Ian Dale on Politics Live says that members of staff at Sky were livid that they were cutting the sound on the Rafiq testimony today. Apparently Sky played it unfiltered after they had complaints from their staff.
Did they cover the bit when Rafiq criticised David Lloyd?
I haven't seen the testimony myself, just heard what Dale said about it.
On the Digital Spy thread, it was suggested that Lloyd tried to influence journalists into playing down the allegations.
Back when the Tiger Woods infidelity allegations came out (12 years ago now!) there was an interview with an ex-golfing journalist who had tried to write a story on Woods, many years before. Woods' management got to hear about it, and the golfing journalist was immediately an ex-golfing journalist. Others received threats about losing access if they wrote stories.
Threats to journalists can work, sadly.
Didn't some journalists have their careers ruined over Lance Armstrong?
It wouldn't surprise me. But wasn't that a slightly different situation? From memory, allegations had always surrounded Armstrong, and he had always been cleared. That makes writing 'the truth' somewhat harder - especially given his backstory wrt cancer.
Everybody, even if only tangentially involved, in pro cycling knew exactly what was going on with Lance. And every other GC contender before and after him. It was way more encompassing than just not reporting on Lance.
I remember watching the Tour in a shared house in the early 90's and someone there had been a keen amateur competitor but had given it up. She told me that they all had their little medical kits and that it was all fake. Rather naively I couldn't quite believe that they were all cheats, but she was of course right.
It isn't just cycling that had (or has) an Omerta though.
With regard to the cricket, I wonder if it isn't really drinking culture that is at the heart of this. If you aren't a drinker, then you can never be 'part of the team'. The clubhouse is never quite separated from the competitive sport.
What sad little people if the only way they can socialise is by getting pissed.
The Indie has it in for the PM's Dad; like son, like father? 'Two women — including Tory MP Caroline Nokes — have accused Boris Johnson’s father Stanley of inappropriately touching them.
Ms Nokes, who is the chair of the parliamentary women and equalities committee, said the 81-year-old smacked her “on the backside about as hard as he could” during a party conference in 2003.
The elder Mr Johnson declined to comment about her allegation made to Sky News, other than to say he has “no recollection of Caroline Nokes at all”.'
Apparently he smacked her hard on the bum and said, "oh, Romsey, you've got a lovely seat." Romsey being her constituency.
It doesn't sound sexual assault territory, and indeed many will find it absolutely trivial and even borderline funny, but I just don't understand the brain chemistry of blokes who behave like this. Where does it come from?
It comes in part from the fact that too many men (not you, I hope) do think it is "trivial" and "borderline funny" and so do not call it out.
How many times were you smacked hard on the bottom at a work event? And how would you have reacted if you had been?
And yet, as I have written, women routinely endure this sort of stuff and worse. Perhaps if we slapped men or punched them in the face every time they did this, the extensive bruising they would suffer might give men a bit of a clue? Dunno. Not in favour of violence. But relying on men being good chaps and calling out those chaps who are being bad chaps hasn't really worked, has it?
The reports on YCCC are awful, but so is the reporting. We do not need to have Paki and Monkey etc bleeped out - lets hear it. Its not being used as an abuse term now, its being used to call out the racists. Lets hear it so that we can shame them.
Naive. People have lost careers for using the n word, even when in context - eg to show how the word was used by someone else. That can now get you fired and cancelled
How is anyone to know if and when this arbitrary rule will be extended to the P word and beyond? They can’t. So they are understandably super cautious
I recall predicting many years ago that one day racist terms would be seen as much more toxic and offensive than swear words in the 1950s
And so it is. Perhaps that is a good thing, but my inner libertarian still thinks “they are just words, however stupid and ugly”
I don't see a binary distinction between words and actions. Words are the result of an action - the action of writing or speaking. And this action, the writing or speaking of words, can do real damage. It can do just as much damage as other types of actions, eg punching and slapping, sometimes more.
Do you think someone should lose their job for just quoting someone else using the N word?
Maybe. I'd have to know the circumstances. Also 'lose their job' would need clarifying. Eg fired vs feeling shamed out vs loss of freelance income, these are different.
General point, though, is that I sometimes hear "it's only words" as if words exist in a separate milder dimension to actions, and I don't really view it like that myself.
You're so tediously myopic. Do you never do any research? Explore? Find out stuff? Or is it just easier to sit in a contented little bien pensant bubble in your leafy Belsize Park pub.
I'm bored of educating you, and I shall stop interacting with you shortly. But there are countless examples of people being sacked for using the N word
One of my favourites, a professor replaced for using a Chinese word that SOUNDS like the N word
"In a controversial decision, the University of Southern California replaced a professor of business communication with another instructor in one of his classes for saying a Chinese word that sounds like an English slur."
There's hundreds. That's 2 minutes Googling. Which you are apparently unable to do
I'm aware there are sometimes false accusations of racism which can lead to injustices to the individuals on the receiving end. However imo the problem of real and actual racism in society dwarfs that of false accusations of racism or hair trigger sensitivity to it. So I simply cannot get as animated as you do about the latter stuff. Indeed I find it pretty odd when people do. I also disagree that 'words' are inherently and always less harmful than actions and that the 'policing' of them is an affront to liberty. I find that view pretty odd too. So, you know, fine, you plough on in your 'space', but don't pretend you're educating anybody on this. All you're doing is riding a hobby horse.
There is a clip going round of AI Wei Wei. He says that we are already living in an authoritarian society, but don't yet realise it.
If we are we need a new term for societies where freedom of speech and behaviour is severely restricted.
Has it entered your tiny tiny brain that when you have Vladimir Putin AND Ai Weiwei both saying the exact same thing: the West is having a Cultural Revolution, Woke is like Marxism, we are damaging our own societies, then there may just be a fucking problem? Maybe they have a point?
Excitable reactionary bloke who thinks the West is committing suicide so that men can go into women's toilets argues with a slightly calmer and less reactionary bloke who rather doubts this. He mentions brain size for some odd reason. And Vladimir Putin.
King Cole, the bit after the Western Empire falls and before the Norman Conquest (especially pre-Alfred) is not the most popular in history for the general public.
What annoys me is every single damned documentary or drama (well, the vast majority) are fixated retelling stories of Henry VIII and Elizabeth II when (even just looking at England) there are so many more interesting and neglected events and characters to consider.
"The Vikings" did rather well from depicting the period, and the spin off "Vikings: Valhalla" covering the later period before the Norman conquest looks promising.
The period that seems to be lacking is the early post Roman period. In a generation or two, we abandoned roads, towns and the trappings of urban life, turning back to subsistence farming and more egalitarian social structures.
Perhaps we can find out about the latter in person, second time around?
The Dark Ages were only dark in the sense of the abandonment of Christianity, and also literacy. It happened between 409 and 450 or so, so a couple of generations. There seems surprisingly little evidence of resistance to going back to a simpler more sustainable communitarian lifestyle once the Romans stopped enforcing the alternative.
Who abandoned Christianity in 409->450 or so? Not really my period.
(or is that the joke I just edited out?) (Blockquote maybe borked warning)
The reason that there was little resistance was that when armed, competent invaders showed up, the locals had next to no military capability. Sharp swords make sharp arguments.
The process of robbing the locals when you felt like it, evolved into "You can't tax those peasants. They are my peasants"....
You could call that an egalitarian social structure. Depends which end of the sword you are holding, I suppose.
But who (or where) abandoned Christianity in 409->450 or so?
New one to me as well - in England, the Saxons who turned up to occupy senior management positions after the Romans divested their offshore holdings were initially pagan, but converted fairly rapidly to Christianity....
It seems very early for that.
Even the Edict of Milan (Constantine) wasn't until 313 (?) AD.
I've always associated Dark Ages with a period in either the second part of the first millenium 1000 AD, or a period in the middle ages, which is why I'm asking.
Dark Ages to me means that period when the absence of Christianity/literacy means there was a bit of a lacuna in recorded history. In England a relatively short period maybe AD400 - 800. We really know very little about the end of Roman Britain and the Germanic settlers had started to make their presence known. In Scandinavia it is different: not a lot is known pre 1000 or so, and in Sweden everything before 1200 might as well be Prehistory.
The absence of a real written record tells its own story of economic collapse and population decline, IMHO.
King Cole, the bit after the Western Empire falls and before the Norman Conquest (especially pre-Alfred) is not the most popular in history for the general public.
What annoys me is every single damned documentary or drama (well, the vast majority) are fixated retelling stories of Henry VIII and Elizabeth II when (even just looking at England) there are so many more interesting and neglected events and characters to consider.
"The Vikings" did rather well from depicting the period, and the spin off "Vikings: Valhalla" covering the later period before the Norman conquest looks promising.
The period that seems to be lacking is the early post Roman period. In a generation or two, we abandoned roads, towns and the trappings of urban life, turning back to subsistence farming and more egalitarian social structures.
Perhaps we can find out about the latter in person, second time around?
The Dark Ages were only dark in the sense of the abandonment of Christianity, and also literacy. It happened between 409 and 450 or so, so a couple of generations. There seems surprisingly little evidence of resistance to going back to a simpler more sustainable communitarian lifestyle once the Romans stopped enforcing the alternative.
Who abandoned Christianity in 409->450 or so? Not really my period.
(or is that the joke I just edited out?) (Blockquote maybe borked warning)
The reason that there was little resistance was that when armed, competent invaders showed up, the locals had next to no military capability. Sharp swords make sharp arguments.
The process of robbing the locals when you felt like it, evolved into "You can't tax those peasants. They are my peasants"....
You could call that an egalitarian social structure. Depends which end of the sword you are holding, I suppose.
But who (or where) abandoned Christianity in 409->450 or so?
New one to me as well - in England, the Saxons who turned up to occupy senior management positions after the Romans divested their offshore holdings were initially pagan, but converted fairly rapidly to Christianity....
It seems very early for that.
Even the Edict of Milan (Constantine) wasn't until 313 (?) AD.
I've always associated Dark Ages with a period in either the second part of the first millenium 1000 AD, or a period in the middle ages, which is why I'm asking.
Dark Ages to me means that period when the absence of Christianity/literacy means there was a bit of a lacuna in recorded history. In England a relatively short period maybe AD400 - 800. We really know very little about the end of Roman Britain and the Germanic settlers had started to make their presence known. In Scandinavia it is different: not a lot is known pre 1000 or so, and in Sweden everything before 1200 might as well be Prehistory.
The absence of a real written record tells its own story of economic collapse and population decline, IMHO.
It would these days when literacy is universal. But remember in early Western Europe, literacy was a Roman thing, perpetuated by the Church. The withdrawal of Roman control over the British provinces probably did result in economic decline, but I am not so sure about population. At least one usurper may have marched off to Europe with a sizeable army, but the Romans had been settling Germanic foederati here for some time and there was obviously an influx of settlers. At that time, human population density seems to suggest that most places weren't fully exploited and there was room for settlers.
On another subject, another thing this shows is that local media isn't dead yet. My view - and this is blether rather than me knowing what I'm talking about - is that the MEN is more influential in GM than any of the national papers. I'm sure the same is true of the Echo on Merseyside, the Chronicle in the North East, the Yorkshire Post in Yorkshire, and so on. This makes me happy and slightly proud for reasons I can't quite place.
Jennifer Williams is a very fine journalist. I have been following her work for a while. Well worth reading.
Did you see Simon Reeve’s new show, ‘The Lakes’ at the weekend? All about Cumbria
I didn't even know of its existence. But thank you. I will look out for it.
The reports on YCCC are awful, but so is the reporting. We do not need to have Paki and Monkey etc bleeped out - lets hear it. Its not being used as an abuse term now, its being used to call out the racists. Lets hear it so that we can shame them.
Naive. People have lost careers for using the n word, even when in context - eg to show how the word was used by someone else. That can now get you fired and cancelled
How is anyone to know if and when this arbitrary rule will be extended to the P word and beyond? They can’t. So they are understandably super cautious
I recall predicting many years ago that one day racist terms would be seen as much more toxic and offensive than swear words in the 1950s
And so it is. Perhaps that is a good thing, but my inner libertarian still thinks “they are just words, however stupid and ugly”
I don't see a binary distinction between words and actions. Words are the result of an action - the action of writing or speaking. And this action, the writing or speaking of words, can do real damage. It can do just as much damage as other types of actions, eg punching and slapping, sometimes more.
Do you think someone should lose their job for just quoting someone else using the N word?
Maybe. I'd have to know the circumstances. Also 'lose their job' would need clarifying. Eg fired vs feeling shamed out vs loss of freelance income, these are different.
General point, though, is that I sometimes hear "it's only words" as if words exist in a separate milder dimension to actions, and I don't really view it like that myself.
You're so tediously myopic. Do you never do any research? Explore? Find out stuff? Or is it just easier to sit in a contented little bien pensant bubble in your leafy Belsize Park pub.
I'm bored of educating you, and I shall stop interacting with you shortly. But there are countless examples of people being sacked for using the N word
One of my favourites, a professor replaced for using a Chinese word that SOUNDS like the N word
"In a controversial decision, the University of Southern California replaced a professor of business communication with another instructor in one of his classes for saying a Chinese word that sounds like an English slur."
There's hundreds. That's 2 minutes Googling. Which you are apparently unable to do
I'm aware there are sometimes false accusations of racism which can lead to injustices to the individuals on the receiving end. However imo the problem of real and actual racism in society dwarfs that of false accusations of racism or hair trigger sensitivity to it. So I simply cannot get as animated as you do about the latter stuff. Indeed I find it pretty odd when people do. I also disagree that 'words' are inherently and always less harmful than actions and that the 'policing' of them is an affront to liberty. I find that view pretty odd too. So, you know, fine, you plough on in your 'space', but don't pretend you're educating anybody on this. All you're doing is riding a hobby horse.
There is a clip going round of AI Wei Wei. He says that we are already living in an authoritarian society, but don't yet realise it.
If we are we need a new term for societies where freedom of speech and behaviour is severely restricted.
Has it entered your tiny tiny brain that when you have Vladimir Putin AND Ai Weiwei both saying the exact same thing: the West is having a Cultural Revolution, Woke is like Marxism, we are damaging our own societies, then there may just be a fucking problem? Maybe they have a point?
Excitable reactionary bloke who thinks the West is committing suicide so that men can go into women's toilets argues with a slightly calmer and less reactionary bloke who rather doubts this. He mentions brain size for some odd reason. And Vladimir Putin.
Quite funny that PB Tories are representing Ai Weiei as a critic of political correctness, when in fact he was comparing Donald Trump to Chairman Mao!
If Johnson had had any sense at all (don't laugh there please, I did say 'if') then he would have cancelled the southern part of HS2 and kept the bits from Birmingham northwards.
Not that it was ever in doubt but today saw the end of the England career of Alex Hales and the career of David Lloyd.
Can't see Michael Vaughan doing any more media work either.
Not too late but with every flat denial, he looks less and less credible.
Initially I assumed he must have been referring to overseas players, but that's not the case - only one of the players concerned was an overseas player (Rana Naved-ul-Hasan)
Oh and remind me to pop to Tesco's later would you? I have never agreed with boycotts of businesses in any way even if I think they are being stupid (which I don't in this case). It always gives me great pleasure to disrupt boycotts by patronising those establishments which are the target - all the better if I would not normally shop there.
Ian Dale on Politics Live says that members of staff at Sky were livid that they were cutting the sound on the Rafiq testimony today. Apparently Sky played it unfiltered after they had complaints from their staff.
Did they cover the bit when Rafiq criticised David Lloyd?
I haven't seen the testimony myself, just heard what Dale said about it.
On the Digital Spy thread, it was suggested that Lloyd tried to influence journalists into playing down the allegations.
Back when the Tiger Woods infidelity allegations came out (12 years ago now!) there was an interview with an ex-golfing journalist who had tried to write a story on Woods, many years before. Woods' management got to hear about it, and the golfing journalist was immediately an ex-golfing journalist. Others received threats about losing access if they wrote stories.
Threats to journalists can work, sadly.
Didn't some journalists have their careers ruined over Lance Armstrong?
It wouldn't surprise me. But wasn't that a slightly different situation? From memory, allegations had always surrounded Armstrong, and he had always been cleared. That makes writing 'the truth' somewhat harder - especially given his backstory wrt cancer.
Everybody, even if only tangentially involved, in pro cycling knew exactly what was going on with Lance. And every other GC contender before and after him. It was way more encompassing than just not reporting on Lance.
I remember watching the Tour in a shared house in the early 90's and someone there had been a keen amateur competitor but had given it up. She told me that they all had their little medical kits and that it was all fake. Rather naively I couldn't quite believe that they were all cheats, but she was of course right.
It isn't just cycling that had (or has) an Omerta though.
With regard to the cricket, I wonder if it isn't really drinking culture that is at the heart of this. If you aren't a drinker, then you can never be 'part of the team'. The clubhouse is never quite separated from the competitive sport.
What sad little people if the only way they can socialise is by getting pissed.
As a non-drinker I agree, but that's the way it is. You are immediately marked as an outsider.
If you also happen to have a different skin colour then so much the worse, it seems.
The reports on YCCC are awful, but so is the reporting. We do not need to have Paki and Monkey etc bleeped out - lets hear it. Its not being used as an abuse term now, its being used to call out the racists. Lets hear it so that we can shame them.
Naive. People have lost careers for using the n word, even when in context - eg to show how the word was used by someone else. That can now get you fired and cancelled
How is anyone to know if and when this arbitrary rule will be extended to the P word and beyond? They can’t. So they are understandably super cautious
I recall predicting many years ago that one day racist terms would be seen as much more toxic and offensive than swear words in the 1950s
And so it is. Perhaps that is a good thing, but my inner libertarian still thinks “they are just words, however stupid and ugly”
I don't see a binary distinction between words and actions. Words are the result of an action - the action of writing or speaking. And this action, the writing or speaking of words, can do real damage. It can do just as much damage as other types of actions, eg punching and slapping, sometimes more.
