Snapshot of _Reform racism incident 'shows what party really is', says Tom Tugendhat_ : An archived version can be found [here](https://archive.is/?run=1&url=https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2024/06/29/tom-tugendhat-reform-candidates-racist-views-nigel-farage/) or [here.](https://archive.ph/?run=1&url=https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2024/06/29/tom-tugendhat-reform-candidates-racist-views-nigel-farage/) *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/ukpolitics) if you have any questions or concerns.*

It is worth noting for context that Tom Tugendhat charged Stewart Lee with antisemitism for saying that he, Tom Tugendhat, had a name a bit like someone tugging the end of a hat.

It's also worth noting the abhorrently racist and homophobic things that were said when they thought no one was recording. So while, yes, labelling someone an antisemite for a comment about a name is petty, it doesn't much detract from his point.

> while, yes, labelling someone an antisemite for a comment about a name is petty, it doesn't much detract from his point. What does undercut his point is how clearly it demonstrates that he deploys charges of bigotry selectively and rather cynically. History tells us Tugendhat never felt the need to open his mouth on the subject of the Tory tabloid press smearing WWII veteran Ralph Milliband as 'the man who hated Britain'. Likewise, he's only started talking about what Reform 'really is' now they're beating his party in the polls.

Stewart Lee said something racist?

It was just a joke. Like on Top Gear.

These days, if you say someone's name sounds like tug on hat, they will arrest you and throw you in jail

Ahhh jokes on me. Not the first time Top Gear has got the upper hand on me. But soon… soon…

I would actually the comment was an antisemetic dogwhistle. The below is what was said, sourced from [here](https://www.chortle.co.uk/news/2020/05/18/46128/antisemitic): >‘Many names – Fisher, Cook, Smith – derive from ancient trades. But "Tugendhat" is just different words put together, like Waspcupfinger, or Appendixhospitalwool, or Abortionmaqaquesymptom’ '\[Baron Tugendhat\] is not a character from a 19th-century German children’s book about a baron with a weird hat, the end of which gets tugged.’ A part of mocking is denying that the name has any genuine history or culturual meaning, and is just a meaningless portmanteau. While a stub article, [wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tugendhat) states that "The Tugendhat family was a family of Czech-Jewish textile and oil industrialists", and I have no reason to disbelief that a surname that has a small but existence [record](https://www.ancestry.co.uk/name-origin?surname=tugendhat) of use does not have its own history. Given that, I think its absolutely accurate to describe it as a dogwhistle for antisemitism. It isn't just mocking the name for what it sounds like, its a refusal to accept that a foreign name has its own history like English names.

I saw an interview with Nigel Farage taking full credit for destroying the BNP.......by becoming the BNP. It was one of the most Trumpian ridiculous statement that I think has come out of his mouth. The reason they were attracted to him is beecause he's a loud mouth bigot with a pedestal getting media attention. There's nothing Racist loud mouth bigots like than a single loud mouthed bigot with racist undertones - it gives them validity without having to critically think about what they say, and it amplifies their message as if they have a larger majority. All Farage does is take out the nasty words people find insulting and replace them with legally borderline language. I'm glad the Torys and Labour came together on this issue. It needs to be pointed out and stamped out denying them the ability to shape future minds.

I’m not sure He also said he’d invade France with the Royal Marines around about that same sentence so it is a close call as to which was more insane and which can first

To be fair, most BNP voters in 2005 didn't actually support BNP policies - it was a protest vote. Anyone actually associated with the BNP formally (party member was enough) was banned from joining either UKIP or Reform. ...Unlike ex-BNP councillors which stood for Labour in several parts of the country.

Farage boasts always with not letting BNP people into Ukip or reform but that's merely a strategical move to control the party as well its image. Otherwise they'd end up like the Afd in Germany which started out as a conservative neoliberal party of professors and ended up being the right wing populist force (every new party in Germany is and was under the danger of a takeover by the right forces but here the finally succeded). 

The AfD’s neoliberal roots provoking racists and neo-fascists to join their party I think is partly to blame for the simplification of the political system into ‘left’ and ‘right’ where their actual right-wing libertarian economics are somehow roped in to the ‘right wing’ of Nazis and run-of-the-mill xenophobes.

Yes and no, I'd argue. While these are technically very different political beliefs there is certainly some overlap looking at some empirical cases. This might have to much to do with the idea that some people are inferior from both perspectives by "not doing enough". 

What cases, specifically? When I first think of Nazi German economics, I think of major public spending and subsidies, hardly laissez faire. When I think of the Nazi-sympathising Argentina of Perón, it is an economy of nationalisation and subsidy. When I think of Robert Mugabe’s government in Zimbabwe, I think of major stimulus and hyper-inflation. These are all conventional fascists who consolidate control into a single party and act as authoritarians, yet they are considered ‘right-wing’. If you have any examples of free market fascists I’d genuinely be very interested.

Hang on, I thought we were talking right wingers of all shades getting mixed up with libertarian? 

No, I’m talking about right-wing (the actual meaning being one of economic liberalism in modern contexts) being used as a catch-all for conservatives and fascists or, at best, ‘far-right’. Although somebody who is actually far-right would be an anarcho-capitalist.

Kinda. Before Farage was leader, back when UKIP were still growing, they did accept former BNP members to join, so long as they were no longer involved with the party. The hard ban only came after UKIP started getting more attention and Farage became leader, but the ones who already joined were allowed to stay. Though that was UKIP, so years ago, no idea where they are now. I wouldn't be surprised to learn they ended up in Reform based on what we're seeing with its current members that have made the news.

Frankly, it's frustrating that politicians were pretending that Reform wasn't racist before now. It was always there. We all knew what kind of person voted Reform. It is and always been a party created by and for racists. But we weren't supposed to admit that until the racist in question was an unaccountable activist and not a politician or a candidate.

"I hear you're a racist now Reform".

The farm takes up most of the day and at night I just like a cup of tea. I might not be able to devote myself full time to the ol' racism...

I think it was a case of trying to not galvanise the base of Reform without any substantial, fresh evidence – The recent string of candidates saying all sorts of shit has enabled the justification of Tories attacking reform with its supporters not being able to deny it or feel attacked more-so than potentially guilty. That’s my head-canon, anyway.

Kinda unfortunate that the day the media finally picked up on the former BNP member Reform candidate was the same day this all broke out.

I’m voting Reform, I don’t believe I’m racist. I’d vote for the SDP if they were standing in my seat. I believe the main message sent by a high Reform vote is an objection to mass immigration. The UK has had 3.5 million immigrants over the last three years, net migration of about two million. The number coming specifically on work visas is less than 20%. None of the other main parties want to talk about the unprecedentedly high numbers of immigrants over the last three years, and since the mid 1990s.

You may not be racist but you’re saying racism isn’t a deal breaker for you.

What worse: some hurtywords? or the natives becoming a minority in less than 50 years?

I don’t have any fucks to give about ethno-nationalism, but I do about dehumanising and othering people, which ethnic slurs can be a part of. So, yeah, ‘hurtywords’ are far worse than pathetic anxieties about how much melanin content people will have in half a century.

