I have lots of white working class mates and loads of them are now parroting shite about two tier policing, anti-white racism, Islamic fundamentalism and god knows what else. They're not racists (I wouldn't be mates with them if they were),
they are racists
Why hang around with folk like that if you cannot talk to them about the social media bollox that they are ingesting?
Because there’s a lot more to life than that.
2 of my very best friends in the world (we grew up together) use language that would earn them both instant bans on here and lavender-scented handkerchiefs would have to be handed to all the usual suspects.
For example, they both routinely refer to Muslims as ‘Ragheads’ and Muslim women as’Ninja’s’. One of them has definite Tommy Robinson sympathies.
But then they’ve both done repeated tours of Iraq and Afghan and I’d imagine the years of councilling required for their PTSD after the horrors they witnessed somewhat colours your judgement.
so I just let it slide because I love them both dearly, they’re 2 of the finest human beings you could ever wish to meet and quite frankly, without people like them we’d all be well and truly ****ed!
"Assumes that reform voters are racists, which is just lazy thinking. As has been pointed out, some voters for reform will obviously be, the vast vast majority aren't."
Agreed. Moot point though as vote for fundamentally racist party, get fundamentally racist party regardless of your individual beliefs.
TBH though, not sure that Reform is actually ideologically racist. It's just using that as the populist playbook easy win route to power and the big grift? Suspect that Farridge would go full socialist/liberal/anarchist/whatever at the drop of a hat if he thought there was some cash/power/glory in it (or his paymasters told him there was).
Why hang around with folk like that if you cannot talk to them about the social media bollox that they are ingesting?
Because there’s a lot more to life than that.
2 of my very best friends in the world (we grew up together) use language that would earn them both instant bans on here and lavender-scented handkerchiefs would have to be handed to all the usual suspects.
For example, they both routinely refer to Muslims as ‘Ragheads’ and Muslim women as’Ninja’s’. One of them has definite Tommy Robinson sympathies.
But then they’ve both done repeated tours of Iraq and Afghan and I’d imagine the years of councilling required for their PTSD after the horrors they witnessed somewhat colours your judgement.
so I just let it slide because I love them both dearly, they’re 2 of the finest human beings you could ever wish to meet and quite frankly, without people like them we’d all be well and truly ****ed!
Fair enough, they’re your racist friends but attempting to absolve them of their abhorrent attitudes speaks volumes
Why hang around with folk like that if you cannot talk to them about the social media bollox that they are ingesting?
Because thats how you change peoples perceptions. You start with the people you know.
My mate Dave was very like that, very anti Muslim, and while out camping in the wilds of winter we had a lot of very long conversations, and i made it my duty to change the misinformation he'd been fed.
Not sure i entirely succeeded, but he was less violent towards them, and took the points on board. I think it at least quietened his mind a little, and every little bit helps.
Fair enough, they’re your racist friends but attempting to absolve them of their abhorrent attitudes speaks volumes
Life must look great from your elevated equine position, that rarely, if ever, encounters the pointy end of reality
One of those said ‘racists’ is my best mate and he’s a forces medic. He’s just retired after 32 years service. He’s now had years of therapy for his PTSD to get him back to some kind of equilibrium.
You know what really *%#*ed him up? Not his tours of Iraq or Afghanistan, though they were obviously massively contributory factors. What really ****ed him up was Sierra Leone.
Racist bastard that he is, he spent 6 straight months working 12-14 hour days containing the Ebola outbreak there and saving the lives of countless brown people.
When he came back he was, somewhat unsurprisingly, an absolute *%#*ing mess, to put it mildly. He came and stayed with me when he got back and he was a shell of a man. Completely broken. We’ve talked about it recently and he says he was so severely traumatized back then he had no recollection of getting home. It’s taken years of therapy to address the horrors he witnessed and knowing that every day could be his last. They subsequently found out that the orders from the MOD were that if any of the crew were infected then the ship couldn’t return and they’d moor it up off the coast and let it take its course.
But you know… the language he uses is sometimes inappropriate so let’s burn him for that eh? I’m sure you’re ideally qualified to be dishing out criticism of someone like him.
Honestly, sometimes I wonder what planet you people live on. It must be lovely
I’d pay good money to watch you offer him the benefit of your wisdom in person
For perspective…. The entire counties population is the same size as that of the Greater Manchester and Merseyside combined authorities
Scotland's population is one million higher than those two combined authorities.
Life must look great from your elevated equine position, that rarely, if ever, encounters the pointy end of reality
I can't be the only one who loves being lectured by a middle class crayon botherer.
