XFool wrote:Lootman wrote:Then you are effectively trying to stifle any dissenting view by attempting to dismiss the evident correlation between dislike of Jews and dislike of a Jewish state. You surely would not expect readers to let you get away with such an arbitrary restriction. The reality is that people who are anti-semitic are far more likely to find fault with Israel. The "No, I was only criticising Zionism and not Jews" can often be a tactic designed to deflect scrutiny of their deeper underlying motives.
Yes. But then the correlation is not necessarily symmetric, is it? An analogy can be made with Brexit.
I don't believe all Brexit supporters are racist; but show me a racist and I'll show you a Brexit supporter.
Have you ever wondered why there might be a correlation between support for Brexit and racism?
My own view - and I accept it's unlikely to be a popular one - is that some racist attitudes are actually a fairly rational and understandable response to the effects of mass immigration over the past few decades.
The first point I’d make is that most of the prosperous middle classes - which term probably applies to 90% of Fools - have not been unduly affected by mass immigration at all.
The vast majority of first-generation immigrants ended up in the poorer areas of the country. Most of them are still there, but those (or more likely their children) who have managed to gain a good education and career have long since moved out, and have also largely assimilated into middle-class England. So your new Asian or black neighbour is probably just another prosperous, professional person like you, with similar values and preferences.
But it's been a totally different experience for the working class / poor people that lived in those areas where most of the immigrants arrived. I speak from my own knowledge of the Lancashire mill towns, where very large numbers of South Asian immigrants started arriving in the 1960s and 70s, but the same applies to similar towns in Yorkshire, the Midlands and some parts of London.
These immigrants were from a completely different culture to that which they found on their arrival, and their cultural values were often almost directly opposite to the host community. To give just one example, the life of the white, working class community often revolved around the local pub, and drinking - often heavy drinking - was a way of life. The new arrivals were, of course, mostly Muslims who didn't drink at all, so were effectively excluded from a central part of the host culture.
Moreover, many of these immigrants were unable to speak English with any fluency, and the women were – and in many cases shamefully still are - effectively kept entirely away from the host community.
The net effect was that many members of the host community were often extremely unhappy about the arrival of these `alien' people. They derived little or no benefit at all from their presence – the immigrants had basically been brought over to supply labour for the wealthy local business owners - and resented seeing familiar surroundings changing to accommodate them.
Over the years, as the numbers of immigrants continued to grow, this differentiation became more pronounced. Churches closed or were turned into mosques. Schools had to concentrate more of their efforts on teaching English to children that didn’t speak it as a first language, often causing resentment amongst the white parents. The phenomenon of `white flight' meant that the more affluent members of the white community moved to other areas, thereby increasing even further the concentration of Asian people.
In general terms there has been - even now - remarkably little assimilation of the Asian community into the white one. Many Asians still speak to each other in their own language, and dress in traditional clothing. The two communities co-exist side by side, generally without much overt hostility, but also with very little integration. It's a very long way from the multi-cultural dream fostered by the good old `metropolitan elite'.
Of course, from my privileged position I can very easily see that the immigrants have done nothing objectively wrong. Even if they had been minded to adopt the host community’s culture it would have been very difficult, due to the hostility they would have faced, so it’s hardly surprising that they have chosen to continue their own culture. In any case, the host culture was hardly what might be termed aspirational!
But for people who don’t have that benefit of objectivity I really don't think it's remotely surprising that they are `racist'. They have seen their communities where they and their families had grown up for generations fall apart and become semi-ghettos. They have often seen the value of their houses fall, so that they are denied the option of selling up and moving to a more traditional (i.e. white) community. Many of their friends have left, the local pubs are now all closed, and they are often left feeling very isolated - strangers in their own country.
This may all sound rather melodramatic, but I can assure you that it isn't. I have lived among and dealt with very many people like this, and the situation is just as much a problem now as it was 50 or 60 years ago.
Furthermore, that racism is present not just in the people that are unable to move away; it's also prevalent amongst those who feel that they were `forced' to move away from an area where they were happy and had their roots.
And the phenomenon is by no means limited to the towns where there has been large scale South Asian immigration. Similar attitudes will be found – though rarely now voiced in public - in virtually all communities which have been subject to large scale immigration by people of a different culture. It helps to explain why so many people in the Eastern counties voted Brexit as a protest about the large number of East Europeans that had arrived. Once again, they’d been brought in solely for the financial benefit of the people who owned the local farms – many of whom probably lived in the Thames Valley! - but it was the local people who had to deal with the disruption that such uncontrolled immigration had brought to their communities.
It's very easy to preach the benefits of multi-culturalism when you can afford to pick and choose where you live. But to criticise those who don't have that privilege for not joining in that enthusiasm shows a fundamental lack of understanding of human nature.