Why is there so much more anti immigration sentiment NOW?

As an example of the rights we are losing, you might want to consider this related thread https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/5267503-aibu-to-be-furious-that-there-are-no-jobs-for-young-doctors

We are losing the rights to train into a job and then work that job . Yet our society is based upon having a job. We need to have jobs to survive. Most of us have no other choice, that choice was removed from us at the latest in 2000 when housing and land prices became utterly disconnected from work, and at the same time, the idea of having a safety net for those unable to work came under serious attack.

I used the phrase 'we need this to survive' deliberately, because if we do not retain the right to make a living in the only way we are allowed to -0 if all other options are taken away - then it is a question of survival. Perhaps those of us who do not come from wealth and the cushion of family support see this a lot more clearly, because we have no other way to survive.

I think its a combination of overpopulation and the sheer numbers of immigration: and an underlying realisation that we are losing rights as citizens. Citizenship no longer really exists, nations no longer really exist, in a time when we can have high percentages of foreigners moving here compared to those already here. We cannot keep an identity when those coming in arrive in numbers too huge to even think about a need to integrate.

Concerns about social cohesion are real, because the need for social cohesion in a society is real. Concern about losing rights is real, because the need for people to have rights is real. Concern about overpopulation is real, because everyone needs resources to live and there are decreasing amounts of those.

The real question is why people think mass immigration into a finite space is a good idea. Some people refuse to listen to the very real issues around it and caused by it. I'd guess the op is one of those by the very need to ask the question.

I do think that this debate lacks nuance on both sides, and that's because the middle ground have been scared off discussing the issue.

We need to stop the name calling and let people talk about this issue fairly.

No, I can't beat it, so I am joining the trend. I have no animosity to migration per se, but I don't think the host population should be expected to subsidise migrants. Wherever we wind up, we shall be contributing to tax revenue.

The Belgians have just appointed a right of centre government btw.

See UnHerd Newsroom for the full story.

@Adamante - but there will be a number who do agree. Are these the kind of people we want in the UK? My view is not.

Trump's second election is definitely a factor, there was a similar swing after Brexit and his first term.

When the bigots get a 'win' they have a brief window to influence the discussion.

Edit: when I say 'bigot' I mean those who are directly unpleasant to immigrants, not those who have concerns about immigration.

Where are you going to go that doesn't have immigration? Hungary?

Unconvinced that the UK is gaining much from importing 750,000 people a year, so I am considering exercising my economic freedom to relocate via a non-lucrative visa programme (ie, buying an alternate citizenship). Score another two notches on dollar millionaire emigrant tally leaving the UK.

I’ve heard similar. I heard a Muslim man say on a podcast that they have a saying in his country “if you want to work and make a business go to the US, if you want to live for free and live easy go to the UK”…

We are total White Saviour mugs. It’s embarrassing.

Edit to say he was criticising it, not agreeing with it.

Well yes, they wouldn't have been common before.

I agree with you though, I don't think any country is really pro immigration.

Were immigrants ever seen as novel? After the war those who were invited to work here suffered terribly from racism. It isn't the case that everyone was fine with immigrants until very recently. Do you not remember No Blacks, No Irish, no dogs? There has been a historical fear and aversion of the 'other', with some types of immigrants being particularly viewed as a danger/threat.

I think it's a lot to do with how people are less well off these days (14 years of tory rule!) and looking for an easy target to blame - as politicians cause it but misdirect the causes and blame onto immigrants.

Because of the amount of immigrants here and the consequences of that. When your family arrived, it was novel and the consequences had not yet become apparent.

As to 'white British people shouted down' , immigration has been the number one issue for bigots and racists forever, we can't have a normal discussion about it because racists and bigots shout up whenever we do.

Out of interest what do you think would constitute a “normal discussion” and at what point does someone become a “racist / bigot”? There are a lot of people on this thread making pretty reasonable points about the current situation. Do you view this as a normal conversation or is it tipping into racist and bigotry?

What a load of rubbish. To compare it to one of the worst atrocities and all of the millions of lives lost because one nutter had ideas of grandeur is frankly disgusting.