I have actually graduated onto felt tips recently, but it’s a bugger trying to keep between the black lines and I keep leaving the tops off them.
Baby steps and all that….
I can see why calling out racists is beyond you.
It’s difficult to get anything else in, with all the competitive virtue-signalling, to be honest
I’d pay good money to watch you offer him the benefit of your wisdom in person
Sounds like he has experienced rather horrific scenarios to recover from, sounds like you’ve supported him like any friend would.
I’m not sure why you’ve immediately jumped on my statement regarding racial terminology with a personal story.
If we’re playing that game,
My cousin did 3 tours in Iraq with the Black Watch, first Basra assault 2003, another tour in 2004 he’s never talked about for “operational reasons” but a number of his colleagues came back in body bags, and finally for 6months in 2006/2007 on Iraq/iran border that led him to leave the army - he’s even featured in an award winning play that was written/produced about the Black watch
He's worked for the Halo trust since 2010 as coordinator/logistics/resolution coordinator, currently on the ground in Gaza trying to avoid getting shot by the IDF whilst organising his diffusion team as they discover bones buried and mutilated bodies from under the rubble, amongst many tonnes of unexploded ordnance.
I’ve never heard him use racist terminology of any sort when discussing issues though - despite loosing most of his left hand and a chunk of upper arm whilst under fire in 2007, he openly admits he occasionally has “moments” when at home in the quiet and prefers being under pressure with his work at Halo wherever that takes him
I think the issue with my mates is that there’s two of them who’ve been through similar experiences, so when the 3 of us get together, those 2 revert to the type of language they’d use on a front line
As you can imagine, despite my Guardian reading credentials I’m hardly going to pull them up on it. I just let it slide.
I think that we all need an understanding of why people are like they are. My mates are 2 incredible, compassionate and caring people who have been through all manner of shit which means their opinions on some things are very different from mine. I can live with that and would never ever judge them for it, because what right do I have
Others are more ready to judge
How about we stop playing Top Trumps with other people's service to try and score points in this argument? Neither of you served, so neither of you has earned the right to use someone else's service as a trump card to justify your position.
How about we stop playing Top Trumps with other people's service to try and score points in this argument? Neither of you served, so neither of you has earned the right to use someone else's service as a trump card to justify your position.
lfair enough, 😉 but we did not throw down trump cards are so succinctly say
It’s difficult to get anything else in, with all the competitive virtue-signalling, to be honest
Stop doing it then.
How about we stop playing Top Trumps with other people's service to try and score points in this argument? Neither of you served, so neither of you has earned the right to use someone else's service as a trump card to justify your position.
Fair play. They do bully me relentlessly for being a ‘gay lefty’ but then I just remind them they’re a pair of knuckle-dragging puddle-jumpers 😃
thank you fir getting my point morecash
Getting back to the actual subject of the thread, Keir Starmer, I thought he played a blinder yesterday in putting Farage back in his box at PMQ’s. He got the tone perfectly right as you can tell from the reaction of the Torygraph this morning
Agreed. Moot point though as vote for fundamentally racist party, get fundamentally racist party regardless of your individual beliefs.
I could point at any number of Insta or TicToc clips of 'stalwart' Reform voters having actual Reform party policies being explained to them in words of one syllable and you can literally watch the scales fall from their eyes in real time. Many of the folks that are voting reform have zero idea of what that actually means.
Scotland's population is one million higher than those two combined authorities.
If you take the M62 corridor that goes from Merseyside to just past Leeds, there's 3 to 4 million more people live near it than the entirety of Scotland, and it's significantly more ethnically diverse, where 40% of residents belong to an ethnic minority, compared to Glasgow at 19%, is the most ethnically diverse city in Scotland.
"Assumes that reform voters are racists, which is just lazy thinking. As has been pointed out, some voters for reform will obviously be, the vast vast majority aren't."
Agreed. Moot point though as vote for fundamentally racist party, get fundamentally racist party regardless of your individual beliefs.
TBH though, not sure that Reform is actually ideologically racist. It's just using that as the populist playbook easy win route to power and the big grift? Suspect that Farridge would go full socialist/liberal/anarchist/whatever at the drop of a hat if he thought there was some cash/power/glory in it (or his paymasters told him there was).
Yep…..
1)Some people have convictions.
2)Some people like money.
3)Some people have convictions and like money.