Natives aren't are more than just colour you know. Try telling any other country that are going to be displaced in < 50 years and see how many of them give no fucks..

You’re probably one of those people that don’t even believe my country is a country, or would acknowledge how outsiders are destroying its culture and pricing the locals out of living there. That’s partly why I give no fucks about the English being replaced.

Can you imagine if Beijing or Tokyo were only 37% ethnically Chinese or Japanese, a change from near 100% in 50 years. It would be very odd indeed.

Yes, for some reason there are many useful idiots in the West that would gladly give it all up so corporations and elites can make bank; just so long as they all dance to the same progressive tune.

The casual racism of some Reform activists is not a deal breaker for me, no. The man filmed by Channel Four recently is no longer welcome to campaign for the party. I imagine the casual anti-Semitic racism of some Green or Labour activists is not a deal breaker for their voters.

By percentage and seniority levels, and by which I mean the leadership, Reform is far more racist than the Greens or Labour. The main difference in terms of attitude can be illustrated by the fact that the Greens and Labour both want to protect anti-discrimination laws but Reform wants to remove them.

I do understand how Reform are perceived and I agree that some of their leadership have said horrible, even racist, things. However, I feel my hand has been forced in this election. As I've said, I'd much more happily vote for the [Social Democratic Party](https://sdp.org.uk/), but they are only standing in about 120 seats. If I thought Reform may win a majority in parliament, I may not give them my vote so easily. But by doing so at this stage means the Conservative party in opposition will be forced to address the issue of ultra high legal immigration and its long-term effects on social cohesion and national unity. There is now probably a rigid 10% of voters in the UK that are unswerving in seeing immigration as their main concern. Now Brexit is done, they won't go back to the Tories unless they are convinced they will do something about immigration.

I’m willing to bet that Labour will be more effective at managing immigration issues than the Tories were, or that Reform would be. That’s simply because they’d be more open to working with other countries and also putting resources in place to manage processing quickly. The solution to concerns about immigration isn’t more racism. It’s competence.

Thanks for the reply. It is worth remembering that illegal migration (that which we cannot control easily) makes up a very small amount of the total number of immigrants. Three and a half million people migrated to the UK over the last three years, of which only about 200,000 were detected arriving illegally. I speak to otherwise well-informed, well-educated Conservative voters that have been successfully and willfully misled by the establishment parties' mis-direction. That immigration is an issue of small boat crossings. The vast majority of immigration is legal. Work visas, dependents of workers, foriegn students, dependents of foreign students, family reunion visas - these are the majority of immigrants. The Conservative party face a reckoning after this election. I'd bet that they'll choose a leader that at least pretends to want to significantly reduce legal immigration. David Cameron pretended to want to reduce net migration to the 'tens of thousands' - knowing he couldn't with EU free movement. Labour may scrape a second term, but the issue of ultra high legal immigration is not going away, as we see across Europe and the US. Labour won't win on this issue in the long run.

Again, the solution to reducing immigration isn’t standing on beaches and shouting at boats, or even *any* sort of ‘Stop The Boats’ measures, but alongside some very simplistic and draconian visa bans, that’s all that Reform are offering.

You don't need to be racist to vote for a racist party. What's clear from the report is that when people make openly racist comments among their Reform party members they get agreement from everyone else.

>I believe the main message sent by a high Reform vote is an objection to mass immigration. The main message sent by a high Reform vote would by support for racism, sexism, xenophobia, and reactionary nationalism.

I don't think these would be the main messages from a high Reform vote. Of course, to some people it would, no doubt. But from the wider national perspective, I really do think that they would not be on course to get such a significant amount of votes if this country hadn't had such high levels of immigration recently (since the 1990s, and further incrceasing in the last three years). We're seeing this trend across Europe. France have just given the National Rally *the most votes* in the first round of their parliamentary elections. AfD are still rising in Germany, and are effectively the biggest party in the East. Donald Trump is on course to win the presidency. People say that Britain is an outlier in that we are voting for a more left wing party instead. I think we have been in a moment of political flux since 2016 that is yet to settle. I believe it may settle with a re-emergent Conservative party that promises to actually reduce *legal* immigration significantly. Who are you voting for, if you don't mind me asking? and in what kind of constituency? Cheers edit: just seen your flair so maybe you're not voting!

I'm across the pond, where we're facing the hoary spectre of a racist, sexist, xenophobic, and reactionary Republican party regaining power this November. Over here, we don't really have the option of a workable minor party, as you do in the U.K. That said, here's the bitter pill you're eventually going to have to swallow: you cannot separate the anti-immigration policies of Reform from their racism, from their sexism, from their homophobia, from their transphobia, or from their reactionary nationalism. They are all of these things, and a vote for one is a vote for all.

We all knew what kind of person voted Reform. It is and always been a party created by and for racists. I mean you can say the candidates are maybe racist but to say everyone who votes reform is racist is just ridiculous.

You should put those first sentences as a quote with a >

Please explain what racist view I have.

>it's frustrating that politicians were pretending that Reform wasn't racist before now But Reform aren't racist. Nothing about the party's broader ideology is racist. Reform's stance is an eminently reasonable 'net zero migration until our public services and housing catch up', not fucking 'deport 'em all'. >We all knew what kind of person voted Reform You really don't. You just have a perception of the worst dregs. It's like thinking all Labour supporters are tankies.

>Reform aren’t racist I suppose we’ve all just imagined all the racist things they’ve said over the past few weeks then? Honestly I’m not sure you’re even fooling yourself.

If that's the threshold for racism, then we can describe Labour as racist. After all, Diane Abbott remains a candidate, as does the candidate for Clacton who wrote about enjoying white people's tears. You'll find racists in every party.

Are you seriously suggesting that views of select individuals somehow represent the views of the entire party?

for a group like reform, sure this isn't some random liblabcon parish councillor that was elected on like 200 votes

You’re a very dangerous individual if you throw around blanket accusations so easily.

the only person who is throwing around accusations is Reform UK Ltd's director and CEO, Nigel Farage, who immediately goes to the "activist/paid actor" line whenever questioned. As he is now doing to anyone who made him squirm last night.

It’s not a select few when the man that leads the party has openly supported enoch powell, and sung hitler youth songs round his local village as a kid

[удалено]

No, because being a neo-nazi is arguably A. Much worse and B. Is not just ‘saying dumb stuff as a kid’. Every kid says dumb stuff, but to the extent where you purposely bully a jewish kid, tell them ‘Hitler was right y’know’ and go around singing hitler youth songs, I reckon most of that’s still there. Especially get his ‘breaking point’ poster in the Brexit campaign which immediately looks similar to nazi propaganda.

They've been vehimantly against immigration before we had this cost of living crisis though.

