PC

As an immigrant I am very grateful for tolerance and inclusiveness of British society. Open, tolerant and inclusive society is a wonderful thing but there are some setbacks. Opposing different forms of discrimination is certainly the right thing to do.

However, I see a danger of new social taboos which make facing certain problems almost impossible. People who are trying to raise certain issues or even refer to certain facts are sometimes automatically branded certain terms and accused, for example, of racism or islamophobia. Pussyfooting, political correctness, multicultural sensitivity – all raised to such a level they became rules of the game.

At the moment it seems to me that this trend, this practice is not no longer as beneficial as it used to be back then in times when there was a huge level of discrimination. Nowadays it is rather harmful and prevents open discussion. People are constrained from having “real talk” and afraid of new social taboos. Others take advantage of it. Sometimes it looks like it is not so important what somebody is really saying but what others will make out of what he or she is saying. In the public sphere these days certain discussions are almost postponed in fear of offending somebody.   

MG

An idea for solving ills of welfare depended pockets of the society

First of all, every state has responsibilities to its citizens, for example public safety for individuals and their property. Recent riots in England aroused fear, shock and questions. The state and its institutions failed to protect many hard working, law abiding citizens. It took five days to restore order. Another responsibility of the government is enhancing well-being and prosperity of citizens by providing education, health service, places to work, etc.

Second and foremost, citizens also have responsibilities. People have to pay taxes and abide the law of the land. But menacing gangs of underclass youths on the vicious loose, looting with no restraints and no regret whatsoever, setting everything on their way on fire – where have they come from?  

Surprisingly, they were joined by many so –called “normal” people; people, who usually work and do not commit crimes. But this time, in this very situation when normality disappeared from the streets and so behavioural and social constrains of so many temporally ceased to exist t – in effect so many people found themselves on the wrong side, joining mob, attacking police and opportunistically looting shops, with no dignity and no morals – for a pair of new trainers or a new telly, and I ask rhetorically – what is wrong with this picture? Some citizens failed the state and failed their co-citizens as well. But some people can be hardly called citizens – they do not contribute anything and nothing is expected of them – apart of not causing too much trouble.

The matter is clear enough when we look from the perspective of relations between state and citizens: Citizens pay taxes and expect protection and services in return. From this perspective two problems appear to be obvious:

First problem is that state requires no obligations from some of their citizens without any good reasons. Yes, some people get benefits for doing chronically nothing. In fact, they are hardly expected to do anything. They do not contribute anything. The society seems to be happy enough with keeping them out of the streets e.g. in various forms of social and support housing and they get benefits to feed their basic needs (and addictions). Young and middle aged people who have never worked and who will never be; living all their lives on state benefits and often committing petty crimes or doing drugs. Most of them poorly educated with no real perspectives or incentives or even skills to turn their lives around. They grew up in dysfunctional families and on the streets. They are not needed and they were pretty much abandoned. They have got institutionalised instead and the current system is not helping them. They are entitled but nothing is expected of them.

The second problem is that state is not able to provide work for everybody (and besides, not everybody is able to work). And that is the reality of post-industrial world in which unqualified and low skilled people do not fit well.

If those institutionalised welfare-depended people are entitled to benefits without any expectations then they are not really citizens – that is my conclusion. In fact, they are not even called “citizens” – by various social services they are called “clients”. No surprise: “clients” or “customers” have only rights but no obligations.  And this is just so wrong and in so many ways. Getting something for doing nothing is very harmful – think about perpetual dependence, disconnection, low-self esteem, drugs use – and I am not talking about single mothers (who often work so hard)or other people who are in genuine need and who are not able to do anything constructive in their lives as a way of contributing to the society.  

My idea is simple but fundamental and therefore revolutionary: we should treat people like citizens not consumers.

Citizens are people who have rights and obligations – people receiving benefits should have equally or to some extend their benefits balanced with some statutory obligations as well.

