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[hector13]

I did think he was the least objectionable during the lead up to Truss, but that’s like saying I’d rather be punched in the left arm rather than the right.

He also seems to actually give a shit about the union beyond the sake of the union, but we’ll see how that goes. If he does well with that a I’ll be sad, but he’s a Tory so if he does well for anything other than South-East England the world will end.

[Grim Portent]

Well this is a nice surprise, though I dunno anything about him. What is nice is seeing all the white racists get triggered that he is now PM of the conservative party lol. Granted, I dunno if the conservative party is like right or left wing or middle or whatever, but I just like seeing all the racists mad. I mean, I assume they lean right cause of the name and all, but europe parties are a bit weird cause I thought some were right wing based on the name but were actually left/middle lol. And even reading about them, it doesn't help sometimes what they are I'm just a dumb american who only understands our own parties lol.

I really thought it was gonna be Boris again, so at least its not him.

Brief rundown of the important UK parties.

Conservatives are firmly right wing. Before Brexit they had a centre-right faction, but after some candidate shuffling post-Brexit those guys mostly got replaced with more right wing people, so the party as a whole has jumped a chunk further to the right over the last decade or so. The members have always been pretty right wing, but it was generally considered rude to espouse the viewpoints that they hold in polite company, so until recently they just didn't talk about it much outside of pubs.

Labour is the center/center-left/center-right party, with a small contingent of proper left wing people. Used to be actual socialists, grew out of miners strikes and so on around the start of the 1900s as the political representative of the unions, became a neo-liberal middle class dominated party in the 90s. Big rift between their different member groups, a mix of ideological and class based divides.

Lib Dems are the 3rd party, waaaaay smaller and less important because of the FPTP electoral system screwing them over. Sort of straddle the center like Labour usually does. Consistently back electoral reform, which is nice. Otherwise couldn't tell you much about them.


Far as English politics goes they're basically all that matter, and sadly that means they're basically all that matter in UK politics. Odd one's out for minor parties being the SNP and the DUP, two regional parties that actually do matter from time to time.

SNP are the Scottish nationalist party, left/center-left, and have basically replaced Labour in Scotland. They back electoral reform, though the current stupidity that is FPTP is the only reason they have a good chunk of seats in Parliament, and Independance of course. In parliament they basically vote with Labour.

DUP are the Northern Irish unionist party. Pro-UK, very conservative on social issues, generally considered more than a bit insane by everyone in the rest of the UK. Main rival is Sinn Fein, the Irish republican party, who are vaguely center-left to my recollection, and while they stand in UK elections they don't actually take the seats they win because they would have to swear an oath to the monarch, leaving them vacant as a protest instead. Traditionally the UK parties don't stand in NI, so it's basically just the two of them there.

[Lidku]

Rishi Sunak becoming the next Prime Minister is super freaking EPIC.

And the fact he's PM out of the Conservative Party is even more deliciously ironic. His colleagues must be secretly going crazy on the inside. LOL

More British Raj to Prime Ministership of the UK.. it's come full circle..

[hector13]

His colleagues are the ones that put him in position though? He was also most popular among his party colleagues the first time round.

The party members are probably not happy about it though.

[Starver]

(Re: Brief rundown)

Well, LibDems were formed from the Liberal Party (once the main to-and-fro competitor with the Conservatives, back before Labour emerged as a political force[1]) and the SDP (Social Democractic Party, created by the "Gang Of Four" - four dissaffected Labour centrists - after Labour lost to Thatcher's Conservatives in 1979) and have generally been the (distant-)third party for most of the time since they were created, at least at National level.  When Labour (under then PM Brown) found itself nearly level-pegging with the Conservatives (under next PM Cameron) with neither having a majority, the LibDems formed a Coaliation with the Conservatives (as hinted by my naming the next PM!) in what seemed like a mixture of "king-maker" and somehow getting into power even though (despite doing well) they were nowhere near getting into power under their own steam.

The result put many people off the idea of coaliaions, which aren't generally a thing that happens here in the UK; though the DUP supporting the Conservatives under May, etc, might be considered similar.

