To think a lot of left wing people are actually close minded?

[DeepFatFriar]

Close minded as in not receptive to other peoples views.

Disclaimer: i consider myself left wing.

But at the same time, I'm quite happy to have a talk with someone down the pub who might be anti immigration or anti abortion. As long as they've thought their point out properly, im open to debate and i dont feell offended by their views.
But it feels like a lot of the left wing people i come across just go into "racist twat! Fucking tory!" mode- like theyre incapable of seeing that situations are often a bit more complex than just this is right/thats wrong.

For example with Brexit, i voted remain and was gutted by the result - at the same time, i felt a bit irritated by fellow remainers "theyre all little englander tory twats" attitude to brexiters. Yeah, some of them are. Others just have a different POV, you know?

I was discussing this with my mum and she said back in her day (im assuming this means the 70s!) "conversation felt more nuanced".

It sometimes feels like a lot of left wing people just want to live in an echo chamber. I think you need to try and keep an open mind to different points of view. You clearly dont have to agree. But you can at least accept that people have different mindsets because they've had different experiences - it doesnt make them a worse person though.

But Merkel's decision may actually have had far more to do with the fact that they are Christian Democrats? That is a far more likely driver of their position, which was welcomed by many Germans at the time.

In fact calling migration is neither a left nor right issue, your attempts to pass it off as a one sided issue are poor and lack accuracy.

I thought Merkel acted when it became apparent that some of the 'population' were very much in favour of supporting the refugees ? In that it was politically expedient for her to act as she did.

I would agree, the assertion that allowing the refugees to come to Germany is some kind of leftist policy is ridiculous and doesn't bear scrutiny.

I would agree, the assertion that allowing the refugees to come to Germany is some kind of leftist policy is ridiculous and doesn't bear scrutiny.

Which side of politics is generally in favour of open borders - the left or the right?

Oh, and look at the consequences of Merkel's policies - a right-wing upsurge across Europe that hasn't been seen in decades:
www.theguardian.com/world/2018/jun/11/italy-coalition-collision-course-eu-migration-standoff-matteo-salvini

With xenophobia on the rise across the continent and hard-right, anti-immigration parties either in government or riding high in the polls in countries as diverse as Italy, Hungary, Germany, Poland, Austria and Sweden, immigration has become an issue of existential importance for the bloc.

Care to reconsider your position?

I thought Merkel acted when it became apparent that some of the 'population' were very much in favour of supporting the refugees ? In that it was politically expedient for her to act as she did.

Yes, I'm sure the open borders really helped her popularity. That must be why at the last election she led her party to its worst result since 1949: www.theguardian.com/world/2017/sep/24/angela-merkel-faces-stark-choice-between-coalition-or-minority-rule

Try again.

It was popular at the time.

Also conflating offering refugees fleeing war a place to come with "open borders" is incorrect. The two are not one in the same.

The right wing surge across Europe? What the Polish and Hungarian right wing were in power before this, and the Polish right wing government had previously been in power from 2005 to 2007 the Austrian far right last formed a coalition government in the early 2000s, as did the Italian's, Marine Le Pen polled well in 2012, but still lost in 2017m The Sweedes haven't had an election yet.

Immigration might be an issue, but it isn't down to Merkel's actions, its been going on for a long time.

Here have some confirmation for your bias.

Or to put it another way, only two of the countries you have named elected right wing governments ( or to be more specific had far right wing parties join coalitions, they didn't win enough of the vote on their own) since Merkel's intervention.

The growth of the far right wing is partially down to immigration, but also in response to the fall out from the financial crash too.

Yes, I'm sure the open borders really helped her popularity. That must be why at the last election she led her party to its worst result since 1949:

To be fair, it was a political move. She was very popular, but not very "actively" progressive up until then, there was some significant backlash going on at the time around how She and Schäuble handled the Greek crisis.

Plus add in the German guilt of WW2 etc and the fact that if she adopted the policy of what the Greens and Social Democrats were offering she was guaranteed another term in parliament.

TopCat is correct, it was a very popular decision at the time, and for some time afterwards, were she messed up was to not add limits and caveats, which she has now done and accepts that was a failure in her stance, the rise of the far right across sweden/france/norway etc is multi faceted as TopCat said.

I think it comes back to a running theme in this thread that there is extremes on both sides, people pick out what the stories they want to push, they are all terrorists/they are all fleeing from war etc.

I do also think that people are conflating 'open borders' with 'willing to take refugees and asylum seekers fleeing war and persecution'.

Or to put it another way, only two of the countries you have named elected right wing governments ( or to be more specific had far right wing parties join coalitions, they didn't win enough of the vote on their own) since Merkel's intervention.

