I donât think the shocking spread of racist violence and rioting in Ballymena in Northern Ireland has been covered. As far as I know nobody has been killed yet in the anti-immigrant pogroms. But as we know from years of this itâs only an accident if they donât and some time luck runs out and children get burnt in their beds.
They are looking for volunteers to assist from other police forces in Britain I believe. Not sure how that would go.
I saw that the other day and had not gotten around to reading up on it.
Similarities to some of the other anti-immigrant violence in both the rest of UK and the Republic?
[ETA]
âThe riots have a valid point; we are being overpopulated,â said Danielle OâNeill, 32. âIt sounds like Iâm racist but Iâm not. Itâs like an invasion. I donât feel safe walking the streets any more. Just yesterday one of them was following me and eyeing me up.â
OâNeill credited some arrivals with working hard and creating jobs, but she accused others of criminality â a bane that authorities ignored. âIf they can terrorise our kids we can terrorise the town. Itâs a way of getting our voices heard.â Her husband, Ryan OâNeill, 33, said residents had to take action against alleged criminals. âIf the government wonât put them out, weâll put them out.â
Look at these racist dipshits with their dumb smug facesâŚ
They know who was busting out windows and setting fires. Assholes. Just look at what they said aboveâŚ
ETA
Scottish Police sent reinforcements to Belfast last year, also over hate crimes/riots.
They are not riots. Pogroms are the more correct term.
Racism has similarities everywhere I guess but NI has a century of state backed/tolerated pogroms to guide its behaviour. Something like this has not been seen in Bradford or Dublin as far as I know.
Look who sent the racists to burn down a building with people in it? Bet heâll top the poll next time out.
https://www.rte.ie/news/ulster/2025/0612/1517997-ballymena-larne-disorder/
Larne Leisure Centre in Co Antrim has been badly damaged after masked youths attacked the facility last night.
(âŚ)
Two ethnic minority families who had been forced from their homes in Ballymena the previous evening had been offered temporary overnight shelter at the leisure centre, including a pregnant woman.
They had left during the day yesterday, but word went around that other affected families might be accommodated at the centre.
Yeah, good point.
Indeed. But the same could be said about pogroms in just about any other place - Eastern Europe, the American South, etc, all state-backed and sanctioned violence.
Yeah, the Irish government seemed far less tolerant of the anti-immigrant violence and there were denunciations against them at least from the top.
Ugh⌠I hate DUP.
Iâm hasty. You never know. They might boot him out.
This might spread through the UK and Ireland also.
Jesus, I hope not. 
Well nowhere else has a recent history of cleansing the community by burning groups of people out of their homes so that is a reason to hope it wonât.
Also the police arenât doing it this time so thatâs a reason to be hopeful.
I donât know, for the past decade every time I have hope that things will stop getting meaner and stupider, but instead will get smarter and nicer, I end up disappointed. Iâm still sort of clinging to hope that someone out there will go the smarter and nicer route and show us the way⌠but mean and stupid has some serious mindshare right now⌠StillâŚ
I keep wondering were we jus tin the gap between the lead toxins and, I donât know, microplastics in the brain that we donât know about yet?
I remember reading a Lenin pamphlet when I was a kid where he argued that imperialism was delaying the inevitable collapse of capitalism by exporting the exploitation. And I often wonder if the 40s to now is (unevenly) imperialism running out of road, coming up with new schemes, and running out again?
I like the framing that Naomi Klein has taken recently, influenced by post-colonial, global south scholars, of home grown fascism just being imperialism turned inward, and that being the more historically accurate way of thinking about the early modern and modern eras.
But yeah, I think less people support imperialist governments in general, and want more democracy at home, and some number of those people are being swept up in the age-old game of âblame the outsiderâ rather than keeping the eyes on the prize of decolonization their governments and mindsets. Given that imperialism, as a form of government, has been around for a very long time now, putting a final stake through itâs heart will take time. Nation-states are a relatively new invention politically, and most people canât imagine living any other way, though⌠which reminds me of a Cat and Girl which is just a bunch of squares of Cat and Girl living through out history in different clothes, some new technology just sort of abiding, until they get to the final 2 squares which is Cat dressed up as Marx, saying âI invented capitalismâ and then the next panel is Girl saying âI canât live without capitalismâ⌠Itâs kind of amazing how quickly we do accept something as normal, and then act like itâs the only way humans have ever been in the history of the worldâŚ
This is an interesting interview about where Australia sits politically in a multi-polar Indo-Pacific region, now that itâs becoming clear the US really is backing out and canât be counted on in defence.
I was particularly struck by the observations on how the US went from an isolationist policy to being a huge supporter of WWII and NATO. Hugh White (the interviewee) contends that the US is pretty secure geographically as long as Eurasia isnât dominated by a single power. Supporting Europe against Nazism then against the USSR made good sense, in that context.
Now that the cold war is long over and China, India, Japan, and Europe are the major Eurasian powers, thereâs a lot less urgency for the US to back Europe. A return to isolationism seems very possible.
He doesnât like the way T***p is doing things, but he points out that itâs realistic to be ready for the US support for Europe and Australia effectively disappearing.
Ilta-Sanomat has a story on the challenge facing the Finns Party as they grapple with polling figures around half of what they achieved at the last parliamentary election.
The party conference is coming up this weekend, and leader Riikka Purra is broadly expected to secure a new term in office.
She has a challenging task, according to researcher Markku Jokisipilä, who says that no Finnish party has suffered a similar dip in support and recovered by the next election without changing leader.
Purra has taken on the Finance Minister portfolio in an administration looking to cut spending, which has made her the face of the governmentâs austerity programme.
This stands in stark contrast to Timo Soiniâs decision on entering government as Finns Party leader in 2015: he became foreign minister, avoiding the tricky task of explaining spending cuts or difficult decisions to voters.
He still saw support collapse and his party splintered in 2017, illustrating the challenge for populist parties taking on government responsibility.
Jokisipilä has one perhaps surprising suggestion for the Finns Party as they look to shore up support. He says they could adopt a more sensible immigration policy, distinguishing between work-based and humanitarian immigration and trying to appeal to some of the more conservative immigrants in Finland.
The other parties all agree that Finland needs immigration to maintain public services and keep the economy moving, so Jokisipilä suggests that adapting to this policy choice might be a way for the Finns Party to find new voters.