If we ever needed proof that the Tories are Britain’s equivalent of the U.S.’s Republicans, this is it.
Yesterday, British Tories (Conservative Party members) produced the following poster after delivering the 2014 budget; this version came from a tw**t by Grant Shapps, chairman of the Conservative Party:
That’s about as classist and condescending as you can get, and what’s scarier is that it eerily echoes a passage in George Orwell’s 1984 (my emphasis):
“So long as they [the Proles] continued to work and breed, their other activities were without importance.
Left to themselves, like cattle turned loose upon the plains of Argentina, they had reverted to a style of life that appeared to be natural to them, a sort of ancestral pattern…Heavy physical work, the care of home and children, petty quarrels with neighbors, films, football, beer and above all, gambling filled up the horizon of their minds. To keep them in control was not difficult.”
It didn’t take long before the poster was mocked. And, according to the Guardian, the Tories are already trying to distance themselves from this bit of hamhanded propaganda. The Independent reports widespread scorn and parody of this poster; and here’s a good example:
What’s striking in the Tory poster at top is the phrase “hardworking people,” clearly distinguished from those who made the poster, and stereotyped as enjoying beer and bingo. It is a poster made by an entitled class to placate a “lower” one. The word “they” implies a difference from “we”: the entitled. Look what “we” are doing for “them”!, it says.
For, after all, beer and bingo are the opium of the people—the heart of a heartless world.
h/t: Grania
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Exactly. The first thought that came to my mind was that “bingo and beer” could easily be replaced by “bread and circuses”.
Or the more modern version “junk food and smartphone apps”.
+1
A pint of ale isn’t that bad 🙂
The Old Etonians in the government are more used to champagne of course.
That depends on the time of year. In summer it’s Pimm’s, and claret in the hunting season 🙂
OMG! That poster was so on the nose! Did the creators of it think that no one would get the reference or were they ignorant of Orwell completely? Maybe this is why British apocalyptic films tend to be the best ones. 🙂
I am going to guess: ignorant
“British apocalyptic films tend to be the best ones” – are you sure? Which ones do you have in mind? To name one, I think The Day the Earth Caught Fire is pretty good – it has an open ending not a nice comfortable solution.
solution = resolution I meant!
Children of Men? 28 Days/Months Later? How I live Now? Those are pretty good ones. And of course 1984/Brazil.
Maybe they read Orwell from the perspective of Big Brother. It was they who gave everyone a place to live, a job to work and beer and gambling to keep them happy. Since all good stories have a happy ending and 1984 ended happily with Winston being reeducated and celebrating his country.
That was a crass piece of propaganda but ( and this is going to hurt me as I type) they are not the same as the Republicans. Yet.
Just to give one striking example: it was this Conservative led coalition that has legalised gay marriage. I genuinely cannot see the Republicans ever doing that.
Lead the coalition? Of course, you’re right, the GOP would never do that. The Republicans fear their base. Democrats disdain their base, so establishment Democrats didn’t really lead the coalition that has advanced the cause of gay marriage either – Obama, for example, ran out in front of the parade after it was well under way. Democrats take their base for granted.
That’s why I don’t listen to what they say but watch how they act. It is the Republican that is pushing laws that tend to remove the well being of those that lack power and prestige. The republican has an almost insatiable interest in catering to the will of the elite. Which is compounded by the elite’s ravishing hunger for more power and wealth, with no care at all for the continuing viability of the planet to sustain life.
The democrats at least are willing to climb on board with social justice when the public becomes united in their calls for action.
“With no care at all for the continuing viability for the planet to sustain life,”
That’s a very wide brush you’re using to paint many hundreds of Republicans in elected office. Are you capable of seeing that perhaps many of them have similar goals for the country that you have but they disagree with you regarding the best way to turn those goals into realities? Or that maybe they are mistaken in their approach? To say they are motivated only to help the elite who have “a ravishing hunger for more power and wealth” is a terrible insult to those Republicans who honestly care about doing what’s best for their country, but disagree with you about what is best and what are the best methods to use to get us there.
You might call me naive, but you’d be wrong to do so. It’s cynical to think the “little people” like you and me are intentionally being attacked by all Republicans for the benefit of their elite friends. You have a better chance of convincing the other side if you stick to the issues.
For starters, who is more likely, a Republican or non-Republican, to view flesh-and-blood human beings as human “resources” and human “capital”?
