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Rishi Sunak to become first British Asian PM as Penny Mordaunt bows out
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- Title
- Rishi Sunak: A quick guide to the UK's next prime minister
- Published
- Oct 24 2022
- Word count
- 375 words
It's worth noting that his ethnic background doesn't remotely redeem him. He's still a planet-destroying, corporate-worshipping, poor-stomping money grabbing bastard (not to mention being the richest person in Parliament)
See also: Suella Braverman, Priti Patel, James Cleverly, etc. etc.. The Conservative party, for all their many faults, have always been pretty good at being an equal opportunity party. As long as you're a heartless fuck they don't mind what you look like (the parliamentary party at least, the membership and voters are generally more likely to be bigoted)
I come to Tildes to try and avoid the endless 'my enemies are ontologically evil' spout that fills up r/uk and r/ukpolitics. Disappointed to see this here, and can't help feel it's been on the rise in Tildes lately, and getting the votes for it too in the comments.
I'm as left-wing as they come, and anxious to see the Conservative party downfall, but I don't think we derive any value here parroting the same platitudes and quips at every chance.
Given that the decisions made by Mr Sunak and his associated people directly affect very many aspects of both mine and my family's lives, both in the past, now and in the future, not to mention millions of people I've never met but still care about, you'll forgive me for feeling strongly about them.
Nothing I've said is as flippant as a "quip" or a "platitude", and neither are these opinions that I am "parroting", and I'm not sure you assuming that is adding any value to something you already consider without value.
You might be surprised to learn that I am not one of those people who believes that politics should be something discrete from everything else, spoken of only in emotionless and "objective" terms. Least of all on a thread explicitly about actual political events. Politics is everywhere, all the time, and is a matter of both facts and feelings. I appreciate you may feel differently and that's OK. We're all different, eh? What a dull world it would be if we were not.
I’m with @TooFewColours on this. And I find it weird that his ethnic background is mentioned in your post, and the very abstract, super generic complaints you made in your post are not a basis for “political discussion”, it’s just a rant.
I can understand wanting to rant but it doesn’t generally make for good discussion, especially in a space where not everybody is as informed as the author, so it needs to be framed.
For example, @DanBC’s thread from the other day was far more high quality without pulling punches. And you yourself contributed very nicely to it.
I think anyone here actually of the Indian diaspora (and still has plenty of family back there) will know exactly why mat brought it up. It's a huge conversation point there and Indian media is really hyping the guy up based on nothing but his ethnicity at the moment.
Should it matter? No, but that's more of a western ideal than an Indian one.
The fact that he is the first Indian PM is a big deal and does matter. It's why it's in the headline. I believe what they're objecting to is the implication that his race would affect his policy standpoint
Implies that being Indian could "redeem" him, or that it is otherwise expected that someone of his ethnic background would have certain political/ethical/moral beliefs that contradict his actual political/ethical/moral beliefs.
Which doesn't really seem like something you should be assuming, especially considering he's a second generation immigration who was born in Southampton and lived in the UK his entire life. He's British, and if you're going to condition your priors on anything, it should be that he's British. And, well, I'd imagine most of the Tory party (and all other parties) are mostly British.
Not quite with these conclusions or reasons, but this is basically the flow of assumptions going on in India. It's more rooted in nationalism and the fact that an Indian is PM of the UK specifically is huge there. I don't think any of his politics are being assumed or understood there, only his ethnicity and his station, and that does translate into a common conclusion of "he's going to be great". I understand this sounds wild but India can be pretty alien in terms of its values on racial and cultural prejudices compared to what western lenses are used to. This isn't the first time it's happened, similar things were going on with Kamala Harris and many an Indian was touting she'd be an amazing VP based solely on the fact that she's got Indian heritage and nothing else.
Your last paragraph is actually what the pushback against the assumptive celebrations are centred around. Many an international family group chat is lighting up about how he's not really Indian because he has no ties to India, and expressing confusion about why Indian media is blindly celebrating him as an Indian victory when he's "not a real Indian".
The funny thing is that I haven't seen anyone in, from, or around India actually taking stances on his actual politics.
