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Showing content with the highest reputation on 08/07/2016 in all areas

  1. If EU policies were used as a front for anti-immigration rhetoric then anti-immigration rhetoric was used as a front for racism. To expand: there are people in the UK with... what might in a generous light pass as a good reason to object to immigration. Immigrants aren't the problem, they are an immensely valuable and highly underappreciated part of the workforce. They are however a visible facet of an invisible problem: neoliberalism shattered the British manufacturing sector and the people sent in to pick up the pieces (and fill in the cracks) were often immigrants. It's a bit like blaming dung beetles for a cowpat on your lawn: they didn't cause the mess, they're just working in it. This sense that immigrants were "taking all our jobs" was grabbed, fanned and ruthlessly exploited by people with a political axe to grind (Boris Johnson), racist nutjobs (Britain First and like organisations) and people who are both (Nigel Farage). I don't want to go into all the gritty details, so long story short, "immigration" became a codeword to mean all sorts of disgusting things. Criminal, violent, terrorist, rapist, dangerous, mercenary, freeloading. Once you've convinced someone that a group of people is to blame for one problem (lack of jobs) it becomes a great deal easier to persuade them that this group is responsible for all sorts of other problems. Saying "if we restrict immigration, terrorists will have a harder time getting in" not only denies the fact that British citizens have been terrorists in the past, but implies that anyone who isn't British could be a terrorist. It's a slippery slope. I have no sympathy for people who mourn for the days when they never had to hear a language they didn't understand or talk to a brown person. Some of them might, on a good day, actually be resentful that they don't have a good job and are blaming the people who do. But the vast majority are using job concerns as a cover for rampant jingoism, and a sizable minority of those are using THAT as a cover for outright racism. It's not pretty, but racially biased crimes are still rising here. That's the situation, one month on. The new Prime Minister is "negotiating" while everyone she might be negotiating with insists that she isn't. The economy and currency are both, as far as I know, in shambles, UK scientists (the group I'm most in tune with, though that barely) are already facing blocks to EU participation and funding due to uncertainty about the future, a situation likely mirrored in other industries. Things have calmed down, you'd never know what was going on if you looked out the window. But this isn't over yet. Calls to do another referendum have been refused, calls to start the split immediately have also been refused. Everyone is waiting for the other shoe to drop. My personal suspicion, and I should emphasise that I have no evidence to back this up, is that the new PM is playing for time and will continue to do so for as long as she is able. Someone with a plan would surely have made some sort of public indication as to what it is by now. The Scottish government, meanwhile, is actively promoting a strongly immigrant-positive agenda and being as pro-EU and generally internationalist as it can. While London prevaricates, Edinburgh is gleefully turning up the volume on its thinly-veiled push for continued EU membership, with or without the rest of the UK.
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