These bloody Benefits Street and Benefits Britain programmes are just nasty judgemental propaganda.

[GratefulHead]

Following another thread I made the mistake of watching Benefits Britain.....or at least as much as I could stand before turning it off.

We met a large family with 14 kids....yep....huge family but one of very few such families nationally.

The voiceover says that the programme makers worked out the family's benefits at £70k per annum. And added "two of the children have disabilities so that means they can also claim Carers Allowance" as if that was such a crime ffs. They live in an 8 bedroom "benefits house" apparently and the cameraman was careful to ensure they got all the things like flat screens, games consoles etc into shot.

Then there was Sarah from Essex, a woman unemployed and probably unemployable. She is divorcing and planning to marry her new boyfriend she has known all of two weeks.(does she sound stable and employable to you?). She lives in a "benefits house" with her two adult children who the programme makers couldn't wait to tell us had never worked. From the short bit I saw of Sarah she came across as Dysfuntional ...and yes I did mean to put in a capital D! I would put money on her having had a crappy life right from birth with poor parenting which she has repeated with her own kids. I've seen other similar families....in all cases the families were know. To social services from when the parents were small children the,selves.

The last one was a 60 year old man who has been unable to work for the last two years due to degenerative arthritis of the spine, he walks with a frame and lives in a "benefits flat". But hey...who cares if he walks with a farm and is in constant pain as long as you get that footage of him playing his XBox eh? Judgemental and nasty.

I just wanted to scream FUCK OFF very five mins at the screen. Wtf IS a "benefits house"? Am I in a "benefits house" because it's social housing and I claim housing benefit (and Carers Allowance too), or if I pay my own rent does it cease to be "a benefits house" Is the private let a "benefits house" of the tenant claims housing benefit?

Seriously....these programmes are awful.....and I was so angry at the comment about Carers Allowance as they made it sound almost an "extra perk" for the family with 14 kids. Do you know what it's like to support a child with autism or ADHD or anything else which is severe enough to warrant middle rate care for DLA? It's bloody exhausting and non-stop, if my DS doesn't sleep then neither do I ....and its a regular occurrence too. How dare anyone think it is some kind of fucking perk. Live my bloody life for a week and then see if you still think it's a good deal! This week has been very difficult as its half term and my son has been full on in his tics and activity levels...day AND night!

These programmes just turn people against the most vulnerable....and they managed to pick three families with circumstances which were frankly not usual. Most families on benefits DONT have 14 kids (would like to see the stats for how many families nationally are both that large and on benefits), most families on benefits are far more stable and functional than Sarah from Essex whose new boyfriend was a homeless Polish man she met on the steps of her local Morrisons.
The poor man with the severe spine problem was almost flagged up as "deserving"...until the filmmaker spotted his XBox I assume.

Horrible and judgemental, I won't be watching any more of them. They need taking off air.

Not once did i direct it at you. I quoted you to make a point about the left demonising anyone who disagrees with their policies. I think you proved my point by saying that mn used to be left leaning now everyone is self intrested (basically saying anyone who didn't vote for a left wing party is selfish). I pointed out that actually many of Labour and the other left-wing parties policies are ineffective at helping people in poverty and increasing social mobility.

The point about the left in this country been mainly made up of middle class was more of an ironic after note considering they seem to believe there the 'parties of the poor' when actually they've smacked down anyone who raised issues that disproposionatley affect poorer communities such as immigration.

Oooh, right-wing person mentions immigration!

Do I get a prize?

Do you know who affected the community I grew up in? White scumbags, stealing, mugging, being generally anti-social. And yet, as I say, I grew up in Birmingham, with its huge Muslim community. Very little trouble from them though.

Do you know who affected the area of Birmingham I left behind me two years ago? White scumbags, drinking, vandalising, stabbing, thieving. Large Polish community there who worked hard (often two or more jobs) and raised their kids to be decent.

You're Nigel Farage's wet dream!

I agree, everyone has a responsibility to society's most vunerable. But to here people say 'we have no school places, our services are at breaking point, theres no chance of us getting social housing while immigrants are fast tracked into them, the area is crime-ridden etc we don't blame them but we shouldnt be taking more' and then just to dismiss them as a label is not fufulling that responsibilty imho.

I agree with you about education. Its the root of social mobility & equality of oppertunity. However I just don't think Labour have an clue how to pragmatically improve education in the UK, for example they promise lower class sizes but suggest no ideas on how to fund an effective school building programme.