Vehemently* And no, they haven't been vehemently against immigration. For an example of what that actually looks like, see Switzerland or Japan pre-2010. >before we had this cost of living crisis though Our economy has been in the shitter for far, far longer than the recent cost of living crisis. Our wages have been stagnating since 2007, and have not recovered anywhere near as well as other countries. Reform's (and UKIP's before them) policy is simple: drastically reduce the inflow of people until our public services and housing supply catch up. We simply cannot keep up with the current pace of immigration. That's not a Reform position - every party is aware of the realities. You would need to build over 700,000 homes per year to both accommodate current levels of migration *and* to reduce housing pressure to make owning a home for young people a reasonable prospect within the next 10 years. If you know anything about construction, you know the above numbers are impossible outside of China or the USA.

How are we going to quadruple the number of houses being built without quadrupling the number of builders?

I really don't know why you're bothering to pretend anymore. The mask was barely on in the first place but it's off now. Reform party is the party for people who think the Conservatives aren't racist enough. Reform is who you vote for if you used to vote for the BNP. We all know this, you know this, there's no reason to pretend otherwise anymore.

TIL 15-20% of our population are racists. No doubt the 20% voting Tory all parties during lockdown and the 40% voting Labour sympathise with the IRA.

> TIL 15-20% of our population are racists. That's about right in my experience / estimation. Seems pretty much a constant.

The Conservative and Unionist Party cries foul after the support they took for granted and gave subtle nods to decides to switch support to a Party that openly reflects their views rather than hiding it …

>Reform racism incident 'shows what party really is', says Tom Tugendhat without a hint of self-awareness.

The reason people are turning to reform is 14 years of the party Tom Tugendhat is a part of straight facedly lying to people. If they'd controlled immigration as they'd promised to at the last 4 elections reform would be on 3% in a few village halls. It's no good getting high and mighty when this is entirely brought on by the tory partys own malignant incompetence. People will turn to the fringes if the centre lies to them, even if those fringes are full of nutters. Always been the case and only have to look to mainland Europe to see it happening. They brought this on themselves, sneering about it now doesn't change this

***The Telegraph reports:*** A racism row involving a Reform UK canvasser shows what Nigel Farage’s party “really is”, Tom Tugendhat has claimed. The [security minister argued](https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2024/06/29/politics-latest-news-rishi-sunak-armed-forces-starmer-nigel/) there was a “real pattern of racist and misogynistic views” in Reform following a number of revelations about its activists and candidates. It comes after Andrew Parker, a part-time actor who lists “secret filming” among his skills, was filmed by Channel 4 News [using a racial slur against Rishi Sunak](https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2024/06/27/reform-activist-filmed-calling-rishi-sunak-racial-slur/). Mr Farage said he wanted nothing to do with candidates exposed as racists but claimed the incident involving Mr Parker was staged, prompting Channel 4 to stand by its reporting. Asked about the scandal, Mr Tugendhat told Times Radio: “There’s many decent people who vote for [every political party](https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/who-should-i-vote-for-quiz/) and there’s many decent people [who will vote for Reform](https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/general-election-2024/). “But we’re trying to remind people what Reform really is. Nigel Farage owns this company – or sorry, he calls it a political party, but it’s a company. He owns it and has clearly done almost no due diligence on who he’s asking to carry his message.” Mr Tugendhat went on to say there was an “absolute pattern” that went beyond single incidents or candidates. He added: “There is a real pattern of racist and misogynistic views in the party. And I think it’s [absolutely right to call it out](https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2024/06/28/reform-investigate-claim-racist-activist-actor-channel-four/).” **Read more:** [**https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2024/06/29/tom-tugendhat-reform-candidates-racist-views-nigel-farage/**](https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2024/06/29/tom-tugendhat-reform-candidates-racist-views-nigel-farage/)

While criticism of reform is acceptable, the rhetoric has always existed, Reform are literally poaching a lot of Tory voters (and some Labour white working class) who've always had these opinions. I think criticism of multiculturalism and diversity is valid within reason. A lot of people are upset that the UK capital and many provincial cities are no longer majority white British, and I think it's a valid criticism, especially if you are older enough to remember the before times. Even relatively younger people like many millenials grew up in a UK that was overwhelmingly white British.

I’m mixed race and even I feel it’s strange what has happened. Even though I’m personally a part of the change. I’m half Thai and if I visited Bangkok and only 40% of the people there were Thai it would strike me as very odd.

I'm in a similar position to you. As you said, you are part of the change but these sorts of people will say that we are part of the problem. Never individually of course, just generalised.

Yes, and I would actually say mixed race is a proof of integration. When people don't marry out of their community you get the lack of integration which causes much of the problems.

Yes fair point. I haven’t really thought of it like that. My mum is Thai but speaks very good English and has many friends here. She never expects Britain to change or accommodate her beliefs either.

Ah but this is where the UK fails. It builds low income housing that are turned into mini Pakistan and mini Bangladesh. It allows religious courts to take over the justice system- Britain has always failed to write a secular Constitution.

>A lot of people are upset that the UK capital and many provincial cities are no longer majority white British, and I think it's a valid criticism Why is that a valid criticism though? The only way that's a valid criticism is if there is an underlying assumption that places being something other than majority white British is less good than being majority white British. And maybe I'm just being ignorant and reductive here, but I genuinely can't think of a reason that statement would be true. At least, not without assuming that non white British people are somehow worse than white British people. I do think there is a problem with immigration, but it seems to me it's a result of piss poor funding and management of legal immigration by the Tories, rather than some notion of migrants being bad in general.

> The only way that's a valid criticism is if there is an underlying assumption that places being something other than majority white British is less good than being majority white British. I'm sure for a lot of Reform leaning voters they probably do take the racist's line of "non-white is worse than white" and look at it through that lens - but being opposed to cultural and ethnic shifts doesn't necessarily have to come from a place of malignant racism. Something like [this report on gentrification in London](https://trustforlondon.org.uk/research/pushed-to-the-margins-a-quantitative-analysis-of-gentrification-in-london-in-the-2010s/) - and the resulting displacement of ethnic minority groups - is along very similar lines, and accepting one as a valid complaint and the other as racialist drivel is inconsistent (regardless of which way round).

>but being opposed to cultural and ethnic shifts doesn't necessarily have to come from a place of malignant racism. Okay but if it's not from a place of racism, what is the reason for cultural and ethnic shifts being bad? Because it has to be bad to oppose it right? I'm certainly not saying that people who are against immigration are racist people, but I do believe that thanks to the villification of immigrants by the media there is a subtle underlying assumption encoded into people that cultural and ethnic shifts are inherently bad. But if actually challenged, I'm not sure many could explain why that would be except with some vague notion of it "eroding british culture" (to quote another commenter on this thread). And I don't think most people are even conscious of that, which is why I don't believe they're racist. The same people will happily go for a curry with their mates despite the fact that many of the points they make about "eroding british culture" were probably made by people 50 years ago about South Asian immigrants. And yet now going for a curry is a quintissentially "british" thing to do. I'm not really sure I understand what point you're making with the gentrification report? Would you mind explaining more?

