Immigration to the UK - do you have concerns?

[Gramsci]

Someone () managed to get me banned before I read this, but I notice nobody else has responded to it either.

Are you suggesting these measures to accompany the current entry requirements, or as part of an "open borders" policy?

The former would be sensible, whilst the latter, ludicrous.

It wasn't about open borders.

Those posts were about different kind of immigration rules. Replacement of hostile environment.

 

[brogdale]

So the welfare dependency arguement.

On the Far right riots thread you said this:

The US centre right view (been discussing the British riots with Trump supporters) is that half the problem in the UK is dependency on welfare. If there weren’t so many people expecting the state to house them and pay for their living there’d be less of a sense that you’re not getting what your ‘owed’ and others are. Appreciate that’s a view a long way from Urbans general perspective.

That's interesting.

So the suggestion is that the racist hate mobs would not have rioted had neoliberal consolidation of the state been accelerated to the point where the citizens of the arrival nation were as impoverished as those seeking refuge. And that take on "looking after our own" is attributed to MAGA/Trump supporters.

This explanation of what lies behind this posters "big think" does help to place their posts to this thread in some context. I don't pretend to know anything of their past posting history but, on the face of it, this post that you linked to looks like they may (recently?) have been through some form of radicalisation. Troubling.

 

[Spymaster]

Culture, nation-state, nationality, country: these are not synonyms.

Culture is far more granular and layered than nationality. Nationality is something that stops at borders.

And let's get something very clear here. State and country are not synonyms. A state is a power structure. A country is a region.

I don't identify with the state. The state is not my identity. The state is a bureaucratic structure. A polity made by people. The institutions of the state are just constructs. The peoples of the region are not those constructs.

The political affairs of humans come and go. The lines we draw on maps do not exist in the dirt on the land that those maps describe. Even check points erected according to those maps will crumble if not maintained.

Saying I don't identify with those structures is not saying "I hate this country". I don't hate this country. I don't hate the people or the cultures of this country.

I was born and raised on an archipelago known as the British Isles. Because of the political baggage that comes with the term "British", people in Ireland contest that name. I personally like to refer to the archipelago as "these islands". One day it may not be a political statement to say "British". But for many it still is. One day we may be able to say British in the way Norwegians and Swedes can say Scandinavian. I would like that. I hope it comes soon. But it hasn’t come yet.

I am not, by the way, saying nobody feels British. Nor am I saying that by not feeling British I am "above" anything. I am saying that identity is not something we can just assume falls into the borders we ourselves have drawn.

I feel Scottish and European, and I want one day to be able to put a name to These Islands without assumptions being made. But those identities for me are not the governments or institutions of government.

Although I am Scottish, I speak English. This is an example of why it is nonsense to imagine culture stops at borders. Nor is culture homogenous within borders.

I grew up north of the Highland Boundary fault in a place that had not long previously had Gaelic as its majority language. When I grew up there, only very few old people still knew any Gaelic. And yet local church services had been held in Gaelic until the 1930s. But in my day, only a few decades later, that was all forgotten.

My parents, though, were not raised there. My Dad came from Blantyre, my mother from Galashiels. The varieties of dialect they brought to my childhood included words and syntax I didn't hear elsewhere locally when I was growing up. And the dialect of Galashiels is very different from the dialect of Blantyre.

The local traditions of those places differ, too, as did the employment opportunities in my parents' youths.

All of this stuff overlaps, layers, mingles. And I love it.

I am not blind to culture. Culture enriches our lives. When I speak to people from Galashiels I want to hear the accent and vocabulary. Just as when I visit my wife's home in Staffordshire. And when I talk to my Syrian musician friend, I want to hear about his culture, folk tunes, his words for things, his way of seeing the world. Why would I want to be blind to that? It's fascinating!

When I visit the part of Staffordshire my wife grew up in, many of the older people have ways of saying things that the younger people don't. Because culture is ever changing. I knew my wife's grandparents, now long dead, and their irregular plural of house, houzen. You don't hear people say that now. And that too is fascinating. Why would I want to be blind to that? I don't! I'm glad I heard houzen spoken, but I'm also intrigued that it has gone the way of other -en plurals in English. Why now? Why did it hang on so long there? But also what was it that finally made it follow the trend and vanish?

Why would I want to be blind to all that? The change is as interesting as the existence of the outlier in the first place!

