As if they are living in a parallel universe

Ben Sixsmith has a nicely sarcastic piece in The Critic about opportunist attempts to stifle public discourse on the back of the murder of Sir David Amess. It is well worth reading the whole piece.

There is something about Twitter that makes it almost impossible to resist not only making but publicising snap judgements. As soon as news broke that Sir David Amess MP had been stabbed, online commentators were drawing conclusions. Some blamed incendiary verbiage from the left, such as Angela Rayner MP calling Conservatives “scum”. Others blamed the government, with former PCC Arfon Jones, saying “this is what happens” when you have a government that “sows hate”. No one, to be clear, knew what had happened.

Evidence that has emerged since, following Sir David’s tragic death, has not been kind to the “civility in politics” narrative. The killer is reported to have been Ali Harbi Ali, apparently the 25-year-old son of a former media spokesman for the Prime Minister of Somalia. The suspect had reportedly been referred to the government’s anti-radicalisation scheme Prevent and has been detained under terrorism legislation. This makes it unlikely, though not impossible, that he was radicalised by watching people argue about Brexit or lockdowns.

Somehow, journalists and politicians have maintained their initial narrative. It is as if they are living in a parallel universe where none of this news has been reported. Their discourse flows on, river-like, and nothing one hurls into it can make a difference.