Underclass scum and "normal" people who joined them

During the last several days and nights civilised and decent citizens of this lovely land of Britain experienced shocking images of underclass scum thugs looting and setting whatever they could on fire.

Apparently, packs of deprived youths were able to shaken and rock the normality of the British street to such extend that they were apparently joined by opportunistic hundreds of those who had something wrong with their moral compasses and who got carried away giving in to the mentality of an aggressive mob.

Certainly for many, it was one of those moments when normal rules do not apply and everything is allowed which gives an impression that under a thin layer of normal social relationships there is a beastly drive to aggressive, violent looting with no regard to anything.

So we have observed packs of underclass youth representing gang culture and some “normal” people who seemingly joined them maybe in a mix of greed and dislike of those more successful and rich, or maybe in a sudden rush of power and impunity felt by those normally powerless. 

MG

British (English) society from an immigrant’s (mine actually) perspective, part 1

British society seems to be more stratified socially than in my native Poland. Demography is also much more diverse. Big cities like London or Birmingham seem to be dominated by immigrants, migrants, naturalised British and their descendants.  That ethnic and cultural mosaic has different economical, social and political flavours – depending where you look. 

Generally, in terms of income, most migrants – especially perform low-paid and unskilled jobs but there are also quite a few working professionals and shop/restaurant owners.  Migrants/ immigrants and their descendants tend to be more religious than native British, sometimes with strong social and political views; for example, Islamic Londonistan would serve as an infamous example of attempts to introduce Islamic Sharia Law - recently through bullying 'Sharia law zone' stickers. In fact Sharia courts already exist throughout England as a clrear parallel judiciary system in civil (for now) cases. Another negative phenomenon is ghettoisation resulting in whole areas dominated by particular ethnic group and pressure to create more faith schools.


It must be said however, radicals who do not want to integrate remain a minority within minority. Most immigrants try to integrate and get along with others around. 

While integration seems to be a vocal political problem within muslim communities it remains a social one for most ethinc groups. Immigrants who work with other immigrants in some cases have almost none contact with English language - there are many people who have been living in UK for years but they still don't speak English. I am not surprised: low-educated economical refugees often in their forties from small towns and villages across, let's say, eastern Europe; working long hours and performing low paid jobs among others like them - their contact with English is none. When they come back home they have enough energy to watch TV in their national language, eat something and go to bed.   

Old, industrial, and low-skilled white British working class has been severely affected by deindustrialisation and some communities have disintegrated leaving thousands of those who have never worked and have always lived on benefits. Additionally, those people were neither able to compete with more committed and mobile workforce coming from abroad nor motivated to it by easily accessible system of benefits. And then they become the Poor. In my perception this group is especially prone to various social diseases: addictions, junk food, petty crimes and clearly visible poor sense of fashion – or rather, a complete lack of it. They are uneducated and tend to have heavy local accents. By the way, addictions to drugs and alcohol affect heavily people from across social stratum, not just lower not-working anymore class, and often degrading people to living on benefits and supporting housing. Many people who end like this come from dysfunctional families but not always. Sometimes they were doing fine or coming from good families but they lost everything after affair with drugs followed by episodes of living on the street and crime to feed addiction. 

English working class and middle class are people who work, have families, have a car or even two, have morgage. Small business, office workers, technicians, engineers. 

Upper middle class – working professionals, business owners.

Upper class and royalty – aristocrats, prince William, the queen. 

Being in England for a while I am pretty much able to tell the difference based for example on hearing the language: Spoken English of the Poor is totally different than English spoken by educated upper classes. By the way, anybody wanting to train himself or herself in ‘the proper’ English, can take elocution lessons, which are quite expensive. Another way to tell who is who, or who aspires to become (or experience) who, is to see where those people do their shopping and what they wear. A scarf in Primark can cost £4 while in a posh shop in Cheltenham a similar one costs £40. 

To see a chart with a little bit different and more detailed social class specification, click here. 

MG