Over the weekend, the Quietus received an email about a campaign launched as a reaction to the depressing news that Nigel Farage’s UK Independence Party had done rather well in the recent local government elections. The plan is to try and get British Sea Power’s pro-immigration anthem ‘Waving Flags’ into the hit parade as a bit of a ‘d–m your eyes’ to Farage and his small-minded compadres. We can get behind this! Refresh your memory of ‘Waving Flags’ above, and view the Facebook campaign here. We also thought we’d drop the band a line to find out what they thought about it all. Buy ‘Waving Flags’ here.
We received the following email from BSP’s Jan Scott Wilkinson, currently sat waiting for soundcheck for the band’s Dublin show, and who says he’s "reminded of my own parents’ English and Irish immigration-based romance."
Wilkinson writes: "It seems that over the last year or two especially there has been a rise in anti-immigration sloganeering and propaganda. For several reasons this seems rather stupid, and what is more disappointing is the way that so many people in politics and the media who should know better have largely not challenged this view. Obviously times are hard and the economy is not going well, and it seems the old story of ‘blame the last ones in’ rather than looking towards real solutions has become popular. It’s a kind of superstitious nonsense akin to witch burning. Instead of hearing about the NHS being staffed and kept going by conscientious hard workers from other parts of the world, we’re told that it’s groaning under the strain of newcomers. It seems obvious that immigration is being used as a scapegoat for all the problems caused by greed, ignorance, bad luck and a lack of planning.
"It would be easy to get angry at all the fools and the sanitised racism, but i would prefer myself to stick to the attitude of ‘Waving Flags’. This is a positive song of pro-immigration, an embracing of different cultures and a welcoming of tolerance, a quality lacking these days and one which we could do with a lot more of in the UK.
"One of the good things about being in a band is the amount of travelling we do and the chance to meet all sorts of people from different backgrounds and countries. it was this adventuring through Europe that inspired ‘Waving Flags’, a wanting to be a part of it and not hiding in the corner separate to it all. The sentiment of the song is a genuine one, literally welcoming people in to help improve the standards of this island and wanting this feeling to be reciprocated back to us when we travel to other places, whether temporarily or permanently.Â
"I myself have a lot of faith that the majority of people are intelligent and open-minded. It seems a shame that the idiots are being given too much air time and that many mainstream politicians are so worried about losing a vote that they’ll fall for any old kind of peer pressure rather than stand up for sensible values and gain votes such as my own.
"I’m not really a political ranter but I do agree with the sentiment behind this ‘Waving Flags’ movement, although it seems an unlikely to succeed. It’s a pleasant thing, much like the three legged horses with beautiful names we sometimes go on about. I think I’ll have a pint of Guinness and toast the whole thing good luck."
