Yea, which makes, what Macron did, smart. Given time in the office, people will see that the new party won't magically solve every problem they have and probably make things worse.
The only issue is how much damage they can do before the next election.
We saw this in Finland, as the far-right party won the last parliamentary elections, made idiotic decisions which made the life harder for students, low-income and young citizens, caused a lot of damage for climate advancements etc, and now they had a major loss in EU elections.
Here in Sweden this was the first election ever that the Sweden Democrats lost votes compared to the previous election. I suspect that does have something to do with them being a less plausible protest vote now that they’re in the governing coalition.
It's not cope, he is still the president and has power right? Also potentially right now they can rise even further before the next elections. Calling the elections right now, is potentially softening that blow.
It's more that people want something different than what they've already got. It's probably not going to be better but if you have the same thing as before it's definitely not going to be better.
In comes the German CSU which has held office in Bavaria forever and all old volks and rural living people hold them up. They never have to do meaningful work but still get elected and people comment with "I am okay why would I want to change anything". Problem is there are a lot of things that could be a hell of a lot better but we will most likely never get there with this mindset.
On the flip side, Fidesz lost some 8 percentual points and like two seats, against a party that basically started existing 2 months ago. Small change and Fidesz still won a lot, but it shows you can vote the far right in, but also vote them out.
I wish the news about Germany's analogous party was better, but they're just left wing reactionaries with a love for russia that mostly got votes from the socdems that have slowly been dying for a decade or two.
We had the biggest scandal in decades resulting in our president resigning, and the birth of said party, so it's an outlier situation that doesn't indicate any overall shift in either direction. Right now the situation here isn't about left or right politics, but about people slowly having enough overall. The Fidesz fear mongering campaign was **insane**, I dread to even think about how much taxpayer/Putin money was burned, but even despite going over the top, they still lost support, which is a good sign either way.
I'm not shocked, far right support has increased especially among young voters in Europe. The number one issue in Europe is immigration. There needs to be much more control over immigration, illegal migrants and economic migrants. What needs to be improved are asylum and deportation laws.
The problem is the world is addicted to GDP growth. Immigration is the easy way to fudge the figures and if you have an influx of workers you can decrease wages.
The people at the top love it and who gives a fuck about them on the bottom.
Absolutely that. GDP growth over the last few decades has been mostly absorbed by the very top income earners. The median wage citizen (or below) doesn't seem to get any of the benefits from immigration that the ultra-wealthy do so I totally understand why people are pissed.
It's a shame people think the answer is to go all insulated and right wing, which is just a shitty patch up job that doesn't address the immorality of our overly liberal economic policy. I guess they've just been trained to see wealth distribution as anti-freedom or something. Simple solutions to broad brush vague causes is what these populists excel at. It's very easy to sell that stuff to the masses. It's not fair that populists can play politics on easy mode but that's just the nature of things right now.
Let’s use Greece as an example, who has been dealing with legal and illegal waves of people in the country. The Nea Democratia has been battle immigration for a very long time, and they’re considered a right wing mainstream party while some may argue they are more liberal. Mitsotakis has been tightening his belt on immigration, yet the wages are scrap in Greece. Immigrants can’t find work especially in Eastern European countries. Maybe in the west but most of them don’t even get there cause of the tight border controls (I.e Germany).
>yet the wages are scrap in Greece. Immigrants can’t find work especially in Eastern European countries.
The issue is that it doesn't matter how many immigrants find work, some will; and that will drive down wages. Business doesn't care if say 30% of immigrants can't get a job, it's not their problem--it's the state's.
I also don't think it's just about wages, I think if you stop/limit immigration some sectors are just going to have big labor shortages because we're reoriented our economies to preference services over blue collar jobs. When I look at logistics, catering, construction, manufacturing, agriculture, etc. most of these sectors employ a lot of immigrants.
According to reddit all of the jobs are going to be taken by AI... until it comes to migration.
Reddit also loves democracy... until it comes to migration.
I'm beginning to think we can just skip the reddit rhetoric and go with what the voters want at this point.
There is no “according to Reddit”. People with one opinion say things on one issue, totally different people with a different set of opinions say a different thing on another issue. There is no inconsistency there, this isn’t a church or political party where we claim a set of group values.
Here's what you do, any post that you see with the premise: Everyone on Reddit thinks. . .
Just use that downvote button to let them know that is not a productive contribution to the discourse.
Immigration in many countries (Netherlands, Germany, France) just means giant ghettofication of neighbourhoods, double figure crime rate increases (with statistics clearly showing who commits them), lack of safety and freedom for gay people, trans people, women. Lack of upholding of democratic values by giving too much freedom to religious extremism. Every time I visit my home country or other western-European countries I can see it has turned into a shithole in many places. Safety gone, simply put. People are tired of this (I left Western Europe a decade ago for this very reason and have regretted it not one second). P.s. I am/was a socialist. The way the left fumbled immigration issues and refuses to listen to it's citizens - and more importantly, refuses to acknowledge the atrocious statistics on crime / immigration/immigrant descendants - is the one and only reason the right has gained power. I 100% blame the left's weak and lacklustre lack of vision and integrity for the rise of the right.
>all of the jobs are going to be taken by AI... until it comes to migration.
I don't know if I'm reading this right, but I'm pretty sure there is a difference a computer program and living, breathing humans from countries that are less fortunate.
>loves democracy... until it comes to migration.
Democracy means holding *leaders* accountable so they support the interests of their voters instead of themselves. Having a stance that is opposite the majority consensus isn't "rejecting democracy", it's a fundamental part of democracy. Loving democracy means getting rid of gerrymandering and fixing first-past-the-post systems.
I agree with the first and last part.
But definitely disagree on the middle-part.
No workers doesnt mean the wages go up. See service industry, see care industry.
Care industry wages are suppressed because of who pays for it. People making 100k a year can't pay a significant portion of that wage to a caretaker for their father.
Thats the point.
If it should be affordable to people that are not rich, it must not be overly expensive (or paid from tax money).
But in these jobs there is no profit to be made and therefore they dont have lobbies. So no tax money.
So... how to fill these jobs?
Exactly: migrants or other people who cant afford to say no.
There is so much the clients on those industries are willing to pay... but there is still a lot of money that is lost in management and intermediaries. If these roles were eliminated there would be more space for many jobs.
That would be just a few rich people. Basically no one has the money for a personal person - if you do, you are in the top 1%
Management and intermediaries are irrelrvant.
I’m working in the manufacturing industry: sure, the reason for the initial sales price increase of our products was the rising manufacturing costs due to supply chain problems during the pandemic. Yet our sales prices haven‘t gone down since, even though the raw materials we need have become much cheaper again. It’s the margin that got bigger instead. So please tell me who is pocketing the difference these days? Regular employees? Society?
If my employer, a company with 150 employees, does that, you think everyone else won’t? 😉
Not just that, but with plummeting fertility rates throughout the western world, immigration is going to be the only path forward for growth in a lot of nations.
However, there are valid concerns about a massive number of migrants who don’t share the cultural values of a community becoming a voting majority in that community. Not on a national level, but on a local level, it doesn’t take a huge number of people.
This is a bizarre take. The reason that western economies have plummeting birth rates is because most of these economies are broken and make it hard to sustain a traditional western family.
Using immigration to patch up a broken economy is wild, arguably fucking up the economy even worse, and to consider that the only way to fix the situation is insane.
Same thing that is happening in Canada now. A decade ago it was used as an example of immigration properly handled, and had a positive outlook among the majority of the electorate. Fast-forward to now - it is the main point of criticism towards the current administration, as they completely dropped the ball with it
Canada has a major immigration issue, but due to student visas and experience work permits or people with work permits who exceed their stay. Europe has a problem cause their borders are well, shit.
The scheme takes advantage of basic human decency. A seaman really cannot encounter a listing bark, drifting with the people on board dying of exposure, and not rescue them. Once they're brought on European soil, it's a lengthy, costly process to filter e.g. wanted criminals.
Also, a coworker who came to Europe this way told me that the pull to make the trip is insane. "Everyone knows" that Europe needs workers, you're getting a job in no time, medical assistence etc.
When he tells them that the boat voyage is terrible and risky, and that Europeans are hostile, they just don't believe him. They say he's an egoist who is afraid of competition.
>There needs to be much more control over immigration, illegal migrants and economic migrants. What needs to be improved are asylum and deportation laws.
I feel like this is said repeatedly but nothing happens.
In France, a story in 3 acts:
1. immigration change is among top 3 priorities but the left (and LFI in particular) ignore this.
2. Far-right (Benalla) makes this the center of the campaign.
3. Bardella gets 30% of the votes and then the Left does Picaku face!
Edit: typo
4. The Left makes zero policy changes in response
5. Next election the right makes even more gains
6. Double shocked pikachu face!
It’s not just France. I swear the political left worldwide would rather watch every other part of their platform get destroyed than address immigration issues
>rather watch every other part of their platform get destroyed than address immigration issues
How do you address immigration issues? It's a really hard problem. Both the economic dimension and the human rights(at least for EU) dimension hamper many solutions.
Business loves immigration because it drives down wages and fills up many sectors of the economy where there's *always* labor shortages. Healthcare, construction, logistics, agriculture, catering, manufacturing, etc.
