Say what you like about Gavin Williamson, he never thumped anyone at the annual "Fireplace Salesman of the Year" awards.
He wasn’t put between a rock and fireplace
The Rock - further evidence that baldies can make it to the top.....
A mistake I have only just learned I have been making all these years: Chris Rock <> Dwayne 'The Rock' Johnson. The latter is bald, the former was slapped by Will Smith.
It’s always an interesting wake up call on pb realising how disconnected a lot of people are from modern culture. Comments like not being able to recognise Will Smith in the street. Really?
Even The Rock’s gross box office is over $5bn, the 20th highest grossing actor of all time. And that’s his second successful career (as per Will Smith).
A hilariously self-torpedoing post, because The Rock is Dwayne Johnson, while Chris Rock is Chris Rock.
Laughing at people for medical conditions is supposed to be well beyond the pale nowadays so I wonder if this incident will mean that now everybody hates Chris?
No I got the reference, I just wondered if we are or not
If you want a serious answer: No.
I have no desire to see Chris Rock get cancelled, nor do I think its bad that he got what was quite frankly a well-deserved slap. So he might think twice before using someone's wife's medical condition as a punchline again, but he shouldn't be cancelled.
Quite frankly I think Will Smith both slapping Chris Rock, then apologising for doing so, and that being the end of the matter is probably the right sequence of events to have happened.
The main insight from this morning's LBC interview with Starmer is that Labour is going to get hit with a whole bunch of culture war wedge issues in the run-up to the next election. Those issues say a lot more about the distorted concerns of Westminster/media than the country.
I'm not sure "women's rights & safety" are a "distorted concern"....
There are a lot of 'yebbuts' in those sorts of issues. For example, the man in the pub is initially against whatever it is, but then says 'yebbut' and turns out that on reflection he thinks it's quite a good idea. Like gay marriage. Your average 'straight' isn't bothered, finds it mildly amusing, but if it's not hurting anyone, and it protects the survivors rights on death, why not?
I've some sympathy with Cyclefree's view as I have two friends who feel equally strongly. But it is nonetheless not something that comes up much on the doorstep even if one feels it should, and taking sides in culture wars is as fundamental a mistake as a councillor taking sides in a neighbour dispute - everybody involved (including whoever you back) feels you're not sufficiently on their side, need to say more, etc., and you just get sucked in. Meanwhile, everyone else thinks you're obsessed with something they don't care about because they've never met a trans person.
It's a big deal in the Green Party, where quite a few activists are very deeply entrenched on both sides - I know some senior party people who said they'd quit if the leadership candidate with the "wrong" view got elected.
In general people who feel strongly about an issue are often incapable of accepting that others may not feel strongly (let's not even consider them accepting the validity of opposing views). There also appears to be a significant lump of folk who are desperate for it to be a wedge issue.
BBC Scotland recently did a survey on public attitudes to trans issues and GRA reform in Scotland; the general consensus seemed to be that folk weren't that bothered and in general had a mild preference that life should be made a bit easier for trans people. You could almost see the cloud of thwarted disappointment above Pacific Quay.
Quite.
And whatever Tyndall thinks, as I said most trans people are invariably non-violent.
Of course a few slip through or, worse, use this as a cover but there's violence everywhere and they are in the extreme. I've seen very violent cis women in ladies loos after a few drinks.
ignorant scumbag.
I shall sign off for the time being as I come on here for sensible, erudite, debate not to have insults needlessly thrown.
But I would ask you to go and take a look in a mirror, draw a deep breath, and ask yourself if this was your finest moment as a human being.
Say what you like about Gavin Williamson, he never thumped anyone at the annual "Fireplace Salesman of the Year" awards.
He wasn’t put between a rock and fireplace
The Rock - further evidence that baldies can make it to the top.....
A mistake I have only just learned I have been making all these years: Chris Rock <> Dwayne 'The Rock' Johnson. The latter is bald, the former was slapped by Will Smith.
It’s always an interesting wake up call on pb realising how disconnected a lot of people are from modern culture. Comments like not being able to recognise Will Smith in the street. Really?
Even The Rock’s gross box office is over $5bn, the 20th highest grossing actor of all time. And that’s his second successful career (as per Will Smith).
A hilariously self-torpedoing post, because The Rock is Dwayne Johnson, while Chris Rock is Chris Rock.
Laughing at people for medical conditions is supposed to be well beyond the pale nowadays so I wonder if this incident will mean that now everybody hates Chris?
So we're pro cancel culture now?
Nah, no need to cancel either of them, just funny watching Chris Rock take a beat down after shit chatting another dude's wife that he's got a personal beef with. I mean what did he expect to happen.
Violence is never the response.
Eh, people who have never been in a fight usually say that. Sometimes punching the bully in the face is exactly what's needed. Chris Rock was picking on a woman with alopecia for being bald to get at her husband, he, deservedly, got a beat down for it.
The main insight from this morning's LBC interview with Starmer is that Labour is going to get hit with a whole bunch of culture war wedge issues in the run-up to the next election. Those issues say a lot more about the distorted concerns of Westminster/media than the country.
I'm not sure "women's rights & safety" are a "distorted concern"....
Until the extremists on the Daily Mail and Telegraph started whipping this up most people really couldn't care a less about gender identity. If people want to identify as female or non-binary then that's fine. And, again, until the haters went on their rampage most women I know couldn't give a fig if a trans person uses the ladies. Trans people are almost invariably non-violent, despite what Allison Pearson and co tell you.
"Trans people are almost invariably non-violent" = lol, a typical bit of (I am almost certain) baseless generalisation from you. Probably true, mind you, because people are almost invariably non-violent, but the more intelligent pupils have grasped that the problem we don't know how to address, is non-trans people pretending to be trans people precisely in order to access the ladies.
The main insight from this morning's LBC interview with Starmer is that Labour is going to get hit with a whole bunch of culture war wedge issues in the run-up to the next election. Those issues say a lot more about the distorted concerns of Westminster/media than the country.
I'm not sure "women's rights & safety" are a "distorted concern"....
There are a lot of 'yebbuts' in those sorts of issues. For example, the man in the pub is initially against whatever it is, but then says 'yebbut' and turns out that on reflection he thinks it's quite a good idea. Like gay marriage. Your average 'straight' isn't bothered, finds it mildly amusing, but if it's not hurting anyone, and it protects the survivors rights on death, why not?
I've some sympathy with Cyclefree's view as I have two friends who feel equally strongly. But it is nonetheless not something that comes up much on the doorstep even if one feels it should, and taking sides in culture wars is as fundamental a mistake as a councillor taking sides in a neighbour dispute - everybody involved (including whoever you back) feels you're not sufficiently on their side, need to say more, etc., and you just get sucked in. Meanwhile, everyone else thinks you're obsessed with something they don't care about because they've never met a trans person.
It's a big deal in the Green Party, where quite a few activists are very deeply entrenched on both sides - I know some senior party people who said they'd quit if the leadership candidate with the "wrong" view got elected.
In general people who feel strongly about an issue are often incapable of accepting that others may not feel strongly (let's not even consider them accepting the validity of opposing views). There also appears to be a significant lump of folk who are desperate for it to be a wedge issue.
BBC Scotland recently did a survey on public attitudes to trans issues and GRA reform in Scotland; the general consensus seemed to be that folk weren't that bothered and in general had a mild preference that life should be made a bit easier for trans people. You could almost see the cloud of thwarted disappointment above Pacific Quay.
Quite.
And whatever Tyndall thinks, as I said most trans people are invariably non-violent.
Of course a few slip through or, worse, use this as a cover but there's violence everywhere and they are in the extreme. I've seen very violent cis women in ladies loos after a few drinks.
ignorant scumbag.
I shall sign off for the time being as I come on here for sensible, erudite, debate not to have insults needlessly thrown.
But I would ask you to go and take a look in a mirror, draw a deep breath, and ask yourself if this was your finest moment as a human being.
Have a nice day.
Good riddance. Don't rush back you apologist for rape.
The main insight from this morning's LBC interview with Starmer is that Labour is going to get hit with a whole bunch of culture war wedge issues in the run-up to the next election. Those issues say a lot more about the distorted concerns of Westminster/media than the country.
I'm not sure "women's rights & safety" are a "distorted concern"....
There are a lot of 'yebbuts' in those sorts of issues. For example, the man in the pub is initially against whatever it is, but then says 'yebbut' and turns out that on reflection he thinks it's quite a good idea. Like gay marriage. Your average 'straight' isn't bothered, finds it mildly amusing, but if it's not hurting anyone, and it protects the survivors rights on death, why not?
I've some sympathy with Cyclefree's view as I have two friends who feel equally strongly. But it is nonetheless not something that comes up much on the doorstep even if one feels it should, and taking sides in culture wars is as fundamental a mistake as a councillor taking sides in a neighbour dispute - everybody involved (including whoever you back) feels you're not sufficiently on their side, need to say more, etc., and you just get sucked in. Meanwhile, everyone else thinks you're obsessed with something they don't care about because they've never met a trans person.
It's a big deal in the Green Party, where quite a few activists are very deeply entrenched on both sides - I know some senior party people who said they'd quit if the leadership candidate with the "wrong" view got elected.
In general people who feel strongly about an issue are often incapable of accepting that others may not feel strongly (let's not even consider them accepting the validity of opposing views). There also appears to be a significant lump of folk who are desperate for it to be a wedge issue.
BBC Scotland recently did a survey on public attitudes to trans issues and GRA reform in Scotland; the general consensus seemed to be that folk weren't that bothered and in general had a mild preference that life should be made a bit easier for trans people. You could almost see the cloud of thwarted disappointment above Pacific Quay.
Quite.
And whatever Tyndall thinks, as I said most trans people are invariably non-violent.
Of course a few slip through or, worse, use this as a cover but there's violence everywhere and they are in the extreme. I've seen very violent cis women in ladies loos after a few drinks.
The fact you use cis shows what an absolute twat you are and what twaddle you are talking..
Say what you like about Gavin Williamson, he never thumped anyone at the annual "Fireplace Salesman of the Year" awards.
He wasn’t put between a rock and fireplace
The Rock - further evidence that baldies can make it to the top.....
A mistake I have only just learned I have been making all these years: Chris Rock <> Dwayne 'The Rock' Johnson. The latter is bald, the former was slapped by Will Smith.
It’s always an interesting wake up call on pb realising how disconnected a lot of people are from modern culture. Comments like not being able to recognise Will Smith in the street. Really?
Even The Rock’s gross box office is over $5bn, the 20th highest grossing actor of all time. And that’s his second successful career (as per Will Smith).
A hilariously self-torpedoing post, because The Rock is Dwayne Johnson, while Chris Rock is Chris Rock.
Laughing at people for medical conditions is supposed to be well beyond the pale nowadays so I wonder if this incident will mean that now everybody hates Chris?
So we're pro cancel culture now?
Nah, no need to cancel either of them, just funny watching Chris Rock take a beat down after shit chatting another dude's wife that he's got a personal beef with. I mean what did he expect to happen.
Violence is never the response.
It is sometimes.
A slap was well called for here. Right to apologise afterwards, but it was well-deserved.
This correction isn't going to correct prices for people that can afford it, it's going to correct prices for those that can't.
And the Tories are going to do nothing, unlike those big banks who take our money.
If you have a decent slug of equity, a fall in house prices is annoying, but it's losing paper money. Easy come, easy go and at the end of the day you still have a house.
If you don't have said equity (probably because you didn't have the foresight to buy ten years ago because you were still studying then), falling house prices can wipe you out.
The other thing to remember is that, for mortgage payers, there's no such thing as a uniform housing price. It all depends on when you bought- you then fix that price in place for the duration. The basically identical houses in my street cost anywhere between £100 000 and £500 000 depending on when the current owners bought them.
Hence the age profile we currently see, where younger people can't buy houses and older people are baffled as to why this is so.
It's a scam, and a scam that politicians of all parties have ridden for decades. But whilst it deserves to be unwound, unwinding it ain't going to be pretty, and I'm not sure what can be done about it, short of inventing a time machine and going back to the mid 1980's.
Starter for 10? Empower housing associations to build private developer style apartments & housing which have to be let at a regulated rent. That crashes the BTL market and dumps a load of housing stock onto the market for people to buy and the prices will go down as its a property dump. Can't charge market rents > can't deliver ROI > price drops.
The fact that the oldies are baffled why young people can't afford houses suggests those housing equity gains should be stripped from the old forthwith as they clearly don't deserve them despite their swollen egos
Which baffled oldies though? Round here, and in much of ignored England especially in the north young people in very middling jobs buy houses all the time.
This correction isn't going to correct prices for people that can afford it, it's going to correct prices for those that can't.
And the Tories are going to do nothing, unlike those big banks who take our money.
If you have a decent slug of equity, a fall in house prices is annoying, but it's losing paper money. Easy come, easy go and at the end of the day you still have a house.
If you don't have said equity (probably because you didn't have the foresight to buy ten years ago because you were still studying then), falling house prices can wipe you out.
The other thing to remember is that, for mortgage payers, there's no such thing as a uniform housing price. It all depends on when you bought- you then fix that price in place for the duration. The basically identical houses in my street cost anywhere between £100 000 and £500 000 depending on when the current owners bought them.
Hence the age profile we currently see, where younger people can't buy houses and older people are baffled as to why this is so.
It's a scam, and a scam that politicians of all parties have ridden for decades. But whilst it deserves to be unwound, unwinding it ain't going to be pretty, and I'm not sure what can be done about it, short of inventing a time machine and going back to the mid 1980's.
Starter for 10? Empower housing associations to build private developer style apartments & housing which have to be let at a regulated rent. That crashes the BTL market and dumps a load of housing stock onto the market for people to buy and the prices will go down as its a property dump. Can't charge market rents > can't deliver ROI > price drops.
The fact that the oldies are baffled why young people can't afford houses suggests those housing equity gains should be stripped from the old forthwith as they clearly don't deserve them despite their swollen egos
The main insight from this morning's LBC interview with Starmer is that Labour is going to get hit with a whole bunch of culture war wedge issues in the run-up to the next election. Those issues say a lot more about the distorted concerns of Westminster/media than the country.
I'm not sure "women's rights & safety" are a "distorted concern"....
There are a lot of 'yebbuts' in those sorts of issues. For example, the man in the pub is initially against whatever it is, but then says 'yebbut' and turns out that on reflection he thinks it's quite a good idea. Like gay marriage. Your average 'straight' isn't bothered, finds it mildly amusing, but if it's not hurting anyone, and it protects the survivors rights on death, why not?
I've some sympathy with Cyclefree's view as I have two friends who feel equally strongly. But it is nonetheless not something that comes up much on the doorstep even if one feels it should, and taking sides in culture wars is as fundamental a mistake as a councillor taking sides in a neighbour dispute - everybody involved (including whoever you back) feels you're not sufficiently on their side, need to say more, etc., and you just get sucked in. Meanwhile, everyone else thinks you're obsessed with something they don't care about because they've never met a trans person.
It's a big deal in the Green Party, where quite a few activists are very deeply entrenched on both sides - I know some senior party people who said they'd quit if the leadership candidate with the "wrong" view got elected.
In general people who feel strongly about an issue are often incapable of accepting that others may not feel strongly (let's not even consider them accepting the validity of opposing views). There also appears to be a significant lump of folk who are desperate for it to be a wedge issue.
BBC Scotland recently did a survey on public attitudes to trans issues and GRA reform in Scotland; the general consensus seemed to be that folk weren't that bothered and in general had a mild preference that life should be made a bit easier for trans people. You could almost see the cloud of thwarted disappointment above Pacific Quay.