It also put people off the LibDems, for 'selling out'. Because of various promises by the LibDems (e.g. tuition fee issues that attracted students to them) which they surely thought they'd never have to honour. They clearly found that they had to default on them, as junior partner to the Tories, and so disappointed many of their natural base. They probably moderated some Conservative things, but it's hard to tell how much so they really couldn't get any credit for making an already bad Austerity.  (It was in light of the global economic depression which Brown had mitigated a bit, probably, but because he left office and the low-tax/low-spend Tories took over we never really got any hint of the complete bounce-back of the kind we might - or might not - have had.


Also, add Plaid Cymru ("Plide Cumree") to the 'others' list. The Welsh party that does the same as the SNP does for Scotland (though more rumbling and less "absolutely in control of their own regional government), and... these days at least... not as radically subnationalist as Sinn Feinn might be considered to be (except, of course, they also don't just not want to be part of the UK, they also want to become part of Ireland.

All-nation (or at least all-British Mainlaind[2]) parties also include everything from the wacky Official Monster Raving Loony Party (whose policies I think are probably the most realistic) to the wacko successors to the United Kingdom Independence Party (whose policies got absorbed into the Tories anyway, but not very successfully). There's also your Greens (with actual MPs, but not many, and certainly below their proportional level of general support) and redder-than-the-Red/etc parties. But effectively it's two parties (and a third) in the UK parliament, one party dominant (and the other main three as also-rans) in the Scottish one, a rather more dynamic and (generally?) friendly mix in the Welsh assembly and nobody doing that much in the Norn Ir'n one as one party (and, seemingly, it is always the same one party these days) not playing ball and so spoiling it for everyone else.

[1] Pror to Conservatives/Liberals it was various other pairings, generally, like "Whigs and Tories", but the lines from the Tories of old to the (conserva)Tories of now are a bit mixed. And I couldn't tell you the ins and outs off the top of my head...

[2] NI being a special case. I think it's bascially got two pro-Irish parties, two pro-British parties (each half of each half swaying politically in the more usual two directions as well) and a "we don't have an opinion" fifth-party trying to lever itself in there. But of all the areas of the UK I find that one a little bit harder to even think I understand.

[Loud Whispers]

'As is tradition with BBC executives, once something is 17 years old they lose interest,'
- the last joke on Mock the Week. Man I'm gonna miss that show.

Anyways RE Rishi Sunak owning the racists I would ask our Atlantic cousins to not project their culture war onto the UK; I grow tired of reading about how every European politician is the Trump of xyz country or this is sure to rile up all the racists as if Sharon Grimaline Barnsdale from Farnham age 56 is the same as some Washington suit with a KKK hood in the closet -_-

For context the UK conservative party is usually the party of firsts. First Jewish PM, first female PM, first British-Indian female home secretary, first Black Chancellor of the Exchequer, first British Asian home secretary, first Buddhist home secretary and there's probably a whole bunch of other first this first that you can add that I don't remember. The UK parliament had its first black MP before the USA existed; though it's honestly a stupid metric to go on. The conservative party markets itself as the party which doesn't care what you are, and the party credits that with why it scores all the "firsts." The quiet part is they don't care what you are provided you have money, but I digress. You may as well be celebrating an Irish PM who opposed Irish home rule on the basis that it would surely upset the English, or celebrate a Jewish PM who supported aggressive imperialism because it would surely offend the Christians, or support the first female PM who unleashed privatisation on the UK because it would surely upset the misogynists.

I'm upset about Rishi because he's not the right man for the job. He's in it for the money, was raised in a boarding school that charges twice the salary of anyone in my borough, has a clear conflict of interest with awarding government contracts to companies his wife has shares in, bragged about ending the reallocation funding of impoverished areas of the UK, and when confronted with his tax dodging responded by saying they pay all the tax they're legally obliged to

Regarding libdems, they really could've been something. Breaking the student fees promise was such a bizarre move that guaranteed their death, then in the post-Clegg world they drifted without a clear goal or purpose. Stuff like "we'll add a heart to Tories and a brain to labour" was a poor slogan, because it didn't have any clear identity to gather people around besides "hate labour hate tories simple as." Which was fine in a world where the spawnlings of Farage didn't exist. Their voting reform was a missed opportunity :/

[EuchreJack]

You know, the Republican party has firsts also...

