117 posts
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Post by ldm2016 on Nov 10, 2016 12:23:31 GMT
So people you don't agree with are loonies and weirdos and u say I'M the idiot. Are you seriously suggesting that Corbyn does not attract weirdos and complete social misfits? |
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Post by Deleted on Nov 10, 2016 12:32:43 GMT
While I grant you not technically from a 'Council Estate' I am from a white working class background, with parents who worked on minimum wage most of their lives...in an area that has become more diverse, and in fact adjacent to one of the largest refugee housing centres in the UK. Oh and a stone's throw from the Welsh valleys. So I know a thing or two about working class life, and immigration, and I'm somehow managing to be a raging racist.
Also the 'all the white working classes pulled together in times of need' is frankly bullsh*t as well.
Is that what they're teaching you youngsters in university nowadays? No that's what I'm using a position of being a University lecturer to teach the youngsters. In the hope they grow up more tolerant and educated than you.
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117 posts
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Post by ldm2016 on Nov 10, 2016 12:40:17 GMT
Is that what they're teaching you youngsters in university nowadays? I'm frankly flattered that you think I'm a youngster. But given that I'm a former Secondary School teacher and have a PhD I think I'm fairly well educated. Oh wait I'm guessing you're one of those 'education is a waste of time' types as well. Heaven forbid people do that too. Education is the second most important thing, after love, a child can receive... Any person who claims otherwise is an idiot who who wouldn't tell the time to. My problem with modern "education" is that, and this is widely accepted, that pupils are now taught according to a borderline leftist dictatorial political correct policy which ensures that people grow up with a misconception that life is black and white and also gave birth to that most despicable group: generation Snowflake. Education is about enrichment and enhancement but nowadays it is, sadly, about teaching how to pass exams that are accepted to be dumbed down compared to when we took them, and as said above, creating a generation who are accepting of political correctness even when it is in the wrong. |
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117 posts
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Post by ldm2016 on Nov 10, 2016 12:41:04 GMT
Is that what they're teaching you youngsters in university nowadays? No that's what I'm using a position of being a University lecturer to teach the youngsters. In the hope they grow up more tolerant and educated than you.
Please see my reply to your initial answer... |
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Post by Deleted on Nov 10, 2016 12:44:45 GMT
No that's what I'm using a position of being a University lecturer to teach the youngsters. In the hope they grow up more tolerant and educated than you.
Please see my reply to your initial answer... That I'm not allowed to reply unless I'm from a council estate?
Actually you've won there because I have no response for such a level of stupidity.
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117 posts
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Post by ldm2016 on Nov 10, 2016 13:06:49 GMT
Please see my reply to your initial answer... That I'm not allowed to reply unless I'm from a council estate?
Actually you've won there because I have no response for such a level of stupidity.
No, my reply to the post you deleted but too late for me to quote it... |
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117 posts
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Post by ldm2016 on Nov 10, 2016 13:09:23 GMT
That I'm not allowed to reply unless I'm from a council estate?
Actually you've won there because I have no response for such a level of stupidity.
No, my reply to the post you deleted but too late for me to quote it... Anyway, I'm out of here... Look forward to reading how the country is full of white racists when the Tories win a landslide victory in 2020.... |
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Post by Deleted on Nov 10, 2016 13:16:20 GMT
For the record (oh sensible board users) I didn't delete any post...before I become the next Hilary on some board post sending or not sending scandal  |
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1,320 posts
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Post by londonmzfitz on Nov 10, 2016 13:33:41 GMT
Wait -
What happened?
I was doing some stuff, stepped away and now I'm supposed to be ashamed of having a view because I wasn't brought up in a council estate ...
Eh?
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Post by Deleted on Nov 10, 2016 13:37:40 GMT
ldm2016 makes a very fair point. Quite a lot of the voters who are being castigated for the way they voted are in just such a situation s/he describes, ie a close-knit predominantly white community that either has factually been, or perceives itself to have been, vastly changed by immigration. It's not just about your neighbour having a different skin colour (which clearly would be racist). It's about pressure on local council services, the NHS, schools. The political response so far - on whatever side, other than UKIP and the far right - has been to either ignore the problem hoping it will go away, or criticise those raising concerns as 'racist'.
It should surely be clear to anyone that if you fail to ignore a problem in that way, then the people who are being criticised and/or ignored will register their discontent in the only way they can - voting in an extreme fashion. I suppose they think, 'Maybe NOW they'll listen.' So it's even more ridiculous when in fact even then the elite don't listen - they just shout 'racist' even louder.
