Is anyone else getting quite tired of being called a racist?

[Peppatina]

I know it can't just be me.

It doesn't matter what carefully thought out reasons a brexiter has for wanting to leave (I've seen some very articulate and reasoned ones on mn itself) we are still all getting lumped into a stereotypical group of closet racist idiots.

And Lord forbid any of those reasons might just involve any concern over levels of eu migration!

I've been told that I'm essentially imagining the three week waiting list for my GP or that this is nothing to do with eu migration. If I say I know it is because of the names being called out I become the equivalent of Enoch Powell.

The same goes for a certain local estate very much being a no go area, especially for young girls. After braving this street once with my children and being spat on and shouted at by a group of very hostile Romanian men/boys I've been told I imagined it.

When I had my son a few week ago my I was the only English speaking person in my ward. A polish man was shouting and being very aggressive to staff as they were struggling to find an interpreter.

I absolutely know that not every migrant is aggressive and that they should build more schools and go surgeries but I believe I'm right to be concerned about a high number of migrants who are not intergrating with their local community and the unsustainable strain on services.

I'm sick of being told that my experiences don't matter. That to even mention that this is what life is like in our town means I am a racist or little englander.

Yeah but ask any racist you know, they want to leave.

Your best bet with them is that they're also too stupid to vote.

• by racist I mean racists and xenophobes just to be clear

Good for you our

They're all still on your side, whether you know them individually or not...yay

I've seen various Facebook's posts celebrating multiculturalism, generosity and warmth etc and how we should vote remain. I sport multiculturalism too and have many friends, colleagues and neighbours from different backgrounds and will be voting leave. I live in West London and am feeling the effects of over population. I'm not racist, just practical.

In don't much like that they are likely if they bother to vote the same way as I am

But we have two choices or not to vote

I am not so concerned with appearing liberal that I am going to ignore what I really think is best for the country

Surely that has to be more inportant

Sorry for typos above.

This is an interesting read:

www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/jun/17/britain-working-class-revolt-eu-referendum

About the one thing that pretty much everyone agrees on is that Brexit would trigger a recession. The saddest thing for me is that many of the people voting leave would be among those most affected by another recession. Let's face it - Boris won't be.

Doesn't that tell you something ?

People think the gamble is worth it even if there is going to be a few hard years ahead

S'ok Dave will fix it again

It tells me people haven't worked out their jobs are at risk. I know quite a few business owners who are seriously worried about redundancies in the wake of Brexit (particularly businesses that would be affected by a property market crash, but once they're buggered others will follow).

It tells me that economic arguments don't fire people up - even when the whole world (except Trump & Putin) would see the UK leaving as economic lunacy.

I'm not sure much more can be done - the solutions needed to fix the problems would be easier to provide if we stay within the EU, but if people don't believe that (& they have good reason to be disaffected with Westminster) then so be it.

It tells me that people especially those at the bottom of the barrel know there is a few more hard years ahead and then just maybe better times

That offers far more hope than what they have been stuck in for the last 10 years

And as for a burst in the property market it has to happen sooner or later as prices have absolutely spiralled out of control who can afford to get on the property ladder in London now ? Certainly not anyone on the average wage would be able to buy anything half decent

The EU has also given lots of grants to deprived regions in the UK (Cornwall for example is practically kept afloat by EU money). It's not all one way.

Of course housing is a problem - that Guardian article identifies it as a huge problem but a sudden crash in the market is not the way to fix those problems. Particularly because unemployment will rocket. People are putting property deals on hold currently btw because a large crash is expected in the case of Brexit.

In two campaigns of lies & exaggerations the economic arguments for staying are about the one thing you can accept as pretty clear cut. It's worth reading the non-european press on the economics (& immigration) as it takes an outsiders view & is therefore less emotional.

The Washington Post is running a lot of articles on Brexit. This one from last week was an interesting take www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/britain-flirts-with-economic-insanity/2016/05/01/bb8d7a4a-0e1f-11e6-bfa1-4efa856caf2a_story.html?tid=a_inl

Peppatina, you make fair points. You were just being factual but free speech obviously is risky these days. There is a hyper sensitivity about everything. It's crazy that you have to be a minority to say what you have said and to not get a backlash. A recent episode of the channel 4 news that interviewed only minorities (which I did think was a bit racist) about immigration gave similar viewpoints to what you said but they were acceptable and unquestioned because of the background of the people saying them.