Do you think someone should lose their job for just quoting someone else using the N word?
Maybe. I'd have to know the circumstances. Also 'lose their job' would need clarifying. Eg fired vs feeling shamed out vs loss of freelance income, these are different.
General point, though, is that I sometimes hear "it's only words" as if words exist in a separate milder dimension to actions, and I don't really view it like that myself.
You're so tediously myopic. Do you never do any research? Explore? Find out stuff? Or is it just easier to sit in a contented little bien pensant bubble in your leafy Belsize Park pub.
I'm bored of educating you, and I shall stop interacting with you shortly. But there are countless examples of people being sacked for using the N word
One of my favourites, a professor replaced for using a Chinese word that SOUNDS like the N word
"In a controversial decision, the University of Southern California replaced a professor of business communication with another instructor in one of his classes for saying a Chinese word that sounds like an English slur."
There's hundreds. That's 2 minutes Googling. Which you are apparently unable to do
I'm aware there are sometimes false accusations of racism which can lead to injustices to the individuals on the receiving end. However imo the problem of real and actual racism in society dwarfs that of false accusations of racism or hair trigger sensitivity to it. So I simply cannot get as animated as you do about the latter stuff. Indeed I find it pretty odd when people do. I also disagree that 'words' are inherently and always less harmful than actions and that the 'policing' of them is an affront to liberty. I find that view pretty odd too. So, you know, fine, you plough on in your 'space', but don't pretend you're educating anybody on this. All you're doing is riding a hobby horse.
There is a clip going round of AI Wei Wei. He says that we are already living in an authoritarian society, but don't yet realise it.
If we are we need a new term for societies where freedom of speech and behaviour is severely restricted.
Has it entered your tiny tiny brain that when you have Vladimir Putin AND Ai Weiwei both saying the exact same thing: the West is having a Cultural Revolution, Woke is like Marxism, we are damaging our own societies, then there may just be a fucking problem? Maybe they have a point?
It seems Sky's Asian employees don't agree with you. They have complained about the offensive words being bleeped out by Sky and Sky have reacted accordingly by stopping doing so.
Of course we should hear this. It is a world of difference between someone using it as an insult and someone reporting its use.
Anyone being fired for using one of these words in the appropriate context I am sure would have a good claim in an employment tribunal. After all how would the claimant be able to report it or it be raised in the tribunal if not spoken. Common sense needs to apply.
If Johnson had had any sense at all (don't laugh there please, I did say 'if') then he would have cancelled the southern part of HS2 and kept the bits from Birmingham northwards.
If the eastern leg is cancelled, the Birmingham interchange station ain’t gonna get as much use. If you were to design from scratch, it would probably be scrapped.
This is the problem when you dick around with infrastructure projects half way through.
Oh and remind me to pop to Tesco's later would you? I have never agreed with boycotts of businesses in any way even if I think they are being stupid (which I don't in this case). It always gives me great pleasure to disrupt boycotts by patronising those establishments which are the target - all the better if I would not normally shop there.
Ah, but your falling into their trap. Obviously the people complaining are idiots, but Tescos know what they're doing. Their advert was played during Politics Live today. Very clever.
On another subject, another thing this shows is that local media isn't dead yet. My view - and this is blether rather than me knowing what I'm talking about - is that the MEN is more influential in GM than any of the national papers. I'm sure the same is true of the Echo on Merseyside, the Chronicle in the North East, the Yorkshire Post in Yorkshire, and so on. This makes me happy and slightly proud for reasons I can't quite place.
Jennifer Williams is a very fine journalist. I have been following her work for a while. Well worth reading.
Did you see Simon Reeve’s new show, ‘The Lakes’ at the weekend? All about Cumbria
I didn't even know of its existence. But thank you. I will look out for it.
We watched the first episode last night - featured a woman who hunts grey squirrels and makes Waistcoats, fishing tackle, and curry out of them!
King Cole, the bit after the Western Empire falls and before the Norman Conquest (especially pre-Alfred) is not the most popular in history for the general public.
What annoys me is every single damned documentary or drama (well, the vast majority) are fixated retelling stories of Henry VIII and Elizabeth II when (even just looking at England) there are so many more interesting and neglected events and characters to consider.
"The Vikings" did rather well from depicting the period, and the spin off "Vikings: Valhalla" covering the later period before the Norman conquest looks promising.
The period that seems to be lacking is the early post Roman period. In a generation or two, we abandoned roads, towns and the trappings of urban life, turning back to subsistence farming and more egalitarian social structures.
Perhaps we can find out about the latter in person, second time around?
The Dark Ages were only dark in the sense of the abandonment of Christianity, and also literacy. It happened between 409 and 450 or so, so a couple of generations. There seems surprisingly little evidence of resistance to going back to a simpler more sustainable communitarian lifestyle once the Romans stopped enforcing the alternative.
Who abandoned Christianity in 409->450 or so? Not really my period.
(or is that the joke I just edited out?) (Blockquote maybe borked warning)
The reason that there was little resistance was that when armed, competent invaders showed up, the locals had next to no military capability. Sharp swords make sharp arguments.
The process of robbing the locals when you felt like it, evolved into "You can't tax those peasants. They are my peasants"....
You could call that an egalitarian social structure. Depends which end of the sword you are holding, I suppose.
But who (or where) abandoned Christianity in 409->450 or so?
New one to me as well - in England, the Saxons who turned up to occupy senior management positions after the Romans divested their offshore holdings were initially pagan, but converted fairly rapidly to Christianity....
It seems very early for that.
Even the Edict of Milan (Constantine) wasn't until 313 (?) AD.
I've always associated Dark Ages with a period in either the second part of the first millenium 1000 AD, or a period in the middle ages, which is why I'm asking.
Dark Ages to me means that period when the absence of Christianity/literacy means there was a bit of a lacuna in recorded history. In England a relatively short period maybe AD400 - 800. We really know very little about the end of Roman Britain and the Germanic settlers had started to make their presence known. In Scandinavia it is different: not a lot is known pre 1000 or so, and in Sweden everything before 1200 might as well be Prehistory.
An interesting aside which I think I have mentioned before is that if you go to a Norwegian museum (The Archaeology Museum in Stavanger is a very good one) then you find that what hey call the Iron Age continues right the way through to beyond 700AD. The lack of Roman settlement in the peninsular meant that there is no natural break for the Iron Age as there is in the rest of Europe. So it carries on until the arrival of Christianity.
Not that it was ever in doubt but today saw the end of the England career of Alex Hales and the career of David Lloyd.
Nasser Hussain has been saying for years there must be more to Hales exclusion from England’s limited overs squad than meets the eye - and it was naming his dog Kevin!
Oh and remind me to pop to Tesco's later would you? I have never agreed with boycotts of businesses in any way even if I think they are being stupid (which I don't in this case). It always gives me great pleasure to disrupt boycotts by patronising those establishments which are the target - all the better if I would not normally shop there.
As an added bonus, you are now much less likely to contract COVID there.
Ian Dale on Politics Live says that members of staff at Sky were livid that they were cutting the sound on the Rafiq testimony today. Apparently Sky played it unfiltered after they had complaints from their staff.
Did they cover the bit when Rafiq criticised David Lloyd?
I haven't seen the testimony myself, just heard what Dale said about it.
On the Digital Spy thread, it was suggested that Lloyd tried to influence journalists into playing down the allegations.
Back when the Tiger Woods infidelity allegations came out (12 years ago now!) there was an interview with an ex-golfing journalist who had tried to write a story on Woods, many years before. Woods' management got to hear about it, and the golfing journalist was immediately an ex-golfing journalist. Others received threats about losing access if they wrote stories.
Threats to journalists can work, sadly.
Didn't some journalists have their careers ruined over Lance Armstrong?
It wouldn't surprise me. But wasn't that a slightly different situation? From memory, allegations had always surrounded Armstrong, and he had always been cleared. That makes writing 'the truth' somewhat harder - especially given his backstory wrt cancer.
Everybody, even if only tangentially involved, in pro cycling knew exactly what was going on with Lance. And every other GC contender before and after him. It was way more encompassing than just not reporting on Lance.
I remember watching the Tour in a shared house in the early 90's and someone there had been a keen amateur competitor but had given it up. She told me that they all had their little medical kits and that it was all fake. Rather naively I couldn't quite believe that they were all cheats, but she was of course right.
It isn't just cycling that had (or has) an Omerta though.
With regard to the cricket, I wonder if it isn't really drinking culture that is at the heart of this. If you aren't a drinker, then you can never be 'part of the team'. The clubhouse is never quite separated from the competitive sport.
What sad little people if the only way they can socialise is by getting pissed.
As a non-drinker I agree, but that's the way it is. You are immediately marked as an outsider.
If you also happen to have a different skin colour then so much the worse, it seems.
It's not so much getting pissed, but pub culture. The cameraderie of the pub, where real-world problems can be abandoned for a few hours, there is assumed freedom to talk about things in a way you normally wouldn't, etc. But equally difficult for someone from a different culture to fit in, or a non-drinker.
Oh and remind me to pop to Tesco's later would you? I have never agreed with boycotts of businesses in any way even if I think they are being stupid (which I don't in this case). It always gives me great pleasure to disrupt boycotts by patronising those establishments which are the target - all the better if I would not normally shop there.
As an added bonus, you are now much less likely to contract COVID there.
Hey I've got so many antibodies from 3 jabs plus having had the damn thing I reckon I could cure an infected person just by standing next to them
Ian Dale on Politics Live says that members of staff at Sky were livid that they were cutting the sound on the Rafiq testimony today. Apparently Sky played it unfiltered after they had complaints from their staff.
Did they cover the bit when Rafiq criticised David Lloyd?
I haven't seen the testimony myself, just heard what Dale said about it.
On the Digital Spy thread, it was suggested that Lloyd tried to influence journalists into playing down the allegations.
Back when the Tiger Woods infidelity allegations came out (12 years ago now!) there was an interview with an ex-golfing journalist who had tried to write a story on Woods, many years before. Woods' management got to hear about it, and the golfing journalist was immediately an ex-golfing journalist. Others received threats about losing access if they wrote stories.
Threats to journalists can work, sadly.
Didn't some journalists have their careers ruined over Lance Armstrong?
It wouldn't surprise me. But wasn't that a slightly different situation? From memory, allegations had always surrounded Armstrong, and he had always been cleared. That makes writing 'the truth' somewhat harder - especially given his backstory wrt cancer.
Everybody, even if only tangentially involved, in pro cycling knew exactly what was going on with Lance. And every other GC contender before and after him. It was way more encompassing than just not reporting on Lance.
I remember watching the Tour in a shared house in the early 90's and someone there had been a keen amateur competitor but had given it up. She told me that they all had their little medical kits and that it was all fake. Rather naively I couldn't quite believe that they were all cheats, but she was of course right.
By those on the inside doping isn't even thought of as 'cheating' as it has been a part of the sport's culture for so long. Just the methods and techniques change. I did injectable PEDs when I was a semi pro but I wish I had fully committed and done a lot more.
Steroids, epo and testosterone are still absolutely rife in amateur competition where the controls are much weaker.
I recall a clip of Dick Pound summarising a report he'd done on sports doping as one of the main issues is people dont really want the systems to work. That you can run countless tests and not catch people if deep down you dont want to.
Oh and remind me to pop to Tesco's later would you? I have never agreed with boycotts of businesses in any way even if I think they are being stupid (which I don't in this case). It always gives me great pleasure to disrupt boycotts by patronising those establishments which are the target - all the better if I would not normally shop there.
As an added bonus, you are now much less likely to contract COVID there.
Why? Have I missed something?
Just looked up their advert and its really fun. Anything using a Queen song generally is. Have I missed something offensive that should result in boycotts?
The reports on YCCC are awful, but so is the reporting. We do not need to have Paki and Monkey etc bleeped out - lets hear it. Its not being used as an abuse term now, its being used to call out the racists. Lets hear it so that we can shame them.
Naive. People have lost careers for using the n word, even when in context - eg to show how the word was used by someone else. That can now get you fired and cancelled
How is anyone to know if and when this arbitrary rule will be extended to the P word and beyond? They can’t. So they are understandably super cautious
I recall predicting many years ago that one day racist terms would be seen as much more toxic and offensive than swear words in the 1950s
And so it is. Perhaps that is a good thing, but my inner libertarian still thinks “they are just words, however stupid and ugly”
I don't see a binary distinction between words and actions. Words are the result of an action - the action of writing or speaking. And this action, the writing or speaking of words, can do real damage. It can do just as much damage as other types of actions, eg punching and slapping, sometimes more.
Do you think someone should lose their job for just quoting someone else using the N word?
Maybe. I'd have to know the circumstances. Also 'lose their job' would need clarifying. Eg fired vs feeling shamed out vs loss of freelance income, these are different.
General point, though, is that I sometimes hear "it's only words" as if words exist in a separate milder dimension to actions, and I don't really view it like that myself.
You're so tediously myopic. Do you never do any research? Explore? Find out stuff? Or is it just easier to sit in a contented little bien pensant bubble in your leafy Belsize Park pub.
I'm bored of educating you, and I shall stop interacting with you shortly. But there are countless examples of people being sacked for using the N word
One of my favourites, a professor replaced for using a Chinese word that SOUNDS like the N word
"In a controversial decision, the University of Southern California replaced a professor of business communication with another instructor in one of his classes for saying a Chinese word that sounds like an English slur."
There's hundreds. That's 2 minutes Googling. Which you are apparently unable to do
I'm aware there are sometimes false accusations of racism which can lead to injustices to the individuals on the receiving end. However imo the problem of real and actual racism in society dwarfs that of false accusations of racism or hair trigger sensitivity to it. So I simply cannot get as animated as you do about the latter stuff. Indeed I find it pretty odd when people do. I also disagree that 'words' are inherently and always less harmful than actions and that the 'policing' of them is an affront to liberty. I find that view pretty odd too. So, you know, fine, you plough on in your 'space', but don't pretend you're educating anybody on this. All you're doing is riding a hobby horse.
There is a clip going round of AI Wei Wei. He says that we are already living in an authoritarian society, but don't yet realise it.
If we are we need a new term for societies where freedom of speech and behaviour is severely restricted.
Has it entered your tiny tiny brain that when you have Vladimir Putin AND Ai Weiwei both saying the exact same thing: the West is having a Cultural Revolution, Woke is like Marxism, we are damaging our own societies, then there may just be a fucking problem? Maybe they have a point?
Excitable reactionary bloke who thinks the West is committing suicide so that men can go into women's toilets argues with a slightly calmer and less reactionary bloke who rather doubts this. He mentions brain size for some odd reason. And Vladimir Putin.
Quite funny that PB Tories are representing Ai Weiei as a critic of political correctness, when in fact he was comparing Donald Trump to Chairman Mao!
Oh dear. You didn't actually watch the clip, did you?
Ian Dale on Politics Live says that members of staff at Sky were livid that they were cutting the sound on the Rafiq testimony today. Apparently Sky played it unfiltered after they had complaints from their staff.
Did they cover the bit when Rafiq criticised David Lloyd?
I haven't seen the testimony myself, just heard what Dale said about it.
On the Digital Spy thread, it was suggested that Lloyd tried to influence journalists into playing down the allegations.
Back when the Tiger Woods infidelity allegations came out (12 years ago now!) there was an interview with an ex-golfing journalist who had tried to write a story on Woods, many years before. Woods' management got to hear about it, and the golfing journalist was immediately an ex-golfing journalist. Others received threats about losing access if they wrote stories.
Threats to journalists can work, sadly.
Didn't some journalists have their careers ruined over Lance Armstrong?
It wouldn't surprise me. But wasn't that a slightly different situation? From memory, allegations had always surrounded Armstrong, and he had always been cleared. That makes writing 'the truth' somewhat harder - especially given his backstory wrt cancer.
Everybody, even if only tangentially involved, in pro cycling knew exactly what was going on with Lance. And every other GC contender before and after him. It was way more encompassing than just not reporting on Lance.
I remember watching the Tour in a shared house in the early 90's and someone there had been a keen amateur competitor but had given it up. She told me that they all had their little medical kits and that it was all fake. Rather naively I couldn't quite believe that they were all cheats, but she was of course right.
It isn't just cycling that had (or has) an Omerta though.
With regard to the cricket, I wonder if it isn't really drinking culture that is at the heart of this. If you aren't a drinker, then you can never be 'part of the team'. The clubhouse is never quite separated from the competitive sport.
What sad little people if the only way they can socialise is by getting pissed.
As a non-drinker I agree, but that's the way it is. You are immediately marked as an outsider.
If you also happen to have a different skin colour then so much the worse, it seems.
It's not so much getting pissed, but pub culture. The cameraderie of the pub, where real-world problems can be abandoned for a few hours, there is assumed freedom to talk about things in a way you normally wouldn't, etc. But equally difficult for someone from a different culture to fit in, or a non-drinker.
It's not pub culture it is British culture. As an example, go online to any greetings card company. 80% of the cards will be something to do with drinking extraordinary amounts (usually of gin). It is something that we do and we do to excess. Perhaps the reason was the pub opening times era when people felt obligated to drink as much as possible as their time was limited to do so.
Drinking too much is seen as somehow heroic and not sordid - look at the synonyms - plastered, sozzled, battered, blotto, bladdered, caned, off your face (can be used for other drugs), rat-arsed, slaughtered, etc, etc.
