Patrick West

If allegations of ‘family voting’ taking place at Thursday’s Gorton and Denton by-election prove substantiated, the incidents will not only mark a grave infraction of the law, they will give further weight to the fear that this country is becoming perilously fragmented, terminally Balkanised and mired in sectarianism. Polling had scarcely closed when, a few minutes after 10 p.m., Sam Coates of Sky News posted on X intelligence related to him by a team from Democracy Volunteers, a group of voluntary election observers, in which they claimed to have witnessed a total of 32 cases of family voting in 15 of the 22 polling stations in the constituency.

In politics, there has always been an assumption held by atheists, humanists and many liberals in general that those of a modern, secular persuasion act with autonomy and reason because they are unencumbered by religious belief. They believe themselves in possession of an intellect that needs no external crutch or sanction. While this enables them to achieve objective detachment, those who cling to religion can never attain such a refined plateau of enlightenment: their convictions are indelibly shaped and clouded by religious dogma.

The more excitable and less well-educated elements of the liberal left are forever apt to observe that politics today resemble those of the 1930s, being prone to denounce a development or policy they disdain as being ‘just like Nazi Germany’. To be fair, they have a point. It’s not just the street brawls we’ve seen in Manchester and Lyon over the last week, between hard left and hard right youths, that should arouse such unnerving comparisons. It’s also because we are living in an age of appeasement. And this time it’s the liberal left who are doing the appeasing. This was a textbook case of appeasement: not a tactical retreat to be dismissed as a one-off, but an action consistent with a sustained process of surrender This trend continues to make itself more obvious.

In the fevered imagination of those obsessed with implementing ever greater ‘diversity’, there is seemingly no object or aspect of life they won’t seek to change at all costs. Thus it’s no surprise to hear that the latest target of opprobrium is the British countryside itself. It epitomises the blundering ignorance of the global, Anywhere class who have been in charge for too long Following a Defra report in 2019 that revealed that some saw the countryside as 'being for white people and middle-class people', officials have spent the last few years working on changing that – by making the great outdoors more welcoming to ethnic minorities. National Landscapes, a charity mostly funded by Defra, has been busy overseeing the diversity drive.

It’s been a cherished belief of progressives over the decades that you change the way we think, and in turn transform society, by changing the kind of language we use. This stretches back to a 1980s strand of feminism determined to jettison default masculine terms such as "chairman" and "headmaster" and replace them with gender-neutral equivalents. Then there are today’s hyper-liberals, who believe they can erase binary thinking on sex by introducing expressions such as "pregnant people" or forgo "he" and "she" altogether and substitute everywhere with "they." Many radicals have imagined that linguistic revolution is essential to actual revolution. Unfortunately for these idealists, new research suggests that their faith has been misplaced.

At last, the BBC has been forced to admit what even the dogs on the street know to be true: that the corporation is guilty of ‘shoehorning’ diversity into its television drama output, in series such as Shetland and This Town, and making them feel ‘preachy’ and ‘inauthentic’ as a consequence. Productions which distort history deliberately and cynically are even more exasperating A large swathe of the viewing public believe that the BBC tries too hard to represent diverse groups in its drama, according to a report commissioned by executives, involving a survey of 4,500 adults.

Much has been written in recent years, and even recent days, about the threat posed to the mental wellbeing of children by malign external forces, whether it be X generating nude images of women, the misogyny spread by influencers such as Andrew Tate, or the welter of ‘misinformation’ available online. But a story at the weekend reminds us of one of the most formidable actors in this department, one that continues to warp and taint young minds: our education system. This constant drip of revelations and pronouncements merely reflects the dismal state of our education system A state-funded computer game, developed with government backing by councils in East Yorkshire, reminds teenagers they risk being referred to a counter-terrorism programme if they question mass migration.

In one respect, the scaremongers are right: Racism is alive and well in this country, being imbedded in our institutions and abetted by the arms of the state. But this scourge manifests itself not in the hackneyed and often illusionary variety forever invoked by the liberal-left. This is the benevolent, ‘nice’ form of racial discrimination, one which bizarrely presents itself as an extension of anti-racism. Those with a morbid fascination with skin colour are being actively encouraged in their hobby Race obsessives not only remain a real presence, but those with a morbid fascination with skin colour are being actively encouraged in their hobby. Taxpayers are now funding a music festival which bans white people from its leadership.

We’re scarcely into the new year and already luminaries on the liberal left have resumed one of their favourite pastimes: issuing alarmist forebodings about the threat posed by populism, and imploring everyone that Reform UK must be stopped.

In the wake of a tragedy it is only fitting that public figures issue words of condolence. But there’s a vast difference between making a statement that conveys condemnation and anger, sentiments that most ordinary people have felt after the attack on Bondi Beach yesterday, and proffering bland, evasive platitudes that ignore the grave problems that face us – in this case, anti-Semitism and Islamist terror. With every attack carried out by individuals beholden to an extreme interpretation of Islam, responses of the latter kind arrive with grim predictability. The reaction to the Sydney atrocity has proved no exception.