What I don't do is to imagine those things extend all the way to nation-state borders and stop dead at them.

I know I've used the term border a lot in a thread about immigration. And the danger is that people will therefore make assumptions about what that means about the policies I "want". That would be to miss the point.

The point is that these things are of different orders. Policy and culture are like apples and chalk.

Well thought through post. Would you agree though, that they are your views on what culture is, and whilst I may agree with you, others might differ and they wouldn't necessarily be wrong?

To me, what you've posted outlines that culture is specific to regions although it may blur at the edges and change completely where different people mix.

To some, you may even have described a specific culture which they might even call British. It won't be everyone's idea of it but it certainly wouldn't apply in, say, Iran or China.

I've even seen it suggested here by others that there is no such thing as British culture. If that's the case, there's no such thing as any national culture, unless perhaps that nation is completely insular.

 

[Spymaster]

It wasn't about open borders.

Those posts were about different kind of immigration rules. Replacement of hostile environment.

Ok. It seems people are talking about different things.

So when you said before that you didn't agree with immigration policy, you were actually referring to the "hostile environment" and you are not an advocate of open borders?

Those aren't what most people are thinking of when they talk about "immigration policy".

That's about who is and isn't allowed into the country.

 

[isvicthere?]

On here, maybe. Out in the big wide world, many things just get boiled down to...
"So you're calling me racist then?"
"So you hate our country/culture then?"

Back in the day, it was followed with "So why don't you go live in Russia?" Now you just get called woke.

The unwitting comedy version of this, in the aftermath of brexit, was when brexit supporters used to say: "If you like the EU so much, why don´t you go and live there?"

 

[Gramsci]

Ok. It seems people are talking about different things.

So when you said before that you didn't agree with immigration policy, you were actually referring to the "hostile environment" and you are not an advocate of open borders?

Those aren't what most people are thinking of when they talk about "immigration policy".

That's about who is and isn't allowed into the country.

No.

In context of the rows on the thread I was trying to put a compromise. Not open borders but a ( imo) more liberal humane immigration policy suggestion.

Doesn't mean I'm for borders but as this is minority position I was suggesting a different one. This was just one suggestion.

 

[brogdale]

No.

In context of the rows on the thread I was trying to put a compromise. Not open borders but a ( imo) more liberal humane immigration policy suggestion.

Doesn't mean I'm for borders but as this is minority position I was suggesting a different one. This was just one suggestion.

Your earlier post has got me thinking about why neoliberal states are content with the promotion of 'America/Britain first' right-wing ideas regarding irregular (refugee) migrations such as 'build that wall' & 'stop the boats'. I suppose I'm stating the bleeding obvious, but occasionally I find it useful to work through where our class opponents are coming from.

Firstly, I suppose, flows of irregular refugees offers a concrete reminder of the consequences of our states' foreign policy, specifically the wars conducted to protect corporate accumulation. The refugees bring those neo-colonial wars to our very doorsteps; not something desirable for the military-industrial states.

Secondly, the very act of landing and setting foot on 'our' territory highlights the impotence of the state to actually stem the refuge flows that their military and economic wars produce; that's clearly anathema to those neoliberal state actors who seek to cast themselves as 'tough' for populist electoral purpose.

Thirdly, arriving 'without papers' is a very direct challenge to the state's domestic/security policies; the politicians literally look powerless without their usual bureaucratic apparatus.

Fourthly, once accommodated, the refugees become a further anathema to the neoliberal consolidator state; they become a cost to the public purse as they are fed, clothed and housed by the state. They become the very thing that these states despise, a progressive transfer of wealth.

No wonder that this issue drives the right into frothing fits.

 

[danny la rouge]

Well thought through post. Would you agree though, that they are your views on what culture is, and whilst I may agree with you, others might differ and they wouldn't necessarily be wrong?

To me, what you've posted outlines that culture is specific to regions although it may blur at the edges and change completely where different people mix.

To some, you may even have described a specific culture which they might even call British. It won't be everyone's idea of it but it certainly wouldn't apply in, say, Iran or China.

I've even seen it suggested here by others that there is no such thing as British culture. If that's the case, there's no such thing as any national culture, unless perhaps that nation is completely insular.

I wouldn’t argue that there’s no such thing as any national culture (British or any other), only that there’s no such thing as monoculture. Within any nation, however defined, there is gradation, variation, overlap.

