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UK Politics: Spaffed up the wall while chuntering from a sedentary position


Chaircat Meow

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11 hours ago, Werthead said:

Something I am expecting to happen soon - or immediately - after Brexit is for countries to start calling on the UK's permanent seat on the UN Security Council to be revoked.

Anyone can call for any or all permanents seat to be revoked, but the people who wrote the UN Charter weren't stupid: it cannot be changed without the consent of all permanent Security Council members:

Quote

Article 108

Amendments to the present Charter shall come into force for all Members of the United Nations when they have been adopted by a vote of two thirds of the members of the General Assembly and ratified in accordance with their respective constitutional processes by two thirds of the Members of the United Nations, including all the permanent members of the Security Council.

Article 109

A General Conference of the Members of the United Nations for the purpose of reviewing the present Charter may be held at a date and place to be fixed by a two-thirds vote of the members of the General Assembly and by a vote of any nine members of the Security Council.

...

Any alteration of the present Charter recommended by a two-thirds vote of the conference shall take effect when ratified in accordance with their respective constitutional processes by two thirds of the Members of the United Nations including all the permanent members of the Security Council.

The emphasis is mine. It's basically impossible to get rid of any of the permanent members no matter how hilariously incompetent their current governments appear to be or how far they've fallen from where they were when the UN was created. The only way the UK can lose its seat is if it's government itself votes for losing it and while the latter is not theoretically impossible, I don't think your government is quite that far gone yet. :)

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13 hours ago, Werthead said:

Something I am expecting to happen soon - or immediately - after Brexit is for countries to start calling on the UK's permanent seat on the UN Security Council to be revoked. As a member state of the EU, representing EU interests where necessary alongside France, and as the world's 5th largest economy, our place on the council could be argued for. After Brexit, and with us already relegated to the world's 6th largest economy and dropping, the argument will be strong for a country like India to take over that seat (or perhaps the occasionally mooted idea of a permanent South American or African seat rotating through several countries). Our argument for having it will become purely historical.

This is straight-out not happening. Not least because there's an equally reasonable case for taking the French seat and giving it to the Germans, and no-one wants to open that can of worms.

(Giving India a seat screws Pakistan. Again, it ain't happening).

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https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/nigel-farage-brexit-party-tory-seats-peerage-election-boris-johnson-a9198996.html?

Garage offered a knighthood, suspiciously soon before independently, and entirely coincidentally, that he likes Cockwomble's dealafter all, and stands down 300 candidates.

 

This also happened today: https://mobile.twitter.com/ElectoralCommUK/status/1194258776561508352

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On 11/10/2019 at 9:28 PM, Ser Hedge said:

You are not wrong. But this is not just the Tories, but conservative parties all across Europe.

Your point being? We are explicitly talking about the conservative party of the United Kingdom, not about the conservative party of Germany, Spain or the Netherlands. Then again, how does their racism problems make the Tories any better?

On 11/10/2019 at 9:28 PM, Ser Hedge said:

So while the ridiculous BoJo articles are deplorable, you would rather take that if he can appoint a diverse cabinet, than someone who might stay PC on record at all times and do jack-all for diversity, which is basically everybody on the continent, except maybe the French (who are still a bit behind I would say).

Those Tory cabinet members, who take a very hardline stance against immigrants. So, yeah. I am all for looking at HMG record, and not just the sex, religion and ethnicity of appointments. Otherwise we arrive at very lazy conclusions. Liesay, ARlene Foster is heroine of the feminist movement and chamion of womens' right, because she is a female party leader.

 

1 hour ago, Werthead said:

That's a very charitable enterprise, isn't it?

1 hour ago, Which Tyler said:

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/nigel-farage-brexit-party-tory-seats-peerage-election-boris-johnson-a9198996.html?

Garage offered a knighthood, suspiciously soon before independently, and entirely coincidentally, that he likes Cockwomble's dealafter all, and stands down 300 candidates. 

Andrew Lloyd Webber got rewarded a peerage for his crimes against music, so why not?

Anyway, the news being Tories are corrupt, and Frogface is willing to sell his dark soul to the highest bidder.

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It is being reported that the LibDem candidate has unilaterally stood down in Cambridge Canterbury to help Remainer Rosie Duffield. This is not a national policy by the Liberals. Hopefully some other candidates in seats that will be likely Liberals or Labour targets or vulnerable seats will do the same. Swinson and Corbyn will never do an official deal. 

