Do you know anyone in real life who votes for UKIP?

[puddingsforsandy]

And if so, do you judge them?

If you're a UKIP supporter yourself, are you happy to declare it in public/at work?

I haven't yet (well I think!) meet anyone who votes for this party. Someone from FB linked something from UKIP FB page disagreeing with it. This lead me to their page. The supporters of this party come across as thick (going by the FB page)

I can't believe this is the same party that was lead by that talk show host. Silk something.

Anyway that's my opinion but my questions above still stand.
Thanks.

Can I just say that in 12 years of living here nobody's tried to rape me or convert me to Islam. I think you'll find most white people living in areas of high immigration will say the same.

My experience of living in a minority-white city, and having my children at a minority-white school, is that everyone's too busy making a living. I regularly shop in one of the areas that is essentially 100% Pakistani heritage (cheaper, better, more interesting vegetables, all the delights of a sweet centre where fresh samosas are about 25p each) and it's a bustle of industry, not radicalism. There are a tiny, tiny minority of extremists (although I actually know more fundamentalist Christians, whose views on homosexuality and uppity women are just as disgusting, just wrapped up in fancier language) but those extremists are treated with the same, or more, disdain as they are by the wider community.

I hear tales of the area I live and work in from people who have engaged in white flight to the surrounding towns. I don't recognise the place I live from their accounts of it, all of which appear to be a combination of third-hand stories and things from The Daily Mail.

I wouldn't use the term 'forriners' and don't like it.

There are still parts of the city where I would not like to walk through. I was probably a bit over the top to say I felt unsafe that's not so much it, more like I stick out like a sore thumb. Those are areas which have not integrated with the rest of the city - why is this? This is a genuine question. It has happened in some places, why not others?

@ minifingers im not the one making sweeping statements - you are! yep I know all 5 of my local MPs - I pass one of them regularly who sits outside the pub down the road with his wife drinking wine. yes I have contacted them all about graffiti in our area - every one of them said this is nothing to do with us - what do you want us to do? really? lazy fuckers that's what they are. yes I have attended meetings about various things but what do they do? hee haw.

Wow, really could not see this turning into a 'bloody foreigners' thread. Oh, wait...

Olives - you plan to vote UKIP and you use the word 'chavvy'? What a delight you're turning out to be! Stick around on MN long enough and I'm betting I'll have a bingo card with your name on it.

"My experience of living in a minority-white city, and having my children at a minority-white school, is that everyone's too busy making a living. "

I grew up somewhere like that, and now live somewhere that is mostly white. I've noticed little real difference between the two areas (both economically similar), aside from little things like more haberdasheries in my home town than my adopted town.

There are slightly more areas in my home town that I wouldn't walk through late at night, though these are actually mostly the predominantly white areas. And I'm white, so it's not that I stand out there. IME it's not the predominant nationality in the areas which makes them dangerous.

Friday - I am in no way trailing a coat for UKIP. I am just repeating one of the reasons I have heard that people vote UKIP. It is mad to not discuss these if you/I want to challenge the UKIP vote.

Englands population density is very high - the average voter that I know don't want the ins and outs or much detail. If England has one of the highest population densities in Europe (which it does, - larger populations mean nothing if you are not looking at land space too!) then to my friend that is as good as a sweeping statement of us having 'the country being the most populated'. I don't live in the real SE (and don't visit much either apart from to London) but she tells me that in her opinion (and we can't argue with an opinion) there is not much countryside left. I am sure there is but I have heard this a lot from people round here - a lot of whom are disillusioned tory voters.

She is already pretty old and yes, is likely to grow older. But you must know that you can't always argue politics on fact - if I showed her your post it would just turn her off. IF labour did a good PR job on decreasing the population, controlling housing on greenfield, encouraging more jobs and properly reducing full time unemployment she may be convinced.

I have no idea where I will vote - I have never voted UKIP, but then I have never voted green. I tend to go through the manifestos in detail nearer the time and then decide.

I think its very dangerous that people are so against UKIP/BNP that they don't listen to why people vote for them without attacking. The mainstream, more centralised, parties should listen and then compete in a less extreme way. That would undermine any extreme party.

People will turn a blind eye to the more loathsome features of UKIP, such as their alliances with extreme right wing groups in Europe, the racism and xenophobia of many of its members, and it's crap and discriminatory policies against women, on the strength of its anti immigration policies.

Have no lessons been learned from the experience of Nazi germany?

Frogwatcher does your friend gets her 'facts' from the Daily Mail? Well done friday for so so comprehensively demolishing them.

But then the average UKIp voter isnt interested in actually knowing anything, they just want someone who will pander to their uninformed prejudices.

I just love how most people who come out with UKIP tripe usually live in a mostly-white area, yet are scared sick of all the forriners!

