All about retaliation

Mr Maurice Mizzi confessed that he doesn't read my column regularly. Nor, of course, is he an avid consumer of the blog I produce, sporadically as is the custom in the blogosphere, in the virtual edition of this estimable component of the media.

So it was with some tardiness that Mr Mizzi penned some responses to my earlier (quite a bit earlier, actually) reaction of mine to a previous effort of his to outline his (final?) solution to the problem of illegal immigration. For a man who doesn't read my stuff regularly, Mr Mizzi betrayed a certain degree of familiarity with my oeuvre, referring, as he did, to what he imagined was my ridiculing of him for leaving a football match early.

To be perfectly honest, I don't remember extracting the Mike from Mr Mizzi in any way other than - probably - a fondly mild ribbing after that famous match when Manchester United did for Bayern in the last minutes of the Barcelona final. I had had the pleasure of being at the match and I recall a few chaps of my acquaintance lamenting that they had left the ground a bit early, thereby missing the drama.

Whether I actually mentioned this Mr Mizzi by name (there was another Mizzi there, who kindly gave me a lift after the match, and I'm not at all sure it wasn't to him that I was referring, if I referred to a Mizzi at all) or not, I really don't know but I do know that I meant no personal affront. Quite the contrary, in fact.

So, if Mr Maurice Mizzi felt affronted by that long-passed mention, I hereby grovel at his (no doubt) well-shod feet and beg his forgiveness.

On the other hand, I request no such indulgence in connection with my less temporally distant references to Mr Mizzi. Not to put too fine a point on it, a phrase which I find myself using a bit too much at the moment, so I'll try to stop, I found the solutions (or lack thereof) proposed by Mr Mizzi to what he referred to as the problem of illegal immigration to be unworthy of a gentleman of his ilk.

And I found his responses to my sallies equally unsatisfactory.

I was saddened to learn that, during the war, Mr Mizzi suffered significant tribulations, as did so many others, but the relevance of this to his attitude towards immigrants from the south is, I'm afraid, lost in the mists of incoherence that so often afflict those who try to propose a solution to a problem that exists very much in their point of departure.

Let me translate the last part of the previous paragraph: illegal immigration is a problem but it is a problem that needs solution in the way the "stop them on the beaches" brigade want to solve it because the immigrants are perceived as unwanted aliens.

If, on the other hand, they were to be seen as human beings who need compassion and genuine help, rather than segregation and grudging charity, people like me, who detest racism in all its forms, would have less cause for concern.

Mr Mizzi, sadly for this country, can take comfort in the fact that many, many commenters (as in the people who comment under articles like this) are far, far more racist than he. In fact, I'd go as far as to say that Mr Mizzi is probably not racist at all, merely unguarded in the way he writes, but the people who spew out their racist venom whenever they get the chance to do so are racist, no ifs, no buts, no maybes.

If you don't believe me, have a look at the comments under the story about a comment a magistrate recently made to a couple of immigrants who saw fit to resort to fisticuffs. The judicial comment was mildly injudicious, it is true, but the comments that welcomed (and misinterpreted) it were revolting, pure and simple.

Also finding me in his cross-hairs was Lino Farrugia, indefatigable champion of the huntin' and trappin' brotherhood.

In his inimitable fashion, Mr Farrugia lashed out with vim and vigour, blithely ignoring the harm his sort of ranting does to the interests of his constituents.

Have the FKNK not got the point, yet? We, the people, are fed up with the way that every time someone dares to point out that hunting is not the greatest thing since sliced bread people like Mr Farrugia start screaming and shouting and getting all emotional, to say nothing of resorting to personal insult and, in the case of various thugs (and, here, I categorically exclude Mr Farrugia) violence and sheer disregard of the law.

Does Mr Farrugia really think that by committing the most blatant of outrages of invoking personal tragedy (suicide) and placing the responsibility for this at the door of the anti-hunting lobby he is doing anything but harm to his cause?

imbocca@gmail.com, www.timesofmalta.com/blogs