Category Archives: birthright

Islam is simply incompatible with Western society

Robert Henderson

Seventeen people have  been murdered in the two terrorist attacks in Paris (between  7-9th January 2015). Ten were journalists, including some of France’s leading cartoonists,   working for the  French satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo. To them can be added two policemen, one policewomen and four  members of the general  public who happened to be unlucky enough to be in the wrong place at the wrong time.  The attacks were made on the Charlie Hebdo offices and  the  Jewish supermarket Hyper Cacher. The policewoman was shot in a separate incident.

The terrorist acts  were coordinated to produce maximum effect. That on  Charlie Hebdo was by the  brothers Said and Cherif Kouachi , who were of Algerian ancestry.  A third  brother Mourad Hamyd aged 18  was at school at the time of the Charlie Hebdo attack and has spoken to but not been detained by the police. The attack on a Jewish supermarket  was undertaken by a Mailian  Amedy Coulibaly.  He also killed a policewoman before his attack on the Jewish supermarket.  Coulibaly’s wife, Hayat Boumeddiene, who is of Algerian ancestry,  is thought to be another Muslim fanatic with homicidal tendencies. She is believed to have fled to Syria after  the shooting of the policewoman.

Those who died  at the Charlie Hebdo office were slaughtered  by men  shouting Allahu Akbar (God is great), “We have avenged the prophet!”  [for cartoons of making fun of Mohammed published by Charlie Hebdo) and just to make sure the message got across “Tell the media that this is al-Qaeda in Yemen” .   Cherif Koachi also said in a telephone  interview with a magazine  after the killings that the plot was financed by  al Q aeda The Jewish supermarket killer  introduced himself to frightened hostages  with the words ‘I am Amedy Coulibaly, Malian and Muslim. I belong to the Islamic State’.  All three killers  either expressed a wish for martyrdom or  behaved in a way in which was guaranteed to get  them killed.   All three were shot and killed by French security forces.

Unless  you are a particularly stupid and self-deluding  liberal  and have either persuaded yourself  that  this was a black op and the killers were agents of the wicked old West or have fallen back on that old liberal favourite  that the killers  are not true  Muslims  – congratulations to the Telegraph’s Tim Stanley for being so quick off the mark with that piece of shrieking inanity   –  you will think these are Muslim terrorists.  (The next time you encounter someone spinning the “not true Muslims” line ask them whether  the Crusaders of the twelfth and thirteenth centuries were Christians).

Sadly there are many liberals who have not learnt the lesson dealt out by these atrocities. It is true that there has been almost complete condemnation of the killings by the liberal elites around the Western world, but one wonders how unqualified and sincere their regret and anger is.  Apart from the  liberal apologist  mantras  “not true Muslims”, “Just a tiny minority of Muslims” and “Islam is the religion of peace”   being  much in evidence, there has  been a disagreeable media eagerness to portray the killers as sophisticated military beasts. Here is a prime  example from the Telegraph:

“They wear army-style boots and have a military appearance and manner. One of the men wears a sand-coloured ammunition vest apparently stuffed with spare magazines. Some reports suggest that an attacker was also carrying a rocket-propelled grenade launcher.

“The men attacked the magazine’s headquarters with clinical precision, killing their victims and then shooting two police officers in the street outside.

“Amateur footage shows them using classic infantry tactics. They move along the street outside the office working as a pair: one advances while the other gives cover.

“Instead of spraying automatic gunfire, they fire two aimed shots at each target – a pattern known as “double-tap” firing – thereby conserving their ammunition.”

Shades of white liberals in the 1960s drooling over the Black Panthers in the USA  .

The truth is that the attackers did not behave like highly trained soldiers, and some of the reporting was simply wrong, for example, after the slaughter the killers,  as was widely reported , did not walk calmly back to the stolen  car  they were using but ran.  When they abandoned the car one of the killers left his identity card behind. After the murders at Charlie Hebdo the  two killers drove around  like headless chickens hijacking cars and holding up petrol stations to obtain food and water.  If they had really been cold, calculating beasts they would either have stayed where they were after the Charlie Hebdo killings and died in a firefight with the French police or arranged matters so that they had a hiding  place  to go to and  would  carried things like a little  food and water with them.  The widespread media  depiction of them as quasi-military figures glamourized and sanitised what they were.

The British political mainstream response

But it would be wrong to say nothing changed in Britain after the attacks. The Ukip leader Nigel Farage broke new ground for a mainstream British politician in modern Britain  by speaking of  a fifth column of people who hate us within Britain.

“There is a very strong argument that says that what happened in Paris is a result – and we’ve seen it in London too – is a result I’m afraid of now having a fifth column living within these countries.

“We’ve got people living in these countries, holding our passports, who hate us.

“Luckily their numbers are very, very small but it does make one question the whole really gross attempt at encouraged division within society that we have had in the past few decades in the name of multiculturalism.”

This was predictably  condemned by David Cameron, a  man who incredibly  still believes Turkey within the EU would be of great benefit to all concerned,  despite the anger and dismay in Britain about mass immigration generally making the prospect  of 70 million Turkish Muslims having a right to move freely within the EU certain to be  utterly dismaying to most native Britons. Interestingly, a would-be successor to Cameron as Tory leader, Liam Fox,  edged a long way towards reality in an article for the  Sunday Telegraph:

“All those who do not share their fundamentalist views are sworn enemies, whether Muslim or non-Muslim, Arab or non-Arab. It is the first lesson that we must understand – they hate us all because of who we are, our views, our values and our history. Western liberal apologists who tell us that the violence being directed at us is all of our own making not only fail to understand reality, but put us at increased risk.

“We must understand that there are fanatics who cannot be reconciled to our values and who will attempt to destroy us by any means possible. They are at war with us. They do not lack the intent to kill us, merely the means to do so, and our first response must be to deny them that capability. Sometimes that will require lethal force.”

The fact that Farage also condemned multiculturalism in no uncertain terms  provoked an automated politically correct response from the leader of the Liberal Democrats Nick Clegg:

“The Deputy Prime Minister hit out after Mr Farage suggested the attack on the offices of a satirical magazine should lead to questions about the UK’s “gross policy of multiculturalism”.

“I am dismayed that Nigel Farage immediately thinks, on the back of the bloody murders that we saw on the streets of Paris yesterday, his first reflex is to make political points,” Mr Clegg said during his weekly phone-in on LBC radio.

“If this does come down, as it appears to be the case, to two individuals who perverted the cause of Islam to their own bloody ends, let’s remember that the greatest antidote to the perversion of that great world religion are law-abiding British Muslims themselves.

“And to immediately … imply that many, many British Muslims who I know feel fervently British but also are very proud of their Muslim faith are somehow part of the problem rather than part of the solution is firmly grabbing the wrong end of the stick.”

Such  condemnations are of little account because Farage has spoken an obvious truth and the general public will understand that.  The promotion of multiculturalism has been generally pernicious because it wilfully creates serious divisions within a society,  but is unreservedly toxic in the case of Islam because Muslims,  violent and non-violent, believe in the supremacy of their religion.

The change of language by public figures particularly politicians is of the first importance because the general  public need a lead to be given where a matter is contentious. In these politically correct times it is particularly necessary  because the native population of Britain have been thoroughly intimidated by the totalitarian application of political correctness which has resulted in people saying non-pc things  losing their jobs, being arrested and,  in a growing number of cases , being brought before a criminal court to face charges.

Once things  forbidden by political correctness are  said by public figures change could be very fast. More and more people will embrace the forbidden words and ideas and, like a dam bursting, the  flood  of non-pc  voices will  overwhelm the politically correct restraints on speech and writing.

A tiny proportion of  Muslims

The  claim is routinely made by the  politically correct Western elites and “moderate” Muslims  that those committing terrorist atrocities are a tiny proportion of Muslims.  That is pedantically true but unimportant,  because it is to misunderstand the dynamic of terrorism which rests on a pyramid of commitment and support for the cause. At the top are  the leaders. Below them are those willing to carry out terrorist acts.  Supporting them will be those who make the bombs, acquire guns and so on. Below them will come those who are willing to raise funds through criminal behaviour such as extortion and drug dealing and administer  punishment – anything from death to beatings –  to those within the ambit of the group who are deemed to have failed to do what they were told or worse betrayed  the group.  Next will come those willing to provide safe houses for people and weaponry.  Then there are  those willing to provide information and come out on the streets to demonstrate at the drop of a hat.  At the bottom of conscious supporters will come the  “I disagree with  their methods but…”  people.   They say they support the ends of the terrorists but do not support terrorist  acts. This presses the terrorist demands forward because the public will remember their support for the ends and forget the means because it is the ends which engage the emotions . Those who are familiar with the Provisional IRA during the troubles in Northern Ireland will recognise this  character list  with ease. Moreover, even those from a community from which  terrorists  hail who refuse to offer conscious support  will   aid the terrorists’  cause by providing in Mao’s words “the ocean in which terrorists swim”.

There are differences in the detail of how terrorist organisations act, for example,  PIRA operated in a quasi-military structure  with a central command while Muslim terrorism is increasingly subcontracted  to individuals who act on their own. But however a terrorist movement is organised  the  general sociological structure of support described above is the same  whenever there is a terrorist group which is ostensibly promoting the interests of a sizeable minority and that minority has, justified or not, a sense of victimhood which can be nourished by the terrorists . Where the terrorists can offer a cause which promises not merely  the gaining of advantages by the group but of  the completion of some greater plan its potency is greatly enhanced.  Marxism had the communist Utopia and the sense of working towards final end of history; the great religions offer, through the attainment of some beatific afterlife, the favour of God’s will for their society and the completion of God’s plan.  Islam has those qualities in spades.

All this means that  though the active terrorists may be few , the effectiveness of the terrorist machine relies on large numbers who will offer some degree of support.   Consequently, the fact that the number of Muslims committing terrorist acts may be a tiny proportion of the total Muslim population is irrelevant. What matters is the pyramid of support which at its broadest will  include all Muslims because it is the total population which provides “the ocean in which the terrorist  may swim”.

There is also good evidence that large minority of Muslims in Britain support the methods of  Islamic terrorists, for example an NOP Poll in 2006 found that around a quarter of  British Muslims  said the  7/7 bombings in London in July 2005 were justified because of Britain’s involvement in the “War on Terror”.  There is also plenty of British Muslim support for the imposition of Sharia Law on Britain and some  Muslim children are confused as to whether it is Sharia Law or British Law  which is the law of the land. There are also growing numbers of Sharia Courts in Britain which allow disputes between Muslims to be decided outside of the British legal system.

Importantly,   it is not a case of just  the poor and the ignorant only holding  such views. Young educated Muslims are  if anything more enthusiastic than the average British Muslim to have Sharia Law with 40%  in favour and no less than 32% favouring killing  for Islam if the religion is deemed to have been slighted in some way. All of this points to a considerable reservoir of support for the ends of Muslim terrorists if not always the means.  Many Muslims in the West  would not be prepared to engage in violent acts themselves ,  but they would quite happily accept privileges for their religion and themselves won by the sword.

How should the West react to Muslim terrorism?

How should the West react?  In principle it should be simple. There is no need for gratuitous abuse, no need for laboured reasons why Islam is this or that. All that needs to be recognised  is that Islam is incompatible with liberal democracy because in its moral choices it is a belief system  which runs directly counter to liberal democracy and has as  its end game the subjugation  of the entire world.

What effective  action can Western governments do to prevent the gradual  erosion of  the values upon which their societies are built? ? There are three general  possibilities. These are:

  1. Logically, the ideal for any Western government committed to their country’s national interest would  be to expel all Muslims from their territory as a matter of policy with no legal process allowed.   That is because  (1) there is no way of knowing who will become a terrorist;  (2) a large population of Muslims provides the “ocean in which the terrorist swims “ and (3)  any action disadvantaging Muslims short of expulsion will breed terrorists.
  2. A less comprehensive programme would be to block all further Muslim immigration, ban all Muslim religious schools,  cease funding any Muslim organisations, deport any Muslim without British citizenship, remove the British citizenship of any Muslim with dual nationality and deport them back to the country  for which they hold citizenship.  The question of legal aid would not arise because  their would be no appeal allowed as the policy deals in absolutes: you are a Muslim either without British citizenship or with dual nationality and you qualify for deportation . The difficulty with that set of policies is it would  allow a large population to remain within the West and would create resentment amongst that population which could lead to terrorism.
  3. The least dynamic government action would be to implement programme 2 but allow any Muslim with British citizenship or long term residency to appeal expulsion through the courts. That would have the disadvantages of programme 2 plus the added opportunity for endless delay as appeals are heard and re-heard. Such a system would also require legal aid to be given if the judicial process was to be sound.