I don't understand the lefts obsession with university either. Its a very wasteful and ineffective way of training the future generations. It places debt onto individuals, it provides very industry general training & education (hence the need for graduate training schemes), offers training in fields that don't require a degree level education or offers very unrealistic chances of getting a job. Add to that the vast majority of graduates don't end up going into there studied field

In my ideal world unless your off to study a traditional subject that requires a degree (law, medicine, stem) the vast majority of school leavers would go into apprenticeships to be trained as skilled workers putting the onus off funding on buisnesses instead of taxpayers. Those with the desire/ambition/talent to progress into management would then be sponsored to do a part-time degree. It offers so many benefits; bosses swear by its effectiveness, they're not left in debt, there trained for a job that actually exists, they earn a wage, they gain job experience, complete top-bottom industry mobility. I've met nuclear power station directors with masters who started right at the bottom and are beyond grateful for the investment their companies made in there careers. No reason it can't be replicated in other industries.

Sorry for derailing op.

Oh fuck off.

I don't hate immigrants trying to better there lives i'd do the exact same in there position but when poor communities are been failed dysmally if makes no sense to place even more people into those areas.

There's very real issues of wage depression (big buisness love mass immigration), services been overstreched, lack of school places, lack of social housing etc. Then theres the culture clash, i live to 2 mins from the scene of a horrific rape/attempted murder commited by an Asian fella and about 20 mins from an area where hundreds of girls in care were systamatically groomed and raped by Asian street gangs. It's pigheaded attitudes like yours why no one wanted to confront the issue and allowed it to continue for years. I'm not saying race/nationallity effect crime rates, i'm saying poverty causes crime and econmic migrants are naturally poor upon arrival.

PS i'm actually very centre with socialist tendencies. However thanks for showing me your a pigheaded racist who makes generalisations based on skin colour. I don't blame immigrants, i blame people like you and the politicians who enabled this.

People like me?

You've just brought up two incidents involving Asians (which part of Asia, the whole continent?) and then called me racist. Laughable.

First, the vast majority of child abuse is carried out by white men, even gangs that groom. The reason the gangs of men recently made the news is because it was sustained over many years and the girls involved were already known to authorities and had been ignored. The fact that the men were 'Asian' was unusual, hence people frothing.

The majority of rapes and murders in the UK are by white males. Again, you've picked ONE by an 'Asian' male.

And these 'Asians' are usually second or third generation so therefore British.

Now, as I've pointed out that the majority of crime I've encountered has been by white males and you've specifically picked out crimes committed by 'Asian' men, please point out where I've been racist and you haven't.

rale

1. What about arts degrees?
2. Let's discuss abuse and the Catholic Church, shall we. Lots of predominantly white men abusing children...

Let's discuss abuse and the Catholic Church, shall we. Lots of predominantly white men abusing children...' Exactly, dawndonna.
I grew up in an area where many young boys were abused by white Catholic men. Where young, pregnant, unmarried women suffered in the hands of white, Catholic Nuns. Where many women were subjected to barbaric medical procedures, or the wholly unnecessary removal of their ovaries or wombs, by, you guessed it, a white Doctor. So no 'cultural clash' there.

Ah, but rale knows of an 'Asian fella' who committed a terrible crime, so this is evidence of a 'culture clash'.

Rale, I'd love to know what evidence you have for calling Whisk a 'pigheaded racist'. Also what you meant when you referred to Whisk as 'people like you'?

Why does it always have to be one or the other? No-one is denying that there was abuse from the church. There was also abuse from the white upper/middle class. But there were also gangs of men who groomed specifically white girls.

The term Asian is usually used in this context to mean people of Indian, Pakistani or Bangladeshi origin just as White is usually used to mean anglo saxon British. Both terms are a bit vague so not really logical to criticise the use of one while using the other.

As sensible debate would be useful - not constant attacking of each other.

Art degrees as in fine arts or art degrees as opposed to stem based degrees? If fine arts (painting, sculpting etc) i'd probably have it that they'd have to find a art apprenticeship (possibly run by galleries, other art organisations etc) or fund it themselves (with scholarships for the particularly talented). I don't question the legitamacy of the field but its incredibly competative and putting out say 5000 art graduates if theres only 100 jobs in the field in the whole country is a complete waste of the investment made into them. Its why we have graduates working in starbucks.

