Whatever Happened to Merry Olde England?

This article first appeared in New English Review.

If you have been following the news out of England for the past week, you might think that the country has all but fallen into civil war. Riots and various forms of violent protests and counterprotests have broken out in cities all over the country in reaction to a shocking murder that occurred in the town of Southport last week. On July 29, a group of little schoolgirls were attending some sort of Taylor Swift-themed dancing class when a 17-year-old son of Rwandan immigrants (who was born in England) attacked them with a knife. Three of the schoolgirls (ages 6. 7, and 9) have died and eight others went to the hospital with serious knife wounds.

The entire nation has erupted in shock and anger. Obviously, the anger is being directed at immigrants in general-given the country’s out-of-control migration situation and long-simmering  tensions  with the largely-radicalized Muslim communities. It seems that now-finally- the people have had enough.  At least one migrant shelter has been attacked, and several Muslim young men are showing up to counter-protest and do battle with young white men, many apparently belonging to the English Defense League. Now the cops in several cities are trying to keep the two sides apart.

I should state at this point that I will not condone the violence and destruction that is taking place and the objects being thrown at police who are trying to keep order. While I do not condone the violence, I think I can understand why it is taking place. I recall back in the 1960s when there were many riots in inner city areas of the US during the Civil Rights era and in response to the murders of black civil rights leaders like Martin Luther King and Medgar Evers. Many responsible black leaders condemned the violence but also added that they could understand the reasons for it. It was a different era then in America, and in the South, segregation had the force of local laws behind it. Many blacks felt that the government was not responding to their grievances.

Can we not say the same thing about Britain today? Britain is a diverse society, and there are many productive and law-abiding immigrants who have resided there for generations. At the same time, radical Islam has taken root in the British Muslim community, and in recent years, there have been multiple mass prosecutions of mostly Pakistani men who have “groomed” and sexually exploited British teenage girls, prosecutions that occurred much too late in many cases due to the fear of the police to appear as if they were targeting Muslim men. Due to political correctness, many people in England have felt themselves muzzled and thus, are afraid to speak out against the government’s lax migration policy and thus, be accused of racism. Contrary to popular belief, European countries do not enjoy the same level of freedom of speech as we do in the US, thanks to our First Amendment.

It is only natural to conclude that when a country’s elected government refuses or fails to deal with a problem, eventually things will blow up. Right now, many Brits feel that their government will not protect them from immigrant crime and Islamic extremism.

So the country has now exploded.

So what is the solution? As history teaches us time and time again, the longer governments allow a problem to grow and fester, the more radical the solution must be. But what is radical about closing your borders to all except those you choose to allow in? Nothing. What is needed now is not just closing the border, but mass deportation of convicted criminals who are not citizens. Due to years of uncontrolled migration (all over the West) those numbers are now probably too huge to remove every undesirable alien. In addition to convicted criminals, the English police no doubt know the names of thousands of other bad hombres who have yet to be caught committing any crime or act of terrorism and are walking around. (Whatever happened to the concept of undesirable alien?)

Ironically, they just had an election in the UK in which the Labour party gained a huge victory. Do we really think they will solve the problem? I doubt it.

And far be it for me to lecture the English. We have a similar problem here in the US. Yes, we are diverse. Yes, most immigrants are here legally and contributing to our society. However, uncontrolled migration also leads to undesirable people coming across our borders.

The fact is that far too many nations in the West, including ours, have suffered from bad political leadership. We see it in our cities, we see it in our state capitals, and we see it in Washington DC. Bad political leadership results in bad cities, bad states, and a bad country. The fish rots from the head, and what we need to do-in England-in France, in America, etc is elect responsible people who recognize that their government’s number one duty is to protect the citizens. When a government fails to do so, eventually what happens is what we see in England today.