Will anything like this happen? Most improbable at least in the short term.  The West is ruled by elites who worship at the altar of  political correctness.  Theirs in a fantasy world in which human beings are interchangeable and institutions such as the nation state  are seen as  outmoded relics as homo sapiens marches steadily towards the sunlit uplands of a world moulded and controlled  by  the rigid totalitarian dicta of  political correctness .

For such people the mindset of anyone willing to die for an idea is simply alien to them.  Even more remote to these elites  is the belief that there is an afterlife which is much to be preferred to life on Earth. Most damaging of all they cannot conceive of people who have no interest in compromise and consequently will be remorseless in their pursuit of their goal. The liberal  mistakenly believes that simply by contact with the West will  the values the liberal espouses be transferred to the rest of the world. This incredibly arrogant fantasy can be seen at its most potent in their attitude to  China, which is  quietly but efficiently creating a world empire by buying influence, and in the Middle East and North Africa where the attempt to transfer liberal  values by a mixture of force and material aid has been a shrieking failure which mocks the liberal every second of every day.

Because of such ideas Western elites are only too likely to keep fudging the issue and conceding, not necessarily right away, more and more privileges to Muslins within their societies. They will also probably greatly increase funding for “moderate” Muslims to enter Schools and Mosques to teach Western values. This will drive many young Muslims towards extremism not away from it because however the teaching of British or Western values is conducted it will inevitably be seen as a criticism of Islam.  Older Muslims will also be angered at such  teaching of their children.  Anything the liberal is likely  to do will simply be throwing  petrol on the fire.

What is required is the replacement of the present elites either by removing them from power or by them changing their tune utterly.  The first is improbable in Britain because of the structure of the voting system  which hugely protects the status quo and a complicit mainstream media which shares the devotion to political correctness and manipulates access to favour parties and politicians which play the politically correct game.

But the changing of political tune is a real possibility because liberals are starting to get truly frightened as they realise things could get seriously out of control if Muslim terrorism continues to occur. There is also the fact that white liberals  recognise in some part of their minds that what they ostensibly espouse – the joy of diversity – is bogus.  This can be seen by how they so often arrange  their own lives  to ensure that they live in very  white and in England very English circumstances. The  massive white flight away from places such as  inner London and Birmingham bears stark witness to this.  Being capable of the greatest self-delusion they explain their hypocrisy by telling themselves that this is only because the great project of producing a country, nay a world, fit for the politically correct to love in, has tragically not been fully realised yet because  the outmoded non-pc  ideas and emotions still exists  as people have not yet been educated to see the error of their primitive ways such as believing in the nation state and a homogenous society. But in their heart of hearts they know they would dread to live in the conditions to which they have sanguinely consigned the white working class.

Liberals  may also have the beginnings of a terror that their permitting of mass immigration, the promotion of multiculturalism and the suppression of dissent from their own native populations will soon come to be called by its true name, treason. All these fears will act as a motor to drive the liberal elites to become more and more realistic about what  needs to be done.

The question every non-Muslim  in the West needs to answer is this, do you really believe that if Muslims become the majority in a Western country they will not do what Islam has done everywhere else in the world where they are  in the majority and at best place Islam within a greatly privileged position within the state or at worst create a Muslim theocracy?  Even Turkey, the liberals’ favourite example of a Muslim majority secular democracy, is rapidly moving towards a position when it cannot meaningfully be called a democracy or secular as Islamic parties gain more and more leverage and the Prime Minister Erdogan becomes ever more autocratic.

If a person’s answer to the question I posed is no, then they need to answer another question, do I want to live in such a society? If  their answer is no then they must  be willing to fight for their way of life or the “religion of peace” will change their society beyond recognition.

When I hear someone describing Islam as the “religion of peace”  I am irresistibly reminded of the aliens in the film Independence Day emerging from their spaceship yelling “We come in peace” before blasting every human in sight.  The white liberals who peddle into the “religion of peace” propaganda should be constantly called upon to explain why it is that a “religion of peace” can be so unfailingly successful in attracting people who say they subscribe to it yet are unremittingly cruel and violent.

British Future report says 25% of British adults want all immigrants repatriated 

Robert Henderson

The think-tank British Future has recently published  the report How to talk about immigration based on research conducted by ICM, Ipsos MORI and YouGov. The report purports  to provide a blueprint for both the pros and antis in the immigration debate  to manage the subject  most effectively in public discussion.  This is not something which they achieve because they have bought into the internationalist agenda, viz: “Some three or four generations on from Windrush, it is now a settled and irreversible fact that we are a multi-ethnic society. Managing immigration effectively and fairly in the public interest  should and does matter to Britons from different ethnic backgrounds. We should be suspicious of approaches that sharply polarise British citizens along racial lines, in whatever direction”.

Nonetheless the research  does have much of interest.  One finding  is truly startling. Faced with the question  “The government should insist that all immigrants should return to the countries they came from, whether they’re here legally or illegally”  the result was Agree 25%, disagree 52% and neither 23%. (P17 of the report).  In addition, many of those who said no to forced repatriation were also firm supporters of strong border controls and restrictive  immigration policies.

The fact that 25% of the population have overcome their fear of  falling foul of the pc police and say that they do not merely want immigration stopped but sent into reverse is  stunning. Moreover, because political correctness has taken such an intimidating place in British society it is reasonable to assume that a substantial number of those who said they disagreed did so simply out of fear of being accused of racism.

The obverse of the immigration coin was shown by the question “In an increasingly borderless world, we should welcome anyone who wants to come to Britain and not deter them with border controls” (P16 of the report).  The results were 14% agree, 67% disagree and 19% don’t know.

That only 14% support such a policy compared to the 25% who  wished for forced repatriation is striking in itself, but  it is even better for the  opponents of immigration than it looks for two reasons. First, the 14%  of those who agreed with the question will be the honest figure because to say that you want open borders carries with it no penalties from the pc police  and will gain the person brownie points amongst the politically correct elite and their axillaries. Second,  as already mentioned, the 25% of those wanting forced repatriation of all immigrants will understate the true position because a significant proportion of those questioned with be lying out of fear.

The report also shows that older voters are more likely to be those who are most strongly opposed to immigration (P11 of the report).  That is important because older voters are the most likely to vote.

Taking all that into account  it is reasonable to assume that a referendum with the question “Do you wish to end mass immigration?”  would result in a solid probably overwhelming YES vote.

These facts  should persuade politicians that they would risk nothing if they move much further to restrict  immigration than they have already done and in so doing would  gain  considerable  extra electoral support.

This may well happen. Public rhetoric  about immigration is rapidly hardening There will come a tipping point where  the rhetoric  has departed so far from the politically correct position that serious  action to restrict immigration will occur because the stretch between rhetoric and action will  become too great to sustain in a society where governments are elected.

A party political  bidding process on the  subject of immigration is already taking place  and there will come a point where serious action has to follow  or there will be a very real chance that either one or more of the mainstream parties will become irrelevant and be superseded, or members of the mainstream parties will wrest control of these parties from their pc indoctrinated leadership  and adopt a policy on immigration  closer to what the public wants.

The other important effect of greater political honesty in political utterances about immigration is that it makes  it much easier for people generally to speak openly about their feelings on the subject and to lobby for radical action.   In  turn this will feed the desire of politicians to gain electoral credibility by being  ever former in their immigration policies.  Indeed, the only reason that the present immigration has been allowed to develop is because the subject has been effectively wiped off the public debate agenda since the1970s.

If there had been no post-1945 mass immigration into Britain …

Robert Henderson

Without mass immigration we would not have ….

1.. A rapidly rising population. http://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2013/nov/06/uk-population-rise-ons

2. Ethnic minority ghettoes. http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/edwest/100047117/britains-ethnic-ghettos-mean-liberals-can-wave-goodbye-to-their-dream-of-scandinavian-social-democracy/

3. Race relations legislation, most notably the Race Relations Act of 1976. http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/1976/74

4. Gross interferences with free speech such as those in the 1976  Race Relations Act  and 1986 Public Order Act arising from the British elite’s determination and need (from their point of view) to suppress dissent about immigration and its consequences.

5. Native Britons being  charged with criminal offences and,  in increasing numbers of cases,  finding themselves in  prison  for expressing their opposition to mass immigration  or  for being non-PC about immigrants and British born ethnic and racial minorities.  https://englandcalling.wordpress.com/2013/07/02/the-oppression-of-emma-west-the-politically-correct-end-game-plays-out/

6. Native Britons losing their jobs simply for beings non-pc  about  immigration and ethnic and racial minorities. http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1239765/Park-ranger-sacked-racist-joke-wins-40k-compensation-tribunal-tells-council-skin-colour-fact-life.html

7. Such a virulent political correctness,  because the central plank of the creed  – race – would have been removed or at least made insignificant. Without large numbers of racial and ethnic minorities to either act as the clients of the politically correct or to offer a threat of serious civil unrest to provide the politically correct with a reason to enact authoritarian laws banning free discussion about the effects of immigration, “antiracism” would have little traction.   Moreover, without the massive political  leverage race has provided,  political correctness in its other  areas,  most notably homosexuality and feminism,   would have been much more difficult to inject   into British society.  But   even  if  political correctness  had been  robbed of its dominant racial aspect  whilst leaving  the rest of the ideology  as potent as  it is now,    it would be a trivial thing compared to the ideology with its dominant  racial aspect intact.   Changes to the status of homosexuals and women do not fundamentally alter the nature of a society by destroying  its natural  homogeneity. Moreover, customs and laws can always be altered peacefully. A  country with  large unassimilable minorities  cannot be altered peacefully.

8. State sponsored  multiculturalism, which is now institutionalised within  British public service and the state  educational system. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-12371994

9. Islamic terrorism. https://www.mi5.gov.uk/home/mi5-history/mi5-today/the-rise-of-the-islamist-terrorist-threat.html

10. The creeping introduction of Sharia Law through such things as the toleration of sharia courts to settle disputes between Muslims provided both parties agree. The idea that such agreement is voluntary is highly suspect because of the  pressure from within the Muslim population for Muslims to conform to Sharia law and to settle disputes within the Muslim population.  But even if it was always entirely voluntary, it would be wrong in principle to have an alien system of law accepted as a rival to the law of the land because inevitably it would undermine the idea of the rule of law and  further  isolate Muslims from the mainstream. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/women/womens-politics/10778554/The-feisty-baroness-defending-voiceless-Muslim-women.html

11. Muslims Schools which fail to conform to the national curriculum at best and at worst are vehicles for the promotion of Islamic supremacist ideas. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/education/educationnews/10777054/Ofsted-chief-to-take-charge-of-probe-into-Islamic-school-plot.html

12.  A calamitous housing shortage. http://www.jrf.org.uk/media-centre/shortage-homes-over-next-20-years-threatens-deepening-housing-crisis

13. Housing Associations which cater solely for ethnic and racial minority  groups. https://englandcalling.wordpress.com/2011/04/08/the-truth-about-social-housing-and-ethnic-minorities/

14. A serious and growing shortage of school places, especially primary school places . http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/education-23931974

  1. Health tourism on a huge scale http://www.spectator.co.uk/features/8880071/international-health-service/

16  Benefit tourism on a massive scale. http://www.migrationwatchuk.co.uk/pdfs/BP1_37.pdf

17 . Such crowded roads and public transport. http://www.london.gov.uk/media/assembly-press-releases/2013/10/fears-of-future-overcrowding-due-to-167-million-more-london-bus

18. Such a low wage economy.  http://www.theguardian.com/uk/2010/jan/17/eastern-european-immigration-hits-wages

19. Such high unemployment and underemployment. http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/2013/11/13/uk-employment-figures_n_4265134.html

20. Such a  need for the taxpayer to subsidise those in work because of the under cutting of wages  by immigrants.  http://www.insidehousing.co.uk/majority-of-new-housing-benefit-claimants-in-work/6521183.article

21. Areas of work effectively off limits to white Britons because either an area of work is controlled by foreigners or British born ethnic minorities, both of whom only employ those of their own nationality and/or ethnicity, or unscrupulous British employers who use foreigners and ethnic minorities because they are cheap and easier to control. http://www.standard.co.uk/news/uk/800000-uk-jobs-advertised-across-europe–and-foreign-jobseekers-even-get-travelling-costs-8734731.html

