Britainology 81: George Galloway feat. Hussein Kesvani

Would you consider doing an episode on 'Jerry Springer The Opera'? It was aired on BBC 2 in 2005 and received over 47,000 complaints BEFORE it aired. It was one of the occasions where the Christian movements in the UK had some actual sway, with the tour of the show being cancelled. I'll even post you the DVD I have of it (for lending, I'll want it back) but it is on Youtube in full! I did an A Level in Christian Philosophy and when we focused on Christian Art I got obsessed with Jerry Springer the Opera. Blame the 'Tism.

how many more of the trash future crew worked for RT and when?

Dumb question but what was the issue with the phrasing of "Jews don't have to be on the side of apartheid"? Is it just that it implies that they *are* by default/nature? I guess when I heard it I took the probably-too-charitable reading of "even though they are pressured to be by society as a whole, they don't have to be".

Kinda looks like Van Morrison during his freshly converted to being an evangelical era in the 90’s. This guy feels like an NYC borough president from late the 80’s.

I looked up when Galloway was on Celebrity Big Brother only to stumble into a clip in which they welcomed Jimmy Savile into the house as a guest

His Respect victory was very interesting internationally for some of us in the far left trying to break out of isolation. At some point I proposed to my socialist org in Australia that we organise a speaking tour. I was informed that this had been checked out and apart from some caution around his politics, his speaking fees were just way too high.

I met him few times during STW years and yes, as Hussein said, as i took him to the venue and set stuff up, all you'd get is grunts, then suddenly... 'show time' and he'd have the audience enthralled in fiery rhetoric.

The talk about Galloway being a wrestling heel and keir being basically John Cena brings the horrifying thought of what a "professor of thunganomics" starmer would look like.

Also re. the Neturei Karta, I don’t know much about their specific beliefs but as an antizionist Jew myself I have been finding it increasingly frustrating how much attention they get at every Palestine protest when there is a Jewish bloc on every demo that unquestionably *is* there because of our moral opposition to Zionism. It feels quite othering and frankly antisemitic to see many non-Jewish leftists gawking and taking photos of them because they’re visibly Orthodox while not paying the same attention to the hundreds, if not thousands of Jews who turn up every time out of genuine solidarity with Palestine.

Galloway was my MP when he was on Big Brother, when I was 11 or 12. I remember watching it with my mum. Who’s to say how that shaped my fledgling understanding of politics.

Apologies for the paragraph, but I’m from what might be described as an “ultra orthodox” Jewish family and around the 37 min mark was kind of a painful listen. There are lots of valid criticisms of Jewish orthodoxy in general and the Neturei Karta in particular, but the idea that Orthodox Jews think that gentiles don’t have souls and are sitting around waiting for non-Jews to be obliterated in the apocalypse is a pretty insidious antisemitic trope that’s largely a product of the right-wing imagination. I’m not saying that absolutely no one believes those things, but I’ve never once heard them expressed and they’d be strange, fringe views to care about even within an ultra-Orthodox context. (It’s also not true that haredi Jews as a general statement don’t have a genuine moral and political antizionist stance - lots of them do, and the idea that they’re all disingenuous and religiously motivated is pretty sketchy. Not trying to be too harsh but please be wary of the things you hear/believe/repeat in front of an audience about Orthodox Jewish people. If you hear someone say “Jewish supremacy” and they’re not talking about Zionism, 9/10 times it’s a dogwhistle.

References to Omar's challenge naan is the real Britainology I need

Rochdale is in Greater Manchester.

Rogue Traders/Flytipping could totally be an episode

george is clearly competent at doing very cynical politics to get elected, but it annoys me that he never uses that to any end, like soliciting graft or using parliamentary privilege to baselessly accuse people of pedophilia

Dude you guys gotta make a video of Hussein taking Nate's friend John to the Pakistani restaurant and John getting made the muad'did, that would go so hard.

Hussein, you were thinking of The Big Questions with Nicky Campbell, very popular with the usual question time-type guests looking for more exposure

Finishing the giant naan and the curry house owner murmuring, "Lisa al-gaib..."

I think Nate mixed up Christmas Island, which AFAICT is a perfectly nice place, with Pitcairn Island, where 1/3 of the adult male population were indicted for sex offences with children and young adults. Apparently part of their defense was "The defence maintained that the UK never made a formal claim to Pitcairn, and never officially informed the islanders that British legislation, such as the Sexual Offences Act 1956,[note 1] was applicable to them."

yeah americans and canadians have trucks to dump our busted fridges in the woods or river or something

Christmas island is part of Australia, so it doesn't have a nonce army but it's open to just regular war crimes

I don't condone mixing up Lancashire and the petty counties Yorkshire, but to cheer up the hosts: when I introduced my spouse to my family up there they were more interested in hearing about London than they were about the U.S. Which, fair enough.

Britain is like a train crash, I just can't look away. I hope you all get out of there and move to Germany or someplace that's less actively trying to destroy itself

First!

I consider this show required research for understanding my British boyfriend as an American.