4 hours ago, studiot said:

So who is prepared to say that the UK is not already seriously overcrowded ?

Or that we can properly feed, house, support the people already here ?

And yes, there are other parts of the world that are also seriously overcrowded.

Yes there is short-termism in our current approach which has been going on for a long time and doesn't seem about to change.

It is not immigration per se that is driving the decay in our society.

Then stopping immigration isn’t the fix.

1 hour ago, studiot said:

I have already answered you.

Hardly. You raised 'overcrowding' in response to @swansont 's questioning of why 'white Caucasian' immigration to the UK was being overlooked. Nobody seems to be clear on your reasoning. Perhaps you misunderstood the question.

2 hours ago, sethoflagos said:

On the face of it, a very reasonable point to make.

Yet I contrast this with the more than a quarter of a century I've lived as a white British man in Nigeria - permitted to do so currently purely on the grounds of having Nigerian born dependents (a wife and daughter). How many times in that considerable period have I been verbally abused because of my skin colour? Or criticised for having no religion; not speaking a word of Hausa; dressing unconventially; eating 'foreign' food (frequently, bacon); playing Pink Floyd or Frank Zappa loudly whenever I felt like it; or some degree of responsibility my ancestors may have had for the the slave trade, or other heinous crimes of the colonial era?

In a word: never. Not once.

Now compare that with the experiences of my wife (a naturalised British citizen) living in London where she is about to be awarded an upper-class 2nd honours degree in Mental Health Nursing from Kingston University to sit alongside her other upper-class 2nd honours degree in Public Administration from the University of Lagos. The poor girl is nervous taking the night bus home after a long shift caring for the demented population of the Surrey stockbroker belt for fear of racial abuse. An abuse encouraged by the fascist Reform Party; the rancid dregs of a Conservative Party that are now indistinguishable from the fascists; and a largely foreign-funded mass-media promoting their toxic ideas.

I don't know about you, but for me this is a very personal matter.

There isnow, I believe, no sitting on the fence on this one. You either condemn racism unilaterally wherever it occurs, or you don't. Which is it to be? Anyone?

Which at 286 people per square kilometer compares with the 250-266 estimate for Nigeria. Huge difference, eh?

If you don’t want racist political parties to succeed, you have to be able to understand what drives people towards them. In my opinion, the culture issue is real enough in places like London’s East End or Leicester, without invoking racism at all. Though obviously it will tend to breed racism.

(I’m disappointed to hear of your wife’s experience, especially in a fairly prosperous suburb of Southwest London.)

Edited 15 hours ago15 hr by exchemist

Side note, which is that viable populations of nations are not tied to biological carrying capacities as they were pre industrial revolution. For sure, remove fossil fuels, cheap fertilizer and global transport and places like UK or Belgium would see mass starvation while Oregon (roughly same land area as UK, but with 1/18 of the population) would probably do okay. Such matters of carrying capacity are more relevant when modern nations are blockaded. Given that a lot of immigrants to the UK or EU or US are from cultures where personal carbon footprint is massively lower, they would seem to bring some useful perspectives to the crowded wealthy places.

@sethoflagos 's life experience, moving between the poles of Nigeria and England, certainly added something to this discussion.

53 minutes ago, TheVat said:

Side note, which is that viable populations of nations are not tied to biological carrying capacities as they were pre industrial revolution. For sure, remove fossil fuels, cheap fertilizer and global transport and places like UK or Belgium would see mass starvation while Oregon (roughly same land area as UK, but with 1/18 of the population) would probably do okay. Such matters of carrying capacity are more relevant when modern nations are blockaded. Given that a lot of immigrants to the UK or EU or US are from cultures where personal carbon footprint is massively lower, they would seem to bring some useful perspectives to the crowded wealthy places.

@sethoflagos 's life experience, moving between the poles of Nigeria and England, certainly added something to this discussion.

Not sure what you mean by this but

1845 Ireland

1868 India

They had all your requirements but millions died, although the British administration could have intervened to prevent this. (To our eternal shame)

2 hours ago, swansont said:

Then stopping immigration isn’t the fix.

I agree wholeheartedly, although it depends upon the solution to what, I assume you are referring to 'the decay'.

1 hour ago, exchemist said:

If you don’t want racist political parties to succeed, you have to be able to understand what drives people towards them. In my opinion, the culture issue is real enough in places like London’s East End or Leicester, without invoking racism at all. Though obviously it will tend to breed racism.

Yes I have already agreed with your perceptive observation about the cultural dimension.

