Pamela Geller and Robert Spencer barred from UK

In a welcome move, the UK government has barred Pamela Geller and Robert Spencer from entering the United Kingdom to address events organised by the EDL (English Defence Lesage).

The EDL is a British far-right movement that is particularly anti-Muslim, considering Muslims a threat to English society.  Ms. Geller and Mr. Spencer are American bloggers and activists whose singular purpose is to make the American people and United States government fearful of Muslims and their ‘hidden agenda’.  Their writings resemble police blotters — an unending litany of Muslim criminals from various parts of the world and pseudo-psychological babble about how the religion of Islam is behind the *mens rea *for the crime.

Not only are the writings of these two people hateful, their words get quoted and re-quoated in the echo-chamber of ‘wing-nut’ right-wing American sub-culture.

The news of the refusal resulted in refrains from the duo along the lines of ‘Britain succumbs to Jihad’ and ‘the country that gave us the Magna Carta . .  ‘.  True to their selective facts and reasoning, they probably ignore that many Muslim clerics have been barred from the US, and Muslim permanent residents expelled for similar hate-mongering.  They would also be wise to consider anti-Semitic hate-mongers.  We urge them to read what the Magna Carta was about : we are confident that it did not ask for the liberty to utter hate speech or argue with premises that defy common sense and intelligence.

In summary, we applaud this decision of the UK government, which is in line with earlier decisions about extremist Muslim clerics and far-right hate-mongers like Geert Wilders.