European Parliament on Right-Wingers Banned From UK

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Lauren Southern



Lauren Cherie Southern (born 16 June 1995) is a Canadian far-right political activist, internet personality, and journalist. She has been described as alt-right, though she has claimed she is not alt-right in a video she created in response to another YouTube personality. In 2015, Southern ran as a Libertarian Party candidate in the Canadian federal election. She worked for The Rebel Media until March 2017. In addition, she has written for Spiked, the International Business Times, and The Libertarian Republic. Southern continues to work independently and publishes videos on YouTube.

In 2017, Southern supported the white identitarian group Defend Europe opposing the action of non-governmental organizations involved in search-and-rescue operations in the Mediterranean Sea. She was detained by the Italian Coast Guard for blocking a ship embarking on a search-and-rescue mission. In March 2018, she was questioned under the UK Terrorism Act and denied entry to Britain, because of her intentions during her March visit. She said she was "permanently banned" from the UK, though it was later confirmed she was refused entry for specific purposes only, not banned.

In July 2018, she went on a speaking tour of Australia and called for the country to be bombed, quoting the Bible, as a joke. In August 2018, her attempted speaking tour of New Zealand was unsuccessful. Auckland Council cancelled Southern's booking and blocked her from using its venues to "stir up ethnic or religious tensions".

Southern has been widely described as alt-right, far right and right-wing. She rejects the label "alt-right". The Southern Poverty Law Center has described Southern's videos as anti-feminist, xenophobic, Islamophobic, and borderline white nationalist. She is anti-multiculturalism and has called the Black Lives Matter movement a "terrorist organisation".

Southern is anti-multiculturalism. She has asked whether a multicultural society would require "witch doctors" at medical conferences, and has claimed that "multiculturalism will inevitably fail unless 50 per cent of the population believes in western culture". New Matilda reported that the core message of her 2018 speaking tour of Australia was that "multiculturalism doesn't work". On the tour, she caused controversy for publicly criticizing an "Asian only" room-share advert that she had photographed and published as evidence of the "extremely tribalistic" nature of immigrants; attempting to highlight the supposed failure of multiculturalism, in that it produced a form of "segregation".

In February 2018, Southern, along with Brittany Pettibone and Caolan Robertson, distributed flyers in the English town of Luton describing Allah as "gay".

In March 2018, Southern, Pettibone, and Pettibone's boyfriend, Martin Sellner, were all denied entry to the United Kingdom. Southern was also questioned under the Schedule 7 of the Terrorism Act 2000. Her denial of entry was due to her intentions during her March visit and on the same grounds as Pettibone and Sellner.

She said she was "permanently banned" from the UK. However, it was later confirmed she was instead refused entry for specific purposes only, and reports of her being banned were false.

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