Lancaster Unity

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Lancaster Unity is a blog that operated from 2005 to early 2012 in support of the British organisation Unite Against Fascism. Despite its name, it focused on nationwide issues and sometimes on foreign affairs, with a primary emphasis on attacking the British National Party and the English Defence League. It was managed by Ketlan Ossowski with the aid of various contributors.

Although purporting to oppose extremism in the UK, the blog tended to dodge the issue of British Islamism, which it did not appear to take seriously: commenting on the Salman Rushdie controversy, contributor "AndyMinion" described The Satanic Verses as "a book I'd be tempted to burn just for sheer, inpenetrable, bloody awfulness".

In early March 2011, mainstream British press reported on a London imam who was forced to retract controversial statements (namely, that people evolved from apes and that Muslim women don't have to cover their hair) after receiving death threats from whackadoodles. Lancaster Unity chose to ignore this example of rationality being drowned out by fundamentalism and instead reported on such issues as an elderly porn star supporting the BNP and a music video showing an idiot slurring his speech.

The blog did make a post around that time that touched on homophobic stickers quoting the Qu'ran, but this ultimately focused mainly on the English Defence League; and even then comments were posted insisting that the EDL put up the stickers to smear Muslims.

A following incident, in which gay rights campaigners complained to the East London Mosque that its practice of hiring homophobic preachers was partly responsible for the stickers, was similarly ignored by the blog.

As is so often the case the comments section was a good source of crazy; highlights include someone calling for a boycott of Facebook simply because EDL supporters use it. All comments were moderated, so one wonders what they didn't let through...

External links

• The blog