In a shocking disregard for freedom of expression, Neil Phillips from Rugeley, Staffordshire, was arrested last week after he made tasteless jokes about Nelson Mandela on the internet. Or was he?
In a shocking disregard for freedom of expression, Neil Phillips from Rugeley, Staffordshire, was arrested last week after making tasteless jokes about Nelson Mandela on the internet.
Or so the Daily Mail reported last Thursday.
A sandwich shop owner endured eight hours of questioning by police and had his computer seized for three weeks – after making tasteless Nelson Mandela jokes on the internet.
Neil Phillips, who runs Crumbs in Rugeley, Staffordshire, says he was also finger-printed and DNA-swabbed after officers received complaints about what he insists were harmless gags.
In one online post, the 44-year-old wrote: ‘My PC takes so long to shut down I’ve decided to call it Nelson Mandela.’
Mandela, the former South African leader, and Nobel Peace Prize recipient, died on Thursday, aged 95.
He said: ‘It was an awful experience. I was fingerprinted, they took DNA and my computer.
‘It was a couple of jokes, Bernard Manning type.
‘There was no hatred.”
Poor Mr Phillips.
In reality, however, Neil Phillips was not arrested for making online wise cracks about the former South African President and anti-apartheid hero at all. Rather, a complaint was made to the police about him for hate speech which was directed toward local Muslims.
According to the man who reported Mr Phillips to the police, Nelson Mandela was mentioned, but was not central to the complaint made against Mr Phillips.
Below is a copy of the letter of complaint sent to the police.
And here are a few examples are why the complaints were made.
The only ‘joke’ the Mail noticed:
This wasn’t the only inaccuracy in the Mail’s piece. Further down the article we read the following:
“Mr Phillips admitted to once being a member of the far-right BNP, but quit 25 years ago.”
Unfortunately for the Mail and Mr Phillips this also isn’t true, as a local newspaper clipping from 1999 attests. In a letter to the Rugeley Mercury from 1999, Mr Phillips boasted that the BNP were “growing in Rugely and here to stay”.
“…we are receiving excellent support from our fellow residents,” Mr Phillips added.
Contrary to what he told the Daily Mail, then, Mr Phillips did not leave the BNP 25 years ago – he was still a member 14 years ago and perhaps even later.
So it was less a case of ‘man locked up for Mandela jokes’, and more ‘lying ex-BNP member questioned after allegedly making string of anti-muslim online remarks’.
This is not to say that Mr Phillips’ arrest wasn’t rather illiberal, just that the original story by the Mail was wildly inaccurate.
Not like the Mail to get the basic facts wrong on a story now, is it?
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30 Responses to “The man who wasn’t actually arrested for joking about Nelson Mandela”
Flaming Fairy
I’ve read it and – so what?
Flaming Fairy
The Mail is inaccurate. That’s the important issue here?
Flaming Fairy
But even with the ‘facts’ this is still “political correctness gone mad”. Nobody is actually physically hurt buy a tweet
DaveAtherton20
Despite the horrific photograph arguably Phillips has done a public service by publishing the murder or possibly genocide of innocent people. The wheelchair is just humour, the Mandela joke is just possibly tasteless and the visit to the Mosque is fair if not reasonable comment.
How many Muslim parents would object to their children being made to visit a Christian Church? Probably more than Christian children being sent to a Mosque I would guess, will Tim Jones be reporting Muslims for racism too?
I am afraid this is a non article too and shows the left to be vindictive, bigoted and anti free speech. It was a Nazi and Communist tactic to use guilt by association.
May God help us all.
Comprehensiveboy
What I find interesting is that this article pulls out all the stops to dissipate the outrage about the arrest. When you start to read it you follow the arguement so far and learn some background and context. Then, as is shown by many other commentors, your initial reaction that this is an outragious abuse of a british citizen in an apparently only formerly free county is inescapable. The argument is only attractive if you think it’s acceptable to shut some people up about sensitive issues. These people are working class white people. If this was working class white people being rude about white people with exactly the same beliefs and practices there wouldn’t be a peep. Because it’s non whites and muslims it’s different.