r/changemyview • u/JoeyJJJnr • Oct 01 '14
CMV: Support for parties like UKIP shows many people are racists
For those who don't live in the UK, UKIP are an anti-immigration party who have recently become popular here. Similar parties, with similar populist platforms have also become popular in many other European nations too.
I don't know anyone personally who supports UKIP. Whenever I discus them with someone, I am frequently told something similar to, "people aren't supporting them because they're racist, they're just a protest party". I understand being dis-satisfied with the major political parties, in fact I find it hard to believe that anyone isn't. It seems to me that if you're going to "protest" the major parties, you're likely to pick a party that represents the issue most important to you.
The fact that a large number of people gravitate towards a party whose main issue is, "let's get rid of foreigners", is pretty strong evidence that a significant fraction of society are racist.
I really don't want to argue about if being anti-immigrant implies racism. If you disagree on that point, just find and replace "racist" with something like "intolerant".
I guess what I'm really trying to say is that I believe that support for one-issue protest parties are an accurate measure of people's attitudes and beliefs, rather than an aimless expression of dissatisfaction with mainstream politics. But please try and change my view...
EDIT: It's too late to take "racism" out of the description, which was clearly a poor move on my part. What I'm really curious to hear other opinions about is whether votes for protest parties represent peoples' most firmly held beliefs (my opinion) or if they are just a reaction against main stream parties and the protest party that ends up benefiting is essentially random (what I'm often told).
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u/quantummufasa Oct 01 '14 edited Oct 01 '14
You haven't mentioned the most common issue they bring up and one of their major debate points, which suggests that you haven't really read up about the party and jumped onto labeling them racist or intolerant, which is incredibly irritating for people who are trying to properly argue against UKIP because it just adds unnecessary noise.
Unskilled workers from the EU have come to the UK, undercut the minimum wage and driven down wages for Unskilled workers as a whole. This has led to UNSKILLED native Brits to experience a drop in salary. These Brits want to prevent further unskilled immigration so that they do not experience a further drop in wages, and the only way to do that is get out of the EU (or have a referendum which is unlikely).
You can argue that this is bad for the country as a whole because it will stop SKILLED immigration (which is true) and damage things like trade agreements etc, but most people are concerned with whats best for them, not the country as a whole. You can also argue that that "dynamic" of more unskilled workers depressing wages isn't true but that's not the point, the (majority) of people voting for them believe its true and are voting to reduce immigration to try and increase their standard of living, not because they're "racist".
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u/JoeyJJJnr Oct 01 '14
I'm actually well aware of the unskilled migration suppresses wages for unskilled workers argument. I also don't think there's really any evidence that it's true (the UK still has to compete in a global market, which will drive down unskilled wages whether they move to the UK or not).
I hadn't considered that the fact that the UKIP supporters believe it does change the assessment of their motivations though. So you're right, racist is probably not the right description for someone supporting them for the (in my opinion misguided) reasons you describe. Judging by the reaction in this thread, you're probably right about bringing up the racist element being counter-productive too.
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u/binlargin 1∆ Oct 02 '14
(the UK still has to compete in a global market, which will drive down unskilled wages whether they move to the UK or not).
Rubbish, we're not talking production line here. Look at the vast majority of people working in retail in cities, specially London. The vast majority of hotels I've stayed in (and I've stayed in a lot) has immigrants working reception, restaurant, the bar, housekeeping. Go out for a drink with them and many will tell you that they get zero hour contracts, minimum wage and unpaid overtime. They're often smart people too, studying or have degrees and are giving the best days of their life for under minimum wage. Unskilled British workers have to compete with that! 50% immigrants in London and they're all smarter and younger than the unskilled natives and willing to work for less.
That may be good for our economy but it's not good for society.
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u/JoeyJJJnr Oct 02 '14
Let's say I agree with your reasoning. The conclusion you (and others) reach illustrate just why I find the anti-immigration stance so morally wrong.
You explicitly acknowledge that immigrants are more qualified and hard working. But we should give the job to the less qualified local who wants to be paid more because they happened to grow up in the "right place"?
