48% of English would support Anti-immigration English Nationalist Party

[Comrade Wolfie's Very Nearly Banned Adventures]

Fantastic news for all Brits:

Huge numbers of Britons would support an anti-immigration English nationalist party if it were not associated with violence and fascist imagery, according to the largest survey into identity and extremism conducted in the UK.

A Populus poll found that 48% of the population would consider supporting a new anti-immigration party committed to challenging Islamic extremism, and would support policies to make it statutory for all public buildings to fly the flag of St George or the Union flag.

Anti-racism campaigners said the findings suggested that Britain's mainstream parties were losing touch with public opinion on issues of identity and race.

The poll, commissioned by anti-fascist charity the Searchlight Educational Trust, suggests that the level of backing for a far-right party could one day equal or even outstrip that in countries such as France, the Netherlands and Austria, where such parties have traditionally received significant support.

France's National Front party hopes to secure 20% in the first round of the presidential vote next year. The Dutch anti-Islam party led by Geert Wilders attracted 15.5% of the vote during last year's parliamentary elections. Anti-fascist groups said that the poll's findings challenged the belief that Britons were more tolerant than other Europeans. "This shows that this is not because British people are more moderate, but simply because their views have not found a political articulation," said a report by the Searchlight Educational Trust that will be unveiled on Monday, outlining the findings.

According to the survey, 39% of Asian Britons, 34% of white Britons and 21% of black Britons wanted all immigration into the UK to be stopped permanently, or at least until the economy improved. And 43% of Asian Britons, 63% of white Britons and 17% of black Britons agreed with the statement that "immigration into Britain has been a bad thing for the country". Just over half of respondents overall – 52% – agreed with the proposition that "Muslims create problems in the UK".

Nick Lowles, from the anti-fascist campaign group Hope Not Hate, said that the poll shattered many traditional liberal preconceptions. He said: "The harsh truth is that we are in danger of losing touch with the public on race, immigration and multiculturalism."

Jon Cruddas, the Labour MP who fought a successful campaign against the British National Party in his Dagenham and Rainham constituency in east London, said that the findings pointed to a "very real threat of a new potent political constituency built around an assertive English nationalism". The report identified a resurgence of English identity with 39% preferring to call themselves English rather than British. Just 5% labelled themselves European.

Earlier this month David Cameron delivered a controversial speech on the failings of "state multiculturalism". The speech was seized on by the anti-Islamic English Defence League, which said that the prime minister was "coming round" to its way of thinking. BNP leader Nick Griffin also welcomed the speech as a sign that his party's ideas were entering "the political mainstream".

The poll also identified a majority keen to be allowed to openly criticise religion, with 60% believing they "should be allowed to say whatever they believe about religion". By contrast, less than half – 42% – said "people should be allowed to say whatever they believe about race".

Source

Pretty depressing news, but British society always has been highly xenophobic, and comments such as Cameron's statment that Multiculturalism has failed does nothing but fuel such sentiments.

[Zeus the Moose]

UKIP must be extremely happy right now :\

[Demogorgon]

It is the fault of the right wing press that has been getting away with increasingly naked racism and xenophobia. Look at the sort of thing the Mail and Express write and then tell me you are surprised by this. I rather suspect that the reason this sort of thing is less of a problem in Scotland is simply that such papers have a lower circulation.

[Queercommie Girl]

By contrast, less than half – 42% – said "people should be allowed to say whatever they believe about race".

That is still a huge proportion.

This is worrying news.

[Admiral Swagmeister G-Funk]

It is the fault of the right wing press that has been getting away with increasingly naked racism and xenophobia. Look at the sort of thing the Mail and Express write and then tell me you are surprised by this. I rather suspect that the reason this sort of thing is less of a problem in Scotland is simply that such papers have a lower circulation.

Exactly this. Its no surprise whatsoever, I wouldn't even be surprised if the statistics were higher than that, given that a larger proportion of the people I know consider immigration a crucial issue than 48%.

The question is how do we fight these misconceptions about immigration, that are essentially put forward by the bourgeois media to influence false-consciousness and divide the working class, when the bourgeois media has the biggest influence on public perception than anything/anyone on our side?

[ComradeOm]

It is the fault of the right wing press that has been getting away with increasingly naked racism and xenophobia. Look at the sort of thing the Mail and Express write and then tell me you are surprised by this. I rather suspect that the reason this sort of thing is less of a problem in Scotland is simply that such papers have a lower circulation.

