The Roma in Roma Not Doing As The Romans

[peterbirks]

An opinion poll of Italians found that more than two-thirds of respondents wanted to see all "Roma", that is, the gypsies, expelled from the country. That includes 30,000 who are descended from settlers in the 1400s, as well as another 40,000 who possess Italian passports. Four-fifths of respondents called the gypsies either "barely likeable" or "not likeable at all".

Now, we all know that the responses that you get in opinion polls can be heavily skewed by the way in which the questions are phrased, and we all know that possession of the passport of a country has never been much of a guarantee -- just ask the Kenyan Asians who adopted British nationality in preference to Kenyan nationality on independence, only to discover that a British passport no longer guaranteed residence in Britain (or, indeeed, Kenya). Thanks to Jim Callaghan for that piece of betrayal.

But the interesting thing about this report was the reaction of EveryOne, a "Group For International Cooperation on Human Rights Culture". Spokesman Matteo Pegoraro said that "This hostility is a result of the generally inflammatory language of the current government, as well as the previous one".

This is a frequent reaction of the liberal left when a bunch of ignorant cunts decide to attack foreigners. The hostility, you might have noticed, included the burning down of a gypsy camp near Naples last week when a mob threw molotov cocktails at it. The instigators later boasted of doing their own bit for ethnic cleansing. Does Pegoraro really think that people like this are so easily led? It's an old-fashioned belief in the power of persuasion and top-down leadership. The Liberal left think that the "ordinary people" enacting these horrors are merely misguided. The real villains are the right-wing government. The "people" are, at heart, good.

It's all bollocks, of course. Lots of people in Italy resent gypsies not because of an inflammatory government, but because lots of people, at heart, don't like strangers. Persecutions of minorities have taken place in many places at many times in history; not all of them can be blamed on inflammatory statements by whoever happens to be in power. The Liberal left really needs to realize that, at least in part, a large proportion of "the people" are intolerant bigots out of choice, not because of poor political leadership. They actually like being that way.



__________________

Comments

[real-aardvark.livejournal.com]

Ah yes, Jimbo Callaghan. The Man Who Brought You Margaret Thatcher.

The strange thing is, I was only in my mid-teens at the time, and I remember being particularly outraged about the Kenyan Asian thing. Just goes to show that New Labour isn't so much New Labour as Ancient Re-Tread.

I've always thought of Callaghan as a sort of "Mini-Me" for Harold Wilson, who would of course have done exactly the same thing in this case; only with more eloquent language, what with him being a Balliol boy and all.

Both of the sods are dead, so I no longer worry about these things. Top of my list on this year's "Dead List" sweepstakes at the Nag's Head in Reading, by the way (for which I stand to gain at least £50 if I'm right) is Henry Kissinger. It's not that I care about the £50, it's just that I'd be shamefully happy if I'm right. (I also have to share it with an Israeli, who would be just as happy as me.)

Anyhoo.

As Nick Cohen repeatedly points out, you'd have to redefine the "Liberal Left."

As I could have pointed out to Cohen in the 1980s, through the pages of Thing, you always had to do that.

Long overdue feedback

[ukastronomy.livejournal.com]

Just a note to say that I still read and enjoy your blog everyday. I have, rather to my surprise, embraced this blog concept myself but I do seem to be one of a very small minority of the over 50's in my circle of friends and family to have done so. If I want to hear the latest gossip I still have to use the phone for many of them and a couple prefer letters.

Some of this group do have email access but they seldom if ever check for incoming emails. This strikes me as the worst of all worlds but hey, what do I know!

Martin Nicholson, Daventry.

[jaybee66.livejournal.com]

Lifeboat Europe is sinking.

Enough of the lefty knee jerk claptrap and come up with some answers.

Re: Long overdue feedback

[peterbirks.livejournal.com]

Hi Martin:

I've always been uncomfortable with the telephone, so e-mail came as a liberation for me. And it took me forever to get in touch with how mobile phones worked/were used. Perhaps we need to get to the stage where e-mails are part and parcel of mobile phone techology.

PJ

[peterbirks.livejournal.com]

There's a fascinating coda to this post. An upsurge in attacks on refugees in ... er... South Africa (where's yer lifeboat now, JB?)

I'd also like to see what Matteo Pegoraro has to say about this, because Mbeke has played down the existence of refugees from Zimbabwe in South Africa. Indeed, no mainstream political party at all has made an issue of the matter. Is anything more needed to disprove this concept of government's "stirring up" such hatred amongs a sheep-like but generally peace-loving populace?


PJ

[real-aardvark.livejournal.com]

Enough of the Chicken Little generalities and come up with some questions...

Meant for JB

[real-aardvark.livejournal.com]

This threading lark doesn't really work too well, does it?

Re: Meant for JB

[peterbirks.livejournal.com]

No, I noticed that in other people's LJ blogs....

PK

Re: Meant for JB

[real-aardvark.livejournal.com]

Well, technically, it does what it says on the tin.

