Somebody who bullied somebody off this website is calling other people abusive, ironic.
I don't think Charles has ever bullied or been abusive to anyone. I don't get your vendetta against him and a few others.
A bit more tolerance of people with views different to your own would do you good. Some of the best conversations I have on this site are with people I disagree with, and some of the people I find most objectionable vote the same way I do. Its enlightening to embrace a variety of viewpoints not just a circle of likeminded people.
I wasn't referring to Charles when I said that. I think you know exactly who I was referring to.
I get on with plenty of people I disagree with. HYUFD, MrEd, Richard, in fact the only people I don't get on with are the bullies and those who condescend and are abusive to me and others - and I am not the first to point this out.
Politely disagreeing with you isn't bullying you, or "shouting you down".
A bully calling somebody else a bully. Ironic.
I'm going to step out of the conversation as it isn't productive. You're the only one I can see calling people a bully, or insulting people. I stepped in to defend Charles after he was unfairly smeared.
This conversation seems most unproductive. If you've got nothing nice to say about someone, don't say anything at all is a good rule of thumb.
You bullied somebody off this website. Don't you dare try and call me a bully.
I did no such thing.
Someone left the website because they didn't like my opinion, politely expressed. That is not bullying. If I was bullying I'd expect to be rightly banned, but politely expressing your own opinion is never bullying even if others don't like that opinion.
They asked you to stop engaging with them, which you ignored. So they left.
It’s a pity this forum doesn’t have a block function for such instances.
It's actually possible to bodge together your own crude "block" functionality. There are browser addons that allow you to program certain sites to hide html elements that meet certain criteria. So you could fairly easily have it detect a user's name, say "Farooq", and your browser would collapse that element and you wouldn't see it.
It might also spoil your experience since you'd end up seeing weird orphan threads etc., but it can be done.
I had one many years ago, not sure what browser support is like for user scripts nowadays or whether you have to turn it into an extension or what:
2 negative LFTs in our house today. We've managed to get all 4 infected and recovered from omicron in 22 days. And in 2 separate batches so we weren't all sick at the same time. Pretty efficient wotk, eh? Onwards and upwards for 2022 then.
If it wasn't for the impending crippling inflation i might have been tempted to say its going to be a great year...with two thumbs up.
Somebody who bullied somebody off this website is calling other people abusive, ironic.
I don't think Charles has ever bullied or been abusive to anyone. I don't get your vendetta against him and a few others.
A bit more tolerance of people with views different to your own would do you good. Some of the best conversations I have on this site are with people I disagree with, and some of the people I find most objectionable vote the same way I do. Its enlightening to embrace a variety of viewpoints not just a circle of likeminded people.
I wasn't referring to Charles when I said that. I think you know exactly who I was referring to.
I get on with plenty of people I disagree with. HYUFD, MrEd, Richard, in fact the only people I don't get on with are the bullies and those who condescend and are abusive to me and others - and I am not the first to point this out.
Politely disagreeing with you isn't bullying you, or "shouting you down".
A bully calling somebody else a bully. Ironic.
Guys, guys, look at us. Arguing. Bickering. It didn’t used to be like this.
Hmm. I'm a fairly irregular poster, but I started posting here around five or (maybe nearer six?) years ago after years of lurking.
I stopped posting almost entirely this year due to health issues which I've been fairly candid about, but I also stopped lurking too, so I've been absent almost an entire year.
My perspective is that while much has stayed the same... it also seems like a much angrier, testier and less civil place to be. Spats will always happen, but they seem to go from 0 to all the way up to 11 in the blink of an eye now.
I don't know if that is because two years of this pandemic has worn us all down to the bone and made us snappier and grouchier, or if it's something else.
But that's my two cents, as someone who took a year's sabbatical from posting on or reading PB.
I think the whole country is a much angrier, testier and less civil place tbf. Everyone is on edge, exhausted, strained, fed up.
@Endillion fair, but the simple fact is that this entire debate is completely meaningless. There is nothing stopping anyone from using whatever toilet they want. Talk of a distinction between pre- and post-op is meaningless because there isn’t a “between the legs” inspector at the door of every bathroom.
Ultimately self ID (in respect to toilets) does not create an increased danger to women because there is nothing stopping violent and abusive men from going into women’s toilets already, regardless of trans or otherwise.
Sport and prisons etc is another debate entirely.
I don't actually agree - because currently if a wannabe abuser sticks his head round the door of the ladies' toilets he gets shouted out 99 times out of 100, whereas if you change the rules, suddenly that's no longer possible or even legal - but it's not actually important. What I said was that I think it's emblematic of the way the debate is being conducted, with far too much focus on individual self expression and little to nothing on societal interactions.
This is bizarre, because the debate sort-of breaks down into left/right blocs, and it is very strange to me that the left have completely forgotten about the societal aspects, and the right are having to remind them that not everything is about the rights of the individual.
Somebody who bullied somebody off this website is calling other people abusive, ironic.
I don't think Charles has ever bullied or been abusive to anyone. I don't get your vendetta against him and a few others.
A bit more tolerance of people with views different to your own would do you good. Some of the best conversations I have on this site are with people I disagree with, and some of the people I find most objectionable vote the same way I do. Its enlightening to embrace a variety of viewpoints not just a circle of likeminded people.
I wasn't referring to Charles when I said that. I think you know exactly who I was referring to.
I get on with plenty of people I disagree with. HYUFD, MrEd, Richard, in fact the only people I don't get on with are the bullies and those who condescend and are abusive to me and others - and I am not the first to point this out.
Politely disagreeing with you isn't bullying you, or "shouting you down".
A bully calling somebody else a bully. Ironic.
I'm going to step out of the conversation as it isn't productive. You're the only one I can see calling people a bully, or insulting people. I stepped in to defend Charles after he was unfairly smeared.
This conversation seems most unproductive. If you've got nothing nice to say about someone, don't say anything at all is a good rule of thumb.
You bullied somebody off this website. Don't you dare try and call me a bully.
I did no such thing.
Someone left the website because they didn't like my opinion, politely expressed. That is not bullying. If I was bullying I'd expect to be rightly banned, but politely expressing your own opinion is never bullying even if others don't like that opinion.
They asked you to stop engaging with them, which you ignored. So they left.
It’s a pity this forum doesn’t have a block function for such instances.
2 negative LFTs in our house today. We've managed to get all 4 infected and recovered from omicron in 22 days. And in 2 separate batches so we weren't all sick at the same time. Pretty efficient wotk, eh? Onwards and upwards for 2022 then.
If it wasn't for the impending crippling inflation i might have been tempted to say its going to be a great year...with two thumbs up.
I’m rowing back almost all spending from Jan. 2022 is going to be miserable!
Somebody who bullied somebody off this website is calling other people abusive, ironic.
I don't think Charles has ever bullied or been abusive to anyone. I don't get your vendetta against him and a few others.
A bit more tolerance of people with views different to your own would do you good. Some of the best conversations I have on this site are with people I disagree with, and some of the people I find most objectionable vote the same way I do. Its enlightening to embrace a variety of viewpoints not just a circle of likeminded people.
I wasn't referring to Charles when I said that. I think you know exactly who I was referring to.
I get on with plenty of people I disagree with. HYUFD, MrEd, Richard, in fact the only people I don't get on with are the bullies and those who condescend and are abusive to me and others - and I am not the first to point this out.
Politely disagreeing with you isn't bullying you, or "shouting you down".
A bully calling somebody else a bully. Ironic.
I'm going to step out of the conversation as it isn't productive. You're the only one I can see calling people a bully, or insulting people. I stepped in to defend Charles after he was unfairly smeared.
This conversation seems most unproductive. If you've got nothing nice to say about someone, don't say anything at all is a good rule of thumb.
You bullied somebody off this website. Don't you dare try and call me a bully.
I did no such thing.
Someone left the website because they didn't like my opinion, politely expressed. That is not bullying. If I was bullying I'd expect to be rightly banned, but politely expressing your own opinion is never bullying even if others don't like that opinion.
They asked you to stop engaging with them, which you ignored. So they left.
It’s a pity this forum doesn’t have a block function for such instances.
It's actually possible to bodge together your own crude "block" functionality. There are browser addons that allow you to program certain sites to hide html elements that meet certain criteria. So you could fairly easily have it detect a user's name, say "Farooq", and your browser would collapse that element and you wouldn't see it.
It might also spoil your experience since you'd end up seeing weird orphan threads etc., but it can be done.
I had one many years ago, not sure what browser support is like for user scripts nowadays or whether you have to turn it into an extension or what:
"The EU and the US reached a Halloween agreement to remove tariffs on a quota of steel and aluminium imported from the bloc into the US from 1 January, but tariffs will remain on all UK steel and aluminium exports after government talks failed to secure a matching breakthrough."
AIUI remaining in place because Mr Biden has chosen to try and prevent the UK being able to use a Treaty clause which is expressly in the EU-UK Treaty to protect the long-term stability of UK society. Does he really think it is possible to walk away form that? Would the USA?
By making the link he ensures that companies such as Harley Davidson will continue to have balancing sanctions applied to them, and that further balancing tariffs etc will be applied, as he has chosen to deadlock the conversation.
A fairly stupid thing for him to do.
That hardly matters because a HD isn't a price sensitive purchasing decision. They are already significantly more expensive than the equivalent competition anyway.
Somebody who bullied somebody off this website is calling other people abusive, ironic.
I don't think Charles has ever bullied or been abusive to anyone. I don't get your vendetta against him and a few others.
A bit more tolerance of people with views different to your own would do you good. Some of the best conversations I have on this site are with people I disagree with, and some of the people I find most objectionable vote the same way I do. Its enlightening to embrace a variety of viewpoints not just a circle of likeminded people.
I wasn't referring to Charles when I said that. I think you know exactly who I was referring to.
I get on with plenty of people I disagree with. HYUFD, MrEd, Richard, in fact the only people I don't get on with are the bullies and those who condescend and are abusive to me and others - and I am not the first to point this out.
Politely disagreeing with you isn't bullying you, or "shouting you down".
A bully calling somebody else a bully. Ironic.
Guys, guys, look at us. Arguing. Bickering. It didn’t used to be like this.
Hmm. I'm a fairly irregular poster, but I started posting here around five or (maybe nearer six?) years ago after years of lurking.
I stopped posting almost entirely this year due to health issues which I've been fairly candid about, but I also stopped lurking too, so I've been absent almost an entire year.
My perspective is that while much has stayed the same... it also seems like a much angrier, testier and less civil place to be. Spats will always happen, but they seem to go from 0 to all the way up to 11 in the blink of an eye now.
I don't know if that is because two years of this pandemic has worn us all down to the bone and made us snappier and grouchier, or if it's something else.
But that's my two cents, as someone who took a year's sabbatical from posting on or reading PB.
WFH does not help because it means people can stay here all day. Thread length and posts per day are far higher than used to be the case, which I suspect puts people off. Certainly I avoid threads where I need to read 500 posts to catch up. It also means pairs of PBers can conduct private feuds for hours, as if anyone else cared. There is also, I suspect more trolling. Whether that is intentional or comes from people re-posting twitter trolls here, I could not say.
I know someone who is doing 5 tests a day just because someone they saw someone a week ago who now has Omicron. If that type of behaviour is being repeated then no wonder there are supply problems for tests.