In my area there is a lot of migration, not just from the EU but from all around the world. Many of the issues are because it was already a deprived area prior to this. It is becoming overcrowded and funding hasn't necessarily kept up. The EU built us a nice arts centre with a lovely cafe ( which is quite expensive so many people can't use it anyway). The reason why many people are crowded into this area rather than dispersed over the greater area is that it has the facilities that they want - mosque, halal food, Polish food, EE hairdressers, doctor/dentist with staff of their nationality etc. This is why it now feels REALLY full. But ask many migrants and they would not want to be put in a village with nobody from their community, no access to the things they want and so it ends up becoming seen as an area where there is a very high foreign born population, the white British population move out because they want the facilities/community that they had before. But does it give a true picture of migration as a whole?

The working class population are finding times very hard anyway so there is a bit of a no pain no gain ethos about it. As one of my DH colleagues said when the credit crunch first hit "Credit Crunch? What Credit Crunch? I've always been poor!".

Many working class British people are already unable to holiday in Europe so raising prices of holidays won't affect them at all.

While not all leavers are racist, all racists are leavers

This is just silly. A lot of the Bremainers that I know or have seen knocking about on MN are either employers of large contingencies of East Europeans e.g. contractors, or their jobs are funded by the EU, or their long-time nanny is from the EU, or they themselves are EU economic migrants.

In other words, they are voting out of self-interest. I'm not going to call them all kinds of nasty names like racist, but can you not see that essentially everyone does what they think is best from their own point of view?

You were just being factual but free speech obviously is risky these days. There is a hyper sensitivity about everything.

It is true that people have become very sensitive to any comment that could be interpreted as racist. To avoid the accusation, Peppatina may have had to be a little over-cautious and said something general like "your staff isn't trained in local specialties/customs" and leave out the specifics that they were Romanian (they could have been from Kent and still be badly trained on Scottish tourism).

Yes, it's a bit of a pain and a bit artificial. But to be honest, overall I think it's rather a good thing that people are becoming very sensitive - a bit of an over-correction, but on balance, probably better than not being sensitive enough and leaving instances of genuine casual racism unchallenged.

It may be annoying to have to watch your words if you're part of the white majority, but it's still not nearly as annoying as being subjected to racist attitudes if you're not. Erring on the side of safety is really not such a big imposition.

*white British majority

Yes, it's a bit of a pain and a bit artificial. But to be honest, overall I think it's rather a good thing that people are becoming very sensitive - a bit of an over-correction, but on balance, probably better than not being sensitive enough and leaving instances of genuine casual racism unchallenged.

What you call 'overly sensitive', others might call a chilling effect on free speech - a laboratory of sorts for racist sentiment to mutate/foment and come back stronger than ever.

'Overly sensitive' was great in the short-term for the EU and very bad in the long-term, so Bremainers should theoretically not like it at all.

I agree that people vote Remain out of self interest as well. I am voting Remain for all sorts of reasons, including that I believe disabled people's rights are better protected within the EU & that I believe DH's job & salary are at risk if we leave and we don't have the savings for him to be out of work or take a large cut in salary. Those are two self interested reasons to vote Leave & I'll happily admit to it (I have other non-self interested reasons for voting Remain, but am aware disabled rights & risk of job loss are two self interested reasons) .

The biggest problem I see for people using immigration to justify leave is that a lot of articles/research suggest their reasoning is wrong (see this one for example www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/eu-immigration-has-no-negative-impact-on-british-wages-jobs-or-public-services-research-finds-a7026796.html ) - add in a Nigel Farage poster or two and it all looks a bit iffy.

My mother is voting leave & she isn't racist. She hasn't been very clear why she is voting leave - it seems to be a hankering for past times & nostalgia. (And before anyone accuses me of being patronising she was ranting at me about publicising the remain cause so I asked her why she was voting leave & it was because 'I'm older than you & remember what it was like before the EU' - which is an insane reason imo given leaving the EU won't recreate the sixties - and why would we want it to - but I don't believe she is a closet racist at all.) She's retired so a rise in interest rates would presumably suit her & she wouldn't be affected particularly by a recession.

So a long rambling way of saying I don't think it's fair if it's assumed leave voters are racist, but if you do use immigration as an argument then you have to be able to counteract articles such as the Independent one above.