But back to the point, sorta sad to see that apparently the Left is completely out of English politics.  Then again, you lot still have nobility, so I guess that makes sense.

But back to the original "culture wars" comment: Wait and see how bad the racists get AFTER your first brown PM. 
For the love of God DON'T let the racists take over one of your three major political parties.  They'll certainly TRY to take over Labour or LibDems, if they're anything like the Far-Right drek.  For better or worse, they're less likely to take over the party that put the leading brown man in charge.  LibDems seem particularly vulnerable since they need a cause, but if Labour draws upon the working class, there might be fears of job stealing to draw upon.

[Grim Portent]

Racism is normally more of a draw for the Conservative base in my experience. They like to hammer the 'tough on immigration' line. Not actually doing anything about it of course, because our economy needs young people to prop up our aging demographics. They also present themselves as the financially responsible ones, but IIRC the deficit tends to grow under their care.

Lib Dems are big on multiculturalism and quite firm supporters of individual rights, so it'd be a hard sell for them. Wouldn't be surprised to see some racism bubbling away behind closed doors, but it's not something they would try to build a platform on. I don't recall any racism related scandals with them.

Labour has some issues with racism, from both the working class and middle/upper class elements. Tends to make the news more because they've generally taken the party line of being pro-multiculturalism, so allowing racists to run around is hypocritical.

[Starver]

The actual Left (in UK terms... given how variable that is in international experiences) isn't as 'out of it' as all that.

The whole push for Jeremy Corbyn[1] by the "Momentum" group wasn't imaginary. Even if the dedicated Socialist Worker sellers/subscribers might think he doesn't veer to port quite as much as the 'real real Left' would like.

True, though, that (perhaps as a bounce-back against the Corbynite motion) while Starmer is almost by definition leftward-inclined[2] he can be considered centre-left, centre or even centre-right, depending upon the issues concerned. (Perhaps because of the Tories vacating the near-centre ground and the LDs being somewhat MIA still.)


The left-Left has had problems, though. Though not uniquely so, they seem to have been hit by various "-isms and -ists" scandals; antisemitism in particular, not helped by the dreadful handling of the aftermath. And, like US politics, it seems that similar scandals in the right-Right area of politics (perhaps anti-Islamic, though anti-Jewish is of course something there too) just don't stick anything like as much for... reasons.

((And this latter point has been nicely described by Grim, who has ninjaed me and done a better job of summarising some aspects of it.))

And so there's an Overton Window aspect, but I don't think that there's really a lack of Left-Wingers. Just that you get a number of Brexiteer Leftists who seem to have decided that Brexiteer Right candidates are preferable to various choices of (potentially-)Europhile Left ones for just that one single-issue reason.  And, seeing some interviews, apparently without yet admitting that they'd just kicked themselves in the teeth by doing so.


[1] One of a strange string of people named Jeremy... a very diverse field they're arrayed across. Consider a comparison between Corbyn, Clarkson, Paxman, Vine, Beadle, Hardy... I get the idea that most any random pairing of those would create an argument. (Even Paxman and Vine, BBC stalwarts both but of differing styles. And as for even whether left-wing comedian Hardy would have tolerated left-wing politician Corbyn..?)

[2] Definitely his father was. I mean, naming his son after Labour's first parliamentary leader isn't meaningless... And I can confirm that this was not a surprise to those who knew him.

[Loud Whispers]

You know, the Republican party has firsts also...

This corroborates my point; being the "first" of anything is not even a token indication of good intent to anyone. My list is not a list of celebration, it's pointing out how being the first x has no correlation to supporting anything, not even the interests of the demographic they hail from. Like a gay politician who supports gay torture camps. There's no kudos for winning a personal career milestone.

But back to the point, sorta sad to see that apparently the Left is completely out of English politics.  Then again, you lot still have nobility, so I guess that makes sense.

It's more to do with bankers than barons but the end result is the same

But back to the original "culture wars" comment: Wait and see how bad the racists get AFTER your first brown PM.