Culture is social, but it is also something individuals do. My habits and beliefs are my culture. Others may share many, but not all.

I listen to the Fall and to jazz. That’s an overlap others might not share. They may know the lore and shared assumptions of one music form but not the other. I attend a zen Buddhist sangha. Others who attend may not share my atheism, or they may. My wife does not attend the sangha. Neither do you. I am not a member of an Orange marching band. Others in my city are. And so and on.

While other views of what constitutes “British culture” certainly will exist, what I’m describing is a widely held understanding - within and outside of the social sciences - of what culture is.

 

[Funky_monks]

A classic example of banal nationalism is the weather map on TV. It shows me all the weather in England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. But not in France or the RoI. Why? Because it’s “natural” — this is our country, that is their country. It implies that I will care about one particular geographical territory.

Do you ever go outside?

This suggests that you only watch the weather forecast as some kind of "general interest" programme as opposed to (I suspect) the vast majority of people who want to know what the weather is like specifically where they are going to be. The BBC is broadcast in Britain, therefore is likely to be overwhelmingly watched by Brits, for whom the weather in Bordeaux has very little bearing on their daily planned activities. I must be some kind of ultra-nationalist because I have the MET office app which shows the weather even more specifically where I am (or, where I'm going to be if I change the location of the service) for, you know, knowing whether I need a coat or not or other such trivialities that seem to be of no import round here.......

 

[brogdale]

I wouldn’t argue that there’s no such thing as any national culture (British or any other), only that there’s no such thing as monoculture. Within any nation, however defined, there is gradation, variation, overlap.

Culture is social, but it is also something individuals do. My habits and beliefs are my culture. Others may share many, but not all.

I listen to the Fall and to jazz. That’s an overlap others might not share. They may know the lore and shared assumptions of one music form but not the other. I attend a zen Buddhist sangha. Others who attend may not share my atheism, or they may. My wife does not attend the sangha. Neither do you. I am not a member of an Orange marching band. Others in my city are. And so and on.

While other views of what constitutes “British culture” certainly will exist, what I’m describing is a widely held understanding - within and outside of the social sciences - of what culture is.

I suppose the question I would put to Spymaster is in whose interests is it to promote notions of a shared national culture. IMO it would be those forces and interests that seek to cast as all one people together, a notion that has the effect of deliberately masking class division.

 

[chilango]

As we are on culture and migration...I'll ask again. Which cultures have been threatened and by who?

(Hint: It's not "British Culture" and it's not immigrants)

 

[Saul Goodman]

View attachment 439998

With every packet of corn flakes.

 

[Pickman's model]

I wouldn’t argue that there’s no such thing as any national culture (British or any other), only that there’s no such thing as monoculture. Within any nation, however defined, there is gradation, variation, overlap.

Culture is social, but it is also something individuals do. My habits and beliefs are my culture. Others may share many, but not all.

I listen to the Fall and to jazz. That’s an overlap others might not share. They may know the lore and shared assumptions of one music form but not the other. I attend a zen Buddhist sangha. Others who attend may not share my atheism, or they may. My wife does not attend the sangha. Neither do you. I am not a member of an Orange marching band. Others in my city are. And so and on.

While other views of what constitutes “British culture” certainly will exist, what I’m describing is a widely held understanding - within and outside of the social sciences - of what culture is.

I think there is a national culture, a deliberately promulgated one in which the 'natural order' is justified, in which imperial history is defended, in which the 'glorious dead' secured for us the freedoms we enjoy. It's manifested in things like the proms, the 11 November commemoration, the invented traditions around monarchy and the armed forces. It's the world in which Dixon of dock green and not regan and carter epitomise the police. And while this may seem marginal to or alien to most people's everyday lives, many people buy into aspects of it, even if they don't swallow the whole thing.

 

[The39thStep]

I think there is a national culture, a deliberately promulgated one in which the 'natural order' is justified, in which imperial history is defended, in which the 'glorious dead' secured for us the freedoms we enjoy. It's manifested in things like the proms, the 11 November commemoration, the invented traditions around monarchy and the armed forces. It's the world in which Dixon of dock green and not regan and carter epitomise the police. And while this may seem marginal to or alien to most people's everyday lives, many people buy into aspects of it, even if they don't swallow the whole thing.

