I really do disagree with you maddyone about the comparisons with pre-war Germany. OK, so I speak German and have studied original documents and I have a passion for history, especially social history. I accept that not everybody has studied 1930s Germany in the depth I have. (Sorry if that sounds like bragging - it's a statement of fact).
Germany in the 1920s was an educated, cultured country. It was beginning to recover from WW1, but it had a fragile democracy and economy. Jews were reasonably well integrated and were treated better than in many other European countries. There were numerous cases of intermarriage and many Jews no longer believed in Judaism, but were secular.
I've read numerous newspaper articles, diaries and letters written in early 1930s Germany. Some people were worried (increasingly so), especially minorities, which is why some people emigrated if they could. However, people really didn't see what was coming. They voted for the Nazis because they were promising a land of milk and honey to people who had lived through WW1 and the late 1920s depression. Jews, socialists, gays, Slavs, the disabled and unemployed were demonised and gradually people began to believe the media. Laws were changed to enable the government to have its way. There were so many parallels with what's happening now that it really is frightening.
It took Germany years to recover morally from WW2. There was an overwhelming sense of guilt because people finally realised that they had enabled the holocaust by not standing up sooner and being swayed by short term gains (radios, better roads, affordable cars, jobs).
I hope to goodness that nothing really awful happens. The UK has a stronger democracy and more robust constitutional laws than Germany had in the early 1930s, which is precisely why we must never let anybody attack them.
@ jura. I know, but the thought of Tony Robinson (who is a Labour supporter) and seems pretty harmless, being associated with those oafs was a bit much.