BNP - first euro seat

[Tony.London Suburbs]

david_carnell Wrote:

..to mawkish flag-waving to prove my worth?

mawkish as in:

1/ Excessively and objectionably sentimental ?

2/ Sickening or insipid in taste ?

[david_carnell]

Keef - how is it "superior" of me to find excessive patriotism unnecessary and unpleasant. Whilst England games in pubs can be great it's not a rarity for it to descend into displays of xenophobia. And the Leeds comparison doesn't hold up - I can choose what club to support.

Tony - both, but primarily 1.

[gallinello]

The people's flag is deepest RED, it shrouded oft our martyred dead, and ere their limbs grew stiff and cold, their hearts' blood dyed its every fold......

[Jeremy]

As I said before... patriotism needn't imply nationalism or xenophobia. Many other countries seem to be able to separate the two concepts.

[Keef]

David, it's just the tone of a lot of your posts IMO.

Anyway, you said "to prove my worth", so I think the Leeds comparison hold up perfectly well. People wave flags, banners, and scarves of clubs to show they are part of the crowd, and support their team. I don't see anything at all wrong with the same being done for a national side.

Watch the world cup, and you will see flags of every nation being waved in the crowds, or painted on the cheeks of pretty Brazillian ladies. It doesn't make them nationalist mentalists!

I am a bit patriotic, I don't wave a flag at games, because I can't be arsed, but I would wave one and it would mean only that I was cheering on my country's team. Yes there are plenty of people who would wave the flag, and also be nasty racists c**ts, but that doesn't mean that everyone waving the flag should be labelled so!

I really don't get where you're coming from, you support your national team, so you are being patriotic to some degree. What is the difference?

[Keef]

Forget that whole post, and just read Jeremy's above it. It's put a lot more clearly in his.

[gallinello]

Yes, Jeremy, but those other countries didn't have an Empire as 'we' had. And those other countries' banners were rallying ensigns of liberty, equality and fraternity, or focal, vocal symbols against foreign domination.

Our culture is different and the Union flag, or the cross of St. George, can both signal and connote hostile, nationalistic and martial sentiments.

Unfurl the red flag, the people's flag, the international banner of all nations, workers unite!!

[Tony.London Suburbs]

gallinello Wrote:

Unfurl the red flag, the people's flag, the international banner of all nations, workers unite!!

Right On Brother! I'm with you all the way!

btw: Which Team is that please?

[????]

During the World Cup I notice plenty of people from ethnic minorities with english flags and shirts proudly and openly worn, for the 'resl' world the english flsg was claimed back from extremist years ago.....perhsps it's just in the minds of the white, liberal, out of touch, middle class left that it marks you out as some kind of fascist

[????]

welcome back Sean ;-)

[Marmora Man]

gallinello Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> Yes, Jeremy, but those other countries didn't have

> an Empire as 'we' had. And those other countries'

> banners were rallying ensigns of liberty, equality

> and fraternity, or focal, vocal symbols against

> foreign domination.

> Our culture is different and the Union flag, or

> the cross of St. George, can both signal and

> connote hostile, nationalistic and martial

> sentiments.

> Unfurl the red flag, the people's flag, the

> international banner of all nations, workers

> unite!!

Galinello - I'd venture to suggest that many of the former Soviet Union states and other Iron Curtain countries found the Red Flag hostile and martial - if not nationalistic. It's also somewhat presumptuous to ascribe all colonialism to Great Britain - France, Germany, Holland, Japan, in the last two centuries, Spain in the 15th & 16th centuries, prior to that take your pick of marauding military forces looking for land and booty.

[Sherwick]

Geez, looking at the BBC HYS on the election, you'd be forgiven for thinking that the BNP swept the board! (I have seen this all before with the Republican party when I lived in the USA though lol).

[Keef]

Lets all just take some solace in the fact that the BNP actually got less votes this election than they did last time round.

[Sherwick]

The BNP have won two seats. Two. Fewer people voted for them than last time around. Other minor parties have fared better, but aren't sensationalist enough to grab headlines. E.g. the Greens did much better this time round.

Contrary to popular belief amongst racists, there is no 'surge' towards the BNP whatsoever.

[????]

the problem is not the share or numbers but that the seats give them some ill-deserved legitimacy. The good news is that their vote fell in areas where they have council seats...suggesting that their obvious stupidity rather than their odious views makes them poor at delivering

[Tony.London Suburbs]

???? Wrote:

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> the problem is not the share or numbers but that

> the seats give them some ill-deserved legitimacy.

