Laurence Fox slammed after saying attitudes to Putin were ‘devoid of nuance or debate’

Outspoken actor Laurence Fox has sparked controversy over comments made about people’s attitudes on Vladimir Putin, describing them as “devoid of nuance or debate”.

The controversial commentator regularly crusades against “woke” culture and this time has criticised people for supporting Ukraine’s president Volodymyr Zeleknsky and for hoping Russia’s leader is unsuccessful.

He compared the hope for Putin to fail in his war against Ukraine as the equivalent of saying “Hands face space” during the deadly pandemic.

While quote tweeting a post from Downing Street condemning Putin, Fox posted his bizarre comparisons, also claiming people view Zelensky as the new Churchill and accused such views of being “so binary and simplistic”.

He wrote: “‘Putin must fail’ is the new ‘Hands face space.’ Shut up and don’t think for yourself.

“Zelensky is the new Churchill! This is the belief you must hold now, or else. It’s all so binary and simplistic, devoid of nuance or debate.”

Fox’s conflation of the two very separate issues has puzzled many. Others have also questioned why anyone would think differently about wanting Putin to be unsuccessful in his bloody war against Ukraine.

Comedian David Baddiel tweeted: “Equating the hope that a murderous dictator's genocidal ambitions will fail with one of the Government's Covid jingles is the opposite of nuanced.

“It's a random yoking together of two things, demonstrative only of the immensely exhausted brand of ‘dude who thinks differently.’”

Sign up to our new free Indy100 weekly newsletter

Someone else commented: “*sees a maternity hospital being bombed* ‘time for some nuance, methinks’.”

Another person questioned: “Not sure how complex and nuanced you need to make a foreign invasion into a sovereign state and the persistent and ongoing committal of war crimes.

“I mean, how do you, ‘both sides" that?”

Fox is not the only public figure to spout views that could be considered as being apologetic towards Russia's actions. Recently, the moments Nigel Farage has expressed pro-Putin views resurfaced. Former President Donald Trump has also claimed he "got along" with the Russian leader.

The Independent has a proud history of campaigning for the rights of the most vulnerable, and we first ran our Refugees Welcome campaign during the war in Syria in 2015. Now, as we renew our campaign and launch this petition in the wake of the unfolding Ukrainian crisis, we are calling on the government to go further and faster to ensure help is delivered. To find out more about our Refugees Welcome campaign, click here. To sign the petition click here. If you would like to donate then please click here for our GoFundMe page.

Have your say in our news democracy. Click the upvote icon at the top of the page to help raise this article through the indy100 rankings.