It is a rite of passage for Brits. That cafe culture never arrived.
Actually I was chatting to a friend the other day whose daughter had just started Uni and he said how he expected her to get drunk and was in a way relieved that it was a relatively "healthy" way of letting off steam and, er, getting off your face.
Ian Dale on Politics Live says that members of staff at Sky were livid that they were cutting the sound on the Rafiq testimony today. Apparently Sky played it unfiltered after they had complaints from their staff.
Did they cover the bit when Rafiq criticised David Lloyd?
I haven't seen the testimony myself, just heard what Dale said about it.
On the Digital Spy thread, it was suggested that Lloyd tried to influence journalists into playing down the allegations.
Back when the Tiger Woods infidelity allegations came out (12 years ago now!) there was an interview with an ex-golfing journalist who had tried to write a story on Woods, many years before. Woods' management got to hear about it, and the golfing journalist was immediately an ex-golfing journalist. Others received threats about losing access if they wrote stories.
Threats to journalists can work, sadly.
Didn't some journalists have their careers ruined over Lance Armstrong?
It wouldn't surprise me. But wasn't that a slightly different situation? From memory, allegations had always surrounded Armstrong, and he had always been cleared. That makes writing 'the truth' somewhat harder - especially given his backstory wrt cancer.
Everybody, even if only tangentially involved, in pro cycling knew exactly what was going on with Lance. And every other GC contender before and after him. It was way more encompassing than just not reporting on Lance.
I remember watching the Tour in a shared house in the early 90's and someone there had been a keen amateur competitor but had given it up. She told me that they all had their little medical kits and that it was all fake. Rather naively I couldn't quite believe that they were all cheats, but she was of course right.
It isn't just cycling that had (or has) an Omerta though.
With regard to the cricket, I wonder if it isn't really drinking culture that is at the heart of this. If you aren't a drinker, then you can never be 'part of the team'. The clubhouse is never quite separated from the competitive sport.
What sad little people if the only way they can socialise is by getting pissed.
As a non-drinker I agree, but that's the way it is. You are immediately marked as an outsider.
If you also happen to have a different skin colour then so much the worse, it seems.
It's not so much getting pissed, but pub culture. The cameraderie of the pub, where real-world problems can be abandoned for a few hours, there is assumed freedom to talk about things in a way you normally wouldn't, etc. But equally difficult for someone from a different culture to fit in, or a non-drinker.
I am sure this is an issue. I've seen Muslim football fans awkwardly watching a game in a pub (because they couldn't see it anywhere else?). Surrounded by booze, and boozers, and not exactly comfortable
Oh and remind me to pop to Tesco's later would you? I have never agreed with boycotts of businesses in any way even if I think they are being stupid (which I don't in this case). It always gives me great pleasure to disrupt boycotts by patronising those establishments which are the target - all the better if I would not normally shop there.
As an added bonus, you are now much less likely to contract COVID there.
Why? Have I missed something?
Just looked up their advert and its really fun. Anything using a Queen song generally is. Have I missed something offensive that should result in boycotts?
All the anti-vaxxers are up in arms because Santa shows a covid passport. Apparently this is promoting discrimination and segregation according to some of the 'leading' idiots. The advert is already the most complained about this year and there are lots of calls for a boycott.
Hence my comment that I will make a point of going to my nearest Tesco for my next shop.
If Johnson had had any sense at all (don't laugh there please, I did say 'if') then he would have cancelled the southern part of HS2 and kept the bits from Birmingham northwards.
If the eastern leg is cancelled, the Birmingham interchange station ain’t gonna get as much use. If you were to design from scratch, it would probably be scrapped.
This is the problem when you dick around with infrastructure projects half way through.
Even a non-details idiot like Johnson wouldn't cancel the Southern section of HS2. Too late. They are literally tunnelling the ground.
On another subject, another thing this shows is that local media isn't dead yet. My view - and this is blether rather than me knowing what I'm talking about - is that the MEN is more influential in GM than any of the national papers. I'm sure the same is true of the Echo on Merseyside, the Chronicle in the North East, the Yorkshire Post in Yorkshire, and so on. This makes me happy and slightly proud for reasons I can't quite place.
Jennifer Williams is a very fine journalist. I have been following her work for a while. Well worth reading.
Did you see Simon Reeve’s new show, ‘The Lakes’ at the weekend? All about Cumbria
The teenage (I think) lad who was carrying on the farm after his parents had died within a year of each other was a bit of an eye opener.
Ian Dale on Politics Live says that members of staff at Sky were livid that they were cutting the sound on the Rafiq testimony today. Apparently Sky played it unfiltered after they had complaints from their staff.
Did they cover the bit when Rafiq criticised David Lloyd?
I haven't seen the testimony myself, just heard what Dale said about it.
On the Digital Spy thread, it was suggested that Lloyd tried to influence journalists into playing down the allegations.
Back when the Tiger Woods infidelity allegations came out (12 years ago now!) there was an interview with an ex-golfing journalist who had tried to write a story on Woods, many years before. Woods' management got to hear about it, and the golfing journalist was immediately an ex-golfing journalist. Others received threats about losing access if they wrote stories.
Threats to journalists can work, sadly.
Didn't some journalists have their careers ruined over Lance Armstrong?
It wouldn't surprise me. But wasn't that a slightly different situation? From memory, allegations had always surrounded Armstrong, and he had always been cleared. That makes writing 'the truth' somewhat harder - especially given his backstory wrt cancer.
Everybody, even if only tangentially involved, in pro cycling knew exactly what was going on with Lance. And every other GC contender before and after him. It was way more encompassing than just not reporting on Lance.
I remember watching the Tour in a shared house in the early 90's and someone there had been a keen amateur competitor but had given it up. She told me that they all had their little medical kits and that it was all fake. Rather naively I couldn't quite believe that they were all cheats, but she was of course right.
It isn't just cycling that had (or has) an Omerta though.
With regard to the cricket, I wonder if it isn't really drinking culture that is at the heart of this. If you aren't a drinker, then you can never be 'part of the team'. The clubhouse is never quite separated from the competitive sport.
What sad little people if the only way they can socialise is by getting pissed.
As a non-drinker I agree, but that's the way it is. You are immediately marked as an outsider.
If you also happen to have a different skin colour then so much the worse, it seems.
It's not so much getting pissed, but pub culture. The cameraderie of the pub, where real-world problems can be abandoned for a few hours, there is assumed freedom to talk about things in a way you normally wouldn't, etc. But equally difficult for someone from a different culture to fit in, or a non-drinker.
It's not pub culture it is British culture. As an example, go online to any greetings card company. 80% of the cards will be something to do with drinking extraordinary amounts (usually of gin). It is something that we do and we do to excess. Perhaps the reason was the pub opening times era when people felt obligated to drink as much as possible as their time was limited to do so.
Drinking too much is seen as somehow heroic and not sordid - look at the synonyms - plastered, sozzled, battered, blotto, bladdered, caned, off your face (can be used for other drugs), rat-arsed, slaughtered, etc, etc.
It is a rite of passage for Brits. That cafe culture never arrived.
Actually I was chatting to a friend the other day whose daughter had just started Uni and he said how he expected her to get drunk and was in a way relieved that it was a relatively "healthy" way of letting off steam and, er, getting off your face.
It is less salient now, however. Kids today drink far less than we did when we were idiot youths. That is born out in the data
"Nearly 30% of young people in England do not drink, study finds
"Research shows greater proportion of 16- to 24-year-olds shunning alcohol entirely"
Drinking too much is seen as somehow heroic and not sordid - look at the synonyms - plastered, sozzled, battered, blotto, bladdered, caned, off your face (can be used for other drugs), rat-arsed, slaughtered, etc, etc.
It is a rite of passage for Brits. That cafe culture never arrived.
Perhaps we should do the same for cafe culture and come up with a range of words to describe being overcaffeinated.
Oh and remind me to pop to Tesco's later would you? I have never agreed with boycotts of businesses in any way even if I think they are being stupid (which I don't in this case). It always gives me great pleasure to disrupt boycotts by patronising those establishments which are the target - all the better if I would not normally shop there.
As an added bonus, you are now much less likely to contract COVID there.
Why? Have I missed something?
Just looked up their advert and its really fun. Anything using a Queen song generally is. Have I missed something offensive that should result in boycotts?
All the anti-vaxxers are up in arms because Santa shows a covid passport. Apparently this is promoting discrimination and segregation according to some of the 'leading' idiots. The advert is already the most complained about this year and there are lots of calls for a boycott.
Hence my comment that I will make a point of going to my nearest Tesco for my next shop.
If Johnson had had any sense at all (don't laugh there please, I did say 'if') then he would have cancelled the southern part of HS2 and kept the bits from Birmingham northwards.
If the eastern leg is cancelled, the Birmingham interchange station ain’t gonna get as much use. If you were to design from scratch, it would probably be scrapped.
This is the problem when you dick around with infrastructure projects half way through.
Had the Transport Ministry had a sudden influx of staff from Defence Procurement ?
Ian Dale on Politics Live says that members of staff at Sky were livid that they were cutting the sound on the Rafiq testimony today. Apparently Sky played it unfiltered after they had complaints from their staff.
Did they cover the bit when Rafiq criticised David Lloyd?
I haven't seen the testimony myself, just heard what Dale said about it.
On the Digital Spy thread, it was suggested that Lloyd tried to influence journalists into playing down the allegations.
Back when the Tiger Woods infidelity allegations came out (12 years ago now!) there was an interview with an ex-golfing journalist who had tried to write a story on Woods, many years before. Woods' management got to hear about it, and the golfing journalist was immediately an ex-golfing journalist. Others received threats about losing access if they wrote stories.
Threats to journalists can work, sadly.
Didn't some journalists have their careers ruined over Lance Armstrong?
It wouldn't surprise me. But wasn't that a slightly different situation? From memory, allegations had always surrounded Armstrong, and he had always been cleared. That makes writing 'the truth' somewhat harder - especially given his backstory wrt cancer.
Everybody, even if only tangentially involved, in pro cycling knew exactly what was going on with Lance. And every other GC contender before and after him. It was way more encompassing than just not reporting on Lance.
I remember watching the Tour in a shared house in the early 90's and someone there had been a keen amateur competitor but had given it up. She told me that they all had their little medical kits and that it was all fake. Rather naively I couldn't quite believe that they were all cheats, but she was of course right.
It isn't just cycling that had (or has) an Omerta though.
With regard to the cricket, I wonder if it isn't really drinking culture that is at the heart of this. If you aren't a drinker, then you can never be 'part of the team'. The clubhouse is never quite separated from the competitive sport.
What sad little people if the only way they can socialise is by getting pissed.
As a non-drinker I agree, but that's the way it is. You are immediately marked as an outsider.
If you also happen to have a different skin colour then so much the worse, it seems.
It's not so much getting pissed, but pub culture. The cameraderie of the pub, where real-world problems can be abandoned for a few hours, there is assumed freedom to talk about things in a way you normally wouldn't, etc. But equally difficult for someone from a different culture to fit in, or a non-drinker.
I am sure this is an issue. I've seen Muslim football fans awkwardly watching a game in a pub (because they couldn't see it anywhere else?). Surrounded by booze, and boozers, and not exactly comfortable
How do you bridge the gulf?
And yet I have been out with many Muslim friends over the years who were quite happy to sit in the pub and drink alcohol free or soft drinks. I assume they were not as committed as some but they were religious enough to not want to drink alcohol so I assumed that was kind of the norm - don't drink it yourself but no issue with others drinking it.
On another subject, another thing this shows is that local media isn't dead yet. My view - and this is blether rather than me knowing what I'm talking about - is that the MEN is more influential in GM than any of the national papers. I'm sure the same is true of the Echo on Merseyside, the Chronicle in the North East, the Yorkshire Post in Yorkshire, and so on. This makes me happy and slightly proud for reasons I can't quite place.
Jennifer Williams is a very fine journalist. I have been following her work for a while. Well worth reading.
Did you see Simon Reeve’s new show, ‘The Lakes’ at the weekend? All about Cumbria
The teenage (I think) lad who was carrying on the farm after his parents had died within a year of each other was a bit of an eye opener.
If Johnson had had any sense at all (don't laugh there please, I did say 'if') then he would have cancelled the southern part of HS2 and kept the bits from Birmingham northwards.
If the eastern leg is cancelled, the Birmingham interchange station ain’t gonna get as much use. If you were to design from scratch, it would probably be scrapped.
This is the problem when you dick around with infrastructure projects half way through.
Had the Transport Ministry had a sudden influx of staff from Defence Procurement ?
The eastern leg hasn't been cancelled, it's merely be shortened to a field somewhere near Eastern Midlands Airport...
Oh and remind me to pop to Tesco's later would you? I have never agreed with boycotts of businesses in any way even if I think they are being stupid (which I don't in this case). It always gives me great pleasure to disrupt boycotts by patronising those establishments which are the target - all the better if I would not normally shop there.
As an added bonus, you are now much less likely to contract COVID there.
Why? Have I missed something?
Just looked up their advert and its really fun. Anything using a Queen song generally is. Have I missed something offensive that should result in boycotts?
All the anti-vaxxers are up in arms because Santa shows a covid passport. Apparently this is promoting discrimination and segregation according to some of the 'leading' idiots. The advert is already the most complained about this year and there are lots of calls for a boycott.
Hence my comment that I will make a point of going to my nearest Tesco for my next shop.
So they believe in Santa but not Covid? 🤦♂️
Oh don't please. My brain is already melting trying to get my head around this 'logic'.
On another subject, another thing this shows is that local media isn't dead yet. My view - and this is blether rather than me knowing what I'm talking about - is that the MEN is more influential in GM than any of the national papers. I'm sure the same is true of the Echo on Merseyside, the Chronicle in the North East, the Yorkshire Post in Yorkshire, and so on. This makes me happy and slightly proud for reasons I can't quite place.
Jennifer Williams is a very fine journalist. I have been following her work for a while. Well worth reading.
Did you see Simon Reeve’s new show, ‘The Lakes’ at the weekend? All about Cumbria
The teenage (I think) lad who was carrying on the farm after his parents had died within a year of each other was a bit of an eye opener.
Oh and remind me to pop to Tesco's later would you? I have never agreed with boycotts of businesses in any way even if I think they are being stupid (which I don't in this case). It always gives me great pleasure to disrupt boycotts by patronising those establishments which are the target - all the better if I would not normally shop there.
As an added bonus, you are now much less likely to contract COVID there.
Why? Have I missed something?
Just looked up their advert and its really fun. Anything using a Queen song generally is. Have I missed something offensive that should result in boycotts?
All the anti-vaxxers are up in arms because Santa shows a covid passport. Apparently this is promoting discrimination and segregation according to some of the 'leading' idiots. The advert is already the most complained about this year and there are lots of calls for a boycott.
Hence my comment that I will make a point of going to my nearest Tesco for my next shop.
So they believe in Santa but not Covid? 🤦♂️
It's because they believe in Santa that they don't believe in Covid. Their brains can only cope with 1 thing at a time.
Ian Dale on Politics Live says that members of staff at Sky were livid that they were cutting the sound on the Rafiq testimony today. Apparently Sky played it unfiltered after they had complaints from their staff.
Did they cover the bit when Rafiq criticised David Lloyd?
I haven't seen the testimony myself, just heard what Dale said about it.
On the Digital Spy thread, it was suggested that Lloyd tried to influence journalists into playing down the allegations.
Back when the Tiger Woods infidelity allegations came out (12 years ago now!) there was an interview with an ex-golfing journalist who had tried to write a story on Woods, many years before. Woods' management got to hear about it, and the golfing journalist was immediately an ex-golfing journalist. Others received threats about losing access if they wrote stories.
Threats to journalists can work, sadly.
Didn't some journalists have their careers ruined over Lance Armstrong?
It wouldn't surprise me. But wasn't that a slightly different situation? From memory, allegations had always surrounded Armstrong, and he had always been cleared. That makes writing 'the truth' somewhat harder - especially given his backstory wrt cancer.
Everybody, even if only tangentially involved, in pro cycling knew exactly what was going on with Lance. And every other GC contender before and after him. It was way more encompassing than just not reporting on Lance.
I remember watching the Tour in a shared house in the early 90's and someone there had been a keen amateur competitor but had given it up. She told me that they all had their little medical kits and that it was all fake. Rather naively I couldn't quite believe that they were all cheats, but she was of course right.
It isn't just cycling that had (or has) an Omerta though.
With regard to the cricket, I wonder if it isn't really drinking culture that is at the heart of this. If you aren't a drinker, then you can never be 'part of the team'. The clubhouse is never quite separated from the competitive sport.
What sad little people if the only way they can socialise is by getting pissed.
As a non-drinker I agree, but that's the way it is. You are immediately marked as an outsider.
If you also happen to have a different skin colour then so much the worse, it seems.
It's not so much getting pissed, but pub culture. The cameraderie of the pub, where real-world problems can be abandoned for a few hours, there is assumed freedom to talk about things in a way you normally wouldn't, etc. But equally difficult for someone from a different culture to fit in, or a non-drinker.
I think there's a subtle distinction between pub culture and drinking culture, even when they take place in the same venue.
It is one thing sitting in a pub with a bunch of mates and not drinking. The rules of the game are clear there and there's no compulsion involved.
It is the built-in expectation in the culture of the 'team' that causes the issue. The 'buying everyone drinks if you score 50' was a good example. What if you just want to play a sport?
Ian Dale on Politics Live says that members of staff at Sky were livid that they were cutting the sound on the Rafiq testimony today. Apparently Sky played it unfiltered after they had complaints from their staff.
