2004: something new
10 years ago I was on holiday in Poland and remember the shocked German news reports stating that UKIP had obtained 16% of the vote. They had returned 12 MEPs. "These aren't just Eurosceptics" they informed the audience: "They've decided they're not sceptical: they want to leave the EU." The rest of the EU were well used to decades of Tory Eurosceptics attempting to scupper anything that came out of Europe, but this was something new.
The thought of leaving the EU seemed ridiculous, just at the point where most of the continent was celebrating the accession of 10 new countries. Yet here we are in 2014 with poll predictions of upwards of 30% of the vote for UKIP, and our PM pledging an in/out referendum on the EU if the Tories win the general election in 2015.
Since 2004 UKIP has gone from a single issue anti-EU protest party to a catch-all repository for the disaffected right wing vote. The droning on about EU issues seem to have been replaced to a large extent by a much broader anti-immigration platform. Anti-islam feeling runs high and a dislike of anything not "English" (its appeal is specifically strong in England, not in the rest of the UK).
The language of UKIP supporters
I'm very interested by the language that UKIP supporters use on social media, and the psyche of fear that appears to motivate them. Much of it is incredibly dramatic, particularly when discussing immigration. The country is "overrun". Schools and hospitals are "full". The "indigenous people" are being "pushed out". England is "smouldering beneath ready to explode". Wow, is it really?
When you fly over this green and pleasant land of ours, it's hard to tally the rhetoric with the reality. Most of the country isn't built on. No, actually that's wrong. Almost ALL the country is not built on. Any guesses as to the exact figure? 60%? 30%? 15%? Actually only 2.27% of England's land is built on. "Britain's mental picture of its landscape is far removed from reality". It's actually a remarkably peaceful, green, spacious, still comparably well-off country.
It doesn't matter though: you can reason about how immigration is a necessary thing for an economy, and an incredibly positive thing for a society. You can talk about the financial contribution that immigrants make in fiscal terms. You can point out that we have huge amounts of space and we're not about to sink into the North Sea under the weight of millions of newly arrived Romanians.
You simply hit a brick wall of willful, entrenched ignorance, fear and always an underlying belief that the English are somehow superior. It's as if decades of scare-mongering in the right wing tabloid press has finally soaked in and nothing will dissipate it. It's pure emotional reaction and the language reflects it. Let's not doubt it, though: there's real anger, and there's real fear amongst many of these people. A peril has been identified that goes way beyond the original target of the EU.
Farage: Our Last Hope
Having identified an apparent terrible peril the country faces, the next step is to suggest a solution. The country has been let down by the traditional parties, but there is an alternative. Much of the rhetoric I've observed demonstrates an almost Messianic like belief in UKIP to solve matters.
UKIP's policies seem quite ill-defined and apparently to mean many things to many different people. Is it an anti-establishment party, a libertarian party, or a pro-City, authoritarian right wing party? In some respects it doesn't matter. It's just important to note that for some of those 30%+ voters it's not simply a protest party: it's the solution to all their woes.
The party is of course inexorably linked with the personality of its leader, Nigel Farage. It's he who's on the TV endlessly. I doubt few general members of the public could name anyone else in the party (except perhaps Roger Helmer MEP). There's a cult like worship of the affable chap in his tweed jackets, enjoying a warm pint of English beer. He's a man of the people. He will lead us to a better place. He is the "Leader" - note the capitalised L - who is the only politician who truly believes in Britain and the British people.
A Historical Comparison
I'm actually both fascinated and terrified by the mindset that chants that UKIP is "needed urgently" and that UKIP "will prevail". For someone who's historically aware (and in my case, half-German) it's genuinely highly reminiscent of the posters the National Socialists used in the 1920s. The country apparently faced catastrophic danger and only one party, and one man, could save it.
I'm not even going to make any Godwin's law type apologies when I post this image (which actually doesn't apply: it says that as an online argument between two or more parties grows longer, the probability of a comparison involving Nazis or Hitler approaches one. I'm talking to myself here, not arguing with anyone :p). If you don't know what it means, it's simply: "Our last hope: Hitler". It encapsulates so much in one sentence.
Just to be clear, I do not for a moment think that UKIP heralds an overthrow of democracy and the advent of the 4th Reich. It would be silly to suggest it does. Thankfully, the parameters of European politics in 2014 are far more narrowly defined than those of Europe in the 1920s. Almost every country is a fully functioning democracy. Parties are generally grouped far closer to the centre than they were almost 100 years ago: the extreme far right and far left generally do not have the appeal they did back then.
Yet there are valid comparisons to be made here in simple terms of the rhetoric. When 47% of people ticked the "NSDAP" box in Weimar Germany they didn't know what was coming next: we only appreciate with horror the significance in retrospect. They weren't voting for the holocaust. They were voting amongst other things for "national revival" and German jobs. Remember, the very mainstream Daily Mail in this country was praising the Nazis right up until 1938. Their posters, their speeches and their policies attracted millions and seemed eminently reasonable to many.