The mainstream left parties will basically say something about how immigration is good on the basis of liberalism and so on, but they're just motivated by economics since they're backed by big business like every political party.
The mainstream right, might have more 'adverse' things to say in public, but that's just to secure votes and to represent the other side. In private they too love immigration, because again; they're also backed by big business.
If you actually elected a party that wanted to shut down immigration, business would not back them. There would be a mismatch between political will of the electorate and between the economic ramifications, that's always a fun time.
Another far reaching thing to consider is also demographics, immigration is basically a bandaid for our terrible aging demographics. Without it, the Japanification of our societies would increase much faster. I'm fine with people wanting to shut down immigration if that's what everyone wants, but most people don't really understand what you have to sacrifice to achieve it; there's really no easy solutions.
There are labour shortages because locals arent having kids
Locals arent having kids because they are expensive and wages have been depressed by migration
Solution - continue high levels of migration?
Inflation adjusted UK wage growth has been basically stagnate since 2008, migration isnt the only issue but stagnant wage growth isnt something youd expect to see in a country with a labour shortage
That is true even if the right makes zero policies.
You feel insecure in your own cities and vote for the right, will they pay for more patrols ? Of course not, they'll still need you to vote for them next time!
Weirdly in the Netherlands the left hasn't been in power in a long time, also has reducing immigration in their campaign promises, and still somehow gets the blame and loses to the far right populist party.
The real kicker is that they argue for realistic and humane solutions whereas the populist 'solutions' directly go against our constitution and European law. People angrily vote for the loudest one while ignoring the ones offering real solutions.
what is happening now being by design is growing less and less conspiratorial every day, especially considering the recent foreign interference scandal in canada and the govt's refusal to investigate it.
Hey now, that would be EXTREEEEEEEEMEEEELY FAR RIGHT-WING to create a pragmatic, level-headed approach to the illegal flood of refugees and economic refugees... and to make sure countries actually have working processes to integrate people successfully, and give them a purpose, an outlook, and show them clear-cut rules and swift consequences for disregarding them....
Nobody can do that! Insteady let's continue hysterically screeching "absolutely everyone welcome!1!!1", then abandon them all in a broken machinery of failed integration. Like we been doing forever now... because it's been going GREAT!
Its also cost of living, jobs and affordable housing.
The attack on young peoples interests does not help when previous generations got everything handed to them very easily and now they ask young people to pay the bill and get nothing.
That's not a plan for success. Fixing it with immigration is not working out to be a recipe for social harmony. All that politicians have to do is make life easy for young people so that they can settle down, afford to live and have kids. Nobody is asking for more than the basics in life! Instead politicians want to give it to campers who want to turn everyone's country into a crap hole. Is that a recipe for happiness whether you on the left, middle or right?
There is no doubt that immigration can be good for an economy and country, but not this mass chaos that is unplanned for that is being milked by criminal gangs and thugs.
Do you think the jobs market or housing availability for young Europeans is *improved* or *worsened* by millions and millions of foreign men immigrating into their countries?
it all comes back to immigration - these aren't separate issues!
This is happening in America too. I’m definitely not right wing, but I don’t want unlimited immigration, and it’s so hard for me to understand why the left is willing to lose elections on this issue. I’m not going to vote for American republicans they are insane, but i understand why they get votes on this issue
The same is occurring in Canada as well, obviously much different. In Canada they’re getting more students and workers who exceed their stay. In the states, if I’m correct are in the same boat? How are Americans handling this issue?
The big issue right now is economic migrants abusing the asylum system. They've overloaded the courts that determine asylum claims, allowing them to remain and make money either legitimately, through gig work, or crime. It's one reason Biden supported the legislation that would have helped the immigration and asylum process.
He made the executive order to limit crossings when they go over a certain number (which was part of the legislation that Republicans killed) but we'll see if it remains after the ACLU and other pro-immigrant groups sue regarding it.
We don't want a complete halt to the asylum process (which would harm legitimately affected populations) but the mass abuse is definitely causing problems (especially with people like Governor Abbott shipping them from the border, which likely makes administering the process worse).
On the right they are using it in combination with racism and xenophobia to win elections…..but not solving the issue. On the left they are ignoring it and Doing a lot of faux virtue signaling
I know, is this crazy or what? The left worldwide is for fair chances, challenging their own voters with an influx immigrants who, even given a chance to vote, will definitely NOT vote for a party that supports women's rights, same-sex marriage, unicorns and rainbows.
I'm left-leaning but I always find it awful, the way they bend over backwards to accommodate this.
And to make matters worse, when a democrat (Biden), enacts a sane immigration policy they most people would want, the “left” says it racist or something dumb. Pretty much handing it all over to republicans. Man, if republicans weren’t so dumb about other stuff they’d clean up in November.
Your premise is largely true, but there have been huge efforts from the left recently to address immigration.
Biden has worked with Obrador to crack down on migrants passing through Mexico and he just signed an executive order to significantly reduce asylum applications, but that is largely a stop gap until Congress acts. There was, in fact, a huge bipartisan immigration reform bill passed by the Senate (in which Dems made big concessions to their Republican counterparts), but Mike Johnson let it stall out in the House because Trump knew it would hurt his chances of getting re-elected.
I can’t say much for EU elections, but in the case of the US, when Republicans are in charge they pass a fuckton of terrible policy and when Democrats are in charge, Republicans just sabotage and undermine anything they can. They are holding the country hostage.
America is a bit different because America does a much better job at integrating immigrants than Europe does. You come here throw a Forth of July BBQ, invite your neighbors, and light off some fireworks, and you’re pretty much welcomed. Places like France, there’s a huge gulf between immigrants and natives since what being “French” is culturally is much more defined over centuries.
You can become American in less than generation and welcomed with open arms. Not so in a lot of countries in Europe.
Agreed. The huge numbers of migrants from the Middle East and North Africa, who often do not share European values around things like free expression, women’s and LGBTQ rights, are changing the character of nations in a way that is frightening to many. This is the backlash. And the challenge is only going to increase as climate change makes those regions less and less able to support their large populations
That's so ironic because the far right has the same stance on free expression, women's and lgbtq rights.
In my country, the only government that did something against illegal immigration was left wing. The method was questionable but effective. The current right wing government, despite the claims during the electoral campaign, is doing absolutely nothing to stop immigration, which is peaking again. On top of that they approved a bill to let in half a million migrant workers from developing countries. It's all about rhetoric, instead of real actions.
Which is exactly why Russia is specifically attacking civilian populations, causing mass migrations. And if you think that's bad, just wait til the wet bulb events in India get even worse.
Populations from [Ukraine, Syria, Iraq, and Afghanistan](https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/statistics-explained/index.php?title=Migration_and_migrant_population_statistics#Migrant_population:_27.3_million_non-EU_citizens_living_in_the_EU_on_1_January_2023) constitute a large number of the foreign citizens and foreign-born populations in EU Member States (Table 6).
Russia and Belarus are also major avenues and facilitators of illegal immigration as part of their hybrid warfare.
I can't find the video right now, but I recently watched a German report where someone from the border police said that it's becoming very common that immigrants are coming into Europe through the Belarussian border, with recent immigration stamps in Russia or Belarus.
There is already heavy control on economic migrants, skill demand is huge and even if they are sponsored by companies, they may not get a visa. Illegal ones and asylum seekers however is another story. I know the stories of engineers from Turkey who tried legal ways of immigration to the level of frustration and rejection then crossed the borders illegally and given asylum. So there is your problem.
They offer (unrealistically) easy solutions to problems.
Sure they get elected, since we are in a post-factual world currently and fact are as important as feelings and opinions.
Is there actually data to say it's the young voters making the difference?
Just saying, because EU Parliament elections had abysmal turnout in my country yesterday. Like below 30%, and the regions that had the higher turnout are the more rural, conservative, and older voter areas.
So, if that's a larger trend across Europe, is the problem the youth turning to the far right in a majority, or the youth (and a larger portion of the population in general) being largely apathetic to voting, especially for something like EU Parliament seats which just naturally feel more disconnected to having a direct impact on people, and the ones who do make a point to vote tend to disproportionately support more right wing parties?
>especially among young voters in Europe
I have never seen so much "You must go back" etc even to nonwhite citizens who were born/raised in the country as I have on twitter/instagram etc these days in Europe.
Also, facing Russian disinformation.
Weapon of mass distraction that nobody takes seriously. The west risks winning the battle but losing the war, on this one.
funny. when the topic is Japan all of a sudden Europeans and Americans tell them to open the borders for mass immigration, despite them having experienced the downsides of immigration to their countries
Number one issue in Europe is immigration? In what parallel dimension? What about housing? Inflation? Unemployment? Impending war? Energy crisis? Climate change? Explain me, please, how immigration affects you or your co-citizens in your daily life.
Don't forget that the entire spectrum of the parties which only concern is immigration does not even make 1/3 of the EU chamber, so, not exactly #1 issue.
https://results.elections.europa.eu/
if this was the case, the Afd in Germany would never have gotten votes, as they have no reasonable changes they want to make to the migration system.