Yesterday in SA they did 34,753 tests some of which had to be paid for by the person taking the test.
In the UK we did 1,476,216 tests all of which were free.
And our testing system is a "shambles"
Only an hour or so ago I heard on the radio a medic lauding the SA testing system because of how many PCR tests they do. Yet we in the UK do far more PCR tests than SA even if it is a smaller percentage of the total due to the vast number of LFTs. Some people just hate this country without any reason.
When you laud the efforts of country X you don't silently attack country Y.
So unless you've missed something in your reporting where the medic complained about the UK you seem to have leapt to a completely invalid conclusion.
It was in the context of "what has gone wrong with testing?" Saying SA does more PCR tests was only true as a fraction of the total testing, in reality the UK does over 20 times as many PCR tests per capita each day, and it is a smaller fraction of the total testing because we do a huge number of LFTs as well. It was a misleading statement, made by the sort of person who should know better.
There's a certain class of liberal that loathes this nation and everything about it.
Sadly a lot of them post on here regularly.
I've never seen anyone post here that they 'loathe this nation and everything about it.'. Some of us don't think that everything done in UK is 'world-beating' (to quote someone, somewhere) but it's generally because we want our country to do better, not accept second best because it's our system.
Somebody who bullied somebody off this website is calling other people abusive, ironic.
I don't think Charles has ever bullied or been abusive to anyone. I don't get your vendetta against him and a few others.
A bit more tolerance of people with views different to your own would do you good. Some of the best conversations I have on this site are with people I disagree with, and some of the people I find most objectionable vote the same way I do. Its enlightening to embrace a variety of viewpoints not just a circle of likeminded people.
I wasn't referring to Charles when I said that. I think you know exactly who I was referring to.
I get on with plenty of people I disagree with. HYUFD, MrEd, Richard, in fact the only people I don't get on with are the bullies and those who condescend and are abusive to me and others - and I am not the first to point this out.
Politely disagreeing with you isn't bullying you, or "shouting you down".
A bully calling somebody else a bully. Ironic.
Guys, guys, look at us. Arguing. Bickering. It didn’t used to be like this.
Hmm. I'm a fairly irregular poster, but I started posting here around five or (maybe nearer six?) years ago after years of lurking.
I stopped posting almost entirely this year due to health issues which I've been fairly candid about, but I also stopped lurking too, so I've been absent almost an entire year.
My perspective is that while much has stayed the same... it also seems like a much angrier, testier and less civil place to be. Spats will always happen, but they seem to go from 0 to all the way up to 11 in the blink of an eye now.
I don't know if that is because two years of this pandemic has worn us all down to the bone and made us snappier and grouchier, or if it's something else.
But that's my two cents, as someone who took a year's sabbatical from posting on or reading PB.
To be fair things were a lot more heated during and after the referendum. It's not as bad here now as it was from 2016 to 2019 IMO.
It feels like China is getting to the point where it’s politics will start to undermine its economic growth. This kind of action, among many others, doesn’t sit easily with the creativity and freedom to experiment needed for entrepreneurialism to thrive. Even more pernicious is the apparent cronyism that’s been taking over the economy for a few years.
China is at a fork in the road, I think, between different versions of the 7 basic plots. It has been through the anticipation and dream stages. It now reaches the frustration stage. Does this end in tragedy, or the triumphant ending of the quest (which for China is also both rebirth and rags to riches)? Or does the plot just peter out? Demographics are not massively on its site either.
@Endillion fair, but the simple fact is that this entire debate is completely meaningless. There is nothing stopping anyone from using whatever toilet they want. Talk of a distinction between pre- and post-op is meaningless because there isn’t a “between the legs” inspector at the door of every bathroom.
Ultimately self ID (in respect to toilets) does not create an increased danger to women because there is nothing stopping violent and abusive men from going into women’s toilets already, regardless of trans or otherwise.
Sport and prisons etc is another debate entirely.
I don't actually agree - because currently if a wannabe abuser sticks his head round the door of the ladies' toilets he gets shouted out 99 times out of 100, whereas if you change the rules, suddenly that's no longer possible or even legal - but it's not actually important. What I said was that I think it's emblematic of the way the debate is being conducted, with far too much focus on individual self expression and little to nothing on societal interactions.
This is bizarre, because the debate sort-of breaks down into left/right blocs, and it is very strange to me that the left have completely forgotten about the societal aspects, and the right are having to remind them that not everything is about the rights of the individual.
Only if a wannabe abuser doesn't pass as a woman. Otherwise who’s going to know?
People seem to have in their heads that a trans woman is a person in a dress with stubble.
Somebody who bullied somebody off this website is calling other people abusive, ironic.
I don't think Charles has ever bullied or been abusive to anyone. I don't get your vendetta against him and a few others.
A bit more tolerance of people with views different to your own would do you good. Some of the best conversations I have on this site are with people I disagree with, and some of the people I find most objectionable vote the same way I do. Its enlightening to embrace a variety of viewpoints not just a circle of likeminded people.
I wasn't referring to Charles when I said that. I think you know exactly who I was referring to.
I get on with plenty of people I disagree with. HYUFD, MrEd, Richard, in fact the only people I don't get on with are the bullies and those who condescend and are abusive to me and others - and I am not the first to point this out.
Politely disagreeing with you isn't bullying you, or "shouting you down".
A bully calling somebody else a bully. Ironic.
I'm going to step out of the conversation as it isn't productive. You're the only one I can see calling people a bully, or insulting people. I stepped in to defend Charles after he was unfairly smeared.
This conversation seems most unproductive. If you've got nothing nice to say about someone, don't say anything at all is a good rule of thumb.
You bullied somebody off this website. Don't you dare try and call me a bully.
I did no such thing.
Someone left the website because they didn't like my opinion, politely expressed. That is not bullying. If I was bullying I'd expect to be rightly banned, but politely expressing your own opinion is never bullying even if others don't like that opinion.
You bullied them off here. We know what you did.
Don't call me a bully ever again.
I have been nothing but respectful to you since you asked me to be and you've just thrown it back in my face at every junction. That's it, line crossed.
Calm down. I never called you a bully, though you're calling me one. If I called you a bully please quote where I said that, because I quite frankly did not. You're inventing things I never said. The text is there for the record, I never said that.
Nor did I bully anyone, the person concerned never accused me of bullying him either. He expressed distaste for my opinions, that's his prerogative. If someone wants to get away from opinions they dislike and go to a "safe space" away from opinions they don't like they're free to do so but expressing your own opinion is not bullying.
Imagine getting life coaching from El Barto. Fuck me.
Somebody who bullied somebody off this website is calling other people abusive, ironic.
I don't think Charles has ever bullied or been abusive to anyone. I don't get your vendetta against him and a few others.
A bit more tolerance of people with views different to your own would do you good. Some of the best conversations I have on this site are with people I disagree with, and some of the people I find most objectionable vote the same way I do. Its enlightening to embrace a variety of viewpoints not just a circle of likeminded people.
I wasn't referring to Charles when I said that. I think you know exactly who I was referring to.
I get on with plenty of people I disagree with. HYUFD, MrEd, Richard, in fact the only people I don't get on with are the bullies and those who condescend and are abusive to me and others - and I am not the first to point this out.
Politely disagreeing with you isn't bullying you, or "shouting you down".
A bully calling somebody else a bully. Ironic.
Guys, guys, look at us. Arguing. Bickering. It didn’t used to be like this.
Hmm. I'm a fairly irregular poster, but I started posting here around five or (maybe nearer six?) years ago after years of lurking.
I stopped posting almost entirely this year due to health issues which I've been fairly candid about, but I also stopped lurking too, so I've been absent almost an entire year.
My perspective is that while much has stayed the same... it also seems like a much angrier, testier and less civil place to be. Spats will always happen, but they seem to go from 0 to all the way up to 11 in the blink of an eye now.
I don't know if that is because two years of this pandemic has worn us all down to the bone and made us snappier and grouchier, or if it's something else.
But that's my two cents, as someone who took a year's sabbatical from posting on or reading PB.
I think the whole country is a much angrier, testier and less civil place tbf. Everyone is on edge, exhausted, strained, fed up.
OT Deliveroo is taking forever. This might be because there was a double murder a few yards away yesterday so perhaps the police have still blocked the road.
Somebody who bullied somebody off this website is calling other people abusive, ironic.
I don't think Charles has ever bullied or been abusive to anyone. I don't get your vendetta against him and a few others.
A bit more tolerance of people with views different to your own would do you good. Some of the best conversations I have on this site are with people I disagree with, and some of the people I find most objectionable vote the same way I do. Its enlightening to embrace a variety of viewpoints not just a circle of likeminded people.
I wasn't referring to Charles when I said that. I think you know exactly who I was referring to.
I get on with plenty of people I disagree with. HYUFD, MrEd, Richard, in fact the only people I don't get on with are the bullies and those who condescend and are abusive to me and others - and I am not the first to point this out.
Politely disagreeing with you isn't bullying you, or "shouting you down".
A bully calling somebody else a bully. Ironic.
I'm going to step out of the conversation as it isn't productive. You're the only one I can see calling people a bully, or insulting people. I stepped in to defend Charles after he was unfairly smeared.
This conversation seems most unproductive. If you've got nothing nice to say about someone, don't say anything at all is a good rule of thumb.
You bullied somebody off this website. Don't you dare try and call me a bully.
I did no such thing.
Someone left the website because they didn't like my opinion, politely expressed. That is not bullying. If I was bullying I'd expect to be rightly banned, but politely expressing your own opinion is never bullying even if others don't like that opinion.
They asked you to stop engaging with them, which you ignored. So they left.
It’s a pity this forum doesn’t have a block function for such instances.
It would be good if you could block one and only one other contributor. The agony of that decision would be exquisite.
I am not a lawyer but I would like to pick brains on here regarding the Ghislaine Maxwell case. My questions are:
People on here have talked about her revealing names as part of a plea bargain, but as the Maxwell family saying they are challenging the verdict, wouldn't revealing names be tantamount to accepting the guilty verdict?
What are the chances of the Maxwells repeatedly challenging on points of law until the verdict is overturned?
Where is the Maxwell family getting the money from for this extensive and expensive legal defence?
I would genuinely welcome any thoughts on these matters.
Too late for a plea bargain which as the name suggests involves pleading guilty and is a deal with the prosecution who, at least in English law, are now out of the picture. Sentencing is for the judge. The suggestion that she can spill beans at this stage to reduce her sentence verges on conspiracy theory, but some conspiracy theories are true.
Can't see an appeal succeeding certainly not on all counts. No idea about finances, she may have some Epstein money left and has a rich husband
Her brothers were also acquitted of a remarkably serious fraud committed by their late father on a pension fund.
I have no knowledge of American criminal procedure but in this country when the Crown closes its case the defence can plead no case to answer and if there is insufficient evidence in law to allow a safe conviction, taken at its very highest, then the case is taken away from the Jury and dismissed. If the Crown get past that point then the defence has a difficult choice to make: does the accused give evidence or not.
Donald Findlay QC, who has almost certainly done more murder cases for the defence than anyone else in the world given the way our system operates, is famous for not letting his clients give evidence, recognising the many risks. But in sex crimes a person whose case has got past the no case to answer point is taking a very large risk and in my limited experience accused do give evidence in rape cases.