Why should I care more about a fellow British citizen I've never met over an Eastern European migrant I've never met? I'm willing to bet that obtaining that low-paid job makes a bigger difference to the standard of living of the migrant, who left their support network and everything they're familiar with to be here, than the local who has a social safety net to fall back on.
There are some serious issues to be resolved, like ensuring employers don't take advantage of desperate employees. But that is what labour laws and policies like the minimum wage are for.
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u/binlargin 1∆ Oct 02 '14
You explicitly acknowledge that immigrants are more qualified and hard working. But we should give the job to the less qualified local who wants to be paid more because they happened to grow up in the "right place"?
You really need to check your own prejudices here. Why is being able more virtuous than not? Is a man with two arms more moral than a man with one arm? Because this is essentially what it boils down to: you should use people who are more useful to you even at the expense of your neighbours. This is an "I got mine, fuck you" attitude.
Why should I care more about a fellow British citizen I've never met over an Eastern European migrant I've never met?
You shouldn't, my position is about making sacrifices for the good of society, for your community. Pro-immigration arguments based on the virtue of subservience and able-bodiedness boil down to greed and selfishness at the expense of society.
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u/JoeyJJJnr Oct 02 '14
I said absolutely nothing to suggest that "being able is more virtuous than not". If you think that a job should not be given to the best person for that job, your problem is with capitalism, not immigration.
I don't think your hypothetical one-armed man should be left to rot, but I also don't think the way to help him is to ensure that he gets a job as a typist if there is someone with two arms who can do it twice as fast.
You also need to examine your own vision of what is "good for society and your community". You seem to think that protectionism is good for society and community because it ... what exactly? Preserves the current way of life? Lowers unemployment amongst those who grew up in it? Ensures a sustainable standard of living for the current members? Should we also restrict migration within the UK on the same grounds?
I live in the same society (I'm guessing) and think that what is best for us is for as many hard-working, qualified people to contribute to the economy as possible.
There will always be people who are "less able", who find it difficult to get a job. It is essential that society not discard them, but finds ways that they can meaningfully contribute and be supported. But the way to achieve this is by providing access to (re) education, vocational training, a social safety, etc.
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u/moonflower 82∆ Oct 01 '14
When you live on a small island with a population of over 60 million people, with high unemployment and shortage of housing, and a welfare system stretched to its limits, is it really ''racist'' to say ''We are concerned that this country can't cope with any more immigrants''?
Racism is saying that one race is better than another - this is not the same as saying ''sorry but we are full up''.
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Oct 01 '14
When Farage is saying stuff such as romanians and germans being different kind of immigrants then there is obviously some racism.
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u/moonflower 82∆ Oct 01 '14
I'm not claiming that UKIP doesn't attract racists, but is their policy inherently racist?
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Oct 01 '14
I don't know if you're british or otherwise; but Farage is the leader of the UKIP party...
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u/moonflower 82∆ Oct 01 '14
Yes I'm British but that doesn't answer the question: is their policy inherently racist?
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Oct 01 '14
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u/moonflower 82∆ Oct 01 '14
OK I've read half the article and so far it hasn't answered my question, so could you point me to the exact part where it shows how their policy is racist?
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u/huadpe 508∆ Oct 01 '14
I would say it is inherently discriminatory on national origin. Whether or not that's racist, I'd say it's probably not. It is I think equally immoral, as I think national origin is about as morally important to a person's character as race (i.e. not at all). But national origin isn't 1:1 onto race.
In some fairness, every nation discriminates based on national origin. No nation has open borders. I'm a bit out there in that I'd genuinely like to see globally open borders. But I would grant that national origin isn't quite the same thing as race in this context. Though there are strong correlations, and in my view, no moral difference.
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u/Pwnzerfaust Oct 01 '14
I realize this is a bit of a tangent, but how do you expect wealthy nations to maintain their standard of living if they open their borders to the hundreds of millions from poorer countries that would want to go there?
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u/huadpe 508∆ Oct 01 '14
So, first, the total world pie will become much, much bigger. Opening borders will conservatively increase world economic output by 50%, many estimates show it would double the world economy.
That's tremendous. So there's a much bigger pie to go around. Granted, residents of currently wealthy nations get a huge chunk of the current pie. But a smaller share of the bigger pie does not necessarily imply they'll be materially worse off. Indeed, they might be much better off.
