, we get rid of it when we get rid of capitalism as far as I’m concerned. That’s what it’s all about. The establishment has got to go. We’ve got to change it.”
Nobody should get the sack for approving of this, surely. But actually, as we all now know, Long-Bailey got the sack because the article contained the following:
“Systemic racism is a global issue. The tactics used by the police in America, kneeling on George Floyd’s neck, that was learnt from seminars with Israeli secret services.”
Was it really these words that got Long-Bailey the sack? Well, yes, it was. Because Keir Starmer said they were antisemitic, and she had to go. But they weren’t antisemitic, were they? Criticising the Israeli state, or one element of the Israeli state in this case, isn’t antisemitic. There are many Jews who don’t always support Israel, and many who don’t support Israel at all, some for political reasons, some for religious reasons. When I worked for a Jewish organisation in London, we had, on either side of us as neighbours, two ultra-orthodox Jewish groups. On our right, an organisation that supported Israel; on our left, an organisation that was opposed to Israel (as it happens because they believed that Israel should not be brought into existence until the Messiah has come). The two organisations used to demonstrate against each other in the street outside and along the road. On one of these occasions, one of the managers in our office (she was Jewish) watched the anti-Israel group forming outside with their banners and slogans. “Look at them,” she said. “They’re so antisemitic.”
This is a recurring theme, that criticism of Israel is antisemitic. It isn’t. Starmer should understand this. He should realise that if he wants the support of a broad range of Jewish voters he will have to listen to more voices than the Board of Deputies of British Jews or the editor of the Jewish Chronicle. He should recognise his mistake in sacking Long-Bailey, reinstate her, and apologise.
He won’t, of course. Repeated accusations of “antisemitism”, however ill-founded, will help him destroy the left in the Labour Party, as will other convenient accusations as time goes on. We shouldn’t allow him to do any of it.
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