Not having GH give evidence was a brave call and may well form the basis of an appeal if it is contended that she was not in a fit state to give evidence because of her mental health or the conditions of her incarceration. Whether that appeal is successful or not is a different matter.
Interesting you make the point about her incarceration conditions given some of the Maxwell clan have already been interviewed, by quite a favourable media, complaining about how she has been held.
I was discussing the Ghislaine Maxwell case with my brother and pointed to the fact that her brothers were acquitted of fraud. He said financial fraud is usually very complex and few understand it, whereas people understand sex. He said she would be found guilty, I thought otherwise. I fear that wealthy and powerful people can keep appealing against a verdict until it is overturned.
Fraud seems to have a "I was too think to understand what I was doing" defence that works wonders on juries.
Fraud is often badly prosecuted imo by people who have never placed a yankee at Cheltenham. If you tie together ten distinct actions in a slam-dunk fraud, on each of which the prosecutor has a 95 per cent chance of convincing the jury, that comes out as only a 60 per cent chance of conviction. And after acquittal, the usual muppets are up on their hind legs demanding "expert" juries.
I suspect they are looking at it from the opposite angle.
if they don't understand this explanation of how the fraud worked, we could try that explanation instead.
One of them should be understood enough to get the conviction.
When in reality, I do think the issue is that most fraud cases are just too complex because no-one is reducing it to simple enough terms (and that is a real skill that few people have).
Somebody who bullied somebody off this website is calling other people abusive, ironic.
I don't think Charles has ever bullied or been abusive to anyone. I don't get your vendetta against him and a few others.
A bit more tolerance of people with views different to your own would do you good. Some of the best conversations I have on this site are with people I disagree with, and some of the people I find most objectionable vote the same way I do. Its enlightening to embrace a variety of viewpoints not just a circle of likeminded people.
I wasn't referring to Charles when I said that. I think you know exactly who I was referring to.
I get on with plenty of people I disagree with. HYUFD, MrEd, Richard, in fact the only people I don't get on with are the bullies and those who condescend and are abusive to me and others - and I am not the first to point this out.
Politely disagreeing with you isn't bullying you, or "shouting you down".
A bully calling somebody else a bully. Ironic.
I'm going to step out of the conversation as it isn't productive. You're the only one I can see calling people a bully, or insulting people. I stepped in to defend Charles after he was unfairly smeared.
This conversation seems most unproductive. If you've got nothing nice to say about someone, don't say anything at all is a good rule of thumb.
You bullied somebody off this website. Don't you dare try and call me a bully.
I did no such thing.
Someone left the website because they didn't like my opinion, politely expressed. That is not bullying. If I was bullying I'd expect to be rightly banned, but politely expressing your own opinion is never bullying even if others don't like that opinion.
They asked you to stop engaging with them, which you ignored. So they left.
It’s a pity this forum doesn’t have a block function for such instances.
It's actually possible to bodge together your own crude "block" functionality. There are browser addons that allow you to program certain sites to hide html elements that meet certain criteria. So you could fairly easily have it detect a user's name, say "Farooq", and your browser would collapse that element and you wouldn't see it.
It might also spoil your experience since you'd end up seeing weird orphan threads etc., but it can be done.
Or, you know, you could simply look at the name before deciding whether or not to read the post.
Eg, "oh god there's yet another post from @DavidL promoting trite nonsense as the wisdom of the ages, think I'll skip that." Just a (typically boring) thought.
The same people that said Delta was nothing to worry about, are those that are saying Omicron is nothing to worry about.
So is anyone who said Delta was nothing to worry about, going to stick their head up and say this is different
Who said Delta is nothing to worry about?
I don't recall you calling for a lockdown when Delta was around, we didn't need one was what you and several others said. I remember arguing with you about it
That's not the same thing, is it?
My point is you were wrong then and so I am interested in people that did call for a lockdown then who don't think there is anything to worry about now.
What I am hearing now is the same people that initially said "nothing to worry about" then said "lockdown isn't needed" then said "lockdown 2.0 isn't needed". It's the same people
You keep making these massive sweeping generalisations.
I have generally preferred not to make generalisations.
And with that, good night.
But the French elite are so paranoid about Brexit, so allergic to it and fearful of it, they set a low bar for its success. Britain surviving intact and not starving to death will probably seem quite successful to them. given their direful predictions of total British implosion.
Then the next time the EU does something widely unpopular, eurosceptics across the continent will start to look longingly at independent London.
This is the great French fear. By this guy's account it does stalk their nightmares.
The French are trying to restrict travel to essential only.
By blocking British residents of Belgium or the Netherlands who want to use EuroTunnel and transit France?
Are the blocking British? Or just anyone who isn't EU/Schengen?
Travel from the UK to France
URGENT UPDATE FOR BRITISH RESIDENTS IN EU
Following a French Government decision, on 28/12/2021, unless they hold French residency, British citizens are now considered 3rd country citizens and can no longer transit France by road to reach their country of residence in the EU.
Exactly. They aren't treating us differently. They're applying the 3rd country rules which our government demanded be imposed upon us.
What’s the warning
Be careful what you wish for - it may become true.
I don't understand the complaints. What did they think "3rd country" meant? This is what they demanded and they've succeeded in being treated thus.
Just wait until next week when the usual suspects try and blame the French for our lack of Border Control Posts, staff or computers.
Except the rights of British citizens with legal residency in the EU that pre-dates Brexit have their rights protected by treaty.
I think this is just Macron being a twat again, assuming the allegation is true.
Blocking the UK, when Belgium had had case rates twice as high as our peak at that point for weeks was the action of a kneejerking numpty.
It’s totally Macron being a twat.
But it’s the resounding silence from the Remoaners that amuses
Why should we comment? This is what Leavers wanted. To be outside the EU and to be treated like outsiders.
Well congrats!
Because it’s a breach of the Withdrawal Treaty in the same way that they got very excited about the administrative procedures on settled status.
It is - in the same way that other border closures were breaches of other treaties like Schengen. But its a pandemic - temporary breaches are permitted.
Again, we are being treated as we demanded - as a 3rd country. They had to arbitrate on which exceptions to their medically induced ban would exist and they have tret us like the rest of the world not Europe. At our request.
You and others complaining demonstrates English exceptionalism at its finest. That "treat us like a 3rd country" actually meant "we don't want to be European but you will do what we bally well say because we are English and that means we get to make all the rules".
Yes, there were plenty on here saying "ban all travel". Now the French are trying it (which personally I think is a waste of time) the same posters are trying to make a point of it.
Its totally a waste of time - they already have Omicron so they're as fucked as their neighbours.
But - and its a very bit but - it is an established principle that countries have the absolute right in an emergency to change processes even if written into treaty. This was the point being made last March "THEY CAN'T CLOSE THEIR BORDERS COS SCHENGEN" and yet they did close their borders and we didn't.
How a nation chooses to draw up its pandemic emergency powers is up to that nation. Some of our red list country bans have made no sense at all, yet here we are shouting at the French for doing the same. Instead of an arbitrary red list they have done an arbitrary EU list. We aren't EU, we demanded not to be EU and be tret like ROW and now we're Outraged that we're seen as not EU and as ROW.
What the frack is wrong with some people? This is what you wanted!
Closing to transit is unusual
I suspect the fear is that the person will be able to transit into XYZ at the border so leaves France with the problem.
It also strikes me as typical French point scoring.
It’s entirely driven by domestic politics. This effects very few people. (Fly if you need to go to your other home).
But the hypocrisy is deafening
Probably impacts a fair few people as a lot of people will be travelling by car to see all their families at this time of year.
As a point of political point scoring the timing couldn't be better / worse for impacting Brits.
France has the right to ban those people. The issue is with the few who have residency in another EU country and protected status under the Withdrawal Treaty
The issue is clearly with the people like me who booked a nice weekend with his wife to Bruges for late January, which was possible because France allowed drivers to transit en route to Belgium, and Belgium allowed visitors by road for up to 48 hours.
It’s a rule cooked up specifically to spite me.
And after you voted for the LibDems and everything!
Book a ferry…
(Meant in jest in case it comes across as unsympathetic)
@Endillion fair, but the simple fact is that this entire debate is completely meaningless. There is nothing stopping anyone from using whatever toilet they want. Talk of a distinction between pre- and post-op is meaningless because there isn’t a “between the legs” inspector at the door of every bathroom.
Ultimately self ID (in respect to toilets) does not create an increased danger to women because there is nothing stopping violent and abusive men from going into women’s toilets already, regardless of trans or otherwise.
Sport and prisons etc is another debate entirely.
I don't actually agree - because currently if a wannabe abuser sticks his head round the door of the ladies' toilets he gets shouted out 99 times out of 100, whereas if you change the rules, suddenly that's no longer possible or even legal - but it's not actually important. What I said was that I think it's emblematic of the way the debate is being conducted, with far too much focus on individual self expression and little to nothing on societal interactions.
This is bizarre, because the debate sort-of breaks down into left/right blocs, and it is very strange to me that the left have completely forgotten about the societal aspects, and the right are having to remind them that not everything is about the rights of the individual.
Only if a wannabe abuser doesn't pass as a woman. Otherwise who’s going to know?
People seem to have in their heads that a trans woman is a person in a dress with stubble.
No, you've missed the point, I fear. No-one sane is seriously concerned about actual trans people. The concern is that bad actors will take the opportunity to abuse the new system.
Seems to be getting rather heated here... Maybe everyone chill and have a mince pie?
There you go again, trying to pick a fight. I hate mince pies.
I'm just concerned at this barbaric idea of having them chilled. Surely everyone heats them first?
Not too much though; the filling can get very hot indeed. Unless one opens them up and puts brandy butter in. Although I have known people heat mince pies, then add ice-cream.
Somebody who bullied somebody off this website is calling other people abusive, ironic.
I don't think Charles has ever bullied or been abusive to anyone. I don't get your vendetta against him and a few others.
A bit more tolerance of people with views different to your own would do you good. Some of the best conversations I have on this site are with people I disagree with, and some of the people I find most objectionable vote the same way I do. Its enlightening to embrace a variety of viewpoints not just a circle of likeminded people.
I wasn't referring to Charles when I said that. I think you know exactly who I was referring to.
I get on with plenty of people I disagree with. HYUFD, MrEd, Richard, in fact the only people I don't get on with are the bullies and those who condescend and are abusive to me and others - and I am not the first to point this out.
Politely disagreeing with you isn't bullying you, or "shouting you down".
A bully calling somebody else a bully. Ironic.
I'm going to step out of the conversation as it isn't productive. You're the only one I can see calling people a bully, or insulting people. I stepped in to defend Charles after he was unfairly smeared.
This conversation seems most unproductive. If you've got nothing nice to say about someone, don't say anything at all is a good rule of thumb.
You bullied somebody off this website. Don't you dare try and call me a bully.
I did no such thing.
Someone left the website because they didn't like my opinion, politely expressed. That is not bullying. If I was bullying I'd expect to be rightly banned, but politely expressing your own opinion is never bullying even if others don't like that opinion.
They asked you to stop engaging with them, which you ignored. So they left.
It’s a pity this forum doesn’t have a block function for such instances.
It's actually possible to bodge together your own crude "block" functionality. There are browser addons that allow you to program certain sites to hide html elements that meet certain criteria. So you could fairly easily have it detect a user's name, say "Farooq", and your browser would collapse that element and you wouldn't see it.
