34 Comments

I would push back on Canada. It may have once been true that Canada had a meritocratic immigration system, but under Trudeau this is no more than words on paper. Temporary Foreign Worker visas and student visas are widely abused as we import the dregs of the Punjab by the planeload.

Another factor worth considering is that meritocratic immigration from incompatible ethne risks setting up alien socioeconomic elites. Yes, they will appear to integrate; they will not be welfare cases; but in the long run, their sympathies are likely to shift towards their own peoples. The result of this can be institutions falling into the hands of fifth columnists. It is also a recipe for ethnic strife, as the native born look at the upper echelons of their society and see people who are not them. Examples include the Chinese in Malaysia, and Jewish people in many parts of the world.

This has certainly happened in Canada. The Indians and Chinese we brought in have quietly taken over our institutions, helped by hiring and promotion policies that favored diversity, and then (being immensely ethnocentric) using their positions to give their own an additional leg up. The result is that white Canadians are gradually getting frozen out of their own economy. Canadians are beginning to notice this, and are not happy about it. Particularly as Canada has now passed the "meritocratic" immigration period, and embarked upon the "mass immigration" period, which if present trends continue - around 1M a year - will see Canadians reduced to an absolute minority (with no special rights) within about two decades.

In Canada, this is justified by the "Canada 2100" program: 100 million people by 2100, in order to grow the GDP (but not the per capita GDP). This seems similar to the Aussie imperative to "populate or die". Given that imperial Japan isn't so much of a national security threat to Australia anymore, the justification for mass immigration seems attenuated. But more to the point, if rapid population growth is considered desirable, this should be sought via natural growth of the existing people. Encourage a high fertility rate; make this the centre of national policy, with a dedicated National Fertility Ministry and so on. Aim for a TFR of 5 or 6 and the population will boom, without any of the tensions and detriments that accompany the importation of incompatible foreigners.

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All good points.

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If we extended the criteria for the privately-sponsored refugee program to ALL immigrants, with provisions on where they could locate, (to prevent formation of unicultural enclaves) it would have the effect of tying the rate of immigration to the willingness of the existing population to absorb them.

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The privately-sponsored refugee program goes further, by establishing a circle of support and responsibility. This body is responsible for supporting the refugee until he or she can find employment, finding accommodation for him, introducing him to neighbours, finding interest groups and professional services. A dentist who speaks his language? They’ll make it happen. This greatly increases the rate of not just settlement, but positive integration.

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I believe the Swiss do this. The final decision on whether to allow an immigrant to stay is made by a vote of the local people the immigrant has been living among. That has always seemed the best way to me.

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I weep for Canada - I actually dreamed of emigrating there from Aus...

The root of all of this seems a combination of old fashioned greed and new fashioned self loathing by European cultural elites (particularly Anglo).

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Yes, it is very sad.

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Great piece. I believe a transition has happened, one that is being made legible for the first time in the UK, as it is the furthest along this path. Immigration was initially pursued in the aftermath of WWII as a temporary measure to alleviate the burdens of a war-torn country, one pursued out of economic necessity. The narrative used by the ruling class to sell immigration to the working class was one of tolerance and acceptance, one whereby the British could differentiate themselves from the horrors of racial discrimination witnessed in Nazi Germany, thus attempting to link the acceptance of migration to a sense of national pride. This talking point can be seen in the way that anyone approaching a critical view of immigration is immediately met with accusations of being a fascist. Successive generations began to internalise this narrative used to sell immigration as the primary reason for its continuation; thus, immigration goes from being an economic necessity requiring justification to a moral imperative that is by default, 'good'. Murray (whatever you might think of him) makes this pretty clear in a passage from his book on Blair's minister for Asylum and Immigration:

"Over her period in office she repeatedly stated her ambition to transform Britain. As one colleague said, ‘Roche didn’t see her job as controlling entry into Britain, but by looking at the wider picture “in a holistic way” she wanted us to see the benefit of a multicultural society.’

Neither the Prime Minister nor the Home Secretary, Jack Straw, were interested in questioning the new asylum policy, nor the fact that under Roche everyone entering Britain, whether he or she had a job to go to or not, was turned into an ‘economic migrant’. Wherever there was any criticism of her policy, either internally or externally, Roche dismissed it as racist. Indeed Roche – who criticised colleagues for being too white – insisted that even the mention of immigration policy was racist. What she and a few others around her sought was a wholesale change of British society. Roche – a descendant of East End Jews – believed that immigration was only ever a good thing. Ten years after the changes she had brought about she told an interviewer with satisfaction, ‘I love the diversity of London. I just feel

comfortable.’ "

It's pretty clear that the views of the people behind these policies were anything but pragmatic; if anything, I would say they bordered on the theological. This is why there has been no success in finding political solutions to the immigration problem in Britain; once the political framework internalised by the ruling class becomes one that sees the interchangeability of cultures/people as not possible, but a moral good in itself, they are left with no option but to continue to double down. Anything else would be to admit that the entire post-WWII political project in Britain has been mistaken.