France was in a run off between Macron who is a clone of Cameron and the Far right, Germany's third largest party is AFD, plus you cannot ignore what is going on in the Netherlands, Norway, Sweden and Italy, there is a reason why in the UK brexit happened when UKIP started making ground. Just because the parties are not in power does not mean it shapes the political leaders as I'm sure you are aware.

The overriding consensus across the far right populist parties gaining ground in Europe is "limitations on immigration", it's not really a left right issue anymore, more a failure of neoliberalism, what is contradictory is that those who vocally proclaim to be "left wing/woolly liberal, they are all fleeing war and are doctors/engineers" are actually liberals without understanding geopolitics

I do also think that people are conflating 'open borders' with 'willing to take refugees and asylum seekers fleeing war and persecution'.

I don't think they are, there was a lot of criticism about the slant that Germany was just "taking in refugees and asylum seekers from war and persecution", so much so that Merkle herself has admitted that she should have done it differently and has since brought in tougher measures for deportation.

Limits on migration has always been the case for the past couple of decades across europe, the definition of limits is where the left have predominantly called racist, hence we are in the situation where we have fucking brexit and the rise of the far right across europe.

What the vocal/crazy "left" are trying to do now is to rewrite history and pretend that they was always open for said "limitations"

I’d say that this thread has turned into the perfect example of how the op applies to both sides of the political spectrum.

I think the intolerant people are extremists of either ilk - there is very little to separate the far left and far right, both are intolerant of dissent and fundamentally authoritarian. It's no accident that both Corbyn and Farage or Rees-Mogg are pro-Russia, pro-Brexit etc. And their supporters who claim to be at opposite ends of the spectrum are really remarkably similar. They both hate anyone not in their in-group, and disdain moderates and centrists.

Proud non-extremist here. :)

That’s a huge a generalisation too though fiberty! You can support Corbyn and not be ‘hard left’. If people quit generalising and pigeon holing people then the world would be a far better place.

Common I was trying to make the point that Merkel acted as she did, because it was a popular choice at the time, I haven't said what she did was well orchestrated, populous decisions rarely are : see Brexit

I think there are far fewer extreme left and extreme right individuals than people imagine, I think some people hold more extreme views on certain subjects, which if you were only to hear those views would lead you to extrapolate that they were extreme left or right. Personally I think most people hover around the centre and depending on the subject matter tip over into left or right. So as an example, someone I know is very much right leaning on the matter of immigration and yet due to personal experiences leans left when it comes to foreign aid.

It's quite a long time since we've seen people on the extreme left marching in London in support of a convicted criminal and attacking the police.

I agree FontSnob

I think the intolerant people are extremists of either ilk - there is very little to separate the far left and far right, both are intolerant of dissent and fundamentally authoritarian. It's no accident that both Corbyn and Farage or Rees-Mogg are pro-Russia, pro-Brexit etc. And their supporters who claim to be at opposite ends of the spectrum are really remarkably similar. They both hate anyone not in their in-group, and disdain moderates and centrists.

As a centrist, the above resonates with me. Politics seems to be monochromatic for some people on the edges and 'hateful' does seem to be the way the extremists on either side respond to views that are moderate.

I have noticed though (as others have upthread) that extreme lefts in my office/ circle are far shoutier/ more easily provoked than extreme rights. Those on the right tend to keep their political conversations more private - in fact, I couldn't tell you who in the whole company I work for is right-wing. I could tell you exactly who is extreme left-wing because they are the ones who stood around on the mornings of Brexit/ last general elections loudly mouthing off about Tory cunts, racist arsehole fuckwits, etc. I heard one prominent foghorn leftie in the office asking 'who are they? Who are the Tory voters? Where the fuck are they? Because I don't know any'. Yes you do, they just won't discuss politics with you because you'll shriek in their face like a rabid child. Anyway, her conclusion was that the vote must've been rigged.

On balance though, the behaviour described above winds me up as much as the overuse of the word 'snowflake' etc. When did this cultural shift to playground name-calling begin? The lack of nuanced/ original thought is not helpful to anybody. Can't we have adult conversations about difficult issues without calling each other cunts and snowflakes .

Thje point about immigration and limits is interesting, I don't think peiople actually just call any who object to immigration racist, but their reasons for it.

I'm quite prepared to , and have in the past, listened to people's concerns regarding immigration, the problem is a lot of the concerns are either not based in reality but on their preconceived prejudices.

"We need to control immigration"

Well 1. Why? 2. WE already control more than 50% of our net immigration in quite a strict way, and don't impose the controls that we could on EU immigration.

"Immigrants bring down wages!"