I'm not taking sides here. I'm just saying that, objectively, the evidence does suggest that this is the issue - we've seen it in the UK, we've just seen it in the US, and within a year or two when voting rolls around again, the news seems to suggest we'll see it in France, Germany, Italy etc also. The handwringing political elite/journalist class etc don't need to suddenly swing to the far right, or swing to the far left. They just need to stop, listen, make a considered judgement, and then come up with solutions, rather than curse people out and hope they'll go away.
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Post by Deleted on Nov 10, 2016 13:38:21 GMT
Wait - What happened? I was doing some stuff, stepped away and now I'm supposed to be ashamed of having a view because I wasn't brought up in a council estate ... Eh? I dipped a toe into this thread for the first time and that's what I found...it was all so civilised before that... |
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1,320 posts
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Post by londonmzfitz on Nov 10, 2016 13:50:12 GMT
ldm2016 makes a very fair point. Quite a lot of the voters who are being castigated for the way they voted are in just such a situation s/he describes, ie a close-knit predominantly white community that either has factually been, or perceives itself to have been, vastly changed by immigration. It's not just about your neighbour having a different skin colour (which clearly would be racist). It's about pressure on local council services, the NHS, schools. The political response so far - on whatever side, other than UKIP and the far right - has been to either ignore the problem hoping it will go away, or criticise those raising concerns as 'racist'. It should surely be clear to anyone that if you fail to ignore a problem in that way, then the people who are being criticised and/or ignored will register their discontent in the only way they can - voting in an extreme fashion. I suppose they think, 'Maybe NOW they'll listen.' So it's even more ridiculous when in fact even then the elite don't listen - they just shout 'racist' even louder. I'm not taking sides here. I'm just saying that, objectively, the evidence does suggest that this is the issue - we've seen it in the UK, we've just seen it in the US, and within a year or two when voting rolls around again, the news seems to suggest we'll see it in France, Germany, Italy etc also. The handwringing political elite/journalist class etc don't need to suddenly swing to the far right, or swing to the far left. They just need to stop, listen, make a considered judgement, and then come up with solutions, rather than curse people out and hope they'll go away. Ah, articulate post clears the fog. Got it. Ta. Except. I was actually born in a Council Estate in Kilburn, brought up in a street of council houses in Willesden, educated in Harlesden; I've lived all my life (still live) within the London Borough of Brent, *Brent was the first local authority in the UK to have a majority black, Asian and minority ethnic (BAME) population. In the 2011 Census, 63.7% of the population were BAME. By contrast, 14% of people in England and Wales and 40% of people in London were BAME. (source intelligence.brent.gov.uk/BrentDocuments/Brent%20Diversity%20Profile.pdfDoes this frighten me, do I feel my community has been "decimated". No, this is my community. |
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Post by Deleted on Nov 10, 2016 13:54:29 GMT
ldm2016 makes a very fair point. Quite a lot of the voters who are being castigated for the way they voted are in just such a situation s/he describes, ie a close-knit predominantly white community that either has factually been, or perceives itself to have been, vastly changed by immigration. It's not just about your neighbour having a different skin colour (which clearly would be racist). It's about pressure on local council services, the NHS, schools. The political response so far - on whatever side, other than UKIP and the far right - has been to either ignore the problem hoping it will go away, or criticise those raising concerns as 'racist'. It should surely be clear to anyone that if you fail to ignore a problem in that way, then the people who are being criticised and/or ignored will register their discontent in the only way they can - voting in an extreme fashion. I suppose they think, 'Maybe NOW they'll listen.' So it's even more ridiculous when in fact even then the elite don't listen - they just shout 'racist' even louder. I'm not taking sides here. I'm just saying that, objectively, the evidence does suggest that this is the issue - we've seen it in the UK, we've just seen it in the US, and within a year or two when voting rolls around again, the news seems to suggest we'll see it in France, Germany, Italy etc also. The handwringing political elite/journalist class etc don't need to suddenly swing to the far right, or swing to the far left. They just need to stop, listen, make a considered judgement, and then come up with solutions, rather than curse people out and hope they'll go away. This kind of reasoned discussion I can get behind, and to an extent agree with. Trump (and others) have clearly stirred up the sentiments that have been brewing for a long time in the kind of communities you describe. And it's very much a problem that needs addressing not just in the UK and America but as you say beyond.
