Racist Labour Councillor, Caroline ‘Poison’ Penn, Complains of ‘Harassment’ on @Cllorcaroline @thepennydrops

Last week I was at home with my wife and son when who came knocking at the door but 2 members of Brighton Plod with nothing better to do of an evening.  What I wondered had I done?  Robbed the local offy, held up a bank or annoyed some Zionists?  It would seem that the latter was my ‘crime’.

Last year, Progress Councillor Caroline ‘Poison’ Penn, who is a notoriously foul mouthed and abusive person, even by the standards of the Labour Right, took to Twitter to announce that she had joined, like a few fellow Progress members like Cllrs. Emma Daniels and Warren Morgan, the Brighton branch of the Israeli Labour Party (otherwise known as the Jewish Labour Movement).

Since Poison Penn had taken to announcing that she was a racist to the whole world, I thought I would respond.  I wondered if she thought if would be worth announcing that she had joined the National Front or British National Party too.

In May she decided to send out a Tweet (which she has since deleted) calling me an anti-Semite.  Now I am used to Zionists calling me anti-Semitic.  It is the standard accusation to make against anyone who is anti-Zionist or supports the Palestinians.  Nonetheless it is abusive (and to use today’s PC language, ‘harassment’) especially when directed by someone like Poison Penn, who is a Goy, against someone who is Jewish.

So I responded to PP with a series of tweets pointing out that I am a long standing anti-fascist activist whereas she has been a racist for most of her short and miserable career.  I also pointed out that a notorious right-winger, who resigned from the Labour Party because it was too left-wing Harris ‘Fascist’ Fitch, is her flat mate and moreover he has expressed to a number of people the fact that he is a supporter of the BNP.

Probably because a number of people began retweeting what I had sent out, Ms Penn bleated that I was harassing her!!  Presumably responding to these people is harassment!

This isn’t the first time that a similar accusation has been made.  Indeed responding to political criticism with charges of ‘harassment’ is now the done thing.

What you might ask is the common denominator?  Trenchant political criticism of pseuds, careerists, opportunists and racists.  Instead of these people responding in kind, they call in the Police and file charges of ‘harassment’.  So the Police hand you a Police Information Notice which states that nothing in it implies you are guilty but nonetheless you have been warned.

Nonetheless it is serious as it can be the first stage in a charge of harassment, he definition of which is causing ‘alarm or distress’.  This whole procedure is undemocratic.  It is an attack on free speech.  It’s no different in principle to the persecution radical pamphleteers like John Wilkes or Thomas Paine faced.  It is the use of the criminal law to prevent political criticism and dissent.  Because Poison Penn and company cannot respond politically they resort to the Police.

Most people will think of harassment as being a man ringing up, stalking or worse an ex-girlfriend or wife.  It could be an ex-girl friend harassing a man too.  Or breaking into someone’s flat and threatening them, as happenedto Lily Allen or the vile abusethat Lily Allen suffered after the still-birth of her baby.  There are many such examples of harassment and stalking.  What isn’t harassment is political criticism made against people who, by their actions, court publicity but then complain when those actions are subject to scrutiny.

I criticised Gary Spedding because he claimed to be a Palestine solidarity supporter but spent most of the time feeding his own ego whilst attacking other, genuine solidarity activists.

Cecile Wright I criticised because she professed to be a Black anti-racist yet she stabbed Jackie Walker in the back when she supported the (very) white Jon Lansman in voting to remove Jackie as Vice-Chair of Momentum.  I also pointed out that she had also been censored by the Momentum Black Caucus!  This was deemed worthy of a complaint to the Police and I was also sent an email from Emma Rees, of the Momentum National Office implying I’d broken some social media code or other.  Apparently criticising someone who is Black is itself an act of racism!

Caroline Penn is in a different category.  She is a right-wing member of the Labour Party who shares a flat with someone who supports the BNP and EDL.  She is know to be obnoxious and, like many racists, a supporter of Zionism and the State of Israel.  When I called her out about this she ran to the Police.  Well she can continue running because I intend to keep criticising her.  She is a local politician and if she can’t take the heat then she should, in Harry Truman’s immortal phrase ‘get out of the kitchen’.

I look forward to charges of ‘harassment’ being filed and I intend to defend them vigorously!

Tony Greenstein