As some white old bloke once said The "ruling ideas" of a given epoch are, however, those of the ruling class.

 

[kabbes]

Do you ever go outside?

This suggests that you only watch the weather forecast as some kind of "general interest" programme as opposed to (I suspect) the vast majority of people who want to know what the weather is like specifically where they are going to be. The BBC is broadcast in Britain, therefore is likely to be overwhelmingly watched by Brits, for whom the weather in Bordeaux has very little bearing on their daily planned activities. I must be some kind of ultra-nationalist because I have the MET office app which shows the weather even more specifically where I am (or, where I'm going to be if I change the location of the service) for, you know, knowing whether I need a coat or not or other such trivialities that seem to be of no import round here.......

There you go, Gramsci. A textbook example of the processes involved in banal nationalism.

 

[PTK]

You did suggest that common language, culture, and territory defined a nation .

Yes, and the Kurds fulfil the definition that I posted. They have a common language, culture, and territory. There is a piece of land on which the Kurds live. It is divided between four states.

 

[littlebabyjesus]

Do you ever go outside?

This suggests that you only watch the weather forecast as some kind of "general interest" programme as opposed to (I suspect) the vast majority of people who want to know what the weather is like specifically where they are going to be. The BBC is broadcast in Britain, therefore is likely to be overwhelmingly watched by Brits, for whom the weather in Bordeaux has very little bearing on their daily planned activities. I must be some kind of ultra-nationalist because I have the MET office app which shows the weather even more specifically where I am (or, where I'm going to be if I change the location of the service) for, you know, knowing whether I need a coat or not or other such trivialities that seem to be of no import round here.......

A quick google shows me that there are lots of weather maps on British TV that show the whole of Ireland but only give the weather/temperature for Northern Ireland. If you live in Northern Ireland, you're much more likely to be driving down to Dublin in the afternoon than flying to Birmingham, but the weather for south of the border is not marked.

 

[danny la rouge]

I think there is a national culture, a deliberately promulgated one in which the 'natural order' is justified,

Absolutely. Every society has that. And that’s an important point to make.

And from Pharaonic Egypt to Napoleonic France to post independence “southern” Ireland, attempts to impose unified national religion, or unified national language, or even national sports, certainly occur. And may even hold sway for a while. But we know from ancient Egypt that even there religion, language, ways of writing, and so on, changed over time. Because there was variation within the culture.

The French language is an example of the imposition by bureaucracy on a diverse region of the dialect of the Île-de-France of the late 18th Century. Even now French has national institutions to regulate proper language, unlike many National languages. And yet French still has variation, it still has dialects, it is still changing.

There is of course still effort from the top to maintain cohesion and uniformity. But one of the wonders of humanity is that this will only ever be successful to a degree.

 

[The39thStep]

Yes, and the Kurds fulfil the definition that I posted. They have a common language, culture, and territory. There is a piece of land on which the Kurds live. It is divided between four states.

They have been campaigning for a Kurdish state.

 

[littlebabyjesus]

Absolutely. Every society has that. And that’s an important point to make.

And from Pharaonic Egypt to Napoleonic France to post independence “southern” Ireland, attempts to impose unified national religion, or unified national language, or even national sports, certainly occur. And may even hold sway for a while. But we know from ancient Egypt that even there religion, language, ways of writing, and so on, changed over time. Because there was variation within the culture.

The French language is an example of the imposition by bureaucracy on a diverse region of the dialect of the Île-de-France of the late 18th Century. Even now French has national institutions to regulate proper language, unlike many National languages. And yet French still has variation, it still has dialects, it is still changing.

There is of course still effort from the top to maintain cohesion and uniformity. But one of the wonders of humanity is that this will only ever be successful to a degree.

Some of this stuff is sensible. With the arrival of the railways, standardised time was a sensible idea. Other things like standardised weights and measures are also sensible once people are moving around. These aren't necessarily peculiarly national things, of course - transnational standardisations are also sensible - but they require a unified political entity and administration of some kind to get them going.

And then sometimes nationalism can produce strange results in this regard, such as China Standard Time, which doesn't really make a lot of sense, and reflects the dominance of a particular region in China.

 

[Pickman's model]

Absolutely. Every society has that. And that’s an important point to make.