Did they cover the bit when Rafiq criticised David Lloyd?
I haven't seen the testimony myself, just heard what Dale said about it.
On the Digital Spy thread, it was suggested that Lloyd tried to influence journalists into playing down the allegations.
Back when the Tiger Woods infidelity allegations came out (12 years ago now!) there was an interview with an ex-golfing journalist who had tried to write a story on Woods, many years before. Woods' management got to hear about it, and the golfing journalist was immediately an ex-golfing journalist. Others received threats about losing access if they wrote stories.
Threats to journalists can work, sadly.
Didn't some journalists have their careers ruined over Lance Armstrong?
It wouldn't surprise me. But wasn't that a slightly different situation? From memory, allegations had always surrounded Armstrong, and he had always been cleared. That makes writing 'the truth' somewhat harder - especially given his backstory wrt cancer.
Everybody, even if only tangentially involved, in pro cycling knew exactly what was going on with Lance. And every other GC contender before and after him. It was way more encompassing than just not reporting on Lance.
I remember watching the Tour in a shared house in the early 90's and someone there had been a keen amateur competitor but had given it up. She told me that they all had their little medical kits and that it was all fake. Rather naively I couldn't quite believe that they were all cheats, but she was of course right.
It isn't just cycling that had (or has) an Omerta though.
With regard to the cricket, I wonder if it isn't really drinking culture that is at the heart of this. If you aren't a drinker, then you can never be 'part of the team'. The clubhouse is never quite separated from the competitive sport.
What sad little people if the only way they can socialise is by getting pissed.
As a non-drinker I agree, but that's the way it is. You are immediately marked as an outsider.
If you also happen to have a different skin colour then so much the worse, it seems.
It's not so much getting pissed, but pub culture. The cameraderie of the pub, where real-world problems can be abandoned for a few hours, there is assumed freedom to talk about things in a way you normally wouldn't, etc. But equally difficult for someone from a different culture to fit in, or a non-drinker.
It's not pub culture it is British culture. As an example, go online to any greetings card company. 80% of the cards will be something to do with drinking extraordinary amounts (usually of gin). It is something that we do and we do to excess. Perhaps the reason was the pub opening times era when people felt obligated to drink as much as possible as their time was limited to do so.
Drinking too much is seen as somehow heroic and not sordid - look at the synonyms - plastered, sozzled, battered, blotto, bladdered, caned, off your face (can be used for other drugs), rat-arsed, slaughtered, etc, etc.
It is a rite of passage for Brits. That cafe culture never arrived.
Actually I was chatting to a friend the other day whose daughter had just started Uni and he said how he expected her to get drunk and was in a way relieved that it was a relatively "healthy" way of letting off steam and, er, getting off your face.
It is less salient now, however. Kids today drink far less than we did when we were idiot youths. That is born out in the data
"Nearly 30% of young people in England do not drink, study finds
"Research shows greater proportion of 16- to 24-year-olds shunning alcohol entirely"
My friends who work in the city say the same - youngsters just don’t get ranked up like we used to. Good for them really, although insta might have made them excessively vain instead
If Johnson had had any sense at all (don't laugh there please, I did say 'if') then he would have cancelled the southern part of HS2 and kept the bits from Birmingham northwards.
If the eastern leg is cancelled, the Birmingham interchange station ain’t gonna get as much use. If you were to design from scratch, it would probably be scrapped.
This is the problem when you dick around with infrastructure projects half way through.
Even a non-details idiot like Johnson wouldn't cancel the Southern section of HS2. Too late. They are literally tunnelling the ground.
I can see a hundred hi viz jacketed workman beavering away at HS2 from where I sit typing this. They are in the cutting that emerges from Euston. It is, as we have discussed, a scene from Dickens' London. The Arrival of The Railway
They work at night, as well. The burning floodlights and fierce blue flames and occasional glitter-rock cascades of golden sparks are rather dramatic, and picturesque
Ian Dale on Politics Live says that members of staff at Sky were livid that they were cutting the sound on the Rafiq testimony today. Apparently Sky played it unfiltered after they had complaints from their staff.
Did they cover the bit when Rafiq criticised David Lloyd?
I haven't seen the testimony myself, just heard what Dale said about it.
On the Digital Spy thread, it was suggested that Lloyd tried to influence journalists into playing down the allegations.
Back when the Tiger Woods infidelity allegations came out (12 years ago now!) there was an interview with an ex-golfing journalist who had tried to write a story on Woods, many years before. Woods' management got to hear about it, and the golfing journalist was immediately an ex-golfing journalist. Others received threats about losing access if they wrote stories.
Threats to journalists can work, sadly.
Didn't some journalists have their careers ruined over Lance Armstrong?
It wouldn't surprise me. But wasn't that a slightly different situation? From memory, allegations had always surrounded Armstrong, and he had always been cleared. That makes writing 'the truth' somewhat harder - especially given his backstory wrt cancer.
Everybody, even if only tangentially involved, in pro cycling knew exactly what was going on with Lance. And every other GC contender before and after him. It was way more encompassing than just not reporting on Lance.
I remember watching the Tour in a shared house in the early 90's and someone there had been a keen amateur competitor but had given it up. She told me that they all had their little medical kits and that it was all fake. Rather naively I couldn't quite believe that they were all cheats, but she was of course right.
It isn't just cycling that had (or has) an Omerta though.
With regard to the cricket, I wonder if it isn't really drinking culture that is at the heart of this. If you aren't a drinker, then you can never be 'part of the team'. The clubhouse is never quite separated from the competitive sport.
What sad little people if the only way they can socialise is by getting pissed.
As a non-drinker I agree, but that's the way it is. You are immediately marked as an outsider.
If you also happen to have a different skin colour then so much the worse, it seems.
It's not so much getting pissed, but pub culture. The cameraderie of the pub, where real-world problems can be abandoned for a few hours, there is assumed freedom to talk about things in a way you normally wouldn't, etc. But equally difficult for someone from a different culture to fit in, or a non-drinker.
It's not pub culture it is British culture. As an example, go online to any greetings card company. 80% of the cards will be something to do with drinking extraordinary amounts (usually of gin). It is something that we do and we do to excess. Perhaps the reason was the pub opening times era when people felt obligated to drink as much as possible as their time was limited to do so.
Drinking too much is seen as somehow heroic and not sordid - look at the synonyms - plastered, sozzled, battered, blotto, bladdered, caned, off your face (can be used for other drugs), rat-arsed, slaughtered, etc, etc.
It is a rite of passage for Brits. That cafe culture never arrived.
Actually I was chatting to a friend the other day whose daughter had just started Uni and he said how he expected her to get drunk and was in a way relieved that it was a relatively "healthy" way of letting off steam and, er, getting off your face.
It is less salient now, however. Kids today drink far less than we did when we were idiot youths. That is born out in the data
"Nearly 30% of young people in England do not drink, study finds
"Research shows greater proportion of 16- to 24-year-olds shunning alcohol entirely"
Yep my daughter doesn't drink. Certainly not due to her parents but she doesn't like the taste of alcohol.
The thought she was somehow missing out was, I must admit, tempered by the additional thought that she was less likely to get dunk and be taken advantage of.
Ian Dale on Politics Live says that members of staff at Sky were livid that they were cutting the sound on the Rafiq testimony today. Apparently Sky played it unfiltered after they had complaints from their staff.
Did they cover the bit when Rafiq criticised David Lloyd?
I haven't seen the testimony myself, just heard what Dale said about it.
On the Digital Spy thread, it was suggested that Lloyd tried to influence journalists into playing down the allegations.
Back when the Tiger Woods infidelity allegations came out (12 years ago now!) there was an interview with an ex-golfing journalist who had tried to write a story on Woods, many years before. Woods' management got to hear about it, and the golfing journalist was immediately an ex-golfing journalist. Others received threats about losing access if they wrote stories.
Threats to journalists can work, sadly.
Didn't some journalists have their careers ruined over Lance Armstrong?
It wouldn't surprise me. But wasn't that a slightly different situation? From memory, allegations had always surrounded Armstrong, and he had always been cleared. That makes writing 'the truth' somewhat harder - especially given his backstory wrt cancer.
Everybody, even if only tangentially involved, in pro cycling knew exactly what was going on with Lance. And every other GC contender before and after him. It was way more encompassing than just not reporting on Lance.
I remember watching the Tour in a shared house in the early 90's and someone there had been a keen amateur competitor but had given it up. She told me that they all had their little medical kits and that it was all fake. Rather naively I couldn't quite believe that they were all cheats, but she was of course right.
It isn't just cycling that had (or has) an Omerta though.
With regard to the cricket, I wonder if it isn't really drinking culture that is at the heart of this. If you aren't a drinker, then you can never be 'part of the team'. The clubhouse is never quite separated from the competitive sport.
What sad little people if the only way they can socialise is by getting pissed.
As a non-drinker I agree, but that's the way it is. You are immediately marked as an outsider.
If you also happen to have a different skin colour then so much the worse, it seems.
It's not so much getting pissed, but pub culture. The cameraderie of the pub, where real-world problems can be abandoned for a few hours, there is assumed freedom to talk about things in a way you normally wouldn't, etc. But equally difficult for someone from a different culture to fit in, or a non-drinker.
I have just terminated a 15 year sabbatical from drink, and I can report that nobody who isn't a complete, utter and total twat from whose company you should run a mile in any case, minds or notices whether you drink or not. There are people like that - I come across them more in the sailing world than elsewhere - but they are easily spotted and avoided. The trouble is I imagine pro cricket has a disproportionate number of them.
Ian Dale on Politics Live says that members of staff at Sky were livid that they were cutting the sound on the Rafiq testimony today. Apparently Sky played it unfiltered after they had complaints from their staff.
Did they cover the bit when Rafiq criticised David Lloyd?
I haven't seen the testimony myself, just heard what Dale said about it.
On the Digital Spy thread, it was suggested that Lloyd tried to influence journalists into playing down the allegations.
Back when the Tiger Woods infidelity allegations came out (12 years ago now!) there was an interview with an ex-golfing journalist who had tried to write a story on Woods, many years before. Woods' management got to hear about it, and the golfing journalist was immediately an ex-golfing journalist. Others received threats about losing access if they wrote stories.
Threats to journalists can work, sadly.
Didn't some journalists have their careers ruined over Lance Armstrong?
It wouldn't surprise me. But wasn't that a slightly different situation? From memory, allegations had always surrounded Armstrong, and he had always been cleared. That makes writing 'the truth' somewhat harder - especially given his backstory wrt cancer.
Everybody, even if only tangentially involved, in pro cycling knew exactly what was going on with Lance. And every other GC contender before and after him. It was way more encompassing than just not reporting on Lance.
I remember watching the Tour in a shared house in the early 90's and someone there had been a keen amateur competitor but had given it up. She told me that they all had their little medical kits and that it was all fake. Rather naively I couldn't quite believe that they were all cheats, but she was of course right.
It isn't just cycling that had (or has) an Omerta though.
With regard to the cricket, I wonder if it isn't really drinking culture that is at the heart of this. If you aren't a drinker, then you can never be 'part of the team'. The clubhouse is never quite separated from the competitive sport.
What sad little people if the only way they can socialise is by getting pissed.
As a non-drinker I agree, but that's the way it is. You are immediately marked as an outsider.
If you also happen to have a different skin colour then so much the worse, it seems.
It's not so much getting pissed, but pub culture. The cameraderie of the pub, where real-world problems can be abandoned for a few hours, there is assumed freedom to talk about things in a way you normally wouldn't, etc. But equally difficult for someone from a different culture to fit in, or a non-drinker.
It's not pub culture it is British culture. As an example, go online to any greetings card company. 80% of the cards will be something to do with drinking extraordinary amounts (usually of gin). It is something that we do and we do to excess. Perhaps the reason was the pub opening times era when people felt obligated to drink as much as possible as their time was limited to do so.
Drinking too much is seen as somehow heroic and not sordid - look at the synonyms - plastered, sozzled, battered, blotto, bladdered, caned, off your face (can be used for other drugs), rat-arsed, slaughtered, etc, etc.
It is a rite of passage for Brits. That cafe culture never arrived.
Actually I was chatting to a friend the other day whose daughter had just started Uni and he said how he expected her to get drunk and was in a way relieved that it was a relatively "healthy" way of letting off steam and, er, getting off your face.
It is less salient now, however. Kids today drink far less than we did when we were idiot youths. That is born out in the data
"Nearly 30% of young people in England do not drink, study finds
"Research shows greater proportion of 16- to 24-year-olds shunning alcohol entirely"
Yep my daughter doesn't drink. Certainly not due to her parents but she doesn't like the taste of alcohol.
The thought she was somehow missing out was, I must admit, tempered by the additional thought that she was less likely to get dunk and be taken advantage of.
Ditto my teenage daughters. By the time I was their age I was knocking back half bottles of whisky, no problem
How the U.S. Hid an Airstrike That Killed Dozens of Civilians in Syria https://www.nytimes.com/2021/11/13/us/us-airstrikes-civilian-deaths.html The military never conducted an independent investigation into a 2019 bombing on the last bastion of the Islamic State, despite concerns about a secretive commando force.
Oh and remind me to pop to Tesco's later would you? I have never agreed with boycotts of businesses in any way even if I think they are being stupid (which I don't in this case). It always gives me great pleasure to disrupt boycotts by patronising those establishments which are the target - all the better if I would not normally shop there.
As an added bonus, you are now much less likely to contract COVID there.
Why? Have I missed something?
Just looked up their advert and its really fun. Anything using a Queen song generally is. Have I missed something offensive that should result in boycotts?
A double vaxxed Santa has led to a boycott by anti-vaxxers or summat.
Oh and remind me to pop to Tesco's later would you? I have never agreed with boycotts of businesses in any way even if I think they are being stupid (which I don't in this case). It always gives me great pleasure to disrupt boycotts by patronising those establishments which are the target - all the better if I would not normally shop there.
As an added bonus, you are now much less likely to contract COVID there.
Why? Have I missed something?
Just looked up their advert and its really fun. Anything using a Queen song generally is. Have I missed something offensive that should result in boycotts?
All the anti-vaxxers are up in arms because Santa shows a covid passport. Apparently this is promoting discrimination and segregation according to some of the 'leading' idiots. The advert is already the most complained about this year and there are lots of calls for a boycott.
Hence my comment that I will make a point of going to my nearest Tesco for my next shop.
So they believe in Santa but not Covid? 🤦♂️
It's because they believe in Santa that they don't believe in Covid. Their brains can only cope with 1 thing at a time.
Oooo dangerous ground there sir. Are you trying to say Santa doesn't exist? That's fighting talk round my parts.
Ian Dale on Politics Live says that members of staff at Sky were livid that they were cutting the sound on the Rafiq testimony today. Apparently Sky played it unfiltered after they had complaints from their staff.
Did they cover the bit when Rafiq criticised David Lloyd?
I haven't seen the testimony myself, just heard what Dale said about it.
On the Digital Spy thread, it was suggested that Lloyd tried to influence journalists into playing down the allegations.
Back when the Tiger Woods infidelity allegations came out (12 years ago now!) there was an interview with an ex-golfing journalist who had tried to write a story on Woods, many years before. Woods' management got to hear about it, and the golfing journalist was immediately an ex-golfing journalist. Others received threats about losing access if they wrote stories.
Threats to journalists can work, sadly.
Didn't some journalists have their careers ruined over Lance Armstrong?
It wouldn't surprise me. But wasn't that a slightly different situation? From memory, allegations had always surrounded Armstrong, and he had always been cleared. That makes writing 'the truth' somewhat harder - especially given his backstory wrt cancer.
Everybody, even if only tangentially involved, in pro cycling knew exactly what was going on with Lance. And every other GC contender before and after him. It was way more encompassing than just not reporting on Lance.
I remember watching the Tour in a shared house in the early 90's and someone there had been a keen amateur competitor but had given it up. She told me that they all had their little medical kits and that it was all fake. Rather naively I couldn't quite believe that they were all cheats, but she was of course right.
It isn't just cycling that had (or has) an Omerta though.
With regard to the cricket, I wonder if it isn't really drinking culture that is at the heart of this. If you aren't a drinker, then you can never be 'part of the team'. The clubhouse is never quite separated from the competitive sport.
What sad little people if the only way they can socialise is by getting pissed.
As a non-drinker I agree, but that's the way it is. You are immediately marked as an outsider.
If you also happen to have a different skin colour then so much the worse, it seems.
It's not so much getting pissed, but pub culture. The cameraderie of the pub, where real-world problems can be abandoned for a few hours, there is assumed freedom to talk about things in a way you normally wouldn't, etc. But equally difficult for someone from a different culture to fit in, or a non-drinker.
I think there's a subtle distinction between pub culture and drinking culture, even when they take place in the same venue.
It is one thing sitting in a pub with a bunch of mates and not drinking. The rules of the game are clear there and there's no compulsion involved.
It is the built-in expectation in the culture of the 'team' that causes the issue. The 'buying everyone drinks if you score 50' was a good example. What if you just want to play a sport?
I think the keg thing is harmless enough isn’t it? Most teams have that sort of camaraderie. If you don’t like it, fair enough, but expect to be known as a bit of a outsider
Maybe that’s why there are so many Asian teams/ leagues?
Ian Dale on Politics Live says that members of staff at Sky were livid that they were cutting the sound on the Rafiq testimony today. Apparently Sky played it unfiltered after they had complaints from their staff.
Did they cover the bit when Rafiq criticised David Lloyd?
I haven't seen the testimony myself, just heard what Dale said about it.
On the Digital Spy thread, it was suggested that Lloyd tried to influence journalists into playing down the allegations.
