Does rather incense me that people are getting many thousands of "oodles" mongrels when there are so many special breeds on the verge of extinction.
Archy was a smooth Griffon Bruxellois aka a Petit Brabancon.
Beautiful! My previous Wire-haired Terrier (also called Archie) used to have a running barking match with one down our street when we lived in Oxfordshire.
The thing is that I don’t think Gary’s comments were dumb. I think he was spot on.
This Government dehumanises and treats immigrants like cattle.
Yes, I think he has a point. He should be allowed to make that point. The BBC has once again made itself look foolish. Just as with the dodgy editing of the Queen, the Brand/Ross affair and many other issues.
The free speech brigade want him cancelled.
He isn’t a BBC employee, he is no more restricted than you or I - but the BBC think they can silence a man who talks about sport and is hired as a contractor from speaking.
All because the Tories don’t like him.
That’s an important point. In employment law and IR35 there’s a “control test”. Crudely employees are subject to a fairly high level of control, though clearly this does vary depending on the circumstances in each case. Contractors necessarily have more freedom. The more control the BBC exercise over Lineker there is a possibility, albeit remote, that HMRC may come and ask it for PAYE and employers NI contributions rather than chasing Lineker.
This is why most companies have used blanket decisions to put all their contractors inside IR35 rather than run the risk of being caught out by HMRC. I know that is not how they are supposed to work but that is what almost all companies are doing irrespective of whether the contractor should be inside or outside as far as HMRC are concerned.
The whole issue of employment status (both for statutory protection and for tax purposes) is a mess and has been for decades.
I was surprised to find out it was the BBC that was asking or advising presenters to use this tax avoidance structure. I had assumed it was the other way around.
Was this for recruitment purposes, that is - work for us, this way and you'll take home more pay?
BBC needs major reform under Labour to keep it away from the government
You mean privatisation?
Certainly end the licence fee = any BBC employees can say what they like.
Exactly. If I am not paying for Lineker he can say what he likes.
He can say what he likes anyway because you are not funding him in his own time. Why do you think you are? Just like you and I can say what we like and just like all BBC people, we can all do the same. What is wrong with you and censorship?
The only restrictions are:
a) They can not say what they like in their BBC roles b) There are limits outside of their BBC roles just as there are with all of us if what we say is illegal or would be grounds for dismissal for bringing our employers into disrepute.
Why do you have these totalitarian views?
Why do you think it is ok for you to spout your views here, but it is not ok for Gary Lineker?
Why do you not want to fire all the other people who have done the same over the years eg Sugar, Neil, Meaden, Hislop, Clarkson, etc, etc?
you ought to write a thread on it.
I think its the reference how ever obliquely to nazis that's got people so pissed off about it.
a) Why would I do that when it has been talked to death here, with no mean contribution by yourself.
b) Most people aren't pissed off about Linekers post. In fact I wouldn't even have known it had happened if it wasn't raised by others. Only right wing nutters who want us all censored are upset by it.
On a more general note - What is wrong with you? 99% of your posts regardless of the subject are so bitter and your posts this morning calling me Mike were just bizarre. What on earth was that about?
Lighten up. Tell a joke or two here. Don't be negative about everything.
Are you this angry all the time? Get some joy in your life.
To be fair there are several posters who seem to be angry all the time, when a cup of tea and a rich tea biscuit would be a good idea
A lot of us, well me anyway, don’t have any friends IRL and so you get all of our social indicators on here. I am, as Malc doesn’t tire of telling me, a loser. So people on a random message board get all of my many and varied faults and inadequacies. My only friend was a dog who died three months ago. He was pretty chill regarding my issues.
I did post my sympathy about the loss of your much loved Archy yesterday, and as a family who are very much into dogs and cats and lost many, it is a terrible period of grief but you must try to remember all the good times you had with Archy over the 16+ years he was family
And you most definitely are not a loser and you have many friends on here if you need support
I do genuinely think the culture war is now over. It will never have the same impact after this.
I can't say I agree. People waver between saying there isn't one to claiming they are winning it, and it encompasses a lot of different topics. It will never be over.
