Thread by @NudderingNudnik

Thread: Walking the dog with Oswald Mosley

So, it's a wet Sunday morning and @MrsNuddering and I are out walking the dog in beautiful Baslow in the Derbyshire Peak District.
We're almost certainly the only 2 Jews in the village at that moment.

@MrsNuddering We head for the path that will take us alongside the River Derwent & on to the absurdly opulent Chatsworth House - home of the Devonshire family.

The Devonshires -as well as being one of the wealthiest (& enduringly so) aristocratic families-have more than a little notoriety..

@MrsNuddering ...about them, largely due to multiple links with Hitler and the Nazis. Which all seems a little improbable on a wet Sunday morning in Derbyshire.

So there we are, 2 Jews and a dog heading for Chatsworth.
And then, on the path opposite a little house (no, not Chatsworth)..

@MrsNuddering ..that is so stupidly gorgeous that every time we see it we coo a little, I see a sign on a wooden post. I stop. I look again. I step forward and look more closely. No, i didn't imagine it: it's definitely there.
Here it is.

"Oswald Mosley & Diana Mitford: Heroes or Villains."

@MrsNuddering So, being a calm sort of Jew with a calm Jewish wife & a relatively calm Labrador, i stop hyperventilating and then move on to shouting
"ARE YOU OUT OF YOUR FUCKING MINDS, YOU MAD, MORALLY DERANGED FUCKERS? THIS ISN'T EVEN IN @RuthGeorge6 'S CONSTITUENCY!"

@MrsNuddering @RuthGeorge6 A few points to remind us about Mosley & Mitford then:
1. Married at Goebbel's house with Hitler as guest of honour
2. Leaders of British fascism in the pre-war period
3. Unrepentant fascists/Nazis who carried on doing their thing post war.

@MrsNuddering @RuthGeorge6 4. In 1958 (post Notting Hill riots) Mosley stood for Parliament again on a repatriation of immigrants & banning of inter-marriage ticket (got 7.5%)
5. Diana continued to fund the British Union of Fascists & its postwar incarnation until 1994
6. Diana was a lifelong Jew-hater

@MrsNuddering @RuthGeorge6 7. Great quick example of Diana Mitford's visceral hatred of Jews is this quote:
"A nice reporter came to interview Tom but he turned out to be Jewish & was sitting there at our table. They are a clever race & come in all shapes & sizes"

@MrsNuddering @RuthGeorge6 8. Diana was a Holocaust denier until very late in life and then was a revisionist (dear Hitler couldn't possibly have killed as many as 6 million").

So - "Heroes or villains?"

I mean, that's a tough one isn't it?

@MrsNuddering @RuthGeorge6 Look, to be fair, at no point did we see any signs advertising our chosen dog walking route as "Jew friendly" so you know, partly our fault. Happy to own some responsibility.

Talking of responsibility, here's the link to a perfectly nice, normal charity that is...

@MrsNuddering @RuthGeorge6 ....organising the illuminating talk:

helenstrust.org.uk/events/oswald-…

You might want to ask them WTAF they are doing.

And you might also want to ask @sheffielduni if they are happy that one of their emeritus (retired, honorary) professors is giving a talk with this title/slant?

@MrsNuddering @RuthGeorge6 @sheffielduni Personally, I'm now working on the basis that no one very much gives a f*ck about pretending much about anything these days.
And for those who are aware of the neo-Nazi grade anti-Jewish hate blossoming just a few miles up the road in @RuthGeorge6 's High Peak constituency..

@MrsNuddering @RuthGeorge6 @sheffielduni ...helped along by Ruth's own antisemitic views and friends, you might (like me) wonder what exactly is happening in rural parts of the UK like this.
I know @robertlargan is currently wondering something similar.

@MrsNuddering @RuthGeorge6 @sheffielduni @robertlargan And so ends just another everyday story of 2 Jews, a dog and virulent Jew-hate in the Derbyshire countryside.

Stay tuned for the next inevitable episode.

Ends.