Why have we become anti-immigrant when we are all immigrants?

Question

Seems strange that so called pure blood individuals who are of course not so, keep banging on about immigrants etc. People should read a history book!

Answer 1

The plain fact is that most people who take an anti-immigration stance either have completely the wrong idea about illegal immigration (i.e they seem to think that most immigrants into the UK are illegal) or they have swallowed the twisted propaganda of the likes of the BNP who use an anti-immigration stance as simply a way of drawing people in to their true agenda of xenophobia, white-supremacy and racism.

The fact is that relatively few immigrants entering the UK are illegal. The vast majority of immigrants come here legally, and the majority of legal immigrants in the past few years have been from EU countries from which immigration is unregulated.

And yet, most who say they are specifically against illegal immigration, but don't mind legal immigrants, are also the ones who complain about immigrants "taking British jobs" or "being a burden on the benefits system". Illegal immigrants DO NOT have the right to claim benefits in the UK, in fact apart from the most basic of human rights, they have very few rights at all. They also cannot be legally employed since they won't have a national Insurance Number or P45. Therefore, they tend to get absolutely horrible jobs from disreputable employers who pay them next to nothing.

So although illegal immigration should never be condoned (it is a form of trespassing in my view), it is neither the case that illegal immigrants are burdening the benefits system or taking jobs which home grown British workers could do. The only immigrants these arguments could be aimed at are in fact legal immigrants, although in my opinion the benefits they bring to our society outweigh anything they take.

There are those people, of course who don't make any distinction at all, and are against all immigration. This is the stance the BNP take. They not only want to get rid of illegal immigrants, they want to remove all immigrants and their descendants from the UK.

In the mission statement on their web site, they define indigenous Britons as "people whose ancestors were the earliest settlers here after the last great Ice Age and which have been complemented by the historic migrations from mainland Europe. Migrations of the Celts, Anglo-Saxons, Danes, Norse and closely related kindred peoples". Meaning that they apparently want to rid the UK of everyone who can't trace their ancestry in Britain back beyond the Norman Conquest in 1066.

What they actually mean though of course, is that they want to remove all non-white people from Britain and create an all-white society. This is the racism inherent in the BNP which they continually try to cover up with anti-immigration rhetoric.

So, I think anti-immigrant sentiments in general arise mostly from misunderstanding and misinformation (as in the confusion between legal and illegal immigrants), and to a lesser extent from xenophobia, bigotry and racism (as in the BNP example).

I think the recent rise in anti-immigrant feeling has resulted largely from the perfectly legal, but unregulated influx of immigrants from the EU, which has meant that the number of immigrants entering the UK has risen dramatically, and this has been exploited by groups who wish to demonise immigration and stir up bad feeling against immigrants.

Answer 2

That is something which has often puzzled me until that is I started some research of my own. The anti-immigrant ideas and concepts seem to come mainly from people with a strong German or Germanic background - ie those folk who think of themselves as Anglo Saxon and not especially British.

The oldest known people [race] in UK are the people of the Celtic fringe, the Cornish and the Welsh. Recent DNA testing shows these people to have been in Britain for about 10,000 years. These are the same folk who built Stone Henge and all the rest of it. Hard to take in but true.

Britain survives on new-wave immigrants and immigration from afar.

Here's one big scary fact about language. The oldest surviving and still spoken language in Britain is Welsh. Modern Welsh dates from about the 6th century AD. There are words in Welsh which are exactly the same as in Urdu, a language widely spoken in Northern India and Pakistan. Welsh is an Indo-European language.

We're all from somewhere else.

Recently they found a whole bunch of people in Yorkshire [white as the driven snow] who all have African DNA. A lot of puzzlement about that until you know a bit of the history. Back in Roman times the Romans maintained two auxilliary legio in what is now Yorkshire [Britannia Inferior]. These legio were from Ethiopia [Abasynia] - africans. When you had served your 22 years [time] in the Legions you did not go home, you stopped where you were, you got married and were given a small parcel of land, maybe one or two acres, tools blah and get on with it etc.

So, in amongst us all, there are these ancient folk. I mean, back at school in the 1950s I could not get my head around the idea that people built Stone Henge and then just ran away. Makes no sense. Indeed it is simply the case that the people who built the henges are still here, at least their descendants are.

In addition to these early Brits there are folk like myself who think we are Celts. I'm Welsh, so there is a high probability that I am indeed of Celtic descent. I've got blood group 'O' which is indicative of the Celts. When I look in the mirror I see a silver haired Tom Jones look alike [nearly] staring madly back at me. I also see traces of Richard Burton, Griff Reese Jones and lots of other [celts] Welsh too.

Where I live down here in SE England most of the people are of Celtic descent. Not a joke, it's a DNA and blood group fact.

Britain is full of folk from all over the place. New cultures simply merge into the existing culture. Nothing ever gets chucked out, not entirely anyway, we just forget what it was origanally for but keep on doing it.

Take that English dance - Morris Dancing. I have seen the exact same dance performed in Iraq. It probably came to Britain sometime during or soon after the Crusades - it's an Iraqi dance all right - Moorish Dance [dancing] - the Moors sometimes in Flemmish called Black-a-moors [Wm.S.].

Join the story of Breten today.