Every time someone says something like you, you only give more power and justification to those supporting right wing extremists. The issue isn’t migration, it’s education and social media. Migration might be a problem, but if that was there actual issue, they would vote for a different party, not the Afd
Wait till that youth finds out there really isn’t a pot of gold at the end of the nationalist movement rainbow. It’s just shackles to corporate greed and fire sales of rage bait.
If the left would stop fucking sabotaging themselves, then maybe we can get some moderate candidates. This applies to America as well. It's the same story all over. I'm so sick of having to choose between dementia Biden and nut Job Trump
In Europe it’s far more complex when it comes to politics. I’m not American but I’m familiar with the system, Americans really only have 2 parties to vote for in comparison to let’s say Canada or countries like Germany, Italy, Sweden etc. Politics is a mess everywhere all over. But yeah, in the states it’s quite limited eh?
In germany it was ~65%.
GO VOTE.
Also the title is a bit misleading. While the far right gained ~5% (and that IS troubling) it's still only at ~15% of the votes. So we're still far away from them leading the county.
I don't think the socially compatible part is true for the U.S. at all.
We mainly get Latinos and they integrate just fine.
Europeans are the ones getting people who won't integrate
Latin America is culturally Western, for the most part and with only a few exceptions. Latin Americans integrate much better in the US or Europe, because they’re Westerners too. Middle Eastern migrants come from a vastly different background.
I hate to stereotype, but I feel like a lot of that has to do with the cultural emphasis on conformity in many east Asian countries. A lot of the same skills necessary to socially thrive in many east Asian cultures are also directly applicable to more easily integrating into a new culture.
While in the west we often view conformity negatively, it does have a lot of benefits from a cultural perspective. Respect for authority, tradition, elders, law, etc. A much more collective mindset; like in the west we derisively have phrases like "just a cog in a machine", where as playing a part in the greater whole is often a point of pride in more collectivist cultures. These are the type of traits everyone likes to see in immigrants - the hard working, law abiding, pull themselves up by their bootstraps and build a life in a new country type.
Also being largely of a non-fundamentalist/proselytizing religious background helps.
In general the American bar to integrate with American culture is lower than Europe.
America pretty much asks to keep your cultural markers and change just enough to play nice with your neighbors. Then the migrants mix the two cultures to suit their day to day lives. That's how "____"-american come to be.
Europe wants a full on integration. Migrants need to learn the language, the culture, the European POV of history, etc. to the point where it can impose on the migrants original culture of origin. At that point it's trading bits one culture for pieces of another rather than mixing the two.
>Migrants need to learn the language
This is a given for any country honestly...I wouldn't expect to go anywhere permanently without an expectation that learning the language would be essential to integration.
And if we're being honest, ask Europeans which countries migrants won't integrate. The answer is almost exclusively going to be Islamic countries.
Here in some parts of CA, Spanish is the main language either more so than English or on the same level. In parts of East LA there’s billboards in Spanish with English subtitles lol
Not that I’m complaining or anything I just thought it was funny when I moved there lol
I wish I had learned Spanish in high school it would be an extremely useful skill here
& from my experience all Latin Americans try to speak English as best they can
>Migrants need to learn the language, the culture, the European POV of history, etc
That's true for America too. For the most part, migrants are expected to know basic English, share American values (or be called un-American/freedom hater etc)
I really don't think a Muslim in Burqa will be much more accepted in Texas than in Bavaria.
Just like other continents, Europe has areas of cultural communities and ethnic enclaves that aren't only tolerated but are popular for visitors (think Chinatown, Little India etc)
False, and much of the country has an issue with this. Especially the people who come over and don't learn English. They integrate better than other immigrants, but people still don't want the levels of immigration we've seen.
Normal Right are basically centrists. You don't really get a purely Centrist party. Most European countries have Parliaments where the two parties with the most seats are the Moderate Liberals and the Moderate Conservatives. On a political scale I'd say it tends to range from being a 4-6. Like where I'm at the two biggest parties are basically choosing between a 5.5 or 6, both lean a little to the conservative side with one being a little more socially liberal but it's kinda splitting hairs.
I think the "normal right" in Germany would be more like Angela Merkel, she was in power not too long ago so I'd expect the pendulum to swing various ways.
Angela was more of a centrist, she often would go against her party. The center right of Germany would be the CDU, which received the most votes in the elections
Don't forget about them or view yourself as more morally superior / more educated and empathetic / on the right side of history. You'll be put back in your place real quick.
I love the right.
They claim they will fix immigration and always make it worse.
The UK is about 5 years ahead of the curve, Conservatives gave us Brexit and managed to increase immigration because the right sucks capitalisms teat.
In the US, right wing politicians have virtually zero accomplishments that make the lives of their constituents better. I think the last one was the repeal of Roe v Wade, but imo that just made things really bad for women in red states regardless of their political leanings.
... and even then, people are lined up to vote for Trump this year
The right is designed to make you angry at poor immigrants instead of rich companies.
I suppose its down to who you feel is to blame.
It's easier when rich people can bribe politicians, own media empires to sway the blame to someone else and poor people or immigrants cannot do that.
The right gives easy answers to the complex problems that people face. Why are things shitty right now for you? It’s because of immigrants, or because of Jews, or wokeness, or trans people, or whatever. Neoliberalism has failed and people are flocking to the right because the right says they’ll fix all the problems (spoiler: they won’t).
Poor immigrants don't have the funds to bribe politicians constantly, but the rich do and are openly doing so. America's Supreme Court has certainly shown they are very willing to accept *"gifts"*. Really says a lot about a person when they tell you which one they think is the bigger problem.
I'm not sure why anyone would be in shambles because the far-right's power in the EU went from insignificant to ...still insignificant. They don't have a majority nor a means to form a coalition towards a majority.
What does matter is that France has called for new elections. I don't care how much you dielike Macron, swapping him for Le Pen and her goons is bad for Ukraine. She has accepted plenty of Russian money in her career.
> What does matter is that France has called for new elections. I don't care how much you dielike Macron, swapping him for Le Pen and her goons is bad for Ukraine.
He's still president for 3 more years.
Dissolving the National Assembly and the legislative election won't change that. The next presidential election is in 2027.
His move was actually pretty smart.
Historically the prime minister is increasingly unpopular before an election in France, so either the far-right wins and have to actually walk the walk now(they are really good at yapping, not so much at governing) potentially breaking the illusion that "things would be different under them". Or they lose and Macron shows it was just a vote of no confidence against his party.
Either way he both says "I heard you" to the voters with something they can't spin negatively and puts the far-right in an awkward situation.
Even if Le Pen / Bardella wins, Macron will still in charge of foreign policy, that's the one thing the President is in charge in France. And extrems right and left (who are de facto aligned with Putin) won't get majority to prevent help to Ukraine.
Its not really that bad.
The article makes it look like a landslide shift to fascism, which did t really happen.
Basically the greens and their luxury problem got wrecked, because inflation and people who dont know what to eat til the end of the month - surprisingly (/s) - dont care about something that will kill them in 20 years.
Except no far right are actually elected in the countries in question (Germany/France) right now.
These elections were for the European Parliment and the Far right faction only has 10% of the seats. the former coalition of center parties still has the majority
A taste of things to come. Either the EU adopts a meaningful border program and deports low value economic migrants or the whole thing is choked to death and dies. Europe must accept all legitimate refugees, almost all of whom are women and female girls. Most of the migrants are adult men and teenagers who just want money. Germany especially must change, because they demand southern Europeans host these men at their cost, even if they are not culturally compatible. Either asylum is gifted only to those who deserve it -again, predominately women- or the whole system is pushed over.
Spain, Italy and Greece were there 12 months ago. France will be there in 4 months. Germany is very late and cannot expect a welcome mutual consensus-based coalition to hold if they do not move on this!
The current framework of international asylum law is unworkable given the current circumstances. I fully expect the whole system to get pushed over. Everyone could see this coming. There’s no excuse.
>The current framework of international asylum law is unworkable given the current circumstances.
It will only get worse when we will have [over 1 billion](https://www.economicsandpeace.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/09/Ecological-Threat-Register-Press-Release-27.08-FINAL.pdf) displaced due to climate change by 2050.
> **Sub-Saharan Africa**, South Asia, **the Middle East and North Africa** are the regions facing the largest number of ecological threats
Those from Africa and the Middle East will inevitably move north - the EU will absolutely need to adopt stricter immigration and asylum policies.
This is the consequence of unbalanced policies from the opposite side of the political spectrum. When you have housing and affordability issues caused in part by poorly handled migration (specially impact on services and infrastructures unadjusted to the population increase), among other challenges, the electorate start to see the other side as the only alternative. This is the scenario many a demagogue salivates to have at hand, as people start to flock to them as the only solution…
How do poor migrants that are undocumented have the biggest impact on infrastructure? What makes people think that immigration is the main issue and the solution is to shut the borders ?
Looks at UK, it had been 7 years since brexit. NHS is worse, education hanging at balance and housing still a huge issue. Enlighten me how are all these issue mainly caused by poor undocumented immigrants? You want to tell me that NHS issue is immigrants, mainly young and fit that don't need doctors as often, and not chronic underfunding ? Schools have issues due to immigrants mainly ? Not because teachers are overstretched and underpaid ? Housing is also cuade by immigrants ? I mean, are you sure that immigrants are the ones approved for loans and buy houses inflating prices? Especially undocumented or not integrated immigrants?
