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Violet_Crumble

(36,356 posts)
5. I think the US is in a far worse position..
Thu Sep 18, 2025, 02:07 AM
Sep 18

I'm not American or British, so my perspective may be incorrect, but what I see in the UK is a weak Labor leader trying to position the UK in a post-Brexit world where the US is no longer reliable as an ally. Which explains arrests of protesters from Led By Donkeys for projecting a photo of Trump and Epstein on Windsor Castle, as well as classifying a protest group as a terrorist group, leading to the spectacle of elderly folk being dragged away by police. That's bad, but....

What's happening in the US is so much worse. The UK's system of politics makes it much harder for extremists to gain control, and there's far more in the way of guardrails to protect its democracy. While the UK doesn't have a right to free speech enshrined in its constitution, the US does and yet it's the US where the right to free speech is being destroyed. Democracy is safe in the UK. In the US it's under full-scale attack. I'm not scared to travel to the UK next year, while I'm seriously considering cancelling the US leg of my trip. The US govt has made it very clear that foreigners aren't afforded the protections we'd get in most other countries, and I don't want to go somewhere where I'm not welcome, nor where an authoritarian, convicted felon, misogynist, dementia ridden crazy grandpa is the leader.

I feel for you all in the US. So glad I'm very far away from it all and can switch off when I want to

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