And I particularly loved this quote:

She also has a lot of friends in nmw jobs who cant get work.

So, they have work but they can't get work. How does that even make any sense????

@ minifingers - can we say that labour supporters turn a blind eye to their loathesome features? like ed balls? or that labour broke the country? or the blair lied about WMD? or that gordon brown called an ordinary person a bigot because she had a different opinion than his but was 2 faced to say it out of earshot? or so he thought.. or that they lied about their social engineering policies? I can keep going its not overly difficult to pick fault in what they achieved in their time in govt.

Was it not in the news just last week that England does now indeed have a more densely populated land mass than the Netherlands?

I'm a bit confused about ukip policy on "alleged camps for the disabled". One poster here says she found no mention of it within manifesto - another told her ukip-voting friend it was most definitely true. I do remember a party member making some pretty dumb comments - but I wasn't aware any political party operated as Borg.

I may vote ukip as a protest. As someone said pages ago, I've been around the world (spent 20 years travelling). I feel like the proverbial frog thrown it to boiling water whilst the rest of you screaming "thick racist" started cold.

It is extremely folly to assume thick and racist - all you will do is drive the conversation underground.

just want to know who voted for scameron!

Doris it was in the last general election manifesto which oddly has now been deleted.

Peggy - what loathsome features does the Labour Party have? They don't have alliances with far right groups shouting for forced repatriation of immigrants and aren't planning any policies like scrapping maternity leave legislation and the right to protection against discrimination in employment.

As for 'breaking Britain' , ha ha, let me guess which newspapers you read.

Err... Mini Labour introduced ATOS.

UKIP policy mentioned here

If England has one of the highest population densities in Europe

What does that mean? Cornwall. Fuck all people, particularly in the winter. Cumbria. Fuck all people. London and its surroundings are densely populated, but not remotely on the scale or density of Tokyo, which has some of the most savage immigration controls (and a catastrophically low birth rate, too). If you don't want to live in densely populated areas, don't live in densely populated areas.

IF labour did a good PR job on decreasing the population

Who would benefit? Why would the Labour Party want to do a "good PR job" on something which would be socially, economically and standard of living-y suicidal? Imagine you closed off immigration and discouraged people from having children. In twenty years time, who's feeding and caring for the elderly?

We needed immigration in the noughties because the birthrate collapsed. There have been two massive postwar peaks in births, 1965-ish and 1985-ish, when around 900k people were born. In 2000 there were about 650k births: 30% less than the rate fifteen and thirty-five years earlier. There was no reason to believe it would recover; the 1985 peak was the "echo" of the 1965 peak but the birthrate amongst mothers themselves born in the UK was still massively below replacement. So the birthrate amongst the UK population in 2000 was in free-fall, with the TFR at about 1.7 and dropping. Last year there were about 800k births, which is still well below the 1965 and 1985 peaks. What do you think a country looks like when thirty or more percent of the population are over 70?

and here

Fuck me, Fukushima was worse than I thought if Tokyo is now in Europe!

I shall come back when I have read the Lib Dem, Tory, Labour and UKIP manisfestos. In the interim, yes, I do know people who will vote UKIP at the next election, notably my parents and they most certainly aren't stupid or bigoted.

I shall never vote Labour and I feel that Cameron has let down middle England and he has lied about having a referendum on Europe which has not materialised.

I know I shall have no hesitation voting Conservative again as soon as it has a decent leader. In the meantime, I am debating with myself about how to vote to ensure that Cameron stops leading the Conservative party which until the last year or two I have supported and worked for for most of my adult life. It has failed in the last term and it has failed, in my opinion, entirely due to Cameron's arrogance and the fact that he is totally out of sympathy with what British people want.

Doris - you probably would have voted for Hitler too. Millions of right thinking Germans did, once they were persuaded by the Nazis that Jews were the problem and that he was going to solve Germany's social and economic problems by putting them in their place.

I don't know any bigots.So no I don't know anyone who votes ukip.

usualsuspect

I don't know any bigots.So no I don't know anyone who votes ukip.

You also don't know the meaning of the word 'bigot'. It doesn't mean what you think it means.

ArgumentsatChristmas. I wouldn't be so sure that the Tories will give us a lower bill - they are still resolute in spouting off all their bollocks supporting the non-existent business case for the High Speed 2 project, somewhere north of £48 Bn at last count.

I could weep at the thought of passing on that debt to our children and their children

I may just tactically vote UKIP if only to get them to kick it into touch and de-rail it, if you will pardon the pun.

All your categorisations are spot on!

I feel that Cameron has let down middle England

Translation: "a few nutters and I are upset about same-sex marriage".

My FIL. He is a moron.