UKIP leader Nigel Farage is allied with Daily Express proprietor Richard Desmond, and almost every day their front page screams hate directed at migrants.
There are many compelling and valid reasons for leaving the European Union. Many of its institutions are defined by bloated bureaucracy. You can hardly throw a Euro in Brussels or Strasbourg without hitting a corporate lobbyist, and legislation is shaped by them as much as it is by the politicians. Indeed there may well come a time when walking away from the EU is the right thing to do, but that time is not now.
The UK referendum to leave or remain in the EU is happening for one simple reason, the UK Independence Party (UKIP). With its origins in the Anti-Federalist League, its primary purpose has been to get the UK out of the EU. Pursuing this agenda over the years, with a strong anti-foreigner focus, has pushed the Conservative Party further to the right, emboldened fascist groups such as the EDL and created a toxic soup into which UKIPers would throw all those not deemed British enough. Indeed, on the day British MP and Remain campaigner Jo Cox was murdered by a man linked to overtly fascist organisations, UKIP unveiled a billboard demonising migrants which bore a striking resemblance to a Nazi propaganda film from 1942.
The rallying cry of the Leave campaign might as well be “I’m not racist but…”. A win for the leave campaign would be a tacit win for UKIP and the far right in the UK and throughout Europe. Scapegoating migrants is a classic bait and switch tactic, diverting attention away from the financial and political elite who are impoverishing Europe and putting the blame for every conceivable social ill on the shoulders of those with who are the least to blame and have the most to lose from this shift toward fascism. You may balk at the word but fascism is the road down which the UK and much of europe is slipping, and the protectionist, nationalist, anti-immigration sentiments at the very heart of the Leave campaign are undoubtedly a huge part of this. UKIP leader Nigel Farage is allied with Daily Express proprietor Richard Desmond, and almost every day their front page screams hate directed at migrants.
Below are a number of articles and videos giving sound social and economic reasons for voting to remain in the EU. But above all leaving would further alienate, endanger and disenfranchise anyone not British-born, as well as non-white Britons, and for their sake and the sake of everyone who doesn’t wish to aide and abet the far right, we need to unite throughout Europe to once again fight fascism and strive to build a more accountable, more democratic Europe, which may or may not include an economic union in the future but should include every person, regardless of ethnicity or origin.
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Chris Brosnahan ·
On twitter I said “An MP gets stabbed and shot by someone shouting “Britain First” on the day UKIP copies Nazi propaganda. This is terrifying.” Someone accused me of trying to make political gain. This was my response.
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24 min ·
One of the UK’s leading EU law experts criticizes the referendum debate’s “dishonesty on an industrial scale”, as he considers the claims and counter claims from each side.
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Aaron Bastani ·
I've argued that the left should campaign to leave the EU. But now, I'll vote to remain.
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15 min ·
Eleanor Penny explains why Britain needs to remain in the EU despite it's structural racism and lack of democracy.
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Niki Seth-Smith ·
Britain shapes and is shaped by Europe. Let's not pretend otherwise.
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11 min ·
openDemocracy founder Anthony Barnett discusses DiEM25, Brexit and European democracy with Yanis Varoufakis. Recorded at the Another Europe is Possible event in London, 28 May 2016.
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Bertie Russell ·
The 23rd June 2016 is likely to be a miserable day for anyone with an even remotely left-leaning conscience. The weeks before are already overcast with a feeling of inescapable gloom reminiscent of that which consumes a student, the...
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60 min ·
This film analyzes the movement of a society from freedom to tyranny in five steps. It clearly shows how those in positions of power may cultivate the conditions of tyranny in any population by demonstrating how easily ordinary people...
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