I'm not even convinced a culture war is a bad idea, other than the specific label war. Cultural changes big and small probably should be rigorously debate. Fiercely so in the case of significant ones, however positive or negative one side might see them.
I've not really given this specific point much thought, but just now I was thinking that is 'culture war' really just the name people use for when sides engage in hyperbole?
The thing is that I don’t think Gary’s comments were dumb. I think he was spot on.
This Government dehumanises and treats immigrants like cattle.
Yes, I think he has a point. He should be allowed to make that point. The BBC has once again made itself look foolish. Just as with the dodgy editing of the Queen, the Brand/Ross affair and many other issues.
The free speech brigade want him cancelled.
He isn’t a BBC employee, he is no more restricted than you or I - but the BBC think they can silence a man who talks about sport and is hired as a contractor from speaking.
All because the Tories don’t like him.
That’s an important point. In employment law and IR35 there’s a “control test”. Crudely employees are subject to a fairly high level of control, though clearly this does vary depending on the circumstances in each case. Contractors necessarily have more freedom. The more control the BBC exercise over Lineker there is a possibility, albeit remote, that HMRC may come and ask it for PAYE and employers NI contributions rather than chasing Lineker.
This is why most companies have used blanket decisions to put all their contractors inside IR35 rather than run the risk of being caught out by HMRC. I know that is not how they are supposed to work but that is what almost all companies are doing irrespective of whether the contractor should be inside or outside as far as HMRC are concerned.
The whole issue of employment status (both for statutory protection and for tax purposes) is a mess and has been for decades.
I was surprised to find out it was the BBC that was asking or advising presenters to use this tax avoidance structure. I had assumed it was the other way around.
Was this for recruitment purposes, that is - work for us, this way and you'll take home more pay?
Sorry, I am not sure. Doug gave some possible reasons in his reply a few comments ago.
Have the Tories largely shredded their own "War of Woke" by the Wack way they've engineered (or so it appears) perhaps the most famous example of Cancel Culture, since proto-wokeists beheaded Charles I of blessed memory?
Clearly not among true-blue believers, though seems they've dented even their morale & confidence somewhat. Anti-woke still a rallying cry for rallying the base, esp. parts flaking off toward Reform.
However, with swing-voters, whose votes are up for grabs between Conservatives and a LESS right-wing option, the story, reckon it's a different story.
About time for someone with the PM's and CUP's interest(s) at heart, to start giving direction to stop digging, and start re-filling the hole the Tories have dug for themselves.
Maybe George Osborne's statement is part of that?
I recognise you won't have any sympathies politically with this, but as I have said, there are aspects of the kerfuffle that feel to me like a staged media event to reverse the current migration bill. 'Take the proles' football away and they will soon turn away from the migrant bill'.
Every piece of legislative progress than diverges us from the EU, puts us on a secure footing as an independent country in control of our borders, or can lead to economic growth in a post-EU context, is being dropped, quietly or noisily, by the Sunak Government.
Osborne's commentary within that context reminds me of that slithery man in the Lord of the Rings who was advising the King of the Horse Riders.
Yes, of course, the political classes are some giant conspiracy.
Of course, it does rather raise the question of why the Remain camp in the referendum was quite so extraordinarily incompetent. But, don't worry, I'm sure you can think of a couple of good (albeit absurd) explanations.
Quick question for you: who exactly is in on this plan? Presumably, the government would need to be, because otherwise they might have very sensibly ignored his ridiculous comments.
There isn't much of a conspiracy, there are openly proposed changes, ones that are extremely deleterious to the wealth and wellbeing of the vast majority of people, because they amount to an enormous misappropriation of peoples' money, and unacceptable encroachments on peoples' freedoms, primarily but not exclusively by dangling the theat of a man-made climate catastrophe. Careerist politicians, who are fairly easily identified, have decided that this is the way that the wind is blowing, so they will go along with it. Careerist civil servants likewise. It is important that there is no real political choice. If there were, decisions that are going to be massively unpopular would be overturned. Britain has ended up with a choice of Davos man one or Davos man two. Given that the Davos prospectus is one that nobody voted for, and if it were in a manifesto, nobody would, that cannot be right.