I simply took offence at the narrow minded approach to 'discussion' as I said to ldm2016, I'm from a very working class background, but because I don't fit the exact life experience they describe I'm somehow lumped in with the 'loonies' they describe.
Thanks for the reasoned translation of points!
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Post by Deleted on Nov 10, 2016 13:57:00 GMT
Is it say to come back?!?!
But if your protest against the 'elite' (which is more and more a byword for 'liberal) is voting for a party/person who say racist/sexist etc things then surely that makes you these things by default? Or stupid at least?
I'm getting sick of people (not on here) who say they voted for UKIP or BREXIT or Trump as a protest vote. It doesn't work like that. If u want to protest deface your voting paper don't vote for something u don't want. Unless of course people use the 'protest' thing as a way of taking responsibility of how they think?
And when you question people on the elite they are protesting about invariably it is actually the left and liberals they don't like
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Post by Deleted on Nov 10, 2016 14:26:47 GMT
I guess I just don't see how the best solution to someones circumstances getting somewhat worse (and this stuff - immigration, the economy, gentrification etc. - comes and goes) is to vote to ensure other peoples lives become virtually impossible. There are ways to better your circumstances that don't involve worsening those of others. Even to the point that, according to people in this thread, gay people will vote in a vice president that believes in gay conversion therapy. Not only that, but with Brexit at least, people make it worse for their own children who might not have the chance to move to other European countries with any ease, limiting their freedom to travel, work and live.
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Post by Deleted on Nov 10, 2016 14:38:08 GMT
ldm2016 makes a very fair point. Quite a lot of the voters who are being castigated for the way they voted are in just such a situation s/he describes, ie a close-knit predominantly white community that either has factually been, or perceives itself to have been, vastly changed by immigration. (Italics mine) Those are two very different things, and that's the crux of the problem. Are communities actually being torn apart, or is it a matter of people resenting anyone different right from the start and then seeking confirmation of what they've already decided has to be true? Believing something really, really hard doesn't make it real, and it doesn't make it a free pass for being a bigot. I've heard an awful lot of people complaining about immigrants ruining communities, but almost always the sort of people who've never met an immigrant in their lives. I know someone who complains about immigrants putting a burden on our stretched resources, but doesn't see an issue with having numerous children and grandchildren because apparently it's only population growth caused by foreigners that's a problem; population growth caused by our own doesn't matter. When did it become OK to imagine a problem and then make others suffer because you don't care about the truth? You know what? I like the fact there's a Romanian shop in my town. I like the fact that the man who runs the corner shop at the end of my street is learning a bit of Polish out of deference to some of his customers, even though they all speak English. I like the fact that the barmaid at one of my regular pubs is Lithuanian, replacing a Slovakian. It's cool not to be insulated from the rest of the world. If individual people have individual problems then those problems can be dealt with individually. Declaring an entire group of people to be The Problem is not the right approach. That was tried several times during the twentieth century, and you might recall that these days we take a fairly dim view of those attitudes. Take a guess at how people fifty years from now are going to look back at the 2010s. |
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Post by kathryn on Nov 10, 2016 14:59:06 GMT
Its very clearly not about population growth or resources being stretched in the US. If that was the case, the people who voted Trump/Pence wouldn't also be anti-abortion and anti-birth control being covered by health insurance. Those measures actually affect poor non-whites disproportionately, because they can least afford pay for birth control or travel somewhere where abortions are available. It also re-inforces the cycle of poverty in those communities.
People are really bad at judging numbers in everyday life. They overestimate the number of THEM and underestimate the number of US.
Scientists and social scientists spend an awful lot of time and effort to accurately collect data, and have strict procedures for doing so, because human beings are just naturally terrible at it. All the actual data shows that it's not the number of immigrants stretching services, it's underfunding and poor service planning, it's increased life spans and the accompanying increase in chronic ill health of an ageing population. Immigrants are disproportionately young and healthy compared to the rest of the population, and they pay a disproportionate amount of tax.
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433 posts
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Post by DuchessConstance on Nov 10, 2016 15:20:23 GMT
So liberal elite = working classes immigrants who aren't crazy about racism.
Non-elite = billionaires to whom actual law does not apply.
Got it.
