Hell is other voters

[dolorosa_12]

Weirdly, I feel less broken by this result than by the Australian one earlier this year. I'm obviously feeling upset and angry, but there's a kind of clarity in the scale of the defeat: a confirmation that yes, communities like mine in England — young, multicultural, relatively prosperous cities and university towns — are isolated pockets of light amid a dystopia of deprivation, xenophobia and darkness.

Those of us devastated by this election result are going to have to be realistic about how long it will take to come back from this. Barring some utterly bizarre twist of events and/or a switch to proportional representation, we are now not going to see a change in government for at least ten years. For most of the people I know, this means we will be well into middle age by the time that happens. Find a way to make yourselves psychologically okay with this, and then think of some concrete steps to help those who will be left most vulnerable.

Scottish and NIrish friends, looks like you'll be able to get out of this shitshow, and good luck to you. You (like those of us living in big cities and university towns in England and Wales) are being dragged out of the EU against your will, and I don't begrudge you resisting that with all the means possible. (I only wish those of us living in English cities like my own could form city-states and join you!)

The rest of us stuck in this miserable xenophobic island are going to have to come to terms with the fact that most of our fellow voters will continue to believe that they are suffering the effects of austerity due to migrants and/or the EU, rather than the government which they just reelected. I might be wrong, but I don't see them coming back to Labour again. So if Labour wants to win again in this country (minus an independent Scotland?), they are going to have to find some other voters — crucially, in different constituencies, rather than piling on more and more youth votes in London and university towns. This is a problem for social democratic parties in many parts of the world, not just the UK.

Modern democracy is unfortunately not inoculated against the terrible harm unregulated social media and a voting population lacking basic information literacy skills (I'm a former journalist and currently a librarian, and believe me when I say the situation is dire, and likely to get a lot worse) wreaks. We are not equipped to deal with this, and the current election result is likely to make this worse, with the acceleration in the closure of public and school libraries (and, more importantly, the consequent removal of professional, paid, experienced librarians), and the decline in emphasis placed on humanities subjects at school, which taught a degree of source criticism.

If what I'm saying sounds measured and calm, that is not true. I am burning with a kind of cold fury. In the years since I decided to stay in this country, I wanted to be an EU citizen with a kind of desperate yearning. I became a British (and therefore EU) citizen in May 2016, and received my first British (and therefore EU) passport the morning of 24th June, at the same moments as Farage was gloating over the 'bloodless revoution' of the referendum result. I have been fighting to remain an EU citizen ever since. I will never forgive those who took this away from me: and that includes every opposition politician who voted to hold this election. I knew it was a bad idea, I knew it wouldn't get us the result we wanted — my own Labour MP even voted against it — and I blame every opposition MP happily voting for this electoral suicide. They were every bit as much an enabler as the voters who have sealed this country's doom.

We must build the Republic of Heaven where we are: and if 'where we are' is geographically tiny, relatively densely populated cities — and the international online communities which link them — rather than an entire geopolitical entity, so be it. I'm done with the hand-wringing on the centre-left, the endless demands to contort ourselves accommodating the 'legitimate concerns' of a pack of ageing, frightened racists who are convinced that migrants and/or the EU have caused the effects of austerity, rather than the governments responsible. Those voters are gone, and they're not coming back. If we want to govern again, we will have to find new voters elsewhere.

Comments

[eglantiere]

::hugs::

[dolorosa_12]

*hugs*

Weirdly, the scale of the loss has left me with a kind of blank clarity. I was expecting the opposition parties to lose, but only by a handful of seats — twenty, at most, not eighty. That number means it will take at least two elections, at least ten years (and, more realistically, probably three elections and thus fifteen years) for a change of government to come. And the scale of the loss has come because, like everywhere else in the world, white working class voters would prefer their own economic hardship as long as it makes migrants and/or people of colour to feel more besieged and unwelcome here.

And since I lack the skills to speak calmly with people who disagree with me (and why would those voters listen to me, a university educated immigrant from an upper middle class background?) without getting very emotional and crying, there's no point in me attempting to persuade those voters back to the left.

So my reaction has been, basically, fuck it. Those voters are gone, and they're not coming back. I'll turn my energies to building a good community in the left-wing, multicultural university town where I live, and to organisations which help refugees and my fellow migrants. We are in the minority until the opposition parties can persuade new voters outside those old working class industrial towns to vote for them, and I'll have much more luck trying to make things as good as possible for those who share my values.

[auroracloud]

I'm so sorry for you all. *hugs*

I'm done with the hand-wringing on the centre-left, the endless demands to contort ourselves accommodating the 'legitimate concerns' of a pack of ageing, frightened racists who are convinced that migrants and/or the EU have caused the effects of austerity, rather than the governments responsible. Those voters are gone, and they're not coming back. If we want to govern again, we will have to find new voters elsewhere.