But I don't want political parties full stop.

They seem to inevitably lead to corruption and decay.

1 hour ago, exchemist said:

(I’m disappointed to hear of your wife’s experience, especially in a fairly prosperous suburb of Southwest London.)

Thank you. If you ever need advice on how to deal with a deportation notice served on your newly-wed bride a week after you were flown off to assist the MOD in some hell-hole like. say, Iraq, drop me a line. Or flying together for a holiday break to Cyprus - all visas in place - only to be denied entry. Or dealing with an NHS (expletive deleted) who advised a woman of child-bearing age that the only treatment available for uterine fibroids was a hysterectomy... shall I continue?

1 hour ago, exchemist said:

If you don’t want racist political parties to succeed, you have to be able to understand what drives people towards them. In my opinion, the culture issue is real enough in places like London’s East End or Leicester, without invoking racism at all. Though obviously it will tend to breed racism.

Absolutely, yes! Marx couldn't have put it better, and if I were back amongst my fellow shop floor workers in the West Riding paper mill where I served my apprenticeship, I'd probably adopt a different strategy to the arguments I present here. But we're all well-educated, well-read, highly-skilled critical thinkers, aren't we. So no need for training wheels when we hop on the old bicycle. We can all see straight through the divisive BS, right?

Edited 13 hours ago13 hr by sethoflagos
wocking murds fuddled

29 minutes ago, studiot said:

I agree wholeheartedly, although it depends upon the solution to what, I assume you are referring to 'the decay'.

Yes.

 

20 hours ago, swansont said:

I know that in the US, polls have shown that people overestimate the fraction of the population that belong to various subgroups (Muslim, Jewish, transgender, Asian, etc.) I wonder if that same effect is going on here - people perceiving more immigrants than there actually are.

By happenstance I ran across this; though it’s from 2013, I suspect it still applies.

https://www.the-independent.com/news/uk/home-news/british-public-wrong-about-nearly-everything-survey-shows-8697821.html

“British public wrong about nearly everything, survey shows”

“some 31 per cent of the population is thought to consist of recent immigrants, when the figure is actually 13 per cent. Even including illegal immigrants, the figure is only about 15 per cent.”

5 minutes ago, studiot said:

Not sure what you mean by this but

1845 Ireland

1868 India

They had all your requirements but millions died, although the British administration could have intervened to prevent this. (To our eternal shame)

Not sure what you are answering there. My post in no way ruled out the role of hostile politics, poor agricultural policies, etc. in hindering or blocking food access. I'm quite aware of that, having ancestors who barely survived 1845 Eirinn.

I was seeking to sharpen the definiton of "overcrowded," factoring in things like carbon footprint per citizen, global transport and industrial farming, unhindered shipping, and how that can affect nations that greatly exceed biological carrying capacity. I also pointed out that immigrants, often from places with lower carbon footprints, can bring in helpful and much-needed approaches to using less energy/resources for daily life. Another factor which I didn't get into is the degree to which one's geography provides a biological reactor. Some tropical areas can produce more food, construction materials (fast-growing bamboo, e.g.), and other bio resources per unit of land than an area in chilly northern Europe. (others, due to desertification, may provide less)

I didn't articulate this in my other post, but sometimes it has seemed to me that "assimilation" might better work in the opposite direction, where those from a culture with less material goods and high-carbon diets might be the one for multigeneration "natives" to take onboard. As a mostly-vegan (occasional pescetarian), I am sort of disappointed when immigrants from vegetarian cultures settle in red meat countries and "assimilate" by loading their plates with meat dishes and shrugging off the old traditions. I'm not judging, just wishing the cultural gravity pulled the other direction. I'm not sure, but I might be the only current member who has worked in a slaughterhouse/meat packing plant, and had some visceral experience (sometimes literally) of what goes on to put a steak on your plate.

12 minutes ago, sethoflagos said:

Absolute, yes, Marx couldn't have put it better, and if I were back amongst my fellow shop floor workers in the West Riding paper mill where I served my apprenticeship, I'd probably adopt a different strategy to the arguments I present here. But we're all well-educated, well-read, highly-skilled critical thinkers, aren't we. So no need for training wheels when we hop on the old bicycle. We can all see straight through the divisory BS, right?

