Brexit and the waning days of the United Kingdom

[Josquius]

I think Eskimo/Inuit situation is a pretty "testy" one especially for outsiders. Inuit is seen as a somewhat acceptable term for all Northern Indigenous peoples ranging from Alaska to Greenland, but that's with a major caveat that in the far West of Alaska where the Yupik peoples live, they do not like being lumped in with the term Inuit (because they are not Inuit.) In Alaska many of the indigenous people are comfortable with the Exonym "Eskimo" but in Canada many groups view the term Eskimo as racist. I've always felt like unless you really know what you're doing you should be careful with the use of all of these terms, at least in the company of such peoples.

Fair enough - I know there are groups in Alaska that use and prefer the term "Eskimo".  This might have been my Canadianess showing.  I am fairly familiar with those terms, having gone to both Alaska and Nunavut.

That being said "Eskimo" is somewhat debatable in Canada too.  The local CFL club was until recently called the Edmonton Eskimos.  They did not use any indigenous imagery or symbols - just the name.  Edmonton is not traditional Eskimo/Inuit territory, but as Canada's largest, most northernest city, has lots of connections to the north.  Anyways, in those surverys, Inuit people were pretty much divided roughly 50/50 on whether they thought the name "Eskimos" was appropriate for the football team.  Plenty of them thought it was racist, but plenty of them thought it was an honourable name.  Eventually the team changed it's name to the Elks just because the controversy wasn't going to go away otherwise.

That being said I still don't know what Josquis was talking about when he brought them up.

The knee jerk reaction of many is omg you can't say Eskimo that's so offensive, they're called Inuit.... When plenty of the people traditionally called Eskimo aren't inuit and get pissed off at being called such.
From what I gather and as ovb says some of them might even be OK with Eskimo.

Likewise gypsy is traditionally used to refer to a broad group of people and you do get misguided attempts at being pc saying they're romani when a lot of them aren't and would prefer gypsy to that (though their actual name most of all of course).

They are called Roma or Travellers here. Two distinct groups. They don't like being confused with each other and don't like being called gypsies.

Travellers aren't really an ethnic group, they are just a bunch of Irish criminals who live in mobile homes.

Define an ethnic group.
It's a fluffy and unscientific term at the best of times largely based on self identification.

There have been studies that find travellers have a genetic divergance from the Irish population stretching back a significant time.

[Sheilbh]

Fair piece from the Economist on talk of emigration popping up again:

Emigration is in the air for Britons
Plenty of people want to come to Britain. But lots also want to leave
Dec 1st 2022

Adverts on TalkSport, a radio station that does what it says on the tin, reveal the state of the nation. McDonald's advertises for workers in Britain's tight labour market. Santander, a bank, warns against falling victim to fraud, which is rife. Amid it all, the government desperately reminds listeners that it has already knocked £400 ($480) off their energy bills.

But every 15 minutes the listener is treated to an alternative. "Build a life in Western Australia," blares out a man with a questionable Aussie accent. "Find the work and lifestyle you want in Western Australia." White Van Man is implored to ditch Britain and head 9,000 miles (14,500km) south-east for a new life in Perth, which has sunshine and jobs galore in construction and manufacturing. It is, says the jobbing actor, "the lifestyle you deserve".

Migration policy in Britain is framed almost entirely by people arriving. More attention should be paid to those on the way out. In the year to June 2022, over 1m people entered Britain. But people come and go. About 560,000 left the country in the same period, as immigrants returned home to the eu and beyond, and Britons took a punt on starting a new life elsewhere. Unless things improve, many more will follow.

Historically, Britain is a country of emigration rather than immigration. During the 19th century only Ireland, Italy and Norway exported people at a higher rate. The history of those who arrived from the Caribbean on hmt Empire Windrush in 1948 is well known. The tales of the millions of Britons who boarded the ss Canberra and other ocean liners for a new life in Australia and beyond is overlooked, argues David Edgerton, a historian. Britain only became a country of predominantly net immigration in 1983.

When emigration last haunted politicians, Britain was in a rut. In 1974 Jim Callaghan, then the foreign secretary and a future prime minister, joked: "Sometimes when I go to bed at night, I think that if I were a young man I would emigrate." After all, Britain was a country with stagnant growth, high inflation, high taxes, an energy crisis and a state in dramatic need of overhaul.

The circumstances that had Callaghan dreaming of life elsewhere then are similar to today's. Young, potentially mobile workers have it hardest. Graduate-trainee salaries have fallen by 22% in real terms since 2010, according to High Fliers, a graduate-recruitment research agency. An uneven tax system whacks thrusting youngsters. Overall the British state has a smaller tax take than its European neighbours. But those on a typical professional salary with a student loan face marginal rates (41%) similar to those in continental Europe and higher than in Australia and Canada.

