jayj wrote:why are they being so belligerent ?
I thought about this question too "why are they being so belligerent?"
I think the root is at the UK people, mainly the so-called "local UK people" who think they are the true owner of "the land". They are fear of immigration and they vote for parties that appear tough.
In general UK people enjoy a good life but not work as hard as most other peoples. However, most of they don't know their good life is built on 200 years' accumulation by all means (good and bad) of their previous governments. Skilled immigrants work harder than them, and quite often are better educated than them, so most UK people feel they are under threat. Put it frankly, most UK people are not competitive at all. You only need to see how hard our kids study in the school.
So-called "local UK people" cry to let the government protect their job even they are not as good as immigrants. Who cares about UK PLC? If the whole UK economy becomes a job protection scheme, it will be destroied eventually and nobody gets a job. You think this is pretty obvious, but believe it or not, most UK people don't see the point!
There are economists who have long term view, who know that this country needs skilled immigrants, but UK politics is short-term, one election per 4-year. Therefore, to get popular vote, the government needs to ignore what economists say and do short-sighted things to stay in power. It is very simple. It shows that democracy has its limitation too.
This is the tragedy of this people, this country. Time has moved on, but UK is declining. It is trying to close its door. The USA is still going well in terms of economy, but that is thanking to its immigration policy came into effect 10-20 years ago. USA is now tightenting up immigration as well and its effect will show only 10-20 years later.
Unfortunately people tend to link current economic status to current policies and governents are good at manipulating figures to show that their policy is right. In fact, current economic status is due to old policies and the effect of new policies only show 10 years later. Not a lot of UK public think this way. Most UK people think the economy is good now, so they don't need immigrants. I can see after 10 years, when UK's economy is declining, UK people will blame the then government, not knowing it is their decisions now to blame.
The nowaday's world economy is about technology and knowledge. I don't think most UK people want to work hard and study hard to compete with other countries. They are more interested in debating more important things such as moral, religion, freedom, human rights and principles. They forgot that all these must be built on material and they forgot or don't even know the colonial history which enabled this people to enjoy their good life now.
Good life doesn't come free and cheap, someone somewhere needs to actually work hard to prduce the wealth! However, most UK people choose to shut their eyes and think as long they don't see hard working immigrants in this country, they are alright! They probably know they will regret years later, but they don't care. After all, it will be the problem of their children's and grand children's, not theirs? Well, not quite, look at the pension fund crisis, we need to work to 65/70 years old to get our pension now. Who to blame, the government or the business?
The People Themselves! That is the price to pay for having a good life but not working hard enough!
So what are the conclusions:
(1) Democracy doesn't help immigrants, but the legal system might. Although politics is short-term and policy makers are short-sighted, judges are not. They must act according to principles and laws. I have one last hope for the British System, and that is the legal system. I think a judicial review can test whether British democracy can solve its contemporary problems.
(2)
If the judicial review rules that the govenrment is in the right. Then, I will move to the USA and I call all immigrant professionals to move to USA. Why? Because everybody in USA is immigrants apart from native American Indians. After all, isn't that what UK people want us to do? Just disappear and go away?
PS: sorry for being very critical today. I must say that UK is still a leading country in many fields such as research, environmental protection and human rights etc. But the point is, it is declining, and fast... And it is down to the people... If immigrants don't want to go down with the sinking boat, we need to act to change the situation, or just move.
simply does whatever it wants!
