Just not good. Read in The Independent that the B*N*P think the Tories are moving too close to them...

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Apparently Nick G thinks that Michael H's asylum policies will take votes from his party as they are one and the same.

You know, this bigoted, racist asylum nonsense that has erupted over here has never made me more ashamed to be British.

― CRW (CRW), Monday, 21 February 2005 14:02 (twenty years ago)

i wish people would vote BNP instead of tories.

― ken c (ken c), Monday, 21 February 2005 14:04 (twenty years ago)

At times I see little difference.

― CRW (CRW), Monday, 21 February 2005 14:07 (twenty years ago)

This is old news, though surely. One of the reasons the en eff lost a lot of ground electorally in the late '70's - early '80's was b/c basically they were losing supporters/voters to thatcher.

― Pashmina (Pashmina), Monday, 21 February 2005 14:10 (twenty years ago)

The thing that worries me is that I've discovered increasing levels of casual bigotry, even among young people, in regards to this issue. All influenced by the hysteria of the media. This country is getting appallingly racist.

― CRW (CRW), Monday, 21 February 2005 14:13 (twenty years ago)

would you say that the country is more racist now than in the 70s?

― ilkleylido (gareth), Monday, 21 February 2005 14:15 (twenty years ago)

OTM CRW, attitutdes to the small amount of immigration to this country are so warped especially as emmigration is so popular.

― Ed (dali), Monday, 21 February 2005 14:16 (twenty years ago)

(Thread de-indexed, just in case)

― Matt DC (Matt DC), Monday, 21 February 2005 14:18 (twenty years ago)

It's a different kind of racism nowadays. There seems often to be the assuption that assimilated people of other races: just fine, they're just like us; non-assimilated people of other races get the racism, both casual and active, that was more blanket in previous years. A discerning racist is still a racist though and I get the feeling we haven't really moved on all that much.

― Ed (dali), Monday, 21 February 2005 14:19 (twenty years ago)

The amount of people i previously considered intelligent friends saying things like "too many pakis in the country", "Keep them all out" e.t.c

it's shocking.

― Hari A$hur$t (Toaster), Monday, 21 February 2005 14:20 (twenty years ago)

I remember this girl telling me how evil all these people coming to the country to live off OUR benefit system were (and garbled some rubbish about how they can make thousands, according to The Mail or some such rubbish) all the while telling me she intented to move to Holland eventually.

It's ok for her, mind, she's white.

― CRW (CRW), Monday, 21 February 2005 14:21 (twenty years ago)

would you say that the country is more racist now than in the 70s?

i say generally less - but incidents of racism and/or xenophobia or supposed racism are scrutinised and sensationalised more these days as a result it seems.

so far this thread seems too 'i just want to make it clear i disapprove of this attitude' as if people have to prove this to the ILX readership (how jolly decent of you!), but the way right-wing motions concerned with the immigration issue are instantly dismissed as 'racist' and bigoted concerns me also. there are surely deeper, wider factors to take note of that have resulted in them arriving at the conclusions they have. doesn't anyone ask WHY they make these misconceptions about ethnic minorities, 'asylum seekers' etc. and WHY do these feelings STILL exist in the UK in 2005? - where the reasoning comes from etc. - they may well be illogical or ill-founded, but it's those misconceptions that must be tackled, instead of just hurling insults back at the racists and xenophobes.

― Sven Bastard (blueski), Monday, 21 February 2005 14:35 (twenty years ago)

I would say it comes from a misguided Little Englander attempt to "protect" indigenious identity, or what they know as the norm. It's an attitude as old as the hills. We can see it even now with the fox hunting debate ("It's OUR way of life")

I don't need to prove to anyone my feeling on this subject, thank you, if you look through my history of posts I've always made my feelings on racism/ homophobia/ misogyny explicit. It is just that some fail to listen.

― CRW (CRW), Monday, 21 February 2005 14:42 (twenty years ago)

basically 'the public mind' seems to lump in asylum seekers and economic migrants believes that they take away taxpayers' money, and are often engaged in criminal acts.

this is different from 70s racism, which seems to have been much more fixated on 'racial' characteristics, and was also about people 'coming over here and taking our jobs'.

there's a trace of this in the angst about 'diluting' communities and the fragmentation of what britain is about, but what's going on now is not 'racism' of the old sort: much of the phobia is about 'albanian gangsters' and the like. it's more like the common hatred towards travellers/gypsies, and there's far less of the old 'end of empire' anxiety and white-supremacism.

fighting racism is one thing, but just saying everyone with a concern about this is 'racist' doesn't help, doesn't win any minds. you have to make the argument.

― NRQ, Monday, 21 February 2005 14:44 (twenty years ago)

Channel 4 did a documentary on Nigerians kidnapping kids for prostitution didn't they? But they cancelled it because they were worried the B_NP might use it in their favour?