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While migration policy in Australia always had a very large dose of pragmatism. Indeed, pragmatism is a strong feature of Australia generally. As has been observed more than once, our political culture is very Benthamite. In a sense, we are the country where the Chartists won.

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Terrific post with precisely the right degree of venom - neither bloodless objectivity nor ranting hate - directed at our despised elites. Oh, if only they could hurry up and finally see what they have done and are still doing! That would save us all a lot of heartache. But even if they miraculously suddeny face-palm and say 'What have we done?', we are still now stuck with these resentful Middle Eastern Muslims FOR EVER and have no way of getting rid of them. And all for what? To make GDP figures look better while the more important GDP per capita figures remained the same? To feel good about ourselves for taking in the dysfunctional people of the world? A lot of thanks we got for that.

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Strong commentary, but fair.

You do not want to be an average guy in the developed world.

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An interesting way to phrase that idea. It sort of follows by definition: being "developed" meaning that competence has overcome the mere capacity Lorenzo mentions for China, etc.

Also, since proper economic development "raises all boats" including the yachts, people may have less grounds for complaint if they can retain awareness of their previous baseline.

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To what end, though? What does the UK's political-managerial class get out of destroying its own heritage? And, given that at least as much social mobility is downward as upward, benighting the futures of its own granddaughters?

Surely it can't just be in order to keep wages down.

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It is a mixture of things. Cheaper labour; accessing skills you didn’t have to pay to develop; a weird sense of superiority over both present and past; a welfare state apparat and activism that profits off dysfunction …

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As well as those points, Starmer is clearly a religious zealot. From listening to the interview excerpts I have heard, he does not need evidence; he knows, unshakeably, that he is right. He is prepared to sacrifice freedom of speech, the rule of law, and due process for the outcomes that he wants. No, not just prepared, he has already sacrificed them. And he can shamelessly lie while we see the evidence of his lies on the screen next to him.

Time to start quoting that other zealot, Oliver Cromwell, to him and his ilk: I beseech you, in the bowels of Christ, think it possible that you may be mistaken. But he probably thnks he is cleverer than both Cromwell and his opponents.

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I'd say many of them don't think that far ahead or even that broadly, at least in Australia. They're careerists. They're not their as custodians of society, they're there predominantly for their career and the associated benefits of that (wealth, prestige, power).

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Yes, that's what I mean, sort of, it's how the institutions operate at the moment, so they just keep doing what they're doing without thinking further to societal consequences ("not my problem/responsibility/decision ").

I mean I work at a university and many higher degrees in many departments would not be viable without fee paying overseas students. There is a treadmill- to pay the salaries of the faculty you need to teach them, you need so many full fees students - and then you can't stop because people will lose their jobs. In the UK it's been explicitly stated in the press that multiple institutions will go bust if student visa schemes are heavily cut.

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divide and conquer

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Yes, at the back of my mind was also the nagging question of why the elites would want to destroy not only the working class but Britain and Britishness in general. Divide and conquer might be a good strategy but who did they think they were conquering? I suspect the answer lies in psychology rather than economics.

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I think if you look at it through the lense of Critical Race Theory then it sort of makes sense. The whites are the oppressors and the non-whites are victims of that oppression, therefore you prioritise the demands of the non-whites over the whites. In the eyes of the Elites and the game of Grievance Bingo non-whites will always come out on top (even if they don't want to play the game). Hence two-tier policing and a very different attitude to white unrest when compared to similar (or worse) crimes or unrest perpetrated by non-whites.

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I think a lot of it is. It suits business and, a lot of the native working class is dysfunctional as Lorenzo pointed out. Can't or won't do labour intensive jobs. It also keeps all the universities and ex-polytechnics afloat with paying customers (student visas, many of whom never go home). Then there's the claim about needing health and care workers. I don't know if the UK could train more of their own if they tried but when you need them "now" , importing them is always the easier option.

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“Without border control, voters have no effective say over migration policy. Moreover, lack of border control makes it explicit that voters lack such say.”

I would complete that by adding that under these circumstances, migrants set the policy.

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Masterful, Mr. Warby.

Masterful.

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Key point - disenfranchisement caused by lying elites.

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Just as George Floyd made available an outrage convenient for the expression of discontent, so too did the deaths of the children. Outrageous riotous responses express the formidability (or not) of the aggrieved. As the white working class has no victimhood points bad behavior by some cannot raise its social status.

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This piece is astonishing. I learnt so much from reading it - ideas I've never come across before. (Thanks to my insular MSM reading!) Thank you so much Lorenzo from Oz!

