What needs to be explored is the motivation behind woke activism. Is it a genuine high-minded concern for racial and other minorities who are considered to have been oppressed, persecuted or discriminated against in the past? Or is it a desire for activists to signal their own virtue with their woke peer group by presenting themselves as ‘holier than thou’ adherents of the great noble cause that they have all embraced? Alternatively, is it an attempt to destroy the established order of the white western capitalist society for which they seem to have a loathing, and to replace it with one more debased that fulfils their extremist ideology fuelled by a racial guilt conscience, coupled with an unrealistic and idealised egalitarianism?
So, what does Ian have to say about the level of immigration into Britain considered by many on the right to be totally out of control. He claims correctly that ‘many immigrants come to work… and want a better life’ an outlook and objective that is uncontroversial. However, although it would be wrong to blame all the evils of society on immigration, he wilfully ignores whether there might be any downside to huge third world immigration. Such as, for example, the creation of ethnic ghettos, divided communities, increased competition for housing, greater pressure on public services and transport, increase in crime and greater risk of religiously inspired terrorism. These are all matters of deep concern to ordinary members of the public who are most affected by such changes to their communities. But to the woke activist such views are instead evidence of entrenched bigotry and irrational prejudice. For those like Ian, mass immigration must always be presented as a positive benefit, and thus they remain blind to the undermining of societal cohesion and national identity that invariably follows.
Ian takes a strong line on transgender rights, denouncing a recent ruling of the Equality & Human Rights Commission (ECHR) ‘as one of the most disreputable and irresponsible documents’ from a public body; expressing a position which he considers to be ‘on the very furthest fringes of anti-trans activism’. And what is this outrageously extremist view? Merely that ‘trans women should use men’s toilets, and trans men should use women’s toilets’. In other words that biological males should keep out of women’s private spaces, a view held by the overwhelming majority of the public for as long as anyone can remember. He hysterically concludes that this decision would lead to ‘the eradication of trans people from the country’s social fabric’. Sensibly, the conclusion of the ECHR is the only logical response to the ruling of the Supreme Court on this subject. Ian’s angry and unhinged response clearly illustrates how far removed from reality woke activists have become in pursuing their delusional obsessions about gender.
Predictably Ian is an enthusiastic supporter of the BBC describing it as ‘the most trusted news source’. He denounces attacks on the BBC by the political right on the grounds that ‘the entire notion of objective, impartial public service broadcasting is an anathema to them’. Despite this he claims that the BBC has the audacity at times to ‘accept right wing narrative frames’, so his own notion of impartiality has a clear political bias. He overlooks the reality that overwhelmingly the BBC is a bastion of woke ideology, promoting issues such as climate change alarmism, multiculturalism and favoured minority concerns at every opportunity, whilst simultaneously deriding or ignoring traditional and conservative perspectives.
During the 1960s and 1970s the political left in British politics was vocal in its support of ordinary working people. It was during this time that young middle-class left-wing activists would try and ape the manners and appearance of the working-class, whilst denouncing the ‘bourgeois’ society into which they were born. For example, they would remove books by Enid Blyton from school libraries for being too middle class and idealise vocal working-class heroes in ‘kitchen sink’ dramas. This sentimentalised outlook and patronising posturing was clearly inauthentic and was looked at with bemusement by genuine working-class people. But at least it was well intentioned, seeking to materially help those living less comfortable lives than themselves.
Today the working class that was once feted is now demonised. Ian made the mistake of arriving at Waterloo station on the day that Tommy Robinson held his massive rally against uncontrolled immigration, attended by countless thousands of ordinary working people from all over the country. He was horrified for having inadvertently joined this gathering of ‘fascists’, as he termed them, complaining that these people ‘were everywhere, surrounding Waterloo like an army and there was no way to avoid them’. He accused them of doing something ‘which can never be forgiven, they had introduced a notion of racial awareness that made brown people feel unsafe’. In reality ‘brown people’ had nothing to fear from these supporters as all the evidence suggests they were well behaved, a contrast to the alarm faced by white residents living in culturally diverse areas who have to contend with unacceptable levels of street crime, harassment and intimidation.
This summary attempts to provide a flavour of Ian’s political outlook. Although there is a veneer of good intentions underpinning his agenda he lives in a fantasy world divorced from reality. It is not clear whether his intentions are malign or his thinking just plain naïve. However, by always taking the side of minorities, and denouncing the reasoned attitude of ordinary fellow citizens, he comes across as an angry fifth columnist who appears intent on subverting and destroying the well-ordered, cohesive and harmonious society that was once widely taken for granted, and which is now in danger of being lost due to woke extremism.
