UK General Discussion: 2017 and onwards, Mayhem

[King of Kensington]

The free speech activist and citizen journalist Tommy Robinson has been sentenced to a 13 month prison term in the UK. His crime? Providing coverage of a grooming gang trial. He was filming a live video outside the court house when he was arrested. Robinson's trial and sentencing took place on the same day and took about 30 minutes.

And in an Orwellian twist the judge has prohibited all media organisations from reporting on his sentence. They've managed to take down the reporting of some non-UK websites as well but this article is still up and they can't silence Twitter.

http://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2018/05/orwells-nightmare-articles-about-tommy-robinsons-arrest-rapidly-scrubbed-from-the-internet/

UK (and the rest of Europe) is truly in need of a 1st Amendment.

Every far right lunatic is a "free speech activist" according to their fans.

[King of Kensington]

How long can Labour keep triangulating on the Brexit issue?

[King of Kensington]

There's a belief - I don't know how true it is - that a lot of "soft" Labour voters did so because of Brexit.  

[King of Kensington]

Boris Johnson makes me think of what you'd get if Donald Trump and disgraced media baron Conrad Black had a baby.

[King of Kensington]

Remember this chart doing the rounds after the 2017 election? Some would say it's indicative... of something...

OK, accepting this line of argument is roughly true. But when people talk about the White Working Class, what's not usually meant is poor and deprived people, would you agree?
My impression of White Working Class is that the idea describes people who have something to lose, and are losing or fear they might lose it.
I think it has to include being White, Skilled manual workers or possibly non-professional service workers.
I think it may include people above low incomes, people with housing assets, self-employed people, non-members of a trade union, and even certain kinds of manager.
It probably doesn't include professionals or university graduates. Indeed, higher education might be the real phenomenon here.

The contradictions to the standard Marxian model of class struggle in democracy are why it's such an interesting category. It's certainly useful, but must be used with care. E.g., I think one would struggle to explain Brexitrump without this category.

I think what it boils down to, is a point that we've discussed before, in that in British class terminology, the "working class" label is so wide as to be entirely meaningless. It can include the sainsbury's security guard, the small town white van man, the call centre worker...who all have completely different lives, outlooks and voting habits. I mean in the above chart, Labour are winning in the 4th and 5th deciles, which is hardly "deprived" really. Likewise, those old colliery seats in Durham or South Wales very definitely fir the common perception of "working class" while being very different to, say, Boston, Lincolnshire or the Thames estuary.

Essentially - I am waffling but basically agreeing with you. The Working Class label as commonly used contains a set of contradictions as the label is so wide. Which is why sweeping statements about how the "white working class" is trending should rightfully be treated with suspicion.

(Also - could you not argue thar downwardly mobile asset poor young graduates in precious employment form a neo-working class of their own?)

The working class is indeed diverse and not all "deprived."