The problem is, the model is meant for IT discussions. "I can't find the Any button on my keyboard! Can anyone out there help?"

It's not an especially well designed model for cases where some loonie like JB or me goes off-topic.

It's not all that good at locating the Any button, either, now I come to think of it.

[jaybee66.livejournal.com]

The usual dastardly liberal trick of answering your own questions.

Zimbabwean refugees are not exactly economic migrants. Nobody has a job in Mugabe's socialist paradise apart from ZANU PF members and policemen. They are in SA because they are not given or don't want to use force to overthrow the mad man.

Anyway, South Africa and other surrounding countries are just a staging post. Many Zimbabweans have ended up in the UK, as you are no doubt joyful about. Give them guns and let them sort it out in Zimbabawe instead.

Who is to say what the future holds for Europe? Indigenous populations rising up and committing pogroms against so-called asylum seekers, quite possibly. 165,000 given "asylum" last year. Jump up and down again liberals.

I know your occupation prevents you from causing alarm but we are not entering a simple economic downturn. Fuel and food price increases will permanently take up a larger proportion of people's dwindling wealth. Those without expense accounts that is.

Climate change may fill you with joy. A 6C rise in the UK might sound desirable. Such a rise in Africa will make the continent uninhabitable. Then you can enjoy 900 million refugees.

But self-loathing liberals want Europe to be overrun in any case. They have openly called for a Mestizo Europe and will do everything in their power to make it so.

Now, make yourself feel better by calling me a Nazi and then place your head firmly back into the sand.

[jaybee66.livejournal.com]

Do you think the world is over-populated?

Do you think the world has capacity to feed an increased population with non GM food?

Do you think the world can increase food production capacity without causing widespread species destruction?

Yes or No answers please. No liberal bollocks.

Re: Long overdue feedback

[ukastronomy.livejournal.com]

Ah yes, mobile phones. I hardly ever use them, perhaps a handful of times a year. However my sister-in-law, a farmer, is hard to contact any other way. My daughters have mobile phones but they never seem to be switched on when I need to contact them. ****** annoying!

I have never sent a text message using a mobile phone either.

[real-aardvark.livejournal.com]

Didn't your mother teach you to attach labels, JB?

(1) May I refer you to my original point. What do you mean by over-populated? Surely there's a measure that you can apply, however vague.

For the record, yes. For the record, I think it won't be around 2060 or so. Wanna know why?

(2) I don't know. I don't see why it should have to do so. I'm not an agronomist. I'm not anti-GM, either. Stop making stupid assumptions and/or assertions.

(3) That surely depends upon the possible answers to (2), does it not?

So, to re-address your paranoic fears, in your own terms, and with additional annotation:

(1) No.
(2) No.
(3) No.

I am rather charmed to be called a liberal bollock, however. Perhaps this is my chance to find my better half.

[jaybee66.livejournal.com]

So, according to you the earth is not currently overpopulated and we will have to wait until 2060 to attain your magic number. (Why 2060?)

And, when your magic number is achieved then not even GM, burning down more rainforests or turfing other species out of other parts of the globe will help.

Essentially we are virtually agreed. For me we are buggered now and increasingly so to 2060. For you, it's more boolean. Okay for now then all of sudden buggered in 2060.

Fine.

Boolean???

[real-aardvark.livejournal.com]

Why 2060?

I don't know. Why your vague ranting without any substantive argument?

All I did is answer your, incredibly vague, questions. Incredibly vaguely, no doubt, but then you did ask for yes/no answers. (And I cheated on one by giving both.)

According to me, the Earth is not over-populated, because you haven't defined what "over-populated" means. It is, indeed, heavily populated. The question of whether 6 billion or 8 billion or even 10 billion suitably dwarf-sized (I'm thinking of you here, Birks) people is a sustainable number is interesting, but only theoretically.

Ten billion anorexic dwarf tree-hugging Indian peasants burning cow-dung is possibly "sustainable," whatever that means; as long as they don't all try to live in Uttar Pradesh at the same time.

One billion fat-arse mid-western Americans who need an SUV for each buttock is probably not sustainable.

2060 is just a guess. It could be earlier; it could be later. You believe in doom; I believe in technology.

Care to guess when Malthus predicted that the world would come to a brutal full stop?

Re: Boolean???

[jaybee66.livejournal.com]

I forgot the other liberal trick.

If you are not answering your own questions or calling people Nazis then you just belittle them.

Fiiine.

PS Malthus was living in the pre-oil age. I am living in the pre-nothing else coming soon/ever age.

Re: Boolean???

[real-aardvark.livejournal.com]

Jeez, you've got skin thinner than Victoria Beckham trying to method-act a pencil.

I am bemused by your assertion that I belittled you.

I've been holding this back, because I am basically a nice person, but since we're into mud-slinging now: what the fuck gives you the right to insult me by calling me a liberal?

Re: Boolean???

[jaybee66.livejournal.com]

:D

So "liberal" is a dirty word?

Goooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooood.

Re: Boolean???