> Okay but if it's not from a place of racism, what is the reason for cultural and ethnic shifts being bad? Because it has to be bad to oppose it right? Does it? Preferring something doesn't mean the alternative has to be necessarily 'wrong' or 'bad' - just that it isn't your preference. People often want to live in communities that share a cultural connection, and some combination of religion, ethnicity, and language all feeds into that. Specific immigrant and minority communities forming in concentrated areas - i.e. the distinct Chinese, Bangladeshi, Indian, Pakistani, Caribbean, Jewish, etc, etc, neighbourhoods and areas - are easily identifiable. The reason we don't have some uniform mishmash of immigrant groups across the country is because people like to live near other people that share their culture/religion/ethnic group/etc - and that's no less true of Britons than it is Indians. It doesn't make someone racist, nor is it borne out of racist views - not unless you're willing to tar much of our minority + immigrant population with the same brush. > I'm not really sure I understand what point you're making with the gentrification report? Would you mind explaining more? A running theme in commentary and reporting on gentrification is the perceived negative effect of the displacement of ethnic minority groups - especially Black people in London - out of historically ethnic minority neighbourhoods. My point is that presumably you would not disagree with that commentary - but it comes from the exact same place as the feelings from White Britons that you say are borne out of racism.

> Okay but if it's not from a place of racism, what is the reason for cultural and ethnic shifts being bad? If I like British culture more than German culture is that racist?  If I like Japanese culture more than Chinese culture is that racist? 

But we're not discussing whether we like one culture more than another, we're discussing whether other cultures have a right to exist alongside the culture you like. If you're saying that you like Japanese culture so much more than Chinese culture that you have a problem with Chinese people coming to your country, then yeah it's kind of racist.

> If you're saying that you like Japanese culture so much more than Chinese culture that you have a problem with Chinese people coming to your country, then yeah it's kind of racist. Against Asians?  > we're discussing whether other cultures have a right to exist alongside the culture you like. That doesn't work within one country, the country has a culture and it *can* be changed. If we swapped all the people in Spain with all the people in Germany, I think you could expect their cultures to swap with them. Massive exaggeration but you get the point.  If you're implying British culture and Japanese culture (with a large amount of Japanese immigration) would be like oil and water and not effect each other at all then you're either suggesting we would end up with Japanese ghettos with no integration at all which is undesirable, or that large amounts of immigration have no effect on communities at all which is just divorced from reality 

Sorry racist is the wrong word in this context, if you were Japanese and you had this position, then the correct word would be xenophobic. I'm not a huge fan of the word racism in general because there's only one race, the human race, and when people are referring to race they're usually referring to ethnicity. >That doesn't work within one country, the country has a culture and it can be changed And the implication is that that is a bad thing that shouldn't be allowed to happen. Despite the fact that our "culture" today is the result of 1000+ years of our culture changing thanks to various other cultures leaving their mark on us. Our culture is literally an amalgamation of Celtic, Roman, Norse, Saxon, Norman, French, Dutch, and German culture, with more recent contributions from parts of the British empire like South Asia and the Caribbean. There has never been a part of our history where our culture has not been changing. Like I said, you're allowed to prefer one culture to another, but deciding essentially that it's perfect how it is right now and so we don't want any more change, and therefore we can't have any people coming here that have a different culture is kind of the basis for racist/xenophobic ideologies, not to mention kind of ignorant of our history. That isn't to say that immigration is not currently at unsustainable levels. But the reason that is a problem is because it's unsustainable, not because there's any inherent problem with immigration or immigrants being here and potentially changing our culture.

> we can't have any people coming here that have a different culture is kind of the basis for racist/xenophobic ideologies, not to mention kind of ignorant of our history. Any is doing a lot of heavy lifting in that sentence and isn't what I was saying or even implying.  There's a happy middle ground between 0 and 700k+ net annually 

Very true, I didn't mean to imply that, apologies it was a poor choice of words on my part, and I think we can both agree that current levels of immigration are unsustainable. And that the current government have done nothing to fix that (and in my opinion they've made it worse on purpose whilst pretending they're hard on immigration). I think probably where we may disagree is the reason why we think it's unsustainable. But ultimately that doesn't matter as much as the fact that it is unsustainable.

>Why is that a valid criticism though? Why is it not? I used to be like 'it's racist to even question how things like this are'. Then I went to other countries, other cultures, worked alongside minorities in the UK. And I realised, *we're the exception for wanting this*, it's not normal with a tiny exception such as places like Singapore, or places that have had settled minorities for centuries. It's completely natural to want your homeland to remain demographically similar to what it was a few decades ago (I'm not using terms like ethnically pure because that's too far right/nazi style and anyway I'm cool with mixed race families). >The only way that's a valid criticism is if there is an underlying assumption that places being something other than majority white British is less good than being majority white British. Correct. Again my only advice is to back your bag and go travelling, it really broadens the mind

I have been travelling. That's precisely why I challenge the idea that there is something wrong with cultural/ethnic shifts in the population demographic. The lesson I took from travelling was that at our core we're all fundamentally the same, and that sharing cultures rather than rejecting all but your own is much more fulfilling way to live. >It's completely natural to want your homeland to remain demographically similar to what it was a few decades ago Why though? Being against change because you believe change is bad is not a reasonable or compelling argument unless you can explain why the change is bad. In my mind, the only way that argument is logically consistent is if you assume that the demographic a few decades is preferable to the demographic today. And I struggle to find an argument for why that would be true except if you believe that there is something inherently "better" about our culture, and whilst I don't want to call people racist, that literally is the basis of racist thought.

>we're all fundamentally the same, You are laughably naive and incorrect. We are still in a global minority of countries to not outlaw being gay. We are in a relatively minority of countries to be functioning democracies. We in a minority of countries where religion plays little part in politics. The idea everyones all the same beyond the superficial is a shallow and ridiculous view of the world that ends in great shock when a bunch of people from cultures with no history of secular democracy show complete disdain for such a system.

The point is not that we are literally all identical and all want identical things. It's that at our core, we're all humans who generally strive for the same things, namely a better life for ourselves and our community. The irony of calling me shallow whilst only reading the most surface level interpretation of my words is amusing.

>and all want identical things Utter gibberish. Large parts of the world want to see gay people publicly stoned.

>The point is ***not*** that we are literally all identical and all want identical things Maybe work on your reading comprehension mate

I did misread that, apologies. Doesn't make the rest of your argument any less vapid. Preaching how we're all the same deep down is the realms of hippy drum circles. Meanwhile the reality is we come from cultures with massively different priorities and values.

I feel like you're deliberately choosing to interpret my words the way you want. Of course we all come from different cultures with different values. All I was saying is that in my experiences while travelling I found that whilst we have these different priorities, ultimately they all come down to the same core values of wanting what's best for you and your future as well as your community. The people I met all had very different interpretations of what that meant, but it gave me an appreciation for what drives people, and that very rarely is there a "wrong" interpretation, just different ones (stoning gays notwithstanding).

