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Posts
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@kent f OBE wrote:
@jen_jen wrote:
Ah well Kenty, nice try at getting a discussion going…
sorry
So you should be! :D That’ll take the shine off your new shoes! :P
@panda12 wrote:
@(f)politics? wrote:
who is they ?? i have seen a few personal insults thrown around this thread from all sides
like i said debate the topic not the author is the way forwardDo you mean the author of the topic as in the person who started the thread?
No, i mean peoples responses to what others have written having a tendency towards a certain direction or attitude depending on the author of a post rather than on the merit of the post itself
@(f)politics? wrote:
@panda12 wrote:
@(f)politics? wrote:
who is they ?? i have seen a few personal insults thrown around this thread from all sides
like i said debate the topic not the author is the way forwardDo you mean the author of the topic as in the person who started the thread?
No, i mean peoples responses to what others have written having a tendency towards a certain direction or attitude depending on the author of a post rather than on the merit of the post itself
Ok, ta, thanks for clarifying.
you’re welcome
@terry wrote:
@panda12 wrote:
Oh dear! Seems I’m getting to you.
Hmm.
“Oh dear! It seems as though I’m getting to you” is a better way of saying it.
Actually, you’ll only start getting to me when it gets to match point. You haven’t even come close to winning a set yet. :wink:
Well if we’re not @ match point, and I haven’t won a set yet, then surely, neither have you?
Perhaps you should stop double faulting.
@kent f OBE wrote:
@jen_jen wrote:
Ah well Kenty, nice try at getting a discussion going…
sorry
Well, in the spirit of conciliation.. for my part.. I’m sorry too.
If, in being too robust in any criticism, or seemingly unjust in any representation, I have caused any anger or offence on this thread, then I am willing to concede that I may have took things a little too far at times and apologise to anyone and everyone concerned.
And I do mean EVERYONE.
The heat of the battle n all eh?It is but a message board afterall, and Christ knows things are bad enough out there without compounding woes and ill feeling on here.
We are all alive and relatively well. That’s the thing innit?Looking forward to the next bout of craziness :wink:
good on ya, Pepperpot.
I am still a bit worried that any work on a post will be wasted unless it joins in the infantile backbiting here
well, here goes on the backbiting anyway…
*puts on a Rab Nesbitt accent and shakes his fist
“Swine, ye are!!!”
It’s just not fair! I decide I’m going to throw a decent strop after months of trying to be the soul of reason. I drop my little girl off at salsa, drop into a jam session and by the time I get back Terry is playing tennis with Panda and only arguing about the score, everyone’s agreeing we should stick to the subject and even Pepper is acknowledging he might have caused offence and apologising ffs!
Dammit!
:lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol:
@sceptical guy wrote:
words and panda . . . may i ask whether and why you think immigration is a racist issue? . . . . . . . . is the discussion of immigration in our politics relevant, and is it racist?
Sceptical, here’s my answer. Please remember I prefer A roads to motorways and like the occasional detour. Any less constructive responses to this answer from third parties are not my responsibility.
First I will say that racism is not the only unfairness in society and is no ‘worse’ or ‘better’ than sexism, ageism, disability discrimination or any other bigotry.
In recent years “racism” has become an emotive word, more offensive to some than almost any other accusation, even when bias is clear. Openly racist public figures know this and use the subject as a cloak for their lust for power. They have used Immigration as a rallying call for decades; blaming immigrants for the country’s ills, but excluding those immigrants they assume are white and of UK ancestry.
I won’t speak for Panda but I saw meaning in the reference to immigration when others seemed not to because I have been on the receiving of the destructive fallout from the misuse of this subject before and there were resonances with prior experience.
One problem in discussing racism is achieving a common understanding of the subject.
Discussing immigration is, in itself, not “racist” (definition: regarding one racial group as superior or inferior to another). But “Race” itself is a contentious concept. In law it can include biologically inherited group factors, colour, national origin (geographical loyalty) or ethnic origin (group loyalty) and nationality, including citizenship. Unfortunately it lends itself to drawing neat and rigid lines through populations, which rarely works well.
Racism, like any form of unfairness, can be overt or covert, intentional or unintentional, individual or institutional (cultural). Unfortunately where someone with any kind of power or influence uses it in a racist way, the attitude or actions of the target can be of limited protection.
So how can discussing immigration become racist if the subject itself is not racist?
One way is by falsely selecting one or more racial group as a problem. False selection, poor use of figures, sweeping conclusions and insults cloud authentic problems.Immigration is about people. Therefore discussing immigration is relevant to UK politics. Discussing it in a racist manner however, is not.
that’s moving us on, Words, thanks. I hope attempts to deflect discussion though personal slurs and insults can be ignored with contempt, or they’ll derail an important discussion. People like Kenty, minim, poli and Jen have been trying to make serious popints which have to be taken seriously.
Racism is trreating another race as inferior, and that has certainly happened in the debates over immigration when black and Asians were involved 40 yrs ago (Panda’s posts are interesting on this), but tight controls on Commonwealth immigration were imposed 40 yrs ago and the debatge has moved on.
Nativism seems more to the fore now – and manifests itself in a disgust towards, contempt for other groups of ‘foreigners’, people who are ‘not like us’. But who are this ‘us’? There’s often the assumption that the ideal ‘us’ is a white suburb in southern England, and everyone else is either lettng the side down by having ten babies a year and lotting or are taking over the country.
I don’t think a lot of people who are worried about immigration are nativists (my son has complained about Poles getting the available jobs quickly, and he is most certainly not a nativist), but their fears for their jobs, or their failure to get a job, sows seeds of fear, and nativists can play on that.
It’s why nativism is linked to neo-Nazi groups. I’m not saying the UKIP, or even the bulk of BNP voters, (as opposed to some of its leaders) are neo-Nazi, but the two groups place the blame for all our woes on non-national groupings who are ‘taking us over’ (Moslems, the EU) – a politics of fear and paranoia.
Hitler did that with the Jews, but nativist groups in Britain and Europe had been doing that for a long time (there was a Jew Bill in 1905 which had a lot of support in London’ East End). Jews were given stereotypes of physique and character, just as Afro-Caribbean and Asians were (and often are) identified by such stereotypes.
For nativists such as BNP and UKIP, no amount of reason will work. There’s a gut prejudice based on an idealised and usually racial steretype of what our country looks like.
For most people, there is a lot fo fear, and the dangerous financial situation, unemployment, growth of zombie mortgages, declineing quality of health care tec are very real. people aren’t idiots.
But they can be open to nativists. So we have to look at immigration carefully and ask whether it’s the cause of those problems which lead to fear.
That may not be question for nativists of the UKIP/BNP ilk, but they’ve made their minds up already. It is a problem for the rest of us, and an urgent one.
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