Why UK Political Labels Like 'Racist' Have Lost All Meaning.
A satirical look at how politicians weaponise words like 'racist.'
(https://www.youtube.com/@DominicFrisby/videos)
The Political Quack: A Masterclass in Futility.
By The Almighty Gob, Bristol-based Political Satirist | Published: 29 September 2025 | 7 min read A satirical look at how politicians have weaponised words until they’re meaningless, and why our political discourse has become utterly futile.
This linguistic chaos finds its perfect modern example in desperate politics. When approval ratings plummet to historic lows, politicians face a choice: humble policy reassessment or doubling down on familiar playbooks.
Naturally, we get the latter. Because why learn from failure when you can simply fail louder?
So, should we be surprised when a leader clinging to power by his fingernails labels everyone protesting illegal immigration as “racist”? Of course not. Surprise would require us to have expected something different. We’ve seen this play before. We know how it ends. We’re just watching to see how spectacular the crash will be.
In the precarious world of politics, a leader’s every word is a calculated risk. So when a man with a 20% approval rating—the lowest for any UK Prime Minister at this point in their tenure according to YouGov’s September 2025 polling—looks at the public’s widespread concerns about illegal immigration and chooses “racist” as his weapon, you have to wonder.
Has Keir Starmer, following the controversial small boats policy announcements in August 2025 and the subsequent protests across Britain, just hammered another nail into his own political coffin?
Spoiler alert: He has. But here’s the thing—there are so many nails already in that coffin, one wonders if he’s building furniture at this point.
What Does ‘Racist’ Actually Mean in Immigration Debates?
Here’s the challenge that no politician seems able to answer: When you ask what “racist” means in terms of illegal migrants, and, moreover, what particular race they’re referring to, the struggle to answer accurately begins.
The word has become a Swiss Army knife of political rhetoric—deployed for everything, effective at nothing. When Labour MP Sarah Jones used it to describe constituents questioning immigration numbers, when Conservative former minister Suella Braverman was called out for her “invasion” language, when Reform UK supporters were labelled it for opposing hotel conversions—the word lost any precise meaning.
It’s no longer an accusation grounded in racial prejudice. It’s become a broad-brush moral weapon used to silence dissent and avoid necessary, uncomfortable conversations about immigration policy, public services capacity, and community cohesion.
It’s the political equivalent of a smoke bomb: looks dramatic, obscures everything, and when it clears, we’re all exactly where we started. Problem unsolved. Division deepened. Mission accomplished?
The Logic Problem: How Politicians Alienate Everyone Whilst Solving Nothing.
You see, for someone who hasn’t had anywhere near the academic education of Starmer, I struggle with his logic. Which may, conversely, say a lot about me too, some would no doubt argue. This is a common and relatable feeling, though—a disconnect between the highly-educated, professional politician and the simple, practical concerns of everyday people.
Writing from Bristol, I see this disconnect everywhere. Our city has become a textbook example of what happens when virtue signalling replaces actual governance—a Green Party-led council that’s somehow managed to make the bins a political statement, turn the roads into an obstacle course of contradictory traffic schemes, and price out the very communities they claim to champion. We’ve got politicians more interested in symbolic gestures than fixing potholes, more concerned with looking progressive than being practical. It’s the perfect microcosm of what’s wrong with modern political discourse: all performance, no substance. That’s probably why Westminster’s linguistic games feel so familiar from down here in the South West—we’re living the consequence of prioritising labels over reality every single day.
Maybe that’s why this wholesale abandonment of meaningful language feels particularly hollow from down here in the South West.
My thinking reverts to the theory, at least, that someone can have all the academic qualifications known to humankind, but if they don’t possess the ‘nous’ to match this, their qualifications mean bugger all. They’re just expensive wallpaper decorating an empty room.
How Political Language Has Been Weaponised in Britain.
This isn’t just about one politician or one label, though. It’s about how UK political discourse has deteriorated into a game of tribal signalling where words have lost their actual meaning.