Free speech: talking positively about Gary Lineker, who can say whatever he likes Not Free Speech: talking negatively about Gary Lineker, where you cannot say whatever you like
Gary Lineker cannot say what he likes. He cannot libel people (well he can but it might be expensive)
We can talk as negatively as we like about Gary Lineker again as long as we don't libel him.
Seems pretty simple to me.
Gary Lineker can libel anyone he likes, because he's fucking minted. Anyone taking him on in a libel case would live to regret it.
OGH OTOH...
Yes, sadly, it's effectively a privilege of wealth. It's why Gary Lineker and J K Rowling can do things mere mortals cannot.
If you were on £25k a year as a BBC staffer, or contractor, you'd be put back in your box very quickly for even a minor political comment.
Well, yes, because different rules would apply.
But he was a part time freelancer talking in his personal capacity on a separate platform. Whether you agree with what he said or not, it's difficult to argue that the BBC should suspend him for impartiality reasons.
Bringing the corporation into disrepute would have been a stronger ground, but TBF they've done an awesome job of that themselves.
He did bring the corporation into disrepute. He compared one of the leading policies of the Government of the day, which commands majority support, to be similar to the Nazis.
He's one of their leading staffers on a massive salary. He fronts one of their biggest shows. And how many days a week he works at it or his contractual arrangements are irrelevant. He's strongly associated with them and their brand and they pay him, using licence fee payers money. Under IR35 he would be considered a disguised employee. And he crossed the line.
The BBC were right to enter talks with him over the issue, and to suspend him when he refused to discuss any moderation whatsoever.
It's not a free speech issue.
First of all - no he didn't. He said the language used was reminiscent of the Nazis. Which may be an exaggeration but given the increasingly authoritarian and xenophobic behaviour of Braverman in particular can hardly be said to be utterly outrageous. Clamping down on protests, attacking the press, demonising 'otherness' and routine flouting of the law as Braverman has done were all things the Nazis did. True, she has not gone nearly so far as they did, but she is going much too far for a fully democratic system to be healthy.
Under the guidelines as explained by the corporation's own former officer, a sports presenter on a freelance contract making comments, including political comments on a non-BBC platform is not considered to be a breach of impartiality.
Therefore, ironically, in reacting as they did and taking him off air for his political views, the BBC have - in fact - not acted with political impartiality.
They have also broken his contract, breached their own rules, wrecked their programme schedules, caused the whole tweet to dominate several news cycles and made themselves a national laughing stock.
This is not an employment issue. It is not even a free speech issue. It is an example of How To Look Incredibly Thick and Politically Biased.
If they had just quietly said to Lineker 'dial it down please, we're getting complaints' the whole stupid mess could have been avoided.
The problem with this argument is that plenty of your fellow travellers, including @RochdalePioneers, say it absolutely was a comparion to the Nazis and rightly so.
It insults all our intelligence to pretend it wasn't. So let's move on from this shall we.
I do not for one minute believe that the term 'language that is not dissimilar to that used by Germany in the 30s' would stand as a synonym for 'Nazis' in a court of law, e.g in a libel case.
I don’t think anyone actually thinks it was a comparison to the Nazis. Just bad faith actors who funnily enough support the Government.
Of course it was a comparison to the Nazis.
There are some people who regard making a comparison to the Nazis as something like an argument version of a trump card, so that their opponent in the argument instantly loses. It's a boring and lazy way to conduct a debate, but it's not something anyone should lose their job over.
Of course, sometimes such a comparison will be warranted, but nearly as often as it is invoked.
Gary is not thick. And he’s never been afraid to say big accusations before, if he thought Nazis he’d have said Nazis.
As I pointed out a few day's ago, he said 1930s Germany, not 1940s Germany, so he was drawing a distinction between the period under the Nazis when the final solution was in full swing, and the gas chambers were operational, and the period before that, to invoke the slippery slope argument.
if he'd said Nazis then he wouldn't have been able to draw that distinction, but it was Nazis in the 1930s and Nazis in the 1940s all the same.
