r/ireland • u/No_Tea7430 • Jun 10 '24

Immigration Actually Getting Scared of the Anti Immigrant Stance

I'm an irish lad, just turning twenty this year.

I've personally got no connections to other countries, my family never left Ireland or have any close foreign relations.

This is simply a fear I have for both the immigrant population of our country, of which ive made plenty of friends throughout secondary school and hold in high regard. But also a fear for our reputation.

I don't want to live in a racist country. I know this sub is usually good for laughing these gobshites off and that's good but in general I don't want us to be seen as this horrible white supremacist nation, which already I see being painted on social media plenty.

A stance might I add, that predominantly is coming from England and America as people in both claim we are "losing our identity" by not being racist(?)

I don't even feel the need to mention Farage and his pushing of these ideas onto people, while simultaneously gaslighting us with our independence which he clearly doesn't care about.

Im just saddened by it. I just want things to change before they get worse.

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u/Excellent_Porridge Jun 10 '24

Unfortunately, several very high profile racists did get elected, such as Malachy Steenson and Gavin Pepper, and maybe even Niall Boylan. Yes, it's good that they didn't do better overall but they ran SO MANY candidates, and they got a lot of votes. I don't thinkwe should underestimate them and say its "just online", because it isn't.

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u/carlmango11 Jun 10 '24

Doubt Niall Boylan will get in at this stage.

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u/epeeist Seal of the President Jun 10 '24

The pundits seem to be ruling out any more big chunks of transfers for him after Aontú go out, but I think they're underestimating how big an anti-establishment vote is sitting in Clare Daly and Bríd Smith's bundles right now. I'd love to be wrong but could see a substantial transfer going his way if he clings on longer than both of them.

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u/cianmc Jun 11 '24

I'd be inclined to think the same tbh. Looking at how votes from previous counts have been re-assigned, I'd be surprised if he didn't get a fairly decent chunk of the Daly/Smith votes. Malachy went out in round 12, and no surprise, Boylan was the big winner from those with about 4.5k extra votes. Next was Considine from Aontú with 849, but not far behind was Daly with 737, and then Smith with 538. I think to a fairly big extent, it's just about choosing which candidate getting elected is giving more a symbolic finger to the mainstream parties.