To think Britain is getting more racist ?

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Overt anti "foreigner" / anti non-white discussions appear to be normalised at times these days. I don't remember this in previous decades. Was it just under the surface ?

No it is 100% more racist.

its a survival mechanism (do think every German who thought for/ supported the nazis were actually just Jew haters? Course not- they were in survival mode by fawning)

I think Britain is a fairly mixed tolerant country.

I think there is a huge rise in antisemitism which was just below the surface and now isn’t.

I think most people in Britain are fairly tolerant towards individuals of other ethnicities and from other countries (by comparison with other nations where racism is much more overt).

But there's always been a suspicion towards immigrants/foreigners which over time became less and less acceptable and had become largely taboo, but plenty of people expressed it behind closed doors or alluded to it obliquely in the form of "banter".

In the past few years these people have become emboldened by the far right endlessly telling them that being racist is not the same as being worried about immigration. That, coupled with genuine concerns about migration and amplified by social media, has created a toxic cocktail whereby people are letting it all hang out.

I think many people in this country on a one-to-one basis are still capable of being tolerant towards people not like them, but they have been persuaded by cynical political agitators that being racist towards groups of people en masse is OK.

OP, 100% agree with you. My best friend, who is black, and grew up in Hackney in the days of the NF, told me recently she feels the racism she's experienced recently is the worse she has ever known.

I also agree with poster above who said antisemitism is on the rise, as is Islamaphobia.

Mass uncontrolled immigration and suppression of the native's discontent was always going to elicit a response.

It's everywhere and quite open now, people who I thought we apolitical are getting very fired up.

In the past few years these people have become emboldened by the far right endlessly telling them that being racist is not the same as being worried about immigration. That, coupled with genuine concerns about migration and amplified by social media, has created a toxic cocktail whereby people are letting it all hang out.

The genuine concerns about migration you have correctly identified have caused people to push back against the far left (and more recently the mainstream left) endlessly telling them that having genuine concerns about migration is the same as being racist.

That, coupled with many people on the left's tendency to conflate concepts (NB Islamism is not a race) has created a situation that the far right can easily tap into, which will almost certainly (and very regrettably, yet entirely avoidably) require an overcorrection before the left start to engage with it seriously.

David Frum put it well: If Liberals won't enforce borders, Fascists will.

I don't understand how Morgan McSweeney as an Irish man (even though Ireland was once part of the UK) never mind someone from half way across the world can rule the British!

How do you define foreign interference?

What type of person is so up themselves that they believe they have the right to tell another nation how to live?

There has a clip in this short video of people from all races in England having a bitch about each other, many years ago.

No - I think since Brexit people feel that it’s ok to say how they feel. We opened a Pandora’s box of hate and vitriol

I don’t think they’re fired up, I think they’re groomed

Racism and xenophobia were always here. It's just that people started saying things out loud

I would guess it is considerably less racist but until recently the racists didn't have the public platform via social media and the encouragement via Reform etc al. Openly racist yes, I agree, but it's always been there, it just wasn't plastered over social media.

Social media platform owners make money from clicks and traffic. Consequently they allow discrimination as it provokes arguments which in turn lines their pockets. Racism isn't the only form of discrimination that is creeping increasingly into the public domain. Mumsnet is a perfect example of all sorts of controversial posts being allowed. Why allow them unless it's for money?

I found the full clip, it is in 1985 Yorkshire, people of various races are making comments and sharing opinions on the English and Irish.

That lovely young man who said people were all the same!

Look at that you still get some mad old goat in a bonnet saying they should go home 😭

love the man who used the opportunity to ask for a united Ireland 😂😂

Which is why after the English protestants granting the Irish and British Catholic emancipation, I find Morgan McSweeny quite an extraordinary cheeky man.

Fancy not giving the British the right to self determination, as that English man wanted for the Irish.

There is definitely a much more open expression of racism now than there used to be. People seem to consider it to be socially acceptable to voice racist opinions in a way that they wouldn't have dreamt of before.

I suspect that the racism has always been there, just quieter. Now they are emboldened.

I agree with the pp that said this all started with the Brexit referendum, and it has been getting worse since then.

It got worse after brexit imv

Course it is, this country is teeming with ignorant people who don’t actually realise they are being racist

It's always been racist. The difference is now people feel emboldened to voice their opinions because of people like Boris and Farage. It become more overt.

@moderate

The genuine concerns about migration you have correctly identified have caused people to push back against the far left (and more recently the mainstream left) endlessly telling them that having genuine concerns about migration is the same as being racist.
That, coupled with many people on the left's tendency to conflate concepts (NB Islamism is not a race) has created a situation that the far right can easily tap into, which will almost certainly (and very regrettably, yet entirely avoidably) require an overcorrection before the left start to engage with it seriously.
David Frum put it well: If Liberals won't enforce borders, Fascists will.

I don't disagree with this.

But I also think that while migration is a legitimate concern and one which the left glossed over for too long, its importance is grotesquely magnified by the far right. Illegal migration of the "small boats" variety is a very visible and inflammatory example of what happens when migration policy doesn't work but its a tiny proportion of overall migration and the attention paid to it vastly exaggerates its importance.

And it's not the cause of any of our current economic or social problems.

As long as the left amalgamates to racism any criticism of cultural differences or the sensible idea that people born here don’t want to feel like they re just a community among others (and a vilified one, full of gammons, oiks and karens because they’re so unsavoury to the elites), racism will keep on rising

As long as the left keeps on bending over for Hamas and Hezbollah because of self-hatred and sheer ignorance, antisemitism will keep on rising

As long as the left refuses to enforce sensible immigration rules and border control, racism will keep on rising

Mmm - not sure. Growing up, rural Yorkshire in the 1990s skewed racist. Corner shop being called the p-shop, etc. However there wasn't all this shit about "Muslims being offended by Christmas" and Evergreen trees in Tesco.

I think things got better for a while (or at least voicing these thoughts became less acceptable) but we're swinging back again with the Reform immigration rhetoric.

Yup. It was always there, but is now emboldened by constant social media propaganda, which I am certain will eventually be proven to be funded by Russia in an attempt to destabilise the Western world. This started during the Brexit campaign.