I think we’re all over-analysing. One tweet, sent in a moment of exasperation that people were telling him he shouldn’t express an opinion on the Rwanda policy. The 30s German reference was throwaway, yes a bit Godwin, but I doubt he took more than a couple of minutes to compose it.
Twitter is full of bombast and exaggeration. We’re all analysing it as if it’s Xi’s foreign policy speech at the latest national congress of the Chinese Communist party.
That's fair enough, but it's still the case that a reference to 1930s Germany was a reference to the Nazis, and not to some other minor party of the right-wing in late Weimar Republic Germany.
Again, you and others are overanalysing. Of course he was referring to Nazi Germany. Does anyone think he’s thought long and hard about the different factions in 30s Germany and is making some subtle reference to pre-Nazi rumblings from other parties? He’s done the same GCSEs we all did. This is at the level of “The Nazis, a warning from history”.
Yet this one tweet is being picked apart like the meaning of “this is my body” during the Protestant Reformation.
@DougSeal you’re not a loser and that poster who called you that is an arsehole.
You have many friends here including me, please reach out if you need help as I do understand how difficult life can be at times.
Sending you my best and also was sorry to read about your dog. When our black lab passed away I lost the last connection I had to my granny and I was very distressed about it. I lost a very loyal friend and connection all in one go.
Free speech: talking positively about Gary Lineker, who can say whatever he likes Not Free Speech: talking negatively about Gary Lineker, where you cannot say whatever you like
Gary Lineker cannot say what he likes. He cannot libel people (well he can but it might be expensive)
We can talk as negatively as we like about Gary Lineker again as long as we don't libel him.
Seems pretty simple to me.
Gary Lineker can libel anyone he likes, because he's fucking minted. Anyone taking him on in a libel case would live to regret it.
OGH OTOH...
Yes, sadly, it's effectively a privilege of wealth. It's why Gary Lineker and J K Rowling can do things mere mortals cannot.
If you were on £25k a year as a BBC staffer, or contractor, you'd be put back in your box very quickly for even a minor political comment.
Well, yes, because different rules would apply.
But he was a part time freelancer talking in his personal capacity on a separate platform. Whether you agree with what he said or not, it's difficult to argue that the BBC should suspend him for impartiality reasons.
Bringing the corporation into disrepute would have been a stronger ground, but TBF they've done an awesome job of that themselves.
He did bring the corporation into disrepute. He compared one of the leading policies of the Government of the day, which commands majority support, to be similar to the Nazis.
He's one of their leading staffers on a massive salary. He fronts one of their biggest shows. And how many days a week he works at it or his contractual arrangements are irrelevant. He's strongly associated with them and their brand and they pay him, using licence fee payers money. Under IR35 he would be considered a disguised employee. And he crossed the line.
The BBC were right to enter talks with him over the issue, and to suspend him when he refused to discuss any moderation whatsoever.
It's not a free speech issue.
First of all - no he didn't. He said the language used was reminiscent of the Nazis. Which may be an exaggeration but given the increasingly authoritarian and xenophobic behaviour of Braverman in particular can hardly be said to be utterly outrageous. Clamping down on protests, attacking the press, demonising 'otherness' and routine flouting of the law as Braverman has done were all things the Nazis did. True, she has not gone nearly so far as they did, but she is going much too far for a fully democratic system to be healthy.
Under the guidelines as explained by the corporation's own former officer, a sports presenter on a freelance contract making comments, including political comments on a non-BBC platform is not considered to be a breach of impartiality.
Therefore, ironically, in reacting as they did and taking him off air for his political views, the BBC have - in fact - not acted with political impartiality.
They have also broken his contract, breached their own rules, wrecked their programme schedules, caused the whole tweet to dominate several news cycles and made themselves a national laughing stock.
This is not an employment issue. It is not even a free speech issue. It is an example of How To Look Incredibly Thick and Politically Biased.
If they had just quietly said to Lineker 'dial it down please, we're getting complaints' the whole stupid mess could have been avoided.