What was the general reaction to this?

― CRW (CRW), Monday, 21 February 2005 14:48 (twenty years ago)

It is just that some fail to listen.

or they listen but find it amusing to wind you up about it. no use preaching to the converted.

― Sven Bastard (blueski), Monday, 21 February 2005 14:50 (twenty years ago)

Calum, if you are being genuine about these issues then the reason people don't take you seriously is because every other thread you post sounds like you're taking the piss.

― dog latin (dog latin), Monday, 21 February 2005 14:52 (twenty years ago)

I think by now you know the issues that upset me. Racism/ animal experimentation/ sexual violence towards women... that sort of thing.

― CRW (CRW), Monday, 21 February 2005 14:55 (twenty years ago)

what about non-sexual violence towards women?

― NRQ, Monday, 21 February 2005 14:59 (twenty years ago)

I think any violence or derogatory attitude towards women is indefensible.

Comical sexism on a message board, however, where various people treat it was the cannon of offensiveness and get wound up = hilarious.

― CRW (CRW), Monday, 21 February 2005 15:00 (twenty years ago)

please leave you howible bigot

― Sven Bastard (blueski), Monday, 21 February 2005 15:15 (twenty years ago)

But if one minute you're trying to wind people up and next minute you're trying to make a serious point, then how are they supposed to know you're not crying wolf?

― dog latin (dog latin), Monday, 21 February 2005 15:24 (twenty years ago)

I wouldn't mind so much about emogration if it wasn't for all the darkies and pakis taking are great british birds. It appals me when you see a fit young bird with a great spade walking down the high street hand in hand.

― Racist Rick, Monday, 21 February 2005 15:30 (twenty years ago)

i think racism or sexism is okay as long as you say you were only joking afterwards.

― ken c (ken c), Monday, 21 February 2005 15:34 (twenty years ago)

i hate it when emo kids get to snog the pretty indie girls. :(

― ken c (ken c), Monday, 21 February 2005 15:35 (twenty years ago)

Those damn emos stealing our taxes!!!!

― dog latin (dog latin), Monday, 21 February 2005 15:37 (twenty years ago)

I think I went to school with Racist Rick.

― alix (alix), Monday, 21 February 2005 15:46 (twenty years ago)

It's ok for her, mind, she's white.

As are, of course, the largest groups of immigrants to the UK by nationality - the single largest group is former emigrants returning to the UK, and behind them are the Australians, Canadians and Kiwis.

― caitlin (caitlin), Monday, 21 February 2005 16:33 (twenty years ago)

Racists = scum, needless to say. I don't think that is the issue. But then I also wouldn't say that phobias about the likes of "Albanian Gangsters" as mentioned above are misplaced at all. These men exist. Their presence is neither deserved nor warranted nor welcome. These kind of people are neither political refugees nor valid economic migrants. For whatever reason, they find themselves in London, disappear among 10 million people into the Albanian/Moldovan/whatever community of dodgy blokes and disappear into an existence of doing the same dodgy things to survive that they would back home. It's what they know. I have lived in eastern Europe and I know well how these things operate. Sure, I would love to see a system in which these people could be integrated positively and get out of that rut, and do something useful. That is what integration and assimilation truly means.

And for the record, my own family are immigrants and assimilated well. It took time but it hasn't negated who we are and what we were.

― darren (darren), Monday, 21 February 2005 18:21 (twenty years ago)

Darren OTM - the more the genuine (and tiny) criminal element of immigrants is rooted out, the harder it will be for racists like Nick G and less right-wing but still dangerous ppl like Richard L to argue from the particular to the general and talk about "those immigrants" as if all immigrants were a problem. I think that sometimes in our effeorts to be fair and inclusive, we end up denying the existence of Albanian gangsters and the like, playing into the hands of the extreme right-wingers.

― MarkH (MarkH), Monday, 21 February 2005 19:46 (twenty years ago)

Whatabout the tory attitude of "we have to be a little bit racist to keep votes from going to the BNP" ?

― mark grout (mark grout), Tuesday, 22 February 2005 17:02 (twenty years ago)

I've never come across that one, I must admit.

― Pashmina (Pashmina), Tuesday, 22 February 2005 17:06 (twenty years ago)

Admittedly, I hugely paraphrase.

― mark grout (mark grout), Tuesday, 22 February 2005 17:08 (twenty years ago)

there's a fascinating perversity to it

― Sven Bastard (blueski), Tuesday, 22 February 2005 17:55 (twenty years ago)

Oh this should end well -- Armed Volunteers("Minutemen") to Patrol Arizona/Mexico Border

― Fat Anarchy on Airtube (ex machina), Tuesday, 22 February 2005 17:59 (twenty years ago)

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