Quite.
And whatever Tyndall thinks, as I said most trans people are invariably non-violent.
Of course a few slip through or, worse, use this as a cover but there's violence everywhere and they are in the extreme. I've seen very violent cis women in ladies loos after a few drinks.
Everyone agrees that most trans people are invariably non violent.
The argument is the extent to which violent people would pretend to be trans in order to get closer to potential victims, and how you prevent this.
The continued refusal of people like you to accept this obvious fact, is why this is slowly being blown up from a fringe issue on which there is broad agreement across party lines (as it should be) into the mainstream.
Wallace strikes me as a decent sort. Sensible rather than bright, goodish instincts and pragmatic. Definitely one of the better performers in this very ordinary cabinet. Whether he quite has the star dust for the top post, however, I am not so sure.
But in politics, like those being chased by the bear, you don't need to be good or fast, just better or faster than the others.
Shows how absolutely dire a state the Tories are in when he is a candidate for PM.
Just remember the analogy of the bear Malcolm. It is poor but the alternatives are worse.
A good example, at the moment, is the absolutely mindblowing failure that is the Ferry contract. There is an article in the Scotsman by a former Auditor General saying that Nicola really should resign for this. A fixed price contract for £97m for 2 ferries has turned into £240m for one rusting and unusable hulk and one that doesn't even exist. The latest cunning plan seems to be to blame Derek Mackay on the bases that (a) he was once Transport Minister (b) he is a bye word for utter incompetence and (c) he is no longer about.
Which rather begs the question of why Nicola thought it was a good idea to promote him to Finance Secretary.
I know you are not a fan of Nicola or the current leadership of the SNP but someone like Wallace would be well out of sight of the bear before that lot had their running shoes on.
I have to agree with you there David. SNP are especially dumb and this one is a cracker but they have plenty of others. I think it is an extra 260M as well and they have already forked out more than 2 ferries would cost. Given the amount of disaster's , lying , cheating etc so far Sturgeon would brass neck it no matter how bad. Police seem to be totally indifferent to the shenanigans , not a peep on teh £660K missing , unable to find cuplrits leaking government documents when only her and a few pals had copies , people being huckled on feeble excuses , you could go on forever. They are an absolute shambles.
PS: Mackay was in the right circles/cliques for Sturgeon, a kindred soul
So what are we learning on here today? Violence against a man who gave some verbal is okay; if you don't do violence, you're a 'door mat'.
But all trans people have to be despised and hated because *a few* do bad things?
If we really wanted to stop violence of all sorts - and yes, against women - we would talk much more about the former, and not excuse it because you're an alpha-male wannabe idiot.
The main insight from this morning's LBC interview with Starmer is that Labour is going to get hit with a whole bunch of culture war wedge issues in the run-up to the next election. Those issues say a lot more about the distorted concerns of Westminster/media than the country.
I'm not sure "women's rights & safety" are a "distorted concern"....
There are a lot of 'yebbuts' in those sorts of issues. For example, the man in the pub is initially against whatever it is, but then says 'yebbut' and turns out that on reflection he thinks it's quite a good idea. Like gay marriage. Your average 'straight' isn't bothered, finds it mildly amusing, but if it's not hurting anyone, and it protects the survivors rights on death, why not?
I've some sympathy with Cyclefree's view as I have two friends who feel equally strongly. But it is nonetheless not something that comes up much on the doorstep even if one feels it should, and taking sides in culture wars is as fundamental a mistake as a councillor taking sides in a neighbour dispute - everybody involved (including whoever you back) feels you're not sufficiently on their side, need to say more, etc., and you just get sucked in. Meanwhile, everyone else thinks you're obsessed with something they don't care about because they've never met a trans person.
It's a big deal in the Green Party, where quite a few activists are very deeply entrenched on both sides - I know some senior party people who said they'd quit if the leadership candidate with the "wrong" view got elected.
In general people who feel strongly about an issue are often incapable of accepting that others may not feel strongly (let's not even consider them accepting the validity of opposing views). There also appears to be a significant lump of folk who are desperate for it to be a wedge issue.
BBC Scotland recently did a survey on public attitudes to trans issues and GRA reform in Scotland; the general consensus seemed to be that folk weren't that bothered and in general had a mild preference that life should be made a bit easier for trans people. You could almost see the cloud of thwarted disappointment above Pacific Quay.
Quite.
And whatever Tyndall thinks, as I said most trans people are invariably non-violent.
Of course a few slip through or, worse, use this as a cover but there's violence everywhere and they are in the extreme. I've seen very violent cis women in ladies loos after a few drinks.
Everyone agrees that most trans people are invariably non violent.
The argument is the extent to which violent people would pretend to be trans in order to get closer to potential victims, and how you prevent this.
The continued refusal of people like you to accept this obvious fact, is why this is slowly being blown up from a fringe issue on which there is broad agreement across party lines (as it should be) into the mainstream.
Heathener does this on purpose. Needles a perceived wound to wind people up and exenuate division. Then signs off again after a job well done.
Interesting that you consider young people who struggle to buy homes at an 8x house price to earnings ratio to be merely "dickheads".
The only dickheads are those who have invested in a portfolio of properties expecting young people to keep paying them rent, and view that investment as their "pension". If they lose out, then sucks to be them, investments can go down as well as up.
The problem is the bimodality. There are dickheads at one end and poorly advised+overstretched at the other. A solution needs to deal with both.
The middle solution would be to reduce the rate of house price growth to less than pay inflation but more than general inflation.
After about a hundred years, houses would be affordable again.
The chances of creating that situation are about equal to Putin & Co. making it to the English Channel...
" [DeSantis] has also proposed raising his own defense force. As CNN reported in December, he wants to “re-establish a World War II-era civilian military force that he, not the Pentagon, would control,” one that would “not be encumbered by the federal government.” "
" [DeSantis] has also proposed raising his own defense force. As CNN reported in December, he wants to “re-establish a World War II-era civilian military force that he, not the Pentagon, would control,” one that would “not be encumbered by the federal government.” "
I believe this has been debunked in respect that lots of other states already have exactly this. In terms of the US, it isn't anything that out of the ordinary (and it isn't all true red Republican states).
The main insight from this morning's LBC interview with Starmer is that Labour is going to get hit with a whole bunch of culture war wedge issues in the run-up to the next election. Those issues say a lot more about the distorted concerns of Westminster/media than the country.
I'm not sure "women's rights & safety" are a "distorted concern"....
There are a lot of 'yebbuts' in those sorts of issues. For example, the man in the pub is initially against whatever it is, but then says 'yebbut' and turns out that on reflection he thinks it's quite a good idea. Like gay marriage. Your average 'straight' isn't bothered, finds it mildly amusing, but if it's not hurting anyone, and it protects the survivors rights on death, why not?
I've some sympathy with Cyclefree's view as I have two friends who feel equally strongly. But it is nonetheless not something that comes up much on the doorstep even if one feels it should, and taking sides in culture wars is as fundamental a mistake as a councillor taking sides in a neighbour dispute - everybody involved (including whoever you back) feels you're not sufficiently on their side, need to say more, etc., and you just get sucked in. Meanwhile, everyone else thinks you're obsessed with something they don't care about because they've never met a trans person.
It's a big deal in the Green Party, where quite a few activists are very deeply entrenched on both sides - I know some senior party people who said they'd quit if the leadership candidate with the "wrong" view got elected.
In general people who feel strongly about an issue are often incapable of accepting that others may not feel strongly (let's not even consider them accepting the validity of opposing views). There also appears to be a significant lump of folk who are desperate for it to be a wedge issue.
BBC Scotland recently did a survey on public attitudes to trans issues and GRA reform in Scotland; the general consensus seemed to be that folk weren't that bothered and in general had a mild preference that life should be made a bit easier for trans people. You could almost see the cloud of thwarted disappointment above Pacific Quay.
Quite.
And whatever Tyndall thinks, as I said most trans people are invariably non-violent.
Of course a few slip through or, worse, use this as a cover but there's violence everywhere and they are in the extreme. I've seen very violent cis women in ladies loos after a few drinks.
Everyone agrees that most trans people are invariably non violent.
The argument is the extent to which violent people would pretend to be trans in order to get closer to potential victims, and how you prevent this.
The continued refusal of people like you to accept this obvious fact, is why this is slowly being blown up from a fringe issue on which there is broad agreement across party lines (as it should be) into the mainstream.
Heathener does this on purpose. Needles a perceived wound to wind people up and exenuate division. Then signs off again after a job well done.
Sorry, I'm a bit out of touch. Have we definitively moved Heathener from the "Occasionally interesting, if somewhat wacky, purveyor of fringe views" bucket into "Probable troll"?
Either way, he/she/they is/are not the only one who (pretends to) think(s) this way.
On topic, don't Lab and Cons always go inappropriately gooey eyed over anyone ex military? The amount of guff expelled over Dan Jarvis as a leader in waiting was silly.
Those wide shoulders plus the patriotic jawline. Enough for him at one point to be THE betting fav for leader.
Last Secretary of State for Defence to progress to a GooS/PM?
Philip Hammond was Secretary of State for Defence (2011-14) and later became Foreign Secretary (2014-16) and Chancellor of the Exchequer (2016-19), before becoming a non-person following the Johnson revolution.
That's completely unfair. He was always a non-person, as exciting as blancmonge, it just became a bit too obvious when he was Chancellor.
The main insight from this morning's LBC interview with Starmer is that Labour is going to get hit with a whole bunch of culture war wedge issues in the run-up to the next election. Those issues say a lot more about the distorted concerns of Westminster/media than the country.
I'm not sure "women's rights & safety" are a "distorted concern"....
There are a lot of 'yebbuts' in those sorts of issues. For example, the man in the pub is initially against whatever it is, but then says 'yebbut' and turns out that on reflection he thinks it's quite a good idea. Like gay marriage. Your average 'straight' isn't bothered, finds it mildly amusing, but if it's not hurting anyone, and it protects the survivors rights on death, why not?
I've some sympathy with Cyclefree's view as I have two friends who feel equally strongly. But it is nonetheless not something that comes up much on the doorstep even if one feels it should, and taking sides in culture wars is as fundamental a mistake as a councillor taking sides in a neighbour dispute - everybody involved (including whoever you back) feels you're not sufficiently on their side, need to say more, etc., and you just get sucked in. Meanwhile, everyone else thinks you're obsessed with something they don't care about because they've never met a trans person.
It's a big deal in the Green Party, where quite a few activists are very deeply entrenched on both sides - I know some senior party people who said they'd quit if the leadership candidate with the "wrong" view got elected.
In general people who feel strongly about an issue are often incapable of accepting that others may not feel strongly (let's not even consider them accepting the validity of opposing views). There also appears to be a significant lump of folk who are desperate for it to be a wedge issue.
BBC Scotland recently did a survey on public attitudes to trans issues and GRA reform in Scotland; the general consensus seemed to be that folk weren't that bothered and in general had a mild preference that life should be made a bit easier for trans people. You could almost see the cloud of thwarted disappointment above Pacific Quay.
Quite.
And whatever Tyndall thinks, as I said most trans people are invariably non-violent.
Of course a few slip through or, worse, use this as a cover but there's violence everywhere and they are in the extreme. I've seen very violent cis women in ladies loos after a few drinks.
Everyone agrees that most trans people are invariably non violent.
The argument is the extent to which violent people would pretend to be trans in order to get closer to potential victims, and how you prevent this.
The continued refusal of people like you to accept this obvious fact, is why this is slowly being blown up from a fringe issue on which there is broad agreement across party lines (as it should be) into the mainstream.
Heathener does this on purpose. Needles a perceived wound to wind people up and exenuate division. Then signs off again after a job well done.
"You have never been in a Ladies' [loo] is one of the stranger points I've seen made against a male opponent
So what are we learning on here today? Violence against a man who gave some verbal is okay; if you don't do violence, you're a 'door mat'.
But all trans people have to be despised and hated because *a few* do bad things?
If we really wanted to stop violence of all sorts - and yes, against women - we would talk much more about the former, and not excuse it because you're an alpha-male wannabe idiot.
So what are we learning on here today? Violence against a man who gave some verbal is okay; if you don't do violence, you're a 'door mat'.
But all trans people have to be despised and hated because *a few* do bad things?
If we really wanted to stop violence of all sorts - and yes, against women - we would talk much more about the former, and not excuse it because you're an alpha-male wannabe idiot.
Nah mate, you're the guy who launches an inquiry after a school kid commits suicide after being bullied and says "lessons must be learned" then repeats the exercise as needed, learning precisely zero lessons in the process.
" [DeSantis] has also proposed raising his own defense force. As CNN reported in December, he wants to “re-establish a World War II-era civilian military force that he, not the Pentagon, would control,” one that would “not be encumbered by the federal government.” "
p.s. and it's pretty obvious by now that J.K.Rowling has a lot of hurt and anger from her past as well as a distinctly unprogressive attitude on many things. Witness just how incredibly all-white and undiverse the heroes in the Potter franchise are. Just about the only ethnically diverse person turns out to betray the nice white kids ...
If she'd invented non-white characters she'd no doubt have been accused of cultural appropriation.
She has a bunch of non-white characters, and she uses discrimination against fantastical characters (werewolves, house-elves, etc) to make pretty obvious points about discrimination and which side she is on.
The difference between two-year and 10-year [US] Treasury yields, which has predicted every downturn in the last 50 years, is also closing in on inversion. This is the most closely watched recession indicator on markets and typically signals a downturn within the next 18 months.
The main insight from this morning's LBC interview with Starmer is that Labour is going to get hit with a whole bunch of culture war wedge issues in the run-up to the next election. Those issues say a lot more about the distorted concerns of Westminster/media than the country.
I'm not sure "women's rights & safety" are a "distorted concern"....
There are a lot of 'yebbuts' in those sorts of issues. For example, the man in the pub is initially against whatever it is, but then says 'yebbut' and turns out that on reflection he thinks it's quite a good idea. Like gay marriage. Your average 'straight' isn't bothered, finds it mildly amusing, but if it's not hurting anyone, and it protects the survivors rights on death, why not?
I've some sympathy with Cyclefree's view as I have two friends who feel equally strongly. But it is nonetheless not something that comes up much on the doorstep even if one feels it should, and taking sides in culture wars is as fundamental a mistake as a councillor taking sides in a neighbour dispute - everybody involved (including whoever you back) feels you're not sufficiently on their side, need to say more, etc., and you just get sucked in. Meanwhile, everyone else thinks you're obsessed with something they don't care about because they've never met a trans person.
It's a big deal in the Green Party, where quite a few activists are very deeply entrenched on both sides - I know some senior party people who said they'd quit if the leadership candidate with the "wrong" view got elected.
In general people who feel strongly about an issue are often incapable of accepting that others may not feel strongly (let's not even consider them accepting the validity of opposing views). There also appears to be a significant lump of folk who are desperate for it to be a wedge issue.
BBC Scotland recently did a survey on public attitudes to trans issues and GRA reform in Scotland; the general consensus seemed to be that folk weren't that bothered and in general had a mild preference that life should be made a bit easier for trans people. You could almost see the cloud of thwarted disappointment above Pacific Quay.
Quite.
And whatever Tyndall thinks, as I said most trans people are invariably non-violent.
Of course a few slip through or, worse, use this as a cover but there's violence everywhere and they are in the extreme. I've seen very violent cis women in ladies loos after a few drinks.
Everyone agrees that most trans people are invariably non violent.
The argument is the extent to which violent people would pretend to be trans in order to get closer to potential victims, and how you prevent this.
