Vinny van Gogh

[QUOTE=jad n rich] The thread move came after I replied to a comment from BadgeIsBack
It was in answering his observation that any change happened. Which is quite a normal thing on any forum, ie to react to new input.

I apparently and wrongly used the term asylum seekers rather than refugee's.
The facts from tamworth are still the same.

Fights in Perth, and you are there and maybe saw the newspaper reports... are a comment from a post in this thread and I used that because its was already in the thread and becuase it demonstarted that Tamworth appear not be alone.

The riots were mentioned to demonstrate that not all people of the same nation are tarred with the same brush, ie I was supporting the post about the good guy Sudanese.

With regard your breakdown of Australia's many nationals in various positions occupations...which I accept, and I dont understand why you think I dont accept it in the UK either.

BadgeIsBack

[QUOTE=Vinny van Gogh] oops. I was commentating on the natural problems arising from the expansion of the EU - which are as real and problematic, as you care to make them. I didn't want to go anywhere near any subject matter that would go down the old 'anti-migrant' route. It's easy to get into a quagmire and when you get on a high horse it's easy to fall off however safe you think you are and however reasoned or 'defendable' your case is.

Vinny van Gogh

[QUOTE=BadgeIsBack] Aye lad yer right,.... anyway I am off.... just been diggin a big enough hole ..now I intend to hide in for a while!
Funny things is... a few came on to agree with everything I said about my Mystic Meg prediction...just hope I am around in 50 years to stick mi tongue out at a few
PS...I am not and never have been anti immigration to the UK or anywhere else and actually have a list of friends from all parts of Asia....but the IMPACT of immigration will be felt as it so obviously has in Oz already....

BadgeIsBack

[QUOTE=Vinny van Gogh] I personally agree with what most people like you say, you want your culture to be maintained, but the problem is that everyone seems to think it is definitely going down the plughole and then panic and then the old chestnuts start. If you could prove that your personal British culture was being eroded at the expense of another, or due to another, then you might have a case. (Some would even argue there is no such thing as British culture as alot of people understand it to be!)

But most people think that multi-culturalism is a good thing, and that is what is happening alot everywhere for the benefit of all.

Princess Leia

Of course you have a right to an opinion. However if you post it on a public board, particularly if it's a questionable one you cannot expect to only get supportive responses as gratifying as that would be.

It's just that the case you are making isn't particularly good. I've been trained in statistics and know how easy it is for people to believe something is the case when it's not. "40% of Muslims" sounds worrying but when you translate this into "1% of the population" puts the worry into proper context.

A huge number of non-Muslims would have to leave the UK at any given time for your fears of a Sharia law majority a la Hitler to come to pass. Don't forget that many Britons eventually return to their homeland.

As a matter of fact Hitler came to power using the race fear card against Jews. He convinced people that they would take over the world if not stopped. It seems that there is a similar fear here of muslims taking over and we have to be careful on that one.

For the record I agree with Jack Straw's remarks about veiling. I can understand that people want to be able to relate to muslims in the way they are used to in their culture i.e. facial contact. And this isn't wrong to me.

iamthecreaturefromuranus

[QUOTE=BadgeIsBack] My personal opinion is that multi-culturalism has been a bloody disaster for the UK and has directly led to the divided societies and cities that can be seen all over the Britain.

It seems that even the UK government is now coming round to this idea, all be it 40 years too late.

BadgeIsBack

I quite like distilling things down to simple levels and I've been mulling this over. This may appear to go against what I've said already and may believe you to think I hold a 'position' on all this. I don't - its hypothetical.

If your street, town or district filled with people you had nothing in common with, culturally, to a point where you felt undermined, misunderstood, lonely, and you wanted to move, would you? Nice or not?

What if they were Muslims/or a different race, too? Racist or not? Or you feeling lonely and isolated?

What it boils down to is this multi-culturalism has to be genuinely mixed.

<Slight pisstake>Most of the happy clappy left-wing Guardian readers can say with pride "I know loads of xyz" and say it knowing full well that these people are really very much like them. But I bet the same Guardian reader would not necessarily want to move to a ghetto of a single culture nor a ghetto of non-liberal people. The same readers who would not dare move to the 'Provinces'. (Incidentally, I'm reading a novel where a black professor promotes right-wing views and believe that 'right-wing' politics and views in general are as valid as others - it's illuminating and refreshing reading).

So we're all as bad as each other! And all we can hope for is side by side living and no diminishment of anyone's culture. The happy societies will be the ones that can solve this so that it all becomes a geuine melting pot?
US? Done all this by a meritocratic ideal and dream. Too many problems though of status inquality.
Australia? Although there are 'ghettos', at least many migrants are happy to be 'Australian' - there is no doubt in my mind that many migrants do embrace and understand Australian culture so some of the people banging on about being good 'guests' like Vinnie (just realised) actually have a point. It won't happen until the opportunity playing field is level.

I think inequality and life-chances is more of an issue than race.

