I Hate Robert Kilroy-Silk. posted by Richard Seymour

Confessions of a Daytime TV Consumer.

For a preening, smarmy, solipsistic, unenlightened, foghorn-voiced, bigoted creep, Kilroy has certainly made a name for himself. This self-styled man o' t' people can't construct a sensible sentence, but he does know how to ingratiate himself with what is misleadingly called Middle England. Howling down sensible suggestions from an audience member, cat-calling opponents of his waterhead views, simpering with victims of crime, sententiously moralising over the latest Big Issue and countless Non Issues his show producers concoct to fill air time, I haven't yet been able to find within me the sufficient reserves of vomit to express my admiration for his show.

But! Now, we may see the Gobby One silenced for a bit, because his latest retarded effort for the Sunday Express has prompted gales of outrage from readers. Here's a letter on its way to the Press Complaints Commission:

"Press Complaints Commission
1 Salisbury Square
London
EC4Y 8JB


Dear Sir or Madam

I am writing to complain about the following publication: Sunday Express

On the date of: 4th January 2004

The Headline was: We owe Arabs nothing (For Article, PTO).

My complaint details are as follows:

In my opinion, the Sunday Express has breached the code in the following respects.

1) Discrimination:

The article lists a number of acts that have been committed by Arab persons and then proceeds to use indiscriminate generalisations to attribute responsibility to all Arab persons and as such is blatantly discriminatory.

Examples include:
'what do they contribute? Can you think of anything? Anything really useful? Anything really valuable? Something we really need, could not do without?'

'What do they think we feel about them? That we adore them for the way they murdered more than 3,000 civilians on September 11 and then danced in the hot, dusty streets to celebrate the murders? That we admire them for the cold-blooded killing in Mombasa, Yemen and elsewhere? That we admire them. for being suicide bombers, limb-amputators, womenrepressors?'

2) Accuracy:

The statement, 'Saddam Hussein-supporting Syria', is factually inaccurate. Syria has never supported Iraq and in fact the two countries have, for many years, been bitter rivals.

The statement, 'Moreover, the people who claim we are loathsome are currently threatening our civilian populations with chemical and biological weapons.' is again inaccurate, has no evidence to support it and nor are there any statements from Arab groups threatening to undertake such attacks.



Yours Sincerely"

And furthermore, the Muslim Council of Britain is fuming:

"We at the ISB Open Egroup would urge all of you to email the BBC Director-General (greg.dyke@bbc.co.uk) and the BBC1 Controller (lorraine.heggessey@bbc.co.uk) and demand that they terminate Kilroy-Silk's contract immediately. Last year, we initiated the biggest number of complaints over any programme in 2003 concerning the portrayal of Muslims in the BBC1 drama, Spooks.
Similarly, please bombard the Sunday Express with telephone calls (phone 0207-9288000 and ask for the Sunday Express editor, Martin Townsend) or email martin.townsend@express.co.uk and tell him he should sack Kilroy as a columnist.
We understand that the Muslim Council of Britain has already raised this issue with the Press Complaints Commission.
[MCB letter to BBC1 Controller, Lorraine Heggessey]
Ms Lorraine Heggessey,
Controller
BBC One
Wood Lane
London
W12 7RJ

Tuesday 6th January, 2003

Dear Ms Heggessey,

For some time now, many British Muslims have been deeply troubled about why the BBC continues to employ Robert Kilroy-Silk in any capacity, let alone in such a high profile position as the morning chat show host on BBC1. It is truly galling to see an Islamophobic presenter like Kilroy enriching himself over a number of years courtesy of a publicly funded body such as the BBC.

Kilroy-Silk is – as you must know - a man who positively revels in airing his anti-Arab and anti-Muslim views. We wonder whether you would consider it proper to give the same kind of prominence to a presenter who was so openly anti-black or anti-Jewish?

Kilroy-Silk writes a weekly column for the Express on Sunday in which he often gives vent to his bigoted and ill-informed ideas about what is happening in the world. In last Sunday’s paper he surpassed all his previous efforts and produced a hysterically gratuitous anti-Arab rant.

As you can see in the following extract (“We Owe The Arabs Nothing”) from the Express on Sunday (4th January 2004), Kilroy-Silk appears unable (or unwilling) to distinguish between the terrorists who perpetrated the Sept 11 atrocities and the ordinary Arab peoples who constitute a population of over 200 million.

“We're told that the Arabs loathe us. Really?… What do they think we feel about them? That we adore them for the way they murdered more than 3,000 civilians on September 11… That we admire them for the cold-blooded killings in Mombasa, Yemen and elsewhere? That we admire them for being suicide bombers, limb-amputators, women-repressors?”

Note that Kilroy doesn’t attack the actions of a particular few – but ‘the Arabs’ as a whole. This seems to be a clear case of indiscriminate generalisation and as such, blatantly racist. The Press Council upheld a complaint against The Sun for publishing similar comments about ‘the Arabs’ in 1987.

Kilroy also displays a lamentable grasp of geography and history:

“The Arab world has not exactly earned our respect, has it? Iran is a vile, terrorist-supporting regime - part of the axis of evil. So is the Saddam Hussein-supporting Syria. So is Libya. Indeed, most of them chant support for Saddam.”

Iran is a largely Farsi-speaking country (not Arab) and heir to an enormously rich civilisation. Kilroy’s dismissive remarks Iran and the Arab world are not untypical of the arrogant way he treats anything to do with Islam or Muslims.

In addition, the Iraqi and Syrian regimes have for decades actually been bitter rivals in the region as each country’s branch of the Ba’th party tried to project itself as the leader of the Arab world. Moreover, the majority of the Arab public has never hidden its disdain for Saddam Hussein and his brutal rule.

There has been a lot of comment in the press recently about journalists and commentators employed by the BBC who bring the corporation into disrepute by writing opinionated pieces in newspapers.

The Muslim Council of Britain considers Kilroy’s remarks quoted above to be ignorant, extremely derogatory and indisputably racist.

In the BBC’s Producer’s Guidelines, your Chairman, Greg Dyke says “Our audiences rightly expect the highest…ethical standards from the BBC…values such as impartiality, accuracy, fairness, editorial independence and our commitment to appropriate standards of taste and decency” We hope you will agree that Mr Robert Kilroy-Silk has fallen far short of these values and standards.

We now urge the BBC to take urgent and appropriate action on this extremely serious matter to reassure the Muslim and Arab communities in Britain and abroad that the BBC will not in any way accept the contemptible demonisation of entire peoples.

Certainly, if the word ‘Jews’ was substituted for ‘Arabs’ in the Kilroy quotes above it seems to us that the BBC would not tolerate any delay before it took substantive action against Kilroy.

For your information, the Muslim Council of Britain is also writing to the Press Complaints Commission about Kilroy’s article.

Yours sincerely,

Mr Iqbal Sacranie,
Secretary-General
The Muslim Council of Britain
Boardman House,
64 Broadway,
Stratford,
London E15 1NT

Cc:
Greg Dyke, Director-General, BBC
Alison Sharman, Controller, BBC Daytime Television"


Could it be? Could this arsehole suddenly find his volumous ego ripped from the air? Watch this space for more!