AIBU to defriend this person, or should I stand up for what I believe, then defriend? WARNING..FACEBOOK AND IMMIGRANTS ISSUE.

[littlemisssarcastic]

Ok, I know there are many people who don't use facebook for whatever reason, but that's not why I am here.
I believe people should stand up for what they believe in, even if it means they might lose friends over it.

I am being bamboozled by a discussion I am having with a friend over their views on FB. I think I am now out of my depth, because I am convinced that this friend has now got someone else to write her replies to what I am saying. (She has never ever written or spoken like this before, in fact in all the time I have known her, she has never been able to have an intelligent conversation).

Before you say 'defriend', I'd like to say that whilst I agree that she will indeed be defriended (obviously depending on whether I am badly wrong or not) I feel I should at least attempt to give my friend 'food for thought' as it were.
It doesn't feel right to me to just walk away from such hatred without at least trying to enlighten her, or maybe it's me who needs enlightening, I don't know.

I am not sure if anyone will want to help me, so I'll post the conversation if anyone would like to see it,and hopefully make some sense of it for me, so I can at least try to clear up a few myths and maybe get this girl to think about what I have said before I defriend.

Warning: The discussion is about immigrants and how much help they should receive from the govt, so if anyone more intelligent than me who understands about immigration can help me, I'd really appreciate it. I can't help thinking that if one person changes their minds about immigrants (and friend is quite young) then I will feel it has been worth having the discussion IYSWIM.

I just get fed up because DH is an immigrant and people talk a lot about how much benefits immigrants get when they are just going to bugger off - it's crap for him as he contributes a heck of a lot and of course gets no benefits of any kind. I suspect the OP's mate is using tethers definition of immigrant and meaning 'anyone brown' even if they've been given leave to remain/citizenship/were born here.

I also get a bit fed up with points like yours LRDthefeminist

First of all the vilest rant I ever heard about Immigrants specifically Mid European immigrants was from an ASIAN taxi driver - so your statement which makes an assumption that anyone who speaks out about immigration mean black/brown people in otherwords the same old mantra 'all racists are white and all whites are racists' whilst conveniently ignoring the fact that all races and colours are capable of racist attitudes, is total crap.

Your friend really should find out their facts first.
Councils and registered providers (social landlords) allocate on housing need not immigration status. The allocation policy for each organisation is published on line. In addition RPs are businesses - they do get money for development ( £15 -30K per unit) but the day to day running is paid for by the rent of the tenants. As an immigrant can't claim housing benefit it is unlikely that they will be allocated a house with a RP as they won't be able to pay the rent. Therefore the immigrants who are in social rented accomodation are working and paying tax. They will also, by virtue of their working status, be more likely to be offered "Affordable Rent" accommodation which is a rent product that subsidises the building of new units.

I'm not offering an opinion on this one way or another, I think that if there is an abuse of the system taking place then it is the fault of the system, not those who are in a desperate situation or alternatively chancers.

The only thing I will say is this.

My DH used to work processing HB claims.

Claimants used to send letters in with their claims which stated that their application for leave to remain/asylum had been rejected and that they had no right to stay in the country but that they could use this letter as proof of ID to claim benefits until they left.

Well, now my friends friends have jumped on the bandwagon too.

I read this thread and then said to my friend:

From what you've said so far, it appears you can't seem to decide who you don't like. Do you dislike illegal immigrants, who aren't allowed to work and aren't allowed to claim benefits?
Or do you dislike working legal immigrants who are by definition tax payers?
Or do you dislike everyone, British or otherwise that doesn't work?

Also, benefits are not a reward system, paying tax isn't the same as paying into a savings scheme. A welfare state is there to help those who need it most. By your logic, a millionaire in his 70's has more right to financial support from the govt than a child who is disabled which is a very bizarre way of thinking.

If you have a problem with people who have never worked claiming benefits, what about the 'home grown scroungers' who have never worked and have been unemployed their whole lives? Should they be treated as second class citizens too? Or is that reserved for immigrants, regardless of whether they work or not?

How do you feel about the windrush?

It seems we're not going to agree, but one thing that cannot be denied is that your status is inciting racial hatred. Seriously....Does that not concern you?

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To this, I have received a reply from one of my friends friends which says :

Friend has been fairly consistent I think you'll find. I dislike anyone who thinks they have a right to a "free lunch".

Your comments in the first paragraph are completely arse about face to be honest. Just because someone is a "legal" immigrant (I'm assuming you mean someone who has arrived due to abomination that is the EU?) does not automatically make them a tax payer. They would have to be working for that to be the case and you would have to be phenomenally naive to think that they all are.

She never described benefits as a reward system. I suggest you read more carefully in future. A welfare state IS there to help those who need it, someone who will not work does not need a handout, they need a job!