22 As much crime (and particularly violent crime) because foreigners and British born blacks and Asians commit a disproportionately large proportion of UK crime, for example see http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2522270/Foreign-prisoner-total-11-000.html

and

https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/269399/Race-and-cjs-2012.pdf

and

https://englandcalling.wordpress.com/2011/11/04/the-black-instigated-and-dominated-2011-riots-and-the-great-elite-lie/

23.  Double standards in applying the law to the white native population and immigrants, with the white native population being  frequently treated more harshly  than blacks, Asians and white first generation immigrants. http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/2011/12/07/female-gang-who-attacked-woman-spared-jail_n_1133734.html

24. Female genital mutilation. http://www.theguardian.com/society/2014/apr/15/fgm-first-suspects-charged-court

25. “Honour” killings. http://www.bbc.co.uk/ethics/honourcrimes/crimesofhonour_1.shtml#h2

26. Forced marriages. http://www.bbc.co.uk/ethics/honourcrimes/crimesofhonour_1.shtml#h2

27. Widespread electoral fraud. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/10557364/Election-watchdog-demands-action-amid-fears-of-Asian-voter-fraud.html

 

We would have ……

1. A very homogenous country,  as it used to be.

2. No fear of speaking our minds about race and  immigration.

3. No fear of speaking our minds about foreigners.

4. No fear of being proud of our country and Western culture generally.

5. No people being sent to prison for simply saying what they thought about race and ethnicity.

6. Much less political correctness.

7. Equality before the law in as far as that is humanly possible.

8. A stable population.

9. Plentiful housing, both rented and for purchase, at a price the ordinary working man or woman can afford.

10. Abundant  school places.

11. An NHS with much shorter waiting lists  and staffed overwhelmingly with native Britons. Those who claim that the NHS would collapse with foreign staff should ask themselves one question: if that is  the case,  how do areas of the UK with few racial or ethnic minority people manage to recruit native born Britons  to do the work?

12. A higher wage economy .

13. Far more native Britons in employment.

14. No areas of work effectively off limits to white Britons because either an area of work is controlled by foreigners or British born ethnic minorities, both of whom only employ those of their own nationality and/or ethnicity, or unscrupulous British employers who use foreigners and ethnic minorities because they are cheap and easier to control.

15. A much lower benefit bill for those of working age.

16. Substantially less crime.

17. An honest electoral system.

Frank Field calls for an English Parliament on Any Questions

Robert Henderson

Any Questions on 21 Feb 2014 (BBC R4) came from  Blundells School in Tiverton, Devon. The panel answering the question were the  Secretary of State for Scotland  and LibDem MP Alistair Carmichael, Conservative backbench MP Nadhim Zahawi  MP, New Statesman columnist Laurie Penny and Labour backbench MP Frank Field.  A classic example of the BBC’s idea of political  balance one might say  with two left leaning MPs in Carmichael and Field, an ethnic minority representative in Zahawi and a hard left ideologue in Penny.

The programme   contained this question: Will England be better off without Scotland? Carmichael and   Zahawi waffled about how successful the Union had been and  Penny exhibited routine hard left bile over the prospect of a Tory government in the rest of the UK if Scotland left the Union.  But then came Frank Field who upset the politically correct applecart by berating the present devolution settlement, suggesting that England would be well-rid of Scotland  and advocating an English Parliament. I have made a transcript of his words and the programme  presenter Jonathan Dimbleby’s interruptions ( The programme can still be heard on the BBC IPlayer  http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b03vh0d1  – Enter at 33minutes 54 seconds )

Frank Field: “I think this question is a really good example of how the elites whether in England or Scotland stitch up issues in that if you are giving one part of the United Kingdom a vote to say damn you we are leaving,  I think that should be a vote for all of us to decide. And I think we should be having actually a say  on whether we want Scotland to stay with us. And  I think that what we might well  find is that England would vote for Scotland to  leave  and the Scotland  would  vote to actually stay.”

Dimbleby: “How would you vote?”

Field: “I would vote for them to leave. For this reason, I voted against devolution. I feared that once we started this process the inevitability would be an independent Scotland. We have the unfairness now of this Government proposing issues which affect my constituents but don’t affect Scottish constituents and Scottish MPs vote on those issues affecting my constituents. …

Dimbleby attempts to interrupt but Field shrugs him off.

Field “And therefore I support Alastair [Carmichael had suggested English devolution without specifying what it would be, but implied he was thinking of English regional devolution not an English Parliament].  I think we actually need as a first step in this an English Parliament. I don’t fear that because as we withdrew from Empire , particularly Scotland but also Wales and also Northern Ireland, began to gain a huge sense of national identity, of  not being associated with Empire and actually feeling a proper role for themselves. And I think England has been too giving in this situation, I think we need likewise with Scotland, and with wales and Northern Ireland  to begin to find out what our own identity is, how we then join together mix together,  govern together is something downstream, but I do think this huge injustice that the others have assemblies  or parliaments  and yet the English do not have their own Parliament to make their views known …. “

Dimbleby cuts Field off at this point and calls for further remarks from Carmichael who just waffles about  England having a voice rather than a vote in the question of Scottish independence.

Dimbleby then tried to distract the debate away from such an alarming  idea (for liberal bigots) as an English Parliament by calling for one of the ad hoc pseudo polls of the studio audience the BBC loves to use to propagandise the pc view on anything by asking for shows of hands for those for and against a proposition. In most circumstances they can be certain to get the “right” pc answer because  BBC audiences for political programmes are routinely   packed to ensure that the “right” pc answer will be given. However, Any Questions audiences are a little less  easy to predict and control than most BBC audiences because the programme often goes  to parts of England largely untouched by mass immigration. Tiverton is such a place.  Any Questions audiences tend to be drawn from the area of the broadcast  and consequently  the Tiverton audience was  less likely to be rigid with political correctness than the ordinary BBC audience  simply because it was a genuinely  English audience.

Dimbleby  put the questions “Who thinks  England  would be better off  if Scotland became Independent? followed by “Who thinks  England would be worse of if Scotland became independent?”. This produced the desired pc answer with a large majority saying that  England would be worse off.

So far so pc good. Then it all went horribly wrong.  Field immediately jumped in and asked Dimbleby  to put to the audience the question  ”Should England have a Parliament?” Dimbleby  did this and an overwhelming number of hands went up to say Yes, we want an English Parliament.   Such an  open expression of Englishness  was made easier for the audience because the politically correct have not made English patriotic sentiment a formal part of pc. Instead they have simply censured it from public discussion. Hence, the audience did not have the normal pressure of fearing that they would be called a un-pc bigots.

When Any Answers went out on 22 February no phone calls  were taken or tweets, texts and emails read out on the subject of Scottish devolution and where England should stand in a devolved UK.

The liberal bigot tendency who deny England a Parliament always claim that there is no demand for it. This is the exact opposite of the truth. The only reason there is no overt public demand is because the mainstream media and politicians refuse to address the issue.

Field’s view of England needing to find its identity, and indeed of the other home nations needing to do so after the end of Empire, is mistaken because true nations never lose the habit of knowing who and what they are.  Anyone who  believes  the English doubted the reality of their nationhood even at the height of Empire should read  Froude’s History of England (1850–1870), or wonder why when foreigners speak of the UK they to this day more often than not refer to England.  It is only a Quisling elite who suppress public signs of English identity and celebration. Take the politically correct brakes off  English society and the English will leave the world in no doubt of who they are.   The quickest and most certain way to achieve that is the establishment of an English parliament.

The Scottish Independence Referendum – unanswered questions

Robert Henderson

NB UK2 stands for the UK containing England, Wales and Northern Ireland

The vote on Scottish independence is in 2014. The next UK general election is scheduled for 2015. The date for  Scotland to leave  the Union is 2016.  Assuming Scotland votes for independence these unanswered questions need addressing:

1. When will existing MPs sitting in Scottish seats be expelled from the Commons?  Will they be allowed to continue sitting in the Commons until the 2015 general election?

2. Will Scottish Westminster seats which fall vacant before the Independence referendum be filled in the normal way with a bye-election?

3. What will happen to Scottish Westminster seats which fall vacant after a  vote in 2014 to leave the Union but before the 2016 formal departure date?  Will there be a bye-election to fill the seat until the formal departure or will the seat be left vacant?

4. What will happen to peers who have hereditary Scottish titles or  are Scottish life peers?

Unless they are excluded from the Lords they would continue to have a say in UK2’s politics after Scottish independence.    The cleanest solution would be to insist on peers residing  in England, Wales or Northern Ireland and make any peer wishing to sit in the Lords divest themselves of any formal nationality other than British.  That would mean peers were in a different position to the rest of the population with regard to legal nationality, including MPs, who can at present hold more than one nationality.  The answer would be to make illegal the holding of anything other than British nationality by anyone sitting in the Lords or Commons .

5. What will happen to those holding  British passports who find themselves in an independent Scotland or wish to have Scottish nationality whilst living elsewhere? This would be a good time to deny dual nationality to British citizens generally.

6. What will be the position of Scotland and the rest of the UK (UK2) respectively with regard to the EU?  There is no precedent for an EU member splitting into  separate sovereign states and the component parts of the original EU state being taking back into the EU.  Both logically and legally it is difficult to see how the EU could  allow  either or both of Scotland and UK2  back in without a further Treaty agreed by the other 27 states. Several of those states would require referenda before such a Treaty could be approved.

7. What if Scotland or UK2 were refused admission to the EU or decided they  did not want to join the EU?  If one country was outside the EU it  would have to apply the barriers to trade that the EU states apply generally to those outside the European Economic Area (EEA)

8. What would happen to immigration between UK2 and Scotland? The danger is of  Scotland  allowing large numbers of people to enter Scotland knowing that these people would almost all head straight for England. Whether or not Scotland was a member of the EU, there would have to be strict immigration controls on those coming from outside the EEA and if either Scotland or UK2 was outside the EU, there would be a strong case for imposing border controls.

9.What currency will Scotland use? The position with the Pound Sterling is beautifully simple: Scotland was allowed to use the English currency after they signed the Treaty of Union in 1707, having discarded their Scottish Pound, which was only worth a few English shillings. If they leave the Union they break the Treaty of Union and consequently no longer have any legal right to use the Pound.  It would be a disaster for England if Scotland was allowed to use the Pound because in practice England would be the lender of last resort for Scottish financial institutions through the Bank of England and even without a financial catastrophe Scottish fiscal recklessness could generally weaken the Pound.  Scotland should have to choose between the Euro or a new Scottish currency. If Scotland has to reapply for EU membership she would probably be forced to take the Euro as all new state are obligated to do so.

10. How will the oil and gas revenues be divided? Even if this was left simply to a matter of what is in whose territorial waters  Scotland could get much less than they estimate (around 90%+) if the territorial waters are determined by lines drawn at the angle of the coast at the English/Scottish border. Moreover, a good deal of the oil is around the Scottish islands, who have been making noises about not wishing to be part of an independent Scotland. Shale oil and gas also comes into the picture. Most of the likely UK shale deposits are in England. It would be a grand irony if Scotland cut herself off from a share of the revenues from these by opting for independence.

11. From  what date will Scotland’s proportionate share of the UK national debt be calculated?  It would be significantly lower if calculated at the time of the 2014 referendum rather than the formal date of leaving in 2016.

12. How will Scotland finance the servicing of her proportionate share of the UK national debt?

If she retains the Pound this could be done simply by paying to the British Treasury the sum needed to service it. Scotland would be able to reduce the servicing charge by making payments to the British Treasury to reduce the debt.

If Scotland does not retain the Pound she would either have to join the Euro or establish a new Scottish currency. Either could be a very dodgy proposition. To safeguard UK2’s interests,  Scotland should be forced to raise the money, if she can,  through issuing her own bonds, converting these into a safe currency and then  passing the money to UK2. Alternatively she could buy safe currency and pass that to UK2.

13. Since the Union in 1707, Scotland has taken far more from the Westminster Treasury than she has raised in tax. What payment is Scotland to make to the rest of the UK to repay this subsidy from the rest of the UK (in effect from England)?

14. What will happen to the state holdings in the banks RBS and Lloyds?  At the moment these are both net liabilities not assets because the share value of both means the  £45 billion put into them by the UK taxpayer could not be recouped if the shares were sold.