When Frau Vat and I were young (several centuries ago, it seems like), we had some finesse with seeing through divisiveness but often only at the lofty level where it's not as useful as sympathetic understanding of your immediate neighbors. This was brought home to us by a year in married student housing at a large university with a large international student population, when the ME family above us decided to eat a goat and invite people over to share. The goat was brought out on their balcony and its throat slit. It seemed they had not fully prepared for the volume of blood that would flow out and so my (then 2 year old) son was somewhat mystified by this stream of goat blood coming down from overhead splattering over our walkway and immediately drawing thousands of flies. This is the sort of scenario where cultural openness and tolerance falters. It all worked itself out, actually with a considerable amount of amusement - some things are so "over the top" all you can do is laugh. The neighbors, to their credit, realized they had somewhat miscalculated and stepped on some toes, and by the end of the academic year we could all chuckle about it. Especially over the look on the housing complex manager's face when he arrived on the scene. On one other occasion where a goat was in need of sacrificing, the manager did find a suitable location and a way to bend the health laws so long as they were tidier about it.

32 minutes ago, TheVat said:

I'm not sure, but I might be the only current member who has worked in a slaughterhouse/meat packing plant, and had some visceral experience (sometimes literally) of what goes on to put a steak on your plate.

Small exception. There was that time in my wife's village that I was only excused the morning church service if I assisted my brother-in-law with preparing the Xmas dinner.

Rest of album here if anyone is interested

48 minutes ago, TheVat said:

I was seeking to sharpen the definiton of "overcrowded,"

That's a fair question.

So if we have nowhere to put additional people would you consider that overcrowded ?

56 minutes ago, swansont said:

By happenstance I ran across this; though it’s from 2013, I suspect it still applies.

https://www.the-independent.com/news/uk/home-news/british-public-wrong-about-nearly-everything-survey-shows-8697821.html

“British public wrong about nearly everything, survey shows”

“some 31 per cent of the population is thought to consist of recent immigrants, when the figure is actually 13 per cent. Even including illegal immigrants, the figure is only about 15 per cent.”

It is difficult to get accurate figures, as the construction of the statistics is 'ethnicity led' , current official figures seem to concur with this.

This undesirable state of affairs is not only a waste of public money but promotes racism.

1 hour ago, sethoflagos said:

Thank you. If you ever need advice on how to deal with a deportation notice served on your newly-wed bride a week after you were flown off to assist the MOD in some hell-hole like. say, Iraq, drop me a line. Or flying together for a holiday break to Cyprus - all visas in place - only to be denied entry. Or dealing with an NHS (expletive deleted) who advised a woman of child-bearing age that the only treatment available for uterine fibroids was a hysterectomy... shall I continue?

Just to offer a counter story to your unpleasant experiences.

Back in the mid 1980s, my wife suffered an very extended labour with our daughter.

Eventually after nearly 2 days without success for the whole team of white midwives, doctors and nurses a huge black man was called who said

"I'm Dr Larry and I hear you need some help"

The remaining time for the birth was then measured in minutes, with no surgery needed.

Prejudice was the farthest thing from our minds.

However there is the consideration "Should we be trying to attract the best from these countries ?"

20 hours ago, exchemist said:

Yes. Remember, that’s what Brexit was all about. Although culturally, Europeans are obviously far closer so easy to assimilate.

IIRC the most negative attitude among white folks was towards East Europeans (e.g. Polish and Czech). This goes towards my earlier comment that folks will create sub-divisions to further their respective narratives.

8 hours ago, exchemist said:

On the assimilation point I think that's a 2 way process.

I agree that it should be, but often it isn't. I will note that while things are getting weird in North America, in Europe that traditionally has been a problem for visible minorities in many areas. Attitudes have improved somewhat around 2010s but then has seen a huge backlash again. I think the population is very segmented in that regard. As is the society as a whole, one should add. The idea of a consensus in society has crumbled and apparently we all live in some hyper-specific bubbles now (some refer to it as the atomization of society).

19 hours ago, studiot said:

We can't feed the people we have already got.

Two things here. We have another thread about feeding folks and the limits to that. But on a different note, this suggest that immigrants are draining resources, mirroring the idea in OP. Is that really the case though? One of my points is that in most countries that is the standard assumption, but I rarely see evidence of it. The picture is somewhat complex, but I would like to see that before accepting this as as true, I would like to see what kind of data folks have looked at before coming to this conclusion.

6 hours ago, sethoflagos said:

I don't know about you, but for me this is a very personal matter.

