BNP going Asian?

Lancaster Unity: Of Barnbrook, his cream carpets and the mystery of the twenty year-old DNA...

It turns out that the British National Party man who got voted onto the London Assembly has cream carpets and a shoes-off policy in his home.

For those of you who are not British, the British National Party are a far-right group with a Neo-Nazi history who are totally opposed to immigration. I think they are a blight on this nation. They really leave a bad taste in the mouth.

It seems odd that somebody who is against immigration should be adopting a custom that is being brought into this country by Asian and East European immigrants.

I used to be very right-wing in my views. I used to be critical of immigration and a litle xenophobic. To my shame, I once had a friendly conversation with some BNP activists. Then when I found that having a shoes-off rule made sense, I began to think that maybe immigration might be a good thing. If foreigners had excellent customs like removing shoes at the door, maybe muliticulturalism was a good thing.

So a BNP man has a shoes-off policy. So do millions of Chinese people, millions of Indian people, so do Black Muslims, so do New Agers and environmentalists, so do some Jehovah's Witnesses and some Roman Catholics, so do Polish plumbers. So does a Fundamentalist Christian in Worcester who is a member of the Conservative party.

This blog is all about diversity and celebrating it. Removing shoes is a custom practiced all over the world by many different cultures. And it is a great one. The people who read this blog and agree with shoes-off may have very different ideas about a lot of things, but we all believe in treating homes with respect. And that means treating people with respect too.