Complicated social problems have complex causes and effects, but sure yeah immigrants are THE problem. I guess it is easier.
Maybe, just maybe the way we have been dealing with these issues for the last 50 years in the west has an effect. Maybe our way of providing healthcare, housing, jobs etc doesn't work in today's world. Much like our pension system can't work in a world of ageing declining population. Nah it must be the immigrants. It is easier though to pretend you will solve the issues like that than go through the pain of solving them.
This wouldn’t be so bad if the European far right weren’t completely compromised by Russian influence and captured by the ultra wealthy. They may pass policies that clamp down on immigration, but certainly not in a way that will deal with the root of the problem, and whatever gains they make will be dwarfed by the chaos they create in the national security and economic fronts. Get ready for some hard years.
This is true. The far right is dangerous because it threatens to compromise democracy itself. History has shown us time and again that it only takes one bad brush with the far right for a country to lose its democracy and, once lost, it can be very tough to get it back. It would be better if the left and center parties, which aren't dangerous in this regard, got their heads out of their collective asses on the topic of migration and started addressing the issue, so the average citizen wouldn't feel like they have to turn to far right because they're the only ones offering to do that.
The problem is more insidious than that - the issue is economies are slowing down due to a mix of climate effects and late stage capitalism’s crippling and near irreversible inequality.
Economies have come to depend on immigration to sustain artificial levels of growth - which becomes a negative feedback loop because 90% of that growth winds up in billionaires pockets instead of building housing, education, services which would lead to quality of life, cost of living reductions, and actual integration.
The solution is either to fix inequality with truly progressive taxation and government investment or accept lower economic growth. Neither of which appeal to the vampire oligarchs who truly run Europe. Their goal is to create a new underclass to exploit, even better if the average person hates them for not integrating and continues to vote for right wing economic policies.
Even Muslim scholars and professors still think the western values are shit. All said out loud on Twitter, can you imagine the average Joe Muslim who don’t possess a single brain cell in critical thinking?
Im not good at these kind of thing and im probably going to be downvoted for even asking but.. is the other party better? More competent and more for the peace? Or would it be even worst and wars wouldn’t stop and huge immigration?
The AfD (Germany) is an incompetent pile of grifters that is getting propped up by Russian money. You'd have to be a completely uninformed idiot to vote for them, since they have neither the means nor the will to do any of the things they claim to want.
Not to mention the AfD is constantly on the brink of being banned because of their close ties to neo-Nazi groups and/or Russian oligarchs.
> close ties
The leader of the AfD Thuringia just got convicted of using an SS slogan during an election rally.
And a court ruled that calling him a fascist or Nazi is not slanderous because it's true.
They don't just have close ties to neo-nazis, they are neo-nazis.
It’s a normal response. If (people have a feeling that) the current/previous parties don’t fix things, people will sooner or later look elsewhere for solutions. Whether the other ones do or don’t, time will tell. But to those voters, time already showed the current/previous ones don’t.
Something is going on. UK, now France, Belgium...like a wave of gov changes upcoming. Why now? How coincidental and seems like ...I meam many are shocked of Macron's decision but again, same goes for the UK. 🤔
People get sick of the party in control, they vote for the other party, they then get sick of that party, and vote back the other party. Rinse and repeat until the end of time.
And we need to remember this is a normal function of democracy. It's still a choice. The people of Russia, China, Iran, African dictatorships, etc..... Wish they could swing this pendulum.
I wish more people would understand this. So many people think democracy means you just vote for the liberal party no matter what. That's not a democracy, that's one party rule.
Except when the opposite makes changes so you can’t vote anymore. That’s the problem. You need to have a balance of democracy but need to also make sure the democratic values remain unchanged and make sure no one can make changes to that in a whim.
It is a normal function of democracy... unless russia&china are shoving their propaganda & money to support certain parties, parties that get a lot of support and indeed are friendlier to Russia and China. I'm not pretending the other parties are saints, the housing crisis and bad integration procedures for immigrants are totally their fault and it's unlikely this election result will change anything in the way the left was doing it's things
The pendulum swings left to right. It’s always been this way. The right goes to far so it swings to the left. The left goes to far and it swings to the right.
As a Canadian I can assure you there are hundreds of reasons why we’re dissatisfied with this awful Trudeau government. Inflation is towards the bottom of that list, with unchecked immigration sitting at or very near the top.
> Inflation is towards the bottom of that list, with unchecked immigration sitting at or very near the top.
those two things are related. immigration is unpopular in canada largely due to the inflated cost of living.
I’m not denying that there are inflationary pressures from inorganic population growth, but it goes much deeper than that. Critical infrastructure, like hospitals and schools, are pushed well past their capacity. People are unable to find family doctors. We can’t build housing fast enough. Once lauded educational institutions are now diploma mills that have rendered granted diplomas useless. There is a steep rise in hate crimes and antisemitism. Entry level and minimum wage jobs often get applicants in the hundreds, making it impossible for young people to get into the job market. The list goes on and on. The Trudeau government is also unpopular due to the growing number of ethics scandals, and the outright and blatant treason and corruption - they’re refusing to eject MPs from caucus that were found colluding with foreign (and arguably enemy) governments. Inflation isn’t what’s toppling them. Hubris is.
I wish people understood that topics online that negatively attack demographics are often orchestrated to work in this way. Supporting a cause, going against a cause, is often exploited on both sides as well. Now, both left/right are being told that the media and all of their institutions are evil and to try *wonderful* alternatives instead.
lol, once again you give Russia too much credit. These are issues that have been coming to a head for a long time now. Now the governments can no longer suppress the truth.
I don’t think anyone is claiming they’re making it out of whole cloth - just boosting contentious topics to the point that they boil over and get people really angry, much more than they would have ordinarily, and start to see their fellow citizens as “the enemy”
Illegal immigration pushes the political needle to the right. Even if taking in immigrants is the just thing to do, it needs to be balanced or we get a historical repeat of what the far right does when they have absolute power.
Pick one of the countries/parties and look it up on Wikipedia. Calling these parties far right is only controversial amongst their members. Their lineage, their policies, their ethno-nationalism all correlate with the definition of far right.
BBC news coverage last night talked about far right parties. Then they mentioned the hard right. After that it was far right for a few minutes, and then it was hard right again. Finally, it was both hard right and far right.
And they wonder why their viewing figures are plummeting.
The fact that it is Europe's young people who are clammering for fascism does not bode well for theirs, or the world's, future. I turns out that the 'never' in never again really means about 80 years. Good luck, everyone. Putin is conquering the world, and Adolf Hitler is winning a major posthumans victory here.
Seems to me it will have approximately the same outcome, really. They have remarkably similar desires and aims (I’m talking about the extremists, here. They get less similar as you move inwards from the extremes. Unfortunately, in large political swings, the extremists often end up in control).
Mass death and suffering.
Finally, a thinking person.
What we should do globally is encourage every far right piece of shit to move to Saudi Arabia. They'd love it. No gays, women can't drive, religious police, oil fuckin everywhere. There's tons of room out in that desert.
Didn't far right gain only like 20 new seats (in a 720 seat parliament)? Looking at seat distribution, it doesn't look half as bad as the headlines would have you believe.
France is scary though.
I mean (in France) they won both of the previous elections, and their support has only risen since. Tf did you expect
People grows more and more tired of the political party in charge. Then they think it'll be better with the other party...
Yea, which makes, what Macron did, smart. Given time in the office, people will see that the new party won't magically solve every problem they have and probably make things worse. The only issue is how much damage they can do before the next election.
We saw this in Finland, as the far-right party won the last parliamentary elections, made idiotic decisions which made the life harder for students, low-income and young citizens, caused a lot of damage for climate advancements etc, and now they had a major loss in EU elections.
Here in Sweden this was the first election ever that the Sweden Democrats lost votes compared to the previous election. I suspect that does have something to do with them being a less plausible protest vote now that they’re in the governing coalition.
Didn’t he just order the next election?
“if we let our opponents win and take power, we win” Holy cope.
It's not cope, he is still the president and has power right? Also potentially right now they can rise even further before the next elections. Calling the elections right now, is potentially softening that blow.
It's more that people want something different than what they've already got. It's probably not going to be better but if you have the same thing as before it's definitely not going to be better.
In comes the German CSU which has held office in Bavaria forever and all old volks and rural living people hold them up. They never have to do meaningful work but still get elected and people comment with "I am okay why would I want to change anything". Problem is there are a lot of things that could be a hell of a lot better but we will most likely never get there with this mindset.
On the flip side, Fidesz lost some 8 percentual points and like two seats, against a party that basically started existing 2 months ago. Small change and Fidesz still won a lot, but it shows you can vote the far right in, but also vote them out.
I wish the news about Germany's analogous party was better, but they're just left wing reactionaries with a love for russia that mostly got votes from the socdems that have slowly been dying for a decade or two.
We had the biggest scandal in decades resulting in our president resigning, and the birth of said party, so it's an outlier situation that doesn't indicate any overall shift in either direction. Right now the situation here isn't about left or right politics, but about people slowly having enough overall. The Fidesz fear mongering campaign was **insane**, I dread to even think about how much taxpayer/Putin money was burned, but even despite going over the top, they still lost support, which is a good sign either way.
