Westminster: Brexit is the hard right's weapon of mass distraction

[BigChocFrenzy]

The fervour and divisions over Brexit have suspended normal party politics.

The staggering incompetence & unsuitability of Corbyn as a leader, together with the resulting impotence of Labour has removed the normal checks & balances in UK politics.
There is a vaccum where the Official Opposition should be, so Theresa May is under pressure only from her right.

I fear Thereas May and the Tory rightwing are taking advantage of Brexit to complete the destruction of the post-WW2 social contract and the welfare state.

Meanwhile, the constraints of civilised discourse have been loosened and those with racist or social Darwinist views now feel free to spout their poison openly.

Putin is pouring petrol on all the fires and Arron Banks is lurking < sinister emoticons required >

Zoe Williams:
"Behind a smokescreen of bogus patriotism, ideologically driven cuts to the NHS and all our public services are unpicking the bonds of nationhood"

www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/mar/05/brexit-theresa-may-falklands-war-nhs-cuts

"We should be marching against the crisis in adult social care, the closure of care homes, the systematic exploitation of carers, the £4.6bn cut from social care budgets this decade.
We should be .... asking:

“What exactly is the plan, if we’ve decided we can no longer afford to care for the elderly and the disabled?
What do we do with them instead?”

"We should be marching against cuts in education funding"

"Every morning we wake up to someone on the radio explaining, despairingly, that you can’t fix the hospital bed crisis until social care is fixed, and you can’t fix that until council tax brings in more, and it can’t bring in more because wages are too low."

"But when everything breaks at the same time, that is not a coincidence: it is a plan.

As surely as Margaret Thatcher had an economic plan on employment, rights, industry and wages,
this century’s Conservatives have a plan on public services, which is to smash them beyond all recognition."

my experience is that they often feel the Irish are the 'right type of immigrants'

Wasn't always the case. My family are Irish (in UK) and suffered terrible abuse decades ago. Muslims today are getting the same abuse that the Irish suffered historically.

Misti....yep that's a good one

Must disagree with our brexit overlords or we are disloyal!!!!

Ffs.

Here is a link to the thread I think you are talking about.

You know.. the one where leavers are xenophobes, with dreams of the empire fitishising war memorials.

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/eu_referendum_2016_/2867329-Westministers-The-Lords-Strike-Back

Fetishising

ghost I meant the ukipers or their supporters with Irish family. I have personally had the anti Irish sentiment growing up. Had it post referendum too. Did have a nice few years in the middle though.

Sadly I experienced that too ghost.

No ethnic minorities here really so the Irish were fair game I guess.

I see real similarities in the way the irish were treated and how Polish/eastern Europeans are treated now. Very hard workers and quite religious.

I was spat at in the street once

I still don't know why (other than I went to a different school)

That's a shame.... I like irish people

Donald Trump's Muslim ban is nothing compared to Theresa May's 'Christian' approach to immigration. May is hardly the first avowedly Christian politician who would have made Jesus ruin his cute trick with the loaves and fish by puking over the lot of them
www.independent.co.uk/voices/theresa-may-christianity-irene-clennell-dubs-amendment-deportations-a7616386.html

Badders It is quite thinkable that RoI citizens might no longer be allowed to vote.
It would be very easy to justify, since very few countries allow other citizens to vote in their GEs
(EU citizens can vote in EU and local elections in any other EU country, not GEs)

There are about 500,000 RoI citizens in the UK and they mostly don't vote Tory.
So, there would be party political motivation and I'm sure the Fail could help whip up some patriotic fervour against the Irish, as a distraction from bad news elsewhere.

What a load of bollocks. The country rides on a train of give give and help and help me more

What the fuck went wrong with people looking after themselves instead of every man jack wanting something for free because they think it is there God given right.

If I had my thinking it would be an American version of the health system- You get exactly what you pay for.

As per usual its the burden of needing more has to fall on honest Joe taxpayer, normally by those who put nothing in.

I see real similarities in the way the irish were treated and how Polish/eastern Europeans are treated now. Very hard workers and quite religious
And Italians before that in the 1950s.