If you watch or examine the voting records of the republican you should be able to note that your hypothesis has no legs. The republican vote is as a bloc almost every time with very few outliers and the outliers aren’t the same each time and are often protecting the image that they needed to get elected rather than actually intending their vote would make a difference.
It would only be advisable for the voters to look at each issue separately in the case that the republican politicians did that as they voted. The republican has a mechanism for insuring that the party line is met each and every time (with a very low error rate). It isn’t appropriate to speculate that a very wide brush was used when the object is very thin.
Democrats also vote as a bloc too. And Democrats, just like Republicans, are primarily concerned with getting re-elected.
Regarding who is more likely to view humans as resources and capital, they both do, but they do it in different ways. How else would they get you to shill for the Democratic Party? You must have forgotten that the two parties are both evil and they both use the people to further their own agendas. They are only different in degree.
In case you’re wondering, I am not a Republican. I have many very liberal points of view, but I also have conservative ones. I find that my liberal friends have an almost impossible time accepting any conservative view I argue for, but my conservative friends try to convince me I’m wrong about my liberal views in a spirited but friendly way. While conservatives laugh at my foolishness, liberals are angered by it.
I would keep sparing with you but it’s in the site rules that I’m obliged not to. I really don’t have space in this final comment to justly explain the despicable tactics the repug. uses to gain its advantage. I will mention just one that should be self evident to you. The laws that the repug. is passing to dissuade working people from voting is way beyond acceptable.
I don’t think that you are paying attention or you aren’t sincere in your conclusion that the repug. and the democrats use similar tactics to gain consensus. The repug. method is much, much more authoritarian. If you are sincere, I wish you would consider paying more attention. If you think the repug. cares about the environment you are simply wrong.
” . . . who is more likely to view humans as resources and capital, they both do, but they do it in different ways.”
Specifically what are those different ways? Just for the record, will you yourself specifically state whether you find offensive the terms “resource” and “capital” as descriptions of a flesh-and-blood human being?
“How else would they get you to shill for the Democratic Party? You must have forgotten that the two parties are both evil and they both use the people to further their own agendas. They are only different in degree.”
How can you possibly know whether I so “shill”? You can certainly ask. I am not. I don’t belong to a party. I actually agree that the two parties possess some sort of “evil” (or semi-toxic collections of combinations of less-desirable behaviors characteristic of the human species inhabiting this pale blue dot mote in the universe). Per Ralph Nader, Noam Chomsky, et al, the two parties are pretty much two sides of the same party coin.
Are the parties’ agendas their own? Would you care to specifically say whose bidding these parties are doing? Some who unhesitatingly berate government and political parties – however deservedly so – are careful not to mention private corporate tyrannies, the political parties’ paymasters, the “masters of mankind” (Adam Smith). What are the Koch brothers and so-called “social welfare” (talk about Orwellian language) organizations up to?
James Madison: “The purpose of government is to protect the opulent of the minority against the majority.”
John Dewey: “Government is the shadow cast by Business.”
I should also note that Obama wasn’t against gay rights and was willing to open the door to the leaders of gay rights advocacy while the Republicans had that door shut and shackled.
As a hardworking British Pleb(well I would be if I could find a job,but my partner does hard manual labour)I would like to say,I rarely drink,have never gambled in my life ( unless you count raffles),and have never and would never vote Tory,I still remember the Thatcher years.This is how they actually imagine we live,they have no idea what it`s like in the real world.
Currently on the dole albeit in another country I can confirm this conservative tendency.
“God, King/Queen and Country!”
They love that shit…
Good luck with job hunting…
I agree that our Republicans are probably worse than the Tories. After all, the Tories have not dismantled the health care system, while our brand has no greater goal than that.
“the Tories have not dismantled the health care system”
Although some actions they’ve taken do look suspiciously like an attempt to privatise services across the board.
Yes, they certainly *want* to privatise it.
They are not going to – and probably never will. In hard brutal political terms they know that if they tried that then they will lose the next election. Full stop. They might tinker at the edges but the basic principal of free at the point of delivery will remain.
It does not seem like that to me (our library is in a hospital & I know loads of nurses & doctors)- audiology is going the way optometry & dentistry went in the 80s.
Dentistry has always been private businesses and where they do NHS work that is in addition to their private work. GPs are another interesting case: they have never been employed by the NHS but are individual partnerships that are under contract to the NHS.