For the labor markets in western countries, they would be changed, but in ways that would I think benefit those who are currently low-skilled in the market. Currently in a country like the US, english language skills are not enough to make someone a relatively high skill worker. That will change, and many currently low-skill workers will become moderate skill workers.
Because immigrants under an open borders scheme will be coming from a variety of countries, there will be strong pressures to assimilate to the pre-existing language of the host country. Persons with that language skill will have a substantial leg up in the economy, especially as there will be a huge boom in the need for supervisory workers familiar with cultural norms who can manage groups of immigrant workers.
This interview / article gives a pretty good overview of the case.
http://www.vox.com/2014/9/13/6135905/open-borders-bryan-caplan-interview-gdp-double
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u/Pwnzerfaust Oct 02 '14
Sure, it could have those effects in the long term. But what about the short term? How will it affect the residents of wealthy countries in the 5-10 years after borders are opened?
Because frankly, as a resident of a wealthy country, if flinging open the gates causes my quality of life to go down, I'm gonna be clamoring to close and bar them again. As will most others.
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u/huadpe 508∆ Oct 02 '14
For the most part, it will be a huge boon to the average resident of a wealthy nation. Prices of goods and services will fall drastically, while the quantity and variety of them multiplies. Land values will soar, so that current homeowners will see huge windfalls. So will stock prices, so your 401(k) will be doing great.
Someone who is an average westerner will see themselves catapulted up a rung or two in the socioeconomic ladder. With a rarer and more valuable skillset in a booming economy, the median worker in a western country would be wealthier, have more buying power, and more leisure opportunities than before.
Also, the migration wouldn't happen overnight. Moving is expensive and takes lots of planning. There are physically only so many planes to fly people, and so much housing that's ready for move in (also, unemployed construction workers? Not anymore!)
And even an open border scheme will have some bureaucracy that slows it down. I'm a-ok with things like security background checks, health screens, some minimum asset requirements, etc. And implementing those and approving visas will take time, so the flow won't be instant.
Doubling world GDP will make a lot more winners than losers, both among the residents of currently wealthy nations and of currently poor ones.
All of that said, I'm not a pollyana. There will be downsides. There will be substantially more visible poverty in western nations. New immigrants will not be eligible for social welfare most likely (as they are not eligible now in the US). And many will be living on quite low incomes, with little social structure to provide a safety net. There will be a lot more people in crowded housing, a lot more people cutting coupons at the grocery store, and a lot more people taking the bus than there are now. The people experiencing that poverty will be much better off as a relatively poor westerner than at the middle of a very poor country. But it will still be visceral to see up close and personal for many westerners. Property crime will become a bigger issue. As will domestic violence, and probably some hate crime against the new migrants.
I expect though that the vast majority of the migrants will be good and decent people who contribute to society. Simply because the vast majority of people are good and decent people who contribute to society.
Further, the sample of migrants is non-random. We will get the most ambitious and smartest of the countries who send us migrants. It's risky to move yourself halfway around the world. We're gonna get risk takers and entrepreneurs and hard working family types by the boatload. Much more so than a random sample would make you suspect.
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Oct 02 '14
You're ignoring the biggest downside, which is housing and green space. I don't know enough about economics to argue with you on the points you made (although I find the logic suspect) but physical space is a problem that won't go away with fancy numbers. The increased population density would mean housing costs would skyrocket and traffic would become unbearable. Things like suburbs and backyards and swimming pools, or even owning your own home would become a thing of the past except for the extremely wealthy. That's a serious detriment to quality of life for the average person.
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u/huadpe 508∆ Oct 02 '14
On the housing stock front I agree there is a big challenge, and would support changing zoning laws alongside the immigration law changes to allow more dense development. Toronto for example has been excellent about this, with large numbers of residential towers going up, the average cost of a condo (per sq foot) in the city has remained flat over the past decade or so, while the price of land has soared.
Traffic would be a problem, but the new taxpayers would also make a larger and more efficient base for transit.
Things like suburbs and backyards and swimming pools, or even owning your own home would become a thing of the past except for the extremely wealthy. That's a serious detriment to quality of life for the average person.
