This election is making me feel very alienated as an Indian woman

Everyone knows that Reform are racist.

His big problem is that it went down so badly with the vote he's been trying to pitch for. The sort of person who approves of the national service proposals is likely going to be more alert than the average voter to any perceived disrespect of war veterans.

Obviously the large majority of the population wouldn't be voting Tory anyway. But he's pissed off many of those who'd be considering it.

Of course they are. which is why I do not bother to check their silly exaggerated stuff. However, they may well go up. After all Brexit did happened and it was a shocked surprise.

May be tell me how Labour would take care of everyone, each side of society. Specially middle class, women rights, mass lower educated immigration and crime. The policies are out there for all to see. Conservatives are bad and Labour is another kind of malaise. In my view much worse. Calling for a tax on private education as the only country in Europe do place them as extremist and as populist as Farage. My humble view.

I was saying to DH last night that Farage should be called out as a racist for his comments. I don't know why other politicians haven't done. We all know what he was implying

All this frothing is merely Pastor Niemöller being shown to be true.

Especially the bit about when they come for me.

Yeah some quite racists stuff flying around. Tbh he should have probably stayed but I think it’s got more to do with a lack of political nous than his heritage.

We have an election soon, is anyone really going to be basing their vote on whether Sunak stayed for the entire ceremony or not? I’m not sure people care as much as the papers make out, they may say “oh yeah he should have hung around” but I doubt people are investing loads of emotion into it.

I sympathise OP but FFS Farage was just out to get his name in the papers.

That man really is a totally worthless piece of shit.

I’ve had exactly the same thoughts as you OP (I’m not of Indian heritage).

I also don’t think what he did was that bad. He said he attended the British commemorations, and he left early- he didn’t not attend. . Its a media whipped up storm over not very much.

Both my parents are Indian migrants. They are parochial, xenophobic and racist (but not towards Caucasian people). Racism isn't a privileged of the white majority unfortunately. Neither is ignorance.

I loathe Rishi. He represents everything I dislike about the 'pull the ladder up behind them' mentality of a lot of Indian migrants and their offspring in this country.
Some of the worst comments about 'benefit scroungers' etc I've heard have been from second generation migrants. While polishing their Range Rovers.

The media flurry may well have racist undertones but far, far worse will have been said behind Rishi's back in the good old inclusive House of Commons. He'll have ignored that in his desperate career scramble so I'm sure he can live with a few negative media stories.

Many Reform candidates absolutely are racists and conspiracy theorists. The most extreme ones were deselected thank goodness, but plenty of them still continue to blame minorities for every issue under the sun.

It’s purest distilled irony that you consider me to be in an echo chamber yet it’s me who is aware of the wider discourse and the racist & homophobic propaganda being shared to promote Reform.

What issues would Starmer make “worst” and how ?

I find it very bizarre that many of the people throwing shade at Sunak for failing to venerate anti-Nazis sufficiently also support Reform, a party that Hitler would have approved of.

Their cognitive dissonance is underpinned by a racist worldview.

I agree with you OP. The onslaught of histrionics in the media over Rishi's D-Day behaviour has seen multiple commentators utterly losing their minds about his alleged unpatriotic sins.

I am the opposite of a fan of the Conservatives but the depth and breadth of the criticism levelled at Sunak over this has struck me as racist and nationalist.

You don't need to scratch too deeply beneath the surface of many rightwingers to find a bigot.

I'm sorry that you're feeling uncomfortable, OP. You're right that Farage's comments were racist, and the same tone has been reflected in much of the media coverage. I share your disappointment in the fact that others haven't been quicker to call this out.

Sunak's decision not to stay for the D-Day event showed very poor political judgement, and it's fine to criticise him for this, but there has definitely been an undercurrent in some of the criticism that is motivated by race, and that has been quite horrible to witness.

There are many, many reasons to have a go at Sunak. His race isn't one of them.

Leaving the dd commemorations early was very wrong, it's still in living memory for many people I know. It's got nothing to do with his ethnicity, I would be equally critical if he was white! I can't stand garage either. My politics is left leaning anyway so I wasn't going to vote for the Cons even before this debacle. Rishi's issue (and Boris too) is that they are aloof, don't really understand how normal people leave, and what normal people care about. Boris getting a donor to pay to redecorate and Carrie complaining about the John Lewis look of number 10 (what's wrong with John Lewis!!!) not racist, rich people not getting it.

KS or the Labour Party would make the genuine concerns worst. I said this in my first post. I would not visit those sites and do not know who that person is. You do for some reason and I also do not listen to Farage but people have the right to speak out without being gaslighted. Keep ignoring the issues as in your echo chamber see it as not the majority cares about immigration, trans laws and crime at your own peril.

OP, I sympathise with you and also agree that Farage's comments were a dog whistle.

I think the best way to deal with stupid people like Farage is to see them for who they really are. Stupid. And as a pp said, ignore them.

I think race is a low hanging fruit for racists because that's the first thing they go to when they want to get a rise out of someone that is different from them. A little bit like bullies in the playground at school who target children who look different from them. If you can't punch them, you just have to ignore them.

What Farage said was racist. But why is anyone surprised? He is a racist, he will always be a racist. That being said Rishi Sunak deserves what he got (apart from the racism) for leaving the D Day events early. They mattered, a lot. The veterans matter, a lot, and he totally disrespected them.

I think Boris and sunak are equally fucking useless . Neither really give a shit about the average person in this country .. Boris imo more because he was such a fantasist who believed his own crap , sunak because he lives such a privileged life has no comprehension of the real world for most ..

farage will bring out the racists sadly .. they do exist just need someone like farage to give them a platform.

The sad thing is a great many of the population are racist- if they were not they wouldn't be voting Reform because their whole basis and modus operandi is about immigration - have you seen Farage discussing other policies in great detail and where the budget cuts are coming from to fund tax cuts etc -

There will be a team, but ultimately it's his decision. If he'd said he was staying and insisted on it, that's what would have happened. They wouldn't have bundled him back onto the plane.

But yeah, of course blaming it on Rishi's ethnicity speaks volumes about what a turd Farage is. He made a stupid call because he's bad at politics, which is nothing to do with his skin colour.

Ironically he behaved exactly like the Reform/ERG little Englanders would have done- treated the contribution on the Americans, French and Ukranians, other allies ( and the former Empire soldiers, who, as you said, died in their thousands) as not as important as the British.

Agree

You obviously didn’t see the posts on here(now deleted) that said he was Indian and didn’t understand our culture.

I am hoping we are ahead of the European election trend rather than the other way round - ie we had our silly populist right wing moment when "we" voted for Brexit and then for Boris, and are now moving back to centre/left of centre.

Hope I am not proved wrong :(

Edited: it's worth looking at a map of the vote in Germany. What was West Germany voted for centre right parties - it was the old East that voted for AfD. It's important to look at WHY people are voting that way and what the government is doing to do deal with it, rather than just calling them racists like people who had concerns here about immigration from the EU.

You think under a Labour government everyone will turn into a gay muslim woman and dress in rainbows, and Keir Starmer will transition and start wearing vaguely Indian women’s clothing ?

What these images do is tell gullible people what to be afraid of.

”If you see a muslim, be afraid they’re coming to get you”

”If you see a gay person, transgender person or pride flags, be afraid, they’re coming to get you”

”If you see someone wearing Indian style clothing, be afraid they’re coming to get you”

”If you see Keir Starmer, be afraid, he is making all these people come to get you”

It tells people to be afraid of minorities, and is insidiously racist and homophobic.