Quite a different matter and quite tame in comparison, but I find it rather funny that I have been yelled at in three different countries for not speaking the local language with my wife or parents (and each time in a grocery store). But in a broader sense I do often hear the criticism that folks do not want to hear a foreign language in their spaces. That in my mind does not bode well for a two-way assimilation idea. Of course, broader society might have a different attitude, and there is a difference between NA and Europe in that regard. But at the same time, grievances of the majority with anything related to status challenges is politically incredibly powerful as it is often dumb. In that regard I can understand exchemist's comment on the desire to address immigration to not cede to the far right. Rather unfortunately, I also think it will not work on many levels. First, if mainstream parties think that putting on prohibitive restrictions will assuage voters, it often doesn't. The extremists can always claim that a) they would have done it sooner and better and b) it just proves that they are right in the first place.

In addition, most folks do not understand the impact of immigration on the economy. For example, Trump's policies appear to have a net negative impact despite claims that it will somehow benefit (white) Americans. Thus, eve if reducing immigration or expelling immigrants tanks the economy, far right can just claim that they haven't expelled enough immigrants. A bad situation is good for them and they have no qualms do dig the hole ever deeper. I.e. while we likely can all see the reasoning, the solutions are elusive and annoyingly, grievances and emotions tend to win out in the end.

1 hour ago, studiot said:

Back in the mid 1980s, my wife suffered an very extended labour with our daughter.

Eventually after nearly 2 days without success for the whole team of white midwives, doctors and nurses a huge black man was called who said

"I'm Dr Larry and I hear you need some help"

The remaining time for the birth was then measured in minutes, with no surgery needed.

Prejudice was the farthest thing from our minds.

My mother would most definitely have sympathised with you and (more particularly) your wife. She seldom missed a good opportunity to regale the rest of the family with her perspective on the preterm forceps delivery of her eldest and dearest. His perspective on arriving into the world with a hurting, blue, triangular head was not recorded. 🥶

41 minutes ago, CharonY said:

In addition, most folks do not understand the impact of immigration on the economy. For example, Trump's policies appear to have a net negative impact despite claims that it will somehow benefit (white) Americans. Thus, eve if reducing immigration or expelling immigrants tanks the economy, far right can just claim that they haven't expelled enough immigrants. A bad situation is good for them and they have no qualms do dig the hole ever deeper. I.e. while we likely can all see the reasoning, the solutions are elusive and annoyingly, grievances and emotions tend to win out in the end.

I think it's a little simpler in the UK. The argument could be quite fairly be framed as:

"We have a falling birth rate, aging population, unfilled jobs, and barely enough tax income to meet current pension commitments. So what would you rather have: immigration controls and ever rising taxes, or a living pension in retirement? You can't have both. Your choice."

As free passage is a likely precondition of UK rejoining the EU, crossing that Rubicon would help recover most of the 6-8% knock to annual GDP caused by Brexit.

34 minutes ago, sethoflagos said:

My mother would most definitely have sympathised with you and (more particularly) your wife. She seldom missed a good opportunity to regale the rest of the family with her perspective on the preterm forceps delivery of her eldest and dearest. His perspective on arriving into the world with a hurting, blue, triangular head was not recorded. 🥶

I think it's a little simpler in the UK. The argument could be quite fairly be framed as:

"We have a falling birth rate, aging population, unfilled jobs, and barely enough tax income to meet current pension commitments. So what would you rather have: immigration controls and ever rising taxes, or a living pension in retirement? You can't have both. Your choice."

Thank your mother for us please.

Unfortunately your statistics are somewhat out of date.

It would be true to say

We have a rising unemployment, many people who can't find jobs particularly amongst the youth who also can't afford places to live and/or food and/or winter heating. We have a ridiculous tax/ benefit system were we have seen a series of bureaucratic 'adjustments that have been plainly unfair to various people, particularly women, who are the main sector that may only have a state pension. Most men already receiving a pension will have gone through good employment times, not a prospect for those still working. Actually the national average life expectancy has recently fallen, for the first time since the big war slaughters. Yes we have a falling birth rate, since youngsters are choosing to have children later or not to have children at all. cf my first comment about jobs and housing.

None of this is the fault of the immigrants, but their presence makes things worse as they most certainly do absorb resources which is why immigration should be carefully managed, as the Norwegians and Swiss have done. This is not a Brexit issue ; neither Norway nor Switzerland are part of the EU.

1 hour ago, CharonY said:

Two things here. We have another thread about feeding folks and the limits to that. But on a different note, this suggest that immigrants are draining resources, mirroring the idea in OP. Is that really the case though? One of my points is that in most countries that is the standard assumption, but I rarely see evidence of it. The picture is somewhat complex, but I would like to see that before accepting this as as true, I would like to see what kind of data folks have looked at before coming to this conclusion.