It might also spoil your experience since you'd end up seeing weird orphan threads etc., but it can be done.
Or, you know, you could simply look at the name before deciding whether or not to read the post.
Eg, "oh god there's yet another post from @DavidL promoting trite nonsense as the wisdom of the ages, think I'll skip that." Just a (typically boring) thought.
Yeah, that's my preferred method. I'm just doing the service of letting people know it's possible if they want it. Looks like Edmund is well ahead of the game though.
"The EU and the US reached a Halloween agreement to remove tariffs on a quota of steel and aluminium imported from the bloc into the US from 1 January, but tariffs will remain on all UK steel and aluminium exports after government talks failed to secure a matching breakthrough."
AIUI remaining in place because Mr Biden has chosen to try and prevent the UK being able to use a Treaty clause which is expressly in the EU-UK Treaty to protect the long-term stability of UK society. Does he really think it is possible to walk away form that? Would the USA?
By making the link he ensures that companies such as Harley Davidson will continue to have balancing sanctions applied to them, and that further balancing tariffs etc will be applied, as he has chosen to deadlock the conversation.
A fairly stupid thing for him to do.
That hardly matters because a HD isn't a price sensitive purchasing decision. They are already significantly more expensive than the equivalent competition anyway.
@Endillion fair, but the simple fact is that this entire debate is completely meaningless. There is nothing stopping anyone from using whatever toilet they want. Talk of a distinction between pre- and post-op is meaningless because there isn’t a “between the legs” inspector at the door of every bathroom.
Ultimately self ID (in respect to toilets) does not create an increased danger to women because there is nothing stopping violent and abusive men from going into women’s toilets already, regardless of trans or otherwise.
Sport and prisons etc is another debate entirely.
I don't actually agree - because currently if a wannabe abuser sticks his head round the door of the ladies' toilets he gets shouted out 99 times out of 100, whereas if you change the rules, suddenly that's no longer possible or even legal - but it's not actually important. What I said was that I think it's emblematic of the way the debate is being conducted, with far too much focus on individual self expression and little to nothing on societal interactions.
This is bizarre, because the debate sort-of breaks down into left/right blocs, and it is very strange to me that the left have completely forgotten about the societal aspects, and the right are having to remind them that not everything is about the rights of the individual.
Only if a wannabe abuser doesn't pass as a woman. Otherwise who’s going to know?
People seem to have in their heads that a trans woman is a person in a dress with stubble.
No, you've missed the point, I fear. No-one sane is seriously concerned about actual trans people. The concern is that bad actors will take the opportunity to abuse the new system.
And my point is that there is nothing to stop them abusing the current “system”.
If a man wants to follow a woman into a toilet for nefarious purposes, there is nothing stopping them. Self ID isn’t going to change that.
Aside from the medical debate on Omi, this is going to be a huge problem in January. Defacto lockdown due to mass isolation.
Not sure how this will impact the economy, but I know there are some major supply issues in consumer goods that are only going to materialise in Q2 which will cause further issues.
I have no idea how this will pact growth/inflation, but Johnson's possible recovery from the current nadir depends on them.
Seems to be getting rather heated here... Maybe everyone chill and have a mince pie?
There you go again, trying to pick a fight. I hate mince pies.
I'm just concerned at this barbaric idea of having them chilled. Surely everyone heats them first?
don't ever microwave mince pies. trust me on this.
You should certainly take the tin foil casing off first.
Not even then. They can go up in smoke quite easily. I know I jest a lot on here but I'm serious on this point. Use the oven if you must warm your mince pie. Or the toaster?
Seems to be getting rather heated here... Maybe everyone chill and have a mince pie?
There you go again, trying to pick a fight. I hate mince pies.
I'm just concerned at this barbaric idea of having them chilled. Surely everyone heats them first?
don't ever microwave mince pies. trust me on this.
You should certainly take the tin foil casing off first.
Not even then. They can go up in smoke quite easily. I know I jest a lot on here but I'm serious on this point. Use the oven if you must warm your mince pie. Or the toaster?
Must be a very thin 'pie' if it'll go in a toaster.
I am not a lawyer but I would like to pick brains on here regarding the Ghislaine Maxwell case. My questions are:
People on here have talked about her revealing names as part of a plea bargain, but as the Maxwell family saying they are challenging the verdict, wouldn't revealing names be tantamount to accepting the guilty verdict?
What are the chances of the Maxwells repeatedly challenging on points of law until the verdict is overturned?
Where is the Maxwell family getting the money from for this extensive and expensive legal defence?
I would genuinely welcome any thoughts on these matters.
Too late for a plea bargain which as the name suggests involves pleading guilty and is a deal with the prosecution who, at least in English law, are now out of the picture. Sentencing is for the judge. The suggestion that she can spill beans at this stage to reduce her sentence verges on conspiracy theory, but some conspiracy theories are true.
Can't see an appeal succeeding certainly not on all counts. No idea about finances, she may have some Epstein money left and has a rich husband
Her brothers were also acquitted of a remarkably serious fraud committed by their late father on a pension fund.
I have no knowledge of American criminal procedure but in this country when the Crown closes its case the defence can plead no case to answer and if there is insufficient evidence in law to allow a safe conviction, taken at its very highest, then the case is taken away from the Jury and dismissed. If the Crown get past that point then the defence has a difficult choice to make: does the accused give evidence or not.
Donald Findlay QC, who has almost certainly done more murder cases for the defence than anyone else in the world given the way our system operates, is famous for not letting his clients give evidence, recognising the many risks. But in sex crimes a person whose case has got past the no case to answer point is taking a very large risk and in my limited experience accused do give evidence in rape cases.
Not having GH give evidence was a brave call and may well form the basis of an appeal if it is contended that she was not in a fit state to give evidence because of her mental health or the conditions of her incarceration. Whether that appeal is successful or not is a different matter.
Interesting you make the point about her incarceration conditions given some of the Maxwell clan have already been interviewed, by quite a favourable media, complaining about how she has been held.
I was discussing the Ghislaine Maxwell case with my brother and pointed to the fact that her brothers were acquitted of fraud. He said financial fraud is usually very complex and few understand it, whereas people understand sex. He said she would be found guilty, I thought otherwise. I fear that wealthy and powerful people can keep appealing against a verdict until it is overturned.
Fraud seems to have a "I was too think to understand what I was doing" defence that works wonders on juries.
Fraud is often badly prosecuted imo by people who have never placed a yankee at Cheltenham. If you tie together ten distinct actions in a slam-dunk fraud, on each of which the prosecutor has a 95 per cent chance of convincing the jury, that comes out as only a 60 per cent chance of conviction. And after acquittal, the usual muppets are up on their hind legs demanding "expert" juries.
What was interesting was the difference in prosecution styles and methods in the US and the UK.
- In the UK, enormous latitude was given to the defence to bring in irrelevant/barely relevant material - which was used by the defence as a tactic. Either bury the trial under a million pages, or try and dig up something embarrassing enough (if irrelevant) that one of the parties to the prosecution's would want to give up. - In the US, such attempts at a fishing expedition would be rapidly shut down. And could lead to sanctions against the lawyers trying it on. - In the UK fraud is/was often presented as a complex, esoteric thing. Very abstract. - In the US, prosecutions would typically explain how the complex financial fraud was simply a version of ordinary scam X. The NatWest 3 sold their companies assets to themselves at a knockdown price - just like the guys in the motor pool selling trucks to themselves as scrap. - In the US, the prosecution would always make sure to show the juries some actual victims - Union pension funds investing in companies is/was a favourite.
@Endillion fair, but the simple fact is that this entire debate is completely meaningless. There is nothing stopping anyone from using whatever toilet they want. Talk of a distinction between pre- and post-op is meaningless because there isn’t a “between the legs” inspector at the door of every bathroom.
Ultimately self ID (in respect to toilets) does not create an increased danger to women because there is nothing stopping violent and abusive men from going into women’s toilets already, regardless of trans or otherwise.
Sport and prisons etc is another debate entirely.
I don't actually agree - because currently if a wannabe abuser sticks his head round the door of the ladies' toilets he gets shouted out 99 times out of 100, whereas if you change the rules, suddenly that's no longer possible or even legal - but it's not actually important. What I said was that I think it's emblematic of the way the debate is being conducted, with far too much focus on individual self expression and little to nothing on societal interactions.
This is bizarre, because the debate sort-of breaks down into left/right blocs, and it is very strange to me that the left have completely forgotten about the societal aspects, and the right are having to remind them that not everything is about the rights of the individual.
Only if a wannabe abuser doesn't pass as a woman. Otherwise who’s going to know?
People seem to have in their heads that a trans woman is a person in a dress with stubble.
No, you've missed the point, I fear. No-one sane is seriously concerned about actual trans people. The concern is that bad actors will take the opportunity to abuse the new system.
And my point is that there is nothing to stop them abusing the current “system”.
If a man wants to follow a woman into a toilet for nefarious purposes, there is nothing stopping them. Self ID isn’t going to change that.
What about a women's refuge being forced to accept "transwomen".
Somebody who bullied somebody off this website is calling other people abusive, ironic.
I don't think Charles has ever bullied or been abusive to anyone. I don't get your vendetta against him and a few others.
A bit more tolerance of people with views different to your own would do you good. Some of the best conversations I have on this site are with people I disagree with, and some of the people I find most objectionable vote the same way I do. Its enlightening to embrace a variety of viewpoints not just a circle of likeminded people.
I wasn't referring to Charles when I said that. I think you know exactly who I was referring to.
I get on with plenty of people I disagree with. HYUFD, MrEd, Richard, in fact the only people I don't get on with are the bullies and those who condescend and are abusive to me and others - and I am not the first to point this out.
Politely disagreeing with you isn't bullying you, or "shouting you down".
A bully calling somebody else a bully. Ironic.
I'm going to step out of the conversation as it isn't productive. You're the only one I can see calling people a bully, or insulting people. I stepped in to defend Charles after he was unfairly smeared.
This conversation seems most unproductive. If you've got nothing nice to say about someone, don't say anything at all is a good rule of thumb.
You bullied somebody off this website. Don't you dare try and call me a bully.
I did no such thing.
Someone left the website because they didn't like my opinion, politely expressed. That is not bullying. If I was bullying I'd expect to be rightly banned, but politely expressing your own opinion is never bullying even if others don't like that opinion.
They asked you to stop engaging with them, which you ignored. So they left.
It’s a pity this forum doesn’t have a block function for such instances.
It would be good if you could block one and only one other contributor. The agony of that decision would be exquisite.
I'd find it dead easy to make my choice, actually. No competition.
Somebody who bullied somebody off this website is calling other people abusive, ironic.
I don't think Charles has ever bullied or been abusive to anyone. I don't get your vendetta against him and a few others.
A bit more tolerance of people with views different to your own would do you good. Some of the best conversations I have on this site are with people I disagree with, and some of the people I find most objectionable vote the same way I do. Its enlightening to embrace a variety of viewpoints not just a circle of likeminded people.
I wasn't referring to Charles when I said that. I think you know exactly who I was referring to.
I get on with plenty of people I disagree with. HYUFD, MrEd, Richard, in fact the only people I don't get on with are the bullies and those who condescend and are abusive to me and others - and I am not the first to point this out.
Politely disagreeing with you isn't bullying you, or "shouting you down".
A bully calling somebody else a bully. Ironic.