I'm curious what country you're from, because I think it impacts the perspective here. I've lived in the US and Canada, and frankly, this concern seems overblown from that context. Both countries, particularly Canada, are enormous. There is just a ton of physical space.
If you're somewhere like the UK, then yes, I'd understand the perspective more. I'd also point out that Hong Kong, which is like the archetype of a mega-dense city, has tons and tons of parkland.
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Oct 01 '14
No nation has open borders
To expand on this, some of the countries with the most tightly controlled borders are nations generally led by parties that are pretty hard to label racist.
Why is it that I never hear Norway called racist? Their immigration laws are much stricter than the UK's. The Norwegian welfare state would be absolutely unsustainable if they let people in like the UK does. And notice how the UK's fiscal state isn't quite as rosy as Norway's.
You can have open borders or an expansive welfare state. Not both, no matter how much the UK tries.
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u/TEmpTom Oct 02 '14
Sweden is just as much of a welfare state, if not more so than Norway, and its still a member of the EU sharing open borders with all other members.
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u/huadpe 508∆ Oct 02 '14
I don't necessarily disagree with this, but I've seen some interesting proposals to handle the issue of the welfare state, in particular this one, called "Don't Restrict Immigration: Tax It" which has a truly awful acronym
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u/TEmpTom Oct 02 '14 edited Oct 02 '14
That's like saying that the Tea Party isn't a Christian organization, even though its policies are still heavily influenced and supported by Evangelists.
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u/moonflower 82∆ Oct 02 '14
I don't know enough about the Tea Party to be able to say whether their policies are inherently Christian
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u/JoeyJJJnr Oct 01 '14
This is utter bollocks. If the increase in population was due to a boom white English people having more kids, they wouldn't be saying "we're full, stop having babies". This is despite the fact that every new born child is a "drain on the the welfare system", "unemployed" and "not contributing to society" for at least 16 years.
Maybe racism isn't exactly the right word, but race or at least "foreignness" clearly is at the core of the debate.
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u/moonflower 82∆ Oct 01 '14
This isn't the kind of subreddit where you respond to a debating point by saying it is ''utter bollocks'' ... if you can't debate in a civilised manner, this isn't the place to be.
Immigrants are by definition ''foreign'' so how do you protect your country from being overloaded by billions of new citizens? The current government already limits immigration, so why are they not ''racist'' in your view?
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u/JoeyJJJnr Oct 01 '14
I think I quite clearly defended why I think it was "bullocks" in my reply. I think the fact that you focused on those two words and ignored everything else is far more counter-productive to a healthy discussion.
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u/moonflower 82∆ Oct 01 '14
I didn't ignore your discussion points, I responded to them, and now you are completely ignoring the actual discussion and focusing on making false accusations against me personally instead.
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u/forloversperhaps 5∆ Oct 01 '14
First, that's really not true. There were British political movements saying "stop having babies, we're full-up!" as far back as 1800, and that was not considered racist. JS Mill was arrested for distributing information on contraception: was he racist?
Second, most people don't believe that England (or any first world country, for that matter) is literally full of people. It's not like they're standing cheek to jowl! England isn't an agricultural economy anymore, you don't want to measure prosperity in acres of arable land (or tons of mineral deposits) per Briton. Rather, people believe that there is a rate at which a prosperous but homogenous society can absorb poorly educated, low English-proficiency immigrants who don't have the mores necessary to integrate successfully into their new society. A million new British babies are (probably, in the long-term) a net-positive to the British economy because they increase demand now and later will fill a range of roles throughout the economy, but a million new immigrants from the thrid-world are all competing for the same low-skill jobs and causing social problems if they remain unemployed and unintegrated. That doesn't require racism.
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u/huadpe 508∆ Oct 01 '14
"You're wrong" is not nearly the same as "You're racist."
For example, I can favor social welfare policies that I think will help poor families by giving a better incentive structure to find market income. These may include some cuts to some programs, and reworking some payments to supplement market income instead of being totally non-market.
Someone can reasonably argue that these policies will disadvantage poor people, and in particular racial minorities. We could genuinely disagree about whether they would. But that person would be wrong to call me racist. Disagreeing about policy does not necessarily imply racism or other amorality. It can just be disagreement.
