editor
hiraethified
Nope, never said that and it seems very strange that you've chosen to ignore my post of about five minutes ago where I made my position very clear:
Please don't make up stuff, thanks.
Brexit party on 31 January in London is going ahead. And it will be shit.
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ska invita
back on the other side
Brexit is a long process, UKIP has been campaigning increasingly effectively as they go since the 90s, the last ten years the rabid end of the tabloids have been on steroids stoking anti immigrant sentiment whilst campaigning for brexit conflating the two hand in glove, and the leader of the movement was one "too many people speaking forrin in public" Nigel Farage. The Tories have become UKIP in response to keeping up with public demand. Its not fetishising Brexit, its recognising it as a key part of a wider political process. It is possible to fetishise it and lose sight of the woods for the trees - but Brexit is trees alright.
This is all history now anyway. Now its just about resisting destructive trade deals, deportations, and more broadly a Tory government polling 50%.
Pickman's model
Starry Wisdom
have i made this up?
perhaps you might like to apologise for accusing me of making things up
editor
hiraethified
Yes, the racists in the country have felt emboldened and empowered because of Brexit. Do you dispute that?
Pickman's model
Starry Wisdom
it's going from bad to worse.
yes, they have felt empowered because of the way brexit has been dealt with. BUT - and it's a very significant but - they are not 'crawling out of the woodwork and feeling so empowered' solely because of brexit despite what you say (although being as you've contradicted yourself it's so hard to know exactly what you mean to say). responses to 9/11, to 7/7, to the hostile environment, to the 'we'll get immigration down below 100,000', the rise of the bnp, the rise of ukip, the english defence league, austerity pitting people against each other - all things which predate moves towards calling a referendum - helped bring racism back from where it was on 10/9/00. the blair and brown governments have to take some responsibility for the ways in which they stoked islamophobia. so for 15 years before the referendum there were factors increasing if not the respectability of racism then certainly its expression in public.
a decade and a half of empowerment, uneven but certainly there all the time.
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LDC
On est tous des pangolins
<... uninformed anecdote/wild stab in the dark at answering that The39thStep ...>
The area where here I live (northern UK city) is really diverse; ethnically, religiously, country of birth, parental origin, etc etc.
I suspect a massive percentage of people when questioned would say they were tolerant, not racist, etc. But on a day-to-day level when 'competing' groups and individuals are squeezed into a poor area with shit resources, sub-standard housing, and crap services some nasty behaviour and attitudes come out, many of which could easily be put down as hate crime as they're often aimed against people from the perceived 'other'. So I'd be interested to see if many of those hate crimes happen on some kind of more 'spontaneous level' rather than as a 'pre-planned' thing.
chilango
Hypothetical Wanker
If Brexit is such a key cause of a rise in racism, nativism etc. how do we explain similar movements in other countries?
No.
Brexit is a consequence of these conditions (and I don't mean racism, but the conditions within which racism is growing) not a cause of these conditions.
It's not Brexit ---> more racism
Nor is it more racism ---> Brexit
It's more like:
.........................Brexit
conditions --->
.........................More racism
(hopefully that formatting doesn't get too messed up!)
No.
Brexit is a consequence of these conditions (and I don't mean racism, but the conditions within which racism is growing) not a cause of these conditions.
It's not Brexit ---> more racism
Nor is it more racism ---> Brexit
It's more like:
.........................Brexit
conditions --->
.........................More racism
(hopefully that formatting doesn't get too messed up!)
andysays
Love and solidarity
That survey says that 58% of ethnic minorities felt discriminated against before the referendum, so presumably racists were empowered enough beforehand to cause those feelings.It's not me 'pushing' the idea that racists are feeling empowered because of Brexit. It's those damn researches with their pesky facts and studies.
Racism rising since Brexit vote - Opinium
71% of people from ethnic minorities now report racial discrimination, compared with just over half (58%) before the EU vote. Our study has revealed a rise of racism in the UK’s most diverse areas. The study suggests racists are feeling increasingly confident in deploying abuse or...www.opinium.co.uk
Racism rising since Brexit vote, nationwide study reveals
Survey shows 71% of people from ethnic minorities faced discrimination, up from 58%www.theguardian.com
Brexit 'major influence' in racism and hate crime rise
Community officers are being appointed around Wales to help deal with "tensions" in some areas.www.bbc.co.uk
I've been subjected to more racism since Brexit than rest of my career altogether, former children's laureate says
Malorie Blackman said she has heard more racist comments since Brexit than she did in the previous 30 because "people feel they can say whatever they want".www.telegraph.co.uk
And, of course:
View attachment 197638
And you're the one who introduced the bollocks of "all down to" into the discussion, in the post I was responding to.
I accept that some aspects of the Brexit debate have further empowered some racists to more and worse acts of racism than previously, but that's quite a different thing to what you and others seem to be claiming.
littlebabyjesus
one of Maxwell's demons
Problem with that is illustrated by the data It Will Never Work posted up, either here or on another thread, which showed a marked rise in reported hate crime from the moment the brexit referendum campaigns started. There is a very distinct 'before' and 'after' pattern to the levels.
So the conditions that led to the leave vote certainly included 'more racism', from years earlier, a concerted anti-immigrant campaign on various fronts - the Express had been at it relentlessly for 20 years. But the campaign and the result of the vote also had a direct effect. They unleashed and empowered various extremely nasty political forces, and led to the situation where Boris Johnson won an election talking just like Nigel Farage, openly referencing immigrants and the way they are taking over.
The39thStep
Urban critical thinker
Because of the nature of the Brexit campaign dominated by the right and in the absence of a left leave campaign .
chilango
Hypothetical Wanker
I'd certainly agree that large elements of both the Brexit campaign and the Brexit vote both came from and contributed to rising racism. However I still think a tendency to see the Leave vote as the cause of this rise in racism is really dangerous. There is a relationship, but its not a causal one.
editor
hiraethified
And now it's soared to 71%, which is a huge increase.