15. How are the assets of the  UK to be divided between Scotland and UK2?  For the material assets which are physically fixed the only practical way would be for Scotland to retain what is in Scotland and UK2 to retain what is in UK2.  The moveable assets such as military ones could be divided,  but there would be little point in giving Scotland equipment they could not afford to use, for example, the larger surface ships or submarines. The Trident deterrent must be removed to an English base together with any other ships allocated to UK2 which are  currently based in Scotland and warship building retained in Portsmouth.   The only substantial overseas assets would be  the diplomatic operations in embassies and consulates. However, these have been scaled back over the past  thirty years. An agreement would probably  have to be made whereby the UK2 kept the properties and offset some of the Scottish share of the UK national debt against their notional share.

I6. If an independent Scotland cannot or will not maintain armed forces equivalent to those now stationed  in Scotland, what will happen to the men and equipment? Will the British Army absorb them?

17. There are many public sector jobs in Scotland which service the rest of the UK (http://www.theguardian.com/public-leaders-network/blog/2012/aug/14/unified-scottish-civil-service-not-that-simple). How long after the vote for independence will they be removed to the part of the UK which they actually serve?

18. Who will be responsible for paying the pensions of civil servants working in Scotland but servicing another part of the UK?

19. What proportion of the overall UK public  sector pension entitlement at the time of independence will Scotland be responsible for? This pension entitlement will include those paid to the armed forces, British Eurocrats and the diplomatic service.

20. At what date will the accumulated public sector pensions of the UK be calculated? Immediately after the vote for independence, the date of formal independence or what? The later the date the larger the Scottish liability.

21. Will those with Scottish nationality have to have work permits to work in UK2?

22. What will happen to the BBC? At the moment Scotland gets a very good deal because she pays in proportion to her population,  but gets the benefit of the entire BBC output, the vast majority of which is paid for by English TV licence payers. There is no reason why an independent Scotland should continue to do so.  They should form their own public service broadcaster (if that is what they want) and purchase BBC programmes on the same basis as any other foreign country.

The terms on which Scotland could secede from the Union should be agreed before any Scottish vote on independence. Agreement to the terms should be through  a referendum of voters in England, Wales and Northern Ireland. Only if accepted by those voters should the independence question be put to the Scottish electorate.  That question should be Do you wish to have independence on the terms offered by the rest of UK?

Would a libertarian society deprive individuals of cultural roots and collective identity?

There are many rooms in the libertarian  ideological house.  That fact often derails rational discussion of libertarian issues, but it need not be a problem in this instance because the question being asked is most  efficiently  examined   by testing  it against  the flintiest wing of libertarian thought.   If  that pristine, uncompromising  form of libertarianism is incompatible with the maintenance of cultural roots and collective identity, then  all other shades of libertarianism will be incompatible to some degree. 

The pristine libertarian has no truck with  any form of government, believing that  personal relations  between individuals  will adequately order society no matter how large or complex the society,  and that such ordering will arise naturally if  only the artificially constraints on human behaviour such as governments and laws are removed.   Such a society  would supposedly  work along these lines.    If the society is threatened by an invader,  individuals will join together to defend it out of a sense of self-preservation.  To   those who cannot work for reasons of sickness, injury, age or innate infirmity,  compassion and a sense of duty will ensure that private charity is  extended  to relieve the need. If  public works such as roads and railways are required, self-interest and reason will drive individuals to join to together to build them.   Matters such as education may be safely  left to parents and such charitable provision as arises.   Above all the individual is king and personal choice is only circumscribed if a choice involves the imposition of one individual’s will on another.   You get the idea.  The consequence is a vision of a society not  a million miles away from  Rightist  forms of anarchism.

This concentration on the individual makes for a fissile society. If each person  is to follow his or her  own way  without any requirement to believe anything other than to respect the conditions necessary to realise libertarian ends , that in itself  would definitely weaken  collective identity and probably affect cultural unity.  Nonetheless in a truly homogeneous society, especially if it was small, the probability is that cultural weakening would not be great and the absence of a conscious collective identity would not present a difficulty provided the society was not subject to a serious threat from outside.

Serious problems  for the pristine libertarian  arise if the society is heterogeneous,  because  then there is a loss of collective unity. If the heterogeneity comes from class,  the cultural roots may  be largely untouched or at least develop in a way  which ensures that there is still much cultural  uniformity  and that uniformity is clearly an extension of  past cultural traits. It is also true that in a racially and ethnically homogeneous society, a sense of collective unity will be easily rekindled if the society comes under external threat.

The most difficult society for libertarians to deal with is one which is ethnically divided, especially if the ethnic divide includes racial difference. There a society becomes not so much a society but a series of competing racial and ethnic enclaves.   In such a situation,  it is inevitable that both  cultural unity and collective identity is undermined because there is no  shared general cultural experience and this plus racial difference makes a collective identity not merely impossible but absurd even in concept.

The brings us to the most obvious threat presented by pristine  libertarians to the maintenance of cultural roots and collective identity. That  is the idea that national boundaries  should be irrelevant with people travelling and settling wherever they choose.  This presumes human beings are essentially interchangeable and in this respect it echoes  multiculturalism.  The consequence of such a belief is to greatly increase the heterogeneity of a society through the mass immigration of those who are radically different from the native population.  We do not need to guess what the result of such immigration is because it  has happened throughout the western world in our own time. More specifically, it has happened in those  countries whose populations which are most naturally sympathetic  to libertarian ideas: those which may broadly be described as Anglo-Saxon; countries such as Britain, the USA and what used to be known as  the old white dominions.

The influx of millions of people who  see themselves as separate from the native populations of the countries to which they had migrated has resulted in the Anglo-Saxon states gradually destroying their tradition of freedom. Driven by a mixture of liberal internationalist ideology and fear, their  elites have severely restricted by laws and their control of the media  and public institutions  what may be said publicly about immigration and its consequences.  In Britain it is now possible to be brought to court simply for saying to someone from an ethnic minority “go home”, while any allegation of racist behaviour  – which may be no more than failing to invite someone from an ethnic minority  to an office party – against a public servant will result at best in a long inquiry and at worst with dismissal.  Nor, in practice, is application of the law or the  witch-hunts  directed equally against everyone for it is overwhelmingly native Britons who are targeted.

At the same time as native Britons are being silenced and intimidated, an incessant tide of pro-immigrant and multiculturalist  propaganda is pumped out by government, the public organisations they control such as the civil service and state schools and the mass media , which is overwhelmingly signed up to the liberal internationalist way of thinking.  The teaching of history has been made a non-compulsory subject in British schools after the age of 14 and such history as  is taught  is next to worthless in promoting a sense of collective unity,  both because it fails to give any chronological context to what is put before the pupils  because it concentrates on “themes”  rather than periods and because the amount of British history that is contained within  the syllabus is tiny, often consisting of the Tudors and little else.  The consequence is that the young of the native British population are left with both a sense that their own culture is in some strange way to be valued less than that of the various immigrant groups and the lack of any knowledge about their country’s past.

The most  and sinister  consequence of  post-war immigration and the British elite’s response to it  is the development within Britain of  a substantial number of Muslims who not only do not have any sense of belonging to the broader society in which they live, but who are actively hostile to  Britain and its values.  But if this is the most dramatic example of the fracturing  of British society, it is merely symptomatic of the separatist attitude of  ethnic minorities in Britain generally, especially those from radically alien cultures allied to racial difference.

All of these developments are antithetical to pristine  libertarian ideals,  both because they  undermine  shared values and because they  result in actions to control friction between competing racial and ethnic groups which in themselves undermine the conditions in which libertarian ideals  flourish.  That libertarians so often subscribe to the ideal of open borders despite the overwhelming evidence of  its counter-productive effects for libertarian ends is indicative of the blinkered nature of much libertarian thinking.

The fundamental weakness of pristine  libertarianism is its complete  failure to take  account of  human psychology  and the way humans behave as groups.  This is unsurprising  because of the central position given to the individual.  But by doing this pristine  libertarians  ignore the central fact of being human: we are a social animal. Being  a social animal entails two defining behaviours: all social animals  produce hierarchies  and   all social animals place limits to the group.  Homo sapiens is no exception.

Because hierarchies in the human context arise not only from the personal efforts, qualities and talents of each individual, as is the case with animals,  but from the  position  each individual occupies through the accident of birth, this raises two difficulties for libertarians.  The first is there is not a level playing field and without that the pristine  libertarian ideal of society organising itself through freely  entered into relationships is severely distorted because it is clearly absurd to say that a man born poor is freely entering into a master-servant relationship with a man born rich when the poor man needs money simply to feed himself.  The second difficulty is that the very existence of an hierarchy,  whether or not it is based on merit, undermines the notion of free choice because once it is established different power relationships exist.

The question of hierarchy becomes more complex as the heterogeneity of a society grows whether that be ever deeper division into classes or increasing ethnic and racial diversity . All social animals have to have boundaries  to  know where the group begins and ends.  This is  because a social animal must operate  within a hierarchy and a hierarchy can only exist where  there are  boundaries.   No boundaries,  no hierarchy, because  no  individual could  ever  know what the dominance/submission situation  was  within their species or at least within those members of the species with whom they interact.

The need to define the group is particularly important for libertarians.    Above all libertarianism requires  trust. In the pristine libertarian society this means each individual believing that other people will keep their word and generally behave honestly. But as we all know only too well  people cannot  be trusted to observe societal norms and a society which is fractured by class, race or  ethnicity  is the least likely of all to have a shared sense of what is right.  Therefore,  libertarians need to recognise that however much they would like to believe that each human being is an individual who may go where he or she pleases and do what he or she pleases, the sociological reality precludes  this and that the only sane ideological course for a libertarian is to advocate closed borders and the preservation of the homogeneity of  those societies which are most favourable to libertarian ideals not because the society  consciously espouses them,  but because the  society has evolved in a way which includes libertarian traits.

There will be libertarians who find it immensely difficult going on impossible to accept that the individual must in some respects be subordinated to the group.  They will imagine, as liberal internationalists do, that human nature can be changed, although in the case of libertarians the change will come not from re-education but the creation of circumstances propitious for libertarian behaviour to emerge.  Let me explain why this is impossible because of the innate differences between  human beings and the effects of cultural imprinting.

Because Man is differentiated profoundly by culture, the widely accepted definition  of a species – a population of freely interbreeding organisms sharing a common gene pool –   is  unsatisfactory,  for  clearly Man is  more  than  a brute   animal  responding   to   simple  biological   triggers.  When   behavioural differences  are perceived as belonging to a particular group  by  that group  as differentiating  members of the group from other  men,    they perform the same role as  organic differences for  they divide Man  into cultural species.

An analogy with computers can be made. As hardware,  a particular model of  computer is  practically identical to every other computer which  is classified  as  the same model.  But the  software available to every computer of the same model is not identical.   They may run  different operating systems, either completely different or different versions of the same program. The software which runs under the operating system is different  with different versions of the same program being used.  The data which is input to the computer varies and this in turn affects the capabilities of the computer.

It  clearly makes no sense to say every computer of the same  model  is the same even if the computer is loaded with the same software.   But of  course  not  all  computers  are  of  the  same  model.  They  vary tremendously  in  their  power.  The same software  will  run  at  very different  rates  because of this.  Storage and memory size  also  vary tremendously. Some computers cannot run programmes because the programmes  are too large.   We  may call all computers computers ,  but that is to say little more  than that  all  animals are animals,  for  computers  range  from  the immensely  powerful super computers – the homo sapiens  of  the computer  world  as it were – to the amoeba of the  simple  chip  which controls  lights  being put on or off in a room  depending  on whether someone is in it.

Are the circumstances of computers  not akin to those of  Man?  Do  not the racially based  differences in IQ correspond to the differences  in power  of  older  and  newer computers?  Do not different  languages  represent different operating systems? For example, think how different must be the mentality of  a native Chinese speaker (using  a language which  is entirely  monosyllabic)  to that of a native English speaker  (using  a polysyllabic language) simply because of the profound difference in the structure  of the language. A language will not merely impose limits on what  may  be  expressed it will affect the  entire  mentality  of  the individual,  from aesthetic appreciation to  social expression. Is not the experiential input analogous to the holding of different data?

But the most potent of human behavioural triggers are racial differences,  for they exercise the strongest control over the group in a territory where different racial groups exist. Race trumps ethnicity where the ethnic clash is one of people of the same race but different ethnicities.  Place a significant population of a different race into a territory where ethnicity rather than race is the cause of unrest and the ethnic factions of the same race will tend to unite against those of a different race.

