In between watching the cricket this afternoon, I've started reading John Simpson's book "Unreliable Sources." I got the book for my birthday several months ago, and started reading it but only got through the first chapter for some reason. When I returned to it today I started reading a chapter on the reporting of Immigration at the beginning of the 20th century.
The only things that seem to have changed between then and now are the targets of the attacks and the fact that journalists now have to be a bit more subtle, but only a bit. The main attacks are by the same suspects now as they were then: the Express and the Mail. One telling quote is when Simpson says:
"The Express was almost comically virulent, looking for every possible way of stirring up feeling against the immigrants"
Some of the headlines are strikingly similar to ones used today, the Express running a headline "Alien Horde for Great Britain" and "Alien Horde Coming." Some however were as Simpson says, comical: "NATION MADDER. CAUSES OF INSANITY. MENACED BY ALIENS"
The link between immigration and crime, however erroneous is as common now as it was then, the small improvement over the century being that it no longer verified by dodgy science such as that practised by Dr. Ernest W. White in the Express of 1st August 1903
In his article the psychologist speaks of immigrants "with poor bodies and poorer minds", "of the criminal type", "in many cases with neurotic inheritances" and warns that "If no stop is put to this, the stability of the race, mental as well as physical, will be undermined"
It's just a good thing that dodgy science like this is no longer practiced in the tabloids today.
Oh. And some more
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It's worse than you think -they're not just coming in but breeding too.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1301338/New-figures-reveal-barely-half-new-mothers-parts-suburban-England-white-British-origin.html
Note this lovely use of words...
"In some inner city areas the proportion of white British mothers slumps to fewer than one in ten."
Slumps? More dramatic and definitely more pejorative than 'falls' I would argue.
Oh yes, and another thing on that DM story...
ReplyDeleteHeadline - "The UK maternity units in which only 1 in 10 mothers is of white British origin"
Story "Of 652,638 deliveries in 150 NHS Trusts in England"
See what they did there? UK = England.
Oh yes, and the 'White British' angle - let's just ignore the fact that some of the rest would have been British but just a different colour. Bastards.
It appears that the story you're talking about has been taken down off the Mail website, not sure why as it's no worse than the usual shit they publish.
ReplyDeleteGood thing I had clicked on it a couple of hours ago and had the foresight to get a screenshot.