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4,156 posts
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Post by kathryn on Nov 10, 2016 15:39:10 GMT
However, I grew up on a very poor, very white council estate but one with an amazing sense of community - when news got around that my Dad had been made redundant in the 80s people actually came and brought shopping around for us. However, now the estate is used as a dumping ground for immigrants who can barely speak English and have no desire to mix in the community. My parents can barely get two words out of the neighbours on the street I grew up on, either. It's not because they're foreign - they're all white English! I don't know my own next door neighbours' names. They're white English, too. Most people don't speak that much to their neighbours unless they have children the same age who socialise, attend the same place of worship, have the same hobbies, or work together. There's a whole lot of social and economic change that has reduced the likelihood of that and has nothing to do with immigration. We're talking de-industrialisation, house price rises meaning most people will have to move away from the community they grew up in, many people having to travel a long way to work, the decrease in church attendance, the closure of local pubs and social clubs, the rise in households where both parents work, and so on. |
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Post by Deleted on Nov 10, 2016 15:54:09 GMT
However, I grew up on a very poor, very white council estate but one with an amazing sense of community - when news got around that my Dad had been made redundant in the 80s people actually came and brought shopping around for us. However, now the estate is used as a dumping ground for immigrants who can barely speak English and have no desire to mix in the community. My parents can barely get two words out of the neighbours on the street I grew up on, either. It's not because they're foreign - they're all white English! I don't know my own next door neighbours' names. They're white English, too. Most people don't speak that much to their neighbours unless they have children the same age who socialise, attend the same place of worship, have the same hobbies, or work together. There's a whole lot of social and economic change that has reduced the likelihood of that and has nothing to do with immigration. We're talking de-industrialisation, house price rises meaning most people will have to move away from the community they grew up in, many people having to travel a long way to work, the decrease in church attendance, the closure of local pubs and social clubs, the rise in households where both parents work, and so on. Same! When I was a kid the number of 'foreign' folks (by which I'm using the Trump-esque definition of anyone with slightly different skin or accent!) in my area we could count on one hand! Likewise the number of neighbour who we knew/talked to. The idea that all working class (white) folks clubbed together in times of adversity is completely wrong if applied universally. We saw redundancy, hard times and deaths in the family and no community was rallying around then.
But today my neighbour is Czech, and I speak to her regularly and when her 80 year old Dad comes over to visit he does our garden as well.
Now not all European migrants would do that, same as not all working class white folks club together in some happy band of suffering or sticking it to "the man"
Tell you what did make my Mum friends in the area- a dog! nothing like a dog to let the British speak to each other....
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4,156 posts
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Post by kathryn on Nov 10, 2016 17:39:13 GMT
Tell you what did make my Mum friends in the area- a dog! nothing like a dog to let the British speak to each other....
Yup. I was explaining to a Swiss colleague at work the other week about the tube chat thing, that people don't speak to each other on the tube without a good reason, but 'a dog!' is a good reason. On my street the times I have had neighbours spontaneously talk to me was when: 1) The downstairs flat from me had smoke pouring out the window - they rang my bell, and we both tried to get an answer from downstairs. Had to call the fire brigade in the end so we ended up standing in the street while they did their stuff. Downstairs neighbour was fine, though the house stank for weeks. 2) I was doing a spot of gardening and someone was trying to give a kitten away. 3) We were painting the front yard wall ('can you do mine next?!). |
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Post by Jan on Nov 10, 2016 17:55:31 GMT
ldm2016 makes a very fair point. Quite a lot of the voters who are being castigated for the way they voted are in just such a situation s/he describes, ie a close-knit predominantly white community that either has factually been, or perceives itself to have been, vastly changed by immigration. It's not just about your neighbour having a different skin colour (which clearly would be racist). It's about pressure on local council services, the NHS, schools. The political response so far - on whatever side, other than UKIP and the far right - has been to either ignore the problem hoping it will go away, or criticise those raising concerns as 'racist'. It should surely be clear to anyone that if you fail to ignore a problem in that way, then the people who are being criticised and/or ignored will register their discontent in the only way they can - voting in an extreme fashion. I suppose they think, 'Maybe NOW they'll listen.' So it's even more ridiculous when in fact even then the elite don't listen - they just shout 'racist' even louder. I'm not taking sides here. I'm just saying that, objectively, the evidence does suggest that this is the issue - we've seen it in the UK, we've just seen it in the US, and within a year or two when voting rolls around again, the news seems