<]:^D wrote:i think a lot of it is racism, but its mixed up with a lot of right-wing individualism (what would be called Libertarianism), nationalism, neoliberalism, small-mindedness, preoccupation with cost-detail instead of overall economics etc.
i think a lot of it is plonkers looking at budgets and saying 'we can save money here!' instead of realising they could eliminate it as an issue if they raised a certain other tax by 0.0002% at the same time.
Well, you've said a lot there and I don't want to wall-of-text you. To keep it very brief [EDIT: well, moderately brief, but my first draft was way longer!]:
1. Something can be racist, in the sense of having the consequence of disadvantaging people from other ethnic groups, without being all-caps RACIST, like beating someone up for being brown.
2. I think it's difficult to formulate right-libertarianism (a), British nationalism (b), or neoliberalism (c) without being racist.
... (a) See: their obsession with IQ, which is all about thinly-veiled bogus "race science".
... (b) See: their obsession with Anglophonic "cultural similarity".
... (c) See: their obsession with drone-striking schools and hospitals in the Middle-East.
3. Fixating on meaningless fiscal details when a policy is racist deserves to be called out as it normalises racism.
4. To reiterate, we are talking about drastically raising the fees for visas. This is being justified by racist rhetoric, like "they need to make up for draining our resources" ("they" do not). It has a racist end-goal, which is richer, whiter immigration. It's racist. If you get tricked into supporting it for bean-counting reasons you are still supporting something racist.
I think you had a bit of a start when I made fun of Meep because you felt like I was calling him "racist" in the same way a hood-wearing KKK lynch-mobber is racist, like it's some stain on his soul that makes him an evil person. I wasn't, but: he has been somehow hoodwinked into thinking a policy that is definitely racist is better if you only do it a little bit - as if a little bit of racism is ever acceptable - and although I am happy to believe he didn't consciously think of it like that, I don't think it's unreasonable to point out that that's a stupid opinion and that he should change it.