BadgeIsBack

[QUOTE=iamthecreaturefromuranus] Mate there's a bit of irony here! You miss the UK don't you, and many things its stands for and so do so many people wwanting to return. Yet you want to move back to a nice little vision of your UK, and conveniently forget all the problems (I'm not saying that you created them, or ignore them - but by definition you want a good piece of it)

In some ways, I'd rather live in a society like Australia that does sort of have a degree of success with migrants, and, has achieved it on some of the values and attributes that nonetheless so many of it's critics broadside.

iamthecreaturefromuranus

It may be an hypothetical question. but its a real fact that as districts fill with immigrants in the UK, the locals, in many cases the locals being the previous immigrant wave, moves out.

I have family and friends who still live in the Oldham area and that town is utterly divided on race lines. It has already led to race riots in the past and it will again in the future.

Vinny van Gogh

I have been trying to slide away and let this go away..it has gone away from the Tamworth start of the thread..and i thought let it get back to that.

I slid into this inadvertantly with the bit about the EU and the Polish influx into the UK. The snag is that any comments about any "ethnic" group has a certain element jumping screamming RACIST *&*%$%.
In taking on the Polish influence..one thing led to another.
The fact i sthe the UK is a money magnet to all the new EU countries where the average wage is peanuts. It is common sence that it will attract a mass move. The governement denied it happen...then admitted it had!
I dont make this stuff up..I read newspapers etc,.
It stands to reason that the fact that these people want to WORK, and accept lower rates than the norm for the area..will and has affected a lot of small companies, Fred and son plumbers etc,. This builds up resentment.
So far we have not mentioned muslims...but I recalled the poll about sharia law.
Argue the figures till your blue in the face. You talk about population as a whole. To get laws past you need first a few council members, then a few MPs and quite soon..you get a bill past. Now if anyone does not understand that..Tony Blair and George Brown are either scottish or of scots decent! I am sure other cn tell me how many other MPs are Scottish. Tell me one is in charge of the country and the other control sthe purse strings!
AND before the comrades jump up I am Apolitical ie I have no time for tories or labour because the quality of the people for the jobs they do is not impressive.
OK, the next thing you all forgot is this...in OZ its compulsive..you vote. In the UK its choice and the numbers go down annually.
Unless you are a united community and the collective ethos is vote for your man, from where ever the call to duty is made.
The fact that in one community 40% of the muslims poled wanted sharia law.
In the UK there are many predominantly asian area's-they vote in the MP he become one of a number in the house of commons..all that one MP need do is call in whatever it is that MPs do for support. And your percentages mean zilch.
If as one memeber of the thread stated, you have lived with it..you can understand it...if you aint...what do you know about it.

As for Hitler, he may have used the race card to invoke fear, but the facts are that the jewish people did in fact have a major hold in trade and it did concern other German traders who complained all the time.
I do not condone or excuse anything he did. My mention wa s again fact form the British perspective, nobody in 1938 really believed that Germany would rise up again and they did nothing about it. I used this exampple to say..OK Mock me about sharia law....but it can happen.
And again, this was only mentioned to show the power and efect mass influx into a given area can affect the normal balance of the community.
And correct me if I am wrong but a Aussie MP or whatever they are said as much about the Chinese recently! She was lambasted by her peers, but I hear aussies say the same thing nearly everyday.
Noe I suppose I have opened another bag of worms.....

Right, that was the thought process and my opinion. What actually happens inteh UK willnot afect me...I will be dust in your nose long before that...but I can still hold an opinion.

I apologise to the thread starter if I inadvertantly hijacked the thread.

and sorry for spelling....fat fingers..thin keyboard and I have to do tea....

BadgeIsBack

So it is a problem which will not be solved. In these situations, and I'm seemingly doing a 180 here, people like Vinnie have a point....I bet most of Vinnie's opponents are too safely ensconsced in 'safe' seats to have to worry about some of these problems. I go back to my Guardian reader analogy - you can discuss and debate it all you like but you are not apart of it until your life is blighted by problems stemming from inequality.

I lived in S London and what got to me was not the race issue, but the inequality - a 'quality of life' issue.

BadgeIsBack

Vinnie, I think you have a valid 'fear', but aren't winning friends with it, and your position is backed up with indefendable material!

iamthecreaturefromuranus

[QUOTE=BadgeIsBack] I was born and raised in Central Manchester and went to school in Moss Side, so I think my multi-culture credentials are fairly secure.. that doesn't stop me thinking that its entire concept was flawed. The premise that large scale immigration could best be absobed into the UK by making the indegenious populations adapt to the immigrants needs and not expecting the immigrants to adapt their ways to the UK way was a major mistake.

Vinny van Gogh

I dont have any "fears" I do have opinions that are formed from reading material in newspapers, magazines etc,.
If after all I have written that is not understood - I may as well unsubscribe here and leave it others.

Vinny van Gogh

Careful... you wil be accused of being a racist as I have been - usually by those have no idea what I am talking about!

It occures to me that if we changed the context and said...lets all us brits vote for a brits in the next aussie town elections and maybe take over the town council, they will jump and say...naw mate its impossible.....