Any British person who has a foreign-born parent will feel their status is more precarious after the court of appeal decision
The court of appeal ruled this morning that Shamima Begum had been lawfully deprived of her British citizenship. The 24-year-oldās citizenship was first revoked in 2019. She challenged that decision at a special immigration appeals commission last year, and lost. This latest ruling might represent the end of her hope to return home, although given the young womanās circumstances ā all three of her children have died, she lives in a refugee camp they call the āmini caliphateā, and is thought of only periodically by her countrymen in order to be pilloried then forgotten again ā it would be foolish to try to guess at her levels of resilience or despair.
The judges were careful to stress that the ruling didnāt represent any comment on the sympathy or otherwise it was reasonable to have for Begum ā rather, that there was nothing unlawful in Sajid Javidās deprivation decision. The ruling hadnāt failed to take into account that Begum had been groomed and trafficked, which would have put it in breach of the UKās anti-slavery protections, and was the contention of her appeal.
Itās hard to conceive of what grooming and trafficking mean, if not what happened to Begum, painstakingly documented by Josh Baker in his podcast documentary last year, Shamima Begum ā Return from Isis. She left the UK aged 15, and her lawyers highlighted numerous failings of the state ā Begumās school, the Met police, Tower Hamlets council ā that even allowed her to get as far as Turkey. Her entry into Syria was reportedly partly facilitated by an informant for Canadian intelligence, so the state failings go beyond even our own.
You call her a victim of grooming, they call her a potential terrorist threat. Itās not a ācaticatureā of the story. Some fuckups are unforgivable. Going to a different country to join a terrorist org is one of such fuckups.
The really cool part is how in a shorter than you think amount of time theyāll use this precedent to apply a new definition of āterroristā to people who never left the country, then āterroristā will get broader and broader. āThose communist socialist scum are terrorizing our voting booths.ā
When protection from the government only applies to citizens and the government finds acceptable ways to turn citizens into non-citizens with easily malleable definitionsā¦
Then youāve got yourself a fascist stew going.
Like when Obama assassinated that US citizen (who was a massive piece of shit btw) overseas openly and nobody really bitched.
The really cool part of this is that the law has been in effect for 40 years. Yet nothing on the slippery slope you doomsay about happened. The gov website says around 20 people get hit by it every year. Another 20 for fraud charges. Yet it hasnāt been a problem. There is the appeals court for it. The only reason we talk about this is that a tale of a āpoor innocent child being stolen away from the UK returning and being denied citizenshipā sounds great for clickbait in a ānewsā article.
The reality is, she went to join ISIS willingly. Now she is paying the price for it.
It can be both. I worked briefly in youth work and young offender institutes. Some young people were simultaneously fucking terrifying and dangerous, while also wheeling and dealing like a Kray twin crossed with Del Boy (a 12 year old kid who carried 5 mobile phones - all stolen - for different ābusiness purposesā comes to my mind).
Doesnāt mean they arenāt victims as well and doesnāt mean they should be treated as adult criminals.
I donāt particularly care about the most granular definition of āterrorismā in the context of the wide definition of āchild abuseā.
It isnāt a āgranularā definition - read her wiki page. She stitched suicide vests, so they couldnāt remove the explosives without going āboomā. She enforced āmoralityā laws. She carried an AK with her. She was regarded as an enforcer. She tried to recruit other girls into ISIS.
She got lured into joining by watching beheading videos and the luxuries of living as a terrorist. She literally said āI still hold āsomeā of the UKās valuesā. She didnāt regret going to Syria. She excused terrorist attacks. She excused rape in ISIS. She has no remorse for what she did while there.
This is a textbook case of a law working. The only difference between her, and other people deprived of citizenship for similar things, is that she has a PR agency.
Does the UK also revoke citizenship of anyone with a long family history in the country if they do similar things? I canāt fathom taking citizenship away but Iām here in the US where cops just kill you or you get railroaded into jail whether youāre guilty or not (but hey youāre still a citizenā¦that canāt vote ever again)
Yeah, it does, since the UK law states that they can take away your citizenship if they think itās beneficial for the community (i.e. when you are a threat, when you are a terrorist).
Why isnāt jail sufficient?
Because she was part of the morality police, has sewn suicide vests on people so they couldnāt take the explosives out without detonating and because she feels no remorse and actually excuses terrorism and rape.