The continued refusal of people like you to accept this obvious fact, is why this is slowly being blown up from a fringe issue on which there is broad agreement across party lines (as it should be) into the mainstream.
Heathener does this on purpose. Needles a perceived wound to wind people up and exenuate division. Then signs off again after a job well done.
Sorry, I'm a bit out of touch. Have we definitively moved Heathener from the "Occasionally interesting, if somewhat wacky, purveyor of fringe views" bucket into "Probable troll"?
Either way, he/she/they is/are not the only one who (pretends to) think(s) this way.
Suspect internet address, Endillion. That and the occasional lapse, like a surprising lack of familiarity with well-known British landmarks.
He/she is also plug stupid, though that in itself is not a bar to participation here.....
So what are we learning on here today? Violence against a man who gave some verbal is okay; if you don't do violence, you're a 'door mat'.
But all trans people have to be despised and hated because *a few* do bad things?
If we really wanted to stop violence of all sorts - and yes, against women - we would talk much more about the former, and not excuse it because you're an alpha-male wannabe idiot.
Nah mate, you're the guy who launches an inquiry after a school kid commits suicide after being bullied and says "lessons must be learned" then repeats the exercise as needed, learning precisely zero lessons in the process.
No, I really am not. In fact, I have mentioned the horrible levels of violence in this country on several occasions. If you know more than a few dozen people, you will know someone who has suffered domestic abuse in the last year, Often suffering in silence; invisibly.
This correction isn't going to correct prices for people that can afford it, it's going to correct prices for those that can't.
And the Tories are going to do nothing, unlike those big banks who take our money.
If you have a decent slug of equity, a fall in house prices is annoying, but it's losing paper money. Easy come, easy go and at the end of the day you still have a house.
If you don't have said equity (probably because you didn't have the foresight to buy ten years ago because you were still studying then), falling house prices can wipe you out.
The other thing to remember is that, for mortgage payers, there's no such thing as a uniform housing price. It all depends on when you bought- you then fix that price in place for the duration. The basically identical houses in my street cost anywhere between £100 000 and £500 000 depending on when the current owners bought them.
Hence the age profile we currently see, where younger people can't buy houses and older people are baffled as to why this is so.
It's a scam, and a scam that politicians of all parties have ridden for decades. But whilst it deserves to be unwound, unwinding it ain't going to be pretty, and I'm not sure what can be done about it, short of inventing a time machine and going back to the mid 1980's.
Starter for 10? Empower housing associations to build private developer style apartments & housing which have to be let at a regulated rent. That crashes the BTL market and dumps a load of housing stock onto the market for people to buy and the prices will go down as its a property dump. Can't charge market rents > can't deliver ROI > price drops.
The fact that the oldies are baffled why young people can't afford houses suggests those housing equity gains should be stripped from the old forthwith as they clearly don't deserve them despite their swollen egos
Which baffled oldies though? Round here, and in much of ignored England especially in the north young people in very middling jobs buy houses all the time.
It's a desperate, desperate scramble though. The sort of job which fifteen years ago would have earned you enough to afford deposit and mortgage on a perfectly acceptable 3-bed semi in Cheadle now earns you enough for a slightly delapidated 2-bed terrace in Edgeley, which you buy anyway because if you don't, by next year you will only be able to afford an ex-council house in Brinnington. Meanwhile, those whose starting position would have previously been the ex-council house in Brinnington are frozen out.
The main insight from this morning's LBC interview with Starmer is that Labour is going to get hit with a whole bunch of culture war wedge issues in the run-up to the next election. Those issues say a lot more about the distorted concerns of Westminster/media than the country.
I'm not sure "women's rights & safety" are a "distorted concern"....
There are a lot of 'yebbuts' in those sorts of issues. For example, the man in the pub is initially against whatever it is, but then says 'yebbut' and turns out that on reflection he thinks it's quite a good idea. Like gay marriage. Your average 'straight' isn't bothered, finds it mildly amusing, but if it's not hurting anyone, and it protects the survivors rights on death, why not?
I've some sympathy with Cyclefree's view as I have two friends who feel equally strongly. But it is nonetheless not something that comes up much on the doorstep even if one feels it should, and taking sides in culture wars is as fundamental a mistake as a councillor taking sides in a neighbour dispute - everybody involved (including whoever you back) feels you're not sufficiently on their side, need to say more, etc., and you just get sucked in. Meanwhile, everyone else thinks you're obsessed with something they don't care about because they've never met a trans person.
It's a big deal in the Green Party, where quite a few activists are very deeply entrenched on both sides - I know some senior party people who said they'd quit if the leadership candidate with the "wrong" view got elected.
In general people who feel strongly about an issue are often incapable of accepting that others may not feel strongly (let's not even consider them accepting the validity of opposing views). There also appears to be a significant lump of folk who are desperate for it to be a wedge issue.
BBC Scotland recently did a survey on public attitudes to trans issues and GRA reform in Scotland; the general consensus seemed to be that folk weren't that bothered and in general had a mild preference that life should be made a bit easier for trans people. You could almost see the cloud of thwarted disappointment above Pacific Quay.
And although this often gets presented as trans rights vs women's rights it is women who consistently poll as more relaxed (than men) about it being made easier to attain a GRC.
So what are we learning on here today? Violence against a man who gave some verbal is okay; if you don't do violence, you're a 'door mat'.
But all trans people have to be despised and hated because *a few* do bad things?
If we really wanted to stop violence of all sorts - and yes, against women - we would talk much more about the former, and not excuse it because you're an alpha-male wannabe idiot.
Nobody said that , you are making it up
Which bit?
On the previous thread, I said; "A life tip: don't go around hitting people just because they're an ass."
To which someone replied: "Nah, that's not a good tip. Maybe if you're one of life's doormats."
As for my second para; just look at the tone on here towards trans people.
As for my third: I think that's true. We need to talk about it more.
Interesting that you consider young people who struggle to buy homes at an 8x house price to earnings ratio to be merely "dickheads".
The only dickheads are those who have invested in a portfolio of properties expecting young people to keep paying them rent, and view that investment as their "pension". If they lose out, then sucks to be them, investments can go down as well as up.
The problem is the bimodality. There are dickheads at one end and poorly advised+overstretched at the other. A solution needs to deal with both.
Absolutely.
But its like Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs - a property providing a roof over the head of someone, and that someone being able to afford their own property is almost infinitely more important a priority than someone who is investing in homes they don't live in, in order to extract a rent from that person.
Especially given our f***ed up planning system that doesn't allow new housing to be built to replace any homes that people who don't live in it own. If the planning system was reformed so that anyone who wanted a home of their own could just build one anywhere they wanted, instead of having to rent it off someone who is closing the market off to purchasers, then it wouldn't be an issue.
You can build new homes, just it should ideally be in brownfield not greenbelt land and be in keeping with the street scene and if on large scale come with appropriate infrastructure.
Renting not ownership is still mainly a London problem and to a lesser extent a Home Counties problem. In the North and Midlands and Wales and Scotland and NI while people may rent when young they can still afford to buy a property in their 30s relatively easily as prices are far cheaper
Wow that's spectacularly out of touch on almost every level.
So what are we learning on here today? Violence against a man who gave some verbal is okay; if you don't do violence, you're a 'door mat'.
But all trans people have to be despised and hated because *a few* do bad things?
If we really wanted to stop violence of all sorts - and yes, against women - we would talk much more about the former, and not excuse it because you're an alpha-male wannabe idiot.
If you seriously think you can derive your second paragraph from anything anyone has said here today, I do question what you are doing here. Other than the "First" posts it must all be completely over your head.
Sorry if that sounds rude, but it is by no means as ludicrously offensive as your suggestion that anybody thinks that "all trans people [or indeed any of them] have to be despised and hated"
Say what you like about Gavin Williamson, he never thumped anyone at the annual "Fireplace Salesman of the Year" awards.
He wasn’t put between a rock and fireplace
The Rock - further evidence that baldies can make it to the top.....
A mistake I have only just learned I have been making all these years: Chris Rock <> Dwayne 'The Rock' Johnson. The latter is bald, the former was slapped by Will Smith.
It’s always an interesting wake up call on pb realising how disconnected a lot of people are from modern culture. Comments like not being able to recognise Will Smith in the street. Really?
Even The Rock’s gross box office is over $5bn, the 20th highest grossing actor of all time. And that’s his second successful career (as per Will Smith).
A hilariously self-torpedoing post, because The Rock is Dwayne Johnson, while Chris Rock is Chris Rock.
Laughing at people for medical conditions is supposed to be well beyond the pale nowadays so I wonder if this incident will mean that now everybody hates Chris?
No I got the reference, I just wondered if we are or not
If you want a serious answer: No.
I have no desire to see Chris Rock get cancelled, nor do I think its bad that he got what was quite frankly a well-deserved slap. So he might think twice before using someone's wife's medical condition as a punchline again, but he shouldn't be cancelled.
Quite frankly I think Will Smith both slapping Chris Rock, then apologising for doing so, and that being the end of the matter is probably the right sequence of events to have happened.
No, the right sequence of events was the Oscars simultaneously being The Wokest event on cringe-o-vision AND having live televised violence between presenters because of misogynistic jokes about women. Which is what happened
The main insight from this morning's LBC interview with Starmer is that Labour is going to get hit with a whole bunch of culture war wedge issues in the run-up to the next election. Those issues say a lot more about the distorted concerns of Westminster/media than the country.
I'm not sure "women's rights & safety" are a "distorted concern"....
There are a lot of 'yebbuts' in those sorts of issues. For example, the man in the pub is initially against whatever it is, but then says 'yebbut' and turns out that on reflection he thinks it's quite a good idea. Like gay marriage. Your average 'straight' isn't bothered, finds it mildly amusing, but if it's not hurting anyone, and it protects the survivors rights on death, why not?
I've some sympathy with Cyclefree's view as I have two friends who feel equally strongly. But it is nonetheless not something that comes up much on the doorstep even if one feels it should, and taking sides in culture wars is as fundamental a mistake as a councillor taking sides in a neighbour dispute - everybody involved (including whoever you back) feels you're not sufficiently on their side, need to say more, etc., and you just get sucked in. Meanwhile, everyone else thinks you're obsessed with something they don't care about because they've never met a trans person.
It's a big deal in the Green Party, where quite a few activists are very deeply entrenched on both sides - I know some senior party people who said they'd quit if the leadership candidate with the "wrong" view got elected.
In general people who feel strongly about an issue are often incapable of accepting that others may not feel strongly (let's not even consider them accepting the validity of opposing views). There also appears to be a significant lump of folk who are desperate for it to be a wedge issue.
BBC Scotland recently did a survey on public attitudes to trans issues and GRA reform in Scotland; the general consensus seemed to be that folk weren't that bothered and in general had a mild preference that life should be made a bit easier for trans people. You could almost see the cloud of thwarted disappointment above Pacific Quay.
Quite.
And whatever Tyndall thinks, as I said most trans people are invariably non-violent.
Of course a few slip through or, worse, use this as a cover but there's violence everywhere and they are in the extreme. I've seen very violent cis women in ladies loos after a few drinks.
Everyone agrees that most trans people are invariably non violent.
The argument is the extent to which violent people would pretend to be trans in order to get closer to potential victims, and how you prevent this.
The continued refusal of people like you to accept this obvious fact, is why this is slowly being blown up from a fringe issue on which there is broad agreement across party lines (as it should be) into the mainstream.
Yes, that is reasonable.
I can't just put on a wig, say I'm a woman and start using the ladies loos. There needs to be some sort of gatekeeping - probably in the form of a doctor's note and I would also suggest that the person should be on hormone therapy. As I understand it, estrogen nukes your sex drive and stops your willy working so job done in that respect.
Most genuine trans people are at far more risk of violent assault than likely to commit one, I know half a dozen trans people and they have all been victims of hate, ranging from being shouted at in the street to sexually assaulted in one case. But there needs to be a system in place to ensure genuine trans people are protected while preventing men from taking advantage by falsely claiming to be trans, most rational people can see that.
On that note, a trans friend shared this with me the other day and it did make me laugh.
Say what you like about Gavin Williamson, he never thumped anyone at the annual "Fireplace Salesman of the Year" awards.
He wasn’t put between a rock and fireplace
The Rock - further evidence that baldies can make it to the top.....
A mistake I have only just learned I have been making all these years: Chris Rock <> Dwayne 'The Rock' Johnson. The latter is bald, the former was slapped by Will Smith.
It’s always an interesting wake up call on pb realising how disconnected a lot of people are from modern culture. Comments like not being able to recognise Will Smith in the street. Really?
Even The Rock’s gross box office is over $5bn, the 20th highest grossing actor of all time. And that’s his second successful career (as per Will Smith).
A hilariously self-torpedoing post, because The Rock is Dwayne Johnson, while Chris Rock is Chris Rock.
Laughing at people for medical conditions is supposed to be well beyond the pale nowadays so I wonder if this incident will mean that now everybody hates Chris?
So we're pro cancel culture now?
Nah, no need to cancel either of them, just funny watching Chris Rock take a beat down after shit chatting another dude's wife that he's got a personal beef with. I mean what did he expect to happen.
Violence is never the response.
Eh, people who have never been in a fight usually say that. Sometimes punching the bully in the face is exactly what's needed. Chris Rock was picking on a woman with alopecia for being bald to get at her husband, he, deservedly, got a beat down for it.
What would Field Marshall Zhurkov have done in the Death of Stalin is a good test.
So what are we learning on here today? Violence against a man who gave some verbal is okay; if you don't do violence, you're a 'door mat'.
But all trans people have to be despised and hated because *a few* do bad things?
If we really wanted to stop violence of all sorts - and yes, against women - we would talk much more about the former, and not excuse it because you're an alpha-male wannabe idiot.
Nah mate, you're the guy who launches an inquiry after a school kid commits suicide after being bullied and says "lessons must be learned" then repeats the exercise as needed, learning precisely zero lessons in the process.
No, I really am not. In fact, I have mentioned the horrible levels of violence in this country on several occasions. If you know more than a few dozen people, you will know someone who has suffered domestic abuse in the last year, Often suffering in silence; invisibly.
Your comment demeans you.
But suffering in silence is what your proposed solution always seems to be, just take it on the chin and hope for a better world. Bullies need to be confronted, whether that's at school or someone using a privileged position to insult others, the confrontation is necessary, and yes, that may mean violence. I was bullied at school for being a "paki" and while you might have simply suffered in silence, I beat the shit out of one of them who did it and guess what? The bullying stopped, I got a week's worth of detention (including two Saturdays) but it was worth it. I don't think my dad has ever been more proud than he was when I he had to come and pick me up early because I'd been in a fight with the racist bully.
So what are we learning on here today? Violence against a man who gave some verbal is okay; if you don't do violence, you're a 'door mat'.
But all trans people have to be despised and hated because *a few* do bad things?
If we really wanted to stop violence of all sorts - and yes, against women - we would talk much more about the former, and not excuse it because you're an alpha-male wannabe idiot.
Nobody said that , you are making it up
Which bit?
On the previous thread, I said; "A life tip: don't go around hitting people just because they're an ass."
To which someone replied: "Nah, that's not a good tip. Maybe if you're one of life's doormats."
As for my second para; just look at the tone on here towards trans people.
As for my third: I think that's true. We need to talk about it more.
Say what you like about Gavin Williamson, he never thumped anyone at the annual "Fireplace Salesman of the Year" awards.
He wasn’t put between a rock and fireplace
The Rock - further evidence that baldies can make it to the top.....
A mistake I have only just learned I have been making all these years: Chris Rock <> Dwayne 'The Rock' Johnson. The latter is bald, the former was slapped by Will Smith.