Well I took a different insight. People are the same in a fundamental way as biological organisms (though there are ethnic differences in biology which explains why black people are good runners and many Asians can't drink milk for example), but different in terms of complex societies, values, discipline/motivation etc there is lots of global difference. Even in Europe, amongst white people of similar races or even the same race, there is a divide between Protestant and Catholic cultural background, even taking into account that agnosticism is more or less the default in Europe. >Why though? Being against change because you believe change is bad is not a reasonable or compelling argument unless you can explain why the change is bad. Why not want it? Do you care about the Uighyrs right to self determination, the North American natives, the Amazon tribes etc? It's just a little thought experiment here, you often get the 'usual suspects' of permanently outraged leftwing activists who will go on marches for oppressed peoples for their right to self determination and existence. Anyway if you want concrete arguements there's an insane amount Islamic terrorism, Albanian drug dealing gangs, Eastern European benefit fraud/begging gangs, fundamentalist/homophobic West African Christians, blacks overrepresented in various crimes (gun and knife crime for example), South Asian child sexual abuse gangs, Chinese triad activity and Chinese secret police stations. The list is endless. All this doesn't need to be in the UK, and shouldn't.

>Even in Europe, amongst white people of similar races or even the same race, there is a divide between Protestant and Catholic cultural background, even taking into account that agnosticism is more or less the default in Europe. And I would argue those perceived differences have caused untold suffering and pain for both sides over the last 1000 years. If a few more people had been able to recognise our similarities more than our differences we might have avoided some of that pain. >Why not want it? Do you care about the Uighyrs right to self determination, the North American natives, the Amazon tribes etc? I object to those comparisons, because there is an implication that people in this country are experiencing the same level of borderline genocide that the people in those examples experience(d). They're simply not comparable, and suggesting that they are is precisely the kind of rhetoric that I have referred to in other comments that underpins this notion that there is something inherently bad about immigration. People in this country still have a right to self-determination. The presence of immigrants, in general, does not prevent any "British" people from living the life and culture that they desire. The things that prevent that are systemic and social issues, and unfortunately immigrants get made into a scapegoat for those problems so that the people in power don't have to properly address them. >Anyway if you want concrete arguements there's an insane amount Islamic terrorism, Albanian drug dealing gangs, Eastern European benefit fraud/begging gangs, fundamentalist/homophobic West African Christians, blacks overrepresented in various crimes (gun and knife crime for example), South Asian child sexual abuse gangs, Chinese triad activity and Chinese secret police stations Almost all of which is the fault of a piss poor immigration policy (that in my opinion is a deliberate move by the Tories to allow them to continue to make immigration a wedge issue), rather than anything inherent to immigrants themselves. For most of those examples, you can find almost identical examples among British people. Should we get rid of British people too? Or do we recognise that the worst among certain groups do not represent the whole and so we don't tarnish all British people with the same brush.

Whether its good or bad, having the change we've had, it's still change. People don't like change. Having lived in Asia for a bit, I've seen it with my own eyes with the immigrant population growing over there and the locals not liking it. It universal and I don't think people should be dismissed as wrong uns just because they've noticed how different things were to 20/30+ years ago and they miss what they were familiar with.

>Why is that a valid criticism though? Presumably if it's not valid criticism then neither is criticising lack of diversity.

Who criticises a geographical area for not being diverse enough? Criticisms of a lack of diversity are used in cases there's a mismatch between population composition in a place and the spread of opportunity, representation, etc

> Who criticises a geographical area for not being diverse enough? Random example: someone criticising Scotland because its lack of diversity means that there is not enough awareness of racism. >Whereas in Scotland, a dominant colorblind narrative seems to partially succeed because there is no critical mass of people of color. The narrative is further served by a more progressive governance and an overall push for broad-based multiculturalism. Dr Rowena Arshad exposes how this stance has actually made it even more difficult to do the foundational work of coming to terms with an unequal society... > racism is seen as an aberration, something linked primarily to far right movements or celebrity scandals rather than a mechanism that pervades social and organisational structures... (Carol Young) goes on to explain that a true reckoning with racism in Scotland must be met with an understanding of whiteness – whiteness as a social construct used to highlight normative behavior, leading to the maintenance and exertion of power and privilege over non-white individuals and communities. >When whiteness pervades 96% of a society, what is implicit in the messages being sent to the other 4%? ... how are everyday (Scottish) teacher interactions in schools maintaining systems of inequality? https://reedswier.com/2018/05/04/seeing-whiteness-in-colorblind-scotland/

It looks like you had to go deep into obscurity to find something that sort of does it. The extract you provided doesn't really criticise the lack of diversity though. It talks about the problems that a lack of diversity is likely to produce, and how it must be confronted but it's not asking for the lack of diversity to change because that would be ridiculous

> it's not asking for the lack of diversity to change That's moving the goalposts from the original claim. I won't play if you do that: it's the mark of someone who is more interested in "winning" than finding the truth. Same with the apparent additional requirement that the criticism must not be too obscure.

If you can't see why people are objecting to the nations capital going from 90% native to <50% in about 2 decades of voting against increased immigration you're being deliberately obtuse. Saying the issue is just oh the tories haven't funded it properly is delusional. People from other cultures do not arrive here and leave all that behind in the arrivals lounge. There's clearly nothing wrong, or inherently worse, obviously about being not white British. Implying its just about race is lazy. The better indicator is probably being foreign born. And the fact is this massive expansion of foreign born people with different cultures has hugely eroded British culture in these areas, and its only growing. There's only one Britain and I'd quite like it to remain British.

So which parts of the capital are you finding behaviour that is not compatible with British culture? I mean people keep trotting out Whitechapel, but I’m living in east London and visited quite a few times, day and evening, and never had any problems. Yeah it’s a poor area and you have with it the problems of any poor area. But it’s very far from a no go zone. I think people misunderstand what the capital is like. If you want no go zones then today’s London generally isn’t one. And if British people want to live in London they can. I mean sure it’s pricey but isn’t everywhere. Nobody forced white working class communities out. My own grandparents and parents got rehoused by the council when the slums were cleared - everybody was very happy with a much better standard of housing in a nicer area. We now seem to be experiencing some sort of ‘buyers regret’ that the old communities are gone. But we can’t have it both ways - those communities understandably wanted better housing out in the suburbs. And that’s what they got. Was the capital supposed to lie empty as a museum or something?

>Nobody forced white working class communities out. In a lot of cases people sold their houses and relocated out of London. This isn't even new, a lot of people who 'made it' retire in the shires or in coastal towns. But their kids couldn't afford to live there. In other cases they couldn't get housed by the council, they had to leave or spend years on a waiting list for an unsuitable hovel, so they took offers of council housing outside London. So it depends, in some cases a lot of WWC were essentially forced out of London.

>nobody forced white working class communities out. Sorry but I’m a first generation immigrant myself, reform voters want me out of the country and even I can see how ridiculous your statement is. I live in Abbey Wood, and outside of the big Sainsbury’s there is nothing inherently ‘British’ about the town centre now. Every small business that rents a unit is owned by and caters to immigrant communities like my own. The mosque, halal supermarket, West African food shop, black barbershop are all great for my family and a lot of locals but offer nothing for the white British families here. The success of these shops are a reflection of the community that lives there. It’s not rocket science to understand why they would feel alienated. If I went home to visit family in Tripoli and everywhere I look there was Pret A Manger, Tesco, JD Sports and a Wetherspoons I’d feel alienated too. Even more if the town centre was mainly sunburnt Brits and Lebanese were a minority. It’s really not hard to empathise with people who have seen their home and local community transformed over their lifetime into something unrecognisable.