I don't recall any pertinent threads about feeding people, but the cost of food is bothering many folks here in the UK.

You want some evidence ?

Go to food bank and ask yourself why a society that is allegedly so rich need to feed much of its population that way ?

Consider the county town of Somerset. The greedy are promoting a new extension building 1000 + houses and thus increasing the population by some 20,000 to 30,000.

Yet nowhere is there provision for a new reservoir or water catchment facilities or sewage disposal facilities.
That many people will clog up the already overcrowded roads and other public facilities.
And where will they find work ?
There are certainly not tens of thousands of jobs listed at the job centre nor tens of thousands of extra school places etc etc.

And the worst of it is that scenario is being repeated up and down the country all in the greedy name of growth = profit = economic health = nonsense unless properly brought in.

Remember America has almost limitless resources to do these things. The UK does not.

25 minutes ago, studiot said:

Unfortunately your statistics are somewhat out of date.

Really?

Number of vacancies in the UK, seasonally adjusted, April to June 2007, to April to June 2026

Currently about 50% above what it was prior to the Brexit vote.

Edited 9 hours ago9 hr by sethoflagos

Talking about Lagos

Did you ever come across Jonas M K Dake of fluids textbook fame ?

13 minutes ago, studiot said:

Talking about Lagos

Did you ever come across Jonas M K Dake of fluids textbook fame ?

Before my time. Ghanaian wasn't he? Never been there.

10 hours ago, StringJunky said:

Whether the west admits it or not, it is culpable in the destinations many immigrants take. They are going where the resources are, that have been systematically removed from those immigrants countries over the last hundreds of years. Climate change in the equatorial poorer countries will only exacerbate that mass transit over the coming decades.

This is something you never seem to see politicians address. So what if we have made your country unlivable, you can't come here....

Human tribalism has a long history, itself extending into other primates and even mammals before that, etc.

Us/Them thinking is nothing new. What is new (or returning in greater frequency) is the backdrop of global migration.

People seeking to flee from physical and political violence, the issues under discussion here are amplified by droughts, floods, and similar resource constraints being made worse by human caused climate change.

Zero sum thinking plus a smaller overall pie leads to higher levels of xenophobia and hoarding tendencies.

/meta comment

Amplifying themes from stringjunky

30 minutes ago, iNow said:

Zero sum thinking plus a smaller overall pie leads to higher levels of xenophobia and hoarding tendencies.

Well add to that fracturing of society due to social media.

6 hours ago, sethoflagos said:

who advised a woman of child-bearing age that the only treatment available for uterine fibroids was a hysterectomy.

This is rage-inducing. Did they say that there is simply no option or did they try to push hysterectomy over possible options (both are bad, of course. I would assume that this was way before MRgFUS was available?

14 minutes ago, CharonY said:

This is rage-inducing. Did they say that there is simply no option or did they try to push hysterectomy over possible options (both are bad, of course. I would assume that this was way before MRgFUS was available?

Only option available (2014-ish). I did research at the time and knew it was BS. Demanded to speak to the departmental consultant, mentioned my aunt after whom the hospital's flagship renal unit was named, and asked politely for my wife to be referred to an alternative specialist. Didn't see the old one for dust.

Edited 6 hours ago6 hr by sethoflagos

6 hours ago, studiot said:

That's a fair question.

So if we have nowhere to put additional people would you consider that overcrowded

Well, if one has really run out of land on which to build housing, that would be the definitive state of overcrowding. It seems there are degrees of that. If a country has insufficient arable land, e.g., then more subdivisions sprawling into farmland worsens what's already a bad situation. In developing countries, there can be favelas growing up the sides of hills which feature dirt streets with raw sewage flowing down the middle, shanty neighborhoods which can wash away in a mudslide. If I lived in a place like that, wealthy nations with more abstract problems like arable land shortage would probably look pretty good to me. At present human settlements cover ~ 1% of land area, but I'm sure it's a little higher in the UK.

These questions of crowding are somewhat cultural, aren't they? Those that value extensive wilderness and big swaths of natural landscape think the US, with far lower population density, is already too crowded. When I was born the US population was half what it is now, and I can recall people of my parent's generation lamenting how crowded some areas of the West had become.

3 hours ago, npts2020 said:

This is something you never seem to see politicians address. So what if we have made your country unlivable, you can't come here....

In the US we’ve actively been taking it to an even worse level - cutting aid for countries, making their living conditions even worse, while shutting down immigration.