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AIBU?

To be really struggling and frightened about the rise of right?

71 replies

Rowanhart · 08/07/2016 00:22

The videos of two young black men being shot by police in US. Polish family having home set on fire here. Spray paint on Docs surgery saying 'EU Rats Go Home'. American man being shouted at on tram. Polish father and son beaten to pulp in street in London. My takeaway driver saying he has been racially abused twice in past two weeks 'Which came as a shock because it hadn't happened before...." Isis killing hundreds of Iraqis.

Trump, Leadsom, fucking Farage. People suddenly thinking it's okay to say stuff like 'They shouldn't be in this school anyway.." on Facebook about immigrant children in kids and grandkids class at primary school. Race baiting MPs prepared to play along with mob for personal gain.

Sharing of Britain First and UKIP anti-immigration filth on social media. Newsnight allowing Neo-Nazis to be interviewed unquestioned. The poor babies of Jo Cox without their mother. Brexit and its unholy shower of shit.

I just want my children to grow up in a tolerant, peaceful, harmonious world. I don't know if I'd have them now. I'm struggling with they way we are going and feel utterly helpless to make any difference.

OP posts:
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Birdsgottafly · 08/07/2016 00:28

I think that we have to concentrate on what's changed since the Vote out of the EU (it obviously started before that).

There has been a rise in Racism and we all can make a difference, even if it's just adding your electronic signature on a petition.

How you raise your children, teach them to think things out, will also make a difference.

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winkywinkola · 08/07/2016 00:30

It's definitely a big change. It's revolting. And scary.

But what is also a change is the awareness. The refusal to sit by and accept it. We are all part of it and must not ignore it and hope it goes away.

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mynamesnotMa · 08/07/2016 00:39

It's so sad and all too reminiscent of how the NaziS became powerful..blaming the Poles Jews ethnic clensing. When we have had our services stripped to the bone whilst the rich get richer and the poor implode.

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WorraLiberty · 08/07/2016 00:39

It's depressing but your OP is more alarmist than a tabloid newspaper.

Things like that have unfortunately been going on for years and years.

There is a lot more reporting since the Brexit and there has been a spike in racist incidents, but it has always been so.

There has been a spike in racist and anti Islamic incidents every time there's been a major terrorist attack for example.

It's dreadful but it will calm down and the media will go back to concentrating on their next line of stories.

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dybil · 08/07/2016 01:37

It worries me too, especially with Trump and the recent successes of far-right parties in Europe. Austria could soon become the first EU member with a far-right PM. France's far-right party did well in the last set of elections too, and it took some bargaining between the major parties to limit their gain.

Trump is an absolute piece of shit, but America has always been pretty right wing so I'm not sure he marks the same type of shift in attitudes....however, if he actually won....I dread to think.

In respect of a rise in hate crime since Brexit, I'm lucky enough to have left the UK before the vote, but sadly I have at least 3 friends who were on the receiving end of racial abuse in the week following the vote - something they say they had not experienced in a long time.

Sadly I think there are scary times ahead.

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geekymommy · 08/07/2016 02:49

It scares me here in the US, too. Sad

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heyday · 08/07/2016 04:56

Look at the racial make up of the country now in 2016. It is incredibly diverse. With so many different nationalities integrated here and the problems that the country/world is facing at the moment with inadequate amount of housing, lack of jobs etc etc the environment is ripe for far right extremism to begin to flourish but there is virtually no sign of that at all as most people do not want to have anything to do with the hatred of extremist groups and I take comfort in that. We have, on the whole, become a more caring, accepting society, let's not forget that. We all need to challenge hatred and racism when we see it. I think the UK is one of the most tolerant countries in the world.

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VioletBam · 08/07/2016 05:28

As RuPaul says, "face the light"....look to the positive...look to the good, the kind and to those people (and there are MANY of them) who are fighting for the weak and those in need.

Don't focus on the bad...we obviously need to be aware of it all...but don't look only at the bad.

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mathanxiety · 08/07/2016 06:15

It is horrible. It is like opening up a sewer that has always been there, only underground, and once opened all the swill rises up out of it and pours all over the streets.

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Brokenbiscuit · 08/07/2016 06:32

OP, I agree, it's frightening.Sad

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InionEile · 08/07/2016 06:35

This tends to happen in an economic depression. The world economy has been limping along since 2008. There has been some growth but very little of it has benefited the average working person. People feel that their politicians are out of touch and only motivated by self-interest. People feel poor and disempowered and scared.

Those conditions led to a rise of the right in the 1930s and look like they will do so again if we don't find some decent leaders who actually care about something other than their own careers and money. Political leaders on both sides of the Atlantic have been shamefully disengaged and cynical in recent years. Just look at Syria, a war that was fomented by Western idealists and that is raging on and on with no sign of an end because there is such an utter lack of leadership among high-income countries.

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Luckystar1 · 08/07/2016 06:40

These things are, sadly, not new. There have been videos for years of racist attacks on public transport.

Sadly, as a pp has said, reported events tend to increase attacks against the perceived perpetrators (ie. Muslims, Polish etc), it's completely ludicrous but let's look at the people doling out the abuse... Hardly shining beacons of society (not that it matters of course, but some people will always find a way to get in trouble!)