It’s always an interesting wake up call on pb realising how disconnected a lot of people are from modern culture. Comments like not being able to recognise Will Smith in the street. Really?
Even The Rock’s gross box office is over $5bn, the 20th highest grossing actor of all time. And that’s his second successful career (as per Will Smith).
Yep I refrained from commenting in response this morning but the disconnect between pb and the public was really shown up by that remark earlier.
Most everyone under 40 knows Will Smith by name, sight, probably voice.
I would extend that to "under 50" - FPoBE started in 1990, and his movie career kicked off in 1997 (mid 20s being prime moviegoer demographic). You would have to have been living as a Hermit on Iona not to recognize him from that.
Half the people I know my age could probably recite the Fresh Prince lyrics off the top of their head, even now thirty years later.
I find the idea anyone doesn't know who he is pretty incomprehensible.
Yep - he's an A list movie (and tv and music) star and has been for a long time. I personally don't know a single person 'irl' who hasn't heard of him.
p.s. and it's pretty obvious by now that J.K.Rowling has a lot of hurt and anger from her past as well as a distinctly unprogressive attitude on many things. Witness just how incredibly all-white and undiverse the heroes in the Potter franchise are. Just about the only ethnically diverse person turns out to betray the nice white kids ...
If she'd invented non-white characters she'd no doubt have been accused of cultural appropriation.
She has a bunch of non-white characters, and she uses discrimination against fantastical characters (werewolves, house-elves, etc) to make pretty obvious points about discrimination and which side she is on.
And she's about to release Part 3 of a five film series, the central conflict of which is an extended commentary on why white supremacy is bad, in which the principal antagonist is a character she introduced in her first ever book as a direct metaphor for Hitler.
I finally looked at the Oscar incident. It looked as stagey as I expected. I assumed Smith had punched him, not a slap. Obviously not real. Even a pub fight has lots of flailing around. Very poor and aimed at the viewers.
Say what you like about Gavin Williamson, he never thumped anyone at the annual "Fireplace Salesman of the Year" awards.
He wasn’t put between a rock and fireplace
The Rock - further evidence that baldies can make it to the top.....
A mistake I have only just learned I have been making all these years: Chris Rock <> Dwayne 'The Rock' Johnson. The latter is bald, the former was slapped by Will Smith.
It’s always an interesting wake up call on pb realising how disconnected a lot of people are from modern culture. Comments like not being able to recognise Will Smith in the street. Really?
Even The Rock’s gross box office is over $5bn, the 20th highest grossing actor of all time. And that’s his second successful career (as per Will Smith).
A hilariously self-torpedoing post, because The Rock is Dwayne Johnson, while Chris Rock is Chris Rock.
Laughing at people for medical conditions is supposed to be well beyond the pale nowadays so I wonder if this incident will mean that now everybody hates Chris?
No I got the reference, I just wondered if we are or not
If you want a serious answer: No.
I have no desire to see Chris Rock get cancelled, nor do I think its bad that he got what was quite frankly a well-deserved slap. So he might think twice before using someone's wife's medical condition as a punchline again, but he shouldn't be cancelled.
Quite frankly I think Will Smith both slapping Chris Rock, then apologising for doing so, and that being the end of the matter is probably the right sequence of events to have happened.
No, the right sequence of events was the Oscars simultaneously being The Wokest event on cringe-o-vision AND having live televised violence between presenters because of misogynistic jokes about women. Which is what happened
Just sublime
It will all be forgotten shortly and they will be back to moralising about how everybody else is living their lives incorrectly....
Say what you like about Gavin Williamson, he never thumped anyone at the annual "Fireplace Salesman of the Year" awards.
He wasn’t put between a rock and fireplace
The Rock - further evidence that baldies can make it to the top.....
A mistake I have only just learned I have been making all these years: Chris Rock <> Dwayne 'The Rock' Johnson. The latter is bald, the former was slapped by Will Smith.
It’s always an interesting wake up call on pb realising how disconnected a lot of people are from modern culture. Comments like not being able to recognise Will Smith in the street. Really?
Even The Rock’s gross box office is over $5bn, the 20th highest grossing actor of all time. And that’s his second successful career (as per Will Smith).
A hilariously self-torpedoing post, because The Rock is Dwayne Johnson, while Chris Rock is Chris Rock.
Laughing at people for medical conditions is supposed to be well beyond the pale nowadays so I wonder if this incident will mean that now everybody hates Chris?
So we're pro cancel culture now?
Nah, no need to cancel either of them, just funny watching Chris Rock take a beat down after shit chatting another dude's wife that he's got a personal beef with. I mean what did he expect to happen.
Violence is never the response.
Eh, people who have never been in a fight usually say that. Sometimes punching the bully in the face is exactly what's needed. Chris Rock was picking on a woman with alopecia for being bald to get at her husband, he, deservedly, got a beat down for it.
What would Field Marshall Zhurkov have done in the Death of Stalin is a good test.
Zhukov. Represented the entire Red Army at the buffet.
Also, on topic: Wallace, you handsome devil! Stick you in a frock, I'd fucking ride you raw myself.
Say what you like about Gavin Williamson, he never thumped anyone at the annual "Fireplace Salesman of the Year" awards.
He wasn’t put between a rock and fireplace
The Rock - further evidence that baldies can make it to the top.....
A mistake I have only just learned I have been making all these years: Chris Rock <> Dwayne 'The Rock' Johnson. The latter is bald, the former was slapped by Will Smith.
It’s always an interesting wake up call on pb realising how disconnected a lot of people are from modern culture. Comments like not being able to recognise Will Smith in the street. Really?
Even The Rock’s gross box office is over $5bn, the 20th highest grossing actor of all time. And that’s his second successful career (as per Will Smith).
A hilariously self-torpedoing post, because The Rock is Dwayne Johnson, while Chris Rock is Chris Rock.
Laughing at people for medical conditions is supposed to be well beyond the pale nowadays so I wonder if this incident will mean that now everybody hates Chris?
So we're pro cancel culture now?
Nah, no need to cancel either of them, just funny watching Chris Rock take a beat down after shit chatting another dude's wife that he's got a personal beef with. I mean what did he expect to happen.
Violence is never the response.
It is sometimes.
A slap was well called for here. Right to apologise afterwards, but it was well-deserved.
On live TV? In front of millions of impressionable people, presumably including kids? One of the most beloved actors in Hollywood thinks it's OK to hit someone, hard, then say "get my wife's name out of your fucking mouth"?
It's really not OK. Even tho the joke was crude and insulting.
If Smith wasn't a famous actor about to win (!!) an Oscar he would have been arrested then and there. For clear assault
AND he didn't apologise to Chris Rock! It is calamitous for Smith and the Oscars
Say what you like about Gavin Williamson, he never thumped anyone at the annual "Fireplace Salesman of the Year" awards.
He wasn’t put between a rock and fireplace
The Rock - further evidence that baldies can make it to the top.....
A mistake I have only just learned I have been making all these years: Chris Rock <> Dwayne 'The Rock' Johnson. The latter is bald, the former was slapped by Will Smith.
It’s always an interesting wake up call on pb realising how disconnected a lot of people are from modern culture. Comments like not being able to recognise Will Smith in the street. Really?
Even The Rock’s gross box office is over $5bn, the 20th highest grossing actor of all time. And that’s his second successful career (as per Will Smith).
A hilariously self-torpedoing post, because The Rock is Dwayne Johnson, while Chris Rock is Chris Rock.
Laughing at people for medical conditions is supposed to be well beyond the pale nowadays so I wonder if this incident will mean that now everybody hates Chris?
So we're pro cancel culture now?
Nah, no need to cancel either of them, just funny watching Chris Rock take a beat down after shit chatting another dude's wife that he's got a personal beef with. I mean what did he expect to happen.
Violence is never the response.
Eh, people who have never been in a fight usually say that. Sometimes punching the bully in the face is exactly what's needed. Chris Rock was picking on a woman with alopecia for being bald to get at her husband, he, deservedly, got a beat down for it.
What would Field Marshall Zhurkov have done in the Death of Stalin is a good test.
Zhukov. Represented the entire Red Army at the buffet.
Also, on topic: Wallace, you handsome devil! Stick you in a frock, I'd fucking ride you raw myself.
Georgy Zhukov : :"Full Tonto?" I'm going to have to report this conversation. Threatening to do harm or obstruct any member of the Presidium in the process of... [grins] Georgy Zhukov : Look at your fucking face!
Say what you like about Gavin Williamson, he never thumped anyone at the annual "Fireplace Salesman of the Year" awards.
He wasn’t put between a rock and fireplace
The Rock - further evidence that baldies can make it to the top.....
A mistake I have only just learned I have been making all these years: Chris Rock <> Dwayne 'The Rock' Johnson. The latter is bald, the former was slapped by Will Smith.
It’s always an interesting wake up call on pb realising how disconnected a lot of people are from modern culture. Comments like not being able to recognise Will Smith in the street. Really?
Even The Rock’s gross box office is over $5bn, the 20th highest grossing actor of all time. And that’s his second successful career (as per Will Smith).
A hilariously self-torpedoing post, because The Rock is Dwayne Johnson, while Chris Rock is Chris Rock.
Laughing at people for medical conditions is supposed to be well beyond the pale nowadays so I wonder if this incident will mean that now everybody hates Chris?
So we're pro cancel culture now?
Nah, no need to cancel either of them, just funny watching Chris Rock take a beat down after shit chatting another dude's wife that he's got a personal beef with. I mean what did he expect to happen.
Violence is never the response.
It is sometimes.
A slap was well called for here. Right to apologise afterwards, but it was well-deserved.
On live TV? In front of millions of impressionable people, presumably including kids? One of the most beloved actors in Hollywood thinks it's OK to hit someone, hard, then say "get my wife's name out of your fucking mouth"?
It's really not OK. Even tho the joke was crude and insulting.
If Smith wasn't a famous actor about to win (!!) an Oscar he would have been arrested then and there. For clear assault
AND he didn't apologise to Chris Rock! It is calamitous for Smith and the Oscars
'It is calamitous for Smith and the Oscars'
Really? The Oscars are now normally a snooze fest won by right on films barely anyone has heard of let alone seen and seeing rapidly declining ratings.
Last night's Will Smith punch is dominating the headlines this morning and has given the Oscars its biggest publicity coup since Warren Beatty read out the wrong best film winner.
Smith was wrong to hit him, Rock's joke was tasteless but for the Oscars it was brilliant PR.
The average punter in Stoke or Ohio might actually take note of this year's ceremony for once
So what are we learning on here today? Violence against a man who gave some verbal is okay; if you don't do violence, you're a 'door mat'.
But all trans people have to be despised and hated because *a few* do bad things?
If we really wanted to stop violence of all sorts - and yes, against women - we would talk much more about the former, and not excuse it because you're an alpha-male wannabe idiot.
Nah mate, you're the guy who launches an inquiry after a school kid commits suicide after being bullied and says "lessons must be learned" then repeats the exercise as needed, learning precisely zero lessons in the process.
No, I really am not. In fact, I have mentioned the horrible levels of violence in this country on several occasions. If you know more than a few dozen people, you will know someone who has suffered domestic abuse in the last year, Often suffering in silence; invisibly.
Your comment demeans you.
But suffering in silence is what your proposed solution always seems to be, just take it on the chin and hope for a better world. Bullies need to be confronted, whether that's at school or someone using a privileged position to insult others, the confrontation is necessary, and yes, that may mean violence. I was bullied at school for being a "paki" and while you might have simply suffered in silence, I beat the shit out of one of them who did it and guess what? The bullying stopped, I got a week's worth of detention (including two Saturdays) but it was worth it. I don't think my dad has ever been more proud than he was when I he had to come and pick me up early because I'd been in a fight with the racist bully.
IME the person resorting to violence is more often the bully.
I'm sorry to hear about your experience, but perhaps, just perhaps, you tackled it the wrong way.
Say what you like about Gavin Williamson, he never thumped anyone at the annual "Fireplace Salesman of the Year" awards.
He wasn’t put between a rock and fireplace
The Rock - further evidence that baldies can make it to the top.....
A mistake I have only just learned I have been making all these years: Chris Rock <> Dwayne 'The Rock' Johnson. The latter is bald, the former was slapped by Will Smith.
It’s always an interesting wake up call on pb realising how disconnected a lot of people are from modern culture. Comments like not being able to recognise Will Smith in the street. Really?
Even The Rock’s gross box office is over $5bn, the 20th highest grossing actor of all time. And that’s his second successful career (as per Will Smith).
A hilariously self-torpedoing post, because The Rock is Dwayne Johnson, while Chris Rock is Chris Rock.
Laughing at people for medical conditions is supposed to be well beyond the pale nowadays so I wonder if this incident will mean that now everybody hates Chris?
So we're pro cancel culture now?
Nah, no need to cancel either of them, just funny watching Chris Rock take a beat down after shit chatting another dude's wife that he's got a personal beef with. I mean what did he expect to happen.
Violence is never the response.
Eh, people who have never been in a fight usually say that. Sometimes punching the bully in the face is exactly what's needed. Chris Rock was picking on a woman with alopecia for being bald to get at her husband, he, deservedly, got a beat down for it.
What would Field Marshall Zhurkov have done in the Death of Stalin is a good test.
Thankfully he didn't have a gun or guns in his coat.
So what are we learning on here today? Violence against a man who gave some verbal is okay; if you don't do violence, you're a 'door mat'.
But all trans people have to be despised and hated because *a few* do bad things?
If we really wanted to stop violence of all sorts - and yes, against women - we would talk much more about the former, and not excuse it because you're an alpha-male wannabe idiot.
Nah mate, you're the guy who launches an inquiry after a school kid commits suicide after being bullied and says "lessons must be learned" then repeats the exercise as needed, learning precisely zero lessons in the process.
No, I really am not. In fact, I have mentioned the horrible levels of violence in this country on several occasions. If you know more than a few dozen people, you will know someone who has suffered domestic abuse in the last year, Often suffering in silence; invisibly.
Your comment demeans you.
But suffering in silence is what your proposed solution always seems to be, just take it on the chin and hope for a better world. Bullies need to be confronted, whether that's at school or someone using a privileged position to insult others, the confrontation is necessary, and yes, that may mean violence. I was bullied at school for being a "paki" and while you might have simply suffered in silence, I beat the shit out of one of them who did it and guess what? The bullying stopped, I got a week's worth of detention (including two Saturdays) but it was worth it. I don't think my dad has ever been more proud than he was when I he had to come and pick me up early because I'd been in a fight with the racist bully.
With all due respect, your sad but brave experience is many many light years away from an international multi-millionaire megastar getting up on stage, in front of 30 million TV viewers, and whacking someone for making a poor taste joke about his wife. It was clearly assault. Smith should have been arrested. Anyone else - literally anyone - would have been at least questioned by police, straight away
These are meant to be role models, two famous black actors. What does last night say to young black men watching this? - in a country where black on black violence is at horrific, murderous levels?
Say what you like about Gavin Williamson, he never thumped anyone at the annual "Fireplace Salesman of the Year" awards.
He wasn’t put between a rock and fireplace
The Rock - further evidence that baldies can make it to the top.....
A mistake I have only just learned I have been making all these years: Chris Rock <> Dwayne 'The Rock' Johnson. The latter is bald, the former was slapped by Will Smith.
It’s always an interesting wake up call on pb realising how disconnected a lot of people are from modern culture. Comments like not being able to recognise Will Smith in the street. Really?
Even The Rock’s gross box office is over $5bn, the 20th highest grossing actor of all time. And that’s his second successful career (as per Will Smith).
