Openly Abrasive?

Although they have yet to approach Brexit levels, and although we may yet have seen nothing this side of Trump Tuesday, the centrist media have not been so entertainingly shrill since High Corbynism. They are beside themselves that we do not love this Prime Minister and his Government, this Chancellor of the Exchequer and her Budget. What do we mean, that these feel like the dying months of an exhausted third term, with a General Election due in the spring? Even the trade union bureaucracy is waking up, with Unite seeking a judicial review of the withdrawal of the Winter Fuel Payment.

Still, at least those media believe what they are saying. The right-wing media are stuck pretending to hold a position that has turned out to have little or no following, having been first disowned by Reform UK, and now defeated even among the grassroots members of the Conservative Party. There are anarcho-syndicalist newspapers and magazines in this country, but no one treats them as important. 

And again, at least everyone who writes for them really is an anarcho-syndicalist. Beyond the economic policy on which they had little disagreement with Keir Starmer and with Rachel Reeves, and beyond the foreign policy on which they had no disagreement with Starmer and with David Lammy, most of the people writing for the Rightist papers and appearing on the associated television channel believe little or nothing that they are saying for the money.

Their horror is palpable at the advent of a Leader of the Opposition who takes the culture war stuff seriously. They remain devoted instead to the memory of Boris Johnson and Liz Truss, whose courts were downright decadent, and who, whatever either of them may say now, pursued increased immigration as an economic growth strategy, to the extent that 2022, the year when they were both Prime Minister, had Britain's highest ever net immigration. Donald Trump's fanboys should also consider the position of both of them on Ukraine.

Kemi Badenoch has been known to talk the talk without walking the walk on gender self-identification, and she has been equivocal about assisted suicide. In general, though, if it is what used to be called social conservatism that you want, then the communities of post-War immigrant origin are where you need to look. Notice that after the acquittal of Sergeant Martyn Blake, no one rioted. Ask those who did riot this year what they wanted, and it would be a thus-far-and-no-further cultural settlement from about 30 years ago, except with less religion than even then. But with far better food.