Home grown scroungers should be treated like the second class citizens they are in my opinion. Not all immigrants are unwelcome, those which are helpful to the country and the economy, like the windrush (i believe you mean the Jamaicans that arrived after the atrocity of the second world war to help rebuild the country). Those workers were needed - THESE are the kind of immigrants that a country should be opening its borders too. Not any old tom dick and harry that wants to take a British person's job to get a slightly better lot in life. When people are unable to get work and most new jobs are going to immigrants, there is a problem i.e. the rate of immigration is too high. Just to clarify, when immigrants are needed, the hard working are welcome. When British people are struggling to find work they are NOT welcome.

The objection expressed in the status is that someone who has worked hard on the bread line their entire life gets a worse lot than someone who has simply strolled in under some EU policy bollocks, stuck out their hand and had a huge pile of cash planted there so they can sit on their arse not working. Britain needs to put its own citizens first.

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I give up...I really do. Do they actually know this is wrong or are they so blinkered as to believe this rubbish?
I am getting quite annoyed now, especially since I have been accused of being racist. What a U turn!!! Where have I been racist? Please tell me??

Sorry, missed out the last bit of friend's friends post which said:

And what a surprise.... when you can't win with logic, play the racist card against something which makes no reference to race whatsoever. GOOD ONE! claps

Sorry, one more update, it turns out the 'friend of a friend' is actually my friends boyfriend. I imagine he would agree with her, since it would be difficult to date someone if they had such opposing views to you.

What I don't understand is :And what a surprise.... when you can't win with logic, play the racist card against something which makes no reference to race whatsoever. GOOD ONE! claps'

Surely if someone is an immigrant, they are a different race FFS!!! So how can he say there has been no reference to race??? If immigrants were british and were coming to britain, scottish coming to scotland, irish to ireland or welsh to wales, surely to god they wouldn't be immigrants would they??

What your friend's boyfriend is missing is that "the british" used the same arguments he is to justify racism in the 60's and 70's. The whitehall race riots and the innumerable petty discriminations faced by black people were caused by people already living here who equated "foreign" with "lazy scrounger" when the quiet, unheard majority of carribean folk came here for the same reasons eastern europeans are now.

If you were an employer trying to make a profit, would you choose a british person who demands every right they think they're entitled to, or a foreigner who is grateful for any job and does it with a song in their heart? I know who I'd rather (and often do) work with

Why don't you write the figures down of job seekers versus pension someone else posted to show that reagrdless of their views the original post is in fact incorrect.
Also, it incites racial hatred because it compares immigrants to pensioners not unemployed people who are receiving benefits who have never paid in. This group cannot be categorised as immigrants and therefore it is inciting immigrant hatred.

Thank you purplepidjin

I actually feel incredibly insulted to be accused of 'using the racist card' and am fuming at it at the moment, although logically, I don't know why his opinion bothers me that much, haven't worked that bit out yet
I suppose I am just angry right now.

It's seems my friend couldn't argue the case on her own, posted tripe that isn't even correct and lo and behold, along comes her equally obnoxious b/f to argue on her behalf.

I said 'working legal immigrants' so I think it is him who hasn't read my posts properly.

I have always thought that the majority of immigrants who can work, ie, legal immigrants for want of a better phrase do work.
I'm sure I read something a while back where it said that more than 90% of immigrants who are here legally do work.

Are they taking our jobs? I don't know. Does the minimum wage apply to immigrants? I don't know. If they are being offered jobs before UK citizens, then I have to ask why? I suspect they have a much stronger work ethos than unskilled UK workers do. That's just my opinion though.

Well. I am an immigrant. Ive worked here for 10 years or so and paid enormous amounts of tax and have never been entited to, nor have I received any benefits. Frankly I get sick of my tax being used to support the scum benefit society of the resident people of this city.

In fact it compares illegal immigrants to pensioners and illegal immigrants do not receive benefits, so at the very least it's sensationalist and incorrect.

Should we say all indigenous young people with families are receiving more benefits than pensioners because whether they are working or not, in absolute term they will be receiving more 'benefits' like schooling, child benefit etc than pensioners. In addition part of this indigenous group may never have worked, so in their argument are not deserving so should we not allow free schooling for those who either don't pay enough tax to cover their burden or don't work?

I sent my friend a private message to point this out microfight. It is the only private message I have sent her on this issue.

It said: I also think it's worth mentioning that a single pensioner receives more in state pension/pension guarantee credit than either a single parent with one child, a single unemployed person, or even a married/cohabiting couple who are unemployed. Now that's food for thought.
I don't begrudge a pensioner a penny, but the main reason pensioners die of starvation or hypothermia is not because they are not entitled to enough money, but because of a variety of other reasons which would take too long to go into here.

