To feel like I'm not sure where I sit politically anymore, and to worry about it.

[Lookuptotheskies]

I've always been a staunch Labour voter. Always been pro refugees. Always given people the benefit of the doubt. Always felt okay that I've brought innocent kids into the world.

Labour are making cuts to disability benefits (and in turn, carer benefits). They are looking to slash sen support in schools.

My town is being overtaken with overt criminal activity. Illegal cigarettes, money laundering business, violent crime on the increase, known drug dealers, fly tipping, etc. Nothing is done. It's just a never ending thing, they bust one and another pops up.

I've always fought against the tide of racist idiots, using politics as an excuse for violent riots. I live in a multi-cutural town, chose a very multicultural school for my kids. But I can't continue to argue with the people pointing out the rise in crimes, drugs, exploitation etc which is very visibily linked to immigration. I feel so uneasy about acknowledging how I feel about this! Guilty and a bit embarrassed. I've always been live and let live, whereas now I feel more protective, more cynical, less tolerant.

I am also gender critical and very much in favour of single sex spaces, based on biological sex. This has been a slow thing too. I've witnessed the language around women changing (cervix owner, pregnant person, chest feeding etc). I've witnessed our spaces and groups being invaded by biological men (I don't want a man on the other side of the curtain to me in a women's hospital ward, or a bra changing cubicle, or a swimming changing room.

Does anyone else feel like they are completely re-evaluating what they accept/don't accept, and what they stand for politically?

I don't currently feel there is any one political party that aligns with my ideals.

I may or may not get completely flamed, but I'm curious on other's thoughts. I will check back intermittently but I don't live on my phone/mumsnet.

This is not a troll post. I've been a mn user for over 18 years.

Are you in favour of a more left wing government? One that wouldn't slash welfare and would address deprivation.

You’re not being unreasonable to feel politically homeless, and I feel exactly the same for all the same reasons.
However, I’ve realised that in order to maintain my own mental health, I just can’t spend time worrying about politics. I know it sounds lazy to kind of wash your hands of it, but I’d never sleep again if I didn’t.

I can relate op. I feel the scales have fallen from my eyes. Always been brought up “left good right bad” but it’s just not that simple anymore is it? I want to ensure those in need are helped but it’s got ridiculous and unsustainable now with the number of working age adults on benefits and so many migrants needing support. I think we need to be more protective of our values and way of life. Also gender critical and been appalled at how eager the left were to hang women out to dry on that too.

I have the same feeling of guilt and embarrassment about my feelings about immigration. Have always considered myself left wing. I am the daughter of immigrants. Yet, I can't help feeling sad about the way my home town has changed for the worse. Ironically, this happened under the Conservative government but I don't trust Labour to do much about it and would never vote Reform!

I feel the same and you’ve articulated it really well. I’m also an immigrant to the UK so I feel particularly unsettled about my thoughts on how immigration is driving a deterioration in British society. Well, it’s immigration and uncontrolled benefits I think. I’ve also been a Labour or Lib Dem voter in the 12 years I’ve lived here and I’m just not sure how Labour can fix things. I’ve found getting more involved in my local community has helped me make positive changes at a local level.

I agree with a lot of what you say, except I don’t think all or even most of the crime and anti social behaviour you described can be attributed to immigration. It’s mostly to do with poverty, and the decimation of public services, housing and support for the poor and working class (of which some will be immigrants) that occurred over the 14 years the Tories were in power.

There is also an issue with the number of people who cannot work and need to be supported by those who do. The numbers are becoming unmanageable.

I want dignity for people with disabilities. I don’t want people who work to be poorer and have fewer choices and opportunities than those who don’t work- and both are represented among my friendship group.

I've had similar feelings. I feel a mixture of annoyance at the Labour government for not making a better fist of things, then sympathy as they inherited such a poisoned chalice and who actually has the answers? Reform and the Tories I don't trust or like at all. The Greens and Lib Dems are captured by the TWAW rhetoric. Further left Labour is simply not realistic or affordable and has been rejected already too many times by the electorate. So what option is there? I genuinely don't know.

Wouldn’t there be less poverty, fewer housing problems, and thus less crime if there were fewer immigrants? Particularly the ones living in poverty and so contributing as you say to the crime rate.

Same here OP. I was swept up in Corbyn fever even! Now, my opinions are changing.

