The Hypocrisy of John Rees

Photo: By Tedcorred - Own work, Public Domain

One of the leaders of the Stop the War Coalition and a member of the extreme left organisation Counterfire (a breakaway from the Socialist Workers Party), John Rees has refused to accept an invitation to debate at the Oxford Students Union.

Now given this a premier venue where various political and philosophical points of view have been debated over the years this seems an odd response for someone trying to persuade others of the legitimacy of his point of view.

According to Rees:

My reason is simple and compelling: you are in the midst of implementing a systematic policy of inviting speakers from the fascist and far right to speak at the Oxford Union.

Recent invitees include Alice Weidel from the German Alternative für Deutschland, Steve Bannon, the enabler and inspiration of the US and international fascist right, and Marion Maréchal-Le Pen, the niece of presidential candidate Marine Le Pen and politician in her own right in the French fascist National Front.

No doubt you will claim free speech in justification for providing these fascists and far right organisers with a platform. I have long rejected such specious arguments. Free speech can only be extended to those who recognize others’ right to free speech. It can never be extended to those who use the platforms granted by the advocates of free speech to incite racial hatred, to promote violence against their political opponents, and who would at the first opportunity remove the right to free speech from all but their supporters.

This is from a man who used to appear reguarly on Press TV, the mouthpiece of the far-right Islamist Iranian government (and still does as far as I know since the station has been banned in the UK for it's one-sided reporting) which once showed an interview with a man who had been tortured  and was under the surveillance of his torturers whilst appearing on their channel.

Of course Rees who also along with his partner Lyndsey German and her Stop  the War Campaign also take part in the Iranian sponsored "Al Qud's day" march a festival of anti-Anti-semitism and hate. Of course the Iranian government want ot "wipe Israel off the map". So does Rees without considering the genocidal consequences his demands.

Then of course Rees appeared with the Islamist lobby group Cage. The one's who described mass murderer "Jihadi John" as a"nice man".

That of course is without taking into account not just some of the other people he shares platforms with but the fact he is a communist, a supporter of Trotsky, the man that suppressed free speech and opposition in Soviet Russia and then got shafted by Stalin.

Rees is no better than those he condemns. 

Communism, Fascism and Islamism are all murderous oppressive creeds.  Do as they say or die, especially if you happen to be Jewish.

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Footnote (1): Meanwhile in Iran- "Two labour rights activists who were rearrested after speaking out about beatings and other abuse they suffered in detention last year are at grave risk of further torture, Amnesty International has warned. 

Esmail Bakhshi and Sepideh Gholian were violently arrested in Ahvaz, Khuzestan province, on 20 January in apparent reprisal for talking publicly about the torture they have said they endured in detention during November and December 2018, provoking a public outcry.

Read the rest at: www.amnesty.org/news

Footnote (2): The organisations Countefire and Stop the War have blocked me from commenting on their Facebook pages not because I was abusive but they didn't like what I had to say. So much for "free speech" eh comrades.