Tinkering at the edges is the way the elites work, it is their mode of operation. They push at the edge where ever it may be. It becomes increasingly important to protect the edges or anywhere else they might attack.
Wow, that’s pretty tone deaf, even for an establishment political party. However, like other commentators above, I find it hard to equate British Conservatives with the Republicans. In all fairness, they are politically much more closely aligned with the Dems (pro Gay marriage, supportive of a broad safety net, supporting a more or less socialized medical system, not radically pro-religion). Obama, in everything he has said and done, is the likeness of a classical center/right Tory Conservative. He’s clearly not close to the political center, as it might be defined in the UK, or to the left – which is where his opponents here in the US like to try to place him.
I looked from Cameron to Obama, and from Obama to Cameron, and could not tell the difference.
So where is the creep of religion into places it ought not be coming from?
Well largely from the efforts kicked off by Bliar – but I do think there is a good spread of spinelessness on this subject across the board in British politics (and Universities apparently). Nothing like as bad as in the US though.
Everyone is being much too kind to the Tories. In this budget, they have given tax breaks that are worth most to high earners with investment income, while taking just one penny a pint off beer. Meanwhile drawing a contrast between “hard working people” and others, i.e. all those in need of the social welfare safety net that the Tories are de-funding and otherwise destroying.
The irony is that according to a YouGov poll, the budget is widely regarded as fair, even by those who plan to vote Labour.
And that, of course, is right out of the same playbook used by the GOP. Bush could have just reduced deductions for low-earning taxpayers when got his “big tax break”, but instead everybody got a $300 check ($600 for two earners) – just so the proles would be sure that they knew the lord of the manner was their pal. Never mind that people making $1 million a year got tax reductions amounting to at least 100 times more. Of course, later on the deficits thereby created are so convenient in that they can be used to justify defunding the social welfare safety net.
Oh my God; that is so bad! They are hilarious.
“So you just load the shells in like this. You pull it back until it locks. You aim it at your foot and then pull this little trigger down here…”
I must say I cannot understand why those of the left of British politics are always so terribly desperate to vilify those of the right. Epithets such as toff are common currency in the language of the left over here. But Americans should not be taken in by any of this rhetoric. Most of this is triggered by class hatred, which I myself see as the great British disease. Many British Conservatives are middle or working class; any many Conservative politicians are from extremely humble backgrounds. Those that aren’t advance themselves based on merit and talent. It is a sad state of affairs to consider someone who has had a good education as a person to hold in contempt. It is the equivalent of always mentioning someone with a Harvard education with a sneer.
Conservatives here are NOT the equivalent of Republicans. They support free health services and support social welfare measures for the disadvantaged. Indeed, they are the strongest supporters of social mobility and meritocracy – it was the Labour Party under Tony Blair that abolished an essentially tuition free university education system- the greatest blow to British social mobility in modern times.
I’m American, but I’ve lived in Britain for over 30 years. I can see the reality of Conservative policy. In the States I’m a committed Democrat, in Britain an equally committed Conservative. Same politics, same ideals.
I think that one of the biggest mistakes that the Tory party made was selecting Cameron rather than David Davies.
15 members of ONE HIGH SCHOOL – Eton – in Cameron’s cabinet, and you believe that theirs is the party of meritocracy and social mobility?
Looking at our current political climate I keep asking myself whether conservatism strayed away from a ideology based on reasoned caution or has it always been about retaining wealth in the hands of a few haves, or in defense of some archaic dogma?
Everything that happens in human history is and always has been about who gets/controls/keeps stuff.
…& maximize their progeny. Basic biology!
Well said.
Have the Tories decried criticism of their advert content as “class warfare” by their political opponents? That is the first action by the USA GOP after stepping on their own crank in like manner.
Step two, invariably, the offending material is swiftly disappeared, never to be acknowledged by spokespersons/candidates that any such thing ever existed, even in response to direct questions at public events or live recorded press conferences, and despite video/youtube evidence to the contrary.
The enormous American conservative media machine instantly sets to work propagandizing revisionist versions of events. Their base, whether rich, well off, or anywhere down the scale, always either swallows this whole or deliberately wipes their memory banks.
Many harried citizens not exactly members of this base, too harried by life to investigate or lacking the skills necessary for objective evaluation, are also sucked into this vortex.
Works every time. Effective advertising sells product.