Guys, guys, look at us. Arguing. Bickering. It didn’t used to be like this.
Hmm. I'm a fairly irregular poster, but I started posting here around five or (maybe nearer six?) years ago after years of lurking.
I stopped posting almost entirely this year due to health issues which I've been fairly candid about, but I also stopped lurking too, so I've been absent almost an entire year.
My perspective is that while much has stayed the same... it also seems like a much angrier, testier and less civil place to be. Spats will always happen, but they seem to go from 0 to all the way up to 11 in the blink of an eye now.
I don't know if that is because two years of this pandemic has worn us all down to the bone and made us snappier and grouchier, or if it's something else.
But that's my two cents, as someone who took a year's sabbatical from posting on or reading PB.
I hope health issues are ameliorating.
Not everyone is comfortable with robust debate, which this site encourages obviously, but speaking personally is something I need to be aware of in normal contexts.
There is definitely some bullying however, which is deeply unpleasant. It's a shame because it's a minority damaging the site.
OT Deliveroo is taking forever. This might be because there was a double murder a few yards away yesterday so perhaps the police have still blocked the road.
I liked that post for the intent, but sonehow it feels wrong to have done so!
Seems to be getting rather heated here... Maybe everyone chill and have a mince pie?
There you go again, trying to pick a fight. I hate mince pies.
I'm just concerned at this barbaric idea of having them chilled. Surely everyone heats them first?
don't ever microwave mince pies. trust me on this.
You should certainly take the tin foil casing off first.
Not even then. They can go up in smoke quite easily. I know I jest a lot on here but I'm serious on this point. Use the oven if you must warm your mince pie. Or the toaster?
Option 1 is definitely the way to go. Do not use the toaster.
As some friends of mine in Aber who had had more than one too many did when they wanted fried bread and could be bothered using a frying pan...
I am not a lawyer but I would like to pick brains on here regarding the Ghislaine Maxwell case. My questions are:
People on here have talked about her revealing names as part of a plea bargain, but as the Maxwell family saying they are challenging the verdict, wouldn't revealing names be tantamount to accepting the guilty verdict?
What are the chances of the Maxwells repeatedly challenging on points of law until the verdict is overturned?
Where is the Maxwell family getting the money from for this extensive and expensive legal defence?
I would genuinely welcome any thoughts on these matters.
Too late for a plea bargain which as the name suggests involves pleading guilty and is a deal with the prosecution who, at least in English law, are now out of the picture. Sentencing is for the judge. The suggestion that she can spill beans at this stage to reduce her sentence verges on conspiracy theory, but some conspiracy theories are true.
Can't see an appeal succeeding certainly not on all counts. No idea about finances, she may have some Epstein money left and has a rich husband
Her brothers were also acquitted of a remarkably serious fraud committed by their late father on a pension fund.
I have no knowledge of American criminal procedure but in this country when the Crown closes its case the defence can plead no case to answer and if there is insufficient evidence in law to allow a safe conviction, taken at its very highest, then the case is taken away from the Jury and dismissed. If the Crown get past that point then the defence has a difficult choice to make: does the accused give evidence or not.
Donald Findlay QC, who has almost certainly done more murder cases for the defence than anyone else in the world given the way our system operates, is famous for not letting his clients give evidence, recognising the many risks. But in sex crimes a person whose case has got past the no case to answer point is taking a very large risk and in my limited experience accused do give evidence in rape cases.
Not having GH give evidence was a brave call and may well form the basis of an appeal if it is contended that she was not in a fit state to give evidence because of her mental health or the conditions of her incarceration. Whether that appeal is successful or not is a different matter.
Interesting you make the point about her incarceration conditions given some of the Maxwell clan have already been interviewed, by quite a favourable media, complaining about how she has been held.
That's going to be the play. Whether a rich and pampered foreigner found guilty of facilitating the sexual corruption of young Americans is going to get a lot of sympathy from the American judicial system complaining about the living conditions in their jails remains to be seen but I suspect not.
Seems to be getting rather heated here... Maybe everyone chill and have a mince pie?
There you go again, trying to pick a fight. I hate mince pies.
I'm just concerned at this barbaric idea of having them chilled. Surely everyone heats them first?
don't ever microwave mince pies. trust me on this.
You should certainly take the tin foil casing off first.
Not even then. They can go up in smoke quite easily. I know I jest a lot on here but I'm serious on this point. Use the oven if you must warm your mince pie. Or the toaster?
Must be a very thin 'pie' if it'll go in a toaster.
Just give it a shove. It might experience incidental structural degradation but it'll go in.
Somebody who bullied somebody off this website is calling other people abusive, ironic.
I don't think Charles has ever bullied or been abusive to anyone. I don't get your vendetta against him and a few others.
A bit more tolerance of people with views different to your own would do you good. Some of the best conversations I have on this site are with people I disagree with, and some of the people I find most objectionable vote the same way I do. Its enlightening to embrace a variety of viewpoints not just a circle of likeminded people.
I wasn't referring to Charles when I said that. I think you know exactly who I was referring to.
I get on with plenty of people I disagree with. HYUFD, MrEd, Richard, in fact the only people I don't get on with are the bullies and those who condescend and are abusive to me and others - and I am not the first to point this out.
Politely disagreeing with you isn't bullying you, or "shouting you down".
A bully calling somebody else a bully. Ironic.
I'm going to step out of the conversation as it isn't productive. You're the only one I can see calling people a bully, or insulting people. I stepped in to defend Charles after he was unfairly smeared.
This conversation seems most unproductive. If you've got nothing nice to say about someone, don't say anything at all is a good rule of thumb.
You bullied somebody off this website. Don't you dare try and call me a bully.
I did no such thing.
Someone left the website because they didn't like my opinion, politely expressed. That is not bullying. If I was bullying I'd expect to be rightly banned, but politely expressing your own opinion is never bullying even if others don't like that opinion.
They asked you to stop engaging with them, which you ignored. So they left.
It’s a pity this forum doesn’t have a block function for such instances.
It would be good if you could block one and only one other contributor. The agony of that decision would be exquisite.
Although we should have a public league table if most blocked…
@Endillion fair, but the simple fact is that this entire debate is completely meaningless. There is nothing stopping anyone from using whatever toilet they want. Talk of a distinction between pre- and post-op is meaningless because there isn’t a “between the legs” inspector at the door of every bathroom.
Ultimately self ID (in respect to toilets) does not create an increased danger to women because there is nothing stopping violent and abusive men from going into women’s toilets already, regardless of trans or otherwise.
Sport and prisons etc is another debate entirely.
I don't actually agree - because currently if a wannabe abuser sticks his head round the door of the ladies' toilets he gets shouted out 99 times out of 100, whereas if you change the rules, suddenly that's no longer possible or even legal - but it's not actually important. What I said was that I think it's emblematic of the way the debate is being conducted, with far too much focus on individual self expression and little to nothing on societal interactions.
This is bizarre, because the debate sort-of breaks down into left/right blocs, and it is very strange to me that the left have completely forgotten about the societal aspects, and the right are having to remind them that not everything is about the rights of the individual.
Only if a wannabe abuser doesn't pass as a woman. Otherwise who’s going to know?
People seem to have in their heads that a trans woman is a person in a dress with stubble.
No, you've missed the point, I fear. No-one sane is seriously concerned about actual trans people. The concern is that bad actors will take the opportunity to abuse the new system.
And my point is that there is nothing to stop them abusing the current “system”.
If a man wants to follow a woman into a toilet for nefarious purposes, there is nothing stopping them. Self ID isn’t going to change that.
What about a women's refuge being forced to accept "transwomen".
I was talking specifically about toilets and expressly states that prisons, sport, etc (including refuges) is a different debate
Somebody who bullied somebody off this website is calling other people abusive, ironic.
I don't think Charles has ever bullied or been abusive to anyone. I don't get your vendetta against him and a few others.
A bit more tolerance of people with views different to your own would do you good. Some of the best conversations I have on this site are with people I disagree with, and some of the people I find most objectionable vote the same way I do. Its enlightening to embrace a variety of viewpoints not just a circle of likeminded people.
I wasn't referring to Charles when I said that. I think you know exactly who I was referring to.
I get on with plenty of people I disagree with. HYUFD, MrEd, Richard, in fact the only people I don't get on with are the bullies and those who condescend and are abusive to me and others - and I am not the first to point this out.
Politely disagreeing with you isn't bullying you, or "shouting you down".
A bully calling somebody else a bully. Ironic.
Guys, guys, look at us. Arguing. Bickering. It didn’t used to be like this.
Hmm. I'm a fairly irregular poster, but I started posting here around five or (maybe nearer six?) years ago after years of lurking.
I stopped posting almost entirely this year due to health issues which I've been fairly candid about, but I also stopped lurking too, so I've been absent almost an entire year.
My perspective is that while much has stayed the same... it also seems like a much angrier, testier and less civil place to be. Spats will always happen, but they seem to go from 0 to all the way up to 11 in the blink of an eye now.
I don't know if that is because two years of this pandemic has worn us all down to the bone and made us snappier and grouchier, or if it's something else.
But that's my two cents, as someone who took a year's sabbatical from posting on or reading PB.
To be fair things were a lot more heated during and after the referendum. It's not as bad here now as it was from 2016 to 2019 IMO.
Oh, I remember some very heated debates in the aftermath of the referendum. The difference now I feel is the way it ramps up from 0 to 11 (for the spinal tap fans) or 0 - 60 (for the gearheads) in mere seconds. The arguments also feel less about politics and more about personalities.
Maybe it's two years of pandemic or maybe it's WFH, I don't know. Or maybe it was always thus, and a year off has made me soggy eyed with nostalgia for the place that never was.
Either way, it's still a fascinating place full of entertaining, diverse and intelligent opinions (for the most part).
Another graphic from Flo - comparing vaccination roll out in France vs England:
[Translated] As there is no Omicron open data at the moment, I took the opportunity to make a figure that I had been planning for a long time, which aims to compare the progress of the Covid vaccine campaigns in England and in France.
@Endillion fair, but the simple fact is that this entire debate is completely meaningless. There is nothing stopping anyone from using whatever toilet they want. Talk of a distinction between pre- and post-op is meaningless because there isn’t a “between the legs” inspector at the door of every bathroom.
Ultimately self ID (in respect to toilets) does not create an increased danger to women because there is nothing stopping violent and abusive men from going into women’s toilets already, regardless of trans or otherwise.
Sport and prisons etc is another debate entirely.
I don't actually agree - because currently if a wannabe abuser sticks his head round the door of the ladies' toilets he gets shouted out 99 times out of 100, whereas if you change the rules, suddenly that's no longer possible or even legal - but it's not actually important. What I said was that I think it's emblematic of the way the debate is being conducted, with far too much focus on individual self expression and little to nothing on societal interactions.
This is bizarre, because the debate sort-of breaks down into left/right blocs, and it is very strange to me that the left have completely forgotten about the societal aspects, and the right are having to remind them that not everything is about the rights of the individual.
Only if a wannabe abuser doesn't pass as a woman. Otherwise who’s going to know?
People seem to have in their heads that a trans woman is a person in a dress with stubble.
No, you've missed the point, I fear. No-one sane is seriously concerned about actual trans people. The concern is that bad actors will take the opportunity to abuse the new system.
And my point is that there is nothing to stop them abusing the current “system”.
