Reply To: Project Fear

[Gurnelista]

Once again, for the wilfully myopic unjustiron… I can explain it to you, but I can’t understand it for you.

Rewind to 2014 and the run up to the election. The political right decided something had to be done to assuage public anger over austerity. The government and their cheerleaders in the Telegraph, Mail, Express and Sun couldn’t accuse the party they had helped elect of political failure, and blaming Labour was a non-runner – it was too long ago. So instead, they chose something else, something which had been around for ages, but nobody had been really bothered about – the EU – allied with that familiar old canard, immigrants.

Previously, UKIP had been a very minor party of eccentrics and navel-gazers on the outermost fringes of British politics. But suddenly it was dragged into the mainstream. Things were bad because of Brussels and Jonnie Foreigner was the message. There was also Nigel Farage, who, to elderly middle-England seemed respectable, plausible and patriotic. And suddenly it also began to attract huge swathes of hooligans and loonies who were prepared to believe anything he said, no matter how outrageous, if it was simply expressed and validated their prejudices.

Of course, many saw that complaining about EU membership over and above all the other economic and social problems of the time, was a bit like complaining about flies in the room when the roof was on fire. But others did not and the trick worked, due to press support and co-ordinated campaigns on social media. We even saw some of it here. Remember all those stories from Les and the jonnies about the Turkish ‘invasion’, about immigrants in general, much of it coming from those who might know something about justice, but very little about injustice. Big Jobby, BI and his ‘expert’ climate denier chum (haha!), the glamour-puss avatar in shades, and of course Les and the jonnies! It was a mad old time, when truth and experts ceased to matter.

In a disorienting climate of fake posts about fake stories by fake identities, racism came to be officially tolerated. Demonstrative patriotism was “in”, a very un-British thing, which recalled the fascism of the 1930s, with flags in people’s back yards, and the chant of “Ingerlund, Ingerlund” shouting down any arguments to the contrary. The union flag was even on display in the supermarkets, on your cornflakes, on your cheese and pie wrappers. Once, I was looking for some suppositories, but to my immense chagrin I couldn’t find a packet bearing the flag of St George. Imagine my shock and horror, as I explained to the chemist in Asda “I don’t want any foreign muck going up there!”

And meanwhile, those responsible for all this nonsense were smugly smirking at those dummies who keenly sucked it all up, and the Tories were forced to offer a referendum, which managed to reduce the defections to UKIP, but resulted in Cam’s resignation.

Yet, seven years on, we see the right was wrong. Trump, Johnson and Farage were always the charlatans they were said to be. Full of lies and self-promotion, these modern day Hitlers, Mosleys and their supporters told you to deny the evidence of your own eyes and ears in a bid to hold on to power. They knew that many wanted to believe their stories, no matter how outlandish, including you JI, simply because they confirmed their prejudices and didn’t challenge the status quo.

Well, it’s all over now. Most have woken up, and the real issues of climate and the environment, the rights of women, children, blacks, the disabled, concerns about inequality, low pay and foodbanks, the injustice of unaffordable housing, pathetic pensions, and deteriorating standards of health care, are the social and economic issues of our time which people are gradually becoming more clear-sighted and concerned about, as a new politics is starting to take hold.

30 years to make up your mind? Think again. There’s no point having a mind if you never change it.