The problem with this argument is that plenty of your fellow travellers, including @RochdalePioneers, say it absolutely was a comparion to the Nazis and rightly so.
It insults all our intelligence to pretend it wasn't. So let's move on from this shall we.
I do not for one minute believe that the term 'language that is not dissimilar to that used by Germany in the 30s' would stand as a synonym for 'Nazis' in a court of law, e.g in a libel case.
I don’t think anyone actually thinks it was a comparison to the Nazis. Just bad faith actors who funnily enough support the Government.
Of course it was. Naive to say it wasn’t.
So why didn’t he say Nazis then?
He didn’t need to, the allusion was enough. Did you think he was talking about Alfred Hugenbourg? Or the KPD?
I think he was talking about language used in Germany in the 30s. As he said.
Do you disagree that the government uses such language?
Language used by who in Germany in the 30s?
Lots of people?
Don't be coy now.
Anti-immigrant settlement in the 30s was pretty much ingrained in society.
Not so much, as there were far fewer immigrants. Anti-semetism however was widespread in many countries, not limited to Germany.
They were anti immigrants including and mostly referring to Jews.
Sorry but that’s not correct. Most Jews were natives to their countries.
The language used was about Jews flooding into Germany.
No it wasn't. The Jews in Germany had mostly all been there for a very long time. They were not immigrants into Germany.
I think many German Jews were (like British Jews of the time) often migrant Jewish communities fleeing the czarist pogroms in the late 19th century.
A lot of the anti-Jewish Nazi propaganda was directed against those Jews who had been part of German society for longest, the ones who had successful businesses and had integrated most fully, and so could be cast as an enemy within who had stabbed the country in the back, leading it to lose WWI.
There are some fairly broad brush parallels that you can draw in terms of dehumanising language, but it's severely mistaken to attempt to draw to tight a parallel. It's really a very different situation. I don't think it helps.
If you do want to make a 1930s comparison the better one to make is with 1930s Britain, when there was a lot of hostility to refugees from Germany reaching Britain - despite the vomit-inducing back-slapping that now occurs when celebrating those few Britons who did help Refugees enter the country - and perhaps we might consider if we are repeating those mistakes in terms of some of the people we have abandoned in Afghanistan, or elsewhere.
I can’t message Doug as his profile is private which I respect but just hope he knows many people would reach out and offer support if needed. They have done many times for me.
Free speech: talking positively about Gary Lineker, who can say whatever he likes Not Free Speech: talking negatively about Gary Lineker, where you cannot say whatever you like
Gary Lineker cannot say what he likes. He cannot libel people (well he can but it might be expensive)
We can talk as negatively as we like about Gary Lineker again as long as we don't libel him.
Seems pretty simple to me.
Gary Lineker can libel anyone he likes, because he's fucking minted. Anyone taking him on in a libel case would live to regret it.
OGH OTOH...
Yes, sadly, it's effectively a privilege of wealth. It's why Gary Lineker and J K Rowling can do things mere mortals cannot.
If you were on £25k a year as a BBC staffer, or contractor, you'd be put back in your box very quickly for even a minor political comment.
Well, yes, because different rules would apply.
But he was a part time freelancer talking in his personal capacity on a separate platform. Whether you agree with what he said or not, it's difficult to argue that the BBC should suspend him for impartiality reasons.
Bringing the corporation into disrepute would have been a stronger ground, but TBF they've done an awesome job of that themselves.
He did bring the corporation into disrepute. He compared one of the leading policies of the Government of the day, which commands majority support, to be similar to the Nazis.
He's one of their leading staffers on a massive salary. He fronts one of their biggest shows. And how many days a week he works at it or his contractual arrangements are irrelevant. He's strongly associated with them and their brand and they pay him, using licence fee payers money. Under IR35 he would be considered a disguised employee. And he crossed the line.
The BBC were right to enter talks with him over the issue, and to suspend him when he refused to discuss any moderation whatsoever.
It's not a free speech issue.