What happened to those millions of poor people during the mass genocide should not be compared to how a country decides
to open/close its borders! FFS!

That lunatic wanted to erase an entire population and tried his very best to do so. To compare the mass murder and slaughter of millions of Jews to the current debate is utterly disrespectful and you should be embarrassed.

I would ask the same of the high risk and deaths from trafficking and lack of control

Why do we see that as a good system?

Indeed. Some might call it “luxury beliefs” held by those who at the present time remain largely unaffected due to cushions of secure employment and housing, perhaps high incomes, inherited wealth, living in areas that haven’t been developed as yet beyond pleasant little ethnic restaurants and coffee shops.

That old scare tactic. Label them as bigoted and racist and they’ll shush and keep their legitimate concerns to themselves. Bore off

T turn the question around:

Why would the population of any nation be happy to add hundreds of thousands of people to the population when:

There is a housing crises
There is a health care crises
There are problems with adequate school spots
When the country is densely populated and already sacrificing agricultural land

And furthermore, why would the working class population be happy to add hundreds of thousands workers in lower paid jobs who will allow the wages and benefits in those jobs to stay low?

It seems pretty weird to imagine people would be supportive of that?

You can just see what a disaster Brexit was. Some whites voting for less migration from
anywhere, and immigrant communities from
Old Commonwealth countries voting because they believed it would benefit them and make visas more available to those countries.

Of course both things do not work. And racism is not sophisticated.

Because immigration used to be accepted, but now it's too many and we are losing our identity as we are being swamped by values and cultures alien to us, where immigrants don't integrate, can be hostile towards our own traditions and values, and create their own little bubbles. There came a tipping point, and people are now voicing that.

It’s not propaganda. It’s material reality. In 2015, net migration was 200,000 a year, with the majority coming from EU countries. It’s not over 700,000 a year with the vast majority coming from non-western countries.

That is a massive change and people can see the impact. Importing hundreds of of thousands of low skilled, poorly paid workers, as we have done since 2021, makes us poorer. We have a generous welfare state with large fiscal transfers - we are adding to the number of net takers while the number of net contributors is shrinking. We are on a very dangerous path.

As I said upthread, my (ex) front line BGS professional team are all non western immigrants.

Working 1:1 with several, I got to know some reasonably well.

There was a Nigerian guy who was okay at the job, tho pulling the odd 'sickie' to go to a ££ agency job (under an umbrella company, tax offsetting all over the place) elsewhere (it's a small professional world...) in the knowledge there would be no consequences for getting caught... he told me there was a consensus that we were all mugs deserving of what we got! He showed me a 'newsletter' he subscribed to from Nigeria which was basically ''scam' of the month'; he described how in online interviews westerners made 'allowances' for poor quality video, I mean, what can you expect from Nigeria? 🤔- in fact disguising the fact the person you were interviewing wasn't the one who'd be walking into your department 3 months later, pointing out 'white people' struggle to differentiate African features. There was an updated list of who you could buy references from, what key words to use for benefit interviews; the list went on. He himself had a wife, 3 kids and his mother over here, on a base salary of £37k.

I think he was 💯 correct. We're mugs and they know it.

And after only 6 years, they’ll be eligible for citizenship, giving them full access to the welfare state for the rest of their lives - and given how poorly paid they are, that will make them automatically eligible for social housing, UC top ups etc.

Importing hundreds of thousands of low skilled, poorly paid people into a welfare state with large fiscal transfers makes that welfare state unsustainable.

The fact they are so poorly paid is a massive part of the problem!

But white British people can't express the views that my colleagues do without being shouted down on MN and left wing media as bigots and racists.

'Left wing media,' what the fuck is that then? the Guardian and the Mirror, because thats the only fucking left wing media I can think of in this country. And all the social media platforms are owned by Trump lackeys, so where is it?

As to 'white British people shouted down' , immigration has been the number one issue for bigots and racists forever, we can't have a normal discussion about it because racists and bigots shout up whenever we do.

If you want to know why immigration is such a big issue this link explains it perfectly