A tiny English village has voted to leave the United Kingdom as a symbolic protest against government plans to house up to 1,200 asylum seekers on a nearby military base.

Others said the campaign had a darker side and stirred up fear of newcomers. Some backers of the Piddington referendum compared their fight against the asylum accommodation to the 1940 Battle of Britain against Nazi Germany.

Villager Herbert Owen, 76, said after voting on Tuesday that the independence referendum “isn’t just about Piddington,” adding: “It means everything our grandparents, our parents fought for. Today is the Battle of Britain.”

Comparing unauthorized immigration to an invasion has become increasingly common among politicians including Nigel Farage of Reform UK, and far-right groups that have been active in organizing and attending anti-immigrant protests.

What a bunch of assholes. From earlier in the article:

Residents of Piddington, which has a population of about 350…

That makes sense. Small town people need to have no say over issues pertaining to classes of people who are “different” from themselves. They’re too insulated and lack exposure to those who aren’t like them to properly recognize that they’re human beings in all the ways that they’d recognize if they knew someone from said class.

Brief story: decades ago, while I was on excellent drugs at a rave, my homophobia (thanks, Mom!) instantly disappeared when I realized the hilarious gay guy, in a group of us smoking cigarettes, was no different from me. “He just wants to take his drugs and have a good time on Saturday night,” I realized. He was no different from me!

Small town people need drugs and a good time with people unlike themselves.

  • crapwittyname@feddit.ukEnglish
    9·
    4 hours ago

    They had the same say as everyone else in the country. They voted in a representative who sits in the House of Commons.
    The problem here, and the reason I’m in support of this type of protest (though I strongly oppose their stupid, hateful cause) is that our first-past-the-post voting system is completely broken and desperately needs to be updated.

    • bigmamoth@lemmy.worldEnglish
      1·
      4 hours ago

      Yeah. It s unreal to me that theses politics are so common yet no citizen at all had a say in the matter. Next election gonna be interesting

      • crapwittyname@feddit.ukEnglish
        1·
        2 hours ago

        What do you think should be the system? How do we give them more of a say in the matter? I think we need a new voting system, which none of the political parties except the Greens are willing to do.