That's certainly a sizeable factor. Here's a decent article on the disgraceful scaremongering of much of the UK press. Its also worth keeping an eye on Tabloid Watch for some of the more egregious lies

[ed miliband]

It is the fault of the right wing press that has been getting away with increasingly naked racism and xenophobia. Look at the sort of thing the Mail and Express write and then tell me you are surprised by this. I rather suspect that the reason this sort of thing is less of a problem in Scotland is simply that such papers have a lower circulation.

Not just the right wing press, but also politicians across party lines who have voiced sentiments on immigration and race not substantively different from the views espoused by groups like the EDL.

[Comrade Wolfie's Very Nearly Banned Adventures]

Not just the right wing press, but also politicians across party lines who have voiced sentiments on immigration and race not substantively different from the views espoused by groups like the EDL.

Indeed, if you just replace the words 'immigrant' with 'muslim' or 'arab' in most newspaper articles, or political speeches is both alarming and depressing.

Here is one from the Daily Mail I made:

Fears over immigration have increased among young people – amid dire jobs news for their age group.

More than 70 per cent of those in their late teens and early 20s now say Muslims are a problem, according to pollsters Ipsos MORI.

That figure has risen by 10 per cent over the 12 months that saw unemployment among the young approach one million.

For the first time, people in the 16-24 age group are now more worried about muslim numbers than those in their 30s, the poll showed.

Last week it was revealed 965,000 young people are out of work and hundreds of thousands have never worked. One in five 16-24 year-olds is jobless and looking for work.

The poll found almost half of youngsters believe muslims moving into Britain will damage the economic recovery by taking jobs away from those already here.

Ben Page, chief executive of Ipsos MORI, said: ‘The research shows strong support for tougher ianti-muslim policies, and high levels of concern.

‘Concern among young people about muslims has also increased and that could be attributed to the high levels of youth unemployment.’

Across the country, three quarters of Britons say muslims are a problem. Almost two thirds – 65 per cent – want tougher controls on those coming into the country.

More than half (57 per cent) support the Government’s immigration cap on muslims, and just 15 per cent are opposed.

Replacing 'immigration/immigrants' with 'muslim/muslims', also alterd some of the grammar to make sense.

Original article

[Queercommie Girl]

It's not just Muslims though, even though at the moment they are the most prominent.

Fact is, racists are against all immigrants and ethnic minorities: Muslim, Indian, Black or Chinese. Fundamentally there is no difference.

[Manic Impressive]

Can someone explain to me why increasing the reserve labour pool at a time when there is record youth unemployment is a good thing for the working class?

[Ocean Seal]

The problem with this is that the people easily fall prey to extremist reactionaries when they coat themselves in moderate colors. O'Reilly and Dobbs have pretty large crowds here and have had them quite consistently, by playing the moderate card and yet they have extraordinarily far-right agendas. They often endorse racism and sexism under the guise of preserving traditional values and economic nationalism. There is one point at which O'Reilly said something about preserving the white male power structure, and most people were pretty alright with that quote. Dobbs and his crew repeatedly demean Hispanics in the name of the economic interest of the citizens and free speech.

[RedSonRising]

I often wonder why the UK is so susceptible to working class divisions based on race. Class consciousness today and historically has always been higher than in a country like the United States of America...the neighborhoods are economically segregated on a far more visible scale, and the design of labor vs professional skill/capital ownership is much more accented.

[brigadista]

Immigrants in the UK have always been demonised -as a result of the empire/colonisation - unfortunately a lot of people in the UK still have an empire mindset this is why the EDL/NF etc get support - nostalgia for a britain that never existed because it was not the working people of the UK that benefitted in the way the ruling class did - immigrants are easy targets for lazy policitians

[Dimentio]

I often wonder why the UK is so susceptible to working class divisions based on race. Class consciousness today and historically has always been higher than in a country like the United States of America...the neighborhoods are economically segregated on a far more visible scale, and the design of labor vs professional skill/capital ownership is much more accented.

UK is based upon thinking worthy of a caste society.

The structure which consolidated itself in 1066-1688 built upon:

The Normans kicking the Anglo-saxons kicking the Celts kicking their wives and children. A multi-layered exploitation model, which also explains the quite openly expressed class hatred in Britain.

Right now though, the UK feels a bit like Yugoslavia in 1981, with a rebirth of regional and ethnic nationalism. If the EDL comes to power in any shape or form, it would lead to England completely alienating Scotland, Wales and N. Ireland, meaning the probable end of the United Kingdom as a political entity.

[Omsk]

Right now though, the UK feels a bit like Yugoslavia in 1981

The nationalism stared around the 89-91.After that everything went straight to hell.