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11 minutes ago, Chaircat Meow said:

It is being reported that the LibDem candidate has unilaterally stood down in Cambridge to help Remainer Rosie Duffield. This is not a national policy by the Liberals. Hopefully some other candidates in seats that will be likely Liberals or Labour targets or vulnerable seats will do the same. Swinson and Corbyn will never do an official deal. 

That's daft.  The Lib Dems could win Cambridge.

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22 minutes ago, Chaircat Meow said:

It is being reported that the LibDem candidate has unilaterally stood down in Cambridge to help Remainer Rosie Duffield. This is not a national policy by the Liberals. Hopefully some other candidates in seats that will be likely Liberals or Labour targets or vulnerable seats will do the same. Swinson and Corbyn will never do an official deal. 

Canterbury, not Cambridge isn't it?

It's also been reported that the party isn't happy, and are looking to find a new candidate, as there's no pact between Lib Dem and Labour.

 

I don't known how accurate the report

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3 hours ago, A Horse Named Stranger said:

Your point being? We are explicitly talking about the conservative party of the United Kingdom, not about the conservative party of Germany, Spain or the Netherlands. Then again, how does their racism problems make the Tories any better?

Well depends on whether you want to have a wider discussion or just the same group-think rant going in an infinite loop.

 

"The Tories have a lot of racist supporters and want to stop Immigration and are the baddies enabling Brexit."
 

Yawn. Dog bites man. Trump is nasty. Argentina is about to default. Please tell us something new.

 

3 hours ago, A Horse Named Stranger said:

Those Tory cabinet members, who take a very hardline stance against immigrants.


Anti-immigration is obviously significantly correlated with racist or xenophobic attitudes, but is not the same. Sounds abstract? Let me explain. If you are suggesting that being anti-immigration is automatically racism, then by construction, if you do not want to be racist, you have to have 100% open borders. But no one has that. Anywhere.

Windrush is an absolute scandal and that was on May and Rudd's watch. Not sure what Javid or Patel have done that's racist? They have been extremely anti-immigrant for sure, but I think that can be legitimate as long as those immigrants that have followed the rules in the past are in no way inconvenienced or made to feel vulnerable or in any way singled out. In fact, if a significant portion of the population has (for whatever reason) worked itself into a state where they are convinced that immigration needs to be stopped/reduced then its better for existing immigrants and their descendants if the government, assuming they are unable to persuade this segment of the population (due to lack of education, bad diet or whatever) of the benefits of immigration, alternatively show that something is being done. 
 

If establishment parties don't correct course and try to reform the system in a legitimate way, then AfD type parties take over at some point.
 

You might argue the Tories had an internal coup that brought nitwits like Bertie Wooster-Mogg to the fore, but I think it's still a coalition of different groups and Brexit apart should have the ability to course-correct from extreme right-wing-views in terms of racism in general, though Sajid and Munira Mirza's presence notwithstanding Islamophobia definitely needs to be addressed. (Even though I think Warsi might have a few personal axes to grind, which does not mean she should not be listened to)
 

 

 

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6 hours ago, Ser Hedge said:

Windrush is an absolute scandal and that was on May and Rudd's watch. Not sure what Javid or Patel have done that's racist?

Check out the whole EU settled status scandal.

Check out the child poverty scsndal.

Check out the voter ID attempt.

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5 hours ago, HelenaExMachina said:

Is this the political equivalent of I can’t be racist I have black friends? Because it sure reads like it from my perspective

hmmm .... it started with my contrasting the Tories with conservative parties in the rest of Europe and Horse coming back with so what? I was responding to Horse's points.
 

But let's take a step back.
 

Are there racists in Britain? Yes.

Did most of them (if not all of them) vote for Brexit? I'm pretty sure they did.
 

Is everyone who voted for Brexit a racist? No.
 

Are racism and anti-immigration the same? They get conflated and in many cases anti-immigration could be code for racism, but they don't always have to be the same, because in the end every country has immigration controls. 

Is a lot of the Tory party membership (the ones who vote in the leadership election) racist? Most probably.

Did May have an obsessive focus on anti-immigration? Yes, and it resulted in a deplorable Home office culture leading to detention centres, Windrush, insensitive treatment of settlement applications....