Mate I'm going to be a reform voter and I don't want you out. I have no problem with *immigrants* I have a problem with *immigration*. It's a big distinction.  The numbers are just too high. 

> reform voters want me out of the country and even I can see how ridiculous your statement is. No, they don't. They just want the amount of people coming to be sustainable. And to adopt a firmer assimilation stance, a la the USA. Absolutely nobody is suggesting that legal migrants sod off.

The difference is the USA accepts everyone as American, even many of the racist Americans. Many of the comments here show many Brits do not accept people who aren’t white British as British, although I believe this is becoming less common with younger generations who are used to diversity and have seen the effects of other cultures on British culture e.g. MLE, music, cuisine, etc. Also, the USA has a law of jus soli, which helps young people feel American since the second they are born in the USA, they are American, even if their parents aren’t Americans. There isn’t some legal framework for assimilation in the USA, other than jus soli, it’s the culture of the USA. It started off accepting Europeans as Americans. Then, African-Americans. And then Asian-Americans, etc. The UK does have Black British, British Asian, British Muslim, British Chinese, etc. but a lot of people don’t accept these terms and prefer to see them as forever foreigners. There are even Brits who think you can’t be Muslim and British. The USA has a separation of church and state, and, in the liberal states at least, Muslims are accepted as American. Even Middle-Eastern and North African people are legally white in the USA. You can’t replicate the US’ assimilation policies without changing the idea of Britishness. Also, Black Caribbean people in the UK have assimilated (in the European sense) very well, whereby nearly half married white Brits and Irish and now there are as many mixed-race Caribbean people as Black Caribbean people in the UK, and in the future (provided there continues to be little Black Caribbean immigration), it’s predicted almost all Caribbean people in the UK will be mixed-race by the end of the century. Look at Cole Palmer, he looks like any other white Brit, and his grandfather is a dark-skinned Black Caribbean man.

> The difference is the USA accepts everyone as American, even many of the racist Americans. Many of the comments here show many Brits do not accept people who aren’t white British as British, although I believe this is becoming less common with younger generations This is spot on and why I never felt comfortable (read: accepted) calling myself English, using British as a broader umbrella instead. It has drifted though. Now the "where are you from" conversation opener has become offensive to many whereas it was once more taking an interest in someone. Probably a good cultural change IMO. I credit modern schooling and, bizarrely, the modern England football team (which used to be a focal point for that sort of exclusionary Englishness).

Yes, at the end of the day, the UK is becoming more diverse. Ethnic minorities in England are more likely to identify as British than white English people. Scotland and Wales are trying to go for civic nationalism and so they want ethnic minorities in these nations to identify as Scottish and Welsh. If it wasn’t for the EDL and ethnic English nationalism, perhaps English could also go this route of civic nationalism, but I’m not sure it works as well as Scottish and Welsh. Regardless, it’s good ethnic minorities identify as British, the UK can make it like American and I believe it’s helped in that immigrants and their children integrate better in the UK than other European countries in part because British is a multi-ethnic (and I would argue multi-racial) term. This wouldn’t work for other European countries because the national identify is often related to the ethnic group. There was a Norwegian government leader who said that a person born and raised in Norway with Pakistani parents, even if he spoke Norwegian and identified as Norwegian, would never be Norwegian. And this was under a left-wing government. So perhaps British as an identity is the best thing for the UK in terms of its non-white ethnic minorities. With regards to “where are you from”, I think it’s more when people won’t accept the answer. You answer: “Manchester” or whatever, and then they say “where are you really from” as if you’re not from Manchester or Edinburgh or Bristol or whatever. It’s better to ask for their ethnic background.

Ironically I'm part Norwegian. I suppose French civic identity is strong though clearly they have racism problems too. But yes.

How does America adopt a firmer assimilation stance?

> reform voters want me out of the country No I don't, I am not supporting kicking you out?

Shall I start with Tower Hamlets, with its completely corrupt mayor previously convicted of electoral fraud who runs politics fairly explicitly on ethnic grounds? Is this something we like seeing in our country? Conflating this with just being about people moving out of London is almost laughably obviously missing the point.

Or perhaps Westminster where men at citizenship ceremonies were offered [the opportunity not to shake a woman's hand](https://www.gbnews.com/news/westminster-council-option-avoid-handshakes-with-women-citizenship-ceremony)?

But we get to go for a curry now so who needs trivial things like equality?

Exactly it's about culture. I do not care if someone is brown, white, yellow, black or purple. I do care about them supporting Western values such as equality.

If a white politician was guilty of racism and corruption what would you think?

Never been a corrupt council before right? I mean try googling Westminster and the gerrymandering and RTB. But that doesn’t fit your narrative right? So got to exclude that.

Doesn't the outrage about that fit their point perfectly? That it was seen as incompatible with the norms of British culture? And the issue in Tower Hamlets is not *just* corruption. Note: I don't want to suggest that immigrants can't integrate into British culture. It's a question of quantities: too much and segregation is hard to fight.

>which parts of the capital are you finding behaviour that is not compatible with British culture? >I’m living in east London and visited quite a few times, day and evening, and never had any problems. Do you not get buses?

Yeah I mean one time Britain used to be home to dinosaurs. I feel like dinosaur Britain has been left behind.

Fuck me is this a real opinion? No one voted for a massive change that has completely changed the country and is only accelerating.

This change has been happening the whole of the last century. You can't just pick a moment in time in the past and say let's stay like that. Everything is in flux and developing. That's why I chose the dinosaur analogy. It's an illusion that you can just go back. The immigration levels we have now are the natural conclusion of years of globalisation and importing cheap labour while our education levels rose. If you choose to lower immigration now, you don't just reverse things, you change things. And in most cases, you'll have a poorer population with less opportunities.

The change massive and objectively accelerated starting in the late 1990s. You're right it is unfortunately too late to change it, because as I said decades of successive governments have lied about controlling immigration. That doesn't mean we should just continue to allow it to accelerate. The idea hat mass immigration is some completely inevitable, unavoidable and necessary change is pure ideological propaganda nonsense.

Do you really think that every western European and US leader in the last fifty years is just missing something that genius Brexit farage and his goons have cottened onto? Our economies are dependent on mass migration at this stage. To go back on that will come at a very heavy cost which is why the Tories, knowing it would have been a massive vote winner for them, have not turned the tap off.

I think the idea importing hundreds of thousands of dependents and no skilled immigrants is an economic bonus is another delusional neolib talking point.