It definitely nails the modern progressive elitism that I encountered and indeed was part of when I worked in the public service. It did certainly make me uneasy at times - the underlying assumption that "the punters [and indeed any other public servants below a certain rank ] were stupid" and "they didn't know what was good for them" and they couldn't possibly understand these complex policy / legal issues". I can see it so much more clearly now I'm out of it.

What is amusing though... is how simultaneously many senior public servants were also terrified of the punters, they'd go weak at the knees at the prospect of having to meet one of them in the flesh. I remember one such punter who thanked me so sincerely for simply giving him the time day - greeting him and talking to him at a public forum. (My executive boss refused to do this).

I remember another very senior executive relaying a story of how she'd seen a senior stakeholder from a legal but 'unsavory' industry in the street and she acknowledged him. And this stakeholder had later told her how much he appreciated that she said hello to him in the street.

What is it it that the leaders of our public service are incapable of treating other humans with basic decency, or find it sufficiently noteworthy to mention it when they do? Why isn't it the norm to do this?

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A certain socially insular status-seeking would be my hypothesis.

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This is perhaps a better place to ask: just how much does the "class structure" culture so commonly portrayed in England (Upstairs/Downstairs, etc.) play into this? The concept of "pride in service" is a rather foreign concept in the US (and possibly Canada and Oz?). Not to be confused with smart shop keepers also focusing on good customer service for retaining repeat business, etc.

And going even further afield, if WWI took a major toll on the best and brightest of that generation, is 100+ years since then enough time to have corrected for that loss? With WWII also in the mix?

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Differences in the class structure matter. The British educated middle class has, shall we say, a patchy record, going back to the mishandling of the Irish potato famine of the 1840s.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Famine_(Ireland)#Whig_government

There is also some overlap in their views of the Irish then and their own working class now. Both in not being entirely without warrant (stereotype accuracy) and not remotely justifying the policy failures.

I have wondered about the selection effects of the two World Wars, though that some key features have got worse the further away from them complicates matters.

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"asymmetric multiculturalism to elevate incoming cultures over those of native English (the Celtic fringe get minority brownie points)" The English chattering class's uniquely poisonous, national self-hatred-by-proxy is a fascinating subject. One that I wrote about in this piece: " England and the English: how best to characterise them? Well: theirs is a land of poets and dreamers; a land of fiercely independent gritty people who know how to take their drink and dance a jig. And you just can’t help but love to hear them sing. Then there’s the food of course – the marvellous food. And so sexy; with that famous dress sense, such gorgeous specimens of masculinity and femininity the English are overall.........If all - or any - of the above was passed through some AI software it would grunt out “Does not compute, does not compute!” Why is this so? If the English are pricked, do they not bleed? When they party do they not dance and sing...and cook great meals? Do they not compete on reciprocally equal terms with Irish, Italians, French and Americans in the international romantic bonding market? Why, in short, has Englishness failed to garner its own version of the self-flattering national mythology of so many other nations?....." https://grahamcunningham.substack.com/p/englishness-as-a-brand

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There is a point of order here which is quite important, although the overall thrust of the article is wholly correct.

Britain's Islamic population is not middle eastern. It's largely Pakistani. And something like 70% of it originates from a town in Kashmir called Mirpur, which has, let's say, a certain reputation for backwardness amongst other Pakistanis. An astonishing statistic (I do not have this exactly correct, though it's not far off) is that first cousin marriage in Pakistan are about 30% of all marriages. But amongst British Pakistanis it's 70%. This is emblematic of the way in which even the third generation of this cohort after the first arrivals from Mirpur in the late 1950s live in the same isolation (by choice) as their ancestors.

The feeling that pervades in white working class Britian nowadays (or specifically northern England) is one of defeat. Look at the state of us. Look who we have invited. Look at our towns. Look how the elites have ignored us. See how they don't care. We are vanquished, defeated, humiliated.

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I count Pakistan as Middle East. The relevant social patterns change to its East, not its West and it was part of the first waves of Islamic conquest.

Thank you for the other, depressing, details.

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Immigration should be addressed like any other growth-promoting economic policy. Numbers, selection, and policies promoting assimilation need to be mutually optimized.

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“She’s in the Kebab.”

Madeline Cann; 14 years old, disappeared 2003. Raped, Murdered, put in Kebab. The Paki murderers were taped saying she’s in the kebab. However a nation of laws 🧐 like the UK 🇬🇧 is ultimately a nation of technicalities, so the errors made by the detective etc resulted in the evidence being inadmissible, so the poor Diverse men were acquitted and apologized to, and paid £250,000 for the racist indignity in 2007.

In 2008 a new office of UK Crown Prosecutor was created for Keir Starmer, who was able to further diversity by keeping a lid on the 1300 mostly white girls raped in Rotherham , as well as the less well known Rochedale scandal.

Of course Progressively the real scandal is the racism of even bringing it up. 🧐🇬🇧

That’s Keir and the entire British government local council to Crown the last 30 years.

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