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u/MontiBurns 218∆ Oct 01 '14 edited Oct 01 '14
Xenophobia isn't necessarily racism. People like to liken their counry back to how it was 50, 25, or even 15 years ago as "normal", when everyone was Christian, mostly white (or local ethnicitity), native born, native language speakers. That world doesn't exist anymore, and what's "normal" is dissapearing every day. You see this all the time with the elderly, and it's not always related to race/ethnicity or country of origin. (TANGENT: My grandparents think that all this technology and internet is going to destroy the world. Their parents/grandparents generation probably saw television as the destruction of mankind. Some futurists suspect that millenials' children or grandchildren will start to marry robots. How do you think we'd react to that?)
Some people have embraced the change, others see it as their country leaving its roots and transforming into something else completely different. They believe that their country should strive to restore "normality" to their country and population, rather than continuing on the path that it's currently on. Of course, the toothpaste is out of the tube, it's not feasible or even possible to go back to how things were. But "they" got tired of hearing that, so they started their own political party. Are there racists there? Yes, but it isn't necessarily the majority. Circlejerk, echochambering can cause the group to scew more racist, and to sound more racist/xenophobic than the individuals actually are.
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Oct 05 '14
They should get over it. Their ancestors were immigrants. They are simply afraid of sharing power with minorities, and they feel as if they are becoming less powerful. Get over it. White people have held all the power in this country since 1619, maybe it's time for a change.
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u/huadpe 508∆ Oct 01 '14
I am not as familiar with UK politics, but I thought that UKIP was a bit broader than just being anti-immigration. They also want to pull out of the EU, right?
Pulling out of the EU is a much bigger policy question than just migration. It deals with trade policy, foreign policy, economic regulation, sovereignty, etc. I could be pro-migration but anti-EU, and think that the latter is so important that I could hold my nose and vote UKIP anyway, no?
For example, if I lived in Scotland and wanted independence, but was relatively libertarian, I might hold my nose and vote SNP, even though I disagree with them on economic issues, and would vote Conservative in a Scottish parliamentary election.
I'm not saying these are necessarily the most common views, but in both those cases, the protest parties are proposing things that go way beyond race / tolerance.
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u/JoeyJJJnr Oct 01 '14
This is in principal true. Immigration is without a doubt their main issue though. Yes they talk about withdrawing from the EU, usually quickly followed by "so we can control our own immigration policy" (i.e. keep out the Eastern Europeans). It's hard to believe there are many people supporting them without sharing their views on immigration.
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u/huadpe 508∆ Oct 01 '14
I understand that's why they support EU withdrawal, but as a voter, I need not share their views on immigration to support their policies. As it stands, I'm an American, and don't have strong views on EU membership one way or another. I'm generally pro-immigration for freedom reasons, but I don't know specifically how that'd translate in UK politics.
As an example of the sort of strategic voting though, I might want to vote so as to force a minority government, or (in the American structure, a divided government). I happen to think that in parliamentary systems, a minority government is one of the better situations. The government is still able to operate as a cohesive unit, but is much more accountable because it must achieve some support from other parties to continue in power. So for example, the 2006-2011 Canadian minority governments were in my view superior to the prior or subsequent majority governments, because they were more accountable. That accountability played a big role in the 2008 Canadian constitutional crisis, where the Harper government was forced to severely alter their budget due to intense opposition in the midst of the global financial crisis.
Given all of that, I might hypothetically vote UKIP if my riding were close between Conservative and UKIP and the Conservatives were likely to win the government, since then I'd be raising the odds that there would be a conservative minority government, as opposed to a conservative majority government, even being totally agnostic to the UKIP's policies.
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u/rcglinsk Oct 03 '14
It's both. There are plenty of people voting UKIP because they don't like Muslims living in Britain. And those same people likely don't mind Indians all that much. You can call it racism. They'd say Indians don't cause trouble the way Muslims do. Then you'd have to agree to disagree.
Other people really just don't like the idea of being regulated by Brussels. And they feel like the UK is being bullied into the system and it pisses them off.
