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Does criticizing immigration make you a hypocrite when YOU yourself have foreign ties
Pfrancis
Posts: 301 Forum Member
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One of my parents was a 70's immigrant yet my sisters do criticize today's immigration but I can't help thinking that they're a little hypocritical when their existence depended on this.
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Well you would be wrong then.
Your foreign parent on the other hand could only be described as hypocritical if they critisised all forms of immigration whatsoever.
If you say stuff like "damn foreigners, they should stay where they belong" and other such bollocks, then yes
If you have genuine concerns with the numbers of people coming in, criminal records, useful experience/skills etc...then no.
Yes it is somewhat strange to be biting the hand that fed you. Most people in this country are immigrants of variant sorts in terms of their ancestors although convincing them of such a fact is seldom possible.
I think there is a difference between legitimate concerns about factors that affect our lives and general complaining about a generic stereotype so it does depend on that.
It was World War Two that brought them together, therefore as a consequence of that war i came into existence.
I don't think anybody would argue that I couldn't criticise war without being a hypocrite.
I see no real difference in the case of your sisters.
And to be honest they aren't many people with BNP type views on immigration.
Most have genuine concerns, I expect your sisters are the same.
Not really. Immigration is not criticised by me because of the people who want to come here, but because of the fact that we have only limited housing stock and diminishing numbers of jobs for them to do.
My maternal Grandparents were Italian and settled here after WW2, when job opportunities were abundant, and housing was not the issue it is now.
Statistically the most common language in my part of London other than English is French. Strangely, I don't feel like I'm in France, any more than I feel like I'm the UK if I go to France and hear a lot of people speaking English.
Cries of 'racist' and all sorts seem to have been a common ploy when anyone criticized immigration, but worries about the extent of it are perfectly reasonable.
And plenty of people from immigrant backgrounds feel the same.
That's my experience, too, particularly my late in-laws who were Jews who came to the UK before WW2. I remember them being splendidly abusive during the 1970s about the Ugandan Asians coming to Britain in circumstances not dissimilar to those they themselves had suffered years before.
I guess people will always find it difficult to square personal experience (Old xxx down the road is OK, it's the others [I've never met] who aren't) with the fairly obvious conclusion that it is the successive waves of immigration and our tolerance of it that puts the Great into Great Britain, and there's nothing to suggest this latest chapter is going to be any different.
There's a difference in having immigrant family ties who worked, made a living, didn't mooch and such. I'm all for people coming here as long as they get jobs, don't mooch and play health tourism. I'd pack the scroungers, preachers and whingers on a boat (I'd also like to put the british scourgers on but apparently we can't)
Is French the only foreign language you hear then?
Back to topic I don't think it's hypocritical myself - they can criticize the same as anyone else born here.
Just like my parents who came here in the sixties. They weren't handed things freely as it seems to be now, in fact my Dad never claimed a welfare benefit in his working life, but even they think there should something done - be it a quota system, a cap, etc - to our immigration system.
It depends on the nature of the criticism.
Criticism of immigration per se would make you a hypocrite if you have emigrated or you are the product of immigration.
If the criticism is about excessive numbers or undesirable people being let into the country easily, then that would not be hypocritical IMHO.
Immigration is about numbers and pressures on resources and jobs and housing.
When many immigrants came in the 1950s and 1960s we had full employment - and not enough people to fill the jobs. That no longer applies.
Cos in the end most people in the UK are descendants of immigrants if you go back far enough.
The debate should be about pressures on resources and whether our EU partners are living up to their responsibilities with immigrants, not whether we should allow or forbid immigration full stop.
Its a population control issue, not a race issue.
People come and go all the time, but we should be aiming to have an overall negative migration. I.e more leaving than coming in.
England is the most densely populated country in Europe and the recent huge population increase has wrecked government finances., its the reason why we are having to make such huge cuts in services.
Its no coincidence that the richest countries in the world are characterised by low population density. Quality is more important than quantity.
Totally. The most anti immigration person I ever met IRL... was a second generation Irish Brummie.:D Always made me have a bit of a laugh behind her back. Who are your parents? What's your surname? Why do you want to close the door behind yourself? I'm 100% English as far back as can be traced, on every line that can be traced and I don't give a toss about immigration! It seems hypocritical to want to pull up the ladder after yourself and spew out hatred to people only doing what your parents or grandparents did...