Two days ago during a speech to the Conservative Party conference, UK PM Rishi Sunak came forward with his explicitly anti-trans stance, going as far claiming that misgendering non-cis people is “common sense” and that “…we shouldn’t get bullied into believing that people can be any sex they want to be”. https://www.thenational.scot/news/23833811.rishi-sunak-faces-criticism-comments-transgender-people/
I’ve been looking at this story and it makes me sad to have him running the country. I’m past few years the UK economy is doing awful. Very high inflation rates make common items (eg food) unbearably high. The party overseeing it refuses to build houses leading to crazy high house prices (which make it unaffordable for people like me). The National Health Service and the education system are incredibly underfunded due to tax cuts for the rich. So in the midst of this economic crisis, Sunak is quite unpopular and is probably going to when lose the next election next year. So to appeal to voters, he and his appointed officials have started a campaign of transphobia to win back voters. For people who oppose it, you’ll need to explain how gender is a social construct. But that is incredibly boring and doesn’t make a headline, so not many do it. It’s incredibly sad how my country is preying on people’s transphobia for votes instead of fixing the country. The good news? YouGov polls consistently rank 18-24 year olds around 1% for voting conservative (https://d3nkl3psvxxpe9.cloudfront.net/documents/TheTimes_VI_HS2_230927_W_yzXCaLz.pdf) They’ve destroyed a future of potential voters by doing stuff like this.
That's pretty spot on analysis, Danielle. It's just incredibly depressing hearing blatant transphobia from Sunak. Words fail me. It appears that where as racism and homophobia are both no nos in current UK political thinking, it's perfectly fine to hate trans people. Oh and migrants too. What's worrying is the knock on effect government rhetoric has on the street. Whilst overall hate crimes have gone down 5% in the UK in the last year, transphobic hate crimes have gone up 11%. https://www.standard.co.uk/comment/...hobia-islamophobia-antisemitism-b1111578.html Beth
Albeit I’m not an UK citizen or even resident, I do hope he will not be elected for another term. Mr.Sunak has made it clear that he is not working in the interests of general population on multiple occasions already, but this was rather unexpected when I’ve heard it in the news yesterday. Even though UK is not in the EU, I’m worried that Sunak’s statements might cause ripples here, too. Deplorable to say the least.
The Conservative Party has given up the centre ground of British politics in an attempt to emulate Trumpian populism. It will backfire spectacularly. British voters are not right wing Republicans and we mostly track towards the centre, rather than to extremes. The Conservatives have bought into the idea that Brexit voters are all hardliners who will rally behind them, but they are wrong. I know many people who voted for us to leave the European Union who are socially liberal at heart and will not tolerate the politics of division and incompetence that we are seeing from Rishi Sunak's government. It's no coincidence that the Labour Party (having returned to the centre) is doing so well in poll after poll. It could be a bumpy year as the Conservatives cling on to power, but I really think they are on the way out.
I will honestly be surprised if this even helps them gain back some popularity....they're trailing by 15-25% in the polls. I find it VERY hard to believe a party could come back from that. The only thing that is absurd to me is that I believe the election there doesn't have to happen until as late as 2025 (I believe the election has to begin no later than mid-December 2024 but still absurd given the last election was 2019.) I mean at least here in Canada we have a fixed four year period so here Trudeau could remain PM until at most 2025 (after being elected in 2021) if his supply-and-confidence deal remains in place until then.
Just checked, the election must happen no later that 25th of January 2025, which unfortunately gives Sunak and his party plenty of time. I certainly hope they’ll lose popularity, but can’t say I’m too optimistic about it, Sunak probably has won a number votes with that nonsense he said, stance against Ulez and postponing the ban on internal combustion engines - but this is an outsider’s view on the matter, for what it’s worth.
I'd be surprised if a party could gain back 15-20 point deficit but I mean politics is a fickle beast...
Well, the Conservative Party has just lost two by-elections by record breaking margins. If the results of those by-elections were replicated in a General Election they would be almost wiped out. While I don't expect that to happen, the polling experts agree that Rishi Sunak's government is in very serious trouble. The country seems to be sick of the Conservative party and totally disinterested in anything they have to say. Quite frankly, I am delighted. I would like to see them politically annihilated.
From what I gather from the news, he surely has some strong belief in his views, but doesn’t do a particularly good job at his post. His going out of the office would probably also be a win for UK LGBTQ community.
