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Right-wing Donald Trump supporter Milo Yiannopoulos banned from speaking at former school in Kent by extremism unit

Milo Yiannopoulos, the far-right controversialist accused of fomenting hate speech, has been blocked from speaking at his old school after a government anti-extremist unit intervened.

He had been due to speak at the Simon Langton Grammar School for Boys in Canterbury on Tuesday, but the school has since cancelled the talk.

The decision was reportedly made after the school discussed the visit with the Department for Education’s counter-extremism unit.

 Yiannopoulos, 32, has equated Islam with rape culture and has been accused of harrassing a black actress online.

He is an editor of the Breitbart news site and a vocal supporter of Donald Trump.

Writing on Facebook, Yiannopoulos claimed that the school had been “bullied” into cancelling his talk.

“Who even knew the DoE (sic) had a counter-extremism unit?,” he asked. “And that it wasn’t set up to combat terrorism but rather to punish gays with the wrong opinions? Perhaps if I’d called the speech “MUSLIMS ARE AWESOME!” they’d have left us alone. Disgusted.”

A DfE spokeswoman said: “When concerns are raised by members of the public following media coverage in advance of an event, the department would contact the school as a matter of routine to check they had considered any potential issues.

“The decision to cancel the event was a matter for the school.”

The school in Canterbury, Kent said it was “disappointed that both the pastoral care and intellectual preparation we offer to our students has been called into question”.

A spokesman said: “This decision was taken following contact from the DfE counter extremism unit, the threat of demonstrations at the school by organised groups and members of the public and our overall concerns for the security of the school site and the safety of our community.

“We note that, within 24 hours of advertising the event, 220 Langton sixth formers had, with parental consent, signed up for the event and that objection to our hosting Mr Yiannopoulos came almost entirely from people with no direct connection to The Langton. The staff and students of the school were overwhelmingly in favour.

“Whilst disappointed that both the pastoral care and intellectual preparation we offer to our students has been called into question, we at The Langton remain committed to the principle of free speech and open debate and will resist, where possible, all forms of censorship.”

Yiannopoulos
Yiannopoulos Credit: rex features

Roger Gough, Kent Council’s cabinet member for education, said that the cancellation was “up to the school”, but that in general he favoured allowing those with “unsavoury” views to be challenged.

“Direct sunlight is sometimes the best disinfectant,” he said. “I’ve met some of the students and they are very bright and capable young people. I’m sure (Milo) would not be in for an easy night,” he said.

In July, Yiannopoulos was suspended from Twitter following a flurry of abuse towards Ghostbusters actor Leslie Jones which he helped lead.

Jones, 48, announced she would quit close down her account on Monday after retweeting and sharing several abusive tweets.

She told her 250,000 followers: “I leave Twitter tonight with tears and a very sad heart. All this cause I did a movie. You can hate the movie but the s— I got today…wrong.”

“We know many people believe we have not done enough to curb this type of behavior on Twitter. We agree,” Twitter said in the statement.

“We are continuing to invest heavily in improving our tools and enforcement systems to better allow us to identify and take faster action on abuse as it’s happening and prevent repeat offenders.”

Jones shared some of the racist tweets targeted toward her, many of which compared her to an ape. User YellowArmedImposter wrote, “Your Ghostbusters isn’t the first to have an ape in it,” which Jones shared with the comment: “I just don’t understand.”

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2016/11/21/school-cancels-talk-far-right-trump-cheerleader-milo-yiannopoulos/

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