This so much, and it applies to more than just the UK. If to win elections, the left has to adopt policies which make it not the left anymore, what's the point anyway? If the only way to get power is to appease racists and people who'll listen to whatever fear-mongering anyone tells them loud enough, how is it going to even matter who's in power if the same policies get done anyway?

[dolorosa_12]

*hugs*

The thing is, I do think left-wing parties need to compromise — just not in ways that throw the most vulnerable under the bus, and in this country, migrants, refugees and/or people of colour are among the most vulnerable. Why pander to racists whose votes you've lost anyway? Find new voters among those who are appalled by the racism.

[auroracloud]

Yes, there's always need for compromises in politics. But not on those core values, and not in ways that hurt the most vulnerable people.

[wheatear]

For Labour to come back from this, they have to win back the constituencies that the Tories gained and more. If you think that most voters believe they are suffering the effects of austerity due to migrants and/or the EU, then where are these new voters going to come from? How will Labour ever gain a majority? As you've correctly pointed out, piling up votes in cities and university towns is nowhere near enough.

The Conservatives didn't just capture Leave voters, they captured 20% of those who voted Remain too. In my view we've reached the point where a significant number of people voted Conservative because a) they believe that the democratic will of the people as expressed in the referendum should be respected and b) they're sick of hearing about Brexit. You have to ask why the election result was so different to 2017 when most of the same issues were in play. Honestly, I think it's time. I think we've been worn down. People got tired of nothing happening and the longer nothing happened, the more it felt like Parliament was denying the will of the people to deliver on Brexit. People who voted Remain have said this to me. "The country voted to leave, so we should just get on with it."

The Tories played on this sentiment exceptionally well. As a strategy it worked and now we have to face the consequences.

[dolorosa_12]

Labour are not coming back from this, and we are not coming back from this. Scotland will become independent, and with it will go the final chance to have a progressive government in this country.

I believe you are right that coming out for Remain (or at least for a second referendum, which most people interpreted as the same thing) was a major factor, and I think it, and Corbyn as leader were equally to blame, based on what candidates and canvassers were reporting. As a person who advocated for Remain and a second referendum with an almost cult-like fanaticism, I accept responsibility for continuing to push Labour in that direction.

I think, in ten years, or in fifteen years, demographically there will have been a move by younger voters to currently Tory commuter-belt suburbs around London, and around other cities with good employment but a high cost of living (this is already happening around Cambridge), and Labour might be able to get enough votes from there, but it's going to take a long, long time. Those old industrial northern, midlands and Welsh towns are not coming back, and I think Labour (and left-wing voters) need to be realistic about that. (Then again, there were MPs like Jess Phillips who represented Leave constituencies and yet continued to argue passionately for Remain, and who have been returned to Parliament, so maybe lessons need to be drawn from her example.)

If I sound defeatist, that's deliberate. It's over. We are never, ever coming back from this if Scotland becomes independent and if FPTP remains the voting system. Unless I emigrate again, I and my husband and friends are going to spend the remainder of our thirties, and probably all of our forties in the ideological minority, while the decisions made by the government in power erode any chance we will ever have at a comfortable, prosperous retirement. To hell with them all. I lack the skills to calmly speak with people whose values and politics are different to my own (normally I just get emotional and start crying), so there is no point in me going out and trying to change minds. I'd rather spend my energy trying to support the community that's welcomed me, and whose values I share, carving out spaces of light here while it all goes dark around us.

[wheatear]

You do sound defeatist. I am incredibly disappointed too and I completely understand the sentiment, especially in the immediate aftermath of the election. I get what you're saying about how you're going to cope with it too and that makes complete sense.

I'll be honest and say that I'm not liking your description of communities like yours as spaces of light while everywhere else goes dark. I can't accept that. The fact that Labour has lost so many of its heartlands in the industrial north, midlands and Wales isn't something I can brush aside with such finality. If Labour can't represent the working class, then what is Labour for?

To be clear, I'm not trying to change your mind on your personal reaction to this and how you want to spend your energy. It's definitely a good thing to focus on where you can positively make a difference and what matters most to you.

Personally, I have to try and find some hope. I want Labour to come back from this. We need a progressive government at some point, even if it takes 10 years.

[dolorosa_12]

I'll be honest and say that I'm not liking your description of communities like yours as spaces of light while everywhere else goes dark. I can't accept that. The fact that Labour has lost so many of its heartlands in the industrial north, midlands and Wales isn't something I can brush aside with such finality. If Labour can't represent the working class, then what is Labour for?


