The European Union, in all its Kafka-esque bureaucratic glory, could well be approaching its dying days. It has already been reduced to pathetic bullying, bribery and scaremongering in its efforts to keep the United Kingdom in its snake-like grasp, and even if this succeeds the precedent will be set, and many other nations will begin standing up to the bully. If I am honest with myself, I do not know all the facts about the European Union – although I think I know enough about centralised bodies full of socialists to know which way I will vote in the referendum. Regardless, this post is not about the EU as such, merely the BBC’s obvious and easy to understand bias, revealed in all its glory on this one issue where David Cameron, Labour in general and the BBC’s typically leftist journalists all somewhat agree. The fact that people living in the UK are obligated to pay for this propaganda if they want to watch any television is a trivial travesty in the grand scheme of things, but a travesty none the less.
I found one blatant example of this bias in Mark Kendall’s ‘Portugal wrinkles its nose at UK’s EU deal’ article, in which ‘Portugal’ is represented by a handful of random students and a Portuguese nurse who has been living in the UK for four years and apparently thinks the ‘principle’ of cutting migrant benefits is unfair. ‘I think it’s wrong – if you are there contributing with your work and your taxes’, she says, raising the question – if benefits are just your taxes given back to you, why take them in the first place? After quoting this political philosopher Mark goes on to assert that David Cameron’s desire is ‘to put people off’ coming to the UK, and questions the ability of any ‘emergency-brake’ on benefits to achieve this goal. What really needs questioning is Mark’s first statement, however – after all, it is quite a bold claim, blurted out as an apparent fact, without any of the accompanying reasons so much as mentioned.
First of all, David Cameron’s speeches on immigration invariably talk of the problem of social cohesion as a primary, with immigration numbers as a secondary factor. Cameron could hardly get away with as blatant a ‘xenophobic’ desire as ‘less immigration’, with no reason but itself given, which Mark’s statement implies. But, what really matters to most of the people I know who are critical of immigration, is the abuse of the welfare state. In a hypothetical world where welfare didn’t exist but immigration remained the same, there would be no issue (ignoring terrorism for a moment) – immigrants could only be a benefit to society, and more importantly, there would be less expropriation of wealth and use of force. Consider also how a non-integrating immigrant would fare with no welfare, friends or job prospects – integration would be almost guaranteed, and the level of integration would correspond with a higher level of opportunities.
By painting Cameron, who actually wants to stay in the EU, as a xenophobe who wants less immigration simply because he wants fewer immigrants, Mark has portrayed anyone wanting to leave the EU as a bigot without a leg to stand on. This may well be true for your average Joe after three or four pints at the local, but most people have reasonably rational reasons as to why offering benefits to almost anyone is a bad thing.
Rational Observations 