A hilariously self-torpedoing post, because The Rock is Dwayne Johnson, while Chris Rock is Chris Rock.
Laughing at people for medical conditions is supposed to be well beyond the pale nowadays so I wonder if this incident will mean that now everybody hates Chris?
So we're pro cancel culture now?
I thought it was a reference to the TV show of the same name.
Say what you like about Gavin Williamson, he never thumped anyone at the annual "Fireplace Salesman of the Year" awards.
He wasn’t put between a rock and fireplace
The Rock - further evidence that baldies can make it to the top.....
A mistake I have only just learned I have been making all these years: Chris Rock <> Dwayne 'The Rock' Johnson. The latter is bald, the former was slapped by Will Smith.
It’s always an interesting wake up call on pb realising how disconnected a lot of people are from modern culture. Comments like not being able to recognise Will Smith in the street. Really?
Even The Rock’s gross box office is over $5bn, the 20th highest grossing actor of all time. And that’s his second successful career (as per Will Smith).
A hilariously self-torpedoing post, because The Rock is Dwayne Johnson, while Chris Rock is Chris Rock.
Laughing at people for medical conditions is supposed to be well beyond the pale nowadays so I wonder if this incident will mean that now everybody hates Chris?
So we're pro cancel culture now?
Nah, no need to cancel either of them, just funny watching Chris Rock take a beat down after shit chatting another dude's wife that he's got a personal beef with. I mean what did he expect to happen.
Violence is never the response.
It is sometimes.
A slap was well called for here. Right to apologise afterwards, but it was well-deserved.
On live TV? In front of millions of impressionable people, presumably including kids? One of the most beloved actors in Hollywood thinks it's OK to hit someone, hard, then say "get my wife's name out of your fucking mouth"?
It's really not OK. Even tho the joke was crude and insulting.
If Smith wasn't a famous actor about to win (!!) an Oscar he would have been arrested then and there. For clear assault
AND he didn't apologise to Chris Rock! It is calamitous for Smith and the Oscars
I don't understand how the joke made it through to the teleprompter. Surely someone should have picked up that he was just being rude to lady that's going bald because of a medical condition and coincidentally her husband and the presenter have been beefing for years off screen. Chris Rock abused his position as the host to shit on Will Smith's wife, this is a not too surprising result.
Last Secretary of State for Defence to progress to a GooS/PM?
Philip Hammond was Secretary of State for Defence (2011-14) and later became Foreign Secretary (2014-16) and Chancellor of the Exchequer (2016-19), before becoming a non-person following the Johnson revolution.
That's completely unfair. He was always a non-person, as exciting as blancmonge, it just became a bit too obvious when he was Chancellor.
There's a running joke on Callan's Kicks - a satirical impression show on RTÉ radio - of Simon Coveney being so bland that people don't notice when he's in the room.
It does fit for Hammond too. Future history books will note a curious interregnum when Britain was left without a Chancellor, and the name Philip Hammond was used as a placeholder.
Say what you like about Gavin Williamson, he never thumped anyone at the annual "Fireplace Salesman of the Year" awards.
He wasn’t put between a rock and fireplace
The Rock - further evidence that baldies can make it to the top.....
A mistake I have only just learned I have been making all these years: Chris Rock <> Dwayne 'The Rock' Johnson. The latter is bald, the former was slapped by Will Smith.
It’s always an interesting wake up call on pb realising how disconnected a lot of people are from modern culture. Comments like not being able to recognise Will Smith in the street. Really?
Even The Rock’s gross box office is over $5bn, the 20th highest grossing actor of all time. And that’s his second successful career (as per Will Smith).
A hilariously self-torpedoing post, because The Rock is Dwayne Johnson, while Chris Rock is Chris Rock.
Laughing at people for medical conditions is supposed to be well beyond the pale nowadays so I wonder if this incident will mean that now everybody hates Chris?
So we're pro cancel culture now?
Nah, no need to cancel either of them, just funny watching Chris Rock take a beat down after shit chatting another dude's wife that he's got a personal beef with. I mean what did he expect to happen.
Violence is never the response.
It is sometimes.
A slap was well called for here. Right to apologise afterwards, but it was well-deserved.
Say what you like about Gavin Williamson, he never thumped anyone at the annual "Fireplace Salesman of the Year" awards.
He wasn’t put between a rock and fireplace
The Rock - further evidence that baldies can make it to the top.....
A mistake I have only just learned I have been making all these years: Chris Rock <> Dwayne 'The Rock' Johnson. The latter is bald, the former was slapped by Will Smith.
It’s always an interesting wake up call on pb realising how disconnected a lot of people are from modern culture. Comments like not being able to recognise Will Smith in the street. Really?
Even The Rock’s gross box office is over $5bn, the 20th highest grossing actor of all time. And that’s his second successful career (as per Will Smith).
A hilariously self-torpedoing post, because The Rock is Dwayne Johnson, while Chris Rock is Chris Rock.
Laughing at people for medical conditions is supposed to be well beyond the pale nowadays so I wonder if this incident will mean that now everybody hates Chris?
So we're pro cancel culture now?
Nah, no need to cancel either of them, just funny watching Chris Rock take a beat down after shit chatting another dude's wife that he's got a personal beef with. I mean what did he expect to happen.
Violence is never the response.
It is sometimes.
A slap was well called for here. Right to apologise afterwards, but it was well-deserved.
On live TV? In front of millions of impressionable people, presumably including kids? One of the most beloved actors in Hollywood thinks it's OK to hit someone, hard, then say "get my wife's name out of your fucking mouth"?
It's really not OK. Even tho the joke was crude and insulting.
If Smith wasn't a famous actor about to win (!!) an Oscar he would have been arrested then and there. For clear assault
AND he didn't apologise to Chris Rock! It is calamitous for Smith and the Oscars
'It is calamitous for Smith and the Oscars'
Really? The Oscars are now normally a snooze fest won by right on films barely anyone has heard of let alone seen and seeing rapidly declining ratings.
Last night's Will Smith punch is dominating the headlines this morning and has given the Oscars its biggest publicity coup since Warren Beatty read out the wrong best film winner.
Smith was wrong to hit him, Rock's joke was tasteless but for the Oscars it was brilliant PR.
The average punter in Stoke or Ohio might actually take note of this year's ceremony for once
The dog in Asterix is called Ideefix in the original French version.
This only becomes a joke in the later English translation: "Dogmatix".
That is odd.
Best guess: they initially went with Dogmatix from dogmatique and got nixed by the Academie for debasing the language with frenglish puns.
I think it's more that the English translator for Asterix (Anthea Bell) was very very good. Translating pun-heavy humour is really difficult, and you often have to be quite free with it, sometimes adding a new pun in one place that wouldn't have worked in the original language or that the original author just didn't think of, to compensate for losing an untranslatable joke elsewhere. The Guardian had an interview with her back in 2013.
Say what you like about Gavin Williamson, he never thumped anyone at the annual "Fireplace Salesman of the Year" awards.
He wasn’t put between a rock and fireplace
The Rock - further evidence that baldies can make it to the top.....
A mistake I have only just learned I have been making all these years: Chris Rock <> Dwayne 'The Rock' Johnson. The latter is bald, the former was slapped by Will Smith.
It’s always an interesting wake up call on pb realising how disconnected a lot of people are from modern culture. Comments like not being able to recognise Will Smith in the street. Really?
Even The Rock’s gross box office is over $5bn, the 20th highest grossing actor of all time. And that’s his second successful career (as per Will Smith).
A hilariously self-torpedoing post, because The Rock is Dwayne Johnson, while Chris Rock is Chris Rock.
Laughing at people for medical conditions is supposed to be well beyond the pale nowadays so I wonder if this incident will mean that now everybody hates Chris?
So we're pro cancel culture now?
Nah, no need to cancel either of them, just funny watching Chris Rock take a beat down after shit chatting another dude's wife that he's got a personal beef with. I mean what did he expect to happen.
Violence is never the response.
Eh, people who have never been in a fight usually say that. Sometimes punching the bully in the face is exactly what's needed. Chris Rock was picking on a woman with alopecia for being bald to get at her husband, he, deservedly, got a beat down for it.
If a comedian got beaten up every time they made a joke the hospitals would be full.
Attacking somebody physically is not a response, whatever is said. We will have to agree to disagree here.
Say what you like about Gavin Williamson, he never thumped anyone at the annual "Fireplace Salesman of the Year" awards.
He wasn’t put between a rock and fireplace
The Rock - further evidence that baldies can make it to the top.....
A mistake I have only just learned I have been making all these years: Chris Rock <> Dwayne 'The Rock' Johnson. The latter is bald, the former was slapped by Will Smith.
It’s always an interesting wake up call on pb realising how disconnected a lot of people are from modern culture. Comments like not being able to recognise Will Smith in the street. Really?
Even The Rock’s gross box office is over $5bn, the 20th highest grossing actor of all time. And that’s his second successful career (as per Will Smith).
A hilariously self-torpedoing post, because The Rock is Dwayne Johnson, while Chris Rock is Chris Rock.
Laughing at people for medical conditions is supposed to be well beyond the pale nowadays so I wonder if this incident will mean that now everybody hates Chris?
So we're pro cancel culture now?
Nah, no need to cancel either of them, just funny watching Chris Rock take a beat down after shit chatting another dude's wife that he's got a personal beef with. I mean what did he expect to happen.
Violence is never the response.
It is sometimes.
A slap was well called for here. Right to apologise afterwards, but it was well-deserved.
On live TV? In front of millions of impressionable people, presumably including kids? One of the most beloved actors in Hollywood thinks it's OK to hit someone, hard, then say "get my wife's name out of your fucking mouth"?
It's really not OK. Even tho the joke was crude and insulting.
If Smith wasn't a famous actor about to win (!!) an Oscar he would have been arrested then and there. For clear assault
AND he didn't apologise to Chris Rock! It is calamitous for Smith and the Oscars
'It is calamitous for Smith and the Oscars'
Really? The Oscars are now normally a snooze fest won by right on films barely anyone has heard of let alone seen and seeing rapidly declining ratings.
Last night's Will Smith punch is dominating the headlines this morning and has given the Oscars its biggest publicity coup since Warren Beatty read out the wrong best film winner.
Smith was wrong to hit him, Rock's joke was tasteless but for the Oscars it was brilliant PR.
The average punter in Stoke or Ohio might actually take note of this year's ceremony for once
I've seen this theory. That all publicity is good publicity.
And the ratings for the Oscars doubled the moment Smith whacked Rock: they were at their lowest EVER - about 9m, then shot up to 17m
But I just don't buy the idea that this is somehow "good publicity" (let alone that the incident was staged by desperate producers). We are surrounded by pointless, depressing violence. Now it happens live on stage at the Oscars? It is just sad. And that will be the overwhelming takeaway. Sadness
Will Smith is an excellent actor who has made some fine movies. He might well end up best known for this one moment of stupid, nonsensical violence on the biggest stage in the world
Say what you like about Gavin Williamson, he never thumped anyone at the annual "Fireplace Salesman of the Year" awards.
He wasn’t put between a rock and fireplace
The Rock - further evidence that baldies can make it to the top.....
A mistake I have only just learned I have been making all these years: Chris Rock <> Dwayne 'The Rock' Johnson. The latter is bald, the former was slapped by Will Smith.
It’s always an interesting wake up call on pb realising how disconnected a lot of people are from modern culture. Comments like not being able to recognise Will Smith in the street. Really?
Even The Rock’s gross box office is over $5bn, the 20th highest grossing actor of all time. And that’s his second successful career (as per Will Smith).
A hilariously self-torpedoing post, because The Rock is Dwayne Johnson, while Chris Rock is Chris Rock.
Laughing at people for medical conditions is supposed to be well beyond the pale nowadays so I wonder if this incident will mean that now everybody hates Chris?
So we're pro cancel culture now?
I thought it was a reference to the TV show of the same name.
No I know, I just wondered if PB had an opinion as we seem to be anti cancel culture sometimes but at other times not
The dog in Asterix is called Ideefix in the original French version.
This only becomes a joke in the later English translation: "Dogmatix".
That is odd.
Best guess: they initially went with Dogmatix from dogmatique and got nixed by the Academie for debasing the language with frenglish puns.
I think it's more that the English translator for Asterix (Anthea Bell) was very very good. Translating pun-heavy humour is really difficult, and you often have to be quite free with it, sometimes adding a new pun in one place that wouldn't have worked in the original language or that the original author just didn't think of, to compensate for losing an untranslatable joke elsewhere. The Guardian had an interview with her back in 2013.
Say what you like about Gavin Williamson, he never thumped anyone at the annual "Fireplace Salesman of the Year" awards.
He wasn’t put between a rock and fireplace
The Rock - further evidence that baldies can make it to the top.....
A mistake I have only just learned I have been making all these years: Chris Rock <> Dwayne 'The Rock' Johnson. The latter is bald, the former was slapped by Will Smith.
It’s always an interesting wake up call on pb realising how disconnected a lot of people are from modern culture. Comments like not being able to recognise Will Smith in the street. Really?
Even The Rock’s gross box office is over $5bn, the 20th highest grossing actor of all time. And that’s his second successful career (as per Will Smith).
A hilariously self-torpedoing post, because The Rock is Dwayne Johnson, while Chris Rock is Chris Rock.
Laughing at people for medical conditions is supposed to be well beyond the pale nowadays so I wonder if this incident will mean that now everybody hates Chris?
So we're pro cancel culture now?
Nah, no need to cancel either of them, just funny watching Chris Rock take a beat down after shit chatting another dude's wife that he's got a personal beef with. I mean what did he expect to happen.
Violence is never the response.
Eh, people who have never been in a fight usually say that. Sometimes punching the bully in the face is exactly what's needed. Chris Rock was picking on a woman with alopecia for being bald to get at her husband, he, deservedly, got a beat down for it.
What would Field Marshall Zhurkov have done in the Death of Stalin is a good test.
Zhukov. Represented the entire Red Army at the buffet.
Also, on topic: Wallace, you handsome devil! Stick you in a frock, I'd fucking ride you raw myself.
Georgy Zhukov : :"Full Tonto?" I'm going to have to report this conversation. Threatening to do harm or obstruct any member of the Presidium in the process of... [grins] Georgy Zhukov : Look at your fucking face!
Say what you like about Gavin Williamson, he never thumped anyone at the annual "Fireplace Salesman of the Year" awards.
He wasn’t put between a rock and fireplace
The Rock - further evidence that baldies can make it to the top.....
A mistake I have only just learned I have been making all these years: Chris Rock <> Dwayne 'The Rock' Johnson. The latter is bald, the former was slapped by Will Smith.
It’s always an interesting wake up call on pb realising how disconnected a lot of people are from modern culture. Comments like not being able to recognise Will Smith in the street. Really?
Even The Rock’s gross box office is over $5bn, the 20th highest grossing actor of all time. And that’s his second successful career (as per Will Smith).
A hilariously self-torpedoing post, because The Rock is Dwayne Johnson, while Chris Rock is Chris Rock.
Was this aimed at me? I was referring to Dwayne Johnson’s wrestling career. You know. As The Rock. I am aware he is not the same person as Chris Rock. That was kind of the whole point of my post. Oh well…
It was obvious what you were referring to. His wrestling career was brilliant, exceptional. McMahon would have him back in a heartbeat? He was also the son of a decent wrestler too. Started off as Rocky Maivia, which really stunk, but turned himself into the rock. Bags of charisma. But a great worker too.
So what are we learning on here today? Violence against a man who gave some verbal is okay; if you don't do violence, you're a 'door mat'.
But all trans people have to be despised and hated because *a few* do bad things?
