The simplistic answer is to say that we are not facing a V for Vendetta scenario. UKIP has polled high because its supporters buck the trend for low turnout in EU elections, and most credible pollsters are confident that in a UK general election its share of the actual vote would be more like 17%. Even then, it's a 17% that does UKIP precious little good; the party has siphoned support from both Labour and Conservatives, but not to the extent that it (so far as I am aware) has any prospect of winning even a single seat in the next Parliament.
But it's not as simple as that, and there is a lot to worry about. There will be more pressure in the Conservative party to adopt UKIP policies; even more disturbing is the prospect of Labour following suit. The media's - especially, and unforgivably, the BBC's - grotesque love-fest with Farage will if anything get worse. Anti-immigration and anti-immigrant views will increasingly become part of acceptable mainstream discourse, which is a bitter irony seeing as how the mainstream consensus has become astonishingly more liberal in areas such as gay marriage.
There is hope. As this blog post points out, UKIP has no internal coherence, even - if you push far enough - on issues such as Europe. Its dismal failure to impose party discipline or even properly vet candidates has led to a string of gaffes by its candidates that are very revealing about the true nature of UKIP. I would not be at all surprised if UKIP's new crop of local councillors provide endless further examples of just what sort of people a UKIP vote supports.
But then the risk is that a UKIP that is manifestly full of idiots but gets significant support will tempt both major parties to adopt UKIP-lite policies, expressly with the aim of saying "Unhappy about immigration but think UKIP are a bunch of crackpots? Well, now you can happily vote for us!" And that is a prospect I find very depressing.
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But it's not as simple as that, and there is a lot to worry about. There will be more pressure in the Conservative party to adopt UKIP policies; even more disturbing is the prospect of Labour following suit. The media's - especially, and unforgivably, the BBC's - grotesque love-fest with Farage will if anything get worse. Anti-immigration and anti-immigrant views will increasingly become part of acceptable mainstream discourse, which is a bitter irony seeing as how the mainstream consensus has become astonishingly more liberal in areas such as gay marriage.
There is hope. As this blog post points out, UKIP has no internal coherence, even - if you push far enough - on issues such as Europe. Its dismal failure to impose party discipline or even properly vet candidates has led to a string of gaffes by its candidates that are very revealing about the true nature of UKIP. I would not be at all surprised if UKIP's new crop of local councillors provide endless further examples of just what sort of people a UKIP vote supports.
But then the risk is that a UKIP that is manifestly full of idiots but gets significant support will tempt both major parties to adopt UKIP-lite policies, expressly with the aim of saying "Unhappy about immigration but think UKIP are a bunch of crackpots? Well, now you can happily vote for us!" And that is a prospect I find very depressing.