To argue that racial difference is  not important to the choice of a mate is as absurd as arguing  that the attractiveness of a person is irrelevant to the choice of a  mate.

In  Freakonomics  Steven Levitt and Stephen Dubner  cite a study made of a  US dating site (the full story is on pp 80-84).  The site is one  of the  largest  in  the US and the data examined  covered  30,000  people equally  divided  between San Diego and Boston.   Most were  white  but there was a substantial minority of non-white subjects.

The  questionnaire the  would-be  daters had to  fill  in  included  a question  choice on race as “same as mine”  and “doesn’t matter”.   The study  compared  the responses  by white would-be  daters  (those  from non-white were not analysed) to these  questions with the race of  the emails  actually  sent soliciting a date.   The result  in  Levitt  and Dubner’s words was:

“Roughly  half of the white women on the site  and  80  percent  of  the white men declared that  race  didn’t  matter to them. But the response data tell a different story  The white men who said that race didn’t  matter sent  90  percent of  their e-mail  queries  to  white women. The  white women who said race  didn’t  matter sent about 97 percent of their e-mail queries to white men.

“Is  it  possible that race really didn’t  matter  for  these  white women and men and that they simply  never  happened  to browse a non-white date  that  interested them?”

Or,  more likely, did they say that race didn’t matter  because they wanted to come across  especially  to potential mates of their own race as open-minded?” In short, around 99% of all the women and 94%  of all men in the sample were  not  willing  to  seek a  date of a  different  race.   How  much stronger  will  be  the tendency to refuse to breed with a  mate  of  a different race?

If sexual desire will not commonly override the natural disinclination to remain racially separate nothing will.

Because the tendency to mate with those of a similar race is so strong  and universal,  both in place and time, it is reasonable to conclude  that the  behaviour  is innate and that cultures  necessarily include  the requirement for a member of the society to be of a certain racial type. The  consequence of this is that someone of a different racial type  is effectively precluded from full integration because one of the criteria for  belonging has not been met.  That is not to say,  of course,  that many  of the habits of mind of an alien culture may not be  adopted  by someone  of  a  different race.  What is withheld  is  the  instinctive acceptance  of the alien and his or her descendants  as members of  the society. Just as no human being can decide for themselves that they are a member of this or that group, no individual can decide that they belong to this or that nation because it is a two-way process: the other members of the group they wish to join have to accept them as a true member of the group. (Stephen Frears the English  film director once wryly remarked that he had known the actor Daniel Day-Lewis “before he was Irish”).

Where does this leave us? In its present form libertarianism is a most efficient  dissolver of cultural roots and collective identity. It is this because it ignores the realities of  Man’s social nature.  This results in the  creation of the very circumstances which are least conducive to the realisation of libertarian ends.  If libertarians are to realise those ends, they must recognise that the society  most favourable to their beliefs  is one which is homogeneous in which the shared values create the platform of trust which must underlie libertarian behaviour.   Of course, that does not guarantee a society favourable to libertarians because  the shared values may be antithetical to them, but it is a necessary if not sufficient condition for libertarian ideals to flourish. To that libertarians must add a recognition that there are profound differences between ethnic and racial groups and identify those societies which are most worth protecting because they have the largest element of libertarian traits within them.

Written for entry to  the 2010  Chris Tame prize

Ashes news – “Australia’s experiment with their Asian immigrant population will be shelved.”

I sent this letter to the Daily Telegraph on 13 August:

Sir, 

 Scyld Berry’s piece on the fourth Test Ashes win  (Those scars will last until winter – 13th August) ) included this in my paper copy: 
Usman Khawaja will be roasted for the limp defensive prod that he aimed at Swann when Australia were 147 for one. He could well be replaced in the Oval Test by Phil Hughes and Australia’s experiment with their Asian immigrant population will be shelved.”  
 
It has transmogrified into this on the Telegraph Website:
“Usman Khawaja will be roasted for the limp defensive prod that he aimed at Swann when Australia were 147 for one. He could well be replaced in the Oval Test by Phil Hughes. “
    
Why the change?
Yours sincerely,
Robert Henderson

Emma West’s trial scheduled for the sixth time

Robert Henderson

Emma West was due to stand trial at Croydon Crown Court for  two racially aggravated public order offences  arising from her complaint about  mass immigration and its effects made on a Croydon tram  in November 2011 . The trial has been delayed yet again and she will now (allegedly) stand trial on 10 May.[1]

The authorities are extracting the bodily fluids if they expect the general public to believe there is a legitimate reason for the delay.  The 10 May will be the sixth (yes, that is the sixth) trial date Ms West has been given since she was arrested .  By 10 May she will have been waiting to be tried for just short of eighteen months. The delay  is patently unreasonable.

The latest  excuse  given for the inordinate delay are “legal reasons”.   The only likely reasons are political ones, namely, her trial will challenge to politically correct status quo. This is because unlike virtually everyone else who has been charged with these type of offences she has made it clear she will be pleading NOT GUILTY.   The authorities simply  do not know what to do with her.

There is an added complication. When the previous re-scheduling happened the charges of assault against two police offices during the investigation of her case were also delayed  -they were originally due to be held on 3 March and were re-scheduled for 15 April.[2]

It will be interesting to see if these cases (to be heard in a magistrates’ court) go ahead on the 15 April or are put back yet again.   The authorities may have decided they want these cases to be heard before the racially aggravated public order offences. That could be to her disadvantage not just because it would taint her with  a criminal conviction before her Crown Court trial, but even more  dangerously because a criminal conviction for violence could provide the local social services with grounds for removing or threatening to remove her young son.  That might well be used as a lever to persuade her to plead guilty.  It is all too easy to imagine the cant the social services could come out with: “If you show remorse, Emma,  it may be possible to let you keep your child because it shows willingness to change. But if you stubbornly stick to your  not guilty plea we may have to take your son away from you because you are an unfit mother.”

The other possibility is that if the assault charges  are heard on  15 April and she is found guilty, she might be sent to prison. This would be very unusual for common assault cases, but the fact that the alleged victims are police officers might give the magistrates grounds for doing so. If that happened her son would probably be taken into care.  Whether she would ever get him back is a moot point. This scenario could of course also be used to frighten her in pleading guilty.

The EU IN/OUT referendum: strategy and tactics for those who want to leave the EU

Robert Henderson

The general strategy

A) How to leave

Article 50 of the Lisbon Treaty states

1. Any Member State may decide to withdraw from the Union in accordance with its own constitutional requirements.

2. A Member State which decides to withdraw shall notify the European Council of its intention. In the light of the guidelines provided by the European Council, the Union shall negotiate and conclude an agreement with that State, setting out the arrangements for its withdrawal, taking account of the framework for its future relationship with the Union. That agreement shall be negotiated in accordance with Article 218(3) of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union. It shall be concluded on behalf of the Union by the Council, acting by a qualified majority, after obtaining the consent of the European Parliament.

3. The Treaties shall cease to apply to the State in question from the date of entry into force of the withdrawal agreement or, failing that, two years after the notification referred to in paragraph 2, unless the European Council, in agreement with the Member State concerned, unanimously decides to extend this period.

4. For the purposes of paragraphs 2 and 3, the member of the European Council or of the Council representing the withdrawing Member State shall not participate in the discussions of the European Council or Council or in decisions concerning it.

A qualified majority shall be defined in accordance with Article 238(3)(b) of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union.

5. If a State which has withdrawn from the Union asks to rejoin, its request shall be subject to the procedure referred to in Article 49. (http://www.lisbon-treaty.org/wcm/the-lisbon-treaty/treaty-on-european-union-and-comments/title-6-final-provisions/137-article-50.html).

The OUT camp must make it clear that  it would be both damaging and unnecessary for the UK to abide by this Treaty requirement. It  would allow the EU to inflict considerable damage on the UK both during the period prior to formally  leaving and afterwards if  the price of leaving with the EU’s agreement was  for  UK to sign up to various obligations, for example, to continue paying a large annual sum to the EU for ten years . It would also give  the Europhile UK political elite  ample opportunity to keep the UK attached to the EU in the manner that Norway and Switzerland are attached. More of them later.

There is also the danger that the stay-in camp could use Article 50 to argue that whether the British people want to be in or out, the cost of leaving would be too heavy because of this treaty requirement.

The Gordian knot of Article 50 can be cut  simply by passing an Act of Parliament repealing all the treaties that refer to the EU from the Treaty of Rome onwards. No major UK party could  object to this because all three have, at one time or another,  declared that Parliament remains supreme and can repudiate anything the EU does if it so chooses.

If the stay-in camp argue that would be illegal because of the  treaty obligation, the OUT camp should simply emphasise  (1) that international law is no law because there is never any means of enforcing it within its jurisdiction is a state rejects it and (2) that treaties which do not allow for contracting parties to simply withdraw are profoundly undemocratic because they bind future governments.

The OUT camp should press the major political parties to commit themselves to ignoring Article 50. If a party refuses that can be used against them because it will make them look suspicious. Before the vote

B) The parties’ plans of action if there is a vote to leave

It is important that all the parties likely to have seats in the Commons after the next election are publicly and relentlessly pressed to give at least a broad outline of what action they would adopt in the event of a vote to leave.  Left with a free hand there is a serious danger that whatever British  government is  in charge after a vote to leave would attempt to bind the UK back into the EU by stealth by signing the UK up to agreements such as those the EU has with Norway and Switzerland which mean that they have to (1) pay a fee to the EU annually, (2) adopt the social legislation which comes from the EU and (3) most importantly agree to the four “freedoms” of the EU – the free movement of goods, services, capital and  labour throughout not merely the EU  but the wider European Economic Area (EEA).

It is probable that the Westminster parties will all resist this, but that would present them with two problems. First, a refusal to do so would make them seem untrustworthy; second, if one party laid out their position but the others did not, that would potentially give the party which did say what it would do a considerable advantage over the others which did not.  If no party puts its plans before the public before the referendum, there should be demands  from those who want the UK to leave the EU that  any new treaties with the EU must be put to a referendum and, if they are rejected, the UK will simply trade with the EU under the WTO rules.

C) Repudiate re-negotiation before the referendum

Supporting the negotiation of a new relationship between the UK and the EU before a referendum is mistaken because it would seem to many to be giving tacit approval for renegotiation and legitimise the possibility of the UK remaining within the EU.  It is also rash  because  the likelihood  of the EU giving nothing is probably very small.  Indeed, they might well  give something which is substantial,  because the UK leaving the EU would be a very great blow to the organisation. The UK is the country with the second largest population within the EU with , depending on how it is measured,  the second or third largest   economy  and the country which pays the second largest contribution to the EU budget.   For the EU to lose the UK would not only be a blow in itself, it would also create a very strong precedent for every other EU state, especially the largest ones.  If  the UK left and prospered the temptation would be for other EU states to leave.

But even if negotiation  produced  nothing of substance as Harold Wilson’s “renegotiation” did in 1975, it would be a mistake to imagine that it would not influence the referendum result. The electorate is divided between the resolute come outs, the resolute stay-ins and the wavering middle.  A claim by the stay-in campaigners that something had been conceded by the EU, however  insignificant,  would provide the waverers with an excuse to vote to stay in because they could convince themselves they were voting for change.

It would be also be a mistake to see the EU offering  nothing  at all as a gift for the OUT camp. This is  because the waverers might simply see that as evidence that the EU was too powerful to oppose and shift their votes to staying in.

Those who want the UK to leave should unambiguously put the case for no renegotiation.  Dismiss anything Cameron (or any other PM) brings back from the EU by way of altered terms as being irrelevant because the EU has a long record of  agreeing things with  the UK and then finding ways of sabotaging what was agreed. In addition, a future British government  may agree to alter any terms offered at the time of the referendum.  The classic example of this changing of agreed terms happening in the past is Tony Blair’s  giving up of a substantial amount of the Thatcher rebate in return for a promised reform of the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP), a promise which was never met.  That episode produced my all-time favourite amongst Blair’s penchant for lying. Two days before he went to the EU meeting at which he  gave away a  substantial part of the rebate he declared during Prime Minister’s Questions  that  the rebate  was “non-negotiable – period”

It is difficult to envisage any British prime minister not trying to  negotiate with the EU before a referendum, but it might just  happen if whoever is in power when the referendum is announced were to be told privately by the  major EU players that nothing will be given and the prime minister of the day concludes it would be best to pretend that a decision had been made not to negotiate rather than risk the humiliation of getting nothing, perhaps not even a pretence of negotiation before nothing is given.  Why would the EU do this? They might calculate that it would be a gamble worth taking to send a British PM away  with nothing  whilst hoping the referendum vote would be to stay in because then the power of the UK to resist further integration would be shot.