Was she racist? In my opinion, yes. 

Was she aware of it? Perhaps not.

And this I think is the case with a lot of Europe conservative, establishment types. They don't even know they are racist. There is an ingrained sense of superiority, but they have learnt to be PC about it. And just because they are PC in public doesn't mean there is no problem.

So was appointing Warsi as chairman tokenism? Yes. Doesn't prove anything.

Ok, now let's get to Boris' crew.

Is Patel a right-winger? Yes.

Is Javid an opportunist? Probably, but which politician isn't?

Is Boris a Bozo? Yes. In a lot of ways.

Is he way more racist than every other conservative politician in Europe? Now, this is basically, where I think he is not as bad as his stupid columns and you are not meant to take it too seriously. They were brain dead things to write, but focusing on them clouds the bigger picture. He's got a way more diverse team around him than anyone before - both senior cabinet appointments and advisers like Munira Mirza. Obviously they share the ideology of his faction of the party, otherwise they wouldn't be there. i.e. don't expect a liberal or socialist ethnic minority in the conservative party! But the far larger numbers of people with non-traditional background matters. It's more than critical mass now and there has been a wider attempt to reach out to the South Asian community, who are socially conservative, over the recent past - but done very clumsily and some of it looking like it's focused on splitting it along Hindu-Muslim lines, as we saw in Zac's election attempt (I'm sure it wasn't Zac's idea) and this recent attempt by some BJP idiots to send WhatsApp messages around.

Ok, this is getting very long again.
 

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3 hours ago, Ser Hedge said:

Did most of them (if not all of them) vote for Brexit? I'm pretty sure they did.
 

Is everyone who voted for Brexit a racist? No.
 

Did a lot of people’s racist and xenophobic sentiments compel them to vote for Brexit? 

I would say for most yes. 

3 hours ago, Ser Hedge said:

Are racism and anti-immigration the same? They get conflated and in many cases anti-immigration could be code for racism, but they don't always have to be the same, because in the end every country has immigration controls. 

No, but anti-immigration and Xenophobia pretty much are the same at least 99% of time at the very least. Because the sentiments expressed for why there needs to be a cap on it because the people coming over are different. Often in some really vague way such as saying the immigrants just don't like freedom, and puppies and tea other really nice things.. It is the fear of foreigners being in society. You know for most of the US’s history it’s borders we're essentially open. It only started to get regulated because really, really, bigoted sentiments. 

3 hours ago, Ser Hedge said:

Was she racist? In my opinion, yes. 

Was she aware of it? Perhaps not.

 

Most racists don't consider themselves racist. I doubt May is different from in this regard. 

3 hours ago, Ser Hedge said:

Is he way more racist than every other conservative politician in Europe?

Strawman. Like no one here has said that. That's like saying  ”Well is he as bad Hitler?” when someone is levying criticism against a political figure being an racist, Anti-semite, or homophobe, or really any bad thing. 

3 hours ago, Ser Hedge said:

Now, this is basically, where I think he is not as bad as his stupid columns and you are not meant to take it too seriously. They were brain dead things to write, but focusing on them clouds the bigger picture. He's got a way more diverse team around him than anyone before - both senior cabinet appointments and advisers like Munira Mirza. Obviously they share the ideology of his faction of the party, otherwise they wouldn't be there. i.e. don't expect a liberal or socialist ethnic minority in the conservative party!

So ignore all the racist(you know praising British colonialism, using racial slurs to describe people of color)  and xenophobic stuff he's actually said and promoted because his cabinet appointments are diverse in terms of race? Like I would say this is literally the equivalent of the ”I have a black friend” defense like @HelenaExMachina  but its worse. It's basically a ”I have black employees’ defense. The rational seems to be that a person whose able to grant a job to a person of a different race, or ethnic background can't be a racist or at least that big a racist.

Like, you might as well say Reagan wasn't racist because he had made an African-American one of his national security advisers. Ignore how he started his first presidential campaign complaining about how the federal government should respect state’s rights in a town which historically featured three teens who tried to help blacks being murdered, his veto against a bill that placed sanctions on Apartheid South Africa, and him calling Africans monkeys. 

Because he gave a job to a black guy. 