Again, I understand why everyone here would be confused and bemused about what his ethnic background has to do with anything. But if you've got your finger on the pulse of Indians right now, it's almost literally all they're talking about when it comes to him.
I think some reasonable assumptions would be that he's probably not anti-immigration, is unlikely to have much sympathy for people who are anti-immigrant, and might have some sympathy for other people who don't look British. But this is all speculation; it would be nice to have more to go on.
I asked myself what I would be doing if I were actually curious, and I think the first thing is to read the Wikipedia article and then to follow references from there.
I think that's a reasonable assumption, but it does show why priors should be taken with a grain of salt, because by all accounts he's presented himself as "tough on immigration"
https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-politics-63397590
So he is actually more anti-immigration than his predecessor Truss, who looked to it as a means of bolstering the economy supply side.
It’s bizarre this has to be mentioned because why would it?
I think maybe people have been distracted from following the link, which is actually pretty good. (The link text isn't a great way to advertise it.)
Left, on the other hand, is exactly opposite. It preaches all kinds of values like equality, diversity, secularism, democratic values, etc. but when it comes to actually dealing with people, they nitpick and cancel based on petty things like your skin color, racial profile, sometimes even religion and caste. It's like one side is thieves having honor of sorts and other the good guys quitting all honor and becoming scoundrels. It's confusing what to make of this sometimes!
I'd never heard of him before today, but this news seems vaguely promising and about the best one could expect with Conservatives in power? What policies does he support?
That’s pretty much been my reaction - a cautious sigh of relief after the raging destructive absurdity of Johnson and Truss. It’s not a good situation, not by a long shot, but it’s still an improvement.
He’s a billionaire (or close to it, estimates vary) and clear supporter of the rich, but was pragmatic enough to institute a sensible furlough scheme when he was chancellor during COVID, for example. He’s got an actual plan for the current economic crisis that has some chance of helping, or at least not radically worsening things. He’s moderate by the modern standards of the party, but that’s accounting for a pretty significant lurch to the right in recent years. In short: he’s considered a safe pair of hands and is unequivocally the guy the MPs wanted all along, but the party membership didn’t agree so they weren’t allowed into the loop this time.
It's interesting that, despite the seemingly precarious position the UK finds itself in, both the main right and left parties are moderating rather than radicalizing as you would expect with worsening economic conditions.
I think you can very much look at this as glass half empty or half full. The half full is exactly as you say: both sides moving towards the more moderate. The more pessimistic view would be something along the lines of:
Labour's first strongly leftist leader in many years was absolutely eviscerated by a heavily biased press, despite the relative popularity and fiscal robustness of his actual policies.
The Tories took a hard swing towards their reactionary radical wing with the nomination of Johnson.
Labour took a significant step to the right as a direct result of both of these, leaving them far more of a centrist party, which has played out since in their declining support for unions and removal of more left wing MPs from key positions.
The Tory party membership doubled down on all of this by nominating a leader who was even further to the right, widely considered unfit for the job, and whose dogmatic adherence to debunked economic theory cost the country billions when we could least afford it.
The party MPs took it into their own hands to tacitly say "our membership clearly can't be trusted" and forced through a moderate leader by default, denying the public their say.
That's a deliberately pessimistic spin, I think the most accurate read is a bit more nuanced than that, but it also isn't as hopeful as "the UK has seen the error of its ways and moved towards the moderate". I'm particularly conflicted by the Tory party realising their own base needed to be taken out of the loop - pragmatically necessary, but I don't know that it'll trigger the introspection they need to ask themselves why their own supporters can't be trusted.
Yea, it's certainly not for lack of trying that the more radical faction ended up out of the driver's seat. But it's perhaps reassuring they failed anyways. Although good point about party members not having a vote this go-round, things might look different if they did.
On the positive side, some of the membership who wanted extreme policies (represented by Truss) may have changed their minds about that. Or even about supporting the Conservative party at all in the next election? How hardened are conservative opinions in the UK?
See also A Former Goldman Sachs/Hedge Fund Guy Is the New U.K. Prime Minister (Wall Street on Parade, Oct 25, 2022):
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Well, this feels on brand.