Making the news today....

[the village idiot]

2 hours ago, kevinjohnsonmbe said:

That's an interesting point VI.  But it comes with a health warning surely...

 

I happen to agree, to a point, that enrichment of a society through some diversification can be viewed as a positive.  

 

And, that some help and advantage can / should be provided from a (relatively) rich / developed country to some of the people of a less so one.

 

But who gets to decide the numbers?  When does 'some' become 'too much?'  What happens when policy (or the lack of it) results in unsustainable demographic / socio-economic / religious (you'll like that one ?)/ cultural changes within both the donor and receiver countries?  What happens to the people that don't get the lottery ticket?  How is it fair and reasonable to tell someone 'you're not on the list, you're not coming in?' How do you prevent criminal exploitation of those that aren't on the list but try to make their own way anyway?  

 

There are those that advocate a borderless world with free movement as a fundamental right (nut-jobs).....  Can't argue with that, if that's what they properly believe, but anything short of that start point necessarily requires borders, border controls, movement control, the numbers game.

 

The UK, in my opinion, has royally assed up the numbers game to the point where whole-scale, powder keg societal changes have been inflicted upon areas which have changed beyond repair the results of which we have yet to fully appreciate - and - inflicted a drain of the most motivated from within a 'deprived' country to leave it, probably at the point where their skills and talents are most needed.

 

I appreciate the point you make about improving the lives of some, but I struggle to reconcile the morality of the decision making process.   

 

   

It's definitely a tricky one.

 

Despite what Matelot no doubt thinks I think, I am not in favour of open borders. As you suggest, this would be nuts.

 

I also don't believe however that purely relying on a points system is moral unless a potential immigrant scores points related to the desperation they are in. A traditional points based system won't help the people who most need it. 

 

I appreciate that a lot of people don't put helping the desperate as high up their list of immigration priorities as I do and I understand the issues involved with increasing the numbers of unskilled and culturally different individuals in the population, but I just can't get past the fact that we in the West are just lucky and we should not feel entitled to live like relative kings at the expense of others who did not have our luck.

 

Where you draw the line as to who to help and who not to, I have no idea. It is a debate that will never end. I would just be much happier seeing a little more compassion creep into the deliberations, rather than purely focussing on the effect on us.

 

Re. integration, I definitely feel that once granted the right to reside in the UK every effort should be made by the immigrant to fit into the way we do things. If this conflicts with their religious beliefs then I would expect them to make some compromises. One can't have it all.

Edited April 21, 2018 by the village idiot

[Commando]

Fascinating stuff I’m sure.....?‍♀️
 
 
Something funny is happening in Saudi ATM...
 
 

Like what?

[forestboy1978]

Why are we living in luxury at their expense though? 

 

If we were living in luxury at their expense I'd feel more inclined to be philanthropic but I don't see how our standard of living is to their detriment. 

 

Lack of reformation of Islam is to their detriment, as was the lack of reformation of Christianity to ours 500 years ago. 

Edited April 21, 2018 by forestboy1978

[Mick Dempsey]

5 minutes ago, Commando said:

Like what?

Gunshots in Riyadh, turned out to be nothing, Twitter chatter.

[Khriss]

4 minutes ago, Mick Dempsey said:

Gunshots in Riyadh, turned out to be nothing, Twitter chatter.

Wedding or 4 weddings an a quick funeral K

[Commando]

That's an interesting point VI.  But it comes with a health warning surely...
 
I happen to agree, to a point, that enrichment of a society through some diversification can be viewed as a positive.  
 
And, that some help and advantage can / should be provided from a (relatively) rich / developed country to some of the people of a less so one.
 
But who gets to decide the numbers?  When does 'some' become 'too much?'  What happens when policy (or the lack of it) results in unsustainable demographic / socio-economic / religious (you'll like that one [emoji38])/ cultural changes within both the donor and receiver countries?  What happens to the people that don't get the lottery ticket?  How is it fair and reasonable to tell someone 'you're not on the list, you're not coming in?' How do you prevent criminal exploitation of those that aren't on the list but try to make their own way anyway?  
 
