An official-looking leaflet has been delivered to the Zelo Street household in the last few days. Under the guise of being a “Referendum Communication”, and titled “Official Information About The Referendum On 23 June 2016”, it tells “THE EUROPEAN UNION AND YOUR FAMILY: THE FACTS … We are sending this to you as someone who cares about the future of Britain and fair access to our public services”.
Who is this “We” who cares so much that they have sent out this leaflet into the world? Ah well. That is left to the bottom right corner of the back page, such is the furtiveness and subterfuge at play. It is, to no surprise at all, from Vote Leave. It is flagrantly dishonest throughout. And it is dripping with the crudest of dog-whistle politics.
The dishonesty begins with “FACT: Britain’s official bill for EU membership is £19 billion a year or £350 million every week - the cost of a new hospital”. Even Nigel “Thirsty” Farage has given up on the “£350 million a week” claim. But the claim that takes no time at all to be pitched, and where Vote Leave is really aiming, is “FACT: Five new countries are in the queue to join the EU - Albania, Macedonia, Montenegro, Serbia, Turkey … You have to decide whether this will help Britain, Europe, and fair access to public services”.
There is only one message there - all those nasty foreigners are coming here and stopping you, the upstanding, hard-working, put-upon, downtrodden yet proud British people from getting an appointment to see your GP. And the kind of foreigners Vote Leave has in mind are made clear in a helpful map which shows the location of all those countries - along with their populations. Look - there are 76 million of those Turks!
And see what else the helpful map shows? It extends east to show you Syria and Iraq. Why? Because, like Turkey, they are full of Scary Muslims (tm) who by definition are coming over here to do terrible things to us. Forget that something around 90% of Turks do not hold a passport, and so are not about to travel anywhere outside their own country. Forget that Turkish accession to the EU will not happen for decades, if ever.
No, what Vote Leave want you to believe is that not only do all those 76 million Turks - most of whom are Muslims, in case you still hadn’t got that one - want to come here, but that they will bring millions more Muslims from Syria and Iraq with them, because, well, they’re all Muslims, and they’re all after one thing, and whatever it is that they’re all after, it involves them coming over here and doing terrible things to us.
There it all is - money scares, religious scares, racial scares, terror scares, all wrapped up in the language of asking for things to be “fair”. And then they point at anyone wanting Britain to remain an EU member state and shout “Look - Project Fear!” All shot through with rank dishonesty (we’re also told that “politicians in Brussels” are not “people we elect”, which will be news to our MEPs). This is how low the Out campaign has sunk.
This is not “information”. It is hatred and bigotry. As such, it deserves to fail.
Cameron has opened a xenophobic can of worms due to his fear of UKIP denying him power . The racist genie is out of the bottle. UKIP views are getting even more main stream attention Comments you would never hear apart from in hushed tones or from a drunken bigot are being voiced again and on TV FGS .Loose the Ref and who knows where it will end Win and UKIP and RW Tories will begin pushing for another one Radicalising the Outers with more tales of scary immigrants and an all powerful EU that wants the keys to your home ! How different it all could of been ? Could Ed Milliband of been this divisive this toxic to this countries very future and international standing ? Maybe we have #toryelectionfraud to blame for all this or do countries get the Government they deserve. There maybe problems with immigration but to blame them for the Governments failings is ludicrous They are not under funding the NHS and schools not selling council homes to fund homes for Tory voters. Not cutting Local Council budgets and services. They like the EU are just a convenient scapegoat
ReplyDelete'No, what Vote Leave want you to believe is that not only do all those 76 million Turks - most of whom are Muslims, in case you still hadn’t got that one - want to come here, but that they will bring millions more Muslims from Syria and Iraq with them'
ReplyDeleteI think you are confused.
That is NOT what UKIP stand for.
Come on Tim.
I trust your judgement on many things but yoi are wrong on this.
We certainly deserve the government we get because not enough people vote to keep neocon gobshites out. Mainstream media is of course owned by such, and churns out the necessary propaganda through its usual shills. The combination has "worked" so far......but those days are gradually coming to an end.
ReplyDeleteAlways assuming they don't conjure up yet another war in EastAsia - or is it EurAsia these days? Which is why the Yanks have over four hundred military bases trying to encircle China and Russia, pretty much what was done to Germany to provoke the First World War. Which the German loons willing accepted. Which of course led directly to the Second World War. Which then led on to the Cold War, the settlement of which means the crackpots need a new one......whatever happened to the "peace dividend"?
But talking of shills, Toby Jug was on Sky TV earlier making a complete arse hole of himself again. This time saying "Corbyn has no credibility on the EU because he [formerly] said he was against it"......Then looked as though he'd been hit in the face with a cricket bat when a chef sitting across the table reminded him De Piffle formerly said he wanted in. Even by the Jug's standards it was an own goal fit to lose any game. I know I'd relish taking him on in debate. Being attacked by the Jug is like an assault from a rabid moth.
Sorry about the sports metaphors, but really it's all the Jug is worth.
Politics seems to have sunk to a new low whereby 'the end justifies the means', whatever the means.
ReplyDeleteMake it stop, please!
Have there been any meetings of 'Conservative [Party] Friends of Turkey' recently?
ReplyDeleteI've just received this leaflet, and I've noticed that there's more graphics trickery below the map.
ReplyDeleteIn the '£ billions sent to the EU' graph, the same colour as used for Syria and Iraq is used to fill in the area between the rising line and the horizontal axis, apparently linking the two.