First of all - no he didn't. He said the language used was reminiscent of the Nazis. Which may be an exaggeration but given the increasingly authoritarian and xenophobic behaviour of Braverman in particular can hardly be said to be utterly outrageous. Clamping down on protests, attacking the press, demonising 'otherness' and routine flouting of the law as Braverman has done were all things the Nazis did. True, she has not gone nearly so far as they did, but she is going much too far for a fully democratic system to be healthy.
Under the guidelines as explained by the corporation's own former officer, a sports presenter on a freelance contract making comments, including political comments on a non-BBC platform is not considered to be a breach of impartiality.
Therefore, ironically, in reacting as they did and taking him off air for his political views, the BBC have - in fact - not acted with political impartiality.
They have also broken his contract, breached their own rules, wrecked their programme schedules, caused the whole tweet to dominate several news cycles and made themselves a national laughing stock.
This is not an employment issue. It is not even a free speech issue. It is an example of How To Look Incredibly Thick and Politically Biased.
If they had just quietly said to Lineker 'dial it down please, we're getting complaints' the whole stupid mess could have been avoided.
The problem with this argument is that plenty of your fellow travellers, including @RochdalePioneers, say it absolutely was a comparion to the Nazis and rightly so.
It insults all our intelligence to pretend it wasn't. So let's move on from this shall we.
I do not for one minute believe that the term 'language that is not dissimilar to that used by Germany in the 30s' would stand as a synonym for 'Nazis' in a court of law, e.g in a libel case.
I don’t think anyone actually thinks it was a comparison to the Nazis. Just bad faith actors who funnily enough support the Government.
Of course it was. Naive to say it wasn’t.
So why didn’t he say Nazis then?
He didn’t need to, the allusion was enough. Did you think he was talking about Alfred Hugenbourg? Or the KPD?
I think he was talking about language used in Germany in the 30s. As he said.
Do you disagree that the government uses such language?
Language used by who in Germany in the 30s?
Lots of people?
Don't be coy now.
Anti-immigrant settlement in the 30s was pretty much ingrained in society.
I think it was particularly popular with one section of society.
Actually it was popular with mostly everyone.
So if everyone was using the same language, he was comparing it to the language used by the Nazis in the 30s.
What?
That’s like saying if I said language used in 2003 by mostly everyone actually means I was referring to Labour.
Nonsense point.
I think you need to step back and look at this issue with a clear gaze.
Lineker knew what he was doing. He does not specify Nazis, but the allusion is certainly towards the language of the Nazi Party. He quite likely has been evasive in order to be careful so as the issue would remain contained. He is not wrong with his assertion. He is not mentioning concentration camps, although the implication is, that this is where Braverman's style of language led once before.
Personally I do not believe Lineker did anything wrong, neither do I believe Sugar did anything wrong. I don't believe Clarkson breached any guidance either until he thumped Oisin Tymon.
I am not comfortable with Andrew Neil at the BBC, although to be fair on set he was very impartial, and I have a massive problem that twenty five years ago the BBC facilitated Boris Johnson. I have an even bigger issue with the substitute Johnson footage at the Cenotaph in 2019.
Free speech: talking positively about Gary Lineker, who can say whatever he likes Not Free Speech: talking negatively about Gary Lineker, where you cannot say whatever you like
Gary Lineker cannot say what he likes. He cannot libel people (well he can but it might be expensive)
We can talk as negatively as we like about Gary Lineker again as long as we don't libel him.
Seems pretty simple to me.
Gary Lineker can libel anyone he likes, because he's fucking minted. Anyone taking him on in a libel case would live to regret it.
OGH OTOH...
Yes, sadly, it's effectively a privilege of wealth. It's why Gary Lineker and J K Rowling can do things mere mortals cannot.
If you were on £25k a year as a BBC staffer, or contractor, you'd be put back in your box very quickly for even a minor political comment.
Well, yes, because different rules would apply.
But he was a part time freelancer talking in his personal capacity on a separate platform. Whether you agree with what he said or not, it's difficult to argue that the BBC should suspend him for impartiality reasons.
Bringing the corporation into disrepute would