If we really wanted to stop violence of all sorts - and yes, against women - we would talk much more about the former, and not excuse it because you're an alpha-male wannabe idiot.
Nah mate, you're the guy who launches an inquiry after a school kid commits suicide after being bullied and says "lessons must be learned" then repeats the exercise as needed, learning precisely zero lessons in the process.
No, I really am not. In fact, I have mentioned the horrible levels of violence in this country on several occasions. If you know more than a few dozen people, you will know someone who has suffered domestic abuse in the last year, Often suffering in silence; invisibly.
Your comment demeans you.
But suffering in silence is what your proposed solution always seems to be, just take it on the chin and hope for a better world. Bullies need to be confronted, whether that's at school or someone using a privileged position to insult others, the confrontation is necessary, and yes, that may mean violence. I was bullied at school for being a "paki" and while you might have simply suffered in silence, I beat the shit out of one of them who did it and guess what? The bullying stopped, I got a week's worth of detention (including two Saturdays) but it was worth it. I don't think my dad has ever been more proud than he was when I he had to come and pick me up early because I'd been in a fight with the racist bully.
With all due respect, your sad but brave experience is many many light years away from an international multi-millionaire megastar getting up on stage, in front of 30 million TV viewers, and whacking someone for making a poor taste joke about his wife. It was clearly assault. Smith should have been arrested. Anyone else - literally anyone - would have been at least questioned by police, straight away
These are meant to be role models, two famous black actors. What does last night say to young black men watching this? - in a country where black on black violence is at horrific, murderous levels?
Desperate stuff
OTOH every bloody hollywood "action movie" ever made is basically a celebration of the use of automatic rifles as fun and harmless toys, even in sci fi films like terminator 2, inception, matrix, where they have to be dragged into the plot. One M on M slap doesn't really add very much to that
So what are we learning on here today? Violence against a man who gave some verbal is okay; if you don't do violence, you're a 'door mat'.
But all trans people have to be despised and hated because *a few* do bad things?
If we really wanted to stop violence of all sorts - and yes, against women - we would talk much more about the former, and not excuse it because you're an alpha-male wannabe idiot.
Nah mate, you're the guy who launches an inquiry after a school kid commits suicide after being bullied and says "lessons must be learned" then repeats the exercise as needed, learning precisely zero lessons in the process.
No, I really am not. In fact, I have mentioned the horrible levels of violence in this country on several occasions. If you know more than a few dozen people, you will know someone who has suffered domestic abuse in the last year, Often suffering in silence; invisibly.
Your comment demeans you.
But suffering in silence is what your proposed solution always seems to be, just take it on the chin and hope for a better world. Bullies need to be confronted, whether that's at school or someone using a privileged position to insult others, the confrontation is necessary, and yes, that may mean violence. I was bullied at school for being a "paki" and while you might have simply suffered in silence, I beat the shit out of one of them who did it and guess what? The bullying stopped, I got a week's worth of detention (including two Saturdays) but it was worth it. I don't think my dad has ever been more proud than he was when I he had to come and pick me up early because I'd been in a fight with the racist bully.
With all due respect, your sad but brave experience is many many light years away from an international multi-millionaire megastar getting up on stage, in front of 30 million TV viewers, and whacking someone for making a poor taste joke about his wife. It was clearly assault. Smith should have been arrested. Anyone else - literally anyone - would have been at least questioned by police, straight away
These are meant to be role models, two famous black actors. What does last night say to young black men watching this? - in a country where black on black violence is at horrific, murderous levels?
Desperate stuff
It was a well deserved slap. You cannot humiliate a man's wife in front of millions and not expect him to not come at you swinging. Nowt to do with colour more honour
I'm extremely happy to say that I'll be in the BBC politics chair on Sunday mornings from September - it's a genuine honour and real thrill to be working with an amazing team on the show, can't wait to get started! https://twitter.com/bbclaurak/status/1508421097695367172
So what are we learning on here today? Violence against a man who gave some verbal is okay; if you don't do violence, you're a 'door mat'.
But all trans people have to be despised and hated because *a few* do bad things?
If we really wanted to stop violence of all sorts - and yes, against women - we would talk much more about the former, and not excuse it because you're an alpha-male wannabe idiot.
Nah mate, you're the guy who launches an inquiry after a school kid commits suicide after being bullied and says "lessons must be learned" then repeats the exercise as needed, learning precisely zero lessons in the process.
No, I really am not. In fact, I have mentioned the horrible levels of violence in this country on several occasions. If you know more than a few dozen people, you will know someone who has suffered domestic abuse in the last year, Often suffering in silence; invisibly.
Your comment demeans you.
But suffering in silence is what your proposed solution always seems to be, just take it on the chin and hope for a better world. Bullies need to be confronted, whether that's at school or someone using a privileged position to insult others, the confrontation is necessary, and yes, that may mean violence. I was bullied at school for being a "paki" and while you might have simply suffered in silence, I beat the shit out of one of them who did it and guess what? The bullying stopped, I got a week's worth of detention (including two Saturdays) but it was worth it. I don't think my dad has ever been more proud than he was when I he had to come and pick me up early because I'd been in a fight with the racist bully.
IME the person resorting to violence is more often the bully.
I'm sorry to hear about your experience, but perhaps, just perhaps, you tackled it the wrong way.
In what way did I handle it incorrectly? The bullying stopped almost immediately and that racist kid actually stopped being a racist to the other Asian kids as well. All it took was his head getting kicked in a couple of times.
As I said, you're the guy who won't ever learn any lessons from those kids committing suicide after being relentlessly bullied. A lot of the time the bullies do need a beat down, whether that's from the person being being bullied or someone else. I guarantee you that Chris Rock won't be making any jokes about bald women again.
Say what you like about Gavin Williamson, he never thumped anyone at the annual "Fireplace Salesman of the Year" awards.
He wasn’t put between a rock and fireplace
The Rock - further evidence that baldies can make it to the top.....
A mistake I have only just learned I have been making all these years: Chris Rock <> Dwayne 'The Rock' Johnson. The latter is bald, the former was slapped by Will Smith.
It’s always an interesting wake up call on pb realising how disconnected a lot of people are from modern culture. Comments like not being able to recognise Will Smith in the street. Really?
Even The Rock’s gross box office is over $5bn, the 20th highest grossing actor of all time. And that’s his second successful career (as per Will Smith).
A hilariously self-torpedoing post, because The Rock is Dwayne Johnson, while Chris Rock is Chris Rock.
Laughing at people for medical conditions is supposed to be well beyond the pale nowadays so I wonder if this incident will mean that now everybody hates Chris?
No I got the reference, I just wondered if we are or not
If you want a serious answer: No.
I have no desire to see Chris Rock get cancelled, nor do I think its bad that he got what was quite frankly a well-deserved slap. So he might think twice before using someone's wife's medical condition as a punchline again, but he shouldn't be cancelled.
Quite frankly I think Will Smith both slapping Chris Rock, then apologising for doing so, and that being the end of the matter is probably the right sequence of events to have happened.
Him then winning the oscar and doing his speech is imo what pushed this story into ledge territory.
Interestingly no clear right/left, leave/remain, mods/rocker binary split on what the correct take is. People are all over the place.
Probably just a touch of 'Will in the wrong' on the left and 'in the right' on the right.
So what are we learning on here today? Violence against a man who gave some verbal is okay; if you don't do violence, you're a 'door mat'.
But all trans people have to be despised and hated because *a few* do bad things?
If we really wanted to stop violence of all sorts - and yes, against women - we would talk much more about the former, and not excuse it because you're an alpha-male wannabe idiot.
Nah mate, you're the guy who launches an inquiry after a school kid commits suicide after being bullied and says "lessons must be learned" then repeats the exercise as needed, learning precisely zero lessons in the process.
No, I really am not. In fact, I have mentioned the horrible levels of violence in this country on several occasions. If you know more than a few dozen people, you will know someone who has suffered domestic abuse in the last year, Often suffering in silence; invisibly.
Your comment demeans you.
But suffering in silence is what your proposed solution always seems to be, just take it on the chin and hope for a better world. Bullies need to be confronted, whether that's at school or someone using a privileged position to insult others, the confrontation is necessary, and yes, that may mean violence. I was bullied at school for being a "paki" and while you might have simply suffered in silence, I beat the shit out of one of them who did it and guess what? The bullying stopped, I got a week's worth of detention (including two Saturdays) but it was worth it. I don't think my dad has ever been more proud than he was when I he had to come and pick me up early because I'd been in a fight with the racist bully.
IME the person resorting to violence is more often the bully.
I'm sorry to hear about your experience, but perhaps, just perhaps, you tackled it the wrong way.
In what way did I handle it incorrectly? The bullying stopped almost immediately and that racist kid actually stopped being a racist to the other Asian kids as well. All it took was his head getting kicked in a couple of times.
As I said, you're the guy who won't ever learn any lessons from those kids committing suicide after being relentlessly bullied. A lot of the time the bullies do need a beat down, whether that's from the person being being bullied or someone else. I guarantee you that Chris Rock won't be making any jokes about bald women again.
Where do you draw the line though Max?
Because your attitude is what Johnson says about the journalist he had beaten up
Say what you like about Gavin Williamson, he never thumped anyone at the annual "Fireplace Salesman of the Year" awards.
He wasn’t put between a rock and fireplace
The Rock - further evidence that baldies can make it to the top.....
A mistake I have only just learned I have been making all these years: Chris Rock <> Dwayne 'The Rock' Johnson. The latter is bald, the former was slapped by Will Smith.
It’s always an interesting wake up call on pb realising how disconnected a lot of people are from modern culture. Comments like not being able to recognise Will Smith in the street. Really?
Even The Rock’s gross box office is over $5bn, the 20th highest grossing actor of all time. And that’s his second successful career (as per Will Smith).
A hilariously self-torpedoing post, because The Rock is Dwayne Johnson, while Chris Rock is Chris Rock.
Laughing at people for medical conditions is supposed to be well beyond the pale nowadays so I wonder if this incident will mean that now everybody hates Chris?
So we're pro cancel culture now?
Nah, no need to cancel either of them, just funny watching Chris Rock take a beat down after shit chatting another dude's wife that he's got a personal beef with. I mean what did he expect to happen.
Violence is never the response.
It is sometimes.
A slap was well called for here. Right to apologise afterwards, but it was well-deserved.
On live TV? In front of millions of impressionable people, presumably including kids? One of the most beloved actors in Hollywood thinks it's OK to hit someone, hard, then say "get my wife's name out of your fucking mouth"?
It's really not OK. Even tho the joke was crude and insulting.
If Smith wasn't a famous actor about to win (!!) an Oscar he would have been arrested then and there. For clear assault
AND he didn't apologise to Chris Rock! It is calamitous for Smith and the Oscars
'It is calamitous for Smith and the Oscars'
Really? The Oscars are now normally a snooze fest won by right on films barely anyone has heard of let alone seen and seeing rapidly declining ratings.
Last night's Will Smith punch is dominating the headlines this morning and has given the Oscars its biggest publicity coup since Warren Beatty read out the wrong best film winner.
Smith was wrong to hit him, Rock's joke was tasteless but for the Oscars it was brilliant PR.
The average punter in Stoke or Ohio might actually take note of this year's ceremony for once
I've seen this theory. That all publicity is good publicity.
And the ratings for the Oscars doubled the moment Smith whacked Rock: they were at their lowest EVER - about 9m, then shot up to 17m
But I just don't buy the idea that this is somehow "good publicity" (let alone that the incident was staged by desperate producers). We are surrounded by pointless, depressing violence. Now it happens live on stage at the Oscars? It is just sad. And that will be the overwhelming takeaway. Sadness
Will Smith is an excellent actor who has made some fine movies. He might well end up best known for this one moment of stupid, nonsensical violence on the biggest stage in the world
Maybe but he probably connected more with the average American in the rustbelt after he responded with a gut reaction to his wife being insulted than the rest of the room of liberal multi millionaires laughing along to right on jokes and applauding arty high brow films while ignoring the likes of Bond and the superhero films most cinemagoers actually watch. He should not have done it but I doubt it will do him too much damage
Say what you like about Gavin Williamson, he never thumped anyone at the annual "Fireplace Salesman of the Year" awards.
He wasn’t put between a rock and fireplace
The Rock - further evidence that baldies can make it to the top.....
A mistake I have only just learned I have been making all these years: Chris Rock <> Dwayne 'The Rock' Johnson. The latter is bald, the former was slapped by Will Smith.
It’s always an interesting wake up call on pb realising how disconnected a lot of people are from modern culture. Comments like not being able to recognise Will Smith in the street. Really?
Even The Rock’s gross box office is over $5bn, the 20th highest grossing actor of all time. And that’s his second successful career (as per Will Smith).
A hilariously self-torpedoing post, because The Rock is Dwayne Johnson, while Chris Rock is Chris Rock.
Laughing at people for medical conditions is supposed to be well beyond the pale nowadays so I wonder if this incident will mean that now everybody hates Chris?
So we're pro cancel culture now?
Nah, no need to cancel either of them, just funny watching Chris Rock take a beat down after shit chatting another dude's wife that he's got a personal beef with. I mean what did he expect to happen.
Violence is never the response.
Eh, people who have never been in a fight usually say that. Sometimes punching the bully in the face is exactly what's needed. Chris Rock was picking on a woman with alopecia for being bald to get at her husband, he, deservedly, got a beat down for it.
What would Field Marshall Zhurkov have done in the Death of Stalin is a good test.
Zhukov. Represented the entire Red Army at the buffet.
Also, on topic: Wallace, you handsome devil! Stick you in a frock, I'd fucking ride you raw myself.
Georgy Zhukov : :"Full Tonto?" I'm going to have to report this conversation. Threatening to do harm or obstruct any member of the Presidium in the process of... [grins] Georgy Zhukov : Look at your fucking face!
Jason Isaacs at his finest. Even better than Captain Lorca.
The dog in Asterix is called Ideefix in the original French version.
This only becomes a joke in the later English translation: "Dogmatix".
That is odd.
Best guess: they initially went with Dogmatix from dogmatique and got nixed by the Academie for debasing the language with frenglish puns.
I think it's more that the English translator for Asterix (Anthea Bell) was very very good. Translating pun-heavy humour is really difficult, and you often have to be quite free with it, sometimes adding a new pun in one place that wouldn't have worked in the original language or that the original author just didn't think of, to compensate for losing an untranslatable joke elsewhere. The Guardian had an interview with her back in 2013.
She was. Never been too comfortable with Getafix, mind, in a partly aimed at children work. Panoramix works just fine.
The main insight from this morning's LBC interview with Starmer is that Labour is going to get hit with a whole bunch of culture war wedge issues in the run-up to the next election. Those issues say a lot more about the distorted concerns of Westminster/media than the country.
I'm not sure "women's rights & safety" are a "distorted concern"....
There are a lot of 'yebbuts' in those sorts of issues. For example, the man in the pub is initially against whatever it is, but then says 'yebbut' and turns out that on reflection he thinks it's quite a good idea. Like gay marriage. Your average 'straight' isn't bothered, finds it mildly amusing, but if it's not hurting anyone, and it protects the survivors rights on death, why not?
I've some sympathy with Cyclefree's view as I have two friends who feel equally strongly. But it is nonetheless not something that comes up much on the doorstep even if one feels it should, and taking sides in culture wars is as fundamental a mistake as a councillor taking sides in a neighbour dispute - everybody involved (including whoever you back) feels you're not sufficiently on their side, need to say more, etc., and you just get sucked in. Meanwhile, everyone else thinks you're obsessed with something they don't care about because they've never met a trans person.
