Kelvin MacKenzie is a loudmouth, a bully and political thug. For years, during the 80s and early 90s MacKenzie edited the populist, Tory rag, the Sun. He was responsible for the gloating headline “Gotcha” after a British submarine killed 1,200 young Argentinian soldiers and sailors by sinking an old warship, the Belgrano, which was steaming away from the Falkland Islands during the 1982 war.
MacKenzie commented, “The fact that the enemy were killed to my mind was a bloody good thing and I’ve never had a moment’s loss of sleep over it.”
MacKenzie has probably never lost a night’s sleep in his life. Even after his paper blamed Liverpool fans after 96 supporters died in the Hillsborough nightmare in 1989. He clearly revels in his notoriety.
MacKenzie’s Sun regularly taunted Labour leaders. For example, before the 1983 election the Sun printed an unflattering picture of 70-year-old Labour leader Michael Foot alongside the headline, “Do You Really Want This Old Fool To Run Britain?” The Sun backed the Tories and supported Thatcher against the miners during the 1984-5 strike. Now Kelvin MacKenzie has turned his nasty, bigoted mind to attacking Channel 4’s news journalist, Fatima Manji.
Manji covered the 14 July Islamist attack in Nice, France, which left 84 people dead. MacKenzie questioned whether it was “appropriate” for Manji – a Muslim who covers her hair — to be on camera, “when there had been yet another shocking slaughter by a Muslim”. MacKenzie wrote, “With all the major terrorist outrages in the world currently being carried out by Muslims, I think the rest of us are reasonably entitled to have concerns about what is beating in their religious hearts. Who is in the studio representing our fears? Nobody.”
MacKenzie is explicitly inciting hatred against all Muslims, irrespective of their political beliefs, apparently slandering all Muslims as sharing some responsibility for the Islamist attacks. Fatima Manji accused MacKenzie of trying to “intimidate Muslims out of public life.” Channel 4 News has described his comments as, “offensive, completely unacceptable, and arguably tantamount to inciting religious and even racial hatred”.
