John Cleese is one. The famous comedian has complained that open borders have turned London into a city that is "no longer English' and that:
I mean, I love having different cultures around. But when the parent culture kind of dissipates, you're left thinking, "Well, what's going on?
In response, the former mayor of London, "Red Ken" Livingstone, defended the demographic transformation by arguing that,
To stay competitive, London must be what New York is to the U.S., a global centre of business, culture and innovation, none of which can be achieved without people of all nations working and living here.
Ken Livingstone is supposedly a socialist - but here he is defending open borders on the ground that it will benefit big business interests.
It's the kind of thing that rock musician Roger Daltrey can't stand about left-wing politicians:
Roger Daltrey A lifelong Labour voter, he’s disgusted by the last Government. ‘I was appalled at what Labour did to the working class — mass immigration, where people were allowed to come here and undercut our working class,’ says Roger.‘It’s fine to say everybody can come into your country, but everybody should work towards a standard of living expected by people who live here. Not come here, live 20 to a room, pay no tax, send money home and undercut every builder in London. They slaughtered the working class in this country. I hate them for it because it is always the little man who is hurt badly. It’s terrible. It frustrates me.
‘We have got to stop pandering to people because we won’t be able to afford to keep this going. At the very least, it should be a pre-requisite that people have to learn English.
Like John Cleese, Roger Daltrey isn't really making principled criticisms of liberal society here. Unfortunately, he cedes the principle at stake by saying that "it's fine to say that everyone can come into your country" - before then making some good specific criticisms of how that has played out in reality.
Pop star Gary Numan is so disenchanted with the growing thug culture in England that he's considering moving. The final straw was when his wife and children were surrounded and menaced by a local gang:
It was the latest in a string of incidents that have all served to make Numan deeply uneasy about the changes he perceives in British society. A combination of the recent riots and various instances of drunken, aggressive behaviour he has witnessed while touring has led him to contemplate a new life in Santa Monica, California.
'I've always considered myself to be fiercely patriotic,' Numan says. 'I love Britain – its history and the down-to-earth attitude people have. Until recently, I'd never have entertained the thought of leaving
What can we make of such comments? They show that it's not only traditionalists like ourselves who are disconcerted by the changes being made to Western societies. The alienation is being felt even amongst those who were prominent within the culture a generation ago.
The problem, though, is that none of the complaints go far enough. Gary Numan's solution is to relocate to another Western country with its own crime issues. Roger Daltrey is politically articulate, but as mentioned he cedes a lot of ground when arguing against the effects of open borders. And John Cleese has in recent years supported the Liberal Democrats in England and Barack Obama in the US, so he doesn't really seem to have connected the changes in society he dislikes to the political forces pushing those changes onto society.
If you are serious about opposing the alienating trends within modern society, then you have to make a serious effort to recognise the political beliefs which have brought them about - and then learn to effectively counter those beliefs.
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