Oh God - she's going out with a racist. Frankly, she must have been at least a bit racist herself. For most people, expression of racist views would be a total turnoff...

I'd leave them to it. Really. You've done your best.

Many people I know, of a variety of cultures, hold tolerance as a core principle. It's in the bible, koran, talmud etc as well as being enshrined in government policy (law?) And there is massive societal pressure to be inclusive

Being accused of racism undermines those basic tenets so yadnbu to feel massively insulted!

The commonly used phrase 'they're taking jobs from British folk' is, in my opinion incorrect.
I work in a relativly low skilled, minimum wage job - whenever we have to recruit GENERALLY the british applicants (if we have any) are unwilling or unable to work the unsociable hours for £5.93 an hour. They're also pretty shocked that they might actually have to clean a toilet or two.

In addition, the way some of the staff are talked to/treated by customers is astounding. I'm an immigrant myself, but from New Zealand so don't seem to get treated as if I'm an idiot or sponging off the country. The others very much do.

Very interesting topic, but as previously said many people won't change their views until they experience something that changes it for them!

OP I would gracefully retire from the conversation on FB - you have made your point, but clearly aren't getting anywhere!

'I also get a bit fed up with points like yours LRDthefeminist

First of all the vilest rant I ever heard about Immigrants specifically Mid European immigrants was from an ASIAN taxi driver - so your statement which makes an assumption that anyone who speaks out about immigration mean black/brown people in otherwords the same old mantra 'all racists are white and all whites are racists' whilst conveniently ignoring the fact that all races and colours are capable of racist attitudes, is total crap.'

Island I don't know how you came to those conclusions, but I'm really sorry to have offended you. I didn't say or mean that all whites are racists. I'm racist myself. Nor did I say that all racists are whites. In fact, I didn't mention whites.

The reason I quoted what tethers says is because there are people out there who think immigrants are visually distinct from 'British' people. Not all racists are like this, but some are. They are particularly likely to come up against me or DH, because DH is white and Russian. He was asked by the BNP about his voting habits at the last election. It gets you down.

I do accept it is horrible to come across racism in any form, from any person and I'm sad you had this bad experience with an Asian taxi driver - but I think if you read back you'll see I didn't say any of the things you suggest in your post, and would be very unlikely to think them!

Sorry - inappropriate but PMSL.

I've just written 'I'm racist myself' and meant to write 'I'm white myself'.

I take it back, island, maybe I have deep ishoos making themelves heard in Freudian slips (or maybe I'm narked off with responding to straw man arguments, could be either).

Did anyone watch that programme 'The Day The Immigrants Went Home' on the BBC a few months ago. They took a load of unemployed Brits who complained about immigrants taking their jobs and gave them the jobs the immigrants did and filmed them.

5 were given jobs as waitors in an Indian restaurant. On the first day 2 didn't show, 2 rang in sick and the one who showed up quit halfway through the shift because it was too hard and the owner had to do all the work himself for the rest of the day.

There were others as well but I can't remember the details.

LRD - I read that sentence three times to see if I'd misread it!

Well thanks for re-reading it!

I felt like a right fool reading it back.

Haven't read through all of this but grrr! People like your friend OP make me think they really need a slap.............preferably with the 'big book of home office rules on immigration' just to educate them. As far as i'm aware i don't think they can work or claim until their application has gone through can they? Someone correct me if i'm wrong though. Tbh OP I delete anyone with those kind of views but can see why you didn't. Well done for having the guts to go against the grain with them x

Well, after her boyfriend called me a fucking idiot and said I was a fool, and that they are not being racist, because the discussion about immigrants coming to the UK is about nationality's not race or creed, I was so sick of being insulted, that I told them both that they came across as xenophobic racists who are inciting racial hatred, and that if my friend wants to copy statuses like a sheep, make sure she has got her facts correct, because the facts in the status are clearly inaccurate.
I said much more, but can't remember it all, basically it was responding to his pathetic little rants. I remember I did say I was thankful he wasn't running the country.
Oh and he said the NHS were sick to the back teeth of immigrants and wanted them all to disappear, at which I laughed and said the NHS was held together by bloody immigrants. Not sure if I was right about that.
After that, I defriended and blocked, but it's actually scary how many people have the same beliefs and attitudes as ex friend and her boyfriend.
I did question why his g/f hadn't deleted the status, unless of course she was enjoying seeing her b/f making a complete tit of himself, then I defriended and blocked.
Am still angry that there are people out there who are so nasty, but hey ho, that's life. I certainly don't want anything to do with them.

I work in care and probobly half my colleagues are not native english speakers if that makes you feel better, op?

Thanks purplepidjin.