If the EU offer nothing, the OUT camp should welcome the fact and stress to the public that if the referendum is to stay-in the EU could force any federalist measure through because not only would any British government be much weakened in its opposition to more federalism, the UK political class as a whole would more than willing to go along with it because of their ideological commitment to the EU.

D) After the vote

Ideally the government which deals with the EU after a vote to leave will have committed themselves to a plan of action before the referendum vote.  However, as described above,  it is quite possible that this will not happen because  the UK’s overwhelmingly Europhile political class will try to re-entangle the UK with the EU. To prevent them doing so there should be a concerted campaign after the vote to ensure that the  British public understands what is being done on their behalf with a demand for a further referendum to agree any  new treaty.

The terms of the debate

It is essential that the Europhiles are not allowed to make the debate revolve around economics.   If they do it will effectively stifle meaningful debate. As anyone who has ever tried to present economic ideas to an audience of the general public will know it is a soul-destroying experience.  Take the question of how much of UK trade is with the EU. The debate will begin with the stay-in camp saying something like 45% of UK trade is with the EU. Those wanting to leave the EU will respond by saying it is probably less than 40% because of the Rotterdam/Antwerp effect . They will then be forced to explain what the Rotterdam/Amsterdam, effect is. That is the point where the general public’s concentration is lost and the debate ends up proving nothing to most of the audience.

But  although nothing is proved to the general audience by detailed economic argument ,  the audience will remember  certain phrases which have considerable  traction.  In amongst the serious debating on the issue of trade there will be phrases such as three million jobs in Britain rely on the EU and dire threats about how the EU will simply not buy British goods and services any more.  This is nonsense but fear is not a rational thing and many of those who vote will enter the voting chamber with fear of losing their jobs  in their heads regardless of what the OUT camp says if the debate is predominantly about economics.  Shift the debate away from economics and the fear inducing phrases will be heard less often.  If the BIG LIE is not repeated often enough its potency fades.

National Sovereignty

How should those wanting to leave the EU shift the focus of debate? They should put the matter which is really at the core of the UK’s  relationship with the EU  – national sovereignty – at the front of the  OUT camp’s referendum campaign.   Campaign under a slogan such as Are we to be masters in our own house?

Making national sovereignty the primary campaigning issue has the great advantage of  it being something that anyone can understand because it is both a simple concept and speaks directly to the natural tribal instincts of  human beings.   Being a simple concept readily  and naturally understood,   it is a far more potent debating tool than arguments attempting to refute the economic  arguments  beloved of the stay-in camp.  The fact that the natural tribal instincts have been suppressed for so long in the UK will increase its potency because most people will feel a sense of release when it begins to be catered for in public debate.

The appeal to national sovereignty has a further advantage. Those who support the EU are unused to debating on that ground.  That is because uncritical support for the EU has long been the position of both the British mainstream political class as a class and of the mass media.  That has meant that the contrary voice – that which wishes Britain to be independent – has been largely unheard in public debate for thirty years or more. Where it has been heard the response of the pro-EU majority has not been rational argument but abuse ranging from patronising dismissal of a wish for sovereignty as an outmoded nationalism to accusations that national sovereignty amounts to xenophobia or even racism.   These tactics – of excluding those who want to leave the EU from public debate and abuse substituted for argument – will no longer be available to the  pro EU lobby.

Immigration

The most threatening and energising subject relating to the EU for the general public is immigration. The public are right to identify this as the most important aspect of our membership of the EU because immigration touches every important part of British life: jobs, housing, education, welfare, healthcare, transport, free expression  and crime besides radically changing the  nature of parts of  the UK which now have large populations of immigrants and their descendants.

The public rhetoric of mainstream politicians and the media is changing fast as they begin to realise both what an electoral liability a de facto open door immigration policy is  as the effects of mass immigration become ever more glaring.  The argument is shifting from the economic to the cultural.  For example, here is the Daily Telegraph in a leader of  25 March:

“The fact is that, for many in Britain (especially those outside the middle classes), it is not just a matter of jobs being taken or public services being stretched, but of changes in the very character of communities. Those changes may not necessarily be for the worse: as the Prime Minister says, Britain’s culture has long been enriched by the contributions of new arrivals. But as long as ministers treat immigration as a matter of profit and loss, rather than the cause of often wrenching social change, they will never be able fully to address the grievances it causes.” (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/comment/telegraph-view/9952717/Immigration-and-the-limits-of-the-possible.html)

This new frankness in public debate means that the OUT camp can use the immigration argument freely provided they keep the language within the confines of formal politeness. The subject will naturally dovetail with the emphasis on national sovereignty because the most important aspect of sovereignty is the ability to control the borders of the territory of a state.  Judged by their increasing willingness to talk publicly about immigration, it is probable that the mainstream UK parties will be content to go along with  ever more frank discussion about  immigration.

The economic argument must be kept simple

It will not be possible to avoid  economic arguments entirely. The OUT camp should concentrate on repeating these two facts:

–          The disadvantageous balance of payments deficit the UK has with the EU

–          The amount the UK pays to the EU

Those are the most solid  economic figures relating to the EU.   There is some fuzziness around the edges of the balance of payments deficit because of the question of where all the imports end up (whether in the EU or outside the EU through re-exporting) ,  while the  amount the EU  receives  is solid but it has to be broken down into the money which returns to the UK and the amount retained by Brussels.  Nonetheless these are the most certain  figures and the least susceptible to obfuscation by the stay-in side.

The best way of presenting the money paid to the EU is simply to say that outside the EU we can decide  how all of it is spent in this country and to illustrate what the money saved by not paying it to the EU would pay for.

It will also be necessary to address the question of protectionist measures the EU might take against the UK if the  vote was to leave.  It is improbable that the EU would place heavy protectionist barriers on UK exports because:

1.   The massive balance of payment deficit between the UK and the rest of the EU which is massively in the EU’s favour.

2.  Although the rest of the EU dwarfs the UK economy, much UK trade with the EU is heavily concentrated in certain regions of the EU.  The effect of protectionist barriers would  bear very heavily on these places.

3. There are strategically and economically important joint projects of which the UK is a major part,  for example, Airbus, the Joint-Strike Fighter.

4. the Republic of Ireland would be a massive bargaining chip for  the UK to play.  If the UK left and the EU rump attempted to impose sanctions against Britain this would cripple the RoI because so much of their trade is with the UK  The EU would be forced to massively subsidise the RoI  if protectionist barriers against the UK were imposed.  The EU could not exempt the RoI from the sanctions because that  would leave the EU open to British exports being funnelled through the RoI.

5. The EU would be bound by the World Trade Organisation’s restrictions on protectionist measures.

The economic  issues which are not worth pursuing in detail because they are too diffuse  and uncertain , are those relating to how much the EU costs Britain in terms of  EU-inspired legislation. It may well be that these load billions a year of extra costs  onto the UK  but they are not certain  or easily evaluated costs, not least because we cannot in the nature of things know what burdens an independent UK would impose off its own bat.   Getting into detailed  discussions about such things will simply play into the hands of  the stay-in camp because it will eat up the time and space available to those promoting the OUT cause.

Other Issues

Apart from the economic issues the stay-in camp will use these reasons for staying in:

–          That the EU  has prevented war in Western Europe since 1945.  This can be simply refuted by pointing out that the EU was not formed until  twelve years after WW2; that until 1973 the EU consisted of only six countries, three of them small,  and  of only nine countries until the 1980s. Consequently it would be reasonable to look for other reasons for  the lack of war. The two causes of   the peace in Western Europe have been the NATO alliance and the invention of nuclear weapons which make the price of war extraordinarily high.

–          That nation states such as the UK are too small to carry any real diplomatic weight in modern world.   That begs the question of whether it is an advantageous thing to carry such weight – it can get a country into disastrous foreign entanglements such as Iraq and Afghanistan – but even assuming it is advantageous , many much smaller countries than the UK survive very nicely, making their own bilateral agreements with other states large and small.   It is also worth remembering that the UK has such levers as a permanent seat on the UN Security  Council (which allows the UK to veto any proposed  move by the UN) and considerable influence in institutions such as the IMF and World Bank.

Robert Henderson

1 April 2013

England: the mother of modern sport

Contents

1. Sport is stitched into the English social DNA

2. The organisation of sport

3. International  Sport

4. Cricket – the first modern game

5. Football – the world game

6. The amateur and the professional

7. The importance of sport

8. Why was England in the sporting  vanguard?

9. English sport is a mirror of English society

10. The political dimension

Robert Henderson

1. Sport is stitched into the English social DNA

“We [the Coca Cola Championship] are the fourth best supported division in  Europe  with  nearly  10  million  fans  last  season,   after  the Premiership  [12.88 million],  Bundesliga [11.57 million] and  La  Liga [10.92].  We are ahead of Seria A.”   Lord Mahwinny,  Chairman  of  the Football League – Daily Telegraph 28 7 2005.

The English have  a most tremendous sporting culture.  By that I do not mean that England is always winning everything at the national level  – although  they  do far better than is generally realised –  but  rather that the interest in sport is exceptionally deep and wide. As the quote from Mahwinny shows,  not only is the top division of English  football(the Premiership)  the most watched in Europe,   the second    division (the  Coca Cola Championship) attracts  more spectators than   all  but two of the top divisions  in Europe,  beating even the top division  of that supposed bastion of football Italy.

The  colossal   support   for  football in  England  is  all  the  more extraordinary  because the country has so many other  sports  seriously competing  for  spectators,   arguably more  than   any  other  country because  England  competes at a serious level in almost all  the  major international   sports  – basketball, handball, volleyball and   and  alpine  sports   are    the exceptions.  This all round sporting participation resulted in  England in the early 1990s coming within touching distance of becoming    world champions in football,  rugby and cricket. In 1990 England  lost in the semi-finals  on  penalties   to Germany in the football World  Cup;  in 1991 they lost the final of the Rugby World Cup and in 1992  they  lost in  the  final  the  Cricket World Cup.  No  other  country,  not  even Australia, could have shown as strongly in all three sports. The  intense English interest in sport at club level is carried through to  the national sides.   England’s rugby,  cricket and football  teams have  immense  support wherever they go,  whether it be  the  amazingly loyal   England  football  supporters or  cricket’s   Barmy  Army,  the special quality of their support is  recognised by foreigners:  “German fans  want to be like the English fans.  They want to be 100  per  cent for  their team,  for their land.” (German supporter at World Cup  2006 – Daily Telegraph 6 7 2006)

This wonderful English  attachment to  sport  is not so strange when it is  remembered  that  most important international sports  were  either created by the English or the English  had a large hand in establishing them as international sports.   In addition,    other important  sports are  plausibly derived from English games,  most notably  American  and Australian  Rules  football from rugby,   baseball  from  rounders  and basketball  from netball.  In fact,  all the major team games in  their modern forms  originated in Anglo-Saxon countries:  cricket,  football, rugby  union,  rugby  league,  American  football,   Australian  rules, baseball,  basketball,  ice hockey,  hockey.   Even the modern  Olympic games  were  inspired  by the Englishman   Dr  William  Penny  Brookes’ “Olympic Games” at Much Wenlock in Shropshire which he founded in 1850.

A visit to the Wenlock gave the founder of the modern Olympic movement, Baron Pierre de Coubertin,  his idea for reviving the Olympic Games  in Athens.  Brookes was a tireless advocate of such a revival  himself and only  died in 1894 shortly before  the first modern Olympic  games  was held  in  1896.   On  the 100th anniversary  of  his  death,  the  then president  of  the  International  Olympic  Committee,   Juan   Antonio Samaranch   laid a wreath on Brookes’  grave with the words “I come  to pay homage and tribute to Dr Brooks, who really was the founder of  the modern Olympic games.” (Bridgnorth Information).    It would not be too much  of  an  exaggeration  to say that  the  English  invented  modern spectator sport.

Of  the  games directly created,   to the one game which  deserves  the title of a world sport – football – the English may add  cricket, rugby (both codes),  snooker, hockey, lawn tennis, badminton,  squash,  table tennis   and  snooker,  Those who  yawn  at the likes of hockey,  table tennis  and squash should reflect on the fact  that sports vary greatly in   popularity  from  country  to  country.   Hockey  is  the   Indian Subcontinent’s second game:  squash,  badminton and table tennis are to the  fore  throughout  Asia,   while  snooker  is  rapidly  growing  in popularity in the Far East.

