To think Britain is getting more racist ?

The last couple of times I’ve been over the blatant open racism and anti-immigration rhetoric I’ve heard has been grim.

If you look at history there has always been periodic race riots. They usually coincide with periods of austerity.

What's slightly different now is social media meaning that a frenzy can get whipped up. People can organise and mobilise.

I don’t think it’s more racist. I think there was a time when people felt uneasy about being open about it. Sadly that time has past-the rise
if the right is giving credibility and freedom to the racists.

I agree that the UK is generally a tolerant country. We have a few loud mouthed idiots and a smaller percentage of truly vicious nasties.

I haven't seen any rise in antisemitism in my daily life, but I don't live anywhere with a Muslim or Arab population, so perhaps I wouldn't.

This. Emboldened by Farage and the Reform crew.

Also, a suppression of any educated debate about mass immigration, has made people very angry and, in their eyes, validated more extreme views. By ignoring people’s fears, they have been heightened.

And it is racist. I am married to a nice white European and no one tells him to go back to where he comes from.

Wow. That's an "interesting" pretzel you've twisted yourself into there!

It is much worse now. Fuhrer Farage on the rampage, stirring things up. That Irish chappy, Tommy ten names also at it. The right wing press support them. The BBC give Farage more coverage than he deserves with his piddling small number of MPs.

The word ‘racist’ is used far too casually these days, as is the phrase ‘right-wing’ (I have seen people who want rapists deported described as ‘right-wing’). Wanting to preserve a sense of identity and feeling uneasy about mass immigration doesn’t make you a racist. In fact, wanting to live in a society in which the majority of people are from the same race as you doesn’t make you racist. Even wanting to live in a society in which everyone is from the same race as you doesn’t make you a racist (very insular and small-minded, yes, but not racist). A racist dislikes other racial groups and considers them inferior to his own. You can want to live in a racially homogenous society and yet consider other races equal or even superior to your own.

I am white, and pretty much all my ancestors were English, Scottish or Irish, but I certainly do not consider white Europeans superior to other races. Far from it. And I wouldn’t want to live in a purely white Britain either. (If you are very choosy about who you let in, immigration really can enrich a country.) However, I bitterly resent what the left have done. It’s a question of scale. Mass immigration has been used to destroy our national identity and impose a new one on us. No one asked for it and no one voted for it.

How many more of these threads are going to be started?

This

Yup. It was always there, but is now emboldened by constant social media propaganda, which I am certain will eventually be proven to be funded by Russia in an attempt to destabilise the Western world. This started during the Brexit campaign.

Mmm - not sure. Growing up, rural Yorkshire in the 1990s skewed racist. Corner shop being called the p-shop, etc. However there wasn't all this shit about "Muslims being offended by Christmas" and Evergreen trees in Tesco.

I think things got better for a while (or at least voicing these thoughts became less acceptable) but we're swinging back again with the Reform immigration rhetoric.

As long as the left amalgamates to racism any criticism of cultural differences or the sensible idea that people born here don’t want to feel like they re just a community among others (and a vilified one, full of gammons, oiks and karens because they’re so unsavoury to the elites), racism will keep on rising

As long as the left keeps on bending over for Hamas and Hezbollah because of self-hatred and sheer ignorance, antisemitism will keep on rising

As long as the left refuses to enforce sensible immigration rules and border control, racism will keep on rising

@moderate

The genuine concerns about migration you have correctly identified have caused people to push back against the far left (and more recently the mainstream left) endlessly telling them that having genuine concerns about migration is the same as being racist.
That, coupled with many people on the left's tendency to conflate concepts (NB Islamism is not a race) has created a situation that the far right can easily tap into, which will almost certainly (and very regrettably, yet entirely avoidably) require an overcorrection before the left start to engage with it seriously.
David Frum put it well: If Liberals won't enforce borders, Fascists will.

I don't disagree with this.

But I also think that while migration is a legitimate concern and one which the left glossed over for too long, its importance is grotesquely magnified by the far right. Illegal migration of the "small boats" variety is a very visible and inflammatory example of what happens when migration policy doesn't work but its a tiny proportion of overall migration and the attention paid to it vastly exaggerates its importance.

And it's not the cause of any of our current economic or social problems.

It's always been racist. The difference is now people feel emboldened to voice their opinions because of people like Boris and Farage. It become more overt.

Course it is, this country is teeming with ignorant people who don’t actually realise they are being racist

It got worse after brexit imv

There is definitely a much more open expression of racism now than there used to be. People seem to consider it to be socially acceptable to voice racist opinions in a way that they wouldn't have dreamt of before.

I suspect that the racism has always been there, just quieter. Now they are emboldened.

I agree with the pp that said this all started with the Brexit referendum, and it has been getting worse since then.

Which is why after the English protestants granting the Irish and British Catholic emancipation, I find Morgan McSweeny quite an extraordinary cheeky man.

Fancy not giving the British the right to self determination, as that English man wanted for the Irish.

Look at that you still get some mad old goat in a bonnet saying they should go home 😭

love the man who used the opportunity to ask for a united Ireland 😂😂

That lovely young man who said people were all the same!

I found the full clip, it is in 1985 Yorkshire, people of various races are making comments and sharing opinions on the English and Irish.

I would guess it is considerably less racist but until recently the racists didn't have the public platform via social media and the encouragement via Reform etc al. Openly racist yes, I agree, but it's always been there, it just wasn't plastered over social media.

Social media platform owners make money from clicks and traffic. Consequently they allow discrimination as it provokes arguments which in turn lines their pockets. Racism isn't the only form of discrimination that is creeping increasingly into the public domain. Mumsnet is a perfect example of all sorts of controversial posts being allowed. Why allow them unless it's for money?

Racism and xenophobia were always here. It's just that people started saying things out loud