Skip to content or view mobile version

Home | Mobile | Editorial | Mission | Privacy | About | Contact | Help | Security | Support

A network of individuals, independent and alternative media activists and organisations, offering grassroots, non-corporate, non-commercial coverage of important social and political issues.

BNP Membership Leak 2.0

IMCista | 21.10.2009 11:50 | Analysis | Anti-racism | Migration

On 20th October 2009 a list containing personal details of BNP members was leaked for the second time by the whistleblowing website Wikileaks. According to Wikileaks the latest data reflects the state of the party membership as of April 2009. An analysis of the data alludes to the successes and failures of the antifascist movement within the UK.

The claims of a 'surge' in BNP membership since the European elections appear to be false. The figures show a unique paid annual membership of 11,811 which is significantly less than the 14,000 recently claimed by the BNP. The list leaked in November 2008 showed a membership of 12,802 names although this list was widely regarded to include non-members who had shown an interest in the party.

Wikileaks state that a total of 35,000 memberships appear on the list, but after this number reached 33,000, 100,000 has been added to all subsequent membership ID numbers. "It has the effect of making the BNP look larger to new recruits and those they talk to, since the numbers on their membership cards are all over 133,000" say Wikileaks. This was a tactic originally adopted by the German nazi party after 1919 who added 500 to every member's number to exaggerate the party's strength, and was regarded as a key propaganda tactic to increase support.

The number of lapsed memberships also appear to be significantly high which indicates the party is poor at retaining committed support. A member of the state-funded antifascist group 'Searchlight' stated "people join the party because they're angry, agitated or curious, but they leave in equal numbers out of the bottom". However most BNP supporters are unlikely to join a political party so the figures exhibit a skewed representation of the current landscape of fascism in the UK.

Article continued…

Related Articles: BNP Threatens Free Media | Keep Question Time Nazi Free | No to the BNP! No to the Racist Labour Government! | Secret BBC Location

WikiLeaks.org
WikiLeaks.org


Griffin originally threatened that 'those who are responsible for the latest attack will be tracked down and exposed', but is on the backfoot now claiming the list is a 'forgery'. This claim will be of tactical use to the BNP as it will serve as a de facto response to anyone who wishes to raise questions about the list. Clearly the corporate media furore over the list will have died down by the time the truth comes out. However the BNP themselves could face criminal prosecution since organisations have an obligation to take reasonable steps to secure personal data, if proven genuine this would be the third occasion on which they have failed to do so.

The purported growth and shrinkage of the party's influence in different areas is interesting. The BNP have seemingly increased membership in some economically hard hit towns and in areas where they have had active campaigns such as Leicestershire. Likewise the list suggests they had a significant fall in support in Leeds, Keighly, and other areas throughout Yorkshire; areas heavily targeted by antifascist activism. "This is to be celebrated and proves that antifascist tactics in those areas has worked and should be emulated by antifascist groups in similar areas" stated an antifascist activist who wishes to remain anonymous.

Question Time Shock On Thursday antifascist activists intend to disrupt and hold the BBC Question Time programme under siege to deny Griffin a platform to promote the BNP's race hatred. If the programme goes ahead then the leak could potentially provide fuel for tough questioning. Griffin could be questioned over the alleged inflation of membership numbers, their failure to comply with race discrimination legislation, links to the EDL, and an alliance with an overtly racist party in Hungary. However, this seems unlikely when taking into account Craig Murray's view that there is an "astonishing right wing bias on the panel", and now the BBC have stated their committment to vet the Question Time audience for 'antifascist protestors', whilst allowing BNP supporters access to the floor. Whilst the programme is likely to provide primetime photo opportunities for mainstream politicians and through the roof ratings for the BBC, it is unlikely to provide much comfort for the black, asian, chinese, jewish, refugee, migrant, gay, transgender, and disabled people who would be adversely affected by the rise of fascism in the UK.

Meanwhile, former military chiefs have warned that the armed forces are in danger of being hijacked by far-right groups. Whether this is a side effect of the BNP's success targeting their most obvious demographic, or if this is endemic of a more sinister trend is yet to be established. The BNP's links with the jackbooted fascist Jobbik party of Hungary are rarely questioned. The Jobbik party successfully infiltrated the trade union of Hungarian police officers to further the persecution of Roma people, creating a definition of 'gyspy crime' as a pretext. Evidence of widespread abuse of Muslim civilians in Iraq and Afghanistan by British military personnel has already come to light, any growth in fascist support throughout the military could potentially further this trend as well as increasing racial tensions domestically.

What is certain is that the BNP have successfully capitalised on the government's 'war on terror' propaganda, and tapped into the jingoistic support for imperialism in Iraq and Afghanistan drummed up by the state and corporate media. Jack Straw's appearance on Question Time as the Labour opponent of Griffin is of particular irony. Despite the cries of foul play from mainstream political parties against the BNP, they have all played a role in laying fertile ground for the rise of fascism, and it is up to us to oppose it on all it's fronts.

IMCista

Comments

Hide the following 13 comments

Good article

21.10.2009 16:39

...