Yes, you are right here, and I apologise. It was an incredibly condescending thing to say, and I'm sorry. I am going to leave that statement there rather than delete it, for the sake of personal accountability.

Labour's loss of the (white, older) working class is part of a pattern that's happening to social democratic parties across much of the world. It's happened in the US, it's happened in my own country of origin, Australia, it's happened in Germany, and much of the rest of Europe. Those voters seem to be being lost to, quite frankly, fascist parties which encourage xenophobic attitudes, and, in the case of places where those parties are actually in power, do actually do a lot of public spending and social welfare — but hand in hand with extreme nationalism. It's a combination of a lot of things — lack of work and opportunity (and so anyone young, a majority of women, and anyone who finds the right-wing attitudes hostile to them leaves for more prosperous and progressive places), unregulated social media and people's lack of information literacy to recognise that things they're encountering on social media are factually incorrect and designed to manipulate them — and getting those voters back will mean addressing all of those things. I suspect it will involve a lot of slow, careful work, constituency by constituency, by prospective candidates who share their voters' experiences and background. And as a migrant, I'm not prepared to accept being collateral damage in winning back those voters. Winning them back is fine, but not at the expense of allowing them to continue to believe that their situation is caused by me, my husband, and most of my friends being here in this country.

[wheatear]

That's okay. It's this notion of giving up on these working class communities and abandoning them to fascist parties that encourage xenophobic attitudes that I can't accept any responsible Labour party should do. Maybe we're fighting against an inescapable tide, I don't know. Certainly you're right about it being a global pattern.

I also 100% agree that winning these voters back shouldn't be at the expense of allowing or encouraging further xenophobia.

I've been thinking about this whole issue of Labour losing working class voters since the results came in. It does have a personal resonance for me which I've written about in my latest post if you want to read more.

[dolorosa_12]

Yes, I agree 100% with everything that you say here, and with the clarity of hindsight (and, finally, a good night's sleep), I think the mistake ardent and disappointed Remainers like myself made after the referendum was pivoting immediately to attempting to delegitimise the result and calling for a fresh referendum. I don't think we should have urged Labour MPs to back Theresa May's deal, but I think we should have campaigned for a softer Brexit, rather than for preventing it altogether. Looking at the most recent election result honestly and frankly, I think we mistook our Twitter echo chamber (and misleading polling results about how many former Leavers regretted their vote) for the views of the whole country. We should have used the close referendum result (and then the subsequent hung parliament) to argue that the country was completely split down the middle, which demonstrated the need for a kind of compromise, soft Brexit. That would probably have resulted in leaving the EU in May this year, if not the original March deadline, neutralised Brexit as an electoral issue, and probably kept Theresa May — a much more unpopular figure than Boris Johnson — in power up to the next election, which would have been in 2022.

I still think Corbyn was a dreadful choice for leader, and I think he (and the cluster of advisors around him) and Brexit were equally to blame for the election result on Thursday, but although it makes me feel miserable to admit it, Remainers should have switched to a different battle rather than trying to keep the referendum alive as an issue. For my part in that (limited to writing to my MP, signing petitions, and going on protest marches) I am sorry.

I've now read your latest post, and I can see very well why this election result has such a personal resonance, and must be heartbreaking beyond simply the prospect of five more years of Tory government.

[trepkos]

Some psychologist thinks working class tory voters have Stockholm Syndrome: https://unquiet.world/2019/11/03/why-the-impoverished-are-still-voting-tory-and-how-to-help-them/?fbclid=IwAR1uBghDb0cyIU6j8pIpbMmL8Sicg-qHi-GYQJjK0p3mBTkO47OV357MM7s

[dolorosa_12]

I think that psychologist has a point, but I also think it's too late to try and address the problems that article is addressing, because those voters are lost. I have some opinions about how it might be possible to get (some) of them back — stand candidates in their constituencies who actually come from those communities and have shared experiences with the voters, and don't canvass them as if they're some kind of psychological case study! — but I think from sheer pragmatism it would be more productive to try to get new voters from the sort of commuter belt suburbs/towns around London and other expensive cities, rather than win back 'red wall' votes from the old Labour heartlands.

[trepkos]

I'm especially broken because I know Corbyn would have delivered on the animal welfare promises he made - unlike that bastard Blair. And now the badgers, foxes, and every other form of wildlife will continue to be killed in horrible ways, and even more if they make trespass a criminal offence, and stop people sabbing or monitoring illegal hunts.

[beetourist]

This is interesting and thoughtful, thank you

[dolorosa_12]

No problem! I think it's ncessary to be realistic about the situation, and focus our energies on helping our own communities (whether these are geographically defined or not), because it's going to be almost impossible for Labour to come back from this, particularly if Scotland becomes independent.