Opinion: Because of Brexit, ethnic minorities are victims of violence more than ever
The Brexit vote promoted English national identity and questions about who is and who is not English – increasingly distinguished from being British – to the top of the political agenda, and this is not going away
www.independent.co.uk
ska invita
back on the other side
Fine....agreed with that.... as you say its conditions lead to Brexit in tandem with More Racism.
Crucially Brexit gives those rising sentiments not just a victory but a political project to rally around, project power through, and an ideology to foster.
And here we are. Lets move on.
littlebabyjesus
one of Maxwell's demons
Exactly. I'll say it again - brexit is manifestation of the rise in r/w populist anti-immigrant nationalism occurring around Europe and elsewhere in the world, not some kind of reaction to it. Surely that is all too clear now. Currently 'moving on' feels like little more than firefighting, trying to resist losing even more than we've already lost. But yes, there is no other option but to do that.
chilango
Hypothetical Wanker
parts, but by no means all, of brexit is a partial manifestation of the rise in r/w populist anti-immigrant nationalism occurring around Europe and elsewhere in the world, but it is also a manifestation of other (i.e. not racist or r/w) reactions to the same conditions that led to the rise in r/w populist anti-immigrant nationalism.
There'll be no "moving on" whilst people still veer towards blaming racism on Brexit and Brexit on racism.
Wilf
Slouching towards Billingham
Working backwards, I agree with the last sentence, that was the exact problem. There was never a lexit campaign (of any size at least) leading into the Brexit vote and Corbyn's attempt at putting a 'workers + environment brexit' on the table since then was nominal and never likely to get traction - gawd I hate that word - largely because Labour had lost the ability to talk to/engage with/live near the people the message was intended for. That meant that your proceeding sentence became true in practice. Suppose I'm saying it would have been possible to create a workers Brexit position, but not from where the Labour Party - or the wider left - was at over the last decade. So, ultimately, Labour (and the liberal left's) bed shitting over Brexit is more an effect than the true cause.
And here we are. I'm not that fussed that we have left the EU, the protection it provided for workers was minimal (along with its other/larger flaws). The bigger problem is that we've ended up with the hard right in power, unchallenged, as a result of this shit show. Long winded way of saying Brexit isn't the problem, where decades of ne0-liberalism and identity politics have placed the 'left' and/or working class forces is the bigger issue.
not-bono-ever
meh
Nothing being discussed in the past couple of pages is going to be resolved anytime soon. All vocal sides are defaulted to trope mode - there is no sensible resolution in view.
To me
To you
To me
To you
ska invita
back on the other side
It's resolved already. The word Brexit is banned. The shaping of what the Brexit deal is is in the hands of the Tories, with no opposition in parliament. What's there to resolve?
Fight the Tories and fight the causes of Tories is all there is left.
Wilf
Slouching towards Billingham
Yep. Tomorrow belongs to me videos are being posted up and there are still crude attempts to portray the leave vote as driven almost exclusively by racism. And yes, there have been equally robust responses. Aside from trying to influence post Brexit trade deals and the like (fairly hopeless task, tbh), the left(s) should be getting into 'beyond brexit' mode. All that energy that could have been spent fighting the cuts...
Pickman's model
Starry Wisdom
c4u
Bannon is getting his world wide right wing revolution using companies such as Cambridge Analitica to manipulate elections. What kind of idiot would blame this on the left ?
....
No? anyway i did find this quite relevent to the current situation/thread
Foreign Policy in Focus
2016-Global markets lose record $3tn since Brexit vote
FT 2016
....
No? anyway i did find this quite relevent to the current situation/thread
Foreign Policy in Focus
2016-Global markets lose record $3tn since Brexit vote
FT 2016
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Ax^
Silly Rabbit
it was pre referendum tread but the referendum result acted as an almost validation to an percentage of the the population (all classes ) of their more nasty held views
the increase after is at part effected by this
Proper Tidy
Arsed
Ok, so you think if there had been a narrow remain win then what, the material conditions that have created this situation pre and post ref would have changed? That resentment - trad key driver for far right - would have created less wind in sails than a perceived political gain?
Pickman's model
Starry Wisdom
Proper Tidy
Arsed
The UK is not unique in this regard, the far right are on the march across the world, certainly 'developed' world anyway. There is one common reason for that, namely the slow collapse of the dominant political current of last few decades. This collapse is also a significant factor in why leave won. Too many people putting cart before horse and going arse over tit
littlebabyjesus
one of Maxwell's demons
What resentment, though? How much resentment would there have been with a narrow remain win? Serious question. Not as if remain winning would have been a surprise - most people expected it. Resentment over conditions, sure, but resentment over brexit not happening (brexit as a word not yet even really existing, like 'remainer' and 'leaver')? Membership of the EU was low among most people's lists of political concerns pre-ref - all the polls said that. The ref wasn't called in response to popular demand for one. It was called in an attempt by Cameron to hold on to power.
Clearly we can't say what would have happened as an alternate history, but we can say that there was a rise in racist and anti-immigrant sentiment that dated from that point with the result as it happened. In the alternate history of a narrow remain win, we can guess that Cameron would have staggered on, Farage would have continued being noisy but now after a defeat, the tories would have remained hopelessly divided over Europe, no doubt fighting among themselves over it as strongly as ever. Beyond that, we can't say much, but those far right political forces that have been energised by the referendum result would not have received that boost in energy. Do you really think the uptick in hate crimes and overt racism would have happened in the same way with a narrow remain win? What would make you think that?
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