Outlawing the BNP?

It was a couple of days ago now but I'd still like to talk about Nick Griffin having his invitation to the Queen's garden party removed and whether it will actually help or hinder the BNP.

There's no doubt that the BNP have seized upon this as another example of the 'establishment' being frightened and undemocratically bullying them. This despite the fact that the other BNP MEP, Andrew Brons, was still invited and I believe was there. Everyone else is split between thinking either that they were right to ban him or that actually its helped the BNP cause by banning him and they should just have let him go down and be ignored by everyone.

I personally think it was the right decision to ban him, so long as it was done for the reasons they gave (he was using his invite for party political purposes) rather than them just not liking him. I despise the man, but it only gives ammo to the BNP if we begin proscribing them. The way to combat them is at the polls, show people what their policies actually are and hopefully they'll be turned off. The other parties have a duty to explain to voters why a vote for the BNP is a vote for racism and ignorance. The final nail in the coffin for them won't be anger, it will be apathy. We know they have finally been beaten not when we hate them, but when we no longer care because they aren't significant. Apathy is the thing a man like Griffin despises most of all.

And as a final point, Griffin might want to make a melodrama out of this and claim his right to free speech is being attacked but he hasn't been banned from the Commons, or from a public address or anything remotely political. He's been banned from a tea party, let's put it in context. If I were the Queen, I certainly wouldn't have had tea with him.