The first rule of
fight clubclass warfare: You do not talk aboutfight clubclass warfare.Well, no, in many ways the British Tories are to the left of the US Democrats, and *vastly* left of the Republicans. (Do you have universal health care funded through taxes in the US?)
Again, that’s unfair. That phrase is a staple of UK politics, used by the left (Labour) as much as the right (Tories).
The left talk all the time about “hardworking families” who are suffering from the recession and from government spending cuts (the phrase is to emphasize that the relatively poor are not “benefit scroungers”, as some newspapers would have it).
The right then emphasize “hardworking families” who deserve to keep more of their income and not have it taken in taxes.
Thus both the left and the right see the “hardworking people” as their own people, the ones they are trying to appeal to.
This phrasing is *not* supposed to distinguish “hardworking people” from the Tories, it is intended to identify them with the Tories.
Thus both parties are trying to identify themselves with those “hardworking people”.
Fully agree as I explained in my own words below.
“Hardworking people” are contrasted with benefit scroungers or -cheats, immigrants and other assorted subhuman scum.
That’s true. All politicians try to identify with regular Joes.
I think the comparison with Orwell is still apt. It’s not so much the phrase “hardworking people”, it’s that the entire message reduces to “Look! Daddy got you a cookie! Be good now!”
What’s especially troubling is that while there certainly are politicians who understand this approach and really do intend for it to be an easy way to placate and endear their constituency, many other politicians are right in there with the regular Joes, thinking “yes, beer and bingo ARE important issues!” Sort of like elementary school children who run for student government with platform planks like “longer lunches! More soda machines!”
There are 10-year-olds in our governments.
I’m gonna have to drink 300 pints to get another one free.
Slaínte!
Tory MP’s rarely mention religion. That’s quite different from the republicans.
My understanding is that the British government has been waging a bit of a culture war (social engineering) against the ‘evils ‘of drink including threats of taxation. This may be a response to that.
“…It is a sad state of affairs to consider someone who has had a good education as a person to hold in contempt. …” Howiekornstein
Disagree strongly!
I worked with the British Tory party, and was invited inside after a private chat with Mrs Thatcher, who called me “The bright new brains in the Conservative Party” I ran a campaign to retrieve a seat (constituency) from the Liberal leader at the time Jeremy Thorpe had his difficulties with his gay lover, and was suspected of planning a murder. My Tory candidate won, and I spent time at Westminster on various committees. One of my tasks, years ago, was to devise a Working Class softener such as the poster above. And so I crept away. Subsequently I ran for both the Westminster Parliament and the Euros as a Greenie.
The British Tory party is the party of inheritance, not of working people. As Willie Brandt put is, “Conservatism promises to the many that which is reserved for the few!’ You have no such depth of corruption in the USA.
The British Private schools take 7% of children but thanks to various ways of internal influence-peddling, they still claim about 60% of Oxbridge.
Back in the sixties I was truly shocked by the stupidity and simplicity of the Private-School kids destined for high office. I have talked of it on this site before. Oxbridge has done much to move away from that position of a finishing-school for the rich and thick.
With booming over-confidence the the Private School kids enunciated political principles and plans for action which are way above their intelligence levels. At present five out of six of the Prime Ministers aids all are from one school; Eton. Most of the present Tory government went to my Oxbridge college. I knew some of them when they were young and fresh-faced Nazis. Meanwhile that party is deeply in hock to two major vested interests, in banking and in property (houses) and those two ‘industries’ are the stuff of extreme commercial corruption. The present London house-bubble is fuelled by embezzled money from government ministers from a hundred different countries.
It is not contempt to mock those with braying voices and no intelligence. It is scorn at the injustices perpetrated by a crooked education system upon working people.
Fascinating insight. Thanks for sharing.
My initial reaction was to agree with Howiekornstein. I didn’t go to any great school or university and I didn’t have any kind of priviliged upbringing, but I do get tired of the whole “toffs” accusation as it’s simply judging people for where they come from and something they have no control over. So I found your post very interesting reading.
Inconsistent, incorrect, and quite implausible.
Pull the other one George.
I’m not sure of your point, but I think it’s aimed at me. Care to elaborate?
Not at all directed to you lance, sorry if I gave that impression… I suppose I should have added one of George’s specific quotes as well as mentioning him by name in it.
That’s fair enough. Your response came up in my “Notifications”. I wonder if perhaps you clicked reply to my comment when you meant to do so to George’s. I replied from my notifications without double checking George’s name. Hence my confusion.