If a man wants to follow a woman into a toilet for nefarious purposes, there is nothing stopping them. Self ID isn’t going to change that.
Easier to call out a lurker waiting for the right opportunity
Seems to be getting rather heated here... Maybe everyone chill and have a mince pie?
There you go again, trying to pick a fight. I hate mince pies.
I'm just concerned at this barbaric idea of having them chilled. Surely everyone heats them first?
don't ever microwave mince pies. trust me on this.
You should certainly take the tin foil casing off first.
Not even then. They can go up in smoke quite easily. I know I jest a lot on here but I'm serious on this point. Use the oven if you must warm your mince pie. Or the toaster?
Option 1 is definitely the way to go. Do not use the toaster.
As some friends of mine in Aber who had had more than one too many did when they wanted fried bread and could be bothered using a frying pan...
To be clear, and it shouldn't be necessary, but the toaster thing was certainly a joke. If you do try to toast a mince pie, make sure there's plenty of water nearby in case of fire. Perhaps if you're sat in the bath?
I made the mistake of believing you. When I opened the link I saw “I came up with a vaccine, with three vaccines,” Trump told Owens.
Not sensible. Not even sane.
According to a poll in that report 58% of Republicans have been vaccinated, compared to 90% of Democrats and 68% of independents.
So that means Trump is actually still just about aligned with the majority of Republicans in backing vaccination but an anti vaxxer could get over 1/3 of the vote in the 2024 GOP primaries. Trump could even end up the moderate on the Republican side now!
Seems to be getting rather heated here... Maybe everyone chill and have a mince pie?
There you go again, trying to pick a fight. I hate mince pies.
I'm just concerned at this barbaric idea of having them chilled. Surely everyone heats them first?
Mince pies should be eaten at room temperature.
Now I like mince pies hot (when they first come out of the oven) and when they've cooled to room temperature.
See what you started now? A whimsical post from you and response from me has now led to an entire thread devoted to mince pies and cream eggs. Still, maybe it has taken the heat out of the discourse.
Seems to be getting rather heated here... Maybe everyone chill and have a mince pie?
There you go again, trying to pick a fight. I hate mince pies.
I'm just concerned at this barbaric idea of having them chilled. Surely everyone heats them first?
Mince pies should be eaten at room temperature.
Mince pies should be eaten with port and stilton.
Gently warmed in the oven, with custard (made in a saucepan). When I lived in a shared house another chap and I would take it in turns to do that, with a dash or three of Navy Rum into the custard.
I miss my late mum's clootie dumplings, though - even better than Christmas Pudding, esp when boiled in a cloth to get the right glutinous skin. I have saved her recipe book, so some day ...
Somebody who bullied somebody off this website is calling other people abusive, ironic.
I don't think Charles has ever bullied or been abusive to anyone. I don't get your vendetta against him and a few others.
A bit more tolerance of people with views different to your own would do you good. Some of the best conversations I have on this site are with people I disagree with, and some of the people I find most objectionable vote the same way I do. Its enlightening to embrace a variety of viewpoints not just a circle of likeminded people.
I wasn't referring to Charles when I said that. I think you know exactly who I was referring to.
I get on with plenty of people I disagree with. HYUFD, MrEd, Richard, in fact the only people I don't get on with are the bullies and those who condescend and are abusive to me and others - and I am not the first to point this out.
Politely disagreeing with you isn't bullying you, or "shouting you down".
A bully calling somebody else a bully. Ironic.
I'm going to step out of the conversation as it isn't productive. You're the only one I can see calling people a bully, or insulting people. I stepped in to defend Charles after he was unfairly smeared.
This conversation seems most unproductive. If you've got nothing nice to say about someone, don't say anything at all is a good rule of thumb.
You bullied somebody off this website. Don't you dare try and call me a bully.
2 negative LFTs in our house today. We've managed to get all 4 infected and recovered from omicron in 22 days. And in 2 separate batches so we weren't all sick at the same time. Pretty efficient wotk, eh? Onwards and upwards for 2022 then.
Nice, same as my family, dad just getting through to the end of it now. We're all set for 2022!
"Women can't commit rape" - erh, what? As in legally they can't?
If you've transitioned to being a woman, this person would like you to not use female toilets - but where are they supposed to go then? Outside?
That was not what she said, she said majority had not transitioned and they should not be able to use women only spaces. James Max was totally clueless, the idiot thought you could be born female but actually be a man, biggest bellend I have ever heard.
Seems to be getting rather heated here... Maybe everyone chill and have a mince pie?
There you go again, trying to pick a fight. I hate mince pies.
I'm just concerned at this barbaric idea of having them chilled. Surely everyone heats them first?
don't ever microwave mince pies. trust me on this.
You should certainly take the tin foil casing off first.
Not even then. They can go up in smoke quite easily. I know I jest a lot on here but I'm serious on this point. Use the oven if you must warm your mince pie. Or the toaster?
Must be a very thin 'pie' if it'll go in a toaster.
Some surprisingly thick toaster slots, but even so ...
Another graphic from Flo - comparing vaccination roll out in France vs England:
[Translated] As there is no Omicron open data at the moment, I took the opportunity to make a figure that I had been planning for a long time, which aims to compare the progress of the Covid vaccine campaigns in England and in France.
France started the booster roll out sooner - but the NHS has been better at targeting older.
That is the mistake that quite a few people make in comparing across nations - ignoring age. Vaccination is hundreds of times more... valuable?... for an 85 year old than a 14 year old. It's still worthwhile for the 14 year old, but the margin of advantage is much, much smaller.
Seems to be getting rather heated here... Maybe everyone chill and have a mince pie?
There you go again, trying to pick a fight. I hate mince pies.
I'm just concerned at this barbaric idea of having them chilled. Surely everyone heats them first?
don't ever microwave mince pies. trust me on this.
You should certainly take the tin foil casing off first.
Not even then. They can go up in smoke quite easily. I know I jest a lot on here but I'm serious on this point. Use the oven if you must warm your mince pie. Or the toaster?
Option 1 is definitely the way to go. Do not use the toaster.
As some friends of mine in Aber who had had more than one too many did when they wanted fried bread and could be bothered using a frying pan...
To be clear, and it shouldn't be necessary, but the toaster thing was certainly a joke. If you do try to toast a mince pie, make sure there's plenty of water nearby in case of fire. Perhaps if you're sat in the bath?
No, scrap that. Just use the oven or eat it cold.
My comment about the toaster was in fact not a joke. Somebody really did smother a slice of bread in oil and then put it in a toaster.
The results were - spectacular. Two consecutive explosions:
1) When the toaster blew up
2) When the fire brigade found out why they'd been called out at 3am.
Seems to be getting rather heated here... Maybe everyone chill and have a mince pie?
There you go again, trying to pick a fight. I hate mince pies.
I'm just concerned at this barbaric idea of having them chilled. Surely everyone heats them first?
Mince pies should be eaten at room temperature.
Now I like mince pies hot (when they first come out of the oven) and when they've cooled to room temperature.
See what you started now? A whimsical post from you and response from me has now led to an entire thread devoted to mince pies and cream eggs. Still, maybe it has taken the heat out of the discourse.
Ghislaine Maxwell's mistake, (from her point of view, not everyone else's), was not staying in a country like France which doesn't extradite nationals to the United States. She must have been very complacent to actually choose to reside in the United States itself, and not even Canada or the UK.
Did she actually choose to stay in the US, or was that where she happened to be when the FBI put out an arrest warrant in her name?
"Women can't commit rape" - erh, what? As in legally they can't?
If you've transitioned to being a woman, this person would like you to not use female toilets - but where are they supposed to go then? Outside?
That was not what she said, she said majority had not transitioned and they should not be able to use women only spaces. James Max was totally clueless, the idiot thought you could be born female but actually be a man, biggest bellend I have ever heard.
Hello Malky! Mild and dry if grey here. Was thinking about clootie dumplings only a moment ago, prompted by the mince pie discussion ...
When I was in the UK at the beginning of the month, I went down with a heavy head cold. Symptoms were snot-filled sinuses, brain fog and a scratchy throat. That progressed over 2 weeks to loss of my voice and an occasional phlegmy (not dry) cough.
I thought it could be COVID, so I did 3 self-administered LFTs at home, all negative. I also did the officially sanctioned LFT at Heathrow for my flight back, also negative. So I convinced myself that I did not have COVID, just a cold.
Seems to be getting rather heated here... Maybe everyone chill and have a mince pie?
There you go again, trying to pick a fight. I hate mince pies.
I'm just concerned at this barbaric idea of having them chilled. Surely everyone heats them first?
Mince pies should be eaten at room temperature.
Now I like mince pies hot (when they first come out of the oven) and when they've cooled to room temperature.
See what you started now? A whimsical post from you and response from me has now led to an entire thread devoted to mince pies and cream eggs. Still, maybe it has taken the heat out of the discourse.
Somebody who bullied somebody off this website is calling other people abusive, ironic.
I don't think Charles has ever bullied or been abusive to anyone. I don't get your vendetta against him and a few others.
A bit more tolerance of people with views different to your own would do you good. Some of the best conversations I have on this site are with people I disagree with, and some of the people I find most objectionable vote the same way I do. Its enlightening to embrace a variety of viewpoints not just a circle of likeminded people.
I wasn't referring to Charles when I said that. I think you know exactly who I was referring to.
I get on with plenty of people I disagree with. HYUFD, MrEd, Richard, in fact the only people I don't get on with are the bullies and those who condescend and are abusive to me and others - and I am not the first to point this out.
Politely disagreeing with you isn't bullying you, or "shouting you down".
A bully calling somebody else a bully. Ironic.
I'm going to step out of the conversation as it isn't productive. You're the only one I can see calling people a bully, or insulting people. I stepped in to defend Charles after he was unfairly smeared.
This conversation seems most unproductive. If you've got nothing nice to say about someone, don't say anything at all is a good rule of thumb.
You bullied somebody off this website. Don't you dare try and call me a bully.
I did no such thing.
Someone left the website because they didn't like my opinion, politely expressed. That is not bullying. If I was bullying I'd expect to be rightly banned, but politely expressing your own opinion is never bullying even if others don't like that opinion.
They asked you to stop engaging with them, which you ignored. So they left.
It’s a pity this forum doesn’t have a block function for such instances.
It's actually possible to bodge together your own crude "block" functionality. There are browser addons that allow you to program certain sites to hide html elements that meet certain criteria. So you could fairly easily have it detect a user's name, say "Farooq", and your browser would collapse that element and you wouldn't see it.
It might also spoil your experience since you'd end up seeing weird orphan threads etc., but it can be done.
I had one many years ago, not sure what browser support is like for user scripts nowadays or whether you have to turn it into an extension or what:
Your widget is part of PB mythology. The only problem was how frequently certain posters felt the need to loudly proclaim that they'd used Edmund's widget to block poster X, Y or Z which kinda negated its function I felt.
@Endillion fair, but the simple fact is that this entire debate is completely meaningless. There is nothing stopping anyone from using whatever toilet they want. Talk of a distinction between pre- and post-op is meaningless because there isn’t a “between the legs” inspector at the door of every bathroom.
Ultimately self ID (in respect to toilets) does not create an increased danger to women because there is nothing stopping violent and abusive men from going into women’s toilets already, regardless of trans or otherwise.
Sport and prisons etc is another debate entirely.