It's a big deal in the Green Party, where quite a few activists are very deeply entrenched on both sides - I know some senior party people who said they'd quit if the leadership candidate with the "wrong" view got elected.
In general people who feel strongly about an issue are often incapable of accepting that others may not feel strongly (let's not even consider them accepting the validity of opposing views). There also appears to be a significant lump of folk who are desperate for it to be a wedge issue.
BBC Scotland recently did a survey on public attitudes to trans issues and GRA reform in Scotland; the general consensus seemed to be that folk weren't that bothered and in general had a mild preference that life should be made a bit easier for trans people. You could almost see the cloud of thwarted disappointment above Pacific Quay.
Other polls have suggested that (in so far as they are paying attention) the public are uncomfortable with the GRA proposals:
So what are we learning on here today? Violence against a man who gave some verbal is okay; if you don't do violence, you're a 'door mat'.
But all trans people have to be despised and hated because *a few* do bad things?
If we really wanted to stop violence of all sorts - and yes, against women - we would talk much more about the former, and not excuse it because you're an alpha-male wannabe idiot.
Nah mate, you're the guy who launches an inquiry after a school kid commits suicide after being bullied and says "lessons must be learned" then repeats the exercise as needed, learning precisely zero lessons in the process.
No, I really am not. In fact, I have mentioned the horrible levels of violence in this country on several occasions. If you know more than a few dozen people, you will know someone who has suffered domestic abuse in the last year, Often suffering in silence; invisibly.
Your comment demeans you.
But suffering in silence is what your proposed solution always seems to be, just take it on the chin and hope for a better world. Bullies need to be confronted, whether that's at school or someone using a privileged position to insult others, the confrontation is necessary, and yes, that may mean violence. I was bullied at school for being a "paki" and while you might have simply suffered in silence, I beat the shit out of one of them who did it and guess what? The bullying stopped, I got a week's worth of detention (including two Saturdays) but it was worth it. I don't think my dad has ever been more proud than he was when I he had to come and pick me up early because I'd been in a fight with the racist bully.
IME the person resorting to violence is more often the bully.
I'm sorry to hear about your experience, but perhaps, just perhaps, you tackled it the wrong way.
In what way did I handle it incorrectly? The bullying stopped almost immediately and that racist kid actually stopped being a racist to the other Asian kids as well. All it took was his head getting kicked in a couple of times.
As I said, you're the guy who won't ever learn any lessons from those kids committing suicide after being relentlessly bullied. A lot of the time the bullies do need a beat down, whether that's from the person being being bullied or someone else. I guarantee you that Chris Rock won't be making any jokes about bald women again.
Where do you draw the line though Max?
Because your attitude is what Johnson says about the journalist he had beaten up
FYI, might be worth pointing out for legal reasons, no journalist was beaten up. It was a discussion of what should be done to him, another individual wanted to arrange to have him beaten and Boris said he could provide the journalists address.
Say what you like about Gavin Williamson, he never thumped anyone at the annual "Fireplace Salesman of the Year" awards.
He wasn’t put between a rock and fireplace
The Rock - further evidence that baldies can make it to the top.....
A mistake I have only just learned I have been making all these years: Chris Rock <> Dwayne 'The Rock' Johnson. The latter is bald, the former was slapped by Will Smith.
It’s always an interesting wake up call on pb realising how disconnected a lot of people are from modern culture. Comments like not being able to recognise Will Smith in the street. Really?
Even The Rock’s gross box office is over $5bn, the 20th highest grossing actor of all time. And that’s his second successful career (as per Will Smith).
A hilariously self-torpedoing post, because The Rock is Dwayne Johnson, while Chris Rock is Chris Rock.
Laughing at people for medical conditions is supposed to be well beyond the pale nowadays so I wonder if this incident will mean that now everybody hates Chris?
So we're pro cancel culture now?
Nah, no need to cancel either of them, just funny watching Chris Rock take a beat down after shit chatting another dude's wife that he's got a personal beef with. I mean what did he expect to happen.
Violence is never the response.
It is sometimes.
A slap was well called for here. Right to apologise afterwards, but it was well-deserved.
On live TV? In front of millions of impressionable people, presumably including kids? One of the most beloved actors in Hollywood thinks it's OK to hit someone, hard, then say "get my wife's name out of your fucking mouth"?
It's really not OK. Even tho the joke was crude and insulting.
If Smith wasn't a famous actor about to win (!!) an Oscar he would have been arrested then and there. For clear assault
AND he didn't apologise to Chris Rock! It is calamitous for Smith and the Oscars
Interesting take from person last seen fantasizing about shooting people in the leg.
Interesting that you consider young people who struggle to buy homes at an 8x house price to earnings ratio to be merely "dickheads".
The only dickheads are those who have invested in a portfolio of properties expecting young people to keep paying them rent, and view that investment as their "pension". If they lose out, then sucks to be them, investments can go down as well as up.
The problem is the bimodality. There are dickheads at one end and poorly advised+overstretched at the other. A solution needs to deal with both.
Absolutely.
But its like Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs - a property providing a roof over the head of someone, and that someone being able to afford their own property is almost infinitely more important a priority than someone who is investing in homes they don't live in, in order to extract a rent from that person.
Especially given our f***ed up planning system that doesn't allow new housing to be built to replace any homes that people who don't live in it own. If the planning system was reformed so that anyone who wanted a home of their own could just build one anywhere they wanted, instead of having to rent it off someone who is closing the market off to purchasers, then it wouldn't be an issue.
You can build new homes, just it should ideally be in brownfield not greenbelt land and be in keeping with the street scene and if on large scale come with appropriate infrastructure.
Renting not ownership is still mainly a London problem and to a lesser extent a Home Counties problem. In the North and Midlands and Wales and Scotland and NI while people may rent when young they can still afford to buy a property in their 30s relatively easily as prices are far cheaper
Wow that's spectacularly out of touch on almost every level.
I wonder if it's like the early days of Covid, where one of the hidden issues is that most people don't really get exponential growth.
A doubling of house prices from £90k to £180k is a very nice windfall for homeowners who paid £90k, and means that new starters have to start somewhere a bit less nice. £18k is a lot to save for a 10% deposit, but it's imaginable.
The next doubling- from £180k to £360k is a big windfall, and it's getting hard to see how many people can get a deposit together from their own resources.
The next doubling after that... oh momma... (It's more complicated than that in many ways, but not enough to change the conclusion, I reckon.)
Last Secretary of State for Defence to progress to a GooS/PM?
Philip Hammond was Secretary of State for Defence (2011-14) and later became Foreign Secretary (2014-16) and Chancellor of the Exchequer (2016-19), before becoming a non-person following the Johnson revolution.
That's completely unfair. He was always a non-person, as exciting as blancmonge, it just became a bit too obvious when he was Chancellor.
There's a running joke on Callan's Kicks - a satirical impression show on RTÉ radio - of Simon Coveney being so bland that people don't notice when he's in the room.
It does fit for Hammond too. Future history books will note a curious interregnum when Britain was left without a Chancellor, and the name Philip Hammond was used as a placeholder.
The main insight from this morning's LBC interview with Starmer is that Labour is going to get hit with a whole bunch of culture war wedge issues in the run-up to the next election. Those issues say a lot more about the distorted concerns of Westminster/media than the country.
I'm not sure "women's rights & safety" are a "distorted concern"....
There are a lot of 'yebbuts' in those sorts of issues. For example, the man in the pub is initially against whatever it is, but then says 'yebbut' and turns out that on reflection he thinks it's quite a good idea. Like gay marriage. Your average 'straight' isn't bothered, finds it mildly amusing, but if it's not hurting anyone, and it protects the survivors rights on death, why not?
I've some sympathy with Cyclefree's view as I have two friends who feel equally strongly. But it is nonetheless not something that comes up much on the doorstep even if one feels it should, and taking sides in culture wars is as fundamental a mistake as a councillor taking sides in a neighbour dispute - everybody involved (including whoever you back) feels you're not sufficiently on their side, need to say more, etc., and you just get sucked in. Meanwhile, everyone else thinks you're obsessed with something they don't care about because they've never met a trans person.
It's a big deal in the Green Party, where quite a few activists are very deeply entrenched on both sides - I know some senior party people who said they'd quit if the leadership candidate with the "wrong" view got elected.
In general people who feel strongly about an issue are often incapable of accepting that others may not feel strongly (let's not even consider them accepting the validity of opposing views). There also appears to be a significant lump of folk who are desperate for it to be a wedge issue.
BBC Scotland recently did a survey on public attitudes to trans issues and GRA reform in Scotland; the general consensus seemed to be that folk weren't that bothered and in general had a mild preference that life should be made a bit easier for trans people. You could almost see the cloud of thwarted disappointment above Pacific Quay.
Quite.
And whatever Tyndall thinks, as I said most trans people are invariably non-violent.
Of course a few slip through or, worse, use this as a cover but there's violence everywhere and they are in the extreme. I've seen very violent cis women in ladies loos after a few drinks.
Ah not just a scumbag but an ignorant scumbag.
Invariably definition - "in every case or on every occasion; always."
So if a 'few slip through' then they cannot be 'invariably' non-violent.
Richard, Richard, Richard.
I know you sometimes have a problem and form with this but it is entirely possible to have an exchange on PB without immediately insulting your interlocutor. The last thing we want is for you to get yourself into so much of a tizzy that you ban yourself again.
Last Secretary of State for Defence to progress to a GooS/PM?
Philip Hammond was Secretary of State for Defence (2011-14) and later became Foreign Secretary (2014-16) and Chancellor of the Exchequer (2016-19), before becoming a non-person following the Johnson revolution.
IDS was Shadow Defence Secretary then Tory Leader.
Now it looks likely that the next Tory Leader will be Leader of the Opposition, the polls are close enough now for Boris to stay PM and lead the Tories into the next general election (although he could be re elected still of course even if Labour narrowly lead polls now)
What's a GooS, apart from the obvious pillow-fodder?
So what are we learning on here today? Violence against a man who gave some verbal is okay; if you don't do violence, you're a 'door mat'.
But all trans people have to be despised and hated because *a few* do bad things?
If we really wanted to stop violence of all sorts - and yes, against women - we would talk much more about the former, and not excuse it because you're an alpha-male wannabe idiot.
Nah mate, you're the guy who launches an inquiry after a school kid commits suicide after being bullied and says "lessons must be learned" then repeats the exercise as needed, learning precisely zero lessons in the process.
No, I really am not. In fact, I have mentioned the horrible levels of violence in this country on several occasions. If you know more than a few dozen people, you will know someone who has suffered domestic abuse in the last year, Often suffering in silence; invisibly.
Your comment demeans you.
But suffering in silence is what your proposed solution always seems to be, just take it on the chin and hope for a better world. Bullies need to be confronted, whether that's at school or someone using a privileged position to insult others, the confrontation is necessary, and yes, that may mean violence. I was bullied at school for being a "paki" and while you might have simply suffered in silence, I beat the shit out of one of them who did it and guess what? The bullying stopped, I got a week's worth of detention (including two Saturdays) but it was worth it. I don't think my dad has ever been more proud than he was when I he had to come and pick me up early because I'd been in a fight with the racist bully.
With all due respect, your sad but brave experience is many many light years away from an international multi-millionaire megastar getting up on stage, in front of 30 million TV viewers, and whacking someone for making a poor taste joke about his wife. It was clearly assault. Smith should have been arrested. Anyone else - literally anyone - would have been at least questioned by police, straight away
These are meant to be role models, two famous black actors. What does last night say to young black men watching this? - in a country where black on black violence is at horrific, murderous levels?
Desperate stuff
It was a well deserved slap. You cannot humiliate a man's wife in front of millions and not expect him to not come at you swinging. Nowt to do with colour more honour
Are you serious?!
It was an ugly, stupid joke, but no one got physically hurt. The answer is to make a clever, insulting joke back, not storm up on stage and hit the guy in front of the world. Will Smith doesn't lack for exposure, he could have humiliated Chris Rock at a time of his choosing - ie when he got the Best Actor award an hour later
Also, if a hard slap is OK on live TV, what's next? A punch in the nuts? A crack on the skull with a baseball bat? A knife?
At what point do the PB Exponents of Manly Honour say OK, enough's enough, shooting someone in the knees in return for an offensive limerick is a tad too much for live television
Last Secretary of State for Defence to progress to a GooS/PM?
Philip Hammond was Secretary of State for Defence (2011-14) and later became Foreign Secretary (2014-16) and Chancellor of the Exchequer (2016-19), before becoming a non-person following the Johnson revolution.
IDS was Shadow Defence Secretary then Tory Leader.
Now it looks likely that the next Tory Leader will be Leader of the Opposition, the polls are close enough now for Boris to stay PM and lead the Tories into the next general election (although he could be re elected still of course even if Labour narrowly lead polls now)
What's a GooS, apart from the obvious pillow-fodder?
Great Office Of State (Home, Forrin, Chancellor, PM)
Say what you like about Gavin Williamson, he never thumped anyone at the annual "Fireplace Salesman of the Year" awards.
He wasn’t put between a rock and fireplace
The Rock - further evidence that baldies can make it to the top.....
A mistake I have only just learned I have been making all these years: Chris Rock <> Dwayne 'The Rock' Johnson. The latter is bald, the former was slapped by Will Smith.
It’s always an interesting wake up call on pb realising how disconnected a lot of people are from modern culture. Comments like not being able to recognise Will Smith in the street. Really?
Even The Rock’s gross box office is over $5bn, the 20th highest grossing actor of all time. And that’s his second successful career (as per Will Smith).
A hilariously self-torpedoing post, because The Rock is Dwayne Johnson, while Chris Rock is Chris Rock.
Laughing at people for medical conditions is supposed to be well beyond the pale nowadays so I wonder if this incident will mean that now everybody hates Chris?
So we're pro cancel culture now?
Nah, no need to cancel either of them, just funny watching Chris Rock take a beat down after shit chatting another dude's wife that he's got a personal beef with. I mean what did he expect to happen.
Violence is never the response.
It is sometimes.
A slap was well called for here. Right to apologise afterwards, but it was well-deserved.
On live TV? In front of millions of impressionable people, presumably including kids? One of the most beloved actors in Hollywood thinks it's OK to hit someone, hard, then say "get my wife's name out of your fucking mouth"?
It's really not OK. Even tho the joke was crude and insulting.
If Smith wasn't a famous actor about to win (!!) an Oscar he would have been arrested then and there. For clear assault
AND he didn't apologise to Chris Rock! It is calamitous for Smith and the Oscars
Interesting take from person last seen fantasizing about shooting people in the leg.
Is it a new gentle pacifist emerging?
Tiny bit of a difference between invading Russian soldiers in a war zone and badly scripted Hollywood comedians at the Oscars but otherwise: good reach
So what are we learning on here today? Violence against a man who gave some verbal is okay; if you don't do violence, you're a 'door mat'.
But all trans people have to be despised and hated because *a few* do bad things?
If we really wanted to stop violence of all sorts - and yes, against women - we would talk much more about the former, and not excuse it because you're an alpha-male wannabe idiot.
Nah mate, you're the guy who launches an inquiry after a school kid commits suicide after being bullied and says "lessons must be learned" then repeats the exercise as needed, learning precisely zero lessons in the process.
No, I really am not. In fact, I have mentioned the horrible levels of violence in this country on several occasions. If you know more than a few dozen people, you will know someone who has suffered domestic abuse in the last year, Often suffering in silence; invisibly.
Your comment demeans you.