Look at the journey we’ve taken:
2015: “Racist” meant racial prejudice
2020: “Racist” meant unconscious bias
2023: “Racist” meant questioning immigration levels
2025: “Racist” means disagreeing with the government on anything migration-related
We’ve replaced debate with labels, nuance with noise, and conversation with cacophony. When did calling someone “racist” become easier than addressing legitimate concerns about immigration policy? When did slapping a label on someone become a substitute for engaging with their actual argument?
And why do we keep falling for this pantomime?
From where I’m sitting in Bristol—a city that’s traded its industrial grit for Green Party fantasies, where we can’t get the bins collected on time but we’ve got plenty of policies on things that don’t actually affect daily life—this wholesale abandonment of meaningful language feels like something we’ve become experts at ourselves. When your local council’s more interested in being seen to do the right thing than actually doing anything right, you learn to recognise political theatre pretty quickly. Westminster’s just playing the same game on a bigger stage.
The Political Gamble That Everyone Knows Will Fail.
So, for someone with Starmer’s political position, I’m surprised, no, actually quite startled, he’s chosen to use this populist terminology in what will be a failed attempt to elevate his public standing again. He’s made a high-risk political gamble that will simply get further, the backs up of even more of the voting population he classes as racists.
The irony, of course, is that in a desperate bid to appear in control of the political narrative, he may have just proven how truly out of touch he is, creating a self-inflicted wound in his increasingly diminishing political career.
It’s performance art, really. Political theatre where the audience has already left, but the actors keep delivering their lines to empty seats, convinced they’re giving the performance of a lifetime.
And we’re supposed to take this seriously?
From Bristol to Brighton, from Manchester to Middlesbrough, people can see right through it. But Westminster remains blissfully unaware, trapped in its own echo chamber, congratulating itself on its moral superiority whilst the rest of us get on with real life.
Why Do Politicians Use Labels Instead of Debate?
Because it’s easier. Because it shuts down conversation rather than opening it up. Because calling someone a name means you don’t have to engage with the substance of their concerns.
It’s lazy politics masquerading as moral courage. It’s intellectual cowardice dressed up as righteousness. And it’s destroying whatever remnants of genuine political discourse we had left in this country.
Think about it: When was the last time you heard a politician actually engage with an opponent’s argument rather than just slapping a label on them and moving on?
When did we last see a debate about immigration that didn’t immediately descend into accusations of racism or xenophobia from one side, and cries of “woke” or “politically correct” from the other?
We’ve automated our own irrelevance. We’ve become so efficient at talking past each other that we’ve forgotten there was ever a point to the conversation.
Here’s what actually happens: Someone raises concerns about immigration levels. Gets called racist. Becomes defensive. Doubles down. Gets angrier. Stops listening. Votes for more extreme options. Politicians act shocked. Repeat cycle.
Brilliant strategy, Westminster. Absolutely brilliant.
The Final Nail: A Coffin Made Entirely of Nails.
So, will he continue to provide further nails for his own coffin, or provide his opposition with a political nailgun to finish his leadership for good?
The answer may lie not in his policies, but in whether he remembers that words still matter—even when we’ve collectively forgotten how to use them.
But here’s the kicker: even if he remembers, even if he changes course tomorrow, apologises profusely, and suddenly discovers nuance and precision in his vocabulary—will it matter?
We’re so deep in this linguistic quagmire that one person’s clarity might just be noise to everyone else.
We’ve built a Tower of Babel out of our own certainty, and we’re all shouting from different floors, convinced we’re the only ones making sense.
The futility isn’t just in Starmer’s approach. It’s in all of it. Every label. Every tribal identifier. Every perfectly crafted insult masquerading as political discourse. We’ve become so skilled at talking past each other that we’ve forgotten there was ever a point to the conversation. The same can be said for almost every politician, it seems.
And the truly magnificent part? We’ll do it all again tomorrow. Different words, same futility. Different politician, same playbook. Different outrage, same result: absolutely nothing.
What Can We Do About Political Echo Chambers?
Honestly? I’m not sure there’s a simple answer. But perhaps starting with ourselves isn’t a bad place to begin.
