Far right women

The thing is that there were people on the left who kind of saw this coming, even if they only saw it partially. And not only intellectuals like Christopher Lasch or Maurice Glasman.

The period after the Brexit referendum was very revealing. I'm not looking to argue here about whether Brexit was a good or bad thing, I'm just making a point about the popular will. Almost all MPs said before the vote that they'd respect the outcome, and then when the outcome wasn't what they expected, the majority of them spent the next three and a half years acting like a toddler refusing to put his wellies on.

There was a small group of Labour MPs in heavily Leave-voting Red Wall constituencies (Stephen Kinnock, Caroline Flint, Gloria De Piero and a couple of others) who said "we voted Remain, we don't like the outcome, but we promised to respect the result and we'll have to do that, and get the least damaging exit deal". Nobody listened to them.

There was a similar thing in Plaid where Adam Price had a rush of blood to the head and thought Plaid could become massively popular by jumping on the second referendum bandwagon, to which Leanne Wood responded (I'm paraphrasing here) "you must be fucking joking, there is no way on earth I can sell that to Rhondda voters".

I'm not making an argument about the merits of Brexit here, just saying there was a point of view that our leaders might have benefited from paying attention to. I think all those people are now out of active politics except for Stephen Kinnock, who was forgiven due to being regime aristocracy.

The point about the consent of the governed is that there has to be a mechanism where the governing class can listen to the people and receive feedback. You can't have a Parliament full of Rory Stewart types telling us what we should be thinking. That way lies disaster.

It’s not a case of justifying it per se, the authorities were concerned about racists using the gangs as a way to sow discord amongst white and Pakistani communities. I feel like that is a sensible concern. Had they dealt with the problem in house, spoken to community leaders and convinced them to deal with the gangs internally, then there would never have been an issue for the far right to jump all over in the first place.

I suppose 'populism' is distrusted because its equated with mob rule? But if you think about it, populism is the very definition of democracy, especially in a FPTP situation.

Ironically, the fact we have been colonised (so foreign ruling class, not mass migration) is also used to claim there is no indigenous British population.

Sometimes I find it fascinating to watch the Hugo Rifkind show on Times Radio, because it's like watching a dinner party of extremely privileged centre-left people who don't know anyone who isn't also extremely privileged and centre-left.

So a few weeks ago, after Reform conference, Hugo was speaking with Sebastian Payne and Charlotte Evers, and Charlotte reported what a pollster had told her, that they were trying to get a demographic model of the typical Reform voters, and they couldn't do it because the typical Reform voter just looks like the typical voter.

The panel then had a Principal Skinner moment where they spent about a minute stroking their chins and wondering "are we the weirdos?" before concluding that, no, they were perfectly normal and everyone else was out of touch.

They spent most of the next hour chortling about how naff the conference was, with special attention to Andrea Jenkyns in her sparkly jumpsuit belting out the song she wrote for Eurovision, and wasn't it all terribly naff, and this just proves to me that Hugo Rifkind has never sat down with his family on a Saturday night to watch X Factor or Britain's Got Talent.

And that's making me think of this:

https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/the-glorious-campness-of-reform/

Sometimes I find it fascinating to watch the Hugo Rifkind show on Times Radio, because it's like watching a dinner party of extremely privileged centre-left people who don't know anyone who isn't also extremely privileged and centre-left.

So a few weeks ago, after Reform conference, Hugo was speaking with Sebastian Payne and Charlotte Evers, and Charlotte reported what a pollster had told her, that they were trying to get a demographic model of the typical Reform voters, and they couldn't do it because the typical Reform voter just looks like the typical voter.

The panel then had a Principal Skinner moment where they spent about a minute stroking their chins and wondering "are we the weirdos?" before concluding that, no, they were perfectly normal and everyone else was out of touch.

They spent most of the next hour chortling about how naff the conference was, with special attention to Andrea Jenkyns in her sparkly jumpsuit belting out the song she wrote for Eurovision, and wasn't it all terribly naff, and this just proves to me that Hugo Rifkind has never sat down with his family on a Saturday night to watch X Factor or Britain's Got Talent.

I find the ‘populism’ tag quite interesting. It feels like a centre left narrative that keeps the status quo.

It’s reiterated by institutions eg the BBC and others so they can keep power.

Well, this is one of my bugbears, because the discussion on FWR is usually framed as how do we stop populism?

I know populism can go off the rails if you're not careful, but it's my firm view that democracy needs a certain amount of populism to function. Even if it's not possible for politicians to always give the voters what they want, there should be a bias towards meeting the voters half way, giving them what they want if it's workable, and talking to them like adults when what they want isn't workable. Because democracy has to rest on popular consent.

What we've predominantly got in the political class is a kind of anti-populism. Listen to high priests of the regime like Alastair Campbell and Neil Kinnock, and they'll openly say that the purpose of politics is to save the people from their own base instincts.

To translate: we need an expert caste to rule us for our own good. We will eat our broccoli and like it.

We're a broad church on FWR, and I think many here would be happy with that if the expert political caste would recognise what a woman is. Then there are those of us who think, if they've lied to us about something that basic, what else are they lying about, and spot parallels with other things.

I think the post-1997 UK regime is on its last legs, for a whole number of reasons. But you can see the fragility in the attempts to manage the narrative. The definition of disinformation, in the hands of people like Morgan McSweeney (look up the "Centre for Countering Digital Hate") has now been expanded to include things that are actually true but unhelpful to the government.