11 hours ago, Ser Hedge said:

In fact, if a significant portion of the population has (for whatever reason) worked itself into a state where they are convinced that immigration needs to be stopped/reduced then its better for existing immigrants and their descendants if the government, assuming they are unable to persuade this segment of the population (due to lack of education, bad diet or whatever) of the benefits of immigration, alternatively show that something is being done. 
 

If establishment parties don't correct course and try to reform the system in a legitimate way, then AfD type parties take over at some point.

Sure, the AFD could get more power if a large amount people think more immigration is wrong in it of itself. But it’d much harder to mitigate such thoughts when government policies are directly  tailored to accommodate this particular worldview in every way. 

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9 hours ago, Ser Hedge said:

Well depends on whether you want to have a wider discussion or just the same group-think rant going in an infinite loop.

I feel like the moment a person sees themselves type the term 'group-think' is the moment that person should sit down and have a good, honest think about their own position and exactly why it is so many people are on the other side. If you're willing to ascribe that to everyone else suffering from some ill-defined pseudopsychological phenomenon that means you can dismiss their views out of hand, I feel you're not giving your opponents any credit - and that's a bad thing. It blinds you to problems in your own arguments. 

9 hours ago, Ser Hedge said:

Anti-immigration is obviously significantly correlated with racist or xenophobic attitudes, but is not the same. Sounds abstract? Let me explain. If you are suggesting that being anti-immigration is automatically racism, then by construction, if you do not want to be racist, you have to have 100% open borders. 

I would be happy to hear you explain, but this explanation is just a rhetorical smokescreen. Your position appears to be that 'anti-immigration' is defined as literally any position short of completely open borders. That not only makes your 'explanation' merely a tautology, it's nonsensical if applied to the real world. By your definition, nobody is pro-immigration, even if they're in favour of more immigration! It's not a useful way of defining positions in reality: it's just a way of downplaying that connection between racism and restrictions on immigration by selective definition of terms. 

9 hours ago, Ser Hedge said:

Not sure what Javid or Patel have done that's racist?

We literally just discussed Patel giving a speech using anti-Semitic dog whistles. 

Both have supported and advocated for policies that they know will have a disproportionate and unjustified impact on minorities, and both have resorted to citing their own background as a shield against criticism for that. For you, it appears to have worked. But being a minority does not mean you can't engage in racism. 

9 hours ago, Ser Hedge said:

They have been extremely anti-immigrant for sure, but I think that can be legitimate as long as those immigrants that have followed the rules in the past are in no way inconvenienced or made to feel vulnerable or in any way singled out.

And how many of these immigrants do you need to hear telling you that the rhetoric Johnson, Javid, Patel et al are engaging in makes them feel vulnerable and singled out? The press is full of such accounts. And I don't like to break it to you, but for Johnson and the rest, that's the point. That's why they're doing it. They're pandering to voters who want immigrants to feel vulnerable, for the sake of their own careers. 

9 hours ago, Ser Hedge said:

In fact, if a significant portion of the population has (for whatever reason) worked itself into a state where they are convinced that immigration needs to be stopped/reduced then its better for existing immigrants and their descendants if the government, assuming they are unable to persuade this segment of the population (due to lack of education, bad diet or whatever) of the benefits of immigration, alternatively show that something is being done. 

If establishment parties don't correct course and try to reform the system in a legitimate way, then AfD type parties take over at some point.
 

You appear to be advocating appeasement as a response to racism. That's... not a strategy I endorse. And it's based on the assumption that one simply can't persuade people of the benefits of immigration, when in fact that has never really, honestly been tried. 

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37 minutes ago, mormont said:

I feel like the moment a person sees themselves type the term 'group-think' is the moment that person should

I'm happy to debate on specific points as I have been doing.

39 minutes ago, mormont said:

it's just a way of downplaying that connection between racism and restrictions on immigration 

Just out of curiosity, if a naturalized citizen, or first or second generation immigrant opposed unrestricted immigration, or suggests there needs to be a discussion about it, would they be racists/blood traitors or something?

Also my point is if you make it completely non-PC to even talk about immigration policy/restrictions that is not healthy. It's better to have the discussion in the open, so it can be monitored and participants can be better informed. If you shout it down immediately, then don't be surprised when something like Brexit happens.

46 minutes ago, mormont said:

We literally just discussed Patel giving a speech using anti-Semitic dog whistles. 