[Queercommie Girl]

The Normans kicking the Anglo-saxons kicking the Celts kicking their wives and children. A multi-layered exploitation model, which also explains the quite openly expressed class hatred in Britain.

In pre-Anglo-Saxon Celtic societies, women actually had a relatively high social status:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Celts#G...d_sexual_norms

The sexual freedom of women in Britain was noted by Cassius Dio:[69]

...a very witty remark is reported to have been made by the wife of Argentocoxus, a Caledonian, to Julia Augusta. When the empress was jesting with her, after the treaty, about the free intercourse of her sex with men in Britain, she replied: "We fulfill the demands of nature in a much better way than do you Roman women; for we consort openly with the best men, whereas you let yourselves be debauched in secret by the vilest." Such was the retort of the British woman.
—Cassius Dio

There are instances recorded where women participated both in warfare and in kingship, although they were in the minority in these areas. Plutarch[70] reports that Celtic women acted as ambassadors to avoid a war among Celts chiefdoms in the Po valley during the 4th century BC.
Very few reliable sources exist regarding Celtic views towards gender divisions, though some archaeological evidence does suggest that their views towards gender roles may have been different from those of their contemporary classical counterparts.[clarification needed][71] There are some general indications from Iron Age burial sites in the Champagne and Bourgogne regions of Northeastern France which suggest that women may have had roles in combat during the earlier portions of the La Tène period. However, the evidence is far from conclusive.[72] Examples of individuals buried with both female jewellery and weaponry have been identified, such as the Vix Grave, and there are questions about the sexing of some skeletons that were buried with warrior assemblages. However, it has been suggested that "the weapons may indicate rank instead of masculinity".[73]
Among the insular Celts, there is a greater amount of historic documentation to suggest warrior roles for women. In addition to commentary by Tacitus about Boudica, there are indications from later period histories that also suggest a more substantial role for "women as warriors" in symbolic if not actual roles. Posidonius and Strabo described an island of women where men could not venture for fear of death, and where the women ripped each other apart.[74] Other writers, such as Ammianus Marcellinus and Tacitus, mentioned Celtic women inciting, participating in, and leading battles.[75] Poseidonius' anthropological comments on the Celts had common themes, primarily primitivism, extreme ferocity, cruel sacrificial practices, and the strength and courage of their women.[76]
Under Brehon Law, which was written down in early Medieval Ireland after conversion to Christianity, a woman had the right to divorce her husband and gain his property if he was unable to perform his marital duties due to impotence, obesity, homosexual inclination or preference for other women.

The Celts were also very open about homosexuality:

According to Aristotle, most "belligerent nations" were strongly influenced by their women, but the Celts were unusual because of openly preferred male lovers (Politics II 1269b).[66] H. D. Rankin in Celts and the Classical World notes that "Athenaeus echoes this comment (603a) and so does Ammianus (30.9). It seems to be the general opinion of antiquity."[67] In book XIII of his Deipnosophists, the Roman Greek rhetorician and grammarian Athenaeus, repeating assertions made by Diodorus Siculus in the 1st century BC (Bibliotheca historica 5:32), wrote that Celtic women were beautiful but that the men preferred to sleep together. Diodorus went further, stating that "the young men will offer themselves to strangers and are insulted if the offer is refused". Rankin argues that the ultimate source of these assertions is likely to be Poseidonius and speculates that these authors may be recording male "bonding rituals".[68]

The Celts were socially speaking significantly closer to Primitive Communism than either the Romans or the Germanic peoples.

[Dimentio]

Yes, they had a pretty high status in comparison with nearly all other Indo-European societies.

But foreign occupation and exploitation tend to lead to females and children being horribly abused too.

In Sweden during the 19th century, it was usual that wood-cutters and rural workers were offered payment in moonshine instead of money, meaning that a lot of men basically made their families starve. The capitalists would keep the workers until they were completely alcoholised, then the state would put them in prisons and quarries as a penalty for being drunkards. When workers started to organise in Unions and in the Social Democratic Party, an extensive education programme was made to increase the status of women and kids.

In Egypt today, a lot of women have reported that sexual harassment has gone down.

What I meant with my comment was that since Celts were the socio-economic group with lowest status in British society, they have no one else to attack than individuals of the group with lower status than themselves.

[Queercommie Girl]

Yes, they had a pretty high status in comparison with nearly all other Indo-European societies.

Indo-Europeans generally had better rights for women (and better rights for queer people during their pre-Christian pagan phases) than many other ethno-linguistic groups, such as Altaic and Afro-Asiatic.

