Is Political Arrogance dragging Europe to the Right?

[rory_20_uk]

Why is being Xenophobic / Nationalist being "right wing"? The USSR and China are extremely xenophobic / nationalist and are / were left wing.

All countries have a narrative about their past - since most of it is no more than what people choose to remember.

One of the causes of WW2 is the way the Allies punished Germany after WW1 but we prefer to gloss over that.
Britain along with the other Allies sold out Czechoslovakia to Germany since giving away parts of others countries is fine, but we gloss over that.
Britain joined WW2 seemingly to defend Poland which was subsumed into the USSR which was probably as bad as Nazi Germany, but we prefer to gloss over that, and rebrand the implosion of Empire as our "Finest Hour"
Jewish terrorists becoming the IDF? Korean "comfort women"? The bombing of Dresden? The "Highlands Clearance" which is so much nicer a term than the slaughter it entailed. In Russia, there are some who view Stalin with a sense of nostalgia.

But getting back to the subject, almost all countries and their societies change slowly over time. Often, the ideas, words and customs that are brought quickly become viewed as "normal" for the country. When change happens at a rate that is in excess of what the existing people can accept, problems occur. And this probably covers many different variables but generally we all accommodate similar people who are slightly different and who want to fit in than those who are extremely different and do not want to fit in.

With a ring of dictators around Europe for some time we had the luxury of an "open door policy" knowing full well that getting through Libya / Syria / Egypt was nigh on impossible and so we could feel all warm and fuzzy about how welcoming we were when there were few to welcome. The numbers have now massively increased and it is much more difficult and many people turn to those parties that state that they prevent this from happening.