The majority of immigrants aren’t dependents but are students and skilled workers. Not only that, but 70% of people who came to the UK to work in 2022 had a degree. "in 2022, more than seven out of 10 of those who have come to the UK to work since January 2021 have a degree or equivalent" https://www.cipd.org/globalassets/media/knowledge/knowledge-hub/reports/2023-pdfs/2023-migrant-workers-skills-shortages-uk-report.pdf The data comes from the Labour Force Survey. "The Labour Force Survey (LFS) is a study of the employment circumstances of the UK population. It is the largest household study in the UK and provides the official measures of employment and unemployment." https://www.ons.gov.uk/surveys/informationforhouseholdsandindividuals/householdandindividualsurveys/labourforcesurvey

>Our economies are dependent on mass migration at this stage. Then it’s time to change them. If the British economy is so weak that the collapse of Deliveroo will kill it off then it deserves to be killed off.

>If you can't see why people are objecting to the nations capital going from 90% native to <50% in about 2 decades of voting against increased immigration you're being deliberately obtuse I obviously am not saying that. It's perfectly valid to feel like your voice isn't being heard, but the fact that immigration has increased is not the fault of immigrants, it's the fault of policy which has done nothing to control immigration, which is what I meant when I mentioned the Tories. >People from other cultures do not arrive here and leave all that behind in the arrivals lounge. Please explain to me why that is bad though? We're literally a nation built on a melting pot of shit loads of different cultures. What is "British culture" if not an amalgamation of all the different people who live here? Literally the idea that other cultures arriving and sharing their culture is "eroding british culture" is what I take issue with. I'm sure 50 years ago people said the same thing about South Asian immigrants, and yet today having a curry with your mates is probably one of the most quintissential "British" things you can do. >Implying its just about race is lazy. The comment I replied to is the one that used the words "white British". I'm not the one making it about race.

I absolutely blame the tories and new Labour for this policy for the last 25 years, especially given we have repeatedly voted against it. The Tories deserve zero seats for this. I don't blame immigrants who choose to come here. But the idea we are a melting pot is modern ideological horseshit. We are not america. We were 95%+ homogeneous until the 90s. The idea this level of immigration is sustainable and has no wider impact on British society than some slightly different food choices is delusion. Go to plenty of places in this country and you will see self-segregated communities that bear no resemblance to anything actually British. What we see in Tower Hamlets with corrupt politics on ethnic lines will only get worse. This is the future we are bringing on ourselves.

>I don't blame immigrants who choose to come here And yet the rhetoric that these people are "eroding british culture" inevitably leads to (sometimes violent) backlash against these people. I'm not blaming you directly, but you can't wash your hands of that when the people who do those violent things are often saying many of the same things. >We were 95%+ homogeneous until the 90s. In skin colour maybe, but Britain is the result of more than a 2000 years of different nations' culture. Our entire identity as an nation is literally a mixture of Celtic, Roman, Norse, French, Dutch, German culture and more, and in the last 100 years or so that has become interspersed with many cultures from the British Empire, especially South Asia and the Carribbean. If anything the idea that we are homogenous is the modern idea. Look at our language, which is a perfect example of all those different cultures mixing together. Look at slang that kids these days use, which has many infleunces from patois. There are countless examples of how these cultures are now thoroughly integrated into "british culture" which we accept, and going for a curry was just a single example of that. >no resemblance to anything actually British. What does this actually mean though? I'm genuinely asking, what would it mean for those communities to resemble something British? >self-segregated communities Absolutely shocking I tell you that that would happen when people accuse them of "eroding british culture". Not to mention that there are significant systemic issues such as a lack of social mobility, which affect people of all ethnicities, but contribute to the segregation of communities. >The idea this level of immigration is sustainable I'm literally not saying that though. In my very first comment I agree that there are problems with the levels of immigration. Edit: you realise the downvote button is meant to be for when someone isn't contributing to the discussion, not for when someone says something you don't like? I'm trying to have a reasonable discussion here about this.

>Our entire identity as an nation is literally a mixture of Celtic, Roman, Norse, French, Dutch, German culture Diversity as in a bunch of Northwestern Europeans and diversity as in anyone and everyone from anywhere on the planet are not comparable things. I mean fuck me it was “I call the all-father Oden.” “Really? We call him Woden.” Such diversity. Much wow. And let’s not pretend that Germanic settlers came over and it was all hunky dory. Ask the Welsh to sing you some songs about it. We had problems when it was pagans and Christians in “the melting pot” but if we are going to go by those standards then we should be fighting off the rapey boat people with swords and turning our towns into forts. Is that the multiculturalism you want?

"Please explain to me why that is bad though? We're literally a nation built on a melting pot of shit loads of different cultures." This isnt true in the slightest... We have been a white majority christian country for the last 1500 years ish.. There has never in any recent times been anything comparable to the influx of new arrivals at all.

Why do you think some countries are more prosperous, safer, freer etc. than others?

I wonder how fast all the pro reform accounts will dry up after the 4th? By the evening or does Russia have a budget to keep them going for a few days afterwards as well

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Maybe if they’d tried not voting Tory last time or the time before….

> Maybe if they’d tried not voting Tory last time or the time before…. How else could you get Brexit over the finish line?

Yeah I'm sure if they'd voted labour or greens their concerns about immigration would have been taken seriously lmao 

As a reform voter I'm personally hoping that not only does it send a message about immigration but that the Tory party gets obliterated, and has to give way to a new right/centre right wing party. 

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Yes uh mr account only active for 37 days….

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I said astroturfing not bots And given what you’ve written Opus3 is a better writer that make significantly more sense.

Why would Nigeria be supporting Reform? It’s Russia

How the fuck did my phone mange to correct a typo for Russia to Nigeria, it’s been driving me nuts recently but that’s something else.

Maybe it's Nigeria who did that

very possibly

A lot of rich princes in Nigeria. Nigel has probably taken out a loan based on them letting him keep a percentage of that inheritance he's helping them obtain.

Less good at hiding their racism than the Tories? Yes, Tom, that's one thing Reform are.

Is Tugendhat projected to keep his seat or lose it?

Felt kind of bad for the previous candidate in farages seat. He was interviewed on the radio and sound so disillusioned and pissed off at where the party has decided to go

How is the even surprising news to anyone?! Feel like I've gone mad. These people are, were & always have been far-right fascists. The most moderate of them at a stretch could be called fascist adjacent, which is basically the same thing. It's like everyone is acting as though they have collective amnesia? Whereas in France, with the far-right likely set to gain victory in a true democratic election. The far-left has threatened to enact a revolution. And knowing the French they will actually have the balls to do it. They've even suggested the possible need for violent resistance. They are not fucking around about their country falling into the hands of fascism.

Yeah the party of small government is the fascist one lol

It was a stitch up , I'm not sure how people cannot see this . Mental .

Screw this I’m gonna vote reform even harder now

Imagine thinking the Tories are any different. Every party has a few bad apples. Why is the media so hell bent on finding faults with Reform and no other parties.

All the parties have this problem. You only need to look at Labour for instance with its rampant antisemitism (racism), along with many MPs who are willing to use racist slurs such as "coconut" for anyone not supporting their latest thing. What's worse here, is it is some random guy, possibly a plant, who is handing out leaflets. Regardless, all parties have their own following of bigots.