Back when the Tiger Woods infidelity allegations came out (12 years ago now!) there was an interview with an ex-golfing journalist who had tried to write a story on Woods, many years before. Woods' management got to hear about it, and the golfing journalist was immediately an ex-golfing journalist. Others received threats about losing access if they wrote stories.
Threats to journalists can work, sadly.
Didn't some journalists have their careers ruined over Lance Armstrong?
It wouldn't surprise me. But wasn't that a slightly different situation? From memory, allegations had always surrounded Armstrong, and he had always been cleared. That makes writing 'the truth' somewhat harder - especially given his backstory wrt cancer.
Everybody, even if only tangentially involved, in pro cycling knew exactly what was going on with Lance. And every other GC contender before and after him. It was way more encompassing than just not reporting on Lance.
I remember watching the Tour in a shared house in the early 90's and someone there had been a keen amateur competitor but had given it up. She told me that they all had their little medical kits and that it was all fake. Rather naively I couldn't quite believe that they were all cheats, but she was of course right.
It isn't just cycling that had (or has) an Omerta though.
With regard to the cricket, I wonder if it isn't really drinking culture that is at the heart of this. If you aren't a drinker, then you can never be 'part of the team'. The clubhouse is never quite separated from the competitive sport.
What sad little people if the only way they can socialise is by getting pissed.
As a non-drinker I agree, but that's the way it is. You are immediately marked as an outsider.
If you also happen to have a different skin colour then so much the worse, it seems.
It's not so much getting pissed, but pub culture. The cameraderie of the pub, where real-world problems can be abandoned for a few hours, there is assumed freedom to talk about things in a way you normally wouldn't, etc. But equally difficult for someone from a different culture to fit in, or a non-drinker.
I have just terminated a 15 year sabbatical from drink, and I can report that nobody who isn't a complete, utter and total twat from whose company you should run a mile in any case, minds or notices whether you drink or not. There are people like that - I come across them more in the sailing world than elsewhere - but they are easily spotted and avoided. The trouble is I imagine pro cricket has a disproportionate number of them.
I suspect the issue is a lot of time away from home with (pre internet days) very little to do when not playing.
Drinking too much is seen as somehow heroic and not sordid - look at the synonyms - plastered, sozzled, battered, blotto, bladdered, caned, off your face (can be used for other drugs), rat-arsed, slaughtered, etc, etc.
It is a rite of passage for Brits. That cafe culture never arrived.
Perhaps we should do the same for cafe culture and come up with a range of words to describe being overcaffeinated.
"Pubs, restaurants and nightclubs will have a new closing time of midnight from Thursday;
People will have to restrict their movements for five days if they are a household contact and will have to take three antigen tests in a new policy change;
People will be told to work from home as of Friday;
Vaccine passes will not be required for access to hairdressers, barbers or gyms but will needed for theatres and cinemas;
Stricter rules around mask wearing for indoor and outdoor settings;
Antigen tests will be made more affordable for the people ;
Booster jab to be offered to people aged in their 50s and for people aged under 50 with underlying health conditions."
If Johnson had had any sense at all (don't laugh there please, I did say 'if') then he would have cancelled the southern part of HS2 and kept the bits from Birmingham northwards.
If the eastern leg is cancelled, the Birmingham interchange station ain’t gonna get as much use. If you were to design from scratch, it would probably be scrapped.
This is the problem when you dick around with infrastructure projects half way through.
Had the Transport Ministry had a sudden influx of staff from Defence Procurement ?
The eastern leg hasn't been cancelled, it's merely be shortened to a field somewhere near Eastern Midlands Airport...
Can't cancel the bit near London.
That would upset some in the Home Counties - especially now some of it has been built.
Ian Dale on Politics Live says that members of staff at Sky were livid that they were cutting the sound on the Rafiq testimony today. Apparently Sky played it unfiltered after they had complaints from their staff.
Did they cover the bit when Rafiq criticised David Lloyd?
I haven't seen the testimony myself, just heard what Dale said about it.
On the Digital Spy thread, it was suggested that Lloyd tried to influence journalists into playing down the allegations.
Back when the Tiger Woods infidelity allegations came out (12 years ago now!) there was an interview with an ex-golfing journalist who had tried to write a story on Woods, many years before. Woods' management got to hear about it, and the golfing journalist was immediately an ex-golfing journalist. Others received threats about losing access if they wrote stories.
Threats to journalists can work, sadly.
Didn't some journalists have their careers ruined over Lance Armstrong?
It wouldn't surprise me. But wasn't that a slightly different situation? From memory, allegations had always surrounded Armstrong, and he had always been cleared. That makes writing 'the truth' somewhat harder - especially given his backstory wrt cancer.
Everybody, even if only tangentially involved, in pro cycling knew exactly what was going on with Lance. And every other GC contender before and after him. It was way more encompassing than just not reporting on Lance.
I remember watching the Tour in a shared house in the early 90's and someone there had been a keen amateur competitor but had given it up. She told me that they all had their little medical kits and that it was all fake. Rather naively I couldn't quite believe that they were all cheats, but she was of course right.
It isn't just cycling that had (or has) an Omerta though.
With regard to the cricket, I wonder if it isn't really drinking culture that is at the heart of this. If you aren't a drinker, then you can never be 'part of the team'. The clubhouse is never quite separated from the competitive sport.
What sad little people if the only way they can socialise is by getting pissed.
As a non-drinker I agree, but that's the way it is. You are immediately marked as an outsider.
If you also happen to have a different skin colour then so much the worse, it seems.
It's not so much getting pissed, but pub culture. The cameraderie of the pub, where real-world problems can be abandoned for a few hours, there is assumed freedom to talk about things in a way you normally wouldn't, etc. But equally difficult for someone from a different culture to fit in, or a non-drinker.
I think there's a subtle distinction between pub culture and drinking culture, even when they take place in the same venue.
It is one thing sitting in a pub with a bunch of mates and not drinking. The rules of the game are clear there and there's no compulsion involved.
It is the built-in expectation in the culture of the 'team' that causes the issue. The 'buying everyone drinks if you score 50' was a good example. What if you just want to play a sport?
I think the keg thing is harmless enough isn’t it? Most teams have that sort of camaraderie. If you don’t like it, fair enough, but expect to be known as a bit of a outsider
Maybe that’s why there are so many Asian teams/ leagues?
Hadn't really considered why there are all Asian teams in my son's cricket league. This probably explains a fair bit. Incidentally, one of them is called GEMS. Gentlemen of Ethnic Minority Status.
"New general restrictions on the way here in Belgium even though the problem is a specific one limited to a minority (a large one in Brussels) of people who have chosen not to be vaccinated"
King Cole, the bit after the Western Empire falls and before the Norman Conquest (especially pre-Alfred) is not the most popular in history for the general public.
What annoys me is every single damned documentary or drama (well, the vast majority) are fixated retelling stories of Henry VIII and Elizabeth II when (even just looking at England) there are so many more interesting and neglected events and characters to consider.
"The Vikings" did rather well from depicting the period, and the spin off "Vikings: Valhalla" covering the later period before the Norman conquest looks promising.
The period that seems to be lacking is the early post Roman period. In a generation or two, we abandoned roads, towns and the trappings of urban life, turning back to subsistence farming and more egalitarian social structures.
Perhaps we can find out about the latter in person, second time around?
The Dark Ages were only dark in the sense of the abandonment of Christianity, and also literacy. It happened between 409 and 450 or so, so a couple of generations. There seems surprisingly little evidence of resistance to going back to a simpler more sustainable communitarian lifestyle once the Romans stopped enforcing the alternative.
Who abandoned Christianity in 409->450 or so? Not really my period.
(or is that the joke I just edited out?) (Blockquote maybe borked warning)
The reason that there was little resistance was that when armed, competent invaders showed up, the locals had next to no military capability. Sharp swords make sharp arguments.
The process of robbing the locals when you felt like it, evolved into "You can't tax those peasants. They are my peasants"....
You could call that an egalitarian social structure. Depends which end of the sword you are holding, I suppose.
But who (or where) abandoned Christianity in 409->450 or so?
New one to me as well - in England, the Saxons who turned up to occupy senior management positions after the Romans divested their offshore holdings were initially pagan, but converted fairly rapidly to Christianity....
It seems very early for that.
Even the Edict of Milan (Constantine) wasn't until 313 (?) AD.
I've always associated Dark Ages with a period in either the second part of the first millenium 1000 AD, or a period in the middle ages, which is why I'm asking.
Dark Ages to me means that period when the absence of Christianity/literacy means there was a bit of a lacuna in recorded history. In England a relatively short period maybe AD400 - 800. We really know very little about the end of Roman Britain and the Germanic settlers had started to make their presence known. In Scandinavia it is different: not a lot is known pre 1000 or so, and in Sweden everything before 1200 might as well be Prehistory.
An interesting aside which I think I have mentioned before is that if you go to a Norwegian museum (The Archaeology Museum in Stavanger is a very good one) then you find that what hey call the Iron Age continues right the way through to beyond 700AD. The lack of Roman settlement in the peninsular meant that there is no natural break for the Iron Age as there is in the rest of Europe. So it carries on until the arrival of Christianity.
It's a pity that the pagan Scandinavians didn't write their sagas. They were only written in Christian times by people who loved the stories, but didn't believe in the gods. It would be fascinating to know what they actually believed about their gods and heroes, and cosmology, in pagan times.
Ian Dale on Politics Live says that members of staff at Sky were livid that they were cutting the sound on the Rafiq testimony today. Apparently Sky played it unfiltered after they had complaints from their staff.
Did they cover the bit when Rafiq criticised David Lloyd?
I haven't seen the testimony myself, just heard what Dale said about it.
On the Digital Spy thread, it was suggested that Lloyd tried to influence journalists into playing down the allegations.
Back when the Tiger Woods infidelity allegations came out (12 years ago now!) there was an interview with an ex-golfing journalist who had tried to write a story on Woods, many years before. Woods' management got to hear about it, and the golfing journalist was immediately an ex-golfing journalist. Others received threats about losing access if they wrote stories.
Threats to journalists can work, sadly.
Didn't some journalists have their careers ruined over Lance Armstrong?
It wouldn't surprise me. But wasn't that a slightly different situation? From memory, allegations had always surrounded Armstrong, and he had always been cleared. That makes writing 'the truth' somewhat harder - especially given his backstory wrt cancer.
Everybody, even if only tangentially involved, in pro cycling knew exactly what was going on with Lance. And every other GC contender before and after him. It was way more encompassing than just not reporting on Lance.
I remember watching the Tour in a shared house in the early 90's and someone there had been a keen amateur competitor but had given it up. She told me that they all had their little medical kits and that it was all fake. Rather naively I couldn't quite believe that they were all cheats, but she was of course right.
It isn't just cycling that had (or has) an Omerta though.
With regard to the cricket, I wonder if it isn't really drinking culture that is at the heart of this. If you aren't a drinker, then you can never be 'part of the team'. The clubhouse is never quite separated from the competitive sport.
What sad little people if the only way they can socialise is by getting pissed.
As a non-drinker I agree, but that's the way it is. You are immediately marked as an outsider.
If you also happen to have a different skin colour then so much the worse, it seems.
It's not so much getting pissed, but pub culture. The cameraderie of the pub, where real-world problems can be abandoned for a few hours, there is assumed freedom to talk about things in a way you normally wouldn't, etc. But equally difficult for someone from a different culture to fit in, or a non-drinker.
It's not pub culture it is British culture. As an example, go online to any greetings card company. 80% of the cards will be something to do with drinking extraordinary amounts (usually of gin). It is something that we do and we do to excess. Perhaps the reason was the pub opening times era when people felt obligated to drink as much as possible as their time was limited to do so.
Drinking too much is seen as somehow heroic and not sordid - look at the synonyms - plastered, sozzled, battered, blotto, bladdered, caned, off your face (can be used for other drugs), rat-arsed, slaughtered, etc, etc.
It is a rite of passage for Brits. That cafe culture never arrived.
Actually I was chatting to a friend the other day whose daughter had just started Uni and he said how he expected her to get drunk and was in a way relieved that it was a relatively "healthy" way of letting off steam and, er, getting off your face.
It is less salient now, however. Kids today drink far less than we did when we were idiot youths. That is born out in the data
"Nearly 30% of young people in England do not drink, study finds
"Research shows greater proportion of 16- to 24-year-olds shunning alcohol entirely"
Yep my daughter doesn't drink. Certainly not due to her parents but she doesn't like the taste of alcohol.
The thought she was somehow missing out was, I must admit, tempered by the additional thought that she was less likely to get dunk and be taken advantage of.
Ditto my teenage daughters. By the time I was their age I was knocking back half bottles of whisky, no problem
They don't touch a drop
As well as asking why younger people don't drink much I think we should ask why older people drank so much at the same age. It didn't really make sense as an activity. I mean, it was fun mostly but so is plenty of other stuff that's cheaper and not as bad for your health and wellbeing. I think a lot of it came down to social anxiety, for me at least. Personally speaking I have really gone off alcohol in recent years. I still do drink socially because it is the norm but I'd be happy to never drink again, it really wouldn't bother me.
Owen Paterson would have been nine days into his suspension had Boris Johnson just left this alone. Instead the government has blown a hole in the bank accounts of the MPs already most inclined to rebellion. #politics #strategy #whipping https://twitter.com/patrickkmaguire/status/1460633324414722058
King Cole, the bit after the Western Empire falls and before the Norman Conquest (especially pre-Alfred) is not the most popular in history for the general public.
What annoys me is every single damned documentary or drama (well, the vast majority) are fixated retelling stories of Henry VIII and Elizabeth II when (even just looking at England) there are so many more interesting and neglected events and characters to consider.
"The Vikings" did rather well from depicting the period, and the spin off "Vikings: Valhalla" covering the later period before the Norman conquest looks promising.
The period that seems to be lacking is the early post Roman period. In a generation or two, we abandoned roads, towns and the trappings of urban life, turning back to subsistence farming and more egalitarian social structures.
Perhaps we can find out about the latter in person, second time around?
The Dark Ages were only dark in the sense of the abandonment of Christianity, and also literacy. It happened between 409 and 450 or so, so a couple of generations. There seems surprisingly little evidence of resistance to going back to a simpler more sustainable communitarian lifestyle once the Romans stopped enforcing the alternative.
Who abandoned Christianity in 409->450 or so? Not really my period.
(or is that the joke I just edited out?) (Blockquote maybe borked warning)
The reason that there was little resistance was that when armed, competent invaders showed up, the locals had next to no military capability. Sharp swords make sharp arguments.
The process of robbing the locals when you felt like it, evolved into "You can't tax those peasants. They are my peasants"....
You could call that an egalitarian social structure. Depends which end of the sword you are holding, I suppose.
But who (or where) abandoned Christianity in 409->450 or so?
New one to me as well - in England, the Saxons who turned up to occupy senior management positions after the Romans divested their offshore holdings were initially pagan, but converted fairly rapidly to Christianity....
It seems very early for that.
Even the Edict of Milan (Constantine) wasn't until 313 (?) AD.
I've always associated Dark Ages with a period in either the second part of the first millenium 1000 AD, or a period in the middle ages, which is why I'm asking.
Dark Ages to me means that period when the absence of Christianity/literacy means there was a bit of a lacuna in recorded history. In England a relatively short period maybe AD400 - 800. We really know very little about the end of Roman Britain and the Germanic settlers had started to make their presence known. In Scandinavia it is different: not a lot is known pre 1000 or so, and in Sweden everything before 1200 might as well be Prehistory.
The absence of a real written record tells its own story of economic collapse and population decline, IMHO.
It would these days when literacy is universal. But remember in early Western Europe, literacy was a Roman thing, perpetuated by the Church. The withdrawal of Roman control over the British provinces probably did result in economic decline, but I am not so sure about population. At least one usurper may have marched off to Europe with a sizeable army, but the Romans had been settling Germanic foederati here for some time and there was obviously an influx of settlers. At that time, human population density seems to suggest that most places weren't fully exploited and there was room for settlers.
If it's perpetuated by the Church, that doesn't strike me as "early" Western Europe - certainly in the UK.
The first ABC was 597AD.
Christianity before that date can be debated (Celtic etc), however "The Church" is the Roman Catholic church. And that in the UK I think that means Augustine.
If Johnson had had any sense at all (don't laugh there please, I did say 'if') then he would have cancelled the southern part of HS2 and kept the bits from Birmingham northwards.
If the eastern leg is cancelled, the Birmingham interchange station ain’t gonna get as much use. If you were to design from scratch, it would probably be scrapped.
This is the problem when you dick around with infrastructure projects half way through.
Even a non-details idiot like Johnson wouldn't cancel the Southern section of HS2. Too late. They are literally tunnelling the ground.
I can see a hundred hi viz jacketed workman beavering away at HS2 from where I sit typing this. They are in the cutting that emerges from Euston. It is, as we have discussed, a scene from Dickens' London. The Arrival of The Railway
They work at night, as well. The burning floodlights and fierce blue flames and occasional glitter-rock cascades of golden sparks are rather dramatic, and picturesque
I think cancelling the whole thing makes sense politically, that way Boris is "shafting" the whole nation, not just the north.
Ian Dale on Politics Live says that members of staff at Sky were livid that they were cutting the sound on the Rafiq testimony today. Apparently Sky played it unfiltered after they had complaints from their staff.
Did they cover the bit when Rafiq criticised David Lloyd?
I haven't seen the testimony myself, just heard what Dale said about it.
On the Digital Spy thread, it was suggested that Lloyd tried to influence journalists into playing down the allegations.