Or, perhaps, the left went so far left that if you stood still, you ended up right of centre.

I have quite a few friends that feel the same way. They’re all intelligent people and definitely not racist… yet they’re all leaning towards Reform UK. I can’t even say that ‘I would never vote Reform’ anymore because I don’t know if I will definitely feel that way when the next GE happens. That’s how bad it has gotten. We can no longer dismiss all Farage voters as being thick and racist.

Feel exactly the same OP. Overall quality of life is going down in this country.

We simply cannot sustain the numbers of migrants coming here. We also would be naive to ignore the issues their cultural differences bring when it comes to attitudes towards women and girls.

I'm also sick of the whole net zero con and similar green washing. More profit driven smoke and mirrors.

I could have wrote this. What the future holds, god only knows, but I dread to think what the tipping point will be, one way or another.

How much tax do you currently pay and how much more would you be willing to contribute to address the issues you're concerned about?

For me, I pay just under £1900 a month in tax.
It’s not even that I wouldn’t be willing to contribute more, it’s just that I don’t trust that it would be spent wisely!

I completely understand what you’re saying. I was 100% a Labourite, but I cannot support them now.

Are you from the midlands? (Because of your username!)

It’s unfair to say poorer people commit all the crime and make places not pleasant to live in. It’s criminal people who do that. Criminal. The people who do the exploiting are rarely poor. The question is: why don’t we have a police force that will do anything about it? Why have they stood by and let young girls be raped. I think I’m reasonably tolerant but a crime is a crime whoever commits it. Politics doesn’t come into it if the police turn a blind eye. No one meets what I would like to see either. Labour taxes business and expects to see growth! Economical literate. Everyone should be aware you cannot have a vast welfare state without business doing well. Employees and business owners pay for it. No government can expect growth if they keep taxing more and more and disincentivize saving.

You're probably right. I would actually be happy to pay more directly to my local council to be spent on trying to address local issues, but not to be frittered away by central government.

Yes very much so, but I am also aware that a truly socialist party may be hesitant to crack down on the immigration situation. I'm also curious were they would sit on single sex spaces.

Completely agree. And I hate when people say " well the suffragettes fought for women to vote, so you should vote " I just feel like no, they fought for our CHOICE to vote. I now have a choice.
Not to be bullied or Guilt tripped into voting. Isn't that just as suffocating as not voting?
How can we vote when all our options are fools

Immigrants and crime need to be separated. Crime involves illegal behaviours and those responsible for illegal behaviours need to be dealt with and to feel consequences. The Liberal left must learn to deal with those behaviours and to stop hesitating lest racial tensions emerge. A crime is a crime regardless of who commits it.

The town I live in has always been one with a high level of socio-economic deprivation.

But the rising levels of crime have visibly been in pockets of the town where there are high number of immigration from lots of different areas of the world.

You can see it clear as day and that's what has been hard to witness and see unfold, it's made me question my values in a really tough way.

Some of it is trafficking, some is cultural, some is organised criminal gangs and exploitation, etc etc.

I think some of the accepted narratives simply aren’t true.

For example, left wing pro-immigration, right wing anti-immigration. It’s simply not true and never has been. Lots of left wing people dislike too much immigration, it’s often their jobs that are impacted and is associated with keeping wages low, a very classic non worker position. Right wing people are often in favour, especially of legal migration, for the reasons above (money) it’s generally large employers driving it and even people like Farage admit they’d have as much and maybe more in skilled positions.

Don't feel you’re not left wing just because you feel there’s too much immigration, it’s just
not true and wanting control of your own borders makes no one a racist.

However the increasingly extreme positions seemingly on both the left and right these days are leaving most of us without a political home as far as I can see.

I totally get what you’re saying. I consider myself to be politically in the centre and accept that there are good and bad things on both the right and the left. The left good, right bad thing is just playground politics. Ultimately, I think you need to look at who is leading the party. While I haven’t ever voted Tory, I do think that that Kemi is a thousand times better leader than Keir. I’ve also not voted Labour in years as they keep coming up with weak leaders. They don’t appear to have anyone strong enough to lead.

I live overseas so am an immigrant myself. I recently travelled back to visit and was appalled at the state of my home city. Every time I go home it seems worse.

I recognise everything you have said and also feel guilty and wrong.

I also agree re women's rights but don't feel guilty about that at all.