Not sure what you are getting at. Can you explain please?
I’ve just realised that I’ve made a bit of a fool of myself. howiekornstein seems to have replied to me, but his comment was clearly aimed at you, George. Sorry, I missed that. I’ll leave you to defend yourself, but, for the record, I personally appreciated your comment. 🙂
No,howie,George is right. The Conservatives are the party of big business,privilege and vested interests. They are relatively left-wing by US standards because of the Labour party.I detest them both by the way,but this isn’t the place for a rant. I’ve also known a lot of the privately educated people George mentions. I’d go a little easier on them from my personal experience, but there is a substantial minority of real stinkers of the type he describes.
“there is a substantial minority of real stinkers of the type he describes.”
Well, there are a substantial minority of real stinkers on all sides of the political divide Steven. The problem is when we stereotype all the members of an opposing mainstream political view or social class as ALL being stinkers. Thus we have the basis for political tribalism and political hatred. In his post George characterises young Tory politicians as Nazis. Totally beyond the pale. The last time I saw this sort of characterisation was when I was back home at a shopping mall in Ventura California (my USA home) and some Tea Party section had set up a booth with a backdrop poster of Obama styled as Hitler. Appalling! When it comes down to it – left or right – what is the difference in such hateful invective?
Most of those who post here are committed to the ideals of open-mindedness encapsulated in the scientific method. But sadly, a FEW, when it comes to politics seem to throw this high principal out the window and behave as different political ideas or solutions (or people) are contemptible and not even worth thinking about. One of heros of the left was Hitchens. You could never totally predict what stance he would take on a particular issue – but whatever it turned out to be, the reasons would be well thought out and totally cogent. And he reserved his hatred to the few who deserved it, not for the class or party.
Anyhow – I’m an American and a committed Democrat living in Britain for decades. I have no particular axe to grind. My sad observation is that class hatred (mostly generated from the left) is the poison present in British social and political life. If anything brings Britain down it will be that. We have not yet drifted into this terrible state of affairs in the USA, and hopefully we never will.
“….In his post George characterises young Tory politicians as Nazis….”
Howie, you may have misunderstood. They often described themselves that way!! The late Alan Clark M.P. often spoke of himself as a Nazi.
And it seems to be your view that Class hatred has no underlying context. I agree with you that such destructive political views are unwelcome, but the news that five British families have greater wealth that twelve and a half million of the poorest should be a cause of alarm. And it is getting worse.
I was ‘Oxbridge’, and live in a chateau. So to call my views ‘class hatred’ is not really on. Apart from those misunderstandings your post in very agreeable.
George, wonderful post. Moving to the left as you get older. Is that allowed? I would say consistent, correct and plausible. Opportunities for kids from poorer household have diminished greatly. In the sixties our popular culture was dominated by high achievers from working class backgrounds. Acting and popular music are now mainly populated by the products of our private schools.
Design your own patronising poster at http://torybingo.com
John
Living in the UK I don’t think the poster was trying to (not even unconsciously) to create a distance between “its creators” and “the hardworking people”.
Given that the current government has been incessantly waging a war against (perceived) benefit scroungers and other “non-working” people, THAT I think is really what they are trying to emphasise.
To me the message is more like “if you WORK for you money [and not claim benefits] THEN we will let you enjoy beer and bingo”.
Meanwhile the underlying REAL reasons for lowering these taxes are 1) to keep their friends in the drinks industry happy and 2) to buy votes from the older generation (who predominantly play bingo, I’m not sure how that is outside the UK), whom they’ve been screwing over for the last few years so now they have to make up.
While the Proles hoist their pints and play bingo, the Tories compete in the Upper Class Twit of the Year competition.
Here’s some background on Shapps, the Tory chairman who tweeted that:
That would be hysterical if it weren’t so damn depressing.
I guess the main difference between the Uk and US is that the Republican’s would have invoked God and Church in there, and guns of course.
Sadly yes, they are probably more likely to cut the sales tax on ammunition that to cut a gambling tax
Reblogged this on The Road.
You Americans have people(*) like the Tories?
My commiserations. And to escape you’d either have to learn a foreign language (other than Spanish or Navajo) or get past the slavering guard dogs of UKIP. Terrible!
(*) Anthropoid apes, at least.
Navajo would be no good anyway because they’ve already broken that code. 🙂