> The good news is that their vote fell in areas

> where they have council seats...suggesting that

> their obvious stupidity rather than their odious

> views makes them poor at delivering

There is also the point that they now will, legitimately, be able to claim all their "Research" costs.

[Sherwick]

Well, like the extremist Republian party in the USA, they'll soon eat themselves.

[Andystar]

taper Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> An odd subject for your first post. By "right",

> you mean the facist BNP presumably ("they just won

> another")?

>

> I think everyone that voted for them should hang

> their heads in shame this morning.

>

> What do you think?

i think they should just hang...

I can't believe people voted for him

Check out this sorry lot losers

[Tony.London Suburbs]

Why have The Socialists done so poorly throughout Europe in these European Elections?

[Marmora Man]

Tony.London Suburbs Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> Why have The Socialists done so poorly throughout

> Europe in these European Elections?

Perhaps people are beginning to recognise that a suprastate is not exactly what they want or need. Maybe we can start to reverse direction and dismantle some of the more absurd policies. However, I'm more inclined to believe it's just apathy rather than a change of mind.

[Tony.London Suburbs]

I have read this from last December MM.

"European socialist leaders meeting in Spain on Tuesday predicted electoral gains in the wake of the global financial crisis which has revealed the "failure" of the policies of their rivals on the right.

"Conservatives have perhaps a policy for sunny days but now it is rainy and cold. This crisis is an opportunity for social democrats," the leader of Sweden's opposition Social Democrats, Mona Sahlin, told the Madrid gathering, which wound up on Tuesday.

Many of the slogans at the two-day meeting of the Party of European Socialists (PES), that groups socialists and social democratic parties in the European Parliament, mirrored those of the campaign of US President-elect Barack Obama, which successfully tapped into voter concerns over the economy.

"The time is changing now," said former Danish prime minister and the current PES president, Poul Nyrup Rasmussen while others repeated Obama's core slogan: "Yes, we can!".

The global financial crisis has led to an abrupt economic slowdown across Europe and rising unemployment.

It comes as right-wing parties are in government in three major European economies -- Germany, Italy and France -- and have the most seats of any political grouping in the 785-seat European Parliament.

Spanish Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero, one of the few European socialist party leaders to remain in power in recent years, predicted left-wing formations would make gains in next year's European Parliament elections.

Reading the above makes me fail to understand why The Socialists have taken more than their share of the blame for the current Global crisis across Europe.

[bignumber5]

Sherwick Wrote:

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> Contrary to popular belief amongst racists, there

> is no 'surge' towards the BNP whatsoever.

I don't think anyone is suggesting that previously moderate people heard about the expenses row or looked at their new fixed rate and decided that the best solution all round was to become a born again racist. But, unfortunately, the disillusioned "i'm not voting for any of them, they're all as bad as each other blah blah expenses blah recession blah blah" from previous labour (and other main party) supporters allowed the BNP to acquire seats without getting any more votes than in previous years. What was the turn out: 40-something%? I believe that it is the headmaster in The Breakfast Club that brought us the phrase "Apathy is the glove into which evil slips it's hand", and we now have racist scum representing us to Europe.

I assign equal blame to the BNP, it's mindless fuckwit voters, and anyone that didn't vote at all: could've stopped it and didn't.

[Shu.Kurimu.Sensei]

Lets not forget that there are plenty of people from ALL races and nationalities in London, and indeed in ED that are just as racist as the idiots who voted for the BNP. I speak from experience of being in a very happy mixed marriage. Racism is not just a "white" problem.

The sooner people wake up to the fact that we were all black originally, and apes before that, mitochondria before even that, the better.

[gallinello]

Marmora - With all respect, the flag of Stalinism is not the flag of which I speak.

And how exactly do I ascribe all colonialism to Britain? Simply answered, I don't!

Britain's colonial hegemony was more pervasive, potent and recent than the failed, piecemeal attempts at colonization of the countries you list.

Additionally, the last time this country was invaded and conquered was in 1066, whereas all those nations you list.... Well, pull down the history books from your groaning shelves, MM, then we'll have a conversation.

Historical, political and socio-economic factors all coalesce to create the flag-waving, 'god save the queen' ranting, beer-bellied 'we'll fight 'em on the beaches' mentality that delivers up 2 BNP Euro Parliament seats.

Rally round the flag, boys!

Marmora, are you from these parts? Then why don't you understand where the last refuge of a scoundrel is sited?

[Whynniard]

" I don't understand why people find it so hard to accept that there is a racist underbelly in the UK, just as there is in every other Western democracy. "

too simplistic.........have you been to saudia, iran, india to name but a few.