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.

This article gives an overview of what the writer believes the future of the UK is likely to be unless the government implements robust intervention now.

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/authors/m/ma-me/matthew-goodwin/

In fairness though a lot of working class areas are very white British and always have been. My older family live in an overwhelmingly white working class area, no Polish shops, Asian supermarkets etc. There was a Chinese run fish and chip shop that was there 50 years ago when I was a child. Also my doctor and dentist when I was a child were both Indian.
My family can't stand immigrants and often go on about how they're taking over the area (not near them they aren't). I might have some sympathy if they no longer recognise any of their local shops and are now surrounded by people speaking a language they don't understand but that's not the case were they are. I remember being told not to ever bother applying for a job at Aldi because they only hire Polish people, if you're British you've got no chance. Now I've been many times to their local Aldi and have never seen or heard (from the language/accent) anyone, either staff or shoppers who wasn't white British.
My family will also take huge offence if anyone dare suggest they're racist. They're just saying it like it is as far as they're concerned.

@Flitwickflight
I’m sick of governments sucking up to voters. We need to run the country better
We live in a democracy though so the only way for a political party to get into power is to convince enough people to vote for them.

The winter fuel allowance debacle was indeed farcical but it just highlights how a lot of people generally are against any cuts to what they consider to be vulnerable groups (elderly, disabled, SEN children) but they also detest tax rises. They want a magic bullet that will lead to all public services being better funded and everyone getting all the support and help they want and yet they personally won't pay more tax or experience a crap economy. It's pie on the sky thinking and Labour have absolutely played their part in pretending that this could be possible.

The refreshing thing about Reform is that they are at least being clear that cuts will need to be made. I see Farage this morning has mentioned school transport. Whether you agree or disagree with the specific cuts he has mentioned at least he is being clear that cuts are needed and suggesting areas to make them. I wish the other political parties would do the same so that we can have honest, mature conversations about what we value most as a society and how it will be funded. If it's winter fuel allowance then this will mean more children in poverty. If it's good NHS provision for all then this may mean reduced level of benefits for the disabled etc. They are not easy trade offs but something has to give and we as a society need to make a fully informed decision.

"The problem isnt liberalism, the problem is weakness" - Kemi Badenoch's speech at the Alliance for Responsible Citizenship conference.

Thought provoking, whatever your political views may be.

So sad to see it. I recall so much backlash to anyone bringing it up.

This just sounds like a wishlist of things that would benefit you, and ditching all the stuff that would not.

Yes. Trump won because his campaign team put the work in of identifying the issues most voters cared about, including the vital swing voters, and targeted them hard.

Kamala lost because her team disastrously failed to do this.

I loved the idea of being an excellent Londoner.

This is why the entre country is run for the benefit of the baby boomer (and I am one).

I know exactly how you feel, although I will admit from a slightly different perspective.

I have felt politically homeless pretty much forever as my views are a curious mix of right wing and left wing. Ideologically I am fairly right wing however on a fair number of economic issues I am left wing. I hold very few centrist views and both traditional parties have policies I love and policies I absolutely hate.

Actually if you look at the US breakdowns, it's Gen X that gave Trump the win, not the Boomers.

I was initially surprised by this, but the more I think of it, the more it makes sense.

Sorry, I meant the UK

BTW, I meant to say ex Londoner
Not "excellent Londoner" 😂😂😂

I'm sure you were a most excellent Londoner 😄

I wonder what the national picture is though?
IME it IS the poorer working class areas which experience high immigration (and associated issues), but I don't actually know the stats.

Certainly in the city I live in it is the wealthier areas that are overwhelmingly white.

I don't live in a wealthy area. I live in the area with the most migrants. There are two groups that cause particular issues.

One group seem to have no comprehension that other people exist - they play v loud music in the street, have v v loud raucous all-night parties frequently on any day of the week (in terraced maisonettes!) that often spill over into brawling in the street, some of them run an illegal garage filling the air with exhaust fumes and taking up parking spaces which are already in short supply, raid the bins for stuff to sell and leave the rubbish strewn over the streets, and previously had old women begging in the street with a couple of dodgy looking blokes keeping an eye from around the corner. Intriguingly their children (who roam the streets from approx age 3) are a delight, and seem to be super receptive to clearly wonderful work being done in local schools, suggesting that the problems caused by their parents will not continue down the generations.

The other group that is a problem is more complex situation. This is those who believe women should be treated as second class citizens. This is complex because some from the same country/religion are much more integrated, doing great community work etc. But others are shocking - for example bringing over underage wives from their "home" country despite growing up in the UK. This is a problem that should have been nipped in the bud 30 years ago, but has been allowed to run and create an entrenched culture that threatens women's rights more broadly.

Both groups were involved in local paedophile gangs that came to light a few years ago.

I'm pretty much left wing on everything except migration. I cannot understand the lefty campaigner volunteer types who appear to place anything involving migrants at the top of their list, with only a second thought given to those who are often poorer and struggling due to other "isms".