Back when the Tiger Woods infidelity allegations came out (12 years ago now!) there was an interview with an ex-golfing journalist who had tried to write a story on Woods, many years before. Woods' management got to hear about it, and the golfing journalist was immediately an ex-golfing journalist. Others received threats about losing access if they wrote stories.
Threats to journalists can work, sadly.
Didn't some journalists have their careers ruined over Lance Armstrong?
It wouldn't surprise me. But wasn't that a slightly different situation? From memory, allegations had always surrounded Armstrong, and he had always been cleared. That makes writing 'the truth' somewhat harder - especially given his backstory wrt cancer.
Everybody, even if only tangentially involved, in pro cycling knew exactly what was going on with Lance. And every other GC contender before and after him. It was way more encompassing than just not reporting on Lance.
I remember watching the Tour in a shared house in the early 90's and someone there had been a keen amateur competitor but had given it up. She told me that they all had their little medical kits and that it was all fake. Rather naively I couldn't quite believe that they were all cheats, but she was of course right.
It isn't just cycling that had (or has) an Omerta though.
With regard to the cricket, I wonder if it isn't really drinking culture that is at the heart of this. If you aren't a drinker, then you can never be 'part of the team'. The clubhouse is never quite separated from the competitive sport.
What sad little people if the only way they can socialise is by getting pissed.
As a non-drinker I agree, but that's the way it is. You are immediately marked as an outsider.
If you also happen to have a different skin colour then so much the worse, it seems.
It's not so much getting pissed, but pub culture. The cameraderie of the pub, where real-world problems can be abandoned for a few hours, there is assumed freedom to talk about things in a way you normally wouldn't, etc. But equally difficult for someone from a different culture to fit in, or a non-drinker.
I think there's a subtle distinction between pub culture and drinking culture, even when they take place in the same venue.
It is one thing sitting in a pub with a bunch of mates and not drinking. The rules of the game are clear there and there's no compulsion involved.
It is the built-in expectation in the culture of the 'team' that causes the issue. The 'buying everyone drinks if you score 50' was a good example. What if you just want to play a sport?
I think the keg thing is harmless enough isn’t it? Most teams have that sort of camaraderie. If you don’t like it, fair enough, but expect to be known as a bit of a outsider
Maybe that’s why there are so many Asian teams/ leagues?
Hadn't really considered why there are all Asian teams in my son's cricket league. This probably explains a fair bit. Incidentally, one of them is called GEMS. Gentlemen of Ethnic Minority Status.
Thats a quality name, even if the culture possibly encouraging such division being upsetting.
Ian Dale on Politics Live says that members of staff at Sky were livid that they were cutting the sound on the Rafiq testimony today. Apparently Sky played it unfiltered after they had complaints from their staff.
Did they cover the bit when Rafiq criticised David Lloyd?
I haven't seen the testimony myself, just heard what Dale said about it.
On the Digital Spy thread, it was suggested that Lloyd tried to influence journalists into playing down the allegations.
Back when the Tiger Woods infidelity allegations came out (12 years ago now!) there was an interview with an ex-golfing journalist who had tried to write a story on Woods, many years before. Woods' management got to hear about it, and the golfing journalist was immediately an ex-golfing journalist. Others received threats about losing access if they wrote stories.
Threats to journalists can work, sadly.
Didn't some journalists have their careers ruined over Lance Armstrong?
It wouldn't surprise me. But wasn't that a slightly different situation? From memory, allegations had always surrounded Armstrong, and he had always been cleared. That makes writing 'the truth' somewhat harder - especially given his backstory wrt cancer.
Everybody, even if only tangentially involved, in pro cycling knew exactly what was going on with Lance. And every other GC contender before and after him. It was way more encompassing than just not reporting on Lance.
I remember watching the Tour in a shared house in the early 90's and someone there had been a keen amateur competitor but had given it up. She told me that they all had their little medical kits and that it was all fake. Rather naively I couldn't quite believe that they were all cheats, but she was of course right.
It isn't just cycling that had (or has) an Omerta though.
With regard to the cricket, I wonder if it isn't really drinking culture that is at the heart of this. If you aren't a drinker, then you can never be 'part of the team'. The clubhouse is never quite separated from the competitive sport.
What sad little people if the only way they can socialise is by getting pissed.
As a non-drinker I agree, but that's the way it is. You are immediately marked as an outsider.
If you also happen to have a different skin colour then so much the worse, it seems.
It's not so much getting pissed, but pub culture. The cameraderie of the pub, where real-world problems can be abandoned for a few hours, there is assumed freedom to talk about things in a way you normally wouldn't, etc. But equally difficult for someone from a different culture to fit in, or a non-drinker.
It's not pub culture it is British culture. As an example, go online to any greetings card company. 80% of the cards will be something to do with drinking extraordinary amounts (usually of gin). It is something that we do and we do to excess. Perhaps the reason was the pub opening times era when people felt obligated to drink as much as possible as their time was limited to do so.
Drinking too much is seen as somehow heroic and not sordid - look at the synonyms - plastered, sozzled, battered, blotto, bladdered, caned, off your face (can be used for other drugs), rat-arsed, slaughtered, etc, etc.
It is a rite of passage for Brits. That cafe culture never arrived.
Actually I was chatting to a friend the other day whose daughter had just started Uni and he said how he expected her to get drunk and was in a way relieved that it was a relatively "healthy" way of letting off steam and, er, getting off your face.
"we" ?
It's a subset of British culture, not the definition.
People who get bladdered for no reason have always been idiots, as they continue to be now.
As someone planting a vineyard next spring and planning to sell a few thousand bottles of English wine per year from about 2027 onwards I do worry a bit about the younger generation's "healthy" attitude towards alcohol. Hopefully the more expensive end of the market will be less affected, and may benefit from the instagram trend. People opting for quality/brand over ABV %.
Ian Dale on Politics Live says that members of staff at Sky were livid that they were cutting the sound on the Rafiq testimony today. Apparently Sky played it unfiltered after they had complaints from their staff.
Did they cover the bit when Rafiq criticised David Lloyd?
I haven't seen the testimony myself, just heard what Dale said about it.
On the Digital Spy thread, it was suggested that Lloyd tried to influence journalists into playing down the allegations.
Back when the Tiger Woods infidelity allegations came out (12 years ago now!) there was an interview with an ex-golfing journalist who had tried to write a story on Woods, many years before. Woods' management got to hear about it, and the golfing journalist was immediately an ex-golfing journalist. Others received threats about losing access if they wrote stories.
Threats to journalists can work, sadly.
Didn't some journalists have their careers ruined over Lance Armstrong?
It wouldn't surprise me. But wasn't that a slightly different situation? From memory, allegations had always surrounded Armstrong, and he had always been cleared. That makes writing 'the truth' somewhat harder - especially given his backstory wrt cancer.
Everybody, even if only tangentially involved, in pro cycling knew exactly what was going on with Lance. And every other GC contender before and after him. It was way more encompassing than just not reporting on Lance.
I remember watching the Tour in a shared house in the early 90's and someone there had been a keen amateur competitor but had given it up. She told me that they all had their little medical kits and that it was all fake. Rather naively I couldn't quite believe that they were all cheats, but she was of course right.
It isn't just cycling that had (or has) an Omerta though.
With regard to the cricket, I wonder if it isn't really drinking culture that is at the heart of this. If you aren't a drinker, then you can never be 'part of the team'. The clubhouse is never quite separated from the competitive sport.
What sad little people if the only way they can socialise is by getting pissed.
As a non-drinker I agree, but that's the way it is. You are immediately marked as an outsider.
If you also happen to have a different skin colour then so much the worse, it seems.
It's not so much getting pissed, but pub culture. The cameraderie of the pub, where real-world problems can be abandoned for a few hours, there is assumed freedom to talk about things in a way you normally wouldn't, etc. But equally difficult for someone from a different culture to fit in, or a non-drinker.
I am sure this is an issue. I've seen Muslim football fans awkwardly watching a game in a pub (because they couldn't see it anywhere else?). Surrounded by booze, and boozers, and not exactly comfortable
How do you bridge the gulf?
And yet I have been out with many Muslim friends over the years who were quite happy to sit in the pub and drink alcohol free or soft drinks. I assume they were not as committed as some but they were religious enough to not want to drink alcohol so I assumed that was kind of the norm - don't drink it yourself but no issue with others drinking it.
As someone who was a non drinker his entire life but has spent a lot of time in bars and clubs it is very easy.
In my student days my friends loved me, we went to places like Vodka Revolution where they'd only let you drink 4 shots of absinthe or the 98% got rut vodka per customer I went and both the drinks, got stamped on the hand, and gave the drinks to my friends who had hit the limit.
People were curious at first why I didn't drink, but after a few nights out it was never an issue.
The only thing I find awkward with people drinking post my student days, the amount of people who go out for one drink, end up having more and think driving home is a good idea. I've had to step in a few times, but that's not a Muslim thing, plenty of my non Muslim friends have also intervened.
If Johnson had had any sense at all (don't laugh there please, I did say 'if') then he would have cancelled the southern part of HS2 and kept the bits from Birmingham northwards.
If the eastern leg is cancelled, the Birmingham interchange station ain’t gonna get as much use. If you were to design from scratch, it would probably be scrapped.
This is the problem when you dick around with infrastructure projects half way through.
Had the Transport Ministry had a sudden influx of staff from Defence Procurement ?
The eastern leg hasn't been cancelled, it's merely be shortened to a field somewhere near Eastern Midlands Airport...
"Please board the air replacement service to Leeds-Bradford. On landing, you will discover a complete lack of transport infrastructure connecting to either Leeds or Bradford"
Yes, it wasn't going away. He had to do something and that is easier, affects fewer than the other option, with the line easier to draw.
The key will be how "lobbyist" is defined. Was the "strategic advice" of OP or IDS "lobbying"? I would say it was as soon as they were trying to promote the companies paying them for public contracts but there may still be an area where MPs can use their knowledge and expertise without indulging in lobbying.
King Cole, the bit after the Western Empire falls and before the Norman Conquest (especially pre-Alfred) is not the most popular in history for the general public.
What annoys me is every single damned documentary or drama (well, the vast majority) are fixated retelling stories of Henry VIII and Elizabeth II when (even just looking at England) there are so many more interesting and neglected events and characters to consider.
"The Vikings" did rather well from depicting the period, and the spin off "Vikings: Valhalla" covering the later period before the Norman conquest looks promising.
The period that seems to be lacking is the early post Roman period. In a generation or two, we abandoned roads, towns and the trappings of urban life, turning back to subsistence farming and more egalitarian social structures.
Perhaps we can find out about the latter in person, second time around?
The Dark Ages were only dark in the sense of the abandonment of Christianity, and also literacy. It happened between 409 and 450 or so, so a couple of generations. There seems surprisingly little evidence of resistance to going back to a simpler more sustainable communitarian lifestyle once the Romans stopped enforcing the alternative.
Who abandoned Christianity in 409->450 or so? Not really my period.
(or is that the joke I just edited out?) (Blockquote maybe borked warning)
The reason that there was little resistance was that when armed, competent invaders showed up, the locals had next to no military capability. Sharp swords make sharp arguments.
The process of robbing the locals when you felt like it, evolved into "You can't tax those peasants. They are my peasants"....
You could call that an egalitarian social structure. Depends which end of the sword you are holding, I suppose.
But who (or where) abandoned Christianity in 409->450 or so?
New one to me as well - in England, the Saxons who turned up to occupy senior management positions after the Romans divested their offshore holdings were initially pagan, but converted fairly rapidly to Christianity....
It seems very early for that.
Even the Edict of Milan (Constantine) wasn't until 313 (?) AD.
I've always associated Dark Ages with a period in either the second part of the first millenium 1000 AD, or a period in the middle ages, which is why I'm asking.
Dark Ages to me means that period when the absence of Christianity/literacy means there was a bit of a lacuna in recorded history. In England a relatively short period maybe AD400 - 800. We really know very little about the end of Roman Britain and the Germanic settlers had started to make their presence known. In Scandinavia it is different: not a lot is known pre 1000 or so, and in Sweden everything before 1200 might as well be Prehistory.
The absence of a real written record tells its own story of economic collapse and population decline, IMHO.
It would these days when literacy is universal. But remember in early Western Europe, literacy was a Roman thing, perpetuated by the Church. The withdrawal of Roman control over the British provinces probably did result in economic decline, but I am not so sure about population. At least one usurper may have marched off to Europe with a sizeable army, but the Romans had been settling Germanic foederati here for some time and there was obviously an influx of settlers. At that time, human population density seems to suggest that most places weren't fully exploited and there was room for settlers.
If it's perpetuated by the Church, that doesn't strike me as "early" Western Europe - certainly in the UK.
The first ABC was 597AD.
Christianity before that date can be debated (Celtic etc), however "The Church" is the Roman Catholic church. And that in the UK I think that means Augustine.
What I meant was, where places lost literacy when the Romans "left"* it was the Church that reintroduced it.
* it's quite likely that no-one actually left the Britains when the Romans relinquished control
Ian Dale on Politics Live says that members of staff at Sky were livid that they were cutting the sound on the Rafiq testimony today. Apparently Sky played it unfiltered after they had complaints from their staff.
Did they cover the bit when Rafiq criticised David Lloyd?
I haven't seen the testimony myself, just heard what Dale said about it.
On the Digital Spy thread, it was suggested that Lloyd tried to influence journalists into playing down the allegations.
Back when the Tiger Woods infidelity allegations came out (12 years ago now!) there was an interview with an ex-golfing journalist who had tried to write a story on Woods, many years before. Woods' management got to hear about it, and the golfing journalist was immediately an ex-golfing journalist. Others received threats about losing access if they wrote stories.
Threats to journalists can work, sadly.
Didn't some journalists have their careers ruined over Lance Armstrong?
It wouldn't surprise me. But wasn't that a slightly different situation? From memory, allegations had always surrounded Armstrong, and he had always been cleared. That makes writing 'the truth' somewhat harder - especially given his backstory wrt cancer.
Everybody, even if only tangentially involved, in pro cycling knew exactly what was going on with Lance. And every other GC contender before and after him. It was way more encompassing than just not reporting on Lance.
I remember watching the Tour in a shared house in the early 90's and someone there had been a keen amateur competitor but had given it up. She told me that they all had their little medical kits and that it was all fake. Rather naively I couldn't quite believe that they were all cheats, but she was of course right.
It isn't just cycling that had (or has) an Omerta though.
With regard to the cricket, I wonder if it isn't really drinking culture that is at the heart of this. If you aren't a drinker, then you can never be 'part of the team'. The clubhouse is never quite separated from the competitive sport.
What sad little people if the only way they can socialise is by getting pissed.
As a non-drinker I agree, but that's the way it is. You are immediately marked as an outsider.
If you also happen to have a different skin colour then so much the worse, it seems.
It's not so much getting pissed, but pub culture. The cameraderie of the pub, where real-world problems can be abandoned for a few hours, there is assumed freedom to talk about things in a way you normally wouldn't, etc. But equally difficult for someone from a different culture to fit in, or a non-drinker.
It's not pub culture it is British culture. As an example, go online to any greetings card company. 80% of the cards will be something to do with drinking extraordinary amounts (usually of gin). It is something that we do and we do to excess. Perhaps the reason was the pub opening times era when people felt obligated to drink as much as possible as their time was limited to do so.
Drinking too much is seen as somehow heroic and not sordid - look at the synonyms - plastered, sozzled, battered, blotto, bladdered, caned, off your face (can be used for other drugs), rat-arsed, slaughtered, etc, etc.
It is a rite of passage for Brits. That cafe culture never arrived.
Actually I was chatting to a friend the other day whose daughter had just started Uni and he said how he expected her to get drunk and was in a way relieved that it was a relatively "healthy" way of letting off steam and, er, getting off your face.
It is less salient now, however. Kids today drink far less than we did when we were idiot youths. That is born out in the data
"Nearly 30% of young people in England do not drink, study finds
"Research shows greater proportion of 16- to 24-year-olds shunning alcohol entirely"
Yep my daughter doesn't drink. Certainly not due to her parents but she doesn't like the taste of alcohol.
The thought she was somehow missing out was, I must admit, tempered by the additional thought that she was less likely to get dunk and be taken advantage of.
Ditto my teenage daughters. By the time I was their age I was knocking back half bottles of whisky, no problem
As someone planting a vineyard next spring and planning to sell a few thousand bottles of English wine per year from about 2027 onwards I do worry a bit about the younger generation's "healthy" attitude towards alcohol. Hopefully the more expensive end of the market will be less affected, and may benefit from the instagram trend. People opting for quality/brand over ABV %.
I'd be more worried about the vines getting their chilling requirement by 2027.
Yes, it wasn't going away. He had to do something and that is easier, affects fewer than the other option, with the line easier to draw.
The key will be how "lobbyist" is defined. Was the "strategic advice" of OP or IDS "lobbying"? I would say it was as soon as they were trying to promote the companies paying them for public contracts but there may still be an area where MPs can use their knowledge and expertise without indulging in lobbying.
Is this like the time I billed for 'strategic advice' instead of lobbying?
Ian Dale on Politics Live says that members of staff at Sky were livid that they were cutting the sound on the Rafiq testimony today. Apparently Sky played it unfiltered after they had complaints from their staff.
Did they cover the bit when Rafiq criticised David Lloyd?
I haven't seen the testimony myself, just heard what Dale said about it.
On the Digital Spy thread, it was suggested that Lloyd tried to influence journalists into playing down the allegations.
Back when the Tiger Woods infidelity allegations came out (12 years ago now!) there was an interview with an ex-golfing journalist who had tried to write a story on Woods, many years before. Woods' management got to hear about it, and the golfing journalist was immediately an ex-golfing journalist. Others received threats about losing access if they wrote stories.