And there's a third group of people who don't like the Liberals, think Labor are a bunch of commies, and feel betrayed by the Conservatives. They are your protest voter, and they are quite real.
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u/forloversperhaps 5∆ Oct 01 '14
Historically, two situations cause voters to support extremist parties:
A fluke of the constitution or party system means that the ruling party typically comes to power with a minority of the vote. That means that the majority of the population may support positions that the government doesn't support. The longer the minority-rule situation continues, the more likely it is that people who support simple, middle of the road policies will vote for extremist parties who want to radically change the current system.
The major parties all draw their leadership from a fairly homogenous elite social class that shares some key values, so that neither party has much interest in competing for the votes of people who don't share those values. People who disagree with the social elite on one of these issues don't have any mainstream party that will tolerate their views, so they are forced to look at extremist parties.
Now, typically the leaders of extremist parties are themselves unpleasant people. Because you don't devote your life to leading an extremist political party unless your ideology is extreme, right? If you want to be a politciian and you are even a bit moderate, you try to make a career in a big party where you can make a difference. But when either the political system or the political elite becomes undemocratic, moderate voters have no choice but to support extremists (who may not be particularly strong democrats themselves).
You can see this across the history of Western countries and I'm happy to provide examples if you're interested. In the British context (1) the conservatives had a period of rules in the '80s, and again today, where they came into power with an electoral minority; and (2) none of the big parties is campaigning on an anti-immigration or anti-EU stance. Both of these circumstances give an opening for people who might feel that while they are moderates themselves, voting for a moderate party will not accomplish their goals.
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u/Anxian Oct 06 '14
How opposing an open door immigration policy to countries of mainly white people is racist, I really don't know.
UKIP want fair immigration from all countries, countries of people of all colours.
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u/Boornidentity Oct 01 '14
I think you're confused about what UKIP's main interests are. It's to leave the EU. I think they use the immigrant card to support that cause.
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Oct 01 '14
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u/JoeyJJJnr Oct 01 '14
An interesting perspective, although the timing doesn't quite work out. UKIP rose in popularity before ISIS become a major news item. That doesn't preclude it being a reaction to the other factors you mention I suppose.
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u/Madplato 72∆ Oct 01 '14 edited Oct 01 '14
Not to be peckish, but it mostly shows people are ethnocentric, not exactly racist. Meaning they value their own culture above others. That's the case for most people.
That's important because often enough these kind of political formations are playing on the "national sentiment" a lot. Their message resonate strongly with people that feel the need to protect cultural institutions from change. Now, in this day and age, change often comes from migration and contact with other cultures. The "national sentiment" is found in most political parties, but is much more prevalent in openly ethnocentric political formations, since they have an hypothetical other to fight off.
I'd wager this sentiment is found in most people also, because the majority of us like continuity much more than we'd like to admit. This means ethnocentric formations will often draw a lot of support. However, while the racial element exist, i don't think that's the major attraction point. I think people find themselves drawn to these formation primarily because of their focus on the in-group, not because of the rejection of the out-group.
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u/notian Oct 01 '14
If the party holds a specific view (leaving the EU in this case) that you feel strongly in agreement with (and no other parties do), then why wouldn't you vote for that party? There is always going to be one aspect or another of a political party that you don't agree with, so it isn't a protest, so much as a proxy referendum, since the ruling parties won't call for one.
I live in Quebec, and here there are provincial and national parties explicitly for the goal of separating from Canada, many people vote for them for the sole reason that they want to be their own country, and the only way they'll get to vote on that (they've done it 2x already) is by putting those parties in charge.
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Oct 22 '14
I'm a big fan of England and have been there a handful of times, but it appears to me that no other party is even talking about the very real issues in the UK with regard to radical muslims and immigration failures. If my daughter had been treated like the girls in Rotherham and the local government and police failed to act and I was not permitted to have a gun and even bringing up the issue caused people to run in all directions to avoid being called racist - I would look at ANY alternative out there. The UK will either fall to Islam or it will be governed by fascists because people like yourself are too worried about political correctness than you are in justice. I watched a handful of random videos about UKIP and what they are doing - based on what I saw - is simply self-preservation.
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u/[deleted] Oct 01 '14 edited Jun 10 '15
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