635ista


Face it - the BNP does have some real public support

21.10.2009 23:37

the BNP does have some public support mainly due to the elite's opening up of borders, not because of any good internationalist sympathies, simply because they want cheap labour.
The failure of the mainstream political parties to address this problem has left a gap which the racist BNP have filled with glee
The BBC are 100% right to allow racist scumbags on since they now have been proved to have real support amongst some of the British people.

Indymedia should know that media is for discussing the difficult topics and thrashing them out, not for censoring them

victimised for my views yet again


@ victimised

22.10.2009 06:49

The elite haven't opened up borders, They've been closing them down. 20 years ago there we're a lot less travel restrictions then now, and a lot less immigration controls.

The BNP haven't been capitalizing on the open border policy, they've been capitalising on the portray of immigrants as sub human, illegal, scavengers by the elite!

and you are not victimised for your opinions, your victimised because you are stupid enough to express them here on a radical left/human right website. you are not victimised, you don't even know what that means. being victimised is not getting a job because of your race/birthplace/sex or whatever, being victimised in not being allowed to be with your lover because he/she is of a different nationality, being victimised is being beaten in a back ally because of the colour of your skin, being victimised is getting raped and spat of because you are not white, english, aristocrat. whatever...

you are not being victimised, you are just being stupid.

boo hoo


f**k the bnp and the votes they rode in on

22.10.2009 09:45

They had less than 1 million votes (sounds like a lot, but in reality, it's nothing) and even so, there has always been racism in britain, shit, even the name BRITAIN is like saying a racist word!!

So there's always been racists supporting racists in this country.

It doesn't matter if they turn up on BBC or CBBC...They will get taken out, either through argument, or by force. When the time comes, I'm up for the latter...........

Let Nick Griffin have his five minutes and we can gather and organise and make this war even more real and mainstream....let them show their heads, and we'll hack them off.........how's that for some BNP hatred?

They are coming to Notts on December the 5th, and i for one will be there with projectiles at the ready.

And I'd like some "left" activists to answer this question: should we form voters unions, to act against fascism in the councils and bring anarchists and libertarians into the councils, even if it goes against main anarchist principles?

anti-nazi


Crap analysis

22.10.2009 16:38

"According to Wikileaks the latest data reflects the state of the party membership as of April 2009"
"The claims of a 'surge' in BNP membership since the European elections appear to be false"

Non sequitur watch


More votes than the left...

22.10.2009 17:32

> They had less than 1 million votes (sounds like a lot, but in reality, it's nothing)

It's a lot more than all the Left parties got put together (if you exclude the Greens as a Left party). They also got more votes in the London mayoral election than the SWP's candidate and the SWP is generally agreed to be the most prominent Left party.

Something to think about.

Something to think about


something for the weekend

22.10.2009 18:51

>It's a lot more than all the Left parties got put together

Most people here ask people not to vote, and so something for you to think about is that fewer than half the British electorate vote for our 'elected representatives'. It shows this government and their elections are illegitimate.

You might think this an extreme opinion, but look at elections in Afghanistan. In many districts, a few hundred people voted in constituencies of hundreds of thousands. That is proof that we would all accept that those were invalid elections. So why can't we see that same principle in our domestic pseudo-elections?

One of the good folk I've met through IM just informed me that it is no longer legal to put the words 'None of the above' in a British ballot paper. Can you imagine why that is a law? We are being legally prevented from offering alternative types of democracy - we are a transparently puppet regime as surely as the Afghans. We've consistently failed to 'export Democracy', it's maybe time we started importing it.

Danny


non sequitur

22.10.2009 20:31

"According to Wikileaks the latest data reflects the state of the party membership as of April 2009"
"The claims of a 'surge' in BNP membership since the European elections appear to be false"

Well spotted :)

I think saying "The claims of a 'surge' in BNP membership since the beginning of the financial crisis appear to be false" makes more sense.

Rest of the article is darn good if you don't mind me saying :)

radix


something to think about

22.10.2009 20:45

"It's a lot more than all the Left parties got put together (if you exclude the Greens as a Left party). They also got more votes in the London mayoral election than the SWP's candidate and the SWP is generally agreed to be the most prominent Left party."

Whilst I too would urge people not to vote and give credence to the current parliamentary 'democracy' we live in, I couldn't help point out that the green party are pretty far left, and that the swp don't stand candidates despite calling themselves a party.




troll spotter


SWP, but not as SWP

22.10.2009 22:09

The SWP don't stand as the SWP (make of that what you will) but they do sometimes stand for election. For example Lindsey German, a prominent member of the Central Committee of the SWP stood in the London mayoral election as 'Left List' and the SWP campaigned for her. She fared dismally.

Observer


How certain are we this is genuine?

28.10.2009 01:25

How certain are we this is genuine? Have there been any investigations into people who are on this list but not the first one to check that there are real BNP members on there?

Sorry to be paranoid but anyone anonymous can claim anything on the internet.

