This morning, as the birds were rousing themselves from slumber and the normally rainy sky was actually showing some sort of colour other than grey, I was walking the dog in the park and for the third day running I was able to hear two Czech immigrant children -- yoofs of about 14 -- singing various Czech anthems and patriotic songs at the top of their lungs as they marched in lockstep towards the nearest comprehensive school.
I now know they were Czech because one of them had a huge Czech flag sewn on the back of his coat (not, I admit one of my top ten recognisable flags of Europe, but distinctive nonetheless and thanks to Pikiwedia I now know where it hails from) and they were clearly overjoyed to be here and eager to inform everyone of their heritage. Proud sons of the Czech tradition, no doubt, and perhaps staying here for the money when the job prospects don't pan out as hoped.
As it happens I have heard people singing before in public places (almost always tunelessly) and while this example of Anglo-Czech relations may have involved various east European swearwords and comments on the feckless state of Britain it didn't offend because I had no idea what point the song was making. I suppose I should have been grateful it wasn't rap.
Anyhow, it was timely reminder of the gap that exists between the peoples of nations, especially when they are shoehorned in to the same small area. This is one of my recurring themes in that you can't -- no matter how many laws are passed and how much propaganda is pumped out by the state and how much we are hectored by the lefties -- really expect people to be always perfectly happy with their neighbours. Singing or not.
There is, as far as I can see, a tendency in Britain to let people live and let live. If they don't bother us (or they don't frighten the horses) traditionally we are happy to let them 'do their thing.' The trouble is this allowance for foibles and pride and cultural dissonance and all the rest is actually limited. As much as we may say sure, come and live here, there is a tipping point where we start to become aware that we don't really feel that comfortable over a certain number being tipped here.
What that number is may well be indeterminate as it depends on the person feeling comfortable. I have heard it said that the first person on a street from another part of the world gets welcomed and even the second and third person happily tolerated. But once there is a preponderance of people who aren't willing to fit into the existing way of life then this tipping point is reached. It can manifest as the much-hated 'white-flight' (hated at least by those of the chattering class who have already fled to their secure mostly white fortresses and can pontificate from there) or it can result in a sort of sullen or resentful silence.
The other day a survey revealed that three out of four Brits think there is too much immigration. The left and the state machine at once went into overdrive to tell us we were wrong. Of course, the people asked in the survey didn't think they were wrong, and no, they probably don't need more education and lessons in approved thinking. After all, it isn't as if our glorious self-serving leaders haven't tried already to tell us we are wrong, so it isn't a question of more lectures doing the trick.
The issue over immigration is a feeling, however much you agree or disagree with it, and feelings are hard to shake off. All the intellectualising in the world won't really persuade someone they are 'wrong' about a feeling they have. It's too personal, too up close to their beliefs, to let it go simply to placate some smarmy, self-congratulatory prick who from their ivory tower knows all the correct words and political theories but none of the basic emotions of life.
But the thing is here that most people wouldn't notice immigration if it fitted in with the host country. If someone speaks the language of the host, acts as if they followed the laws and customs, then you might notice their accent is slightly different or their skin tone shade or two darker but it wouldn't matter. They would just be people, and most people are okay. But once they go round with national flags on them and form themselves into loud groups with extra demands then hackles rise.
Back when I was a fourteen year old I used to know a lad at school who was Jewish. We used to have morning assembly which necessitated signing Christian hymns so this lad Martyn would (with a few others) stay out and only come in for the important bits at the end like the Head telling us to not run when walking between classes. There wasn't ever the slightest suggestion that Martyn was 'different' because it wasn't important and because there was nothing different about him. He wasn't part of a scowling, sneering group who didn't speak English, he didn't dress differently and he didn't demand 'rights' and complain he wasn't loved. He came from a background that just had a different idea of something which mattered to his family but made no difference to his ability to join in, share jokes, play drums on the desk (he did go on to make living at it, so he is forgiven) and banter about football and girls and all the rest.
I might have thought Mary was more attractive than Dawn but that was just personal tastes.
Martyn was just Martyn and no one ever noticed he was Jewish. He fitted in, and that was all that was needed. No one gave a shit if he prayed to another deity or didn't eat some meats. So what? He was a good kid to be around. He was pretty much one of us so no one felt uncomfortable, including him.
This fitting in idea is much the same as "when in Rome." You have to fit in to what exists, not announce you are different and determined not to be part of it all. Do that and people feel troubled or resentful and all the state reassurances and intellectual yap doesn't make one iota of difference. No one says "Oh, look, I was wrong. Silly me."
It's just another measure of the gap between what we are and what we want (and indeed, what we have striven for) and what the newcomers want. More than that, it is an increasing gap between those of us who may well regard ourselves as the ordinary people who really have never had much and the pompuous elite who position themselves at the top and hand down advice and edicts and guidance for the ignorant.
We are not children, so the endless teaching tends to grate.
All this is about following some sort of attempt by newcomers to fit in to what exists. There are a whole bunch of places I wouldn't go and live because I wouldn't fit in, and I know it. I don't want to have to learn their language or adapt to some alien practices. I don't want my wife and daughter to have to cover their hair if they don't want. I don't want to bow and prostrate myself before corrupt governments and angry mobs. If you like, while I wouldn't mind carrying water from the local well, I don't like the fact that some people are spitting into it because that's their charming way.
There is, as I have seen on dark mornings lately, a gap between me and others who aren't like me. They announce it loudly enough and while they may be cheerful souls in all sorts of ways I am more happy for them to be cheerful within their own skin. No, I don't want them not to be proud of their national heritage. Hell, I even admire a lot of eastern and central Europe for the way they stood up to the Russians. But I don't need that history drummed into me with tuneless howls in a foreign language early in the morning.
The gap between me and them doesn't need to be announced, and I don't want to be told the gap between me and our morally-superior, self-serving, propaganda-loving and utterly insensitive elite is growing bigger all the time.
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