@David_Goodhart Don't get me wrong, I accept that politics is the art of the possible & that (like the man going to Dublin) we have to set off from where we are rather than from where we'd like to set off from.
I also accept that we treat the other 1/3 of our "2/3 society" with v little "respect" - something that is the result of politics I've never voted for, much less "rigged the vote" for, but for which many of the 1/3 do vote.
I understand why many feel aggrieved and blame their plight on foreigners.
But it's the job of the "cognitively blessed" to speak truth to the powerless, not to accommodate their illusions.
Thus we should say:
Thus we should say:
1) "Stable neighbourhoods" are decreasingly likely to be encountered as features of a modern economy - with or without immigration. And there is no easy way to stop immigration - otherwise we'd have done this wrt to non-EU immigration
....which is greater than EU immigration and over which we have full control. Moreover, it would make all our lives materially worse if we did end immigration.
2) We have full "control over our borders" now - except for the NI/IRL border over which we have no control and are unlikely ever to regain control.
3) In a civilized society we should not have homelessness, foodbanks, beggars and the like - even if that means handing out money others have worked to create to people who are (whether through infirmity or fecklessness) incapable of "contributing".
(Obviously we should try to give everyone the opportunity to contribute and should encourage any who can to do so.)
and 4) Human rights really are "universal" and that, while it is "legitimate" for the UK to grant rights to its own citizens that it denies to other citizens, it is not "legitimate" for the UK to renege on promises made to other citizens and to curtail their existing rights ...
.... in order to assuage the misguided sentiments of "decent populists".
In saying such things, we may fail to persuade and find ourselves on the losing side - as with Brexit (though there we faced, inter alia, a strange coalition of poor people who hate foreigners and rich people who hate poor people)
But, in the end, we have a moral duty to continue to say what is true and do what is right rather than to say and do what is popular.
[NB quotes are allusions to your piece not "scare quotes".]
[NB quotes are allusions to your piece not "scare quotes".]
Since people are kindly RTing this thread I should add a link to the piece I'm talking about: unherd.com/2018/10/i-welc…