2. The organisation of sport

The difference between sports  before the modern era  and those  in the modern  era   is  that the pre-modern sports   were  not  organised  or standardised. In  pre-modern times sports lacked both a standard set of rules  and  governing bodies to enforce the common rules.  The  English changed all that and they began the process  very early,  most  notably in  cricket where a governing body, the MCC,  and a generally  accepted set  of  rules (known as laws) were established before the end  of  the 18th  century.   Some  of major sports  where England  had  the  first national association and  established the first generally accepted  set of  rules are:

Association  Football   –  Football Association  formed  in   1863,  FA established the laws of the game

Cricket – First published Laws 1744, MCC formed 1787

Hockey  –  1883  standard set of rules  published  by  Wimbledon  Club,

Hockey Association founded 1886

Lawn  Tennis – Wimbledon championships established 1877 with first  set of rules resembling the game as it is now

Rugby Union – 1871 The Rugby Union formed and the  first laws published

The  dominance  of  England as a creator and  organiser  of  sports  is further illustrated by  the existence of  iconic  sporting   venues such as Lords (cricket),  Wembley (football),  Twickenham (Rugby Union) and Wimbledon (tennis),  all of which have a resonance that   stretches far beyond  England.

3. International  Sport

Anyone who wonders why the four home nations  (England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland),  are allowed to play as separate teams  in major sports  such  as  football  and   rugby   even  though  they  are   not independent  countries need wonder no longer.  The answer is  that  the four home nations were the four original international players in these sports.

The  Rugby Union arranged the first international rugby  match  between England  and Scotland in 1871, while the  first football  international between England and Scotland kicked off in  1872.

Further afield  cricket led the way.   The first international  cricket tour  was   in  1859 when a team of Englishmen  toured  North  America. Further tours took place to Australia in the 1860s and 1870s.  What was later  recognised  as the first cricket Test match was  played  between England an Australia in Australia 1877. The first Test match in England was played between England and Australia in 1880 at the Oval.

Of  course it was not only formal efforts which spread English  sports. Everywhere  the  English went they took their games with them.  In  the time  of  the  Empire  and  Britain’s  dominance  as  an  economic  and political power this meant almost the entire world.  Most of the  world was eager to adopt at  least some English sports.  Indeed,  of the many cultural  things  England have exported,  sports  have a good claim  to be the most eagerly received.  The games which England invented did not need to be forced upon others. The opposite was often the case.  Within the   Empire  complaints  were  not  frequently  made  by  the   native populations that they were excluded from participation in games such as football and cricket.

4. Cricket – the first modern game

Cricket  was the first team game to be a great spectator sport,  indeed one might argue that it was the first great spectator game of any  sort as  opposed to a sport such as horse-racing,  running,  boxing  or  the more  disreputable pursuits of cock and dog fighting and bear  baiting.

Cricket  might also reasonably claim  to have inaugurated the  idea  of international  sport with the first cricket tour to  North  America  in 1859 – see above.

The game is very old.  It can be dated certainly  from the 16th century, but as a pursuit it is reasonable to assume it was much older –  before the  age of printing little was recorded about any subject.  There  are some  intriguing  references  in old manuscripts  which  may  refer  to cricket,  for example, an entry in the wardrobe accounts of Edward I in 1300 which records a payment for the Kings sons playing  at “Creag”  (H S Altham p20 A History of Cricket Vol I).

The  game probably became more than simply  a rustic or boys’   pursuit towards  the end of the 17th  century. The gentry took it up  –  George III’s father,  Frederick, was a very keen player and actually died from an  abscess  caused  by being hit by a cricket ball –  and  teams  were raised  by   great  aristocrats such as the Duke of  Dorset,  Such  men effectively created the first cricketing professionals by employing the best  players  on  their estates,  ostensibly to  do  other  jobs,  but primarily  to ensure they played cricket for a particular team.  Partly because  of  this  and partly because the game grew  out  of  a   still overwhelmingly rural England with its much closer relationship  between the classes than later existed,  English  cricket was always a socially inclusive    game,   with  dukes  literally   rubbing  shoulders   with ploughmen.

The game was early organised. Sides representing counties such as Kent, Hampshire and Sussex were competing with each other by  the first  half of the 18th century.   Teams  called All-England, England or the Rest of England were also  got up to play either a strong county or,  in the second half  of the  century,  the Hambledon Club,  a club based in  a  tiny  Hampshire village.   Hambledon were surprising modern in their  thinking,  having built  the  18th  century  equivalent of the  team  coach  –   a  great pantechnicon  –  to   transport  the team and  its  followers  to  away matches.

During  its  first  century  or so as a  spectator  sport  cricket  was bedevilled by betting.  Important matches  were played  for very  large purses,  sometimes more than a thousand pounds,   a fortune in the 18th century.  Even more insidious was individual betting on results or  the performances  of  individual players within the game –  the  nature  of cricket absolutely lends itself to the latter.   But although the  game was always under suspicion of foul play, much as horse racing is today, betting must have increased interest in the game.

With  the  coming  of  the  railways  cricket  moved  into  the  modern professional  era with the formation of the All-England Eleven and  its imitators  such as the United South of England Eleven.   These  touring professional   sides   took  cricket  around   England  and  laid   the foundation  for  the modern county game.   During the same  period  the county  clubs as we know them today began to be  formally  established, with Surrey dating from 1845.   By the 1870s the work of the travelling professional sides was done and county  cricket became the mainstay  of English cricket.

H.S.Altham  entitled  a  chapter in his  History  of  Cricket  somewhat blasphemously  as the Coming of W.G.Grace.  This was not hyperbole.  In the  high  Victorian age two people were known as the  GOM  (Grand  Old Man). The first was Gladstone, the second was Grace. It is a moot point who  was  the better known.  It is no moot point who  was  the  greater celebrity: W.G. won hands down.

Grace was the first great popular games playing  hero.  His first class career lasted an amazing 43 years (1865-1908).  He made his first class debut at the age of 15.   His Test career began in 1880 with a score of 152.  He played his last Test at the age of 50 in 1899.   At the age of 47  (1995)  he scored a thousand runs in May,  the first man to  do  so (only five other men have ever managed it).

About  the  only two organisational  things seen in modern  team  sport which  cricket did not invent are  cup competitions and leagues  –  the honour for doing so rests with football,  although an unofficial county championship existed before the formation of the Football League.

5. Football – the world game

Football  is  the  nearest there is to  a world game.  There  are  easy reasons for this. At its most basic football  is a game  which requires the  most  rudimentary  of equipment,  a ball.  Its  rules  are  simple compared with those of other  games such as rugby or cricket.   But  it is  more  than  that.  Football is also the game  which  arguably  best combines  pure  athleticism  with the felicity  of  human  thought  and movement to which we give too often the bone-achingly dull  description “hand/eye coordination.”

Football  was  in a state of flux until the middle  of  the  nineteenth century.   Various  forms  existed.  Some codes allowed  kicking  only, others handling.   There were disputes over whether hacking and gouging were allowed.  In 1863 the Football Association was created and stopped the confusion. It was the first national sporting association which was purely  that.  The MCC in practice directed  English  cricket  and  was responsible for the laws of the game, but they were first and foremost, a private club,  as was the Jockey Club. The FA was  the first formally constituted   sporting body created to explicitly to direct  an  entire sport.

No sport has had such a rapid rise to popularity.  In the last  quarter of  the  nineteenth century  it went from a poorly organised  game,  to something  which  was recognisable as the game we  know  today.  Famous clubs  of  today were formed by Public School Old  Boys,  vicars,  boys clubs,  public  houses,  in the work place and  by cricket  clubs.  The first  international  game took place between England and  Scotland  in 1872.  The world’s first cup competition, the FA Cup, was born in 1872.

In  1888 the world’s first  sporting  league was formed,  the  Football League.    International matches involving countries other than England were being played well before the First World War and   football was an Olympic  sport  from  early on in the modern  Olympiad’s  history.  Not least,  football’s  world governing body, FIFA, was founded as early as 1904 (with no encouragement from England it has to be said).

By  1900 the top teams had become overwhelmingly professional and  club owners were often drawn from the ranks of local businessmen.  The  game had become  much more of a business than any other sport.

6. The amateur and the professional

Top  class   sport is now so tied to money that it may seem  quaint  to his  generation  that for all  of the nineteenth century and  much  of twentieth century the  amateur played a major  role in many of the more popular sports.  This was due to the fact that most major sports originated in England, where the spirit of amateurism was very strong, and these became spread across the globe when Britain had the only world empire worthy of the name and was also the most industrial advanced and economically powerful state in the world.  Other nations who took up the games had a natural inclination to imitate the English way in sport, because of where the games originated and because of England’s prominent position in the world.

There was also a strong class element. This was a time when class and status was still very much an issue throughout Europe and those parts of the world which were within the British Empire. Nor was the United States immune to the lure of class. As the amateur was associated with being a gentleman and a professional classed as a working man, it suited the better-off to support the distinction.  It also provided in some games, especially cricket, the means by which, in even a very socially stratified society, people of very different social status could play together.

But there was more to it than that. The English elite of the 19th century was in thrall to an idealised version of the ancient world and from this came the prime amateur ideals of doing something praiseworthy for its own sake and behaving honourably in the observance of  not only the laws but the spirit of a game.

Football,  cricket and golf  had professionals from their early days as public spectacles, but even within  games those  the amateur had a long run.  Other  major sports such as athletics,  tennis  and  rugby  union remained in  theory at least amateur until well into the latter half of the twentieth century,  although shamateurism,  the paying of  amateurs illicitly  through devices such  as inflated expenses or  salaries  for non-sporting  jobs  which were never actually performed,  tainted  most major sports.  But even though this dishonesty went on there were still many   genuine amateurs in top  class sport until quite  recent  times.

It is also true that the shamateurs were paid minute sums compared with the vast amounts many openly professional sportsmen get today. The  amateur  had  a prominent playing role partly because it  was  the upper and middle classes  who developed and ran modern sport.  Even the archetypal  working  class  game,  Association  football,  had  at  its foundations the public schools and innumerable worthies from the gentry and  mercantile  classes who founded many of the clubs  which  are  now household  names.  The true amateur was also cheap because at worst  he drew  only expenses (shamateurs were a different kettle of fish,  often being considerably more expensive to employ than an official pro).

But there was more to amateurism in top class sport  than simple  class dominance  and  cheapness.  The middle and upper classes  brought  with them a rather noble ethos.  Being an amateur  was more than just  being a person who played without being paid.  Games were seen having a moral purpose  in  the  building  of  character.  Team  sports    taught  the individual  to  subordinate  their own interests to that of the  group, while  individual competition forced a boy  to confront their  personal responsibility.  Playing for its own sake was something pure, untainted by the crudity of commercialism.

That  the amateur ethos was always battling with the vagaries of  human nature, which in many people invariably seeks to gain advantage unfairly,  is neither here nor there.  The important thing is the existence of the ideal.  Like  most  noble ideals it was followed to  some  degree   and behaviour during play   was as a general rule rather more sporting than it  is in a purely professional game.   Moreover,  even where  a  sport became  at   a fairly early stage  overwhelmingly professional  on  the playing side,  as  was the case of football,   the existence of  people with  the amateur spirit administering and controlling the  game  meant their mentality  was reflected in the way professionals behaved – a pro who did otherwise would risk the end of his career.  This was important because   the  behaviour of everyone who plays or watches  a  sport  is influenced by the behaviour of those at the top.

The true amateur was also thought to bring a spirt of adventure to  top class  sport  because he  was not weighed down by the thought  that  he must perform if his employment in the sport was to continue.  This  was one  of  the most powerful arguments cited in support  of  the  amateur captain in county cricket. It had a certain force to it.

I  regret  the virtual extinction  of the amateur in  the  popular  top level sports.  In my ideal world all sport would be amateur.   There is something constricting about all-professional sport. Players do have to consider the next contract.  They do have to consider their performance if  they wish to move to a  bigger club or take part in   international sport.   The  talented sportsman who is not a  professional  is  simply excluded.   Such a person may simply not be able to gain a professional opportunity   or he may simply not want to be a full time  professional sportsman. Either way he is lost to the top level of his sport. Cricket in    particular   has   suffered   from   the   abolition    of    the amateur/professional distinction,  with few if any players who are  not contracted  to a county club having any chance to play for the  county.