In fact, I hypothesise that one reason why the Germanics were less systematically brutal than the Huns in Europe was partly due to the status of women. The Germanic tribes had many female warriors, as ancient Roman historical sources attest, unlike the Huns under Attila. And when women are more involved in warfare, warfare tends to become less brutal towards women, children and unarmed civilians in general.

The Germanic tribes actually had a better status for women than the Latin-speaking Romans. The modern English word "family" comes from the Latin term familia, which literally means household slaves belonging to one man.

And the Roman conquest of Celtic Gaul, enslaving over 1 milliion people, was more brutal than the Germanic conquest of the same region centuries later.

What I meant with my comment was that since Celts were the socio-economic group with lowest status in British society, they have no one else to attack than individuals of the group with lower status than themselves.

Well, among white European ethnic groups perhaps, (the Anglos used to call the Irish the "niggers of Europe") but Celts still face less racism in Britain today than Blacks, Muslims and Asians.

[Queercommie Girl]

Here is the eastern-most branch of the Indo-European peoples: The Tocharians (Tuhuoluo in Mandarin Chinese), who had a lot of contact with the Chinese in antiquity. They are also the only Indo-European people who converted not to Christianity, but to Buddhism (the school of Mahayana Buddhism that the Tocharians believe in is very close to Chinese Buddhism). During the Chinese Han Dynasty, the Chinese allied with the Tocharians against the threat from the nomadic Huns/Xiongnu:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tocharians

The Tocharians were the Tocharian-speaking inhabitants of the Tarim Basin, making them the easternmost speakers of Indo-European languages in antiquity. After wars against the northern Xiongnu Empire, the Tocharians migrated out of the Tarim Basim, and the Indo-European language of the Tocharians became supplanted by the languages of the Xiongnu.[1] The Takhar province of Afghanistan is named after Tocharians. Tocharian languages would remain in the region until replaced in 800 AD by the Altaic languages, with the arrival of Turkic migration from modern day Mongolia.[2]

One reason the Tocharians survived so long in Central Asia was partly due to the alliance they had with China, which lasted for centuries.

In 751 CE, the Chinese Tang Dynasty lost the Battle of Talas River against the Arabs. Soon China itself was thrown into the chaos of the An Lushan Coup. Chinese forces would from that point on withdraw from Central Asia, and it is no coincedence that the final conquest of the Tocharians by the Altaic-speaking Turks occurred around 800 CE, not long after Chinese influences vacated the Central Asian region.

Some scholars have suggested that the Indo-European group that is ethnically the closest of the Tocharians are actually the Celts, despite the immense geographical distance between them. Unlike the Indo-Iranians, the other Indo-European-speaking group in Asia, the Tocharians generally have reddish/blonde hair and fair skin.

Also see this interesting linguistic theory stating that Chinese is related to Basque:

http://www.revleft.com/vb/chinese-an...260/index.html

Well, as they say, "it's a small world", this is true even in antiquity.

[Manic Impressive]

UK is based upon thinking worthy of a caste society.

The structure which consolidated itself in 1066-1688 built upon:

The Normans kicking the Anglo-saxons kicking the Celts kicking their wives and children. A multi-layered exploitation model, which also explains the quite openly expressed class hatred in Britain.

Right now though, the UK feels a bit like Yugoslavia in 1981, with a rebirth of regional and ethnic nationalism. If the EDL comes to power in any shape or form, it would lead to England completely alienating Scotland, Wales and N. Ireland, meaning the probable end of the United Kingdom as a political entity.

I disagree with you about the Saxons, historians have changed the main theory about them. Even when I was at school they taught us that there was an invasion but this has been largely proven to be false and in fact it was a slow migration over a few centuries through trade and settlement which was largely peaceful. I would disagree that it was primitive communism though as England under the Anglo-Saxons had the most advanced tax system in Europe at the time which is why it was the perfect target for invasion. The Norman ruling class almost define imperialism up until the modern neo-liberal imperialism of penetration through capital. first taking Normandy and naming it after themselves then England where they literally tried to exterminate the male population of the South East and systematically raped every woman who could bare children. The nature of the Norman ruling class was to conquer and then assimilate (kind of like the borg in Star Trek) after taking Normandy they became French the nobles inter married and they adopted the French class system. Then the next obvious target was England as I said for the tax system, the naval trade and the fertile lands. Within one generation they defined themselves as being English and within 90 years 1066-1154 they had an "English" (read Norman) pope Adrian 4th who decided that Henry the 2nd should be rewarded for his good service to humanity by granting him Ireland. A lot of authors write that the invasion of Ireland was the start of the British empire but I'd say that the invasion of Normandy was.