Ian Dunt is editor of the popular political commentary site “politics.co.uk” and has written and for many other publications. He is mentioned most often for his work as political editor of the Erotic Review where he has written on pornography and the pornography regulator ATVOD. He is a political analyst for Yahoo where he covers the party political race and Brexit. Ian has also worked with Pink News where he wrote on gay rights and sexual crime stories until about 2008.
Ian studied journalism at the London School of Journalism, did an MA in international relations at Warick and graduated in Philosophy at UCL with a 2:1.
Asked whether he would ever stand as an MP himself he replied:
God no. I’d sooner turn to crime. And in fact that becomes a more compelling proposition the more I look at my tax returns.
The reason most MPs are so evidently psychologically damaged is that only someone who was psychologically damaged would ever consider doing the job
I am sure his reaction to his tax return is a very common one.
Ian is author of Brexit: What The Hell Happens Now described by Guido Fawkes as “lobbying MPs to obstruct a proper Brexit”. He explained to Guido that he favours a “super-soft Brexit, with the UK joining EFTA and staying in the EEA” a position not dissimilar to many who are much more vocally eurosceptic than Ian. He continues to make TV appearances in places like the BBC, Sky and Al Jazeera taking the position of the pro-EU participant.
As the editor of a politics website he made the startling admission that “I have a tendency to get lost in the reasoning without first having established the basic parameters of the question.” Fortunately he was only talking about getting lost in the jungle in Chile, not the political analysis which I know he does very well. Indeed I was impressed with how Ian was able to reel-off well-considered analysis with no more than 4 hours notice. He stood in for James Bloodworth on our Causes of the Cost of Living Crisis panel event. His very welcome intervention has meant his face is a permanent fixture on libertarianhome.co.uk, albeit next to someone else’s name.
Ian is back to talk about the reception Tim Farron was met with as leader of the Liberal Democrats. Ian described Farron’s voting record on the issue as fairly decent. During the 2017 election it became clear Farron was not personally comfortable with the idea of homosexual sex. Ian wonders whether such strictly private views still have a place in our liberal society – and whether it would be a good idea if they did.
Ian will explore the details of the Farron story, our culture of free-speech and free-thought, and discuss the implications for other kinds of private belief at the Two Chairmen, Westminster on Thursday.
Libertarian Home 
Either the law of the European Union is the law inside the United Kingdom or it is not – those who pretend that the “Single Market” is just about international trade are not telling the truth. It is the legal claim of the European Union to govern this land with its laws. Mrs Thatcher found that is out the hard way – she had been promised (many times) that the “Single Market” was about free trade, and then found it was really a political project to impose European Union law inside this land.
As for pornography – governments have historically justified censorship powers they really want for political reasons on sexual morality grounds.
Cato the Elder played this game in Ancient Rome – ironically following the tactics of the old Greek philosopher Plato, even though Cato the Elder pretended to despise Greek philosophers – even while he pushed the Legal Positivism (the legislative state) of the late Greek world.
In England Prime Minister Walpole showed Parliament a terrible play (he had it performed before them) – a play that was utterly vile and encouraged murder and rape.
Prime Minister Walpole forgot to mention that he was the person who had the play written – he, of course, wanted the power of censorship for political reasons (using concern over public morals as a mask).
LikeLike