And yes but the catholic church sexual abuse was discovered and debated heavily. We learn't that pillar of the community types are no different from the rest of us. I heard rumours of inappropiate behaviour by some members of the Asian community in West Yorkshire years before the Rotherham scandal but they were dismissed with 'most sexual abuse is commited in the home by white men'. Very true but that didn't help the 100s of vunerable young girls been raped though did it? This was a very speccific crime of street grooming of girls in care by exclusively Asian street gangs. The fact no one wanted to hear about it because it offended there 'but immigrants are hard working and lovely and vital to the country' ideology disgusts me tbh. Immigrants are no different from us they can be lovely. They can be disgusting pedophiles. The only difference is we can choose to turn these people away unlike British citizens commiting sexual crimes (unless your suggesting deportation). My OH will never be eligable for a US Visa because of a minor non violent criminal record while we're letting in convicted Polish murderers.

Oh and you was racist when you decieded to make out white british people in your area were scumbags while other ethnic groupings are perfectly behaved. I've never once suggested skin colour affects crime, you did hence your a racist.

When people say 'immigrants are hard working & do jobs Brits don't' I just assume they have a very easy job in some a/c controlled office somewhere stacking paper clips. If you worked alongside my oh you'd see how demeaning that is to people employed in his and similar fields. He's a welder on power stations who does 70-80 hour weeks during the summer shutdowns. The work takes years of training and is physically demanding (he's seen the heat alone knock out people). The industry has treated its workers horrifically including by bringing in cheap foreign labour to drive down t&cs and wages (check out the Lindsey oil strike unions wouldnt touch it for fear of looking like little englanders, talk bout socialism eh). I'm sure if my oh is ever made redundant it will be because he didn't really want his job or because he wasn't hard working enough

So, as a white British person, I was being racist to white British people? The reason I pointed out that the majority of crime where I lived was committed by white British people was in counter to you bringing immigration into the thread. You brought up immigration, not me, so you started down that route.

And you brought up the rape and murder by an 'Asian fella'. One rape and murder, as opposed to the countless crimes committed by white Brits where I lived. Again, how does pointing out that the majority of crime was, and is, committed by white Brits make me a racist? Surely, racism would be saying something like 'and an Asian fella raped and murdered someone'. Oh wait...

Your arguments are flawed. I'm not the only person to point this out. If you genuinely think I'm a racist, report me. Racism is against talk guidelines. Let's see what HQ think, shall we.

Rale, please stop digging. I would step away from this thread if I were you.

I live in a neighbourhood full of immigrants. Yes, they do put pressure on public services. Yes, most of them are lovely, hardworking people and I am more than happy to let my sons play with their children. Yes, a few of them are not so amazing, but doesn't that happen everywhere, regardless of ethnicity and where people come from?

What happened with the gang you describe is truly terrible, but I don't think it had much to do with the colour of their skin. If ethnicity had anything to do with it, then maybe it was because they felt so alienated from the white community. However, crime like that goes deeper than racial origin and those particular young men would probably have always found some way to be evil. White young men are just as capable of these atrocities, as you have been careful to point out.

I think you sound bitter about immigration. I know immigration has a disproportionate impact on poor communities - I live in one! However, let's not blame the immigrants, hey? Many of our public services would collapse without them (eg nurses from abroad who do an amazing job).

We had some building work done recently and it was obvious from the state of our yard that work was in progress. Every day, at least one eastern European man knocked on our door asking if there was any labouring work available. They didn't look like scroungers to me.... Just people who wanted to provide for their families.

I'm probably not making much sense, and should step away from this thread myself. I know you've had a hard time with your oh being undercut by foreign workers. We are on island, so sometimes it's easy to forget that we also live in a world community where borders are increasingly blurred.

Please don't get yourself upset. You make some good points, and it is clear to see that you have personal experience of life on poor street in the way that some MNers haven't. It's just that your attitude towards people who were born in other countries, or whose parents were born in other countries, perhaps needs thinking about again. I'm glad you realise we are all human, whatever our ethnicity or background. Please don't believe anything that ukip says, ever! They just want to create division among us.

Yes it's perfectly possible to express racist sentiments against your own race. What are you on, of course white people commit the majority of crimes, they make up the majority of the population! You made hugely offensive generalisations about both white british and muslim communities to prove your point that immigration isn't bad, I was highlighting speciffic problems with certain immigrant communities, I oppose uncontrolled immigration of ALL races and nationallities for its negative political, economical and social effects.