I don't actually agree - because currently if a wannabe abuser sticks his head round the door of the ladies' toilets he gets shouted out 99 times out of 100, whereas if you change the rules, suddenly that's no longer possible or even legal - but it's not actually important. What I said was that I think it's emblematic of the way the debate is being conducted, with far too much focus on individual self expression and little to nothing on societal interactions.
This is bizarre, because the debate sort-of breaks down into left/right blocs, and it is very strange to me that the left have completely forgotten about the societal aspects, and the right are having to remind them that not everything is about the rights of the individual.
Only if a wannabe abuser doesn't pass as a woman. Otherwise who’s going to know?
People seem to have in their heads that a trans woman is a person in a dress with stubble.
No, you've missed the point, I fear. No-one sane is seriously concerned about actual trans people. The concern is that bad actors will take the opportunity to abuse the new system.
And my point is that there is nothing to stop them abusing the current “system”.
If a man wants to follow a woman into a toilet for nefarious purposes, there is nothing stopping them. Self ID isn’t going to change that.
I think the issue is the legal rights that go with self-id. "I have the legal right to use this toilet/safe house" from someone who is clearly not a woman but has decided to self-Id as one. Normal politeness and societal pressure then doesn't work.
I have no problem at all with self-Id. I'm a liberal. My concern (which frankly is miniscule. I don't know why I'm entering this swamp!) is the legal rights that go with it. So for legal rights, passports etc, I think there should be a bar higher than self-Id, but simple and respectful. Otherwise chill.
@Endillion fair, but the simple fact is that this entire debate is completely meaningless. There is nothing stopping anyone from using whatever toilet they want. Talk of a distinction between pre- and post-op is meaningless because there isn’t a “between the legs” inspector at the door of every bathroom.
Ultimately self ID (in respect to toilets) does not create an increased danger to women because there is nothing stopping violent and abusive men from going into women’s toilets already, regardless of trans or otherwise.
Sport and prisons etc is another debate entirely.
I don't actually agree - because currently if a wannabe abuser sticks his head round the door of the ladies' toilets he gets shouted out 99 times out of 100, whereas if you change the rules, suddenly that's no longer possible or even legal - but it's not actually important. What I said was that I think it's emblematic of the way the debate is being conducted, with far too much focus on individual self expression and little to nothing on societal interactions.
This is bizarre, because the debate sort-of breaks down into left/right blocs, and it is very strange to me that the left have completely forgotten about the societal aspects, and the right are having to remind them that not everything is about the rights of the individual.
Only if a wannabe abuser doesn't pass as a woman. Otherwise who’s going to know?
People seem to have in their heads that a trans woman is a person in a dress with stubble.
No, you've missed the point, I fear. No-one sane is seriously concerned about actual trans people. The concern is that bad actors will take the opportunity to abuse the new system.
And my point is that there is nothing to stop them abusing the current “system”.
If a man wants to follow a woman into a toilet for nefarious purposes, there is nothing stopping them. Self ID isn’t going to change that.
I suspect we shall have to agree to disagree. I will add only that, if the current setup was so easy to abuse, more people would be doing so, and I am uncomfortable changing the rules until it can be demonstrated that it doesn't make the situation materially worse.
I think we agree anyway that the more important debates are around the edge cases (prisons etc).
What is going on with JK Rowling? This issue seems to have totally passed me by.
She says chicks with dicks aren't chicks.
That's what it boils down to.
Did she actually say that? I have zero interest in TERF wars, but my impression was that she said that trans rights couldn’t be at the expense of women’s rights
Yes she did but that is not an acceptable position in the new Scotland. As one of the last serious taxpayers left in the country this is unfortunate.
Gay people used to face this same kind of "moral panic" cr*p. Giving trans people rights does not take rights away from women any more than taking giving gay people rights took them away from straight people.
That is just bollox Bev, pardon the pun. Giving men the rights to be in women's places where they have to undress etc is just totally wrong given that 90% of them still have their block and tackle and some are real bad un's. You cannot trample the majority's rights on the whim of a very small minority who want extra rights at the expense of the majority.
I think that focuses on the central point Malcolm. The problem with the Scottish legislation in particular is that it gives you the right to identify and be treated as a woman when merely being committed to the path before any drugs, surgery etc have been applied and when they are still biologically operative men.
I have no problem at all in such people wanting to dress, name themselves and live as a woman if that is their preference. Good luck to them. I do have a problem at the edge cases, such as prisons, if the person concerned has not gone past the stage of being able to penetrate anyone with their penis. A reasonably simple recalibration on this could take an awful lot of heat out of the debate.
Exactly David, however the zealots are running the show. The motley crew of ne'er do wells in the SNP and Greens running Scotland don't want anything reasonable.
Another graphic from Flo - comparing vaccination roll out in France vs England:
[Translated] As there is no Omicron open data at the moment, I took the opportunity to make a figure that I had been planning for a long time, which aims to compare the progress of the Covid vaccine campaigns in England and in France.
Somebody who bullied somebody off this website is calling other people abusive, ironic.
I don't think Charles has ever bullied or been abusive to anyone. I don't get your vendetta against him and a few others.
A bit more tolerance of people with views different to your own would do you good. Some of the best conversations I have on this site are with people I disagree with, and some of the people I find most objectionable vote the same way I do. Its enlightening to embrace a variety of viewpoints not just a circle of likeminded people.
I wasn't referring to Charles when I said that. I think you know exactly who I was referring to.
I get on with plenty of people I disagree with. HYUFD, MrEd, Richard, in fact the only people I don't get on with are the bullies and those who condescend and are abusive to me and others - and I am not the first to point this out.
Politely disagreeing with you isn't bullying you, or "shouting you down".
A bully calling somebody else a bully. Ironic.
I'm going to step out of the conversation as it isn't productive. You're the only one I can see calling people a bully, or insulting people. I stepped in to defend Charles after he was unfairly smeared.
This conversation seems most unproductive. If you've got nothing nice to say about someone, don't say anything at all is a good rule of thumb.
You bullied somebody off this website. Don't you dare try and call me a bully.
I did no such thing.
Someone left the website because they didn't like my opinion, politely expressed. That is not bullying. If I was bullying I'd expect to be rightly banned, but politely expressing your own opinion is never bullying even if others don't like that opinion.
They asked you to stop engaging with them, which you ignored. So they left.
It’s a pity this forum doesn’t have a block function for such instances.
It's actually possible to bodge together your own crude "block" functionality. There are browser addons that allow you to program certain sites to hide html elements that meet certain criteria. So you could fairly easily have it detect a user's name, say "Farooq", and your browser would collapse that element and you wouldn't see it.
It might also spoil your experience since you'd end up seeing weird orphan threads etc., but it can be done.
I had one many years ago, not sure what browser support is like for user scripts nowadays or whether you have to turn it into an extension or what:
Your widget is part of PB mythology. The only problem was how frequently certain posters felt the need to loudly proclaim that they'd used Edmund's widget to block poster X, Y or Z which kinda negated its function I felt.
The best one was proclaiming to have blocked some user or other while responding to their post and being grateful that they didn't have to see it. That was peak PB.
And another one - click the link to see the animated vaccine roll out differences:
Here is an animated version of the vaccine pyramid, to compare the vaccination campaigns in France and England. (I changed the source for the English data)
I am preparing another visualization, static, which I will post this evening.
Welsh dashboard just announced 21000 new cases as of yesterday. It was 6000 the day before. Any idea what today will bring nationally?
3 days though?
Today will bring lots of filling in. As will tomorrow. And then we will have the post Christmas/NY effect - bit like a huge weekend, massively changes peoples behaviours....
Numbers next week will be.... interesting as well. My guess is that it will be something like the 10th by the time it all settles down...
Another graphic from Flo - comparing vaccination roll out in France vs England:
[Translated] As there is no Omicron open data at the moment, I took the opportunity to make a figure that I had been planning for a long time, which aims to compare the progress of the Covid vaccine campaigns in England and in France.
France started the booster roll out sooner - but the NHS has been better at targeting older.
That is the mistake that quite a few people make in comparing across nations - ignoring age. Vaccination is hundreds of times more... valuable?... for an 85 year old than a 14 year old. It's still worthwhile for the 14 year old, but the margin of advantage is much, much smaller.
If only there was an existing, well-established, way of quantifying this ...
Another graphic from Flo - comparing vaccination roll out in France vs England:
[Translated] As there is no Omicron open data at the moment, I took the opportunity to make a figure that I had been planning for a long time, which aims to compare the progress of the Covid vaccine campaigns in England and in France.
France started the booster roll out sooner - but the NHS has been better at targeting older.
That is the mistake that quite a few people make in comparing across nations - ignoring age. Vaccination is hundreds of times more... valuable?... for an 85 year old than a 14 year old. It's still worthwhile for the 14 year old, but the margin of advantage is much, much smaller.
Who's Flo?
There's a Flo in Magic Roundabout, and one in Bod.
Another graphic from Flo - comparing vaccination roll out in France vs England:
[Translated] As there is no Omicron open data at the moment, I took the opportunity to make a figure that I had been planning for a long time, which aims to compare the progress of the Covid vaccine campaigns in England and in France.
France started the booster roll out sooner - but the NHS has been better at targeting older.
That is the mistake that quite a few people make in comparing across nations - ignoring age. Vaccination is hundreds of times more... valuable?... for an 85 year old than a 14 year old. It's still worthwhile for the 14 year old, but the margin of advantage is much, much smaller.
Valuable? Perhaps effectiveness measured in terms of NNT - number needed to treat. (= the number of patients treated to get one changed outcome)
Ghislaine Maxwell's mistake, (from her point of view, not everyone else's), was not staying in a country like France which doesn't extradite nationals to the United States. She must have been very complacent to actually choose to reside in the United States itself, and not even Canada or the UK.
Did she actually choose to stay in the US, or was that where she happened to be when the FBI put out an arrest warrant in her name?
She was in France only a short time before she was arrested, and she must have known there was a good chance of being arrested if she returned to the US, but she chose to do so anyway. I think she must have convinced herself it wouldn't actually happen, in the face of reality.
Another graphic from Flo - comparing vaccination roll out in France vs England:
[Translated] As there is no Omicron open data at the moment, I took the opportunity to make a figure that I had been planning for a long time, which aims to compare the progress of the Covid vaccine campaigns in England and in France.
France started the booster roll out sooner - but the NHS has been better at targeting older.
That is the mistake that quite a few people make in comparing across nations - ignoring age. Vaccination is hundreds of times more... valuable?... for an 85 year old than a 14 year old. It's still worthwhile for the 14 year old, but the margin of advantage is much, much smaller.
If only there was an existing, well-established, way of quantifying this ...
I was playing around with a graphic that used the CFR for an age group to "correct" the raw numbers. - an unvaccinated 85 year old is several hundred times more likely to die from CVID, than a 14 year old.
And another one - click the link to see the animated vaccine roll out differences:
Here is an animated version of the vaccine pyramid, to compare the vaccination campaigns in France and England. (I changed the source for the English data)
I am preparing another visualization, static, which I will post this evening.
From age 40+ the English/UK rollout is way better but the French have been good at getting a lot of younger people into the funnel, probably related to the vaccine passport policy. The English rollout has probably delivered a lot better value in terms of lives saved than the French one and it's probably allowed for the UK to live with far fewer restrictions since the middle of May compared to most of the continent. Hopefully our rapid booster rollout will help keep the restrictions away.