When Idi Amin threw the Ugandan Asians out of Uganda, we were so excited to get a Ugandan Asian girl at our junior school in Glasgow, there was a welcoming committee of us to have her play with us.
Different times. Humanity and not racism was valued.

www.standuptoracism.org.uk/national-demo-refugees-migrants-welcome-stand-racism-islamophobia-anti-semitism/

It'll be Northern Ireland that ends up pissing on the Brexit chips

Never mind GFA and borders there are plenty in NI taking Irish passports not British ones.

The good thing is, we don't need to check out what the euro breitbart is publishing today.

I'm loath to give it extra oxygen but the exact words were (from 7.22ish this morning on the last thread) were

"Please go ahead filling these threads with you anti british sentiment/propoganda.

Leaving the EU has fuck all to do with the Empire... You are incredibly screwed up if you think it does.

Many of you have personal issues with the UK are not british.

Your excitement surrounding anything which will be negative for the uk is very unproductive and pretty sick if you like to call the uk home.

Carry on shitting on your own doorstep if you like."

Attitudes like that are best ignored.

Like Misti, I agree that people have the right not to believe in the EU. They are not automatically racist. It is not a perfect institution and I can understand why some wanted to be outside of it but they then shouldn't expect to have their cake and eat it. But then, neither is Westminster. Nor is Holyrood. Nor is the UN. Nor is NATO. I suppose we should leave all of them ok, I admit I want Scotland to leave Westminster

But those that try to justify ignorance or racism or sheer "sticking-their-heads-in-the-sands-ism" should be challenged and asked to justify themselves - or at the very least not allowed to shut down others asking questions about practicalities.

TM is no more a Christian than I am!! And I'm about as heathen as they get yes I'm a great disappointment to my family some of whom are nuns

"Protestant work ethic" = Just bring back the workhouses already!

I'm simply baffled by the sheer number of leave voters currently relying on benefits.
Now, one could say this is just proof of my elite liberal snowflake fuckwittery BUT ....come on!!
Do these people really think farage, May, Gove et al are going to help them?
This is the most right wing govt this country try has ever had - it's determined to privatise the nhs and education.
Benefits will be next.....what do they see happening here??

In the American health system you very often don't get what you think you are paying for. That's if you are indeed in a position to pay at all...

For absolute sure ghost, and talk of a hard border at English ports?
May could have two independence referenda going on at the same time.
Not good.

I thought all NI citizens were entitled to an Irish (and, therefore, an EU post Brexit) passport? What will be their status and what about non-NI UK citizens who move to live in NI?

Oh - the trolls are late tonight.

Re the Irish question - Johnson and Co insist that there will be no change. They forget that Ireland went into the Common Market at the same time as we did. They now gloss over the fact that RoI will Remain in the EU, so this Common agreement can't operate in the same way.

I've read the whole thread

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/eu_referendum_2016_/2867329-Westministers-The-Lords-Strike-Back

Things taken out of the context of where they are said and what they are responding to are often misunderstood.

It's a shame mistis posts were deleted by Mnhq.

red
U ok hun?

Agree with previous posters. My Irish ancestors were either dumped out here (in Australia) as convicts or came as free settlers due to terrible circumstances (Famine). Their kids were then beaten up by teachers and students alike for speaking Gaelic. We've almost lost that language

Badders your last post reminded me of this - committed christian and tory councillior;

www.independent.co.uk/voices/nhs-march-tory-conservative-councillor-fiona-robson-benefits-disabled-scroungers-a7613801.html

I think many people - including unfortunately some in the cabinet - totally understimated the complexity of Brexit.

In that case, they are just plain thick - probably the least offensive word I could find.

It was hardly as if there wasn't any warning.

I grew up during the Troubles (on the mainland) and the Irish were definitely targets for abuse then.
In fact, I think they partly took over from people of colour as scapegoats for those 30 years
Now it's more Polish & Rumania expats

However, it's very dangerous for anyone to think they can channel racism towards a particular group they dislike, without it splashing over onto other groups they approve of, or even belong to.
Hate crime soon spreads from racism to hate against those who are disabled, gay, on benefits ...