Im Irish and my father went to uni in England in the late 70s. He said he often wouldn't go out, or speak if he was, for fear of being attacked. He also refused to allow my siblings and I to have Irish names so that we wouldn't be 'identifiable'.

It's not a new thing.

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ClopySow · 08/07/2016 06:43

I was thinking something similar.

I don't think there's any stopping the path we're on now. I feel like we're on a collision course with disaster and all we can do is watch it unfold. Too many wealthy people have too much to gain if we continue as we are and we're all too scared to stop it because of the shit that is pumped out by the media.

I feel powerless and hopeless about my childrens future.

And i know how melodramatic and paraniod i sound.

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Auti · 08/07/2016 06:58

I just want my children to grow up in a tolerant, peaceful, harmonious world. I don't know if I'd have them now. I'm struggling with they way we are going and feel utterly helpless to make any difference.

Oh please, you really need to stop watching the MSM.

Quite frankly I'm totally appalled at how the MSM are whipping up this bloody hysteria.

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acasualobserver · 08/07/2016 07:01

I'm struggling with they way we are going and feel utterly helpless to make any difference.

Are you a member of a political party that shares your concerns? Are you active in it? Ditto a trade union? Are there community or church projects in your area that reflect the society you want?

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PhloppysFonics · 08/07/2016 07:18

Was coming to say what others have said. Yes there's an increase but lots of that stuff was happening already, for example the two shootings in America, that is purely coincidental to the EU stuff. American police shooting black people for no reason is shocking, horrifying but also sadly they're not isolated cases.

The stuff on Facebook should be challenged though. The reason awful atrocities happen is because people say nothing and accept it and it snowballs.

Neo Nazis should NOT be given air time. End of. Ever heard of the phrase 'no such thing as bad publicity '. Seeing them gives other closet racists a voice.

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sharknad0 · 08/07/2016 07:48

It looks to me like the media are talking a lot more about racist incidents, but you can't deny that they are not new. Maybe it's not a bad things if more people wake up and see what is really happening around them.

There are some awful incidents in London against Jewish people, they are not being reported in the media at the moment (or I completely missed them), it doesn't mean they are not happening. They were all over the media even a few weeks ago.

What I have noticed a lot more since the referendum is average British people being totally awkward towards foreigners. It's weird. Sadly, racism has been heavily around for quite some time.

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Dawndonnaagain · 08/07/2016 08:54

Oh please, you really need to stop watching the MSM.

Quite frankly I'm totally appalled at how the MSM are whipping up this bloody hysteria.

Those of us who are suffering from the fact that the referendum vote has legitimised racism thank you for your belief. Hmm

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ghostyslovesheep · 08/07/2016 09:00

MSM 'whipping up a frenzy' or - you know - reporting events that are real and happening to real human beings ?

Guess it depends on your over all political agenda - or compassion

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Piemernator · 08/07/2016 09:01

Racism has always been here, growing up in the 1970's it was endemic and shit to be a mixed race kid at school. I just think people speak out more now when things happen. I remember the first BNP councillor Derek Beacon winning a council seat in London in the very early 1990's, Tower Hamlets I think. My liberal mates and I had a massive argument about no platform for racists.

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mathanxiety · 08/07/2016 13:42

I disagree InionEile, that it just 'happens' in a time of economic gloom.

Even in Germany the rise of the Nazis in the 1930s happened because they were funded and supported by individuals and cabals who thought they could control them, and because they could spew their message via newspapers who were sympathetic or that they controlled. There was also a strong underlying cultural tendency into which they tapped.

Today's situation is slightly different in that the internet makes it easy for people to put their own individual message out there, but the flames of racism are fanned by unscrupulous politicians and the gutter press in the UK. The underlying tendency is always there.

(I agree with you about Syria - the war there was a special pet project of the State Department, along with the rest of the so-called Arab Spring that has left Libya in the hands of thugs and ISIS, and Egypt in the hands initially of the Muslim Brotherhood, with the army now the arbiters of power. Ukraine remains deep in shit after the US-abetted coup. I would never vote for Donald Trump, but Hillary Clinton has a lot to answer for.)

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Auti · 08/07/2016 14:55

MSM 'whipping up a frenzy' or - you know - reporting events that are real and happening to real human beings ?

Real human beings hmm OooKaay.

My old Irish dad told me about Irish people being racially abused(No blacks, no irish, no dogs) but that was back in the early 70's and 60's.

DH was racially abused in a very ''white'' area of Liverpool but that was 30 years ago.

I remember being really frightened by skin heads on TV but that was 30+ years ago!

My mixed race DC really don't know what racism is because they have never experienced it. Both DC's school have children from diverse cultural backgrounds will no problems.

A Cambodian friend told me she loves the UK as it one of the most tolerant places she had ever been too.

Now I could tell we live in some cultural Shangri-La but nope we live in a Northern city.

Neither DH, our DC or I have witnessed racial abuse on any level for at least 20+ years.

I feel incredibly lucky that we live in such an open and tolerant society.

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evilcherub · 08/07/2016 15:00

Right and left are both dangerous. If you are Jewish then it is the left you need to be afraid of.

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dybil · 08/07/2016 15:08

Yeah, because the Jews have never had any issues with the far-right...

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evilcherub · 08/07/2016 15:12

dybil - they have to be frightened of both the right and the left at the moment. They have the worst of all worlds!

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