According to some within UKIP, the country is "smouldering beneath ready to explode". Many feel that the traditional parties have failed us. One party is the answer, one party can save us, one party is needed. There's a dramatic desperation, an urgency, and there's a feeling that it's now or never. There are clear and unfortunate parallels. The Messianic belief that Nigel is our saviour, the only "Leader" who cares about his people, and can deliver his country, almost literally screams "Ein Volk, Ein Reich, Ein Führer" (One People, one Nation, one Leader). I do wonder whether the people tweeting and re-tweeting the above are so historically unaware that this doesn't even occur to them, if is it subliminal, or if for some it is quite deliberate. Personally, it sends shudders down my back to see a "Leader" referred to in these terms. No wonder people are starting to refer online to the man jokingly as Nigel Führage.
It doesn't matter that the threat to Germany in the 1920s/30s from World Jewry was as imagined as the threat is to England in 2014from Islam, "Labour fascists", gays or immigrants. As much as I hate this government, I really don't think the country is on the precipice of economic collapse and disaster caused by immigrants, the EU, Islam or anything else. It's rather a nice place to be in general, actually. It could be far better still, and I hope it will become so: that won't be achieved by shutting out outsiders and becoming a nation of xenophobes. What UKIP has done is in some ways not identified a fear, so much as to create one. There was no "Jewish problem" in Germany in 1933. There is no "immigration crisis" in the UK in 2014.
What UKIP has achieved
By way of further historical comparison, UKIP has come from nowhere in a very short time and promises a political earthquake. UKIP's aim in the European elections is to send political representatives to a forum it despises and aims to destroy. Other far right, yet more overtly racist parties in Europe promise similar. In May 1928 the Nazis were polling just 2.8%. By March 1933 they had used the democratic process to take power in the Reichstag, an institution that they hated, which they then destroyed from within, by passing the Enabling Act. A 4th Reich isn't staring us in the eyes, but this should give pause for thought.
The effects of the UK leaving the EU would be enormous not just for us, but for the whole of the continent. It would be one of the great events of early 21st century history, with no certainty whatsoever of the outcome. UKIP has already succeeded where a generation of Tory Eurosceptics have failed, in getting the Prime Minister to put this on the political agenda. They have done this by driving home fears about immigration and the danger it is doing, without even a single MP. Dismiss them as "fruitcakes, loonies and closet racists", Mr Cameron, but they've managed this quite impressive and worrying achievement.
What's more, instead of the Tories and Labour standing up to counter UKIP's rhetoric, they're leaving it virtually unchallenged. Instead, they're falling over themselves trying to find ways of accommodating concerns about immigration out of fear of losing votes. Again, quite impressive achievement there, UKIP.
What's the Solution?
It clearly isn't enough to mock Farage, UKIP and its supporters and hope they will go away*. They won't. It seems impossible to get through a positive message on immigration and the EU (yet we must keep trying). Highlighting yet another story about a virulently anti-gay, anti-Islam or overtly racist UKIP supporter isn't working. They appear daily now, Farage dismisses them as "I don't even know who this person is", they're suspended, and we move on. It seems that it would require a UKIP supporter to suggest genocide to grab some genuine attention. We all know the party is full of freaks, extremists, racists and idiots. That doesn't make them go away.
Both the press and we have created this situation. The Green Party actually has an MP, yet it never seems to secure any airtime. Switch on the TV and Farage's grinning mug is everywhere to be seen. He is given a disproportionate amount of airtime. UKIP is given a disproportionate amount of attention on Twitter, by me and by plenty of others.
Our "last hope" is to get out and vote in the EU elections. If you hate everything that UKIP stands for, and think that it reflects the basest and ugliest side of this country, these are very important elections to show that. Analysts predict that many UKIP votes will revert to the main parties in the general elections. However, UKIP will have a huge added claim to airtime and attention if it achieves the largest share of the vote on 22 May. Whether you're a Tory, LibDem, Green or Labour supporter please get out there - one thing we know is that the UKIP voters will be out in force. They're the ones who have more interest than anyone in voting in these elections.
Finally....
Look at this exchange.
If you're not aware of the details, 40,000 political prisoners were held in the Santiago national stadium during the far-right Pinochet military coup of 1973. Prisoners were given yellow, black or red discs. Those with red had no chance of survival. A total of 3000 "leftists" were murdered under the General's rule and a further 1000 disappeared without trace.
As my friend Matt Leys pointed out, it's really rather a leap to go from remarking that UKIP is homophobic, sexist and xenophobic, to thinking that Dave Jones is considering gunning them all down.
I mentioned the dramatic, emotional language of many UKIP supporters earlier. The woman is not some random UKIP supporter. She's a UKIP's London region MEP candidate and Southwark UKIP chair. Do you really want her to be elected as an MEP on a package of around £115,000? I don't.
* As fun as it clearly is
POSTSCRIPT
It's always very difficult to write a post that makes any comparison to the Third Reich, no matter how defined and limited the comparison (i.e here, to the rhetoric of some of his supporters). The magnitude of the horrors that regime represented leave you thinking "no I'm just being a bit silly and I'm imagining all this" ... Then you catch up on a story from Channel 4 News that reveal a letter showing concerns about Farage's fascism and racism at school and his marching through a quiet Sussex village late at night shouting Hitler Youth songs. And you just shake your head.