But suffering in silence is what your proposed solution always seems to be, just take it on the chin and hope for a better world. Bullies need to be confronted, whether that's at school or someone using a privileged position to insult others, the confrontation is necessary, and yes, that may mean violence. I was bullied at school for being a "paki" and while you might have simply suffered in silence, I beat the shit out of one of them who did it and guess what? The bullying stopped, I got a week's worth of detention (including two Saturdays) but it was worth it. I don't think my dad has ever been more proud than he was when I he had to come and pick me up early because I'd been in a fight with the racist bully.
With all due respect, your sad but brave experience is many many light years away from an international multi-millionaire megastar getting up on stage, in front of 30 million TV viewers, and whacking someone for making a poor taste joke about his wife. It was clearly assault. Smith should have been arrested. Anyone else - literally anyone - would have been at least questioned by police, straight away
These are meant to be role models, two famous black actors. What does last night say to young black men watching this? - in a country where black on black violence is at horrific, murderous levels?
Desperate stuff
It was a well deserved slap. You cannot humiliate a man's wife in front of millions and not expect him to not come at you swinging. Nowt to do with colour more honour
Are you serious?!
It was an ugly, stupid joke, but no one got physically hurt. The answer is to make a clever, insulting joke back, not storm up on stage and hit the guy in front of the world. Will Smith doesn't lack for exposure, he could have humiliated Chris Rock at a time of his choosing - ie when he got the Best Actor award an hour later
Also, if a hard slap is OK on live TV, what's next? A punch in the nuts? A crack on the skull with a baseball bat? A knife?
At what point do the PB Exponents of Manly Honour say OK, enough's enough, shooting someone in the knees in return for an offensive limerick is a tad too much for live television
Take your wife’s hand and quietly leave would have been strong, esp considering not there to lift Oscar because of hosts unfunny insulting behaviour.
And I see we're back to people on PB advocating violence against a comedian and saying that he deserved it because he looked at someone's missus in the wrong way.
And they are only saying this because in their fantasy, dare I say keyboard world, the person doing the slapping (themselves, in a blaze of glory and to the admiration of their womenfolk) emerge victorious.
But in a real situation when the aggressor might be oh I don't know I used the example of Tyson Fury this morning, they would far from so simply judge that that person needed a slap and that would be that.
It is not the most pressing issue of the day or even year but Will Smith was absolutely wrong to march up on stage and slap a comedian for being a comedian.
Jeez the very same people who applaud it demand the right for people to be offended. But not when it's Will Smith being a bully by slapping someone he outweighs and who he towers over.
So what are we learning on here today? Violence against a man who gave some verbal is okay; if you don't do violence, you're a 'door mat'.
But all trans people have to be despised and hated because *a few* do bad things?
If we really wanted to stop violence of all sorts - and yes, against women - we would talk much more about the former, and not excuse it because you're an alpha-male wannabe idiot.
Nah mate, you're the guy who launches an inquiry after a school kid commits suicide after being bullied and says "lessons must be learned" then repeats the exercise as needed, learning precisely zero lessons in the process.
No, I really am not. In fact, I have mentioned the horrible levels of violence in this country on several occasions. If you know more than a few dozen people, you will know someone who has suffered domestic abuse in the last year, Often suffering in silence; invisibly.
Your comment demeans you.
But suffering in silence is what your proposed solution always seems to be, just take it on the chin and hope for a better world. Bullies need to be confronted, whether that's at school or someone using a privileged position to insult others, the confrontation is necessary, and yes, that may mean violence. I was bullied at school for being a "paki" and while you might have simply suffered in silence, I beat the shit out of one of them who did it and guess what? The bullying stopped, I got a week's worth of detention (including two Saturdays) but it was worth it. I don't think my dad has ever been more proud than he was when I he had to come and pick me up early because I'd been in a fight with the racist bully.
IME the person resorting to violence is more often the bully.
I'm sorry to hear about your experience, but perhaps, just perhaps, you tackled it the wrong way.
In what way did I handle it incorrectly? The bullying stopped almost immediately and that racist kid actually stopped being a racist to the other Asian kids as well. All it took was his head getting kicked in a couple of times.
As I said, you're the guy who won't ever learn any lessons from those kids committing suicide after being relentlessly bullied. A lot of the time the bullies do need a beat down, whether that's from the person being being bullied or someone else. I guarantee you that Chris Rock won't be making any jokes about bald women again.
No, I am really not like that. And if you knew anything about my history, or any grace, you'd retract that.
p.s. and it's pretty obvious by now that J.K.Rowling has a lot of hurt and anger from her past as well as a distinctly unprogressive attitude on many things. Witness just how incredibly all-white and undiverse the heroes in the Potter franchise are. Just about the only ethnically diverse person turns out to betray the nice white kids ...
Undiverse? It's full of fucking WIZARDS!
Don't know about your troll farm, but there aren't many wizards down my street....
Plus, Harry Potter has been very kind to a group in society most egregiously treated - the gingers.
Say what you like about Gavin Williamson, he never thumped anyone at the annual "Fireplace Salesman of the Year" awards.
He wasn’t put between a rock and fireplace
The Rock - further evidence that baldies can make it to the top.....
A mistake I have only just learned I have been making all these years: Chris Rock <> Dwayne 'The Rock' Johnson. The latter is bald, the former was slapped by Will Smith.
It’s always an interesting wake up call on pb realising how disconnected a lot of people are from modern culture. Comments like not being able to recognise Will Smith in the street. Really?
Even The Rock’s gross box office is over $5bn, the 20th highest grossing actor of all time. And that’s his second successful career (as per Will Smith).
A hilariously self-torpedoing post, because The Rock is Dwayne Johnson, while Chris Rock is Chris Rock.
Laughing at people for medical conditions is supposed to be well beyond the pale nowadays so I wonder if this incident will mean that now everybody hates Chris?
So we're pro cancel culture now?
Nah, no need to cancel either of them, just funny watching Chris Rock take a beat down after shit chatting another dude's wife that he's got a personal beef with. I mean what did he expect to happen.
Violence is never the response.
It is sometimes.
A slap was well called for here. Right to apologise afterwards, but it was well-deserved.
On live TV? In front of millions of impressionable people, presumably including kids? One of the most beloved actors in Hollywood thinks it's OK to hit someone, hard, then say "get my wife's name out of your fucking mouth"?
It's really not OK. Even tho the joke was crude and insulting.
If Smith wasn't a famous actor about to win (!!) an Oscar he would have been arrested then and there. For clear assault
AND he didn't apologise to Chris Rock! It is calamitous for Smith and the Oscars
Interesting take from person last seen fantasizing about shooting people in the leg.
Is it a new gentle pacifist emerging?
Tiny bit of a difference between invading Russian soldiers in a war zone and badly scripted Hollywood comedians at the Oscars but otherwise: good reach
You're closer to that world than I am... Would that so-called "joke" have come from the mind of Chris Rock, or from some backstage gagsmith?
(Not that that would excuse saying it, but I'm curious.)
I'm extremely happy to say that I'll be in the BBC politics chair on Sunday mornings from September - it's a genuine honour and real thrill to be working with an amazing team on the show, can't wait to get started! https://twitter.com/bbclaurak/status/1508421097695367172
I'm shocked that some on Twitter have not taken that news well.
Comments
I have no desire to see Chris Rock get cancelled, nor do I think its bad that he got what was quite frankly a well-deserved slap. So he might think twice before using someone's wife's medical condition as a punchline again, but he shouldn't be cancelled.
Quite frankly I think Will Smith both slapping Chris Rock, then apologising for doing so, and that being the end of the matter is probably the right sequence of events to have happened.
But I would ask you to go and take a look in a mirror, draw a deep breath, and ask yourself if this was your finest moment as a human being.
Have a nice day.
The dog in Asterix is called Ideefix in the original French version.
This only becomes a joke in the later English translation: "Dogmatix".
A slap was well called for here. Right to apologise afterwards, but it was well-deserved.
The argument is the extent to which violent people would pretend to be trans in order to get closer to potential victims, and how you prevent this.
The continued refusal of people like you to accept this obvious fact, is why this is slowly being blown up from a fringe issue on which there is broad agreement across party lines (as it should be) into the mainstream.
Best guess: they initially went with Dogmatix from dogmatique and got nixed by the Academie for debasing the language with frenglish puns.
Given the amount of disaster's , lying , cheating etc so far Sturgeon would brass neck it no matter how bad.
Police seem to be totally indifferent to the shenanigans , not a peep on teh £660K missing , unable to find cuplrits leaking government documents when only her and a few pals had copies , people being huckled on feeble excuses , you could go on forever. They are an absolute shambles.
PS: Mackay was in the right circles/cliques for Sturgeon, a kindred soul
LOL
But all trans people have to be despised and hated because *a few* do bad things?
If we really wanted to stop violence of all sorts - and yes, against women - we would talk much more about the former, and not excuse it because you're an alpha-male wannabe idiot.
DeSantis Is Trump 2.0
https://www.nytimes.com/2022/03/27/opinion/desantis-trump-republican-party.html
There are currently twenty-one active state defense forces.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/State_defense_force
Either way, he/she/they is/are not the only one who (pretends to) think(s) this way.
Telegraph
He/she is also plug stupid, though that in itself is not a bar to participation here.....
Your comment demeans you.
Meanwhile, those whose starting position would have previously been the ex-council house in Brinnington are frozen out.
On the previous thread, I said; "A life tip: don't go around hitting people just because they're an ass."
To which someone replied: "Nah, that's not a good tip. Maybe if you're one of life's doormats."
As for my second para; just look at the tone on here towards trans people.
As for my third: I think that's true. We need to talk about it more.
https://www.rightmove.co.uk/house-prices-in-North-East.html
Rightmove average property price London £681,907
https://www.rightmove.co.uk/house-prices-in-London.html
It is not me out of touch
Sorry if that sounds rude, but it is by no means as ludicrously offensive as your suggestion that anybody thinks that "all trans people [or indeed any of them] have to be despised and hated"
Just sublime
I can't just put on a wig, say I'm a woman and start using the ladies loos. There needs to be some sort of gatekeeping - probably in the form of a doctor's note and I would also suggest that the person should be on hormone therapy. As I understand it, estrogen nukes your sex drive and stops your willy working so job done in that respect.
Most genuine trans people are at far more risk of violent assault than likely to commit one, I know half a dozen trans people and they have all been victims of hate, ranging from being shouted at in the street to sexually assaulted in one case. But there needs to be a system in place to ensure genuine trans people are protected while preventing men from taking advantage by falsely claiming to be trans, most rational people can see that.
On that note, a trans friend shared this with me the other day and it did make me laugh.
https://twitter.com/SenorTren2/status/1507599202439905290
Even worse, the joke wasn't funny.
Also, on topic: Wallace, you handsome devil! Stick you in a frock, I'd fucking ride you raw myself.
Well, apart from giving Jane Campion best director.
It's really not OK. Even tho the joke was crude and insulting.
If Smith wasn't a famous actor about to win (!!) an Oscar he would have been arrested then and there. For clear assault
AND he didn't apologise to Chris Rock! It is calamitous for Smith and the Oscars
https://order-order.com/2022/03/28/biden-mocks-eus-one-candidate-presidency-vote/
[grins]
Georgy Zhukov : Look at your fucking face!
Really? The Oscars are now normally a snooze fest won by right on films barely anyone has heard of let alone seen and seeing rapidly declining ratings.
Last night's Will Smith punch is dominating the headlines this morning and has given the Oscars its biggest publicity coup since Warren Beatty read out the wrong best film winner.
Smith was wrong to hit him, Rock's joke was tasteless but for the Oscars it was brilliant PR.
The average punter in Stoke or Ohio might actually take note of this year's ceremony for once
I'm sorry to hear about your experience, but perhaps, just perhaps, you tackled it the wrong way.
These are meant to be role models, two famous black actors. What does last night say to young black men watching this? - in a country where black on black violence is at horrific, murderous levels?
Desperate stuff
It does fit for Hammond too. Future history books will note a curious interregnum when Britain was left without a Chancellor, and the name Philip Hammond was used as a placeholder.
Best wishes to her.
Attacking somebody physically is not a response, whatever is said. We will have to agree to disagree here.
(And I have been in a few fights)
And the ratings for the Oscars doubled the moment Smith whacked Rock: they were at their lowest EVER - about 9m, then shot up to 17m
But I just don't buy the idea that this is somehow "good publicity" (let alone that the incident was staged by desperate producers). We are surrounded by pointless, depressing violence. Now it happens live on stage at the Oscars? It is just sad. And that will be the overwhelming takeaway. Sadness
Will Smith is an excellent actor who has made some fine movies. He might well end up best known for this one moment of stupid, nonsensical violence on the biggest stage in the world
https://twitter.com/bbclaurak/status/1508421097695367172
As I said, you're the guy who won't ever learn any lessons from those kids committing suicide after being relentlessly bullied. A lot of the time the bullies do need a beat down, whether that's from the person being being bullied or someone else. I guarantee you that Chris Rock won't be making any jokes about bald women again.
Interestingly no clear right/left, leave/remain, mods/rocker binary split on what the correct take is. People are all over the place.
Probably just a touch of 'Will in the wrong' on the left and 'in the right' on the right.
AB's work (which is barely "translation" and more like re-imagining) is outstanding.
Because your attitude is what Johnson says about the journalist he had beaten up
https://www.holyrood.com/news/view,only-a-fifth-of-scots-back-plans-for-selfid-transgender-laws
Is it a new gentle pacifist emerging?
A doubling of house prices from £90k to £180k is a very nice windfall for homeowners who paid £90k, and means that new starters have to start somewhere a bit less nice. £18k is a lot to save for a 10% deposit, but it's imaginable.
The next doubling- from £180k to £360k is a big windfall, and it's getting hard to see how many people can get a deposit together from their own resources.
The next doubling after that... oh momma... (It's more complicated than that in many ways, but not enough to change the conclusion, I reckon.)
Ended the career of Tom King that one.
I know you sometimes have a problem and form with this but it is entirely possible to have an exchange on PB without immediately insulting your interlocutor. The last thing we want is for you to get yourself into so much of a tizzy that you ban yourself again.
It was an ugly, stupid joke, but no one got physically hurt. The answer is to make a clever, insulting joke back, not storm up on stage and hit the guy in front of the world. Will Smith doesn't lack for exposure, he could have humiliated Chris Rock at a time of his choosing - ie when he got the Best Actor award an hour later
Also, if a hard slap is OK on live TV, what's next? A punch in the nuts? A crack on the skull with a baseball bat? A knife?
At what point do the PB Exponents of Manly Honour say OK, enough's enough, shooting someone in the knees in return for an offensive limerick is a tad too much for live television
And they are only saying this because in their fantasy, dare I say keyboard world, the person doing the slapping (themselves, in a blaze of glory and to the admiration of their womenfolk) emerge victorious.
But in a real situation when the aggressor might be oh I don't know I used the example of Tyson Fury this morning, they would far from so simply judge that that person needed a slap and that would be that.
It is not the most pressing issue of the day or even year but Will Smith was absolutely wrong to march up on stage and slap a comedian for being a comedian.
Jeez the very same people who applaud it demand the right for people to be offended. But not when it's Will Smith being a bully by slapping someone he outweighs and who he towers over.
I don't know, the internet sometimes. Sheesh.
Carlsberg owns Russia's biggest brewery. Russia and Ukraine accounted for about 13% of its revenue in 2021.
https://twitter.com/annmarie/status/1508424662698676228
But I don't expect you will.
Don't know about your troll farm, but there aren't many wizards down my street....
Plus, Harry Potter has been very kind to a group in society most egregiously treated - the gingers.
(Not that that would excuse saying it, but I'm curious.)