[real-aardvark.livejournal.com]

You really do need to go back and learn elementary logic, don't you?

"Liberal" is not a dirty word.

"Marxist" is not a dirty word.

Even "fascist" is not a dirty word, since it can apply to (admittedly demented) followers of the Futurist movement in Italy, circa 1920.

I do not object to the word. I object to your unthinking assumption that I am one. (Which I'm not, by the way.)

Do you follow that logic,, pin-head?

Re: Boolean???

[jaybee66.livejournal.com]

Are you a Sherman Tank?

I think I need not waste my time on you and your dwindling empire.

Still, I rattled your cage. Job done.

Byeee!

Re: Boolean???

[real-aardvark.livejournal.com]

So -- thinking is out, then?

Lucky you made your original pile without having to indulge in that sinful exercise.

Ignorant bigots?

[(Anonymous)]

You seem to assume that any dislike of specific groups of people (foreigners or other groups) is due to ignorance and bigotry. No doubt a lot of it is. But surely some groups of people, in some circumstances, can have definite negative effects on a neighbourhood. In which case, wishing they weren't there is rational enough, and not necessarily either ignorant or bigoted.

The difficulty is what to do about it. For instance, imagine that, every time there's a football match in your town, there's a lot of trouble and damage and expense. The correct action is to deal with the specific people who cause the trouble. But identifying them and dealing with them may be difficult and expensive. Whereas banning football matches is simple, cheap, and effective. It's not irrational to prefer a simple and cheap solution, although the simple and cheap solutions are often unjust to many inoffensive individuals.

I know very little about gypsies and won't say anything about them specifically.

-- Jonathan

Re: Ignorant bigots?

[peterbirks.livejournal.com]

Hi Jonathan: This is a valid point, and raises interesting issues.

In many cases in the insurance industry a so-called "prejudice" against certain ethnic groups is based on solid actuarial history. To call it a "pre-judgement" is linguistic nonsense.

So I would be the last to assume that any dislike of specific groups of people is necessarily due to ignorance or bigotry. It's no use saying "sure, a lot of them are trouble, but that bloke's ok", because, in life, you have to go on general classifications. If something hurts you 60% of the time, it's a bit stupid to approach the next case with the view that "it's probably one of the 40%".

But the point of my piece was really against the assumption that any such dislike is "stirred up" by bad governments. I wasn't trying to reinvent the wheel in the whole area of the rights and wrongs of "group dislike". My point was that the people are quite capable of making up their own mind. In some cases, as you say, this can be quite rational, whereas in others it can be bigoted. "Blanket" solutions are, as you say, often cheaper and more unfair. But, well, life is unfair.

As you say, referring to such dislikes, "no doubt a lot of it is". In a sense, I guess I was taking this line, rather than adding in the caveats that would be necessary if the point of my piece was prejudice and dislike, rather than governmental influence (or lack thereof).

PJ

What is ignorance? What is bigotry?

[real-aardvark.livejournal.com]

Well, no: to call such things prejudice ("pre-judgement") is not linguistic nonsense at all. In fact, it's an unusually astute recognition of the root of the term you are using; and I would have expected you, of all people, to back that recognition up.

I am, for example, severely prejudiced against Pakistani males. For exactly the same reason, I am prejudiced in favour of Pakistani females -- who after all have to live with the buggers.

An interesting question arises with this Italian/Romany stuff. Well, two interesting questions, really; the first being whether this is a deep-seated prejudice, or whether it has more proximate causes such as the recent wave of immigration by Albanians, Romanians, etc, what with Italy being 99% white and only 50% southern dago.

Well, that's a question you can safely leave to those more qualified to answer. That is, me. I'm a professional Historian, goddamnit.

The real question is whether this hostility translates into everyday life. You know the sort of thing I'm thinking: exit polls in Chicago where absolutely everybody says "Yes, I know he's black, but I voted for him anyway, because he's the man who will lead us to unprecedented wealth and joy," but in reality, well, they didn't.

Interested in a spread bet on Obama?

Re: What is ignorance? What is bigotry?

[peterbirks.livejournal.com]

Yes, I have to hold my hands up and plead guilty here. My only excuses are that it was Friday, that I was at work, and that I was in "typing professionally" mode (where, of course, any claim that prejudice can be the right thing is likely to get you fired).

Indeed, any analysis of the likelihood of an individual doing something on the basis of actuarial analysis is "prejudice", in the technical sense of the word. My bad.

PJ

Re: What is ignorance? What is bigotry?

[real-aardvark.livejournal.com]

An interesting cameo in re my Obama comment in the Telegraph today, btw.

"I'd vote for him if his name was Barry, not Barack," says one fear-crazed Jew in Florida. (And went on to claim that "My heart is Israel's," which rather puts the shaft to the rabid patriots typical on the Right.)

Apart from neatly demonstrating that concrete nominalism we all know and love in the American psyche, this one doesn't even get it right:

Barack <- Baruch <- Barry.

Ignorance is no defense, but it can certainly be offensive.