Answer 3

Are you talking about the UK or USA? Please specify. You are on UK and Ireland Answers.

I won't answer for the USA - it's different.

There are some kind of arguements which suggest the English are a mongrol nation - which is only correct to some degree. Latest studies have indicated that all the people occupying the British Isles share a common DNA and have slight Scandinavian/Germanic/French influence due to migrations from the continent.

So, in terms of your question, the people of the British Isles are native, not immigrants.

Immigrants arriving place enormous strain on the NHS and benefits system. Having never paid into National Insurance or taxation, there is less money going around to more people. As they are willing to work for less money, employers are favouring immigrants over natives - meaning less jobs. There is an arguement which suggests that much money is being 'sent home' and not pumped back into the UK economy.

There is also a separatist arguement which determines that the government has embraced multi-culturalism so liberally that immigrants find no need to adopt 'British' culture and tend to live in separate communities. This is a fault of the government - not the immigrants.

Answer 4

I am not an immigrant. I was born on American soil making me a native. Open a dictionary.

Now I DO understand your point as my family is descended from immigrants....but you have totally embraced the idiocy of the anti-border security crowd..which is a baseless opinion.

Your question indicates America is anti-immigrant when that is not the case. America is divided now over the issue of ILLEGAL immigrants and if we should reward their violating the borders with citizenship, amnesty, etc.

Now I find that position very racist as we have a vast number of LEGAL immigrants who are waiting in line as the system says to...and we are showing them that they are suckers and losers for doing things the right way......good job

Now my own opinion is illegal (that is not legal) immigrants are not good, should not be encouraged, and should be blocked....the illegals we have now should be taken in and the ones with criminal records sent back home...the ones that are honest should be offered choice of go home or join military for 2 tours and if completes they get citizenship (as well as skills taught in military). Now WHILE this goes on we need to secure the borders to prevent more illegal crossings from Canada, and Mexico too but Canada is the real influx point...and AT SAME TIME make LEGAL immigration easier..take away the red tape that is just holding the process up.

I think we need to streamline the whole process and reinforce border security to alleviate this problem.

Reason we NEED a secure border:
1) Flora+fauna. Animals and plants that could be harmful to the native ecology must be controlled.
2) Disease. Sick people can be contagious and can bring illness INTO a country causing an epidemic...that is a huge reason we need secure borders
3) Tired of reading about the people killed in the crossings by the coyotes and others for not paying the exorbitant amounts of money, being left to starve+die.
4) National security. To claim that our country has to be wide open to any attack by walking across the border is just ridiculous.
5) Illegal immigration is a massive factor of identity theft creating an almost stolen id blackmarket. The people whose identities have been stolen (I know someone personally whose was stolen and found an illegal using her id) have their credit ruined even after the problem is found and resolved.

Answer 5

Dont start this again!!!!
Yea, i imagine everyone is an immigrant but when legions of people from one culture come flooding into one area of britain it tends to ruffle a few feathers.

The world is becoming so small with mass modern media and people have become so concerned with where they can earn the most money!! Why are so many north africans flooding the italian islands!

What about all countries like south africa and 'israel'. That was some great examples of immigration!! And what about fiji, bl**dy nightmare problem with Indians there. When its a few people dont mind - but when its constant and people from cultures that wont adapt to where they are going - people get very annoyed.

Answer 6

I am not anti immigration.

I am against "flood the market with unskilled people creating a huge pool of excess labour which makes competition for even the most basic of jobs more problematic, drives wages down and causes employers to see their workers as expendible and cheap".

Plus I was born here as were my parents, grandparents, great grandparents etc ergo I am not an immigrant. My dad fought in WWII and my grandmother lost two brothers in WWI. My family have been paying their taxes for centuries. We've put plenty into this country. I wonder when it will ever give us anything back, because right now more is given to the immigrants than it is to the "natives".

Different thing.

Answer 7

NumbersUSA is strongly against illegal immigration, as are all patriotic Americans, and they support a reasonable number of immigrants per year, say about 250,000. 250,000 immigrants a year is the historic norm for the USA and it certainly makes sense to cut back immigration from over 1 million per year to 250,000, while the USA is in a deep and probably a prolonged recession. Politicians who do not support cutting back immigration during a recession are gutless at best, traitorous at worst. Of course, La Raza supports open borders, massive numbers of immigrants and the non-enforcement of our nation’s immigration laws. La Raza – what a great patriotic group you belong too --- NOT!

Answer 8

You should read a book called the "dictionary".
An immigrant is one that is born in one country and legally moves in another country. It has nothing to do with history.
Pure blood is a term to define a pure bleed of a animal.

Your knowledge of word History is even incorrect as it has nothing to do with legal citizens. It is just about history and events which things happened.

In your case I doubt you ever read anything thing remotely looks like a history book.

Answer 9

No one is against legal immigrants, only those who ignore the limits on how many poor we subsidize in our schools and hospitals, thereby ruining education and health care for our own people.

It isn't about the quality of an 'immigrant' but how many our infrastructure and programs can take without failing our own people. Unfortunately, with rampant illegal immigration, we have passed that number some time back.

Answer 10

First off people are not anti-immigrant, we are however frustrated with the illegal immigration problem and want something to be done, we have a legal process, use it.

Please tell me how many generations must pass before we are no longer considered an immigrant?