People leave when opportunity lies elsewhere. The realisation that Britain is not, by north European standards, a rich country is entering the country's bloodstream. British gdp per person is now below countries it used to rival, whether Germany, Australia or Canada. Britain's comparison country is increasingly Italy, a country where it is the norm for young people to leave, rather than an exception. In a few years' time the point of comparison may be Poland, which thanks to tearaway growth, is always gagging for workers. In the 1980s "Auf Wiedersehen, Pet", a TV comedy about a group of Geordie builders working in Germany, became a hit. A 2030 remake might be titled "Do Widzenia, Pet".

For now, the last ones in are the first ones out. A net influx of eu citizens has turned into an exodus. Fanny, a 25-year-old Frenchwoman who graduated from the London School of Economics in 2020, is one. Of the roughly 20 French students on her course, she was one of only two to stick around. Now she too is departing, after taking a job in Marseille. Her salary will be the same in net terms but instead of paying for a room in a dingy flatshare in east London, it will stretch to a one-bed flat. If a job in London, where British salaries are highest, requires living in a flat-share until your 30s no wonder people consider going elsewhere.

Those with the easiest path of departure are the most likely to take it. Doctors possess a golden ticket: few countries turn them away. Given wages have dropped by 10% in real terms since 2010 and working conditions are worsening, it is little surprise that many doctors leave. Half of the 10,000 doctors who stopped practising in 2021 intended to go abroad (about 120,000 doctors work in the NHS in England). One in three doctors trained in Britain go on to leave the country, according to a survey by the General Medical Council. Britain has become a temperate Philippines, churning out health-care workers who head elsewhere.

The emigrant song

At this point in the political and economic cycle, all sides are fed up. Labourites despair; Europhiles seethe that their life's work has been smashed up; Brexiteers moan that the country is closer to London-sur-Seine than Singapore-on-Thames. Meanwhile, a recession looms. It is natural for people to think of leaving. But talk about a new life abroad is often just that. Actually doing it is tricky. Visas must be obtained, job offers secured, flights booked, bureaucracies navigated, homes found and friends made. The history of migration is the history of the vast majority of people staying put.

Yet emigration from Britain slowed only when destination countries such as Australia tightened their immigration policies. Now, after years of lockdowns, gaps in labour markets have become canyons and the likes of Australia and Canada are gagging for arrivals, as TalkSport listeners can attest. When immigration to Britain hits 1m, the government panics. When Canada reached the same relative rate this year, its government boasted.

Things in Britain can improve. But if not, leaving is once again an option. In 1978, a year before she defeated Callaghan in an election, Margaret Thatcher told a dining companion about her plans if she did not win: "We'll always stay...but we'll work very hard with the children to set them up with careers in Canada." Emigration has long been a British solution to British malaise.

[Tamas]

Yet Hungarians in Romania get a better treatment than in Slovakia for instance, so I am not sure it is the best example.

I mean, the post-1945 score of anti-Hungarian pogroms is Slovakia 0 Romania 1 (well, multiple, I think, in the late 80s). Actually since it relates to the discussion here, there was a famous instance of Hungarian protesters surrounded by pro-regime Romanians in a town, getting ready for their next round of beatings when a sizeable group of local and area Roma turned up to support the Hungarians and avoiding them being lynched. The Roma community leader who organised that -and probably saved lives- died recently.

[Josquius]

Fair piece from the Economist on talk of emigration popping up again:
[to British malaise.

[/quote]

It's curious how we have a sort of blind spot to emigration despite all those house in the sun tv shows and the like.
The Auf wiedershen pet era just doesn't factor in people's minds at all.
There's such a huge mental block that Britain is just better than anywhere else and unless it's for retiring/opening a pub in the poverty stricken sunlands of Benidorm or some other oddity like marrying a foreigner then it isn't done.

It does make me wonder though. I remember reading back at brexit time when free movement with Australia was mooted that they'd never go for this as they'd get a brain drain to London.
I do wonder who'd get the most of that.

[Sheilbh]

I'm not sure - I mean I think everyone in the country probably has a family member or friend who's moved to Australia or Canada especially. Many will have looked into it - looking at my family I've got an aunty and loads of cousins in Australia, my parents looked into emigrating too. I don't think people have a mental block on emigration (I think the estimate is that there's about 5-6 million Brits living abroad). I could be wrong but I think I read that the UK has quite a high number of emigrants compared to other similar-ish countries (I think France and Germany are both around the 3-4 million).

But I think in the context of Europe because of the shameful state of language learning/teaching it is probably disproportionately elderly people in Spain, Greece, France, Malta, Portugal etc. So when we were in the EU about 25% of British emigrants lived in the rest of the EU (which is less than, say, Australia) which was the lowest rate in the EU by some distance - for comparison about half of German emigrants live in other EU states. My suspicion is that those Brits are also unusually elderly rather than working age compared to other European countries, so it is Place in the Sun type moves.