I pointed out the Rotherham (and lets not forget Oldham) scandals and the Beeston attempted murder/rape to highlight the fact that some cultures hold views that are incompatable with British attitudes (gender equallity been the biggest one). Imho people with them sort of views towards women should not be aloud to settle in the UK. I'd say that if they was white, black, brown or green! You want to be an apologist for certain people from certain cultures treating women like sex objects on British streets them that's your choice. Of course British men commit sexual crimes as well but since there not recent immigrants to the country its pretty irrelavent to a discussion on the pros & cons of immigration is it not.

Go to HQ but i haven't been racist, your just incapable of understanding the difference between a discussion on immigration/culture and an attack on race. Personally i disagree with censorship of any form and believe all information should be free. There's a reason they banned slaves from reading.

I agree about gender inequality. There are some communities living in Britain who have some catching up to do.

However, what happened in Rotherham and Oldham was not about gender inequality, it was about deliberate asexual abuse, plain and simple. The young men responsible were wrong by every standard in their own ethnic and cultural community, as well as according to British law. Nobody is excusing what they did!

(sorry , I meant to write ''sexual", not "asexual ". Is my fat fingers on tiny phone)

You honestly just sound bitter amd twisted. Each post is worse than the last!

You realise a whole lot of white British men hold mysoginistic views against women too, don't you? And that you are basically saying that e should close the gates cos them furriners are all sexist? Bet you die a little more inside each time you see a mixed race relationship, eh? What with 'their' incompatible attitudes to women?

And what, exactly, are British attitudes? Because that's an ancient line of bullshit that went out with imperialism. There's no such thing as typical Britishness anymore.

I didn't say I was going to report you. Please read my posts properly. I said if you're so utterly convinced that I'm such a racist, report me. Please.

I pointed out British men commit sex crimes as well. Mysoginistic views exist in Britain for sure but year by year they are been marginalised, bringing in more people with similar views just reduces the progress we've made. And since British men are already here there's nothing we can do apart from imprison them once they act on such views and encourge more positive attitudes.

If you wanted to immigrate to the US for example you have to prove you can benefit the US by a) been married to a US citizen b) having a skilled profession the US has a shortage off c) have $5m in investable funds. If you have a criminal record your pretty much banned. Anyone else its 'sorry but no thanks'.

You've fundementally misunderstood me, i don't want to 'close the borders'. I want a smaller more controlled amount of immigration, where immigrants are vetted on there fiancial circumstances, skills and abilities and attitudes and beliefs to prove there a benefit to the UK. I've said several times that many if not most immigrants are a benefit, i don't see why that means we shouldn't stop the ones that aren't from migrating over though. I don't blame immigrants i blame the goverment and the left who've allowed this to happen, it's incredibly frustrating that people assume anti uncontrolled immigration = anti immigrant.

Your making hugely offensive assumptions about me, i'm actually in a mixed race relationship and have no problem with foreigners so this will be my last post unless your willing to have a sane intelligent conversation about immigration.

Rale , my feeling is that you have got confused. Please have a good honest think about the points you are making.

You implied that arts degrees are valueless unless there is a job at the end of it. I would argue that a society which didn't fund at least a few people to think about abstract things was in a certain amount of danger .... And I think those people should not all be remote and elite folk from privileged backgrounds .

You think that questions about gender inequality ought to be part of border control. I'm not sure I agree . We have good laws in this country for people to take hold of if they need to. Anyone bringing his wife, girlfriend or daughter into this country needs to understand that she will have the rights that all British women have.

No I think arts is incredible valuable to society. I just think far to many people are trained/educated for the amount of work the industries can provide. In my opinion however the government shouldn't be funding or loaning any money for university degrees in fields that are oversubscribed for students. There are massive skills shortages in this country that is causing a real threat of stunting our developing economy, investing tens of thousands of pounds into an education that results in a minimum wage unskilled job does not in anyway help the arts.

Hi all, I would recomend every one especially those who think all benefits claiments are scroungers to watch ( I Daniel Blake ) Directed by Ken Loach. It is the honest reality of the situation, and you can see what pressures people are under, not only through poverty but the way they are being degraded and the way there self estem is took from them. This is not a sensational portrait of people on benefits it is hard hitting and factual whilst parts make you lol. Fantastic film that should be spread around