Whatever happened to the National Front? Is this just history repeating?

Just spotted there's a programme on Channel 4 tonight about the National Front in 1979 and the death of Blair Peach.

Who's this 'we'?

i think that the tories and
Farage and co have legitimised this new rise of the far right with their anti immigration rhetoric.

I am ethnically Indian. In the 1980s members of my family were regularly harassed and assaulted by the NF and then later the BNP. In some cases beaten senseless. This was routine and in the 1980s the Police were not responsive and in some cases would find it amusing. As time went on attitudes changed and also black Asian communities became more empowered and challenged the lack of any response and the high levels of discrimination. Whilst we have no returned to the 1980s, the people who supported the BNP and NF are still with us as are their children and racism is imbedded quite deeply. So ever so often it surfaces again. It happened to some extent at Brexit and it is happening now under the cover of "anger" against migration.

Robust action against anyone rioting will make it clear that racist behaviour remains unacceptable. I think this will be successful, however in 2023 Farage and others are in Parliament and can make statements that lead towards supporting racism. Farage i clever- he picks words carefully so that he can reinforce racist views without saying things that would be legally difficult. For example suggesting there is two tier policing with no evidence what so ever and suggesting his party was set up by an actor.

We weren't talking about personal responsibility for individual actions.

We were talking about why we as a society are creating optimal conditions for these situations to develop.

Personal responsibility means being able to inflict punishment. It's hard to inflict personal responsibility when they have insufficient finances to cover damage and an over capacity prison service

Ah, so it's everybody else's fault that the perpetrators are racist thugs is it?

Just like when abusers blame their partner for making them angry.

They never went away, they just rebranded. Same ideology, same motives, different logo. Even they realised the old one was a bit much.

But they had basic needs met. Home, health, food

Mechanisation, automation and computerisation, have changed the workplace. Given historically will value people by how much money we can make from them there are more and more people being told they have no value, little prospect of owning a home or even stable renting of one, and poor access to healthcare.

Immigration when you have inherent wealth, social integration and cohesion works. It become more challenging if you make no attempt to find and maintain shared values.

We've had a 20+ years of David Cameron and tone style scapegoating style politics. I'm not sure we have anything different with starmer

@Icedlatteplease I don't think they're getting easier. But the 70s and 80s weren't a piece of cake either.

House prices in relation to average earnings
https://www.schroders.com/en-gb/uk/individual/insights/what-174-years-of-data-tell-us-about-house-price-affordability-in-the-uk/

Poor social mobility

https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.theguardian.com/society/2023/sep/07/social-mobility-uk-worst-50-years-report-finds

Access to healthcare. Eg As a child of the 80's, when I saw the GP, I has the same GP as my parents, my grandparents and I saw them everytime. My chorically ill son cant even be allocated a regular gp, can't get ANY doctor to turn up to a regular process that needs GPS involvement.

Access to council housing
https://england.shelter.org.uk/support_us/campaigns/social_housing_deficit

Social media causing mental health difficulties

None of these suggest life is getting easier

Yes, they were doing slum clearance in the West End of Newcastle! Absolute haven for us unruly kids...

Reasonable living conditions in the 70s and 80s? Not in huge parts of the UK. Not in any way.

So heartening for me this thread.

Here is a song by Chumbawumba written long ago, traditional English folk style.

The day the nazi died.

We are told that after the war
The Nazis vanished without a trace
But battalions of fascist still dreamed of a master race.

The History books they tell of their defeat in ‘45
But they all came out of the woodwork on the day the nazi died.

They say the prisoner of Spandau was a symbol of defeat
Whilst Hess remained imprisoned, then the fascist they were beat.

So the promise of an Aryan world would never materialise
So why did they all come out of the woodwork,
On the day the nazi died.

The world is riddled with maggots
The maggots are getting fat
they are making a tasty meal out of all the bosses and bureaucrats

they are taking over the boardrooms and their fat and full of pride.
And they all came out of the woodwork on the day the nazi died.

So if you meet with these historians
I’ll tell you what to say
Tell them that the nazis never really went away

They are out burning houses down
And peddling racist lies

And I will never rest again until every nazi dies.

Only song i could ever sing without being booed.

I'd forgotten about that. For anyone interested, here's an archived copy:

https://archive.org/details/bulldog_ynf_03/mode/2up

It was also populated by weirdos with uniform fetishes and latent homosexual tendancies which is relevant for an organisation that hated gay people.
I remember one middle aged guy that liked to spend weekends with teenage skinheads ,he was later convicted of child abuse material in his possession.

Back in the 80s I joined the National Front because I strongly suspected their true position was far more extreme than the already extreme positions they were publicly promoting.

I was absolutely right. I was sent a load of pamphlets that essentially mirrored Hitler's nazis. Vile drawings of Jews, all the horrors of a belief that BAME people were intrinsically inferior...

I suspected it would be bad but it was far worse. What these guys believed was horrific and I'd be surprised if the current iterations are any better.

Thevelvelletes · Today 19:32

Thanks for that information, I remember it now, I saw it in pubs from time to time.

I remember the NF in our small town too.

Living in this town, other than British people, there was one Pakistani family, who ran a women’s clothing shop, two Chinese families, one who owned a takeaway; the other, a restaurant, and a black doctor, and his family. They were all second generation and had lived in Britain all their lives.

The NF supporters used to hold mini ‘riots’ every so often, where they’d smash the windows of the clothing shop and restaurant (the takeaway was further out, so they generally couldn’t be arsed going that far).

Even as a kid, I just didn’t get why they’d spoil something they often used. They’d go to the restaurant; their girlfriends bought from the shop. I thought they were stupid when I was 10, and my view hasn’t changed 40+ years later.

Thanks for the update! I originally meant your brother. It's so great to hear that he's distanced himself from that rubbish now.

The Nf sold a paper called British bulldog outside football grounds and it had a league table of what football firms were most active.
The far right has always recruited from the football hooligan elements.
The names change Nf,BNP,C18, Britain first but the message doesn't change.

I remember the NF in town, marching in numbers. They used to hand out leaflets at the football and I saw coppers taking them. I think that the advent of CCTV has helped, as violent idiots are more wary of being identified, so are less badly behaved.

Not sure if you mean my brother, the Any Answers caller, or both?

Brother - I remember being told he had a girlfriend when he was in his mid 20s, and I was astonished to learn she was a PoC. It was quite a serious relationship too, they had met each other's families. I tried to tactfully express my surprise to my mum privately and she said, oh no, he has nothing to do with any of that anymore. That was 15 odd years ago now.

We don't have a lot of contact but he's close to my mum. I've learnt all sorts of things about him that have surprised me as they're totally at odds with how he was as a teenager. He seems like a very caring and sensitive person. I've been wondering how he feels about the riots, it's possibly quite upsetting for him.

AA caller - he joined a church. It sounded like he had spent a lot of time reflecting on his beliefs and came across as a very self-aware and pleasant young man. I think for many it's attractive because it offers a sense of belonging, community and opportunities to express overwhelming feelings of anger and confusing emotions. I very much doubt my teenage brother cared about immigration, it was just a proxy.

I think that with the internet and mobile communications, whilst the bile is still the same, the methods and organisation are different.

I do think that racism was more prevalent in the 70s and 80s though. Just read of the experience of the few black footballers there were at the time, and the abuse they got from men who followed the team they played for.