The evidence is irrefutable. Jo Cox, UK Labour MP and anti-racist campaigner, was killed by a far right activist.

The killer, Thomas Mair, shouted “Britain First” as he shot and then stabbed Cox (Britain First is the name of a British right wing nationalist party). As he was arrested, he told police “I'm a political activist”. When Mair was asked to give his name in court, he said, “Death to traitors, freedom for Britain”. Asked a second time, he repeated the line.

If this weren’t proof enough, the Southern Poverty Law Centre in the USA revealed that Mair was a long term subscriber to material produced by the US fascist outfit National Alliance (NA). Receipted items purchased from the NA included Ich Kämpfe, an illustrated handbook issued to members of the Nazi party in 1942.

The Daily Telegraph (UK) reported that Mair was a paid-up supporter of the South African outfit White Rhino. White Rhino is a white supremacist organisation that laments the overthrow of apartheid and campaigns against all forms of multiculturalism and the “spread of Islam”. Members of Mair’s family have confirmed that he had long been interested in “white supremacy”.

Despite this mass of evidence, all discovered in the first 24 hours after Cox’s murder, the corporate press and the British establishment insist on introducing ambiguity to the issue.

The Daily Telegraph piece that revealed Mair’s connections to White Rhino was largely taken up with describing his mental health issues and his positive interactions with his neighbours. They described him as a “helpful bloke” who “helps local people with their gardens”. According to the Independent, “His own front garden was immaculate, his small lawn ‘like a bowling green’”.

The Daily Mail ran with the headline, “MPs alleged killer was a timid gardener dogged by years of mental turmoil”. The Independent claimed that “Mair’s motive is as yet unclear” and that “had this been any other story, you might have gone to Mr Mair for an embodiment of mild-mannered, but vulnerable decency”.

The judge at Mair’s initial hearing insisted that “he ought to be seen by a psychiatrist”. Nigel Farage, the leader of the right wing UK Independence Party (UKIP), described the murder as an act of “one man with serious mental health issues”, while PM David Cameron made vague statements about the “necessity of compassion” and “the importance of challenging hate”.

The real issue, namely the nature and strength of far right politics in the West, is being studiously avoided. Indeed, the self-declared political identification of the killer is dismissed as little more than the deranged ramblings of a madman or the online fantasy life of a loner.

Such leniency was not offered to the killers of the British soldier Lee Rigby in 2013. The two men who stabbed Rigby stated explicitly that they were avenging the deaths of Muslims killed by British soldiers overseas. Headlines the next day were sensational. The Sun, the Mirror and the Express declared the killers to be “terror fanatics”, “barbaric butchers” and “Muslim fanatics”.

No talk of mental turmoil. No interviews with sympathetic neighbours. No descriptions of the state of their lawns. No feel-good platitudes about prioritising love over hate. The whole affair reveals that there is one narrative for Muslims who commit political killings and another for white supremacists who do the same.

Why? Because the rise of the far right in the US and Europe is the direct result of conditions created by the ruling elite, and in many cases far right sentiment has been positively encouraged by the establishment’s anti-Muslim and anti-migrant rhetoric.

Such an atmosphere has fuelled the growth of right wing extremism and parties such as UKIP. For the British establishment to admit its role in the creation of figures such as Thomas Mair would be too much to bear. And so Mair is declared “mentally unwell”, and the violence and terror of his politics are downplayed.

Meanwhile, misery- and resentment-causing austerity policies are continued while the blame is put on “outsiders”, stoking ever more right wing bigotry that encourages violent acts against “traitors”.

If Jo Cox’s murder tells us anything, it is that the far right is dangerous. Fascist movements across Europe are already terrorising Muslims, migrants and refugees. They appeal to the frustrations of those who find no other way to express their political attitudes.

The movements that breed figures like Mair need to be challenged – both politically and on the streets. There are many who say that the fascists in countries like Australia are small and that protesting against them fuels their fire; if we ignore them they will go away. Others have said that the real fight is against the government and street protests against the fascists are a distraction. Such arguments are not only wrong; they are dangerous. We cannot give fascist movements the room to germinate.

In Australia the far right is numerically small but ambitious. It has a growing online presence. More seriously, is has also made a concerted attempt to build a movement on the streets over the last year. Fortunately, the fascists have been met with determined anti-fascist counter-demonstrations. Thousands of anti-racist, Aboriginal and leftist activists have stared down the fascists. We have stopped the far right from marching. We tore up their Islamophobic placards and called out their Nazism. We stood firm while partisan state police forces pepper sprayed and arrested us.

A strategy of ignoring them would simply allow them to build confidence. Challenging their hubris is a vital part of taking on nascent fascist movements both in Australia and across Europe. Ignoring them by claiming to focus on the broader political scene is tantamount to allowing them to grow.

Of course, challenging the Islamophobic and anti-migrant establishment consensus is vital – street marches for refugees, community organising in support of mosques and organising resistance to the reactionary policies of the major parties are all crucial. But it is also necessary to expose, resist and defeat the fascist fringe. The murder of Jo Cox is terrible proof of why they cannot be ignored.