A white man attacked my mother during covid for coming from a covid-prevalent country, despite not coming from there, and working on the vaccine trial. Two white Britons came to her defence and forced him to back off. I've been assaulted twice on my race; one was black, the other brown. I've seen one serious case of harassment where a tall white skinhead was verbally abusing and intimdating a muslim girl. But these have been mostly exceptional. On the day to day basis the most serious racism I see or others tell me they find are problems of community (no one trusts each other), problems of belonging (the eternal foreigner wherever they are "oh that's an interesting accent where's it from or where are you really from though"), dealing with a casual racism (banter which doesn't stop but got old a long time ago) and sophisticated racism (people who are turbofucking racist but have the vocabulary of a civil rights campaigner to disguise it). And worst of all, the ever present structural racism, in which you can't get no money or post because you didn't have the right lineage, and having an xyz at the top doesn't change it because the structure is still the same :|
Racism is rarely simple. If it was as easy as bad guys vs good guys it would be wonderful but peace between two people is easy, prosperity between communities is difficult, prosperity between communities that aren't even communities is something that needs thought (money can substitute) to achieve

 
For the love of God DON'T let the racists take over one of your three major political parties.  They'll certainly TRY to take over Labour or LibDems, if they're anything like the Far-Right drek.  For better or worse, they're less likely to take over the party that put the leading brown man in charge.  LibDems seem particularly vulnerable since they need a cause, but if Labour draws upon the working class, there might be fears of job stealing to draw upon.

It's the UK. Our racist parties don't care what race you are as long as you are racist too

I am not joking. But you can laugh if you want

Racism is normally more of a draw for the Conservative base in my experience. They like to hammer the 'tough on immigration' line. Not actually doing anything about it of course, because our economy needs young people to prop up our aging demographics. They also present themselves as the financially responsible ones, but IIRC the deficit tends to grow under their care.

There's been a lot of muddling in news between migration, undocumented migration, refugees and so on, it doesn't help to add to it by conflating them here too. Because if you go solely on tax balances and productivity, then conservative policy makes sense - if you wish to benefit from migration, then you need to select for young productive workers, and not include families or older persons who will take more in public spending than they will pay in taxes. But I think it's a dreadful thing to reduce human value down to "you pay taxes or fuck off," especially when there are many peoples with family abroad who cannot bring in their family on a permanent basis because of the trouble of getting a residency visa. Soulless money counting got us into this mess to begin with.

There are four immigration issues which the UK plays political hot potato with;
-The first, which is shared with the LibDems, Labour and Tories, and is reflected in reality, is that migrants who have come here legally are NEEDED for a lot of critical vacancies. Highly technical, highly skilled work for example in the NHS, where the UK employers cannot attract enough UK national workers because the salary is unfair and unlivable. This madness of creating a permanent underclass of people you intend to fuck over until they die, retire or go back home to sustain a system that is inherently unfair is redressed as progressive charity, but is an example of structural racism itself. My own workplace is a marvel of wonderful bosses who do not have a bone of racism in their bodies; nevertheless it chafes me everyday that everyone running the show with no salary are ASEAN or West African or Afro-Caribbean and everyone doing fuck all with huge salaries are WASP.
This is not an acceptable solution. Do not make the jobs you have made hell someone else's problem. Make the jobs acceptable for everyone. I will be happier for it

-The second is the aging population. If young workers must pay for the aging population, then why do we not select for young workers and reject everyone else? Why do we not encourage young peoples to have kids? Because I don't think anyone seriously believes immigration is the answer to our pension or healthcare budget. I have not met a single young person <30 who made more than £29k. Each one at best can give the state £3.6k in income tax, £2.1k in NI and however much in VATs. That wouldn't even cover the NHS balance for 1 old person in 2016, let alone 2022, and does not account for any other gov expenditure. Even if young people did not have the linear habit of becoming old people, current young people and projected young peoples are not enough and will never be enough, because young people are not paid enough as is. Taxes on the already incredible wealth older generations hold, or taxes on the incredible wealth wealther classes of society or corporations possess - though radical, should be considered as potential permanent balances to the government cheque book.