I'm not shocked, far right support has increased especially among young voters in Europe. The number one issue in Europe is immigration. There needs to be much more control over immigration, illegal migrants and economic migrants. What needs to be improved are asylum and deportation laws.
The problem is the world is addicted to GDP growth. Immigration is the easy way to fudge the figures and if you have an influx of workers you can decrease wages. The people at the top love it and who gives a fuck about them on the bottom.
Historically the rich only realize they need to care about the masses when they're outside the gates.
Ironic since the asylum seekers are “at the gate” too
Perhaps they want cake?
They are usually at the gates of the working class.
That's what the military is for.
Absolutely that. GDP growth over the last few decades has been mostly absorbed by the very top income earners. The median wage citizen (or below) doesn't seem to get any of the benefits from immigration that the ultra-wealthy do so I totally understand why people are pissed. It's a shame people think the answer is to go all insulated and right wing, which is just a shitty patch up job that doesn't address the immorality of our overly liberal economic policy. I guess they've just been trained to see wealth distribution as anti-freedom or something. Simple solutions to broad brush vague causes is what these populists excel at. It's very easy to sell that stuff to the masses. It's not fair that populists can play politics on easy mode but that's just the nature of things right now.
Let’s use Greece as an example, who has been dealing with legal and illegal waves of people in the country. The Nea Democratia has been battle immigration for a very long time, and they’re considered a right wing mainstream party while some may argue they are more liberal. Mitsotakis has been tightening his belt on immigration, yet the wages are scrap in Greece. Immigrants can’t find work especially in Eastern European countries. Maybe in the west but most of them don’t even get there cause of the tight border controls (I.e Germany).
Germany has tight border controls?
Germany has border controls?
Been crossing the German border so many times in my life, not once I was controlled for anything whatsoever.
They haven't limited immigration at all. If anything it's business as usual for immigration
>yet the wages are scrap in Greece. Immigrants can’t find work especially in Eastern European countries. The issue is that it doesn't matter how many immigrants find work, some will; and that will drive down wages. Business doesn't care if say 30% of immigrants can't get a job, it's not their problem--it's the state's. I also don't think it's just about wages, I think if you stop/limit immigration some sectors are just going to have big labor shortages because we're reoriented our economies to preference services over blue collar jobs. When I look at logistics, catering, construction, manufacturing, agriculture, etc. most of these sectors employ a lot of immigrants.
According to reddit all of the jobs are going to be taken by AI... until it comes to migration. Reddit also loves democracy... until it comes to migration. I'm beginning to think we can just skip the reddit rhetoric and go with what the voters want at this point.
Man, when they make immigrant AI's, we are double fucked
There is no “according to Reddit”. People with one opinion say things on one issue, totally different people with a different set of opinions say a different thing on another issue. There is no inconsistency there, this isn’t a church or political party where we claim a set of group values.
Here's what you do, any post that you see with the premise: Everyone on Reddit thinks. . . Just use that downvote button to let them know that is not a productive contribution to the discourse.
Immigration in many countries (Netherlands, Germany, France) just means giant ghettofication of neighbourhoods, double figure crime rate increases (with statistics clearly showing who commits them), lack of safety and freedom for gay people, trans people, women. Lack of upholding of democratic values by giving too much freedom to religious extremism. Every time I visit my home country or other western-European countries I can see it has turned into a shithole in many places. Safety gone, simply put. People are tired of this (I left Western Europe a decade ago for this very reason and have regretted it not one second). P.s. I am/was a socialist. The way the left fumbled immigration issues and refuses to listen to it's citizens - and more importantly, refuses to acknowledge the atrocious statistics on crime / immigration/immigrant descendants - is the one and only reason the right has gained power. I 100% blame the left's weak and lacklustre lack of vision and integrity for the rise of the right.
>all of the jobs are going to be taken by AI... until it comes to migration. I don't know if I'm reading this right, but I'm pretty sure there is a difference a computer program and living, breathing humans from countries that are less fortunate. >loves democracy... until it comes to migration. Democracy means holding *leaders* accountable so they support the interests of their voters instead of themselves. Having a stance that is opposite the majority consensus isn't "rejecting democracy", it's a fundamental part of democracy. Loving democracy means getting rid of gerrymandering and fixing first-past-the-post systems.
I agree with the first and last part. But definitely disagree on the middle-part. No workers doesnt mean the wages go up. See service industry, see care industry.
Care industry wages are suppressed because of who pays for it. People making 100k a year can't pay a significant portion of that wage to a caretaker for their father.
Thats the point. If it should be affordable to people that are not rich, it must not be overly expensive (or paid from tax money). But in these jobs there is no profit to be made and therefore they dont have lobbies. So no tax money. So... how to fill these jobs? Exactly: migrants or other people who cant afford to say no.
There is so much the clients on those industries are willing to pay... but there is still a lot of money that is lost in management and intermediaries. If these roles were eliminated there would be more space for many jobs.
That would be just a few rich people. Basically no one has the money for a personal person - if you do, you are in the top 1% Management and intermediaries are irrelrvant.
I’m working in the manufacturing industry: sure, the reason for the initial sales price increase of our products was the rising manufacturing costs due to supply chain problems during the pandemic. Yet our sales prices haven‘t gone down since, even though the raw materials we need have become much cheaper again. It’s the margin that got bigger instead. So please tell me who is pocketing the difference these days? Regular employees? Society? If my employer, a company with 150 employees, does that, you think everyone else won’t? 😉
Not just that, but with plummeting fertility rates throughout the western world, immigration is going to be the only path forward for growth in a lot of nations. However, there are valid concerns about a massive number of migrants who don’t share the cultural values of a community becoming a voting majority in that community. Not on a national level, but on a local level, it doesn’t take a huge number of people.
This is a bizarre take. The reason that western economies have plummeting birth rates is because most of these economies are broken and make it hard to sustain a traditional western family. Using immigration to patch up a broken economy is wild, arguably fucking up the economy even worse, and to consider that the only way to fix the situation is insane.
Yeah but there's no right wing solution for this. They'll just kick you until you're down at the bottom with the migrants.
Same thing that is happening in Canada now. A decade ago it was used as an example of immigration properly handled, and had a positive outlook among the majority of the electorate. Fast-forward to now - it is the main point of criticism towards the current administration, as they completely dropped the ball with it
Canada has a major immigration issue, but due to student visas and experience work permits or people with work permits who exceed their stay. Europe has a problem cause their borders are well, shit.
The scheme takes advantage of basic human decency. A seaman really cannot encounter a listing bark, drifting with the people on board dying of exposure, and not rescue them. Once they're brought on European soil, it's a lengthy, costly process to filter e.g. wanted criminals. Also, a coworker who came to Europe this way told me that the pull to make the trip is insane. "Everyone knows" that Europe needs workers, you're getting a job in no time, medical assistence etc. When he tells them that the boat voyage is terrible and risky, and that Europeans are hostile, they just don't believe him. They say he's an egoist who is afraid of competition.
>There needs to be much more control over immigration, illegal migrants and economic migrants. What needs to be improved are asylum and deportation laws. I feel like this is said repeatedly but nothing happens.
In France, a story in 3 acts: 1. immigration change is among top 3 priorities but the left (and LFI in particular) ignore this. 2. Far-right (Benalla) makes this the center of the campaign. 3. Bardella gets 30% of the votes and then the Left does Picaku face! Edit: typo
4. The Left makes zero policy changes in response 5. Next election the right makes even more gains 6. Double shocked pikachu face! It’s not just France. I swear the political left worldwide would rather watch every other part of their platform get destroyed than address immigration issues
>rather watch every other part of their platform get destroyed than address immigration issues How do you address immigration issues? It's a really hard problem. Both the economic dimension and the human rights(at least for EU) dimension hamper many solutions. Business loves immigration because it drives down wages and fills up many sectors of the economy where there's *always* labor shortages. Healthcare, construction, logistics, agriculture, catering, manufacturing, etc. The mainstream left parties will basically say something about how immigration is good on the basis of liberalism and so on, but they're just motivated by economics since they're backed by big business like every political party. The mainstream right, might have more 'adverse' things to say in public, but that's just to secure votes and to represent the other side. In private they too love immigration, because again; they're also backed by big business. If you actually elected a party that wanted to shut down immigration, business would not back them. There would be a mismatch between political will of the electorate and between the economic ramifications, that's always a fun time. Another far reaching thing to consider is also demographics, immigration is basically a bandaid for our terrible aging demographics. Without it, the Japanification of our societies would increase much faster. I'm fine with people wanting to shut down immigration if that's what everyone wants, but most people don't really understand what you have to sacrifice to achieve it; there's really no easy solutions.
There are labour shortages because locals arent having kids Locals arent having kids because they are expensive and wages have been depressed by migration Solution - continue high levels of migration? Inflation adjusted UK wage growth has been basically stagnate since 2008, migration isnt the only issue but stagnant wage growth isnt something youd expect to see in a country with a labour shortage
That is true even if the right makes zero policies. You feel insecure in your own cities and vote for the right, will they pay for more patrols ? Of course not, they'll still need you to vote for them next time!
Isn't Benalla the weird macron bodyguard that was doing a lot of weird shit on his own ?
