OPINION-Political class- Leave wildlife matters out of your divisive agenda
In recent weeks there has been intensive media coverage and related social media discussion concerning a video alleging swans being “eaten by migrants” and a short clip of an RSPCA inspector supposedly catching them in the act.
The genesis of this clip appears to be from posts from an organisation called “Turning Point UK”- an organisation started in the US which in itself has come under frenzied recent discussion concerning the assassination of one of its founders there. These appear to have been started in June, and yet only recently have they seen viral spread with eye watering views from the clickbait headline.
Nearly 2 million views!
The video itself at just over a minute can be viewed below, but I will give my take on this matter unbiased, and then detail my own experiences of issues over the last 28 years that I have been rescuing wildfowl and reach a conclusion about the allegations and this video and those promoting it.
I am aware of this clip and the programme it was from called “Animal Squad” being many years old, even before that was actually confirmed by the RSPCA themselves as 2010. This is Inspector Herchy Boal, for many years I know based in The West Midlands and from where this clip is from. She later appeared in other programmes such as The Dog Rescuers and has been an RSPCA inspector for at least 20+ years. THOSE ARE FACTS.
The full episode of this from which the short is taken can be viewed below for context, as that is important. This is from Series 1 Episode 4, but that video header also unfortunately claims “cooked swan”- which is part perhaps of the problem of memory as I will prove in this post. This video was not posted by the RSPCA, but by an apparently anonymous individual with their own made up title- I would also claim for clickbait as are many youtube videos to hit certain algorithms if you know anything about that.
In terms of this video, as well as the short shared by Turning Point UK it appears that a member of the public claimed that a family of individuals stole two swans from an unnamed park in Birmingham and took them home. It is unclear as to how the RSPCA arrived at the precise moment that this bird was allegedly being cooked with a camera crew in tow. That is also edited footage.
This is the first thing that I have a problem with, and the context of the heavily edited video story on the programme, the RSPCA have no right of entry– None and that is a fact. There are no police officers shown in the clips, so I would ask were they there off camera and on what grounds the RSPCA were questioning these people and whether this should have been under caution in the appropriate manner not on camera. To me this casual approach appears more like Gordon Ramsey visiting a kitchen and asking questions of the chef. It is to my mind absolutely bizarre television. I can see in this case as to why many people comment as though something does not seem right with this.
The actual “evidence” is not strong at all, and hence concern has to be issued about whether reasonable suspicion thresholds were met and if they were, then why did the inspector leave without apparently taking any forensic evidence? WAS ANY TAKEN- THE VIDEO DOES NOT EXPLAIN? She appears to take a birds head with her, but not in any labelled evidence bag, more like one you would get from a takeaway!
The three pictures above offer comparisons, and I have turned the video right side on which can easily solve this riddle, and the dead bird in question is certainly not a mute swan. The beak is longer in a swan, and also note the lack of concave upper bill, where as look at the same length of the beak for an Embden goose and the distinctive concave in the bill of that species.
I would state that some people that have called me in the past talk of “injured swans” which turn out to be geese, and I have also made calls to the RSPCA national Control Centre to report injured geese, only for the operator to then read back I had said swan. It may be the case that that happened in this case, and the inspector had been given the wrong information.
There clearly was evidence of something in the pot and white feathers- though this is not “proof” that this was even a bird in the pot and the white feathers could have been from a domestic goose or even Aylesbury duck.
I defy anyone to tell me that the picture above is of a swan- there is simply no proof of that. That is where DNA evidence should have been taken, the pot seized there and then along with the feathers. Did Inspector Boal actually have a warrant? Why was this evidence not seized under those circumstances and the individuals cautioned?
What is not accurate is the claim that “RSPCA worker catches migrants eating swans “. That is simply disinformation, and a total lie- she clearly did not. This organisation, Turning Point UK having put their own logo on a video which is not in their own copyright then anchor this false claim with “Why are these people in Britain?” Clearly they have an pre-loaded agenda and are using false narratives to achieve that aim.
And it appears to have worked for them in terms of views and no doubt monetisation if they have that. Unfortunately, I have come across many people who remember this clip and not only believe that the individuals were caught cooking a swan, but that it somehow is endemic in the UK, something which also is not validated with much direct evidence. In psychology this misremembering is known as “The Mandela Effect. “
What TPUK have done with this is to deliberately create a myth to serve their own purposes for purely political reasons. Typically it also invites racist commentators whose acumen and insight add wonders to the level of ignoramus discussion.
They then knock up memes, again so that their useful idiot followers can share that disinformation.