-The third is migration with documents vs migration sans documents. E.g. should you be able to live and work in the UK without a passport at all. Maybe one day; but this is a separate issue, and it is rather annoying that it is bundled together with the first issue when it is its own issue - one which itself should be subdivided, e.g. between people who overstay visas vs people who come here under even more precarious means with even less support available. You can get some nasty end results, like one of my friends from Pakistan who can't afford to stay, can't afford to leave the city, is sleeping on the streets, can't work because he came here illegally and no one will hire you without proof of residence/right to work, has no pathway to citizenship or residency, lost asylum appeal, suffering from heart problems and so on. The problems people like him face are completely different from someone who has come here legally to do work; they will require different responses too. It causes me mental pain to treat such a big issue as just you are racist if you have border control and fuck white people when it goes way beyond that. The race of Priti Patel should not matter when discussing her border policy unless her race is somehow relevant to her border policy, otherwise it's just an uncomfortable insinuation that anyone who is non-white should automatically be in favour of abolishing borders because their parents must've come here illegally -_-

The fourth issue is dealing with refugees, in particular what constitutes a refugee exactly. The main point of contention is that if you cross several safe countries to try and get into the UK sans documents, should you be protected as a refugee or are you in category three. Answer wrong and the gov may exile you to Rwanda, which I'm still not sure how that came to be. There is also an interesting difference in how the UK gov is much more likely to accept refugees who arrive by plane and have good documentation, e.g. Hong Kongers and Ukrainians getting accepted easily versus the 2015 refugee crisis.

There are some other issues which are comparatively less-discussed these days in political hot potato, but are worth mentioning. Multiculturalism was a historic labour meme which hasn't weathered well due to labour malpractice in handling child grooming gangs, terrorism and general national depression. The other thing worth noting is the UK gov taking a stance to effectively exile British citizens who joined ISIS. I'm certain the UK gov will at some point try to make it legal to revoke someone's citizenship even if they have no dual

Lib Dems are big on multiculturalism and quite firm supporters of individual rights, so it'd be a hard sell for them. Wouldn't be surprised to see some racism bubbling away behind closed doors, but it's not something they would try to build a platform on. I don't recall any racism related scandals with them.

They've had some with local council scandals but nothing as far as I remember involving top level LDs

Labour has some issues with racism, from both the working class and middle/upper class elements. Tends to make the news more because they've generally taken the party line of being pro-multiculturalism, so allowing racists to run around is hypocritical.

False allegations

The files obtained by Al Jazeera contain Labour’s disciplinary records from 1998 to 2021 and document their handling by the GLU. They show how some supporters of Corbyn were smeared with false accusations of abusive behaviour submitted to the GLU, including homophobia and anti-Semitism, with the stated intention to suspend or expel them from the party.

Al Jazeera’s Investigative Unit (I-Unit) reveals how a British political party that claims to embrace progressive values created a hierarchy of racism that discriminated against its Black, Asian and Muslim members. Interviews, internal documents and social media messages shared by the most senior staff in The United Kingdom’s Labour Party betrayed a racist culture where abuse was aimed at their own colleagues, councillors and political leaders.

The Labour Files, an I-Unit investigation based on 500 gigabytes of documents, emails, video and audio files from the Labour Party dating from 1998 to 2021, exposes how the party’s campaign to present a tough image on anti-Semitism, while ignoring other forms of discrimination, drove many staff to resign.

The full documentary's worth a watch over an idle lunch. But the reason why the conservatives got away with Boris's casual racism but Corbyn couldn't survive an internal party investigation was that his own party was delaying their own investigation in the hopes it would kill Corbyn's career by paralyzing his ability to do anything about the allegations



tl;dr
stop celebrating firsts for firsts sakes. Celebrate leaders who actually make things better

[EuchreJack]

I'm impressed at your ability to quote me instead of Grim Portent in the discussion of Britain's political parties....

[hector13]

It’s not as impressive as your inability to note that Grim Portent was quoted :p

[EuchreJack]

It’s not as impressive as your inability to note that Grim Portent was quoted :p

Your inability to misunderstand me is...not very impressive.
There is one quote correctly attributed to Grim Portent.  The two quotes afterwards are attributed to me instead of Grim Portent.

Ideally, Lord Whisper will fix the quotes, and I'll look like a loon, and all will be right in the world...

[hector13]

Aaaaay I disappoint everyone why should you be any different.

Misquoting isn’t that big a deal though surely? You’ve not been quoted as a raving Nazi or nuffin’.

We need less Right in the world anyhow.

[EuchreJack]

It's kinda funny that an American was quoted as knowledgeable about British politics.