Professional  sport  has  too much of the closed shop about  it  to  be healthy. Attached  to  amateur  ideal was that of  the   “allrounder”.  For  the gentleman the ideal was the  scholar athlete,  an ideal approached most famously   by the Victorian Charles Burgess Fry,  who  won  a  classics scholarship  to Oxford,  set the world long jump record  whilst  there, obtained Blues  for cricket,  football, rugby and athletics and went on to play cricket and football for England. But there was also a professional niche as a sporting  allrounder. Many famous  footballers  played  cricket  professionally  and  many  famous cricketers,  football,  perhaps most notably Denis Comptom  who  played cricket  for  Middlesex  and England while spending  his  winters  from cricket  tours  speeding down the left wing for  Arsenal.   Sadly,  the extension  of the football season to ten months of the year has  killed the  professional  footballer/cricketer.   Phil  Neal  who  batted  for Worcestershire  and played left back for Lincoln City in the 1970s  and 1980s was the last of the breed.

7. The importance of sport

Those  who say “it’s only sport”  should stand back and reflect on  the amount of time, effort and money which is spent throughout the world on sport. Women may be generally less enthusiastic,  but sports  obviously speak to a deep seated desire within men.

Man  is  a  tribal animal.  If he were not it would matter  not  a  jot whether  one team won or another,  unless money was on the result.  But manifestly men do care and care passionately when no material advantage is  to  be  gained or lost by the result.  In  fact,  the  relationship between  a football fan and his club is probably the most  enduring  of his life, for it commonly begins in childhood and ends only with death.

The  outpouring  of joy when a goal is scored dwarfs any  other  public expression  of  positive  feeling  today.  Those  who  imagine  that  a football  club  is merely a business and that selling  football  is  no different from selling baked beans fail to understand the game and  the fan.

Team sports are war games, a war game in fact as well where men meet in a  form  of  direct  physical confrontation  which  is  a  pretty  good substitute  for  tribal war,  war fought hand to hand  with  sword  and shield  and  spear.  Sport is  war without the  weapons.  That  is  its primary  glamour, that is its excitement.

Sporting heroes are heroes in the literal sense.  Watch even a powerful man  in  the presence of his sporting hero and the  powerful  man  will almost certainly be unconsciously  deferring to the sportsman.

But  sport has much more to it than tribalism.  It is a constant  in  a changing world.  It is a source of aesthetic delight.  It speaks to the whole range of human emotions.

8. Why was England in the sporting  vanguard?

Why did England invent so many games and show such an appetite for them as players,   spectators  and administrators  that modern  sport became possible?

Industrialisation  undoubtedly  provided  the  opportunity  for  modern spectator sports by  moving England early from a predominantly rural to a predominantly  urban  society. Large agglomerations of people provide the  audience  for  sport.  The growing  wealth  of  the  country  from industrialisation provided the money to support professional sport. But that  does  not explain why it happened in England when it did  not  in occur in  other non-Anglo-Saxon industrialising nations,  which  either showed  less interest in sport  or adopted and followed English  sports rather  than  making  their own indigenous  sports  serious   spectator sports.    There had to be something special in the  English  character and society which provided the impetus to take the opportunity when  it was offered.

The  answer I suspect is that the English  have always been a  sporting people,  whether  it  be  pre-modern games  of  football  and  cricket, archery,  dog fighting and so on. The love of the chase remains to this day in  fox hunting.  Athletic pursuits were widely admired before  the modern  era,  especially by the educated Englishman brought up  on  the classics  with  their frequent descriptions of physical  prowess.  Long before the  much Wenlock “Olympic Games”,   Robert Dover of    Chipping Camden  in  Gloucestershire  held his “Cotswold Olimpick Games”  –  the games  were first held in 1612 – which included sledgehammer  throwing, horse racing and wrestling.

But the fact the English have always had an abnormal love of sport begs the question of why. It is probably simply an expression of the general English love of liberty and the practical realisation of that love in a society which until recent times has not oppressed the English man  and woman  with  much  state intrusion into  their  lives.  (Sadly,  recent governments,  most notably that of Blair,  have seriously  changed  the traditional  free nature of English society).   Over the centuries  the English became habituated to the idea that the individual counts,  that a free-born Englishman,  however humble, had a dignity and worth simply as an individual.

This  mentality is important because participation in a sport  requires freedom  from  oppressive elite who frown upon public  gatherings   and societies with  a dominant  ideology which considers the ordinary   man as  next  to  nothing at best and a threat to public  order  at  worst. English  society   has  not been free of such  qualities   but  it  has probably suffered much less severely from them than any other nation.

As  for why England has been so successful in exporting its sports,  it cannot  simply be the consequence of the British Empire and   Britain’s economic  and political dominance.  Sports are demonstrably not  easily transferrable from one society and another.  Other European nations had empires  and their colonies did not take up French sports.  The  United States  for  all  their economic and  cultural  dominance  have  failed largely  to export their two most important native sports, baseball and American  football.   Basketball  and  ice  hockey  have  enjoyed  more popularity   but  nothing  approaching  the  popularity  of   football. Australian  Rules football,  wildly popular  in Australia,  remains  an essentially domestic pursuit.  Ditto  Gaelic games such as hurling   in Ireland.  Cricket and football gained a hold abroad  and maintained  it because  they  are  inherently good and satisfying  games,  the  former immensely  technical to play yet simple in its basic idea,  the  latter the  simplest  and cheapest  game to play – two sweaters  down  on  the ground for a goal and a ball and you have a game.

9. English sport is a mirror of English society

Sport  holds up a mirror to any society.  Sadly,  much of English  sport  today shares  the ills of English society at large. Due to the actions of the British  elite  professional  team sport in England  has  been  heavily infiltrated  by   foreign players just as the country has a  whole  has been left open to de facto foreign colonisation.

Cricket  was  the  first  to fall prey to  the  disease.  In  1969  the qualification  rules  for foreign players appearing in  county  cricket were effectively thrown away.  Before 1969 any foreign player  had   to qualify by two years residence in the county:  after 1969 they could be specially registered without any qualifying period.

Since 1969 there have been various attempts to stem the number  foreign players.   Official overseas players – those not qualified to play  for England by any route  –  have been at various times  restricted to  two per   county side,  then one per side before reverting back to two  per side. As of 2012 its is back to one per side in County Championship matches.

In the past few years  the number of  foreign players in county cricket has   been greatly expanded by  a  ruling  that any EU  state  national must be allowed to play in county cricket whether  England qualified or not – this has resulted in many Australians and South Africans claiming EU  state passports of one sort or another.   The final breach  in  the sporting  emigration  wall has been  the granting of  the  same  rights possessed  by   EU state  passport holders to  people   from  countries which  have  treaties  with the EU that   allow  them  certain  trading rights.

This   loosening  of immigration rules  applies  to all  other  sports, many  of  which   are even more vulnerable  to  invasion  than  cricket because cricket is not played seriously on the continent.  Football and rugby  are  played within the EU and both games in  England  have  been substantially  colonised by continentals.  The situation with  football has  become  especially  serious  with well over  half  the  places  in Premiership  sides being filled by players not qualified  for  England.

Following England’s exit from the 2006 World Cup the ex-England manager Graham  Taylor  voiced his fears that   England might never  again  win the World Cup simply because of the lack of opportunity being given  to English players (BBC R5 Victoria Derbyshire 7 7 2006).

The  other  side  of the foreign infiltration coin  is  the  widespread employment  of  those  who are not unequivocally  English  in   English national teams. These people fall into two camps: (1) those who came to England  as adults  and  (2) ethnic minority players  either  born  and raised in England or at least largely raised here.    Their  employment by  England  has  been generally a failure,  both  in  terms  of  their individual  performances  and in the performance  of  their  respective England teams.

Take  the  two major English team sports cricket and football.  Of  the players  who played any substantial amount of cricket for England  only one  (Robin Smith) has managed a Test batting average of 40 and only two   of the bowlers (Andy Caddick and Dean Headley)has ended witgh a Test bowling average of less than 30.

As  for  football,  the only players in the  immigrant/ethnic  minority category   to show themselves to be of true international standard  are probably Paul Ince and Des Walker.  It is difficult to see the sporting justification   for  the repeated and extensive selection  of   players such  as  Mark Ramprakash (lowest every batting  average – 27 –  for  a front  line England batsman who has played my than 40 Tests)   or  John Barnes  (79  England caps and a man who rarely if ever  reproduced  his club  form  for  England).   Perhaps  the  answer  lies  in   political correctness,  a  desire on the part of selectors  to  guard  themselves against  accusations of racism or simply an ideological  commitment  to multiculturalism.   Here is Stephen Wagg writing in Catalyst, the CRE’s new   propaganda magazine funded by the taxpayer:  “…it is  important that  this  team [the England cricket side] speaks for  a  multi-ethnic England.” (Racism and the English cricket party – Catalyst June 2006).

There is also the attitude of the players  to consider. Some  of those who have  played for England have been blunt about  their attitude  towards turning out for the side.   Here  is  ex-England captain Nasser Hussain interviewed by Rob Steen:

‘If anyone asks about my nationality, I’m proud  to say ‘Indian’,  but I’ve never given any thought  to  playing  for  India.   In  cricketing terms I’m  English.’ Daily Telegraph 11 8 1989

Or  take the black Jamaican England footballer John Barnes in his autobiography:

“I    am  fortunate my England career is now  complete  so   I   don’t have to sound patriotic  any  more.” (P69)

“I     feel    more   Jamaican    than     English     because      I’m black.    A  lot  of black  people born    in    England    feel   more Jamaican  than English because  they  are   not  accepted     in    the land of  their  birth  on account of their  colour, (P 71)

Clearly such mentalities exclude any emotional commitment to doing well for  the sake of English pride.  The most they could have been  playing for was their own ambition.  As the editor of Wisden Matthew Engel  put it:

“It  cannot  be  irrelevant  to  England’s  long  term  failures   that so   many   of   their   recent  Test   players   were   either    born overseas    and/or  spent  their  formative  years  as   citizens    of other   countries.   In  the  heat  of  Test  cricket,   there   is   a difference  between  a  cohesive  team  with  a  common  goal,   and  a coalition    of   individuals   whose   major   ambitions    are    for themselves…There    is  a  vast  difference  between    wanting    to play   Test   cricket   and  wanting  to   play   Test   cricket    for England.” (Editor’s notes 1995 Wisden).

In  the  1990s an England cricket eleven was  routinely   comprised  of something  like  five white Englishmen, two Southern Africans,   a  New Zealander  and three West Indians.  The idea that their  captain  could appeal to their patriotism as a team of Englishmen is risible.  Nor  is it  clear  how  any English man or woman could have seen  it  as  their national side.

10. The political dimension

Because of their  function as lightening rods of national feeling  that the  existence of England sides are so hated and feared by  our  elite. The  erstwhile  and now deceased Labour Sports minister,   Tony  Banks, persistently  puffed  the idea of a British football  team,   something that is indubitably not wanted by any of the four home FAs or the  vastmajority of fans.

The  political  dimension  goes beyond  the  English  national   sides. Sporting  crowds  generally  and football crowds in  particular  are  a source  of concern to our  liberal elite because they provide  the  one opportunity  where large numbers of the white working class can  gather together  with any regularity without having to gain the permission  of the police.

In  these politically correct times sporting crowds in England for  the major sports are also disturbingly white for the liberal  bigot  elite. Vast amounts of time and money have been devoted to making crowds “more representative”, happily with precious little  success.

Finally,  there  is the general contempt which the British  elite  have developed for the white working class.  In English sport this  contempt tends  to be focused on the football fan.  Margaret Thatcher more  than any  other  individual  fostered  the  contempt    when  she  routinely painted  English football supporters as hooligans and  enthusiastically promoted  the  exclusion  of English football clubs  after  the  Heysel stadium  tragedy at the 1985 European Cup final between  Liverpool  and Juventus.

Sport  has  a  particular  importance to  England  at  present  because sporting sides are the only source of national focus the English  have. The  English  are  denied a parliament,  they  are  betrayed  by  their political  elite who shudder at the idea of English  nationalism,  they are constantly insulted by the national media,   but the national sides continue. These sporting institutions  permit the English to articulate their  feelings as a tribe.  Even  English men  and women  without  any interest in sport should support them for that reason if no other.