A Ray of Demographic Light

A Look at a Very Important Development in One Part of Britain

When it comes to demographic change, nationalists have a strong tendency to think that it is always negative. Come to think of it, nationalists seem to have developed a tendency to be negative about just about everything - and it’s time to snap out of it. Concentrate on negative things, and your subconscious is inclined to take that tone on board. That way lies paralysis, so it’s got to stop.

Here’s a positive piece of demographic news: More than 10,000 people a year are now moving from other parts of the UK to Northern Ireland. That doesn’t sound a lot, but I’ve met some of them recently, and I can tell you that something very important is going on here.

These two bands are good, but there are hundreds every bit as good. Taken together, and given the fact that it goes on for so much of the year, this is the greatest expression of living, patriotic tradition anywhere in the white world.

When indigenous communities in England pick up and run with this sort of thing, they will send a very clear message: “We’re proud, organised and competent. If you want to come and watch us, that’s fine. If you want to ignore and avoid us, we’re very happy with that too. But don’t mess with us - or our women.”

Not many people retire to Northern Ireland, not least because it is, to be honest, damper than Manchester. Most of those making the move who are doing so are skilled working-class families, moving because the Province is a far better place to bring up children, to practice a trade and to live than ‘enriched’ parts of England.

They also show a very marked tendency to be stalwart British patriots. A lot of them first visited Northern Ireland either in the army right near the end of the Troubles or, more often than that now, came across for a few days during the marching season.

This experience hits many as a revelation. There’s a heady mix of patriotism, straight pride, heritage and a hint of paramilitary organisation on the streets. It’s not just the 12th July weekend. It’s evening after evening, weekend after weekend, for more than half the year.

Until last year, the widespread flying of Union and Ulster flags was also a very welcome change from the visual desert of mainland settlements. The Raise The Colours upsurge has levelled the playing field on that front, but when it comes to the band culture (roughly speaking, one band for every thousand Ulster loyalists), Northern Ireland is more healthily ‘tribal’ than any other place in the English-speaking world, Perhaps, indeed, in the entire White world.

I am not anti-Catholic. Nor, for that matter, are most of the band members, or the community from which they hail. They are bitterly opposed to everything the IRA did and stood for during the Troubles, and their heritage is Protestant, but the culture these days isn’t about being against Catholics, it’s about being for their own Ulster-British identity.

And, increasingly, about preserving it from the threat of Islamisation and immigration. One of the most heartening developments of the last couple of years has been the sight of young Loyalists and Catholics marching side by side, under their different flags, in a common stand against replacement immigration. The old sectarianism is dying away, thank God.

That said, the higher Catholic birthrate of past decades (now in sharp decline) does mean that the on-average older loyalist population is under political pressure. And working-class loyalist estates in Belfast and other big towns all too often contain empty council houses. These places need more people, and especially more children.

A Ray of Demographic Light

Which brings us back to the demographic good news. Ten thousand people a year doesn’t sound a lot by overall UK standards, but it’s more than 1% of the entire loyalist population. Given the strongly patriotic and British nationalist undertones of the population movement, it’s very significant.

To translate it into mainland population terms, it’s as if the population of England was gaining 500,000 White South Africans - many of them with young families - every year. And as if there was a powerful nationalist cultural and street movement into which their sons and daughters were immediately integrating.

That’s what’s happening, for instance, in the West Belfast enclave of Sandy Row, which is now reportedly home to more than 30 English families, many of them from Birmingham, London or the Black Country.

I will return to this subject - and especially the practicalities of such a move - in a few days. But only after I’ve given you my detailed programme of community-building initiatives for those British nationalists who - living as millions do, in areas in which we are still the overwhelming majority - can (and arguably should) stay put and get to work on constructive initiatives in their current home towns.

But for those living in areas where we are already in the minority, or even simply in big cities where real community building is unfeasibly difficult and where other factors mitigate against raising a family there and against long-term security, Northern Ireland is a place at which you really should look closely.

It’s not “running away”; the place is as British as anywhere in England. In fact, it’s several times more so. Furthermore, the fighting traditions and especially the loyalist band culture are things which are desperately needed among our communities on the mainland.

That makes establishing family and community links on both sides of the narrow sea (crossed by quick, cheap flights) something which will one day be of enormous importance to the Long Road Back struggle in England.

Take another look at the video of the two bands passing each other, in one of the dozens of major band parade competitions held every year in this most vibrant and determinedly-British parts of our country.

Ordinary Lads - Extraordinary Culture

Remember, these are not professionals. They are not supported by council grants. These are young men from overwhelmingly working-class families. They buy their own uniforms, obey their own rules, train the next generation themselves.

The girls of their community take part too, either in the colour parties or sometimes accordion bands, or as enthusiastic spectators. While much of the mainland’s Gen Z are reported shut in their bedrooms and only interacting online, the youngsters of this community meet in the streets on band parades, or in pubs and on street corners afterwards.

There’s a fair bit of drinking and even some old-fashioned fist-fights, especially over band pride and over girls. In a word, Northern Ireland is old-fashioned NORMAL. And hence a guide to where we all need to try to head for the future.

So if you are one of the many young men who regularly ask me where they should go, rather than struggling to afford a roof over their heads in some increasingly unpleasant part of London, Leicester, Birmingham, Bradford or wherever, this may well be the answer.

If, by chance, this reaches one or two of those who’ve already made the jump, please do get in touch, because I’d love to interview you, so that others can find out more about this possible future.