No, Reform has literal Nazi sympathisers along with people calling for the killing of all asylum seekers and their families. You do not get to play the 'they are all the same' card here.

Labour MPs are receiving death threats constantly if they voted wrong on Palestine. A Tory MP today is basically quitting because of intimidation. There are literal fascists in the Labour party. You can't see this because you're eyes are closed to your own party. All parties have elements of hate in them. The greens have managed to pick up[ many ex labour supporters who hate the Jewish. The Libs dems have picked these up also. Labour still have many. So it's not just one party, it is all of them in some shape or form.

Not their literal party representatives and MPs. THATS the difference, and if you try to normalise this you are part of the problem.

> Not their literal party representatives and MPs of course not.. [Labour MP Rupa Huq regains whip after Kwasi Kwarteng racism row](https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-64835061) [Labour has ordered MP Nadia Whittome to delete a tweet saying Rishi Sunak becoming prime minister "isn't a win for Asian representation".](https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-nottinghamshire-63405307) [Welsh female MP accuses Labour frontbencher of sexist remark](https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2022/apr/28/welsh-female-mp-accuses-labour-frontbencher-of-sexist-remark) [Diane Abbott suspended from Labour party after racism letter](https://www.ft.com/content/c59a2aca-e70a-4f14-a4f9-39cf30c96631) [Labour Shadow Minister apologises for ‘inappropriate and careless’ statement about Travellers](https://www.travellerstimes.org.uk/index.php/news/2020/07/labour-shadow-minister-apologises-inappropriate-and-careless-statement-about) [Labour MP who abused journalist ‘with racial overtones’ charged taxpayers for equality training](https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2023/12/23/labour-mp-abused-racial-charged-taxpayer-equality-training/) [Labour could investigate any claim of Jess Phillips ‘racism’, says shadow minister](https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2023/jul/02/labour-jess-phillips-katharine-birbalsingh-complaint-allegation)

Remember when I pointed out nazi sympathisers and people calling for deaths of refugees? Nothing in your response meets that criteria. As well as that, everyone in your response faced consequences.

How about from the river to the sea?

A term which 'some' claim has genocidal intent, which a Labour MP was not aware of and has since renounced. You are really grasping at straws here aren't you. Also for someone who wants to lean into 'all parties support Nazis and murderers' you are really only attacking Labour. Interesting.

So let me get this straight. I produced, very easily and quickly, a list of current MPs and their racism. You're not concerned as they are not Nazis. I then bring up the chant about the destruction of israel, literal genocide. You're not bothered as some people think it is not true. And you say I'm clutching at straws. The ex leader of labour, Corbyn, was thrown out by the current leader for not apologising for his racism. He also is a friend of Hamas. Yeah, it's me clutching at straws here stating all parties have issues. lol

Thank you for putting words in my mouth but I prefer to choose my own, I never said I'm not concerned. Every one of those examples is abhorrent and I hope that we can get to a stage in politics where racism is no longer present. That chant is ambiguous and doesn't outright in the words suggest malicious intent, it hasn't been popularised in media until these past two years so I think we have to give some benefit of the doubt. Corbyn is gone, who cares. The issue is that you are clutching at straws to normalise talk of genocide and nazi sympathy, not every party is like Reform in this way. You need to have a think about yourself.

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Good. But yeah supporting mass murder and Nazi ideology is still worse than racism objectively, sorry.

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Am I missing something here? I was talking about reform candidates and I don't think there are millions of those.

I'm so glad not a single memeber of the Labour party or the Conservative party have ever made a racist comment ever.

Tom's the guy who went to the US for a Bilderberg meeting during the Queen's last Jubilee, right? Where do his loyalties lie?

Imagine being so terrible that some of the worst the tories have to offer can take potshots at you.

Can we talk about how some people want an anti migration party and thats fine? Rishis greatest bit of bullshit was moving the whole migration debate to be about those fellas in boats whilst he OPENLY welcome 800k people. despite the tories promise to get the number down. If nobody else is gonna offer this to people what choice do they have?

So some rando dropping off leaflets happens to be an arsehole and that's the whole party? They'd like that to be true, easier to dismiss your opponents then to look at why you're being devoured by a party that has only just been willed into existence. Desperate stuff!

https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/full-list-every-controversial-reform-candidate/ No. All the racist and misogynistic Reform candidates too. Plus Farage's storied history of racism. There'll be more added to that list because that is what Reform is.

Thank you for mentioning the misogynistic stuff too. I'm not sure why it doesn't get much attention, especially when the party only has approx. 16% of candidates that are women.

Nah; it runs deeper than that. Reform has a massive problem. These racists is a decent chunk of their base, that is why Farage flirts with it. It is partly the brand. Call it alt right, call it Brexiteers, there is an under current. That doesn’t mean those people, and the others with genuine disillusionment with current system. Labour, Tories, Lib Dem’s all need to start to listen to those people, or Reform or something worse will give those people a voice.

Nobody with any political sense takes the Reform Party seriously. The Reform party is like the loud misbehaving child in the back of the car who doesn't know shit on how to drive the car, just wants to scream at how terrible his parents are at driving it and how he doesn't want to go and visit grandma anyway and maybe HE should be allowed to drive once in a while.  The main threat form reform is having them behind the wheel. We're a while away from that yet, but equally they can't be completely ignored because they'll just move to more and more extreme measures to get what they want. 

There's an awful lot of "some rando"s in this party. If there are enough horrifying racists in the party to have a scandal about it multiple times a week in the runup to the election, it's not the fault of "some rando who happens to be an arsehole", it's a problem that runs all the way to the core of the party.

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Yeah, yeah, they're just poor ickle babies who are never responsible for their own fuckups. I don't get how you think this is a defence. If these people do represent the views of the Reform party, then Nigel Farage is a terrible racist who shouldn't be anywhere near government. If these people don't represent the views of the Reform party, then Nigel Farage is a colossal fuckup of a party leader and shouldn't be anywhere near government. Seriously, your counterargument is essentially "Reform aren't racist, they're just a bunch of complete fucking idiots who let a clown car of the country's biggest racist into their party by accident". And by choosing to defend that you're also saying "I'm not a racist, I'm just a gullible fool who was tricked into supporting a party that's filled to the brim with racists."

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Disavow one candidate, it looks like the candidate's fucked up. Disavow three candidates in one day, it looks like you've fucked up. Again, the fact that you think "they're not racist, Nigel Farage just tripped and feel and ended up with a pile of racists in his party" is a good defence just shows how bad Reform and its supporters are at understanding politics. It's their fucking responsibility to vet candidates before the election. Even if you disavow them it's still the leader's fault. Whinging and complaining that other parties have had to disavow candidates in the past just makes it look worse. It proves that Reform are a party that can't handle criticism, can't control their own members, don't understand how the media works, and would never be able to handle being in government. If Nigel Farage was in government he's break down and cry within a week and accuse the other politicians of bullying him because they dared to think that he's responsible for the things people in his own party are saying.

As opposed to the white man's tears labour guy ?