#freedomism

The other night on Facebook I posted a comment saying, “With all these leadership battles going on at the moment, I think I’ll start my own party, as I’m feeling left out” the comment was meant as a bit of lighthearted humour but that night, I laid in bed thinking about everything that is going on at the moment in British Politics. Labour, Conservatives and UKIP all having leadership battles, I’m sure the LibDems would have one too if they had enough members to stand and I thought to myself it is not another political party this country needs, its a new political idealism. Idealism's create change not parties!

Look at UKIP, 22 years ago, they formed a party to get Britain out of the EU and ok I will admit that due to a bit of a fluke with two foster parents in Rotherham being badly treated and the media jumping on it, thus turning UKIP into the underdog, they became the Eddie the Eagle of British politics, which spring boarded them to suddenly becoming the main topic of political conversation. 

Of course the Political Elite were none to pleased about this and soon turned the media on them, to paint them as the racist, homophobic party many Sheeples soon found them to be. Well you can always trust the Sheeples to swallow whatever the media feeds them and react accordingly. However people saw UKIP as a breath of fresh air and kept on listening regardless, much to the disdain of the political elite, so then they reversed the philosophy of ‘if you can’t beat em join em’ and decided if they can’t beat UKIP they’ll turn them into themselves and thus UKIP suddenly abandoned all that which had made them popular to try to become more like the very thing they were against in the first place. Really, you had to be there to really appreciate how it all happened and to understand how it was possible to happen. I remember Nigel Farage back in 2012/13 shouting loud and proud, Labour and Conservatives you couldn’t fit a fag paper between them, you’d be hard pushed to fit a fag paper between UKIP and the Tories now and that is a fact. So what went wrong to make it so easy to change UKIP into just another political party, no different from the rest of them? 

Well I believe it is because they never really had a core idealism, they wanted out of the EU and that was it, the main goal but it wasn’t an idealism that makes parities go the distance and stick to their core belief, Labour has socialism, Tories have Conservatism, heck Libdems even have Liberalism, UKIP had Anti-EUism, they did try to sell the idea of Libertarianism but the only true Libertarian I ever knew in UKIP was Godfrey Bloom. Most were the Butcher the Baker and Candlestick maker of Politics that didn’t have a clue who Young Britons Foundation was, so would never have seen them enter through the back door. For those who have not heard of YBF its a Tory breeding club, with people like Dan Hannan (President) Douglas Carswell (Vice President) even UKIP’s own Party Secretary, Matthew Richardson (Chief Executive Officer of YBF). 

Personally I think they want to create a New Tory Party because Eric Pickles distanced the Conservative Party from YBF, back in 2010 and UKIP were easy pickings. But like I said they never really had their own idealism that could hold the party together no matter what. Coupled with the fact they had a party Chairman that found it far easier to get rid of a problem rather than deal with it and every time a smear campaign got fired at UKIP some poor sod would be booted out of the party and rather than him having to put any real effort into political spin, he decided qualifying the smear was the easier option. Yes Steve Crowther you were only good at one thing and that was being Nigel’s henchman, which you qualified yet again by resigning directly after him. Though to be honest I’m not sure you weren't both pushed but I really don’t care enough to find out.

I’m not Anti-UKIP, I’m just sad the way it all has turned out, I did learn a great deal from UKIP’s mistakes, I learned a lot from Nigel’s strength of character, you can never fault his passion, that’s for sure. But the most important thing I have learnt from over a decade of political inquisitiveness is that to make something solid you need to have that idealism, a core belief that holds it all together. The EU referendum showed me what people of Britain really value more than anything else, that is Freedom. A freedom to be a self governing nation is what won the EU Referendum, people went to the ballot boxes and they voted with their hearts and not their wallets, well those who voted to Leave did anyway. If Freedom is the one thing that we treasure the most then surely any political idealism we should live by should be built around that, a freedom to live our lives as we deem fit, providing of course that does not have a detrimental effect on others, otherwise we’d be encroaching on their freedom. A freedom to believe in any religion we chose without fear of retribution, a freedom of choosing our own sexuality without fear of condemnation, free to express ourselves as we wish without the need to walk on eggshells in case we offend someone, heck a freedom to be offended or even a freedom to dislike things. If someone does something that you dislike, then you have the freedom to ignore that and go off and do something you do like. It is not rocket science to work out if you don’t like something you see then don’t look at it, if you don’t like something you hear then go and listen to something you do like, accept everyone's right to their own freedom’s and you will enjoy your own freedom so much better. 

Freedomism really could put Political Correctness to bed for good. Now wouldn’t that make the world a better place straight away. 

So where am I going with this idea of Freedomism, well I have a name that is always a good start.. ‘British Allegiance of Freedomism’...

British: It is what we are....

Allegiance: loyalty or devotion to some person, group, cause, or the like. 

Freedomism: A political idealism founded on our freedom to live our own lives as we see fit, within the boundaries of the laws based on that freedom.

That is the core belief of BAOF, how it grows is entirely down to the people who agree and get involved in it. I have created a Twitter account (@BAO_FREEDOMISM) I have set up a Facebook group ‘British Allegiance of Freedomism’ and I’ve started work on a website that will have a Forum where everyone involved will have the freedom to express themselves. If it gets to the stage were we have enough involved to actually create a political party, then it will be down to everyone involved on how that party proceeds and as long as we never, ever forget the core belief of Freedomism, that party will only ever grow stronger. No left, no Right, just a strong believe that everyone has the freedom to be themselves and their opinion matters just as much as yours. If that is possible I do believe we can set a standard that will improve the world.

Politically. I am an Independent who believes that the biggest problem in British politics today is in fact party political rivalry, give four parties a problem to solve and the best you can ever hope to achieve is a compromise and that to me is simply not good enough. Why can’t we have a political system that has politicians working together for the better good of the people they are elected to represent, where sensible solutions are found through reasoned debate, would that be a better system than a parliament that has Labour on the left of the speaker and Tories on the right both hurling abuse at each other?