I don't like Patel's policies.  For that matter I don't care much for her personality. However, for the record, she was vice-chair of the conservative friends of Israel (on her Wikipedia page). No one has accused her of anti-semitism outside of this forum that I have seen. The source you are quoting from is likely trying to randomly smear her to see if it sticks, or else the Tories have an anti-semitism problem even bigger than Labour, but I haven't seen the Jewish community highlight that. 

I think we're better off debating her policies than making accusations with thin evidence. Her use of NLME could easily be a gaffe in the light of other evidence. I didn't know about NLME myself would have interpreted it to mean champagne socialist intellectuals from families that did not ever have to stand in a breadline and thought she is attacking Corbyn and his circle.

Unless there is any other evidence, I really don't see why we keep bringing this up.

1 hour ago, mormont said:

And how many of these immigrants do you need to hear telling you that the rhetoric Johnson, Javid, Patel et al are engaging in makes them feel vulnerable and singled out?

We can discuss it more, but I think what we have now is better than May & Rudd. Admittedly a low bar. However it's pretty clear that post-Brexit under the Tories you will very likely replace immigration from the EU with immigration from the commonwealth and the demand for NHS and care professionals is going to lead to higher immigration of non-whites. So irrespective of the motivations of the dumbnuts who voted for it, and of course the deterioration in public dialogue, I don't see Brexit having a racist outcome in terms of non-white immigration numbers.

1 hour ago, Varysblackfyre321 said:

because his cabinet appointments are diverse in terms of race?

Well it's better than not having them and we're talking about serious posts here - Home, Chancellor, Chief Secretary of the Treasury, the advisor in charge of the manifesto, chairman of the party.  Not one Nikki Haley and one Ben Carson. Labour's current shadow cabinet is diverse too, but until very recently it was terrible all around in both parties. 

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3 minutes ago, Ser Hedge said:

Just out of curiosity, if a naturalized citizen, or first or second generation immigrant opposed unrestricted immigration, or suggests there needs to be a discussion about it, would they be racists/blood traitors or something?

You mean like Priti Patel and Sajid Javid?

The term 'blood traitors', frankly, isn't helpful and however it was intended comes off as a cheap shot, so I'm going to ignore it. But can a first or second generation immigrant be racist against other immigrants? As I've already pointed out, that does happen, yes. 

3 minutes ago, Ser Hedge said:

Also my point is if you make it completely non-PC to even talk about immigration policy/restrictions that is not healthy. It's better to have the discussion in the open, so it can be monitored and participants can be better informed. If you shout it down immediately, then don't be surprised when something like Brexit happens.

Again, I have a sense of someone using terminology ('completely non-PC') and implied threats to promote appeasement as a solution to racism.

I'm all in favour of having the discussion in the open: nobody opposes that.

3 minutes ago, Ser Hedge said:

I don't like Patel's policies.  For that matter I don't care much for her personality. However, for the record, she was vice-chair of the conservative friends of Israel (on her Wikipedia page). No one has accused her of anti-semitism outside of this forum that I have seen.

It's by no means limited to this forum, I assure you. 

https://jewishnews.timesofisrael.com/jlm-lambasts-priti-patel-for-north-london-metropolitan-liberal-elite-comment/

https://blogs.spectator.co.uk/2019/10/priti-patel-turns-her-back-on-theresa-mays-legacy-at-the-home-office/

It's even cited in the Wikipedia entry on anti-Semitism in the Conservative party.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antisemitism_in_the_UK_Conservative_Party#Priti_Patel

Now, it is certainly true that Patel is a friend to the Israeli government - in fact, she had to resign from her first government job for being altogether too friendly with them, to the point of setting up secret unauthorised meetings. So I don't think she is genuinely anti-Semitic. But on the other hand, I don't believe that she is so naive as to not understand that the phrasing she chose to use appeals to a certain demographic, as I've said before. And if she is that naive, then that's no excuse. For someone in her position, that level of naivete is inexcusable and suggests that she doesn't care. 

Javid is guilty of it too, by the way. His comments on asylum seekers, for example, often resort to coded language. These people know what they're doing. As I've said, making legal immigrants feel vulnerable and uncomfortable is a feature, not a bug, of the way they talk. They know the audience they need to appeal to eats that up.  Likely they believe it's a form of appeasement too. But it's playing with fire. 

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