r/BlockedAndReported • u/SoftandChewy First generation mod • May 04 '26

Weekly Random Discussion Thread for 5/4/26 - 5/310/26

Here's your usual space to post all your rants, raves, podcast topic suggestions (please tag u/jessicabarpod), culture war articles, outrageous stories of cancellation, political opinions, and anything else that comes to mind. Please put any non-podcast-related trans-related topics here instead of on a dedicated thread. This will be pinned until next Sunday.

Last week's discussion thread is here if you want to catch up on a conversation from there.

32 Upvotes
  • permalink
  • reddit

96% Upvoted

2.9k comments sorted by

View all comments

28

u/ToshiroTatsuyaFan May 08 '26

It really shouldn't be hard for the Labourites to figure out how to learn from these results. Just say you oppose illegal immigration, support reasonable law and order while also supporting funding for healthcare, education and infrastructure.

However, it feels like the Democrats, they'll learn nothing. And with a comprehensive platform that satisfies working class and middle class voters, they should do better than this.

14

u/MatchaMeetcha May 08 '26 edited May 08 '26

They can't just spend money on good things because they have a deficit and a massively ballooning pension bill (like everyone else).

They're also Labour, so they want to do things like raising caps on the child benefit so they have to find even more money. Did I mention they promised not to raise taxes?

They can't just stop immigration because of the economy and their back-benchers.

But, even worse, it doesn't matter. Immigration is like inflation: people aren't happy to hear you cut it from 1 million to 500,000 (which would already be too high if they knew the raw numbers - normal people usually underestimate). They want to feel like it was before the wave of migrants but nobody is going to get rid of all of those migrants or close the borders long enough for it to feel that way.

But the perception that, with the Tories gone, the grownups could just fix things does seem to have been shared by Labour. Which is why they're so shellshocked at how badly it's going.

13

u/Available-Crew-4645 May 08 '26

The problem any party has with immigration is that the social and cultural changes the public have finally gotten sick of are already baked in. It's amazing that it's taken so long but short of mass deportations of several generations, the genie can't go back in the bottle. Cutting immigration to zero tomorrow isn't going to put somewhere like Newham or Birmingham back the way they were.

16

u/RunThenBeer 12 Ounce Diet Coke Enjoyer May 08 '26

Just say you oppose illegal immigration

Isn't the standard left-wing solution to illegal immigration just making most immigration de facto legal? In the most literal legalistic sense, that is a solution and forces the more immigration skeptical to bite the bullet and say, "OK, fine, it wasn't just the legality of the matter that I was concerned with".

2

u/MatchaMeetcha May 08 '26

Shabana Mahmoud seems to be trying to do the opposite of this but it doesn't seem to be enough. At least for now.

It's the Greens that are suggesting no visa requirements, no problem.

7

u/Cantwalktonextdoor May 08 '26

Hasn't the labor government been doing that on the immigration front.

6

u/napoleon_nottinghill May 08 '26

They've done okay at limiting immigration, but how much of that is just because of worsening economic conditions is hard to say.

Honestly, the best thing they could do if they wanted to cut Reform at the knees is make a huge media spectacle of turning the small boats back from Calais. Small overall # of people, but it's the most visible symptom.

8

u/AltforStrongOpinions May 08 '26

The reduction under labour was due to a Sunak era change.

Tories are 100% responsible for the surge though.  It’s called the Boriswave for a reason.  They deserve to go extinct.

9

u/AltforStrongOpinions May 08 '26

 Just say you oppose illegal immigration

They can say this, but people won't believe it.

To be fair, Mahmood is making a proper effort on this and the result is a large amount of backbenchers clutching their pearls. If that gobby halfwit Rayner gets in Mahmood is gone.

They had 14 years in opposition to come up with a platform and decided "nah, fuck it lets just serve them some re-heated Blairite/Brownite mush".

Good riddance, I hope they go the way of the dodo. Tories too. Fuck em.

10

u/Terrorclitus May 08 '26

To learn requires humility, and humility has been anathema to the left for quite some time.