And another one - click the link to see the animated vaccine roll out differences:
Here is an animated version of the vaccine pyramid, to compare the vaccination campaigns in France and England. (I changed the source for the English data)
I am preparing another visualization, static, which I will post this evening.
From age 40+ the English/UK rollout is way better but the French have been good at getting a lot of younger people into the funnel, probably related to the vaccine passport policy. The English rollout has probably delivered a lot better value in terms of lives saved than the French one and it's probably allowed for the UK to live with far fewer restrictions since the middle of May compared to most of the continent. Hopefully our rapid booster rollout will help keep the restrictions away.
Still a good chunk of 40-60 years old in the UK who need a kick up the arse. Boosters have been available to them for several weeks now.
Another graphic from Flo - comparing vaccination roll out in France vs England:
[Translated] As there is no Omicron open data at the moment, I took the opportunity to make a figure that I had been planning for a long time, which aims to compare the progress of the Covid vaccine campaigns in England and in France.
France started the booster roll out sooner - but the NHS has been better at targeting older.
That is the mistake that quite a few people make in comparing across nations - ignoring age. Vaccination is hundreds of times more... valuable?... for an 85 year old than a 14 year old. It's still worthwhile for the 14 year old, but the margin of advantage is much, much smaller.
Valuable? Perhaps effectiveness measured in terms of NNT - number needed to treat. (= the number of patients treated to get one changed outcome)
The value is surely in not needing extraordinary restrictions on normal living to protect the vaccine refuser cohort in older age groups.
When I was in the UK at the beginning of the month, I went down with a heavy head cold. Symptoms were snot-filled sinuses, brain fog and a scratchy throat. That progressed over 2 weeks to loss of my voice and an occasional phlegmy (not dry) cough.
I thought it could be COVID, so I did 3 self-administered LFTs at home, all negative. I also did the officially sanctioned LFT at Heathrow for my flight back, also negative. So I convinced myself that I did not have COVID, just a cold.
A system needs to be introduced whereby people who test positive for Omicron don't have to do the same things/go through the same procedures that people who test positive for non-Omicron variants do. Otherwise everything is going to close down.
Somebody who bullied somebody off this website is calling other people abusive, ironic.
I don't think Charles has ever bullied or been abusive to anyone. I don't get your vendetta against him and a few others.
A bit more tolerance of people with views different to your own would do you good. Some of the best conversations I have on this site are with people I disagree with, and some of the people I find most objectionable vote the same way I do. Its enlightening to embrace a variety of viewpoints not just a circle of likeminded people.
I wasn't referring to Charles when I said that. I think you know exactly who I was referring to.
I get on with plenty of people I disagree with. HYUFD, MrEd, Richard, in fact the only people I don't get on with are the bullies and those who condescend and are abusive to me and others - and I am not the first to point this out.
Politely disagreeing with you isn't bullying you, or "shouting you down".
A bully calling somebody else a bully. Ironic.
I'm going to step out of the conversation as it isn't productive. You're the only one I can see calling people a bully, or insulting people. I stepped in to defend Charles after he was unfairly smeared.
This conversation seems most unproductive. If you've got nothing nice to say about someone, don't say anything at all is a good rule of thumb.
You bullied somebody off this website. Don't you dare try and call me a bully.
I did no such thing.
Someone left the website because they didn't like my opinion, politely expressed. That is not bullying. If I was bullying I'd expect to be rightly banned, but politely expressing your own opinion is never bullying even if others don't like that opinion.
They asked you to stop engaging with them, which you ignored. So they left.
It’s a pity this forum doesn’t have a block function for such instances.
It's actually possible to bodge together your own crude "block" functionality. There are browser addons that allow you to program certain sites to hide html elements that meet certain criteria. So you could fairly easily have it detect a user's name, say "Farooq", and your browser would collapse that element and you wouldn't see it.
It might also spoil your experience since you'd end up seeing weird orphan threads etc., but it can be done.
I had one many years ago, not sure what browser support is like for user scripts nowadays or whether you have to turn it into an extension or what:
Your widget is part of PB mythology. The only problem was how frequently certain posters felt the need to loudly proclaim that they'd used Edmund's widget to block poster X, Y or Z which kinda negated its function I felt.
The best one was proclaiming to have blocked some user or other while responding to their post and being grateful that they didn't have to see it. That was peak PB.
No, peak PB came this year, when one of our dear commenters opined that:
"supermarket tannoy announcements aren't as good as they used to be"
thus implying that there was some Golden Age of Entertaining Supermarket Tannoy Announcements (probably before Brexit)
And another one - click the link to see the animated vaccine roll out differences:
Here is an animated version of the vaccine pyramid, to compare the vaccination campaigns in France and England. (I changed the source for the English data)
I am preparing another visualization, static, which I will post this evening.
From age 40+ the English/UK rollout is way better but the French have been good at getting a lot of younger people into the funnel, probably related to the vaccine passport policy. The English rollout has probably delivered a lot better value in terms of lives saved than the French one and it's probably allowed for the UK to live with far fewer restrictions since the middle of May compared to most of the continent. Hopefully our rapid booster rollout will help keep the restrictions away.
Still a good chunk of 40-60 years old in the UK who need a kick up the arse. Boosters have been available to them for several weeks now.
Yes, no doubt about it, I'd love to see natural immunity overlaid onto this for both countries as well. Especially now we know there is high level t-cell immunity from Delta to Omicron.
Comments
https://github.com/edmundedgar/greasemonkey-widgets/tree/master/pb
This is bizarre, because the debate sort-of breaks down into left/right blocs, and it is very strange to me that the left have completely forgotten about the societal aspects, and the right are having to remind them that not everything is about the rights of the individual.
China is at a fork in the road, I think, between different versions of the 7 basic plots. It has been through the anticipation and dream stages. It now reaches the frustration stage. Does this end in tragedy, or the triumphant ending of the quest (which for China is also both rebirth and rags to riches)? Or does the plot just peter out? Demographics are not massively on its site either.
People seem to have in their heads that a trans woman is a person in a dress with stubble.
if they don't understand this explanation of how the fraud worked, we could try that explanation instead.
One of them should be understood enough to get the conviction.
When in reality, I do think the issue is that most fraud cases are just too complex because no-one is reducing it to simple enough terms (and that is a real skill that few people have).
Eg, "oh god there's yet another post from @DavidL promoting trite nonsense as the wisdom of the ages, think I'll skip that."
Just a (typically boring) thought.
Book a ferry…
(Meant in jest in case it comes across as unsympathetic)
As a result, no Southern services will call at:
❌London Victoria
❌Battersea Park
❌Clapham Junction
❌Wandsworth Common
https://twitter.com/SouthernRailUK/status/1476504249282576390
If a man wants to follow a woman into a toilet for nefarious purposes, there is nothing stopping them. Self ID isn’t going to change that.
Not sure how this will impact the economy, but I know there are some major supply issues in consumer goods that are only going to materialise in Q2 which will cause further issues.
I have no idea how this will pact growth/inflation, but Johnson's possible recovery from the current nadir depends on them.
I know I jest a lot on here but I'm serious on this point. Use the oven if you must warm your mince pie. Or the toaster?
- In the UK, enormous latitude was given to the defence to bring in irrelevant/barely relevant material - which was used by the defence as a tactic. Either bury the trial under a million pages, or try and dig up something embarrassing enough (if irrelevant) that one of the parties to the prosecution's would want to give up.
- In the US, such attempts at a fishing expedition would be rapidly shut down. And could lead to sanctions against the lawyers trying it on.
- In the UK fraud is/was often presented as a complex, esoteric thing. Very abstract.
- In the US, prosecutions would typically explain how the complex financial fraud was simply a version of ordinary scam X. The NatWest 3 sold their companies assets to themselves at a knockdown price - just like the guys in the motor pool selling trucks to themselves as scrap.
- In the US, the prosecution would always make sure to show the juries some actual victims - Union pension funds investing in companies is/was a favourite.
Not everyone is comfortable with robust debate, which this site encourages obviously, but speaking personally is something I need to be aware of in normal contexts.
There is definitely some bullying however, which is deeply unpleasant. It's a shame because it's a minority damaging the site.
As some friends of mine in Aber who had had more than one too many did when they wanted fried bread and could be bothered using a frying pan...
Maybe it's two years of pandemic or maybe it's WFH, I don't know. Or maybe it was always thus, and a year off has made me soggy eyed with nostalgia for the place that never was.
Either way, it's still a fascinating place full of entertaining, diverse and intelligent opinions (for the most part).
[Translated] As there is no Omicron open data at the moment, I took the opportunity to make a figure that I had been planning for a long time, which aims to compare the progress of the Covid vaccine campaigns in England and in France.
Time advances from left to right
https://twitter.com/flodebarre/status/1476261645223665666?s=20
France started the booster roll out sooner - but the NHS has been better at targeting older.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-59826345
If you do try to toast a mince pie, make sure there's plenty of water nearby in case of fire. Perhaps if you're sat in the bath?
No, scrap that. Just use the oven or eat it cold.
So that means Trump is actually still just about aligned with the majority of Republicans in backing vaccination but an anti vaxxer could get over 1/3 of the vote in the 2024 GOP primaries. Trump could even end up the moderate on the Republican side now!
I miss my late mum's clootie dumplings, though - even better than Christmas Pudding, esp when boiled in a cloth to get the right glutinous skin. I have saved her recipe book, so some day ...
The results were - spectacular. Two consecutive explosions:
1) When the toaster blew up
2) When the fire brigade found out why they'd been called out at 3am.
https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/it-s-hard-not-to-pity-ghislaine-maxwell
I thought it could be COVID, so I did 3 self-administered LFTs at home, all negative. I also did the officially sanctioned LFT at Heathrow for my flight back, also negative. So I convinced myself that I did not have COVID, just a cold.
Now I see this: https://www.birminghammail.co.uk/news/midlands-news/new-key-omicron-symptom-discovered-22601856
The additional symptom that I did not associate with the head cold was very itchy hives across my lower back.
Now I am wondering again whether what I really had was omicron and that the LFTs simply did not pick it up.
He did not actually meet Epstein like Prince Andrew, Bill Gates or Bill Clinton or Donald Trump for example
I have no problem at all with self-Id. I'm a liberal. My concern (which frankly is miniscule. I don't know why I'm entering this swamp!) is the legal rights that go with it. So for legal rights, passports etc, I think there should be a bar higher than self-Id, but simple and respectful. Otherwise chill.
I think we agree anyway that the more important debates are around the edge cases (prisons etc).
Here is an animated version of the vaccine pyramid, to compare the vaccination campaigns in France and England.
(I changed the source for the English data)
I am preparing another visualization, static, which I will post this evening.
https://twitter.com/flodebarre/status/1476145618775068674?s=20
Here's the static version:
https://twitter.com/flodebarre/status/1475891948938530816?s=20
Numbers next week will be.... interesting as well. My guess is that it will be something like the 10th by the time it all settles down...
There's a Flo in Magic Roundabout, and one in Bod.
Which one is it?
Hang. Him.
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10352381/Lateral-flow-tests-effective-spotting-Omicron-health-chiefs-rule.html
"supermarket tannoy announcements aren't as good as they used to be"
thus implying that there was some Golden Age of Entertaining Supermarket Tannoy Announcements (probably before Brexit)