Threats to journalists can work, sadly.
Didn't some journalists have their careers ruined over Lance Armstrong?
It wouldn't surprise me. But wasn't that a slightly different situation? From memory, allegations had always surrounded Armstrong, and he had always been cleared. That makes writing 'the truth' somewhat harder - especially given his backstory wrt cancer.
Everybody, even if only tangentially involved, in pro cycling knew exactly what was going on with Lance. And every other GC contender before and after him. It was way more encompassing than just not reporting on Lance.
I remember watching the Tour in a shared house in the early 90's and someone there had been a keen amateur competitor but had given it up. She told me that they all had their little medical kits and that it was all fake. Rather naively I couldn't quite believe that they were all cheats, but she was of course right.
It isn't just cycling that had (or has) an Omerta though.
With regard to the cricket, I wonder if it isn't really drinking culture that is at the heart of this. If you aren't a drinker, then you can never be 'part of the team'. The clubhouse is never quite separated from the competitive sport.
What sad little people if the only way they can socialise is by getting pissed.
As a non-drinker I agree, but that's the way it is. You are immediately marked as an outsider.
If you also happen to have a different skin colour then so much the worse, it seems.
It's not so much getting pissed, but pub culture. The cameraderie of the pub, where real-world problems can be abandoned for a few hours, there is assumed freedom to talk about things in a way you normally wouldn't, etc. But equally difficult for someone from a different culture to fit in, or a non-drinker.
It's not pub culture it is British culture. As an example, go online to any greetings card company. 80% of the cards will be something to do with drinking extraordinary amounts (usually of gin). It is something that we do and we do to excess. Perhaps the reason was the pub opening times era when people felt obligated to drink as much as possible as their time was limited to do so.
Drinking too much is seen as somehow heroic and not sordid - look at the synonyms - plastered, sozzled, battered, blotto, bladdered, caned, off your face (can be used for other drugs), rat-arsed, slaughtered, etc, etc.
It is a rite of passage for Brits. That cafe culture never arrived.
Actually I was chatting to a friend the other day whose daughter had just started Uni and he said how he expected her to get drunk and was in a way relieved that it was a relatively "healthy" way of letting off steam and, er, getting off your face.
It is less salient now, however. Kids today drink far less than we did when we were idiot youths. That is born out in the data
"Nearly 30% of young people in England do not drink, study finds
"Research shows greater proportion of 16- to 24-year-olds shunning alcohol entirely"
Yep my daughter doesn't drink. Certainly not due to her parents but she doesn't like the taste of alcohol.
The thought she was somehow missing out was, I must admit, tempered by the additional thought that she was less likely to get dunk and be taken advantage of.
Ditto my teenage daughters. By the time I was their age I was knocking back half bottles of whisky, no problem
They don't touch a drop
Cause and effect.
Almost certainly a factor. Kids rebel and reject. I am a big boozer. My kids will do the opposite
Ian Dale on Politics Live says that members of staff at Sky were livid that they were cutting the sound on the Rafiq testimony today. Apparently Sky played it unfiltered after they had complaints from their staff.
Did they cover the bit when Rafiq criticised David Lloyd?
I haven't seen the testimony myself, just heard what Dale said about it.
On the Digital Spy thread, it was suggested that Lloyd tried to influence journalists into playing down the allegations.
Back when the Tiger Woods infidelity allegations came out (12 years ago now!) there was an interview with an ex-golfing journalist who had tried to write a story on Woods, many years before. Woods' management got to hear about it, and the golfing journalist was immediately an ex-golfing journalist. Others received threats about losing access if they wrote stories.
Threats to journalists can work, sadly.
Didn't some journalists have their careers ruined over Lance Armstrong?
It wouldn't surprise me. But wasn't that a slightly different situation? From memory, allegations had always surrounded Armstrong, and he had always been cleared. That makes writing 'the truth' somewhat harder - especially given his backstory wrt cancer.
Everybody, even if only tangentially involved, in pro cycling knew exactly what was going on with Lance. And every other GC contender before and after him. It was way more encompassing than just not reporting on Lance.
I remember watching the Tour in a shared house in the early 90's and someone there had been a keen amateur competitor but had given it up. She told me that they all had their little medical kits and that it was all fake. Rather naively I couldn't quite believe that they were all cheats, but she was of course right.
It isn't just cycling that had (or has) an Omerta though.
With regard to the cricket, I wonder if it isn't really drinking culture that is at the heart of this. If you aren't a drinker, then you can never be 'part of the team'. The clubhouse is never quite separated from the competitive sport.
What sad little people if the only way they can socialise is by getting pissed.
As a non-drinker I agree, but that's the way it is. You are immediately marked as an outsider.
If you also happen to have a different skin colour then so much the worse, it seems.
It's not so much getting pissed, but pub culture. The cameraderie of the pub, where real-world problems can be abandoned for a few hours, there is assumed freedom to talk about things in a way you normally wouldn't, etc. But equally difficult for someone from a different culture to fit in, or a non-drinker.
I have just terminated a 15 year sabbatical from drink, and I can report that nobody who isn't a complete, utter and total twat from whose company you should run a mile in any case, minds or notices whether you drink or not. There are people like that - I come across them more in the sailing world than elsewhere - but they are easily spotted and avoided. The trouble is I imagine pro cricket has a disproportionate number of them.
I find there is a general presumption that someone would want to drink, more in a 'it's ok, you can have one' kind of way, which might lead to curiosity if you then clarify you never do, but not leading to a 'that's weird' reaction. No one cares, especially in these abstemious times
Yes, it wasn't going away. He had to do something and that is easier, affects fewer than the other option, with the line easier to draw.
The key will be how "lobbyist" is defined. Was the "strategic advice" of OP or IDS "lobbying"? I would say it was as soon as they were trying to promote the companies paying them for public contracts but there may still be an area where MPs can use their knowledge and expertise without indulging in lobbying.
Is this like the time I billed for 'strategic advice' instead of lobbying?
Yes, it wasn't going away. He had to do something and that is easier, affects fewer than the other option, with the line easier to draw.
The key will be how "lobbyist" is defined. Was the "strategic advice" of OP or IDS "lobbying"? I would say it was as soon as they were trying to promote the companies paying them for public contracts but there may still be an area where MPs can use their knowledge and expertise without indulging in lobbying.
Is this like the time I billed for 'strategic advice' instead of lobbying?
Ian Dale on Politics Live says that members of staff at Sky were livid that they were cutting the sound on the Rafiq testimony today. Apparently Sky played it unfiltered after they had complaints from their staff.
Did they cover the bit when Rafiq criticised David Lloyd?
I haven't seen the testimony myself, just heard what Dale said about it.
On the Digital Spy thread, it was suggested that Lloyd tried to influence journalists into playing down the allegations.
Back when the Tiger Woods infidelity allegations came out (12 years ago now!) there was an interview with an ex-golfing journalist who had tried to write a story on Woods, many years before. Woods' management got to hear about it, and the golfing journalist was immediately an ex-golfing journalist. Others received threats about losing access if they wrote stories.
Threats to journalists can work, sadly.
Didn't some journalists have their careers ruined over Lance Armstrong?
It wouldn't surprise me. But wasn't that a slightly different situation? From memory, allegations had always surrounded Armstrong, and he had always been cleared. That makes writing 'the truth' somewhat harder - especially given his backstory wrt cancer.
Everybody, even if only tangentially involved, in pro cycling knew exactly what was going on with Lance. And every other GC contender before and after him. It was way more encompassing than just not reporting on Lance.
I remember watching the Tour in a shared house in the early 90's and someone there had been a keen amateur competitor but had given it up. She told me that they all had their little medical kits and that it was all fake. Rather naively I couldn't quite believe that they were all cheats, but she was of course right.
It isn't just cycling that had (or has) an Omerta though.
With regard to the cricket, I wonder if it isn't really drinking culture that is at the heart of this. If you aren't a drinker, then you can never be 'part of the team'. The clubhouse is never quite separated from the competitive sport.
What sad little people if the only way they can socialise is by getting pissed.
As a non-drinker I agree, but that's the way it is. You are immediately marked as an outsider.
If you also happen to have a different skin colour then so much the worse, it seems.
It's not so much getting pissed, but pub culture. The cameraderie of the pub, where real-world problems can be abandoned for a few hours, there is assumed freedom to talk about things in a way you normally wouldn't, etc. But equally difficult for someone from a different culture to fit in, or a non-drinker.
It's not pub culture it is British culture. As an example, go online to any greetings card company. 80% of the cards will be something to do with drinking extraordinary amounts (usually of gin). It is something that we do and we do to excess. Perhaps the reason was the pub opening times era when people felt obligated to drink as much as possible as their time was limited to do so.
Drinking too much is seen as somehow heroic and not sordid - look at the synonyms - plastered, sozzled, battered, blotto, bladdered, caned, off your face (can be used for other drugs), rat-arsed, slaughtered, etc, etc.
It is a rite of passage for Brits. That cafe culture never arrived.
Actually I was chatting to a friend the other day whose daughter had just started Uni and he said how he expected her to get drunk and was in a way relieved that it was a relatively "healthy" way of letting off steam and, er, getting off your face.
"we" ?
It's a subset of British culture, not the definition.
People who get bladdered for no reason have always been idiots, as they continue to be now.
Well that's the point isn't it. No one gets bladdered for no reason. There is always a reason and it's interesting to think what it might be.
And as for "we" yes I'm afraid so. You are a Brit, the culture undeniably exists, and hence it is your culture also.
If Johnson had had any sense at all (don't laugh there please, I did say 'if') then he would have cancelled the southern part of HS2 and kept the bits from Birmingham northwards.
If the eastern leg is cancelled, the Birmingham interchange station ain’t gonna get as much use. If you were to design from scratch, it would probably be scrapped.
This is the problem when you dick around with infrastructure projects half way through.
Had the Transport Ministry had a sudden influx of staff from Defence Procurement ?
The eastern leg hasn't been cancelled, it's merely be shortened to a field somewhere near Eastern Midlands Airport...
"Please board the air replacement service to Leeds-Bradford. On landing, you will discover a complete lack of transport infrastructure connecting to either Leeds or Bradford"
Please don't remind me - When we occasional fly from Leeds Bradford I'm never sure if the most terrifying bit is a particularly bad junction on the way in from Harrogate or the fact the plane may lands sideways due to the wind.
Owen Paterson would have been nine days into his suspension had Boris Johnson just left this alone. Instead the government has blown a hole in the bank accounts of the MPs already most inclined to rebellion. #politics #strategy #whipping https://twitter.com/patrickkmaguire/status/1460633324414722058
I thought 3) in that Tweet was already against the rules as per the committee ruling over Paterson?
"New general restrictions on the way here in Belgium even though the problem is a specific one limited to a minority (a large one in Brussels) of people who have chosen not to be vaccinated"
King Cole, the bit after the Western Empire falls and before the Norman Conquest (especially pre-Alfred) is not the most popular in history for the general public.
What annoys me is every single damned documentary or drama (well, the vast majority) are fixated retelling stories of Henry VIII and Elizabeth II when (even just looking at England) there are so many more interesting and neglected events and characters to consider.
"The Vikings" did rather well from depicting the period, and the spin off "Vikings: Valhalla" covering the later period before the Norman conquest looks promising.
The period that seems to be lacking is the early post Roman period. In a generation or two, we abandoned roads, towns and the trappings of urban life, turning back to subsistence farming and more egalitarian social structures.
Perhaps we can find out about the latter in person, second time around?
The Dark Ages were only dark in the sense of the abandonment of Christianity, and also literacy. It happened between 409 and 450 or so, so a couple of generations. There seems surprisingly little evidence of resistance to going back to a simpler more sustainable communitarian lifestyle once the Romans stopped enforcing the alternative.
Who abandoned Christianity in 409->450 or so? Not really my period.
(or is that the joke I just edited out?) (Blockquote maybe borked warning)
The reason that there was little resistance was that when armed, competent invaders showed up, the locals had next to no military capability. Sharp swords make sharp arguments.
The process of robbing the locals when you felt like it, evolved into "You can't tax those peasants. They are my peasants"....
You could call that an egalitarian social structure. Depends which end of the sword you are holding, I suppose.
But who (or where) abandoned Christianity in 409->450 or so?
New one to me as well - in England, the Saxons who turned up to occupy senior management positions after the Romans divested their offshore holdings were initially pagan, but converted fairly rapidly to Christianity....
It seems very early for that.
Even the Edict of Milan (Constantine) wasn't until 313 (?) AD.
I've always associated Dark Ages with a period in either the second part of the first millenium 1000 AD, or a period in the middle ages, which is why I'm asking.
Dark Ages to me means that period when the absence of Christianity/literacy means there was a bit of a lacuna in recorded history. In England a relatively short period maybe AD400 - 800. We really know very little about the end of Roman Britain and the Germanic settlers had started to make their presence known. In Scandinavia it is different: not a lot is known pre 1000 or so, and in Sweden everything before 1200 might as well be Prehistory.
The absence of a real written record tells its own story of economic collapse and population decline, IMHO.
It would these days when literacy is universal. But remember in early Western Europe, literacy was a Roman thing, perpetuated by the Church. The withdrawal of Roman control over the British provinces probably did result in economic decline, but I am not so sure about population. At least one usurper may have marched off to Europe with a sizeable army, but the Romans had been settling Germanic foederati here for some time and there was obviously an influx of settlers. At that time, human population density seems to suggest that most places weren't fully exploited and there was room for settlers.
If it's perpetuated by the Church, that doesn't strike me as "early" Western Europe - certainly in the UK.
The first ABC was 597AD.
Christianity before that date can be debated (Celtic etc), however "The Church" is the Roman Catholic church. And that in the UK I think that means Augustine.
What I meant was, where places lost literacy when the Romans "left"* it was the Church that reintroduced it.
* it's quite likely that no-one actually left the Britains when the Romans relinquished control
I think the ability to write was almost exclusively confined to clerics, after the fall of the Western Empire. But, the ability to read was likely more widespread; leaders after all, have to be able to read records and charters, and know what's being written on their behalf.
King Cole, the bit after the Western Empire falls and before the Norman Conquest (especially pre-Alfred) is not the most popular in history for the general public.
What annoys me is every single damned documentary or drama (well, the vast majority) are fixated retelling stories of Henry VIII and Elizabeth II when (even just looking at England) there are so many more interesting and neglected events and characters to consider.
"The Vikings" did rather well from depicting the period, and the spin off "Vikings: Valhalla" covering the later period before the Norman conquest looks promising.
The period that seems to be lacking is the early post Roman period. In a generation or two, we abandoned roads, towns and the trappings of urban life, turning back to subsistence farming and more egalitarian social structures.
Perhaps we can find out about the latter in person, second time around?
The Dark Ages were only dark in the sense of the abandonment of Christianity, and also literacy. It happened between 409 and 450 or so, so a couple of generations. There seems surprisingly little evidence of resistance to going back to a simpler more sustainable communitarian lifestyle once the Romans stopped enforcing the alternative.
Who abandoned Christianity in 409->450 or so? Not really my period.
(or is that the joke I just edited out?) (Blockquote maybe borked warning)
The reason that there was little resistance was that when armed, competent invaders showed up, the locals had next to no military capability. Sharp swords make sharp arguments.
The process of robbing the locals when you felt like it, evolved into "You can't tax those peasants. They are my peasants"....
You could call that an egalitarian social structure. Depends which end of the sword you are holding, I suppose.
But who (or where) abandoned Christianity in 409->450 or so?
New one to me as well - in England, the Saxons who turned up to occupy senior management positions after the Romans divested their offshore holdings were initially pagan, but converted fairly rapidly to Christianity....
It seems very early for that.
Even the Edict of Milan (Constantine) wasn't until 313 (?) AD.
I've always associated Dark Ages with a period in either the second part of the first millenium 1000 AD, or a period in the middle ages, which is why I'm asking.
Dark Ages to me means that period when the absence of Christianity/literacy means there was a bit of a lacuna in recorded history. In England a relatively short period maybe AD400 - 800. We really know very little about the end of Roman Britain and the Germanic settlers had started to make their presence known. In Scandinavia it is different: not a lot is known pre 1000 or so, and in Sweden everything before 1200 might as well be Prehistory.
The absence of a real written record tells its own story of economic collapse and population decline, IMHO.
It would these days when literacy is universal. But remember in early Western Europe, literacy was a Roman thing, perpetuated by the Church. The withdrawal of Roman control over the British provinces probably did result in economic decline, but I am not so sure about population. At least one usurper may have marched off to Europe with a sizeable army, but the Romans had been settling Germanic foederati here for some time and there was obviously an influx of settlers. At that time, human population density seems to suggest that most places weren't fully exploited and there was room for settlers.
I think the evidence from archaeology these days is pretty clear there was a significant decline in population when the Romans left or rather when the links with the Empire were severed. This was on top of major declines due to plagues throughout the 4th century.
Basically the Romans had cleared much of the settlement from southern and Eastern Britain and brought it into the Villa Landscape which covered the whole south-eastern half of the country. There is little evidence of native, non-Roman settlements in the RB period in those areas. When the Villa landscape collapsed because it lost its markets in the cities and internationally, there seems to have been a rapid drop in rural population. I envisage that much of the late 5th and early 6th century migration by the Germanic tribes was into a largely empty landscape.
Ian Dale on Politics Live says that members of staff at Sky were livid that they were cutting the sound on the Rafiq testimony today. Apparently Sky played it unfiltered after they had complaints from their staff.
Did they cover the bit when Rafiq criticised David Lloyd?