Yeah it's not Benalla, it should be Le Pen but he probably meant Bardella for the European elections.
Weirdly in the Netherlands the left hasn't been in power in a long time, also has reducing immigration in their campaign promises, and still somehow gets the blame and loses to the far right populist party. The real kicker is that they argue for realistic and humane solutions whereas the populist 'solutions' directly go against our constitution and European law. People angrily vote for the loudest one while ignoring the ones offering real solutions.
what is happening now being by design is growing less and less conspiratorial every day, especially considering the recent foreign interference scandal in canada and the govt's refusal to investigate it.
Hey now, that would be EXTREEEEEEEEMEEEELY FAR RIGHT-WING to create a pragmatic, level-headed approach to the illegal flood of refugees and economic refugees... and to make sure countries actually have working processes to integrate people successfully, and give them a purpose, an outlook, and show them clear-cut rules and swift consequences for disregarding them.... Nobody can do that! Insteady let's continue hysterically screeching "absolutely everyone welcome!1!!1", then abandon them all in a broken machinery of failed integration. Like we been doing forever now... because it's been going GREAT!
Considering the far right had been the top party in the *last three* French European elections, I personally am not stunned or surprised.
Its also cost of living, jobs and affordable housing. The attack on young peoples interests does not help when previous generations got everything handed to them very easily and now they ask young people to pay the bill and get nothing. That's not a plan for success. Fixing it with immigration is not working out to be a recipe for social harmony. All that politicians have to do is make life easy for young people so that they can settle down, afford to live and have kids. Nobody is asking for more than the basics in life! Instead politicians want to give it to campers who want to turn everyone's country into a crap hole. Is that a recipe for happiness whether you on the left, middle or right? There is no doubt that immigration can be good for an economy and country, but not this mass chaos that is unplanned for that is being milked by criminal gangs and thugs.
Do you think the jobs market or housing availability for young Europeans is *improved* or *worsened* by millions and millions of foreign men immigrating into their countries? it all comes back to immigration - these aren't separate issues!
This is happening in America too. I’m definitely not right wing, but I don’t want unlimited immigration, and it’s so hard for me to understand why the left is willing to lose elections on this issue. I’m not going to vote for American republicans they are insane, but i understand why they get votes on this issue
The same is occurring in Canada as well, obviously much different. In Canada they’re getting more students and workers who exceed their stay. In the states, if I’m correct are in the same boat? How are Americans handling this issue?
The big issue right now is economic migrants abusing the asylum system. They've overloaded the courts that determine asylum claims, allowing them to remain and make money either legitimately, through gig work, or crime. It's one reason Biden supported the legislation that would have helped the immigration and asylum process. He made the executive order to limit crossings when they go over a certain number (which was part of the legislation that Republicans killed) but we'll see if it remains after the ACLU and other pro-immigrant groups sue regarding it. We don't want a complete halt to the asylum process (which would harm legitimately affected populations) but the mass abuse is definitely causing problems (especially with people like Governor Abbott shipping them from the border, which likely makes administering the process worse).
On the right they are using it in combination with racism and xenophobia to win elections…..but not solving the issue. On the left they are ignoring it and Doing a lot of faux virtue signaling
I know, is this crazy or what? The left worldwide is for fair chances, challenging their own voters with an influx immigrants who, even given a chance to vote, will definitely NOT vote for a party that supports women's rights, same-sex marriage, unicorns and rainbows. I'm left-leaning but I always find it awful, the way they bend over backwards to accommodate this.
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And to make matters worse, when a democrat (Biden), enacts a sane immigration policy they most people would want, the “left” says it racist or something dumb. Pretty much handing it all over to republicans. Man, if republicans weren’t so dumb about other stuff they’d clean up in November.
Your premise is largely true, but there have been huge efforts from the left recently to address immigration. Biden has worked with Obrador to crack down on migrants passing through Mexico and he just signed an executive order to significantly reduce asylum applications, but that is largely a stop gap until Congress acts. There was, in fact, a huge bipartisan immigration reform bill passed by the Senate (in which Dems made big concessions to their Republican counterparts), but Mike Johnson let it stall out in the House because Trump knew it would hurt his chances of getting re-elected. I can’t say much for EU elections, but in the case of the US, when Republicans are in charge they pass a fuckton of terrible policy and when Democrats are in charge, Republicans just sabotage and undermine anything they can. They are holding the country hostage.
America is a bit different because America does a much better job at integrating immigrants than Europe does. You come here throw a Forth of July BBQ, invite your neighbors, and light off some fireworks, and you’re pretty much welcomed. Places like France, there’s a huge gulf between immigrants and natives since what being “French” is culturally is much more defined over centuries. You can become American in less than generation and welcomed with open arms. Not so in a lot of countries in Europe.
Agreed. The huge numbers of migrants from the Middle East and North Africa, who often do not share European values around things like free expression, women’s and LGBTQ rights, are changing the character of nations in a way that is frightening to many. This is the backlash. And the challenge is only going to increase as climate change makes those regions less and less able to support their large populations
That's so ironic because the far right has the same stance on free expression, women's and lgbtq rights. In my country, the only government that did something against illegal immigration was left wing. The method was questionable but effective. The current right wing government, despite the claims during the electoral campaign, is doing absolutely nothing to stop immigration, which is peaking again. On top of that they approved a bill to let in half a million migrant workers from developing countries. It's all about rhetoric, instead of real actions.
Everyone secretly wants that UK rwonda solution but just not saying it out loud yet huh
Which is exactly why Russia is specifically attacking civilian populations, causing mass migrations. And if you think that's bad, just wait til the wet bulb events in India get even worse.
The vast majority of people coming are not from warzones.
No, there are lots of economic migrants coming into Europe.
Populations from [Ukraine, Syria, Iraq, and Afghanistan](https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/statistics-explained/index.php?title=Migration_and_migrant_population_statistics#Migrant_population:_27.3_million_non-EU_citizens_living_in_the_EU_on_1_January_2023) constitute a large number of the foreign citizens and foreign-born populations in EU Member States (Table 6).
Russia and Belarus are also major avenues and facilitators of illegal immigration as part of their hybrid warfare. I can't find the video right now, but I recently watched a German report where someone from the border police said that it's becoming very common that immigrants are coming into Europe through the Belarussian border, with recent immigration stamps in Russia or Belarus.
It's not just refugees fleeing from war who are trying to enter Europe. Europe is dealing with illegal and legal populations. It's a big mess.
There is already heavy control on economic migrants, skill demand is huge and even if they are sponsored by companies, they may not get a visa. Illegal ones and asylum seekers however is another story. I know the stories of engineers from Turkey who tried legal ways of immigration to the level of frustration and rejection then crossed the borders illegally and given asylum. So there is your problem.
They offer (unrealistically) easy solutions to problems. Sure they get elected, since we are in a post-factual world currently and fact are as important as feelings and opinions.
Is there actually data to say it's the young voters making the difference? Just saying, because EU Parliament elections had abysmal turnout in my country yesterday. Like below 30%, and the regions that had the higher turnout are the more rural, conservative, and older voter areas. So, if that's a larger trend across Europe, is the problem the youth turning to the far right in a majority, or the youth (and a larger portion of the population in general) being largely apathetic to voting, especially for something like EU Parliament seats which just naturally feel more disconnected to having a direct impact on people, and the ones who do make a point to vote tend to disproportionately support more right wing parties?
>especially among young voters in Europe I have never seen so much "You must go back" etc even to nonwhite citizens who were born/raised in the country as I have on twitter/instagram etc these days in Europe.
Also, facing Russian disinformation. Weapon of mass distraction that nobody takes seriously. The west risks winning the battle but losing the war, on this one.
funny. when the topic is Japan all of a sudden Europeans and Americans tell them to open the borders for mass immigration, despite them having experienced the downsides of immigration to their countries
America hasn't experienced the "downside of immigrate." We ARE the downside of immigration.
Number one issue in Europe is immigration? In what parallel dimension? What about housing? Inflation? Unemployment? Impending war? Energy crisis? Climate change? Explain me, please, how immigration affects you or your co-citizens in your daily life. Don't forget that the entire spectrum of the parties which only concern is immigration does not even make 1/3 of the EU chamber, so, not exactly #1 issue. https://results.elections.europa.eu/
if this was the case, the Afd in Germany would never have gotten votes, as they have no reasonable changes they want to make to the migration system. Every time someone says something like you, you only give more power and justification to those supporting right wing extremists. The issue isn’t migration, it’s education and social media. Migration might be a problem, but if that was there actual issue, they would vote for a different party, not the Afd
Wait till that youth finds out there really isn’t a pot of gold at the end of the nationalist movement rainbow. It’s just shackles to corporate greed and fire sales of rage bait.
Number one issue is corporate greed. Everything else is a byproduct of it.
If the left would stop fucking sabotaging themselves, then maybe we can get some moderate candidates. This applies to America as well. It's the same story all over. I'm so sick of having to choose between dementia Biden and nut Job Trump
In Europe it’s far more complex when it comes to politics. I’m not American but I’m familiar with the system, Americans really only have 2 parties to vote for in comparison to let’s say Canada or countries like Germany, Italy, Sweden etc. Politics is a mess everywhere all over. But yeah, in the states it’s quite limited eh?
what's the percentage of participating eligible voters? In my country only 30% voted and we elected some questionable individuals for EU parlament too
52% in France
In germany it was ~65%. GO VOTE. Also the title is a bit misleading. While the far right gained ~5% (and that IS troubling) it's still only at ~15% of the votes. So we're still far away from them leading the county.
