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by pjc50 1922 days ago
That sounds great, but in practice doesn't prevent people from receiving racial abuse or discrimination because of what it says in their passport. There's definitely a faction of people who think that if you're not white you're not British, regardless of what it says in your passport. And the Shamina Begum case proves that there's some support for this: the government can simply remove your British nationality if you're Bangladeshi despite her being born in London.
2 comments
jen20 1922 days ago
I’m not arguing for the continued power grab of the home secretary here (who is abhorrent), but the UK does not have birthright citizenship like the US does, so the same set of rules do not necessarily apply.

Anyone born in New York is American, not everyone born in London is British.

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pjc50 1922 days ago
Yes, the UK ended birthright citizenship in 1981. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_Nationality_Act_1981

The empire caused all sorts of citizenships to appear; citizens of the Empire were "British" right up until the point where they actually started moving to Britain, causing that right to be taken away. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Expulsion_of_Asians_from_Ugand...

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aspnet_dev 1922 days ago
She joined up with ISIS not the best example to bring up. She gave it up there and then. It not like she hooked up with some bad lads and got into a bit of hijinks.

The faction of people that don't believe you are British if you aren't white has to be minority of people. Most of the people that may have brought up the subject are in their Winter years now. Pretending that Enoch Powell is still popular is a nonsense and tbh is nothing more than virtue signalling IME.

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Shacklz 1922 days ago
> She joined up with ISIS not the best example to bring up. She gave it up there and then.

While I do see your point (not British myself, but in Switzerland we had a few ISIS cases as well), I'd like to offer a different viewpoint as well: Our countries messed up at some point in their life - education, mental healthcare support, whatever; something went wrong when one of our citizens feels obliged to join something as heinous as ISIS. After all, we also feel like that with every other terrible criminal - murderers, rapists, etc.; our societies believe in their right to find the right path again, why not someone who joins ISIS?

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splintercell 1922 days ago
> She joined up with ISIS not the best example to bring up.

She's the perfect example. If a full on British person like Nigel Farage does a heinous crime (or make it apples to apples, he joins ISIS) would they take his citizenship away?

If she was born in the US, it would be unthinkable.

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aspnet_dev 1922 days ago
I would hope they would take his citizenship away. I don't want a ISIS member coming back to the UK.

The case went through all the legal proceeding and she is not allowed back in the UK. Good!

> If she was born in the US, it would be unthinkable.

If they were born in the US, they would have just been assassinated by drone strike instead like they did with Anwar al-Awlaki.

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splintercell 1922 days ago
> I don't want a ISIS member coming back to the UK.

A lot of ISIS members came back, they faced persecution, some even death sentence but none had their citizenship stripped.

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/u-k-strips-citizenship-is...

> If they were born in the US, they would have just been assassinated by drone strike instead like they did with Anwar al-Awlaki.

Yes, but the point is, is there are a legal treatment which is different for people who have been living here for generations vs those whose parents became a citizen in their lifetimes.

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aspnet_dev 1922 days ago
> A lot of ISIS members came back, they faced persecution, some even death sentence but none had their citizenship stripped. > https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/u-k-strips-citizenship-is...

Well they shouldn't have been let back in anyway. I also have no sympathy for a woman that said she felt nothing when she saw severed heads (of people executed by ISIS). Also there are claims that she enforced some of the Sharia laws and wasn't a passive member of the Caliphate.

She revoked her citizenship when she left.

> Yes, but the point is, is there are a legal treatment which is different for people who have been living here for generations vs those whose parents became a citizen in their lifetimes.

No there is a different legal treatment for people that join a rogue state which literally wants to destroy yours. I don't care about these people. Her supporters can cry racism all they want, It isn't racism. We don't want terrorists back in the country.

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splintercell 1920 days ago
You keep avoiding the answer in the guise of "well I would have done X". The question is simple, how come she lost her citizenship but other ISIS fighters of British ethnicity didn't?
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arwineap 1922 days ago
ISIS is bad, no one is denying this

The citizenship concept is a requirement for modern life. If a person has their citizenship revoked, what are they to do?

They are illegal where they are, and they are illegal where they go. To my knowledge, there's no processes in any country for becoming a citizen without a preexisting citizenship from another country.

Back to this specific example, if she had wanted to come back and denounce ISIS; what should the UK offer her?

What about if she wanted to come back and face trial; what should the UK offer her?

In the end, just to point out the obvious, revoking citizenship is completely unneeded. If she comes back, charge her with her crimes. If she travels, extradite her. If she stays, let the leopards eat her face.

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aspnet_dev 1922 days ago
I don't want any terrorist that has commited treason coming back to the UK. They can rot for all I care.
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