I don't remember anything like that about Australia worrying about a brain drain.

[Duque de Bragança]

Yet Hungarians in Romania get a better treatment than in Slovakia for instance, so I am not sure it is the best example.

I mean, the post-1945 score of anti-Hungarian pogroms is Slovakia 0 Romania 1 (well, multiple, I think, in the late 80s). Actually since it relates to the discussion here, there was a famous instance of Hungarian protesters surrounded by pro-regime Romanians in a town, getting ready for their next round of beatings when a sizeable group of local and area Roma turned up to support the Hungarians and avoiding them being lynched. The Roma community leader who organised that -and probably saved lives- died recently.

I was speaking as of now  not during communism. Ceaucescu's régime turned to nationalism to hide its failures.

Slovakia had Meciar much more recently.

[Admiral Yi]

:lol:yeah but if the transcript is even vaguely correct her problem is being a condescending racist bitch, not old age.

I don't see the evidence for her being racist.  There are basically two places a black person in the UK can be from, Africa and the Caribbean.  There is nothing inherently racist about asking where someone is from.  I've asked plenty of blacks with African accents where they're from and every one has happily answered.

There was one time when I asked a coworker where he was from and he said Jamaica.  I was a little puzzled because his accent was very Haitian but didn't say anything.  A while later he came up to me and told me he had lied because Haiti has a bad reputation.

IMO her sin was, as other people have noted, in insisting on the question after it had become clear the black woman didn't want to answer.  That's clunky and clumsy and tone deaf, but racist?  It's racist IMO only if pressing the black woman to say her family immigrated to the UK 2 or 3 generations ago from the Caribbean (I presume) is a racist act.

I think this is one of the core arguments about PC/woke.  Is it a racist act if the recipient takes offense, even if no offense was intended?  Or if other minority members in the same situation would not take offense at the same question?

[Tamas]

I am sorry Yi but if the attitude isn't obvious for you from that transcript, then it's not just the elderly woman who is tone deaf. I don't understand what is there to explain about it.

[Admiral Yi]

I don't understand what is there to explain about it.

There was presumably a thought process you went through to decide she is a condescending racist bitch.  Explain that thought process to me.

[Admiral Yi]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kjc4BISnpLA

On the palace story.  Nothing new.  Faces you can put on the people.

[OttoVonBismarck]

The part where the black lady makes it clear she isn't interested in that line of questioning and the old bag keeps asking. It's like if someone asks you a personal question and you make it abundantly clear you aren't interested in answering, that's where it stops. When you ask it 4 more times you're beyond boorish and just a straight asshole. Not sure how that isn't obvious from the text of the transcript unless you have Autism and can't understand basic human social interactions.

Also the fact where she makes it abundantly clear you can't be British if you're black. It's hard to believe your skull is this thick Yi.

[Josquius]

:lol:yeah but if the transcript is even vaguely correct her problem is being a condescending racist bitch, not old age.

I don't see the evidence for her being racist.  There are basically two places a black person in the UK can be from, Africa and the Caribbean.  There is nothing inherently racist about asking where someone is from.  I've asked plenty of blacks with African accents where they're from and every one has happily answered.

So did this woman.
Iirc she said she was from London and has an accent to match?
Because that's the truth.
Obviously when someone has an African accent the answer will be somewhere in Africa.

I think this is one of the core arguments about PC/woke.  Is it a racist act if the recipient takes offense, even if no offense was intended?  Or if other minority members in the same situation would not take offense at the same question?

Racism comes in levels.
Screaming death to the darkies is or course the sort of thing one finds at the pinnacle and isn't what we have here.
But we do have somebody who really should know better and can't use ignorance as an excuse being pretty judgementally racist.

[Admiral Yi]

But we do have somebody who really should know better and can't use ignorance as an excuse being pretty judgementally racist.

Where did she demonstrate judgemmentalism?

[Gups]

It's curious how we have a sort of blind spot to emigration despite all those house in the sun tv shows and the like.
The Auf wiedershen pet era just doesn't factor in people's minds at all.
There's such a huge mental block that Britain is just better than anywhere else and unless it's for retiring/opening a pub in the poverty stricken sunlands of Benidorm or some other oddity like marrying a foreigner then it isn't done.

Who actually thinks this otside of your imagination?

[Gups]

I don't see the evidence for her being racist.  There are basically two places a black person in the UK can be from, Africa and the Caribbean.  There is nothing inherently racist about asking where someone is from.  I've asked plenty of blacks with African accents where they're from and every one has happily answered.

No, Yi. Black people in the UK can come from the UK. THe vast majority of them do. Including this woman who hass a very clear London accent.