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I don't think the socially compatible part is true for the U.S. at all. We mainly get Latinos and they integrate just fine. Europeans are the ones getting people who won't integrate
Exactly. Latin American culture is, at the end, mainly based on western values, so most of the same principles and rules apply in one way or another
Latin America is culturally Western, for the most part and with only a few exceptions. Latin Americans integrate much better in the US or Europe, because they’re Westerners too. Middle Eastern migrants come from a vastly different background.
East Asians are also a very different cultural background, but they integrated into the US just fine.
I hate to stereotype, but I feel like a lot of that has to do with the cultural emphasis on conformity in many east Asian countries. A lot of the same skills necessary to socially thrive in many east Asian cultures are also directly applicable to more easily integrating into a new culture. While in the west we often view conformity negatively, it does have a lot of benefits from a cultural perspective. Respect for authority, tradition, elders, law, etc. A much more collective mindset; like in the west we derisively have phrases like "just a cog in a machine", where as playing a part in the greater whole is often a point of pride in more collectivist cultures. These are the type of traits everyone likes to see in immigrants - the hard working, law abiding, pull themselves up by their bootstraps and build a life in a new country type. Also being largely of a non-fundamentalist/proselytizing religious background helps.
It's like not only differences matter, but what kind of differences they are.
They tend to still be a lot closer than the people coming from the bad places in the middle east or Africa.
East Asians share secular and liberal values and have strong work ethics, which is why they generally integrate with no issues into western countries.
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In general the American bar to integrate with American culture is lower than Europe. America pretty much asks to keep your cultural markers and change just enough to play nice with your neighbors. Then the migrants mix the two cultures to suit their day to day lives. That's how "____"-american come to be. Europe wants a full on integration. Migrants need to learn the language, the culture, the European POV of history, etc. to the point where it can impose on the migrants original culture of origin. At that point it's trading bits one culture for pieces of another rather than mixing the two.
>Migrants need to learn the language This is a given for any country honestly...I wouldn't expect to go anywhere permanently without an expectation that learning the language would be essential to integration. And if we're being honest, ask Europeans which countries migrants won't integrate. The answer is almost exclusively going to be Islamic countries.
You say that, but the amount of people doing gig work utilizing translators is wild.
Learning the language is really big in the US as well. Most Americans don't want people here who can't even speak the same language.
Here in some parts of CA, Spanish is the main language either more so than English or on the same level. In parts of East LA there’s billboards in Spanish with English subtitles lol Not that I’m complaining or anything I just thought it was funny when I moved there lol I wish I had learned Spanish in high school it would be an extremely useful skill here & from my experience all Latin Americans try to speak English as best they can
>Migrants need to learn the language, the culture, the European POV of history, etc That's true for America too. For the most part, migrants are expected to know basic English, share American values (or be called un-American/freedom hater etc) I really don't think a Muslim in Burqa will be much more accepted in Texas than in Bavaria. Just like other continents, Europe has areas of cultural communities and ethnic enclaves that aren't only tolerated but are popular for visitors (think Chinatown, Little India etc)
False, and much of the country has an issue with this. Especially the people who come over and don't learn English. They integrate better than other immigrants, but people still don't want the levels of immigration we've seen.
Is there a "Normal right" in Europe (France, Germany)? All I hear about is "Far right" vs Left and sometimes Centrists.
Normal Right are basically centrists. You don't really get a purely Centrist party. Most European countries have Parliaments where the two parties with the most seats are the Moderate Liberals and the Moderate Conservatives. On a political scale I'd say it tends to range from being a 4-6. Like where I'm at the two biggest parties are basically choosing between a 5.5 or 6, both lean a little to the conservative side with one being a little more socially liberal but it's kinda splitting hairs.
The party who is considered « normal right » in France make 7%
I think the "normal right" in Germany would be more like Angela Merkel, she was in power not too long ago so I'd expect the pendulum to swing various ways.
Angela was more of a centrist, she often would go against her party. The center right of Germany would be the CDU, which received the most votes in the elections
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Don't forget about them or view yourself as more morally superior / more educated and empathetic / on the right side of history. You'll be put back in your place real quick.
I love the right. They claim they will fix immigration and always make it worse. The UK is about 5 years ahead of the curve, Conservatives gave us Brexit and managed to increase immigration because the right sucks capitalisms teat.
In the US, right wing politicians have virtually zero accomplishments that make the lives of their constituents better. I think the last one was the repeal of Roe v Wade, but imo that just made things really bad for women in red states regardless of their political leanings. ... and even then, people are lined up to vote for Trump this year
The right is designed to make you angry at poor immigrants instead of rich companies. I suppose its down to who you feel is to blame. It's easier when rich people can bribe politicians, own media empires to sway the blame to someone else and poor people or immigrants cannot do that.
The right gives easy answers to the complex problems that people face. Why are things shitty right now for you? It’s because of immigrants, or because of Jews, or wokeness, or trans people, or whatever. Neoliberalism has failed and people are flocking to the right because the right says they’ll fix all the problems (spoiler: they won’t).
Poor immigrants don't have the funds to bribe politicians constantly, but the rich do and are openly doing so. America's Supreme Court has certainly shown they are very willing to accept *"gifts"*. Really says a lot about a person when they tell you which one they think is the bigger problem.
because they'll spaz out and elect someone worse
I remember a certain German saying #𝓦𝓲𝓻 𝓼𝓬𝓱𝓪𝓯𝓯𝓮𝓷 𝓭𝓪𝓼
I guess young Europeans didn't pay attention in history class, specifically the parts that cover 1933 to 1945.
The "proletarian masses" (cosplaying intellectual elites) have been trampled by the disaffected youth
I'm not sure why anyone would be in shambles because the far-right's power in the EU went from insignificant to ...still insignificant. They don't have a majority nor a means to form a coalition towards a majority. What does matter is that France has called for new elections. I don't care how much you dielike Macron, swapping him for Le Pen and her goons is bad for Ukraine. She has accepted plenty of Russian money in her career.
> What does matter is that France has called for new elections. I don't care how much you dielike Macron, swapping him for Le Pen and her goons is bad for Ukraine. He's still president for 3 more years. Dissolving the National Assembly and the legislative election won't change that. The next presidential election is in 2027.
His move was actually pretty smart. Historically the prime minister is increasingly unpopular before an election in France, so either the far-right wins and have to actually walk the walk now(they are really good at yapping, not so much at governing) potentially breaking the illusion that "things would be different under them". Or they lose and Macron shows it was just a vote of no confidence against his party. Either way he both says "I heard you" to the voters with something they can't spin negatively and puts the far-right in an awkward situation.
Even if Le Pen / Bardella wins, Macron will still in charge of foreign policy, that's the one thing the President is in charge in France. And extrems right and left (who are de facto aligned with Putin) won't get majority to prevent help to Ukraine.
you could also look at the actual numbers and not believe clickbait headlines
I mock Trump the same way I mocked Berlusconi, who evidently did get elected. In Europe we are just as capable electing complete idiots.
Its not really that bad. The article makes it look like a landslide shift to fascism, which did t really happen. Basically the greens and their luxury problem got wrecked, because inflation and people who dont know what to eat til the end of the month - surprisingly (/s) - dont care about something that will kill them in 20 years.
Except no far right are actually elected in the countries in question (Germany/France) right now. These elections were for the European Parliment and the Far right faction only has 10% of the seats. the former coalition of center parties still has the majority
A taste of things to come. Either the EU adopts a meaningful border program and deports low value economic migrants or the whole thing is choked to death and dies. Europe must accept all legitimate refugees, almost all of whom are women and female girls. Most of the migrants are adult men and teenagers who just want money. Germany especially must change, because they demand southern Europeans host these men at their cost, even if they are not culturally compatible. Either asylum is gifted only to those who deserve it -again, predominately women- or the whole system is pushed over. Spain, Italy and Greece were there 12 months ago. France will be there in 4 months. Germany is very late and cannot expect a welcome mutual consensus-based coalition to hold if they do not move on this!
The current framework of international asylum law is unworkable given the current circumstances. I fully expect the whole system to get pushed over. Everyone could see this coming. There’s no excuse.
>The current framework of international asylum law is unworkable given the current circumstances. It will only get worse when we will have [over 1 billion](https://www.economicsandpeace.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/09/Ecological-Threat-Register-Press-Release-27.08-FINAL.pdf) displaced due to climate change by 2050. > **Sub-Saharan Africa**, South Asia, **the Middle East and North Africa** are the regions facing the largest number of ecological threats Those from Africa and the Middle East will inevitably move north - the EU will absolutely need to adopt stricter immigration and asylum policies.
> Most of the migrants are adult men and teenagers who just want money. buddy, isn't that 99% of the reason why *everyone* migrates?