Well actually all of the avaiolable evidence points to the fact that they have a very, very small impact on wages and that there are lots of other factors in the UK for the fact that it has slower growing wages than most other EU countries (Including those who have more immigrants per capita).

"They are a burden on the health service"

Well this conflates health tourism ( very small) with immigrants using the health service. All of the research shows that the healthy migrant effect, where immigration lowers pressure on A and E, waiting times for elective surgery etc, exists.

Also as a group EU immigrants are net contributors to the exchequer.

"They are all on benefits/ stealing jobs"

Immigrants are under represented on the JSA claimant count, and research shows that they do not cause unemployment in domestic nationals.

"They get into social housing ahead of British people on the waiting list."

They don't, and immigrants are again, under represented in social housing for their percentage of the population.

What you get when you have this debate is people repeating things ( as has been done here) which if they were occurring would be easy to identify as trends in the economy through research. They can't be identified, or as in the case of the impact on wages, are extremely small and not the major determining factor.

When people ignore the factual evidence, or in many cases attack the providers of it as being the "elite" they are doing so because they don't want to have their prejudices challenged.

However this is what happens when you try to have a nuanced debate and listen to people's concerns, however if their concerns aren't valid what can one actively do about them? What can the government do?

@TopCat1980

You are not having nuanced points, you are picking strawmen and picking a side that is coming from the "right" whilst ignoring the likes of the left leaning politicians who are also anti FOM, Corbyn being a prime example:

<a class="break-all" href="https://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:B31ASmlKoRUJ:www.newstatesman.com/politics/staggers/2017/07/jeremy-corbyn-wholesale-eu-immigration-has-destroyed-conditions-british+&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=uk" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:B31ASmlKoRUJ:www.newstatesman.com/politics/staggers/2017/07/jeremy-corbyn-wholesale-eu-immigration-has-destroyed-conditions-british+&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=uk

Another example of sneaking in the term "all" when mentioning evidence shows your are not at all nuanced.

Well actually all of the avaiolable evidence points to the fact that they have a very, very small impact on wages and that there are lots of other factors in the UK for the fact that it has slower growing wages than most other EU countries (Including those who have more immigrants per capita).

The "small impact" is largely hit at the lower income level, it is only considered "small" when you include the highly skilled. You are not being "nuanced" in your scenario there.

Well this conflates health tourism ( very small) with immigrants using the health service. All of the research shows that the healthy migrant effect, where immigration lowers pressure on A and E, waiting times for elective surgery etc, exists.

Again with the "all", the latest comprehensive study was done in 2012, and was generally considered difficult to determine either way, so again you yourself are lacking nuance, the comprehensive study that was carried out was here

www.migrationwatchuk.org/key-topics/public-services-infrastructure

With a conclusion of:

uch rapid population growth will continue to have a significant impact on the provision of public services from the queue for social housing (see our separate overview on housing), to hospital, maternity and GP services as well as education, the environment and transport.

Just point out your nuance.

As you are apparently an Econmics grad from LSE I cannot fathom how you passed passing shit off like this:

Also as a group EU immigrants are net contributors to the exchequer.

There is no one true correct report, they all have differing methodology and for all the ones you like to cherry pick they generally add below ~1% GDP per person, with a heavy caveat that it depends on the characteristics of individual immigrants and what they do in the UK, or using a methodology of using very recent migrants.

When people ignore the factual evidence, or in many cases attack the providers of it as being the "elite" they are doing so because they don't want to have their prejudices challenged.

Pot, kettle, black..

rapid population growth will continue to have a significant impact on the provision of public services from the queue for social housing (see our separate overview on housing), to hospital, maternity and GP services as well as education, the environment and transport.

To be fair lurker that's a bit of a no shit sherlock statement ( no LSE degree here ) Can you back it up with figures ? so how much of the population increase is down to immigration as opposed to that other well known population increasing activity of people having babies? If a population is increasing , why has the central Government not put extra funding into the services that are under pressure ? When did the population increase, which has been happening forever, become caused by immigration as the majority reason for increase ?

hahaha you used migration watch to prove a point?

Its partisan and anti immigration, it fudges its facts.

The information I use is from:

LSE, Oxford University, UCL and the Bank of England.

Corbyn is wrong about the impact of immigration, as all of the above and their extensive impartial research proves.

Ah migration watch. Those who 'proved' school space shortages were down to children born to non UK women and migrant children. Without bothering to look at how many of those children had British fathers.

Immigration is also the fault of women apparently.

topcat but LSE and Oxford and UCL are universities, therefore clearly hotbeds of lefties. And experts. The Bank of England is run by a foreigner, so clearly they cannot be trusted either.