Richard Littlejohn: One of Lifes Great Idiots

I was reading the blog of Bethan Jenkins, Plaid Cymru member of the Welsh Assembly, when I read her latest posting:

http://bethanjenkins.blogspot.com/2008/01/murder-of-ipswich-women-daily-mail.html

As Bethan writes about, it seems that Richard Littlejohn has been spewing forth more of the venomous bile for which he is so handsomely rewarded. Some will recall that he was the imbecile who took great delight in denigrating Scotland on Question Time. However, that is not what I am so worked up about. His latest piece is by far more disgraceful.

The latest brunt of his attack has been the victims of murder in Ipswich. These victims happened to have been prostitutes. For some reason this has led Mr Littlejohn to believe it is acceptable to write the following article:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/columnists/columnists.html?in_article_id=423549&in_page_id=1772&in_author_id=322

However, whilst these women happened to be prostitutes, they were above all human beings. They were somebodies daughter.

That is why I cannot fathom why any decent minded individual would think it acceptable to write the following of their murder, "in the scheme of things the deaths of these five women is no great loss". But that is exactly what Richard Littlejohn has written folks.

I suppose the crux of the issue is that I said I cannot fathom why any decent minded individual. Richard Littlejohn can be described as many things, but decent minded is not uppermost among them.

Mr Littlejohn suggests that the death of the women is no great loss because "they weren't going to discover a cure for cancer or embark on missionary work in Darfur". Neither is he likely to do so any time soon either. What is his point then? That only certain human lives are valuable, or some are more valuable than others?

His logic in this article is appalling. He dehumanises the victims to the point where their deaths are meaningless. It is this kind of thinking that leads to the writing off of innocent victims of war as acceptable "collateral damage". I don't think it is stretching the point to say it is this kind of thinking that allowed a band of murderous zealots in the mid twentieth century to try an exterminate an entire people as "Untermensch".

Anyway, I have probably spent too much time writing about this idiot, but had to vent my spleen somehow!