It will be great if it is the addresses of more fascists and their sympathisers but I would be cautious at first.

anti-fascist


just do it

29.12.2009 20:44

Everyone needs to come together that disagrees with the bnp.Everyone even the people who disagree on many things needs to form one antifascist movement or its going to come down to a battle on the streets.Been to leeds recently?

steveis scum antifa
mail e-mail: swellbelly@hotmail.co.uk


Upcoming Coverage
View and post events
Upcoming Events UK
24th October, London: 2015 London Anarchist Bookfair
2nd - 8th November: Wrexham, Wales, UK & Everywhere: Week of Action Against the North Wales Prison & the Prison Industrial Complex. Cymraeg: Wythnos o Weithredu yn Erbyn Carchar Gogledd Cymru

Ongoing UK
Every Tuesday 6pm-8pm, Yorkshire: Demo/vigil at NSA/NRO Menwith Hill US Spy Base More info: CAAB.

Every Tuesday, UK & worldwide: Counter Terror Tuesdays. Call the US Embassy nearest to you to protest Obama's Terror Tuesdays. More info here

Every day, London: Vigil for Julian Assange outside Ecuadorian Embassy

Parliament Sq Protest: see topic page
Ongoing Global
Rossport, Ireland: see topic page
Israel-Palestine: Israel Indymedia | Palestine Indymedia
Oaxaca: Chiapas Indymedia
Regions
All Regions
Birmingham
Cambridge
Liverpool
London
Oxford
Sheffield
South Coast
Wales
World
Other Local IMCs
Bristol/South West
Nottingham
Scotland
Social Media
You can follow @ukindymedia on indy.im and Twitter. We are working on a Twitter policy. We do not use Facebook, and advise you not to either.
Support Us
We need help paying the bills for hosting this site, please consider supporting us financially.
Other Media Projects
Schnews
Dissident Island Radio
Corporate Watch
Media Lens
VisionOnTV
Earth First! Action Update
Earth First! Action Reports
Topics
All Topics
Afghanistan
Analysis
Animal Liberation
Anti-Nuclear
Anti-militarism
Anti-racism
Bio-technology
Climate Chaos
Culture
Ecology
Education
Energy Crisis
Fracking
Free Spaces
Gender
Globalisation
Health
History
Indymedia
Iraq
Migration
Ocean Defence
Other Press
Palestine
Policing
Public sector cuts
Repression
Social Struggles
Technology
Terror War
Workers' Movements
Zapatista
Major Reports
NATO 2014
G8 2013
Workfare
2011 Census Resistance
Occupy Everywhere
August Riots
Dale Farm
J30 Strike
Flotilla to Gaza
Mayday 2010
Tar Sands
G20 London Summit
University Occupations for Gaza
Guantanamo
Indymedia Server Seizure
COP15 Climate Summit 2009
Carmel Agrexco
G8 Japan 2008
SHAC
Stop Sequani
Stop RWB
Climate Camp 2008
Oaxaca Uprising
Rossport Solidarity
Smash EDO
SOCPA
Past Major Reports
Encrypted Page
You are viewing this page using an encrypted connection. If you bookmark this page or send its address in an email you might want to use the un-encrypted address of this page.
If you recieved a warning about an untrusted root certificate please install the CAcert root certificate, for more information see the security page.

Global IMC Network


www.indymedia.org

Projects
print
radio
satellite tv
video

Africa

Europe
antwerpen
armenia
athens
austria
barcelona
belarus
belgium
belgrade
brussels
bulgaria
calabria
croatia
cyprus
emilia-romagna
estrecho / madiaq
galiza
germany
grenoble
hungary
ireland
istanbul
italy
la plana
liege
liguria
lille
linksunten
lombardia
madrid
malta
marseille
nantes
napoli
netherlands
northern england
nottingham imc
paris/île-de-france
patras
piemonte
poland
portugal
roma
romania
russia
sardegna
scotland
sverige
switzerland
torun
toscana
ukraine
united kingdom
valencia

Latin America
argentina
bolivia
chiapas
chile
chile sur
cmi brasil
cmi sucre
colombia
ecuador
mexico
peru
puerto rico
qollasuyu
rosario
santiago
tijuana
uruguay
valparaiso
venezuela

Oceania
aotearoa
brisbane
burma
darwin
jakarta
manila
melbourne
perth
qc
sydney

South Asia
india


United States
arizona
arkansas
asheville
atlanta
Austin
binghamton
boston
buffalo
chicago
cleveland
colorado
columbus
dc
hawaii
houston
hudson mohawk
kansas city
la
madison
maine
miami
michigan
milwaukee
minneapolis/st. paul
new hampshire
new jersey
new mexico
new orleans
north carolina
north texas
nyc
oklahoma
philadelphia
pittsburgh
portland
richmond
rochester
rogue valley
saint louis
san diego
san francisco
san francisco bay area
santa barbara
santa cruz, ca
sarasota
seattle
tampa bay
united states
urbana-champaign
vermont
western mass
worcester

West Asia
Armenia
Beirut
Israel
Palestine

Topics
biotech

Process
fbi/legal updates
mailing lists
process & imc docs
tech