to suggest we'll see it in France, Germany, Italy etc also. The handwringing political elite/journalist class etc don't need to suddenly swing to the far right, or swing to the far left. They just need to stop, listen, make a considered judgement, and then come up with solutions, rather than curse people out and hope they'll go away. Ah, articulate post clears the fog. Got it. Ta. Except. I was actually born in a Council Estate in Kilburn, brought up in a street of council houses in Willesden, educated in Harlesden; I've lived all my life (still live) within the London Borough of Brent, *Brent was the first local authority in the UK to have a majority black, Asian and minority ethnic (BAME) population. In the 2011 Census, 63.7% of the population were BAME. By contrast, 14% of people in England and Wales and 40% of people in London were BAME. (source intelligence.brent.gov.uk/BrentDocuments/Brent%20Diversity%20Profile.pdfDoes this frighten me, do I feel my community has been "decimated". No, this is my community. London is different. The Brexit vote showed that. It is different in Rotherham. |
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Post by BurlyBeaR on Nov 10, 2016 18:40:25 GMT
I guess I just don't see how the best solution to someones circumstances getting somewhat worse (and this stuff - immigration, the economy, gentrification etc. - comes and goes) is to vote to ensure other peoples lives become virtually impossible. There are ways to better your circumstances that don't involve worsening those of others. Even to the point that, according to people in this thread, gay people will vote in a vice president that believes in gay conversion therapy. Not only that, but with Brexit at least, people make it worse for their own children who might not have the chance to move to other European countries with any ease, limiting their freedom to travel, work and live. I think you mean me! What I was trying to say in my earlier post, and failing it seems, is that my Latino pals in Miami weren't voting FOR Trump, the were voting AGAINST Hillary. Because a large proportion of the US population hate her. Anyway it was just on the BBC news that white women were responsible for getting Donny in power so lay off my gays  |
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2,452 posts
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Post by theatremadness on Nov 10, 2016 20:50:30 GMT
Just as an aside to the recent discussions, a bit of research that I recently discovered that I thought was quite interesting that others may or may not already know:
As we all now know, Hillary won the popular vote, Donald won first-past-the-post. Who wrote Federalist No. 68 (we think) arguing for using the Electoral College as a way of selecting the President of the USA? Alexander Hamilton.
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Post by Deleted on Nov 10, 2016 21:02:40 GMT
ldm2016 makes a very fair point. Quite a lot of the voters who are being castigated for the way they voted are in just such a situation s/he describes, ie a close-knit predominantly white community that either has factually been, or perceives itself to have been, vastly changed by immigration. (Italics mine) Those are two very different things, and that's the crux of the problem. Are communities actually being torn apart, or is it a matter of people resenting anyone different right from the start and then seeking confirmation of what they've already decided has to be true? Believing something really, really hard doesn't make it real, and it doesn't make it a free pass for being a bigot. I've heard an awful lot of people complaining about immigrants ruining communities, but almost always the sort of people who've never met an immigrant in their lives. I know someone who complains about immigrants putting a burden on our stretched resources, but doesn't see an issue with having numerous children and grandchildren because apparently it's only population growth caused by foreigners that's a problem; population growth caused by our own doesn't matter. When did it become OK to imagine a problem and then make others suffer because you don't care about the truth? You know what? I like the fact there's a Romanian shop in my town. I like the fact that the man who runs the corner shop at the end of my street is learning a bit of Polish out of deference to some of his customers, even though they all speak English. I like the fact that the barmaid at one of my regular pubs is Lithuanian, replacing a Slovakian. It's cool not to be insulated from the rest of the world. If individual people have individual problems then those problems can be dealt with individually. Declaring an entire group of people to be The Problem is not the right approach. That was tried several times during the twentieth century, and you might recall that these days we take a fairly dim view of those attitudes. Take a guess at how people fifty years from now are going to look back at the 2010s. Agree with your italics. But I think the wider point still stands: if people's perceptions are wrong, you engage with them and show them why they're wrong. Calling them 'racist' and turning your back on them doesn't work, as that liberal elite are now finding. FWIW, where I live in London I can frequently walk down the street or take a bus journey and not hear another English speaker. I don't have the problem with this that, say, Nigel Farage does. It's nice to be able to walk home from the bus stop after the theatre and feel relatively safe because the shisha cafes nearby are open late and the atmosphere is really chilled. I like the ethnic mix of the stores and restaurants in my local area. But others, who live on the local estates, feel very differently as they've seen large groups of immigrants settling there in the last few years. They're concerned about tensions between different ethnic groups, for example. Who am I to tell them they're wrong? |
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