The Government has annnounced its new immigration policy. It’s “responding to people’s very real worries”, apparently. Well, call me a dogmatist, but I don’t think that the Government should be appeasing the poisonous libels of the Mail and its ilk. Today’s Mail headline said it all – “Asylum – You are right to worry”.
For all the undoubtedly clever wording in the Government’s position, the fundamental of it is this: rather than fighting for what’s right, they’ve allowed the Mail to present its petty, vicious racism as in some way approved of by the State. The nuancing and statements in favour of immigration will be lost in the noise and shouting.
The problem with triangulation is that the Mail and their ilk are not open to compromise. It’s like trying to compromise with a Hutu militia by adopting a “let’s just kill some of the Tutsis” policy. Hatred and bigotry cannot be appeased, they can only be fought against, and the Government has clearly bottled it.