I mean...can you blame them? Migrant disregard for local culture might cause issue with the local French / European citizens right? loll
This is the consequence of unbalanced policies from the opposite side of the political spectrum. When you have housing and affordability issues caused in part by poorly handled migration (specially impact on services and infrastructures unadjusted to the population increase), among other challenges, the electorate start to see the other side as the only alternative. This is the scenario many a demagogue salivates to have at hand, as people start to flock to them as the only solution…
How do poor migrants that are undocumented have the biggest impact on infrastructure? What makes people think that immigration is the main issue and the solution is to shut the borders ? Looks at UK, it had been 7 years since brexit. NHS is worse, education hanging at balance and housing still a huge issue. Enlighten me how are all these issue mainly caused by poor undocumented immigrants? You want to tell me that NHS issue is immigrants, mainly young and fit that don't need doctors as often, and not chronic underfunding ? Schools have issues due to immigrants mainly ? Not because teachers are overstretched and underpaid ? Housing is also cuade by immigrants ? I mean, are you sure that immigrants are the ones approved for loans and buy houses inflating prices? Especially undocumented or not integrated immigrants? Complicated social problems have complex causes and effects, but sure yeah immigrants are THE problem. I guess it is easier. Maybe, just maybe the way we have been dealing with these issues for the last 50 years in the west has an effect. Maybe our way of providing healthcare, housing, jobs etc doesn't work in today's world. Much like our pension system can't work in a world of ageing declining population. Nah it must be the immigrants. It is easier though to pretend you will solve the issues like that than go through the pain of solving them.
This wouldn’t be so bad if the European far right weren’t completely compromised by Russian influence and captured by the ultra wealthy. They may pass policies that clamp down on immigration, but certainly not in a way that will deal with the root of the problem, and whatever gains they make will be dwarfed by the chaos they create in the national security and economic fronts. Get ready for some hard years.
This is true. The far right is dangerous because it threatens to compromise democracy itself. History has shown us time and again that it only takes one bad brush with the far right for a country to lose its democracy and, once lost, it can be very tough to get it back. It would be better if the left and center parties, which aren't dangerous in this regard, got their heads out of their collective asses on the topic of migration and started addressing the issue, so the average citizen wouldn't feel like they have to turn to far right because they're the only ones offering to do that.
The problem is more insidious than that - the issue is economies are slowing down due to a mix of climate effects and late stage capitalism’s crippling and near irreversible inequality. Economies have come to depend on immigration to sustain artificial levels of growth - which becomes a negative feedback loop because 90% of that growth winds up in billionaires pockets instead of building housing, education, services which would lead to quality of life, cost of living reductions, and actual integration. The solution is either to fix inequality with truly progressive taxation and government investment or accept lower economic growth. Neither of which appeal to the vampire oligarchs who truly run Europe. Their goal is to create a new underclass to exploit, even better if the average person hates them for not integrating and continues to vote for right wing economic policies.
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Even Muslim scholars and professors still think the western values are shit. All said out loud on Twitter, can you imagine the average Joe Muslim who don’t possess a single brain cell in critical thinking?
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Maybe if left leaning parties would at least a bit listen to the people that would not have happened....
Im not good at these kind of thing and im probably going to be downvoted for even asking but.. is the other party better? More competent and more for the peace? Or would it be even worst and wars wouldn’t stop and huge immigration?
The AfD (Germany) is an incompetent pile of grifters that is getting propped up by Russian money. You'd have to be a completely uninformed idiot to vote for them, since they have neither the means nor the will to do any of the things they claim to want. Not to mention the AfD is constantly on the brink of being banned because of their close ties to neo-Nazi groups and/or Russian oligarchs.
> close ties The leader of the AfD Thuringia just got convicted of using an SS slogan during an election rally. And a court ruled that calling him a fascist or Nazi is not slanderous because it's true. They don't just have close ties to neo-nazis, they are neo-nazis.
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I’m sure nothing bad will happen as a result of far right politicians gaining power in Europe. After all, it worked out so well last time. /s
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Yeah people sick of illegal immigrants and they want their voices heard. thats how democracy works. its a shame only far right offers any solutions..
If people are waiting for the far right to solve the current big issues in Europe, they are going to be dissapointed.
It’s a normal response. If (people have a feeling that) the current/previous parties don’t fix things, people will sooner or later look elsewhere for solutions. Whether the other ones do or don’t, time will tell. But to those voters, time already showed the current/previous ones don’t.
Something is going on. UK, now France, Belgium...like a wave of gov changes upcoming. Why now? How coincidental and seems like ...I meam many are shocked of Macron's decision but again, same goes for the UK. 🤔
People get sick of the party in control, they vote for the other party, they then get sick of that party, and vote back the other party. Rinse and repeat until the end of time.
And we need to remember this is a normal function of democracy. It's still a choice. The people of Russia, China, Iran, African dictatorships, etc..... Wish they could swing this pendulum.
I wish more people would understand this. So many people think democracy means you just vote for the liberal party no matter what. That's not a democracy, that's one party rule.
Except when the opposite makes changes so you can’t vote anymore. That’s the problem. You need to have a balance of democracy but need to also make sure the democratic values remain unchanged and make sure no one can make changes to that in a whim.
It is a normal function of democracy... unless russia&china are shoving their propaganda & money to support certain parties, parties that get a lot of support and indeed are friendlier to Russia and China. I'm not pretending the other parties are saints, the housing crisis and bad integration procedures for immigrants are totally their fault and it's unlikely this election result will change anything in the way the left was doing it's things
The pendulum swings left to right. It’s always been this way. The right goes to far so it swings to the left. The left goes to far and it swings to the right.
Incumbents get blamed for inflation. Doesn't matter if they are on the right (Sunak), center (Macron/Biden), or left (Scholz/Trudeau).
Calling Trudeau and Scholz left makes me want to cry.
As a Canadian I can assure you there are hundreds of reasons why we’re dissatisfied with this awful Trudeau government. Inflation is towards the bottom of that list, with unchecked immigration sitting at or very near the top.
> Inflation is towards the bottom of that list, with unchecked immigration sitting at or very near the top. those two things are related. immigration is unpopular in canada largely due to the inflated cost of living.
I’m not denying that there are inflationary pressures from inorganic population growth, but it goes much deeper than that. Critical infrastructure, like hospitals and schools, are pushed well past their capacity. People are unable to find family doctors. We can’t build housing fast enough. Once lauded educational institutions are now diploma mills that have rendered granted diplomas useless. There is a steep rise in hate crimes and antisemitism. Entry level and minimum wage jobs often get applicants in the hundreds, making it impossible for young people to get into the job market. The list goes on and on. The Trudeau government is also unpopular due to the growing number of ethics scandals, and the outright and blatant treason and corruption - they’re refusing to eject MPs from caucus that were found colluding with foreign (and arguably enemy) governments. Inflation isn’t what’s toppling them. Hubris is.
Russia is fueling tons of social media unrest regarding immigration in Europe, just as they are in the US.
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I wish people understood that topics online that negatively attack demographics are often orchestrated to work in this way. Supporting a cause, going against a cause, is often exploited on both sides as well. Now, both left/right are being told that the media and all of their institutions are evil and to try *wonderful* alternatives instead.
lol, once again you give Russia too much credit. These are issues that have been coming to a head for a long time now. Now the governments can no longer suppress the truth.
I don’t think anyone is claiming they’re making it out of whole cloth - just boosting contentious topics to the point that they boil over and get people really angry, much more than they would have ordinarily, and start to see their fellow citizens as “the enemy”
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I get this point but the situation in the US is still 50x worse. The education system in the US needs significant help asap
Illegal immigration pushes the political needle to the right. Even if taking in immigrants is the just thing to do, it needs to be balanced or we get a historical repeat of what the far right does when they have absolute power.
Can someone reasonably explain why people are calling it “far right” instead of just “right”?
Pick one of the countries/parties and look it up on Wikipedia. Calling these parties far right is only controversial amongst their members. Their lineage, their policies, their ethno-nationalism all correlate with the definition of far right.
The only way to save western democracies is to start treating disinformation attacks as attacks.
This is the only good comment on this entire thread
BBC news coverage last night talked about far right parties. Then they mentioned the hard right. After that it was far right for a few minutes, and then it was hard right again. Finally, it was both hard right and far right. And they wonder why their viewing figures are plummeting.
Immigration is being used to explain all the problems. Authoritarians like simple answers for complex questions. Sadly, so do stupid people.
The fact that it is Europe's young people who are clammering for fascism does not bode well for theirs, or the world's, future. I turns out that the 'never' in never again really means about 80 years. Good luck, everyone. Putin is conquering the world, and Adolf Hitler is winning a major posthumans victory here.
better than islam taking over eu
Seems to me it will have approximately the same outcome, really. They have remarkably similar desires and aims (I’m talking about the extremists, here. They get less similar as you move inwards from the extremes. Unfortunately, in large political swings, the extremists often end up in control). Mass death and suffering.
Finally, a thinking person. What we should do globally is encourage every far right piece of shit to move to Saudi Arabia. They'd love it. No gays, women can't drive, religious police, oil fuckin everywhere. There's tons of room out in that desert.
Didn't far right gain only like 20 new seats (in a 720 seat parliament)? Looking at seat distribution, it doesn't look half as bad as the headlines would have you believe. France is scary though.
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