This brittle orthodoxy really is end of regime stuff. It makes Starmer look like a sort of Erich Honecker of Blairism.

When it comes to describing indigenous people of this Island I think it’s a pretty nuanced subject that one cannot truly nail down in one or two posts, but it is my understanding at least that Cheddar man, one of Britains oldest ancestors was essentially ‘black’ as you would describe a person today. The people who inhabit the islands today are derived from a group of people called the Saxons who migrated here from continental Europe, and even amongst the Saxons, some were black. The BBC did an excellent documentary/drama recently on the Anglo Saxons recently that is rather entertaining and definitely corrected me on what I thought I knew about them growing up. Would definitely recommend.

When it comes to describing indigenous people of this Island I think it’s a pretty nuanced subject that one cannot truly nail down in one or two posts, but it is my understanding at least that Cheddar man, one of Britains oldest ancestors was essentially ‘black’ as you would describe a person today. The people who inhabit the islands today are derived from a group of people called the Saxons who migrated here from continental Europe, and even amongst the Saxons, some were black. The BBC did an excellent documentary/drama recently on the Anglo Saxons recently that is rather entertaining and definitely corrected me on what I thought I knew about them growing up. Would definitely recommend.

When it comes to describing indigenous people of this Island I think it’s a pretty nuanced subject that one cannot truly nail down in one or two posts, but it is my understanding at least that Cheddar man, one of Britains oldest ancestors was essentially ‘black’ as you would describe a person today. The people who inhabit the islands today are derived from a group of people called the Saxons who migrated here from continental Europe, and even amongst the Saxons, some were black. The BBC did an excellent documentary/drama recently on the Anglo Saxons recently that is rather entertaining and definitely corrected me on what I thought I knew about them growing up. Would definitely recommend.

Ironically, the fact we have been colonised (so foreign ruling class, not mass migration) is also used to claim there is no indigenous British population.

The problem is ALL the parties have massive issues.

So Greens and Reform are doing simplistic populism, the SNP has being doing that for ages too. Plaid Cymru again plays the nationalist card.

Tories messed up this country for 13 years now pretending it never happened and none of it is their fault.
Labour finally get power in Westminster then immediately mess it up. However that failure is rooted in their issues in local government and in Wales and their own internal culture.

Lib Dems claim to be the most practical, but they can't even defend free speech. Just like the other parties they are inconsistent. When they have power which they do in local councils and in the coalition they are not perfect either.

The big issue I can see is we need to be grown up about this. A lot of people want to blame individuals for HOW they vote.

The Greens and Reform could not peddle simple solutions if Labour, Lib Dems and Tories were not massively flawed. Their arguments are also simplistic - trust us we know what we are doing. We are competent. Look at our policies. The problem is the actual EVIDENCE of day to day life in the UK does not back this idea up. We have had a huge surge in migration in the last 5 years - has it made this country massively better? No it hasn't. The NHS crisis, housing, economy are all bad.

Many of the people voting Reform are working class people who don't follow politics closely. They vote on what might seem superficial characteristics. However my thinking is the British working class is rather more discerning than they so called superiors would like to think. They have power over who rules if they choose to use it.

If any party wants to win they have to earn the trust of a lot of people.

The fact is people are not voting Reform because they are Nazis or even because they think Farage is amazing.

They just think Farage is the least worst option right now. He maybe lying, but his lies seem more honest than the stuff the other parties are saying.

The other huge factor fueling Farage's rise beside the failure of other parties is the attempt to demonise those who vote for him. This will utterly fail as a tactic in the UK as it has elsewhere.

The only thing that can stop populism is competent effective government that delivers for ordinary people not name calling. If Labour gets results they will be re-elected if not people will go for Reform or the Greens. We should not BLAME them for this. Their choice is actually a rational move if you think about the wider context.

It also suggests that DEI is used yo punish British people for crimes of not their ancestors but their historic overlords

This! Working class Brits weren't responsible for colonisation nor the slave trade. Arguably, we are ourselves a colonised people because we've still not ousted the Norman aristocrats who took over in 1066.

When you look at British history, and the things we’ve done to other countries, if you don’t hate your country because of that then you must seriously lack empathy. We’ve taken way more from the world than we have given, and things like DEI are little steps in the right direction at addressing the balance.

This is such a biased view of British history and that of other countries but one that seems prevalent amongst DEI types. I do also wonder if it reflects their immigration status (as in family immigrated within a couple of generations) as it ignores even recent British history. The suffering of the people of Britain in both world wars is completely ignored - 6% of adult males died in the First World War, the suffering of those in city slums by industrialisation, the history of serfdom, of being colonised or being taken as slaves by countries from Scandinavia to Africa and Asia… It also ignores the colonisation and empires of other countries around the globe such as Ottoman Empire, the Mongol empire, the Roman Empire, the Mughal empire, or African empires that controlled the slavery trade which principally went east (including slaves captured from Europe). Or the tens of millions killed and the genocides under various Islamic caliphates.

It also suggests that DEI is used yo
punish British people for crimes of not their ancestors but their historic overlords. No wonder people hate it!

Who wouldn't be tempted by simple answers to all the problems that match their world view? Vote for me, and you can have unlimited chocolate with someone unworthy paying has a certain appeal for me.