This is not the first time that garbage like this has been printed and promoted. The Sun newspaper in 2003 printed their “swan bake” front page headline with similar unfounded accusations. This also serves as a cue for people to add to the pot with their own ideas and misconceptions. It is not that well known that on this story they fell fault of the Editors Code and printed a rather buried clarification in a later edition.
Other social media posts have taken clips and pictures which also cannot be verified as to what is happening in them, but they are also used for similar purposes.
Perhaps one can conclude that the programme makers of Animal Squad themselves were just looking for sensationalist angles, but this one has merely served to hinder animal welfare investigation and rescue rather than help it.
THE CHANGING SUSPECT FACE AND THE URBAN MYTH
Originally, the claimed suspect swan eaters were “Eastern Europeans” and in particular Polish migrants who in large numbers appear to unfortunately enjoy fishing. There are many stories of fish being stolen, but these also appear to be largely anecdotal with British anglers at the front of the allegations. I am aware that illegal fishing and poaching and transfer of fish is rife and that many people I have seen or know have done this are not Eastern European but British. I have found many fyke traps which are used to catch crayfish, some are illegal and some are placed by the EA.
It is important to distinguish the difference between “migrant” and illegal immigrant , something which TPUK cannot appear to do. Migrants came here in large numbers as a result of free EU movement, and this was badly managed by the then Labour Government. Illegal immigrants who break the law and come to this country on boats from safe EU NATO France in my opinion should be deported immediately and never given entry into the UK. On that matter I would agree with TPUK. But it appears to suggest that this new wave of immigrants are now at the centre of the accusations regards the old RSPCA video.
There is a well known urban myth which goes something like this. Person A is on a bus ride home, when person B asks them for change. Person A gives them the money, and then getting off the bus person B says in an aside “you helped me, so I helped you. Stay out of “X” city on “X” date. ” The connotation is that person B knows and is hinting that a terrorist atrocity will be committed in that location on that date. Person B used to be Irish in the 1970’s, but then morphed into Arab or Muslim in the 2000’s. The story never happened and is made up bullshit, and yet people still believe this garbage is true.
MY OWN EXPERIENCES BASED ON 28 YEARS OF WILDFOWL RESCUE.
I have two examples of real events where non British individuals were involved or accused of eating swans. In the first case I knew of a swan on a park that stayed as a juvenile into adulthood. On one day the swan was not present. Three days later I found a bin bag of feathers, and a separate bag containing a swans head, in tact, but with a cleaved off beak. The carcass had clearly been stripped of meat and this bird had not been predated by an animal. I called the RSPCA and the police and both came out with scenes of crime forensics. In the one bag amongst the rubbish I found a train/tram ticket from a station in Prague dated two weeks earlier. No one was ever caught for this, but on the balance of probabilities the evidence pointed strongly towards someone from the Czech Republic being responsible. I would stress that it was a one off incident.
In case 2 the allegation was that a swan was seen being put in a bag by two men who went to a house. The swan on this park did disappear and was never seen again. It was claimed by the witness who spoke little English that they were Eastern European. This house was a children’s care home in a semi detached house. The police were slow to visit but did so but found no evidence or so they claimed. One child was in the house but the care provider was a rubbish business provider of “care” as I looked up this at the time, as well as carrying out surveillance on the property myself as to who was coming and going. The witness would not give evidence and so it went no further.
In contrast, I see the depravity of the English white working class and their activities every single week harming widlfowl. Of course angling is the most destructive of these, and then of course the wanton vandalism with weapons that should be banned if the political class could be bothered or really cared about wildlife.
What made the TPUK story appear to soar is that Nigel Farage passed some comment on swans and then the “fact checkers” of the left started to seize on this as is their obsession with the political divisiveness and no interest in the issue themselves. I have no time for Farage because he is pro hunting and is not interested in wildfowl. On the other hand I have frequently pointed out that Labour are not “the party of animal welfare” as they like to self style themselves. They are continuity Conservatism and cull keepers , and of course started their own in Sandwell which was exposed.
Do not any of these smug bastards try to tell me that they care about wildlife when they have failed to ever stop hunting when in power, only as the monster Blair deliberately only partially banned hunting with dogs by design so it could continue. Recently we have seen David Lammy attempting to “steal” fish- he had no rod licence, and so under the Theft Act he was committing this offence, and yet he got let off by The Environment Agency.
Hypocrites, liars, in it for themselves, this is the politician of the UK who will use anything and everything to promote something by pointing over there at something else. If you cannot see it for what it is and question the integrity of the evidence then they will keep on stirring the pot with you in it.