I haven't seen the testimony myself, just heard what Dale said about it.
On the Digital Spy thread, it was suggested that Lloyd tried to influence journalists into playing down the allegations.
Back when the Tiger Woods infidelity allegations came out (12 years ago now!) there was an interview with an ex-golfing journalist who had tried to write a story on Woods, many years before. Woods' management got to hear about it, and the golfing journalist was immediately an ex-golfing journalist. Others received threats about losing access if they wrote stories.
Threats to journalists can work, sadly.
Didn't some journalists have their careers ruined over Lance Armstrong?
It wouldn't surprise me. But wasn't that a slightly different situation? From memory, allegations had always surrounded Armstrong, and he had always been cleared. That makes writing 'the truth' somewhat harder - especially given his backstory wrt cancer.
Everybody, even if only tangentially involved, in pro cycling knew exactly what was going on with Lance. And every other GC contender before and after him. It was way more encompassing than just not reporting on Lance.
I remember watching the Tour in a shared house in the early 90's and someone there had been a keen amateur competitor but had given it up. She told me that they all had their little medical kits and that it was all fake. Rather naively I couldn't quite believe that they were all cheats, but she was of course right.
It isn't just cycling that had (or has) an Omerta though.
With regard to the cricket, I wonder if it isn't really drinking culture that is at the heart of this. If you aren't a drinker, then you can never be 'part of the team'. The clubhouse is never quite separated from the competitive sport.
What sad little people if the only way they can socialise is by getting pissed.
As a non-drinker I agree, but that's the way it is. You are immediately marked as an outsider.
If you also happen to have a different skin colour then so much the worse, it seems.
It's not so much getting pissed, but pub culture. The cameraderie of the pub, where real-world problems can be abandoned for a few hours, there is assumed freedom to talk about things in a way you normally wouldn't, etc. But equally difficult for someone from a different culture to fit in, or a non-drinker.
It's not pub culture it is British culture. As an example, go online to any greetings card company. 80% of the cards will be something to do with drinking extraordinary amounts (usually of gin). It is something that we do and we do to excess. Perhaps the reason was the pub opening times era when people felt obligated to drink as much as possible as their time was limited to do so.
Drinking too much is seen as somehow heroic and not sordid - look at the synonyms - plastered, sozzled, battered, blotto, bladdered, caned, off your face (can be used for other drugs), rat-arsed, slaughtered, etc, etc.
It is a rite of passage for Brits. That cafe culture never arrived.
Actually I was chatting to a friend the other day whose daughter had just started Uni and he said how he expected her to get drunk and was in a way relieved that it was a relatively "healthy" way of letting off steam and, er, getting off your face.
It is less salient now, however. Kids today drink far less than we did when we were idiot youths. That is born out in the data
"Nearly 30% of young people in England do not drink, study finds
"Research shows greater proportion of 16- to 24-year-olds shunning alcohol entirely"
Yep my daughter doesn't drink. Certainly not due to her parents but she doesn't like the taste of alcohol.
The thought she was somehow missing out was, I must admit, tempered by the additional thought that she was less likely to get dunk and be taken advantage of.
Ditto my teenage daughters. By the time I was their age I was knocking back half bottles of whisky, no problem
They don't touch a drop
Cause and effect.
Almost certainly a factor. Kids rebel and reject. I am a big boozer. My kids will do the opposite
Both the mothers also like a drink....
Interesting as if I had to put a reason i dont down I'd say it was as neither parent ever drank much. A little, they never pushed a tee total message and let me try wine at a young age (didn't like it), but it just wasnt something i felt like getting into.
But then i am not a rebellious soul as child or adult. I feel like in a dystopia I'd be the collaborator just out if a desire to not cause a fuss.
It's not pub culture it is British culture. As an example, go online to any greetings card company. 80% of the cards will be something to do with drinking extraordinary amounts (usually of gin). It is something that we do and we do to excess. Perhaps the reason was the pub opening times era when people felt obligated to drink as much as possible as their time was limited to do so.
Drinking too much is seen as somehow heroic and not sordid - look at the synonyms - plastered, sozzled, battered, blotto, bladdered, caned, off your face (can be used for other drugs), rat-arsed, slaughtered, etc, etc.
It is a rite of passage for Brits. That cafe culture never arrived.
Actually I was chatting to a friend the other day whose daughter had just started Uni and he said how he expected her to get drunk and was in a way relieved that it was a relatively "healthy" way of letting off steam and, er, getting off your face.
"we" ?
It's a subset of British culture, not the definition.
People who get bladdered for no reason have always been idiots, as they continue to be now.
I agree, but it's one of those things where people move in circles with similar habits and think everyone else is weird. I've seen one poll that says that 50% of Brits almost never go to a pub, for instance, but I know people who go two or three evenings a week.
What I will say, though, is that it's much, much easier nowadays not to drink alcohol in company and not get teased or cajoled - it's seen as a matter of personal choice. Attitudes to drink-driving have changed too - nearly everyone thinks it's stupid, as opposed to the old "one for the road" culture" - and that's helped, since some people at a party will stay sober for that reason.
Yes, it wasn't going away. He had to do something and that is easier, affects fewer than the other option, with the line easier to draw.
The key will be how "lobbyist" is defined. Was the "strategic advice" of OP or IDS "lobbying"? I would say it was as soon as they were trying to promote the companies paying them for public contracts but there may still be an area where MPs can use their knowledge and expertise without indulging in lobbying.
Is this like the time I billed for 'strategic advice' instead of lobbying?
Good luck to OLB. Like him, my COVID started as a bit of a sore throat. Unlike him, all I did during the period I probably caught it was go to work (in a pretty covid-safe environment), a bit of shopping and meet with my running club (outdoors).
Cold symptoms got worse again yesterday evening. However I slept much better, not disturbed by fever, and slept through to about 9.30.
I now have a pulse oxymeter. It was a healthy 99 yesterday afternoon however it was 97 yesterday evening and I have just tested at 95. Hope this isn't a trend, however I don't feel breathless and haven't really been coughing.
At the start of the pandemic, @Foxy advised us to get a pulse oximeter. His advice was if oxygen saturation goes below 93 call 999.
Ian Dale on Politics Live says that members of staff at Sky were livid that they were cutting the sound on the Rafiq testimony today. Apparently Sky played it unfiltered after they had complaints from their staff.
Did they cover the bit when Rafiq criticised David Lloyd?
I haven't seen the testimony myself, just heard what Dale said about it.
On the Digital Spy thread, it was suggested that Lloyd tried to influence journalists into playing down the allegations.
Back when the Tiger Woods infidelity allegations came out (12 years ago now!) there was an interview with an ex-golfing journalist who had tried to write a story on Woods, many years before. Woods' management got to hear about it, and the golfing journalist was immediately an ex-golfing journalist. Others received threats about losing access if they wrote stories.
Threats to journalists can work, sadly.
Didn't some journalists have their careers ruined over Lance Armstrong?
It wouldn't surprise me. But wasn't that a slightly different situation? From memory, allegations had always surrounded Armstrong, and he had always been cleared. That makes writing 'the truth' somewhat harder - especially given his backstory wrt cancer.
Everybody, even if only tangentially involved, in pro cycling knew exactly what was going on with Lance. And every other GC contender before and after him. It was way more encompassing than just not reporting on Lance.
I remember watching the Tour in a shared house in the early 90's and someone there had been a keen amateur competitor but had given it up. She told me that they all had their little medical kits and that it was all fake. Rather naively I couldn't quite believe that they were all cheats, but she was of course right.
It isn't just cycling that had (or has) an Omerta though.
With regard to the cricket, I wonder if it isn't really drinking culture that is at the heart of this. If you aren't a drinker, then you can never be 'part of the team'. The clubhouse is never quite separated from the competitive sport.
What sad little people if the only way they can socialise is by getting pissed.
As a non-drinker I agree, but that's the way it is. You are immediately marked as an outsider.
If you also happen to have a different skin colour then so much the worse, it seems.
It's not so much getting pissed, but pub culture. The cameraderie of the pub, where real-world problems can be abandoned for a few hours, there is assumed freedom to talk about things in a way you normally wouldn't, etc. But equally difficult for someone from a different culture to fit in, or a non-drinker.
It's not pub culture it is British culture. As an example, go online to any greetings card company. 80% of the cards will be something to do with drinking extraordinary amounts (usually of gin). It is something that we do and we do to excess. Perhaps the reason was the pub opening times era when people felt obligated to drink as much as possible as their time was limited to do so.
Drinking too much is seen as somehow heroic and not sordid - look at the synonyms - plastered, sozzled, battered, blotto, bladdered, caned, off your face (can be used for other drugs), rat-arsed, slaughtered, etc, etc.
It is a rite of passage for Brits. That cafe culture never arrived.
Actually I was chatting to a friend the other day whose daughter had just started Uni and he said how he expected her to get drunk and was in a way relieved that it was a relatively "healthy" way of letting off steam and, er, getting off your face.
"we" ?
It's a subset of British culture, not the definition.
People who get bladdered for no reason have always been idiots, as they continue to be now.
Well that's the point isn't it. No one gets bladdered for no reason. There is always a reason and it's interesting to think what it might be.
And as for "we" yes I'm afraid so. You are a Brit, the culture undeniably exists, and hence it is your culture also.
Being sanctimonious is also a British trait.
There is a drinking culture in this country but compared to some we’re amateurs. Russia in particular. When I was there I was astounded. They drink like they don’t want to live.
If Johnson had had any sense at all (don't laugh there please, I did say 'if') then he would have cancelled the southern part of HS2 and kept the bits from Birmingham northwards.
If the eastern leg is cancelled, the Birmingham interchange station ain’t gonna get as much use. If you were to design from scratch, it would probably be scrapped.
This is the problem when you dick around with infrastructure projects half way through.
Had the Transport Ministry had a sudden influx of staff from Defence Procurement ?
The eastern leg hasn't been cancelled, it's merely be shortened to a field somewhere near Eastern Midlands Airport...
"Please board the air replacement service to Leeds-Bradford. On landing, you will discover a complete lack of transport infrastructure connecting to either Leeds or Bradford"
Not true. The Newcastle - Leeds - Manchester Megabus goes right past. Doesn't stop mind. But a well timed pole vault over the fence would get you on the roof. Folk need everything handed to them on a plate these days.
If Johnson had had any sense at all (don't laugh there please, I did say 'if') then he would have cancelled the southern part of HS2 and kept the bits from Birmingham northwards.
If the eastern leg is cancelled, the Birmingham interchange station ain’t gonna get as much use. If you were to design from scratch, it would probably be scrapped.
This is the problem when you dick around with infrastructure projects half way through.
Had the Transport Ministry had a sudden influx of staff from Defence Procurement ?
The eastern leg hasn't been cancelled, it's merely be shortened to a field somewhere near Eastern Midlands Airport...
"Please board the air replacement service to Leeds-Bradford. On landing, you will discover a complete lack of transport infrastructure connecting to either Leeds or Bradford"
Please don't remind me - When we occasional fly from Leeds Bradford I'm never sure if the most terrifying bit is a particularly bad junction on the way in from Harrogate or the fact the plane may lands sideways due to the wind.
Or the fact that you are close to Leeds and Bradford.
On another subject, another thing this shows is that local media isn't dead yet. My view - and this is blether rather than me knowing what I'm talking about - is that the MEN is more influential in GM than any of the national papers. I'm sure the same is true of the Echo on Merseyside, the Chronicle in the North East, the Yorkshire Post in Yorkshire, and so on. This makes me happy and slightly proud for reasons I can't quite place.
Jennifer Williams is a very fine journalist. I have been following her work for a while. Well worth reading.
Did you see Simon Reeve’s new show, ‘The Lakes’ at the weekend? All about Cumbria
I didn't even know of its existence. But thank you. I will look out for it.
We watched the first episode last night - featured a woman who hunts grey squirrels and makes Waistcoats, fishing tackle, and curry out of them!
Was that the one that then went on to feature the nicer parts of Barrow-in-Furness?
Comments
If you also happen to have a different skin colour then so much the worse, it seems.
Of course we should hear this. It is a world of difference between someone using it as an insult and someone reporting its use.
Anyone being fired for using one of these words in the appropriate context I am sure would have a good claim in an employment tribunal. After all how would the claimant be able to report it or it be raised in the tribunal if not spoken. Common sense needs to apply.
This is the problem when you dick around with infrastructure projects half way through.
Just looked up their advert and its really fun. Anything using a Queen song generally is. Have I missed something offensive that should result in boycotts?
Drinking too much is seen as somehow heroic and not sordid - look at the synonyms - plastered, sozzled, battered, blotto, bladdered, caned, off your face (can be used for other drugs), rat-arsed, slaughtered, etc, etc.
It is a rite of passage for Brits. That cafe culture never arrived.
Actually I was chatting to a friend the other day whose daughter had just started Uni and he said how he expected her to get drunk and was in a way relieved that it was a relatively "healthy" way of letting off steam and, er, getting off your face.
How do you bridge the gulf?
Hence my comment that I will make a point of going to my nearest Tesco for my next shop.
"Nearly 30% of young people in England do not drink, study finds
"Research shows greater proportion of 16- to 24-year-olds shunning alcohol entirely"
https://www.theguardian.com/society/2018/oct/10/young-people-drinking-alcohol-study-england
It is one thing sitting in a pub with a bunch of mates and not drinking. The rules of the game are clear there and there's no compulsion involved.
It is the built-in expectation in the culture of the 'team' that causes the issue. The 'buying everyone drinks if you score 50' was a good example. What if you just want to play a sport?
They work at night, as well. The burning floodlights and fierce blue flames and occasional glitter-rock cascades of golden sparks are rather dramatic, and picturesque
The thought she was somehow missing out was, I must admit, tempered by the additional thought that she was less likely to get dunk and be taken advantage of.
They don't touch a drop
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/11/13/us/us-airstrikes-civilian-deaths.html
The military never conducted an independent investigation into a 2019 bombing on the last bastion of the Islamic State, despite concerns about a secretive commando force.
Maybe that’s why there are so many Asian teams/ leagues?
She will start her post, based in Washington DC, early in the New Year.
More details here: https://www.bbc.com/mediacentre/2021/sarah-smith-appointed-bbc-news-north-america-editor/ https://twitter.com/BBCNewsPR/status/1460624451020767241/photo/1
"Pubs, restaurants and nightclubs will have a new closing time of midnight from Thursday;
People will have to restrict their movements for five days if they are a household contact and will have to take three antigen tests in a new policy change;
People will be told to work from home as of Friday;
Vaccine passes will not be required for access to hairdressers, barbers or gyms but will needed for theatres and cinemas;
Stricter rules around mask wearing for indoor and outdoor settings;
Antigen tests will be made more affordable for the people ;
Booster jab to be offered to people aged in their 50s and for people aged under 50 with underlying health conditions."
+++
Not that onerous, but must be a bit dispiriting
Completely inevitable.
That or ban second jobs entirely.
That would upset some in the Home Counties - especially now some of it has been built.
This probably explains a fair bit.
Incidentally, one of them is called GEMS.
Gentlemen of Ethnic Minority Status.
"New general restrictions on the way here in Belgium even though the problem is a specific one limited to a minority (a large one in Brussels) of people who have chosen not to be vaccinated"
https://twitter.com/BrunoBrussels/status/1460208357252513793?s=20
So that's Belgium, Holland, Ireland, and arguably Austria in some kind of new lockdown, in western Europe
I assume he does not know
The questions will be interesting
https://twitter.com/patrickkmaguire/status/1460633324414722058
The first ABC was 597AD.
Christianity before that date can be debated (Celtic etc), however "The Church" is the Roman Catholic church. And that in the UK I think that means Augustine.
It's a subset of British culture, not the definition.
People who get bladdered for no reason have always been idiots, as they continue to be now.
In my student days my friends loved me, we went to places like Vodka Revolution where they'd only let you drink 4 shots of absinthe or the 98% got rut vodka per customer I went and both the drinks, got stamped on the hand, and gave the drinks to my friends who had hit the limit.
People were curious at first why I didn't drink, but after a few nights out it was never an issue.
The only thing I find awkward with people drinking post my student days, the amount of people who go out for one drink, end up having more and think driving home is a good idea. I've had to step in a few times, but that's not a Muslim thing, plenty of my non Muslim friends have also intervened.
* it's quite likely that no-one actually left the Britains when the Romans relinquished control
Both the mothers also like a drink....
The letter to the Speaker has been released to the public and the media
And as for "we" yes I'm afraid so. You are a Brit, the culture undeniably exists, and hence it is your culture also.
Being sanctimonious is also a British trait.
The Prime Minister has torpedoed Sir Keir's speech
Basically the Romans had cleared much of the settlement from southern and Eastern Britain and brought it into the Villa Landscape which covered the whole south-eastern half of the country. There is little evidence of native, non-Roman settlements in the RB period in those areas. When the Villa landscape collapsed because it lost its markets in the cities and internationally, there seems to have been a rapid drop in rural population. I envisage that much of the late 5th and early 6th century migration by the Germanic tribes was into a largely empty landscape.
But then i am not a rebellious soul as child or adult. I feel like in a dystopia I'd be the collaborator just out if a desire to not cause a fuss.
What I will say, though, is that it's much, much easier nowadays not to drink alcohol in company and not get teased or cajoled - it's seen as a matter of personal choice. Attitudes to drink-driving have changed too - nearly everyone thinks it's stupid, as opposed to the old "one for the road" culture" - and that's helped, since some people at a party will stay sober for that reason.
Doesn't stop mind.
But a well timed pole vault over the fence would get you on the roof.
Folk need everything handed to them on a plate these days.