And from Pharaonic Egypt to Napoleonic France to post independence “southern” Ireland, attempts to impose unified national religion, or unified national language, or even national sports, certainly occur. And may even hold sway for a while. But we know from ancient Egypt that even there religion, language, ways of writing, and so on, changed over time. Because there was variation within the culture.

The French language is an example of the imposition by bureaucracy on a diverse region of the dialect of the Île-de-France of the late 18th Century. Even now French has national institutions to regulate proper language, unlike many National languages. And yet French still has variation, it still has dialects, it is still changing.

There is of course still effort from the top to maintain cohesion and uniformity. But one of the wonders of humanity is that this will only ever be successful to a degree.

Yes, the notions now are different to those under victoria or george vi, and changing from those under Elizabeth ii. Ideas of the state and its purpose are mutating. But however it changes in the UK or the 26 cos, the state will defend itself against attacks physical or ideological. It's up to us to undermine it a little bit every day

 

[Happy Tree]

And yet French still has variation, it still has dialects, it is still changing.

The pain au chocolat / chocolatine war still rages to this very day. With plucky Alsace still holding on to petit pain.

In the subway in Toulouse all the stations are announced in standard French and Occitan. In Aix-en-Provence the street signs are in French and Provençal. My grandfather's native language was Scottish Gaelic.

No underlying point to make, really, except perhaps that our identities and expressions thereof can be multiple things at the same time. I feel myself to be European first, then Scottish, then British. When I get Estonian citizenship and passport I'll no longer be British, technically. But that won't change who I feel I am inside. Just a meaningless administrative convenience will have taken place.

 

[Pickman's model]

Some of this stuff is sensible. With the arrival of the railways, standardised time was a sensible idea. Other things like standardised weights and measures are also sensible once people are moving around. These aren't necessarily peculiarly national things, of course - transnational standardisations are also sensible - but they require a unified political entity and administration of some kind to get them going.

And then sometimes nationalism can produce strange results in this regard, such as China Standard Time, which doesn't really make a lot of sense, and reflects the dominance of a particular region in China.

Who is standardised time sensible for? Why have we barely advanced from the 8 day week fought for in the c19? Time is not apolitical. It is in its own way a tool of oppression.

 

[PTK]

Do you ever go outside?

This suggests that you only watch the weather forecast as some kind of "general interest" programme as opposed to (I suspect) the vast majority of people who want to know what the weather is like specifically where they are going to be. The BBC is broadcast in Britain, therefore is likely to be overwhelmingly watched by Brits, for whom the weather in Bordeaux has very little bearing on their daily planned activities. I must be some kind of ultra-nationalist because I have the MET office app which shows the weather even more specifically where I am (or, where I'm going to be if I change the location of the service) for, you know, knowing whether I need a coat or not or other such trivialities that seem to be of no import round here.......

.

 

[littlebabyjesus]

Who is standardised time sensible for?

People arranging lifts from train stations.

 

[Pickman's model]

People arranging lifts from train stations.

That's such a stupid answer I'd have been astonished to see it from any other poster

 

[littlebabyjesus]

That's such a stupid answer I'd have been astonished to see it from any other poster

It was a stupid question.

 

[Pickman's model]

It was a stupid question.

Not at all. As we all know, there are no stupid questions, only stupid answers. E2a if you actually did some reading round the subject you'd recognise the importance of time to the status quo, try eg Beginning of Time, End of Time

 

[PTK]

The pain au chocolat / chocolatine war still rages to this very day. With plucky Alsace still holding on to petit pain.

In the subway in Toulouse all the stations are announced in standard French and Occitan. In Aix-en-Provence the street signs are in French and Provençal. My grandfather's native language was Scottish Gaelic.

No underlying point to make, really, except perhaps that our identities and expressions thereof can be multiple things at the same time. I feel myself to be European first, then Scottish, then British. When I get Estonian citizenship and passport I'll no longer be British, technically. But that won't change who I feel I am inside. Just a meaningless administrative convenience will have taken place.

“European” is a constructed identity for part of Eurasia. Europe and Asia are part of the same landmass. The Ancient Greeks invented the concept of “Europe”.

I did not know that there were bi-lingual signs and announcements in Provence.

By the way, are not Occitan and Provencal different names for the same language?

 

[PTK]

They have been campaigning for a Kurdish state.

Yes, members of the Kurdish nation have been campaigning for their own state, or self-determination as it is known. The case of the Kurds illustrates the difference between the concepts of state and nation.