Reforms a Farage vehicle,now an MP who doesn’t vote much but seems to be getting rather rich off politics (See also previous career as MEP.) so I think he’s 2.
The problem is the amount of damage they do to the country for the sake of enriching themselves and what you are left with when they join me sat in Spain for daiquiris around the pool 🙁
Question Time is from Makerfield tonight so should be entertaining. The panel is Andy Burnham, Robert Kenyon and whoever drew the short straw from the other parties.
The Reform vetting process is already looking as thorough and rigorous as ever, with Robert Kenyon, having deleted all his social media accounts, now having his old posts dredged up, which say exactly what you’d expect for someone standing for Reform.
He did an absolute car crash of an interview with Chris Mason and doesn’t seem to know what Reforms policies on anything actually are. Hardly surprising since Nige seems to make them up on the back of a beer mat as he goes along
Given that his boss has just tried (and in one case succeeded) to use a young lads death to instigate some race riots, expressly against the wishes of his grieving family, he’s going to have some interesting questions to answer tonight. He looks pretty ill-equipped to do so
Why hang around with folk like that if you cannot talk to them about the social media bollox that they are ingesting?
Mate, I'm a white working class bloke, I live in a white working class town, and have lots of white working class mates*. If I'm only allowed to hang around pinko-lefty bedwetters (which I identify myself as BTW) then I'll either have to move and spend ages making new mates or stay at home and be a recluse.
An don't worry, I do talk to them about it, but I can't be arsed having the same argument every time I go down the pub. You know it is possible to be mates with people who might not have exactly the same political opinions as you?
*Not exclusively BTW
We’re all apparently fascists and racists by association now Daz.
You're only allowed to talk to people pre-vetted and approved for idealogical purity comrade
It won't matter tho - if he pulls off a mask & turns out that he was Epstein all along people would still vote for him.
You're only allowed to talk to people pre-vetted and approved for idealogical purity now comrade
Might show them this thread and get one of them to reply. I can imagine what they might say. Honestly if some of the people on here exercised their moral superiority in person rather than hiding behind the internet they'd find themselves in a lot of trouble. On that note though if any of the STW moral arbiters feel brave send me a DM and I'll organise a night down the pub. 😀
How far does it go? A quiet chat down the pub with people who support Farage's "race riots", as Binners calls them? Genuinely interested. Questioning that isn't calling everyone "fascists and racists by association", but it is a question that's worth asking. I don't know the full answer, despite falling into the "keep talking", "don't judge your friends" camp myself.
I don’t know about you, but if I’m having a beer with my mates in the pub (which I do far more frequently than I probably should), then we’re about 1000 times more likely to be talking about who United are going to sign to replace Casimero than we are about Nigel Farage and Reform.
Me and Daz have been riding together for years and years now, and all rides end in the pub (thems the rules!) and we have never once discussed politics in person
they'd find themselves in a lot of trouble
If people can't disagree without being violent, then they're probably best avoided.
As Binners points out though, people don't (and shouldn't) engage in pub chat the same way they post on a forum (in a political thread). Well, some people might, but we'd all be avoiding them as well!
Questioning that isn't calling everyone "fascists and racists by association", but it is a question that's worth asking
You'll be amazed at how much you can change opinions by not calling someone a racist or some other slur. I generally tell people I disagree with them and why, and attempt to correct any disinformation but you can only go so far. Sometimes you just have to agree to disagree and not judge people. It's tricky..
Looks like Farage is using the Matt Chorley thing on Newsnight as an excuse to say that Reform are now boycotting the BBC.
So Robert Kenyon won’t be on QT tonight, after all. I hope they do what HIGNFY do and have a frozen chicken or something on the desk where he would have been sat
Mate, I'm a white working class bloke,
No you are not. You are a well paid professional IIRC university educated and paid multiples of the national average. You may come from a working class background but you left it behind a long time ago. What is this weird pretending to be working class?
He’s as working class as Starmer is.
No you are not.
Oh FFS not this again. Yes you can't be working class unless you're dirt poor and don't have a GCSE to your name. Working class people are not allowed to educate themselves or be paid more than the minimum wage. Snobbery at its very finest.
He’s as working class as Starmer is.
Closer to Angela Rayner probably. I'm nothing more than well paid council estate scum. I still eat Morrisons own brand white sliced bread FFS!
I find it weird that those who say they want a meritocracy are always the same ones who then get uppity when it actually delivers social mobility
Anyway, you think you’ve got issues, my dad was actually a toolmaker. The last few years haven’t been the easiest for us offspring of that particular trade