I hate how it is chracterised as "not liking brown people". Nope - couldn't care less about the colour of someone's skin. Grew up in a functional multicultural area. What I don't like is people who wreck the local area or treat me as second class citizen because I'm female.

Also, even if every migrant was the most wonderful addition to our country, there is the simple question of numbers. We are a small island and I'd rather not concrete over it. We also have a housing crisis which is contributing to issues of poverty and people not having as many children.

WRT disability benefits and needing enough taxpayers - I'm all for getting people back to work. But this government (that I voted for!) are really not going about it the right way.

And this was a year ago. Much worse now.

‘It’s an absurd caricature that progressives are ‘nicer’ and more compassionate. Keir Starmer is proving that Labour is now the nasty party’

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2024/09/04/labour-is-now-the-nasty-party/

100% this. ^

Not true at all. Experience teaches you how corrupt are the right wing. Prepared to pay as little as possible to the real wealth creators ,( the workers not the share holders ) ie just enough to keep them alive and working. This is why it is so important for workers to join a Union to fight for higher wages and better working conditions. This is also why the current right wing campaign to criticise immigrants works against the interests of the working poor as it divides the workers when , as the song goes 'one is workers Unity and evermore will be so'. When you're young you haven't the life experience to realise this.

This is also why the current right wing campaign to criticise immigrants works against the interests of the working poor as it divides the workers when , as the song goes 'one is workers Unity and evermore will be so.

Aren't the ‘working poor’ allowed to form their own opinions rather than being told what to think by the left?

I think there is a big issue with the left wing dictating what left wing policies are. To be left wing you have to think there is a genocide in Palestine, ‘the greedy rich’ will pay for everything through tax, twaw and immigrants should be welcomed. These are mandatory views. If you don’t follow them you are a traitor.

Thus there are lots of people who no longer feel they can associate with the left wing and reform are in the ascendency.

I can relate a bit OP. Labour isn’t left wing anymore, and being a feminist suddenly means you’re a right wing TERF instead of a left wing progressive!

But though there isn’t a UK party where I feel I belong, my values haven’t changed. I support fair taxation to provide good quality public services; I think the hoarding of wealth and decimation of resources that’s possible under capitalism could result in environmental and social collapse.

It’s all exhausting, and hard to care enough that you do what you reasonably can to improve things, but not so much you feel hopeless!

Exactly flit. I thought of myself as essentially left wing always voted Lib Dem or Labour but am on the wrong side of all those diktats. Have concerns about immigration and benefit culture / horrified by October 7 / gender critical. So I am definitely excluded from the current version of “left wing” but am certainly not right wing.

There's a lot of depressing truths on this thread.
I am a very long term member of the Labour Party but I don't think I will be renewing my membership.
I thought of myself as traditionally left wing mainly in terms of wanting economic fairness, legal protections for working conditions, good schools and hospitals.
I never wanted to see people being bullied for being different in any way but some aspects of social liberalism and identity politics have me very confused. If I even say I feel confused people jump down my throat and say that I'm a bigot.
I think I take individual people as I find them and don't make assumptions based on age, social class, race etc.
I cant buy into the parcel of views that are now presented as left wing but I certainly don't espouse traditionally right wing views.
In my 70+ years I have never seen such a mess.
High numbers of children and adolescents with severe mental health issues. Underfunded schools, the NHS deteriorating rapidly in the last few years.
No politician is allowed to complete anything because they are brought down by their own party (both conservative and labour).
Social media tearing politicians apart and demanding instant results so that people who are motivated by ideals and public service are put off and we are left with egomaniacs.
The public demanding no cuts to anything but no rising taxation either.
I too feel a lack of agency to do anything about it. I live quietly in the countryside and could disengage completely but I worry what sort of world it's going to be for today's young people.

It's a bit of a stretch to focus on the idea that right-wing criticism of immigration divides the workers, whilst glossing over what you've just written about paying as little as possible to the workers. You've completely missed the glaring issue of migration - a never ending supply of people willing to work for lower wages and in worse living conditions - meaning the workers wages are undercut, living conditions worsen due to basic overcrowding, and they hold little power as they can just be replaced.

In short, it's in the interests of those wanting to pay as little as possible to the real wealth creators to welcome immigration, and the only reason they say anything against it is to appease voters and give reasons against it that detract from the actual problems it causes.

For so long, we haven't had a political party that actually represents the workers. The left has lost it's way and forgotton them, preferring to brand them as thicko racists if they object.

That’s my view of what left wing is too Anony. Economic fairness and workers rights. Agree with your post so much.

But I’m repulsed by the lefts identity politics the “everyone’s a victim” mentality the mindset of sub sections of society constant taking from the state (us workers) and giving little back. We pay shed loads of tax and of course that is right for a decent society but when you pay and pay and get so little in return because the systems you pay for are unavailable or substandard it’s hard not to be resentful. Thinking about it if we’ve needed something in the last few years we’ve had to go private so where are all these taxes going?