There are those that advocate a borderless world with free movement as a fundamental right (nut-jobs).....  Can't argue with that, if that's what they properly believe, but anything short of that start point necessarily requires borders, border controls, movement control, the numbers game.
 
The UK, in my opinion, has royally assed up the numbers game to the point where whole-scale, powder keg societal changes have been inflicted upon areas which have changed beyond repair the results of which we have yet to fully appreciate - and - inflicted a drain of the most motivated from within a 'deprived' country to leave it, probably at the point where their skills and talents are most needed.
 
I appreciate the point you make about improving the lives of some, but I struggle to reconcile the morality of the decision making process.   
 
   

Why do we give British citizenship to away so easily? IMHO it should be in exceptional circumstances only, very much like much of the Gulf region.
Economic migrants come when we need them, when we don’t.. send them home with their pot of gold. Step out of line you get deported!

Political migrants/asylum seekers get a temporary resident visa but maintain their country of origin passport. Step out of line/commit crime you get deported!
Prove your worth and apply for below....

In the exception, Grant full citizenship, however no more dual/triple nationality - you are either signed up to being British or not...half hearted person need not apply!

[Commando]

Gunshots in Riyadh, turned out to be nothing, Twitter chatter.

Ah that......Allegedly a kids drone shot down for flying too close to Royal Palace.

[the village idiot]

2 hours ago, forestboy1978 said:

Why are we living in luxury at their expense though? 

I mean in terms of not allowing people into the country because it might negatively impact on our levels of wealth.

[matelot]

8 hours ago, the village idiot said:

I mean in terms of not allowing people into the country because it might negatively impact on our levels of wealth.

Places like Africa kicked the white man out because they wanted to run their own countries. Since we were kicked out Africa has went downhill IMHO. They wanted their independence and we shouldn't feel guilty they can't run modern succesful countries.

 

Expecting Europeans to sacrifice some wealth to improve the life's of brown immigrants is one thing. However we can watch the news and see we're being expected to sacrifice more than money. Sorry, if having kids blown up at a music concert is the price we have to pay for multiculturalism it's a price I'm not willing to pay.

 

All this sacrifice might be more acceptable if immigrants showed a little bit more gratitude for being here. However the message we repeatedly hear from immigrant groups is that white people are so racist and white people are so evil. 

 

I think civil war is coming to Europe and I think it's people like you that caused it by wanting immigrants with medieval mindsets in Europe.

[the village idiot]

1 hour ago, matelot said:

I think civil war is coming to Europe and I think it's people like you that caused it by wanting immigrants with medieval mindsets in Europe.

The people I am most in favour of helping are those that are fleeing medieval mindsets. These people are hardly likely to turn into the very people they need to get away from in the first place.

 

I think you are right to talk about mindsets however. You are rightly concerned about people getting blown up in the UK, but individuals don't do this because of the colour of their skin, they do it because of the ideas in their heads.

 

Stopping immigration will not stop terrorism. Increasingly people will become radicalised over the internet. Al Quada has been quietly regrouping in the background and we know they have the capabilities to fly planes into buildings.

 

If we want to stop people killing us because of faith we have to do something about faith. Bad ideas are the problem here. Basing decicisions and actions on faith is not a good way forward and it is very difficult to argue against the validity of one perfect heavenly father when we still cling to one of our own. Christianity is evidently much less troubling than Islam, largely because it is ignoring many of God's commands, but it still promotes the idea that it is reasonable to base ones existence around supposedly divine origin ancient scriptures. I do not believe this is reasonable. I believe it is harmful and the cause of many of our problems.

 

As a side note. You only seem to focus on the deaths inflicted upon us by immigrants. As stated above, this is a devastating issue which needs to be solved by talking about the right things, but the number of deaths attributed to immigrants pales into almost insignificance when you consider the number of British lives that have been saved through the action of immigrants.

 

Immigration and terrorism are very complicated problems. There are no simple solutions, however much you want there to be.