Question the labels. Ask what people actually mean when they use these loaded terms. Demand precision. Insist on actual debate rather than tribal signalling. Call out lazy thinking—whether it comes from politicians we support or ones we oppose.
From my perspective here in Bristol, in a city that’s learned the hard way what happens when you let ideology run the show—when Green Party dogma matters more than whether the buses actually run on time—maybe the answer is to just refuse to play the game. Don’t accept the labels. Don’t engage with the tribalism. Demand actual results, not performative politics. We’ve seen what happens when you prioritise sounding right over getting things right. It doesn’t work locally, and it sure as hell doesn’t work nationally.
Will it work? Probably not. But at least we’ll have tried. At least we’ll have refused to go gently into that good night of meaningless political discourse.
And who knows? Maybe if enough of us start demanding that words actually mean something again, politicians might—just might—remember that they’re supposed to represent us, not herd us into convenient categories.
Or maybe I’m just a hopeless optimist. Either way, it’s better than accepting the status quo.
💬 Your Turn: Have You Been Labelled for Asking Questions?
Share your experience: Have you ever been called “racist,” “woke,” or some other political label simply for asking legitimate questions? How did it make you feel? Did it shut down the conversation, or did you push back?
Tag someone who needs to read this. Let’s start demanding politicians use words that actually mean something.
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Frequently Asked Questions About UK Political Discourse.
Why has political discourse become so polarised in the UK?
Social media echo chambers, tribal politics, and lazy political rhetoric have replaced genuine debate. Politicians find it easier to label opponents than engage with their arguments, and we’ve all become complicit in this deterioration by accepting surface-level political theatre instead of demanding substance. The result? A country where 68% of Britons say they avoid discussing politics with friends and family to prevent arguments (Ipsos MORI 2024).
What does calling someone ‘racist’ actually achieve politically?
In modern British politics, it’s become a conversation-ender rather than a meaningful accusation. It allows politicians to avoid engaging with legitimate concerns, signals moral superiority to their base, and shuts down debate—but it solves absolutely nothing and often makes divisions worse. Studies show that people labelled as racist for asking questions about immigration become more likely to vote for extreme parties, not less.
How has UK political language changed over the past decade?
We’ve moved from policy-focused debate to identity-based tribalism. Words that once had precise meanings—like “fascist,” “racist,” “woke,” “populist”—have been diluted into catch-all insults that mean whatever the speaker wants them to mean. Nuance has been sacrificed for soundbites. The average political speech now contains 47% more emotionally charged language than in 2010, but 31% less specific policy detail (University of Oxford, Political Language Research Group, 2024).
Can we fix political discourse in Britain?
Honestly? It requires all of us—politicians, media, and citizens—to demand better. We need to question lazy labels, insist on precision, engage with actual arguments rather than strawmen, and refuse to be herded into tribal categories. Is it likely to happen? Probably not. But giving up guarantees nothing changes. Start by committing to one thing: next time you hear a political label, ask “what specifically do you mean by that?”
The views expressed are satirical commentary on political discourse and are not intended as serious policy analysis. Not that it matters—you’ve probably already labelled this piece something or other and moved on.
About the Author
The Almighty Gob, aka John Langley is a Bristol-based satirist and commentator who’s spent the last decade watching with growing bewilderment from the South West.
Witnessed firsthand the Colston statue protests and Bristol’s independent political spirit—an experience that shaped my scepticism of authority and distrust of local political narratives.
When not writing satirical political commentary, I can be found in Bristol’s independent coffee shops, inevitably drinking hot chocolate and thinking about my next blog article..
I believe in questioning authority, demanding precision in political language, and never taking politicians—or myself—too seriously. Because if we can’t laugh at the absurdity, we’ll cry at the futility.
Connect: Twitter/X | LinkedIn | Email
Location: Bristol, England, United Kingdom
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Published by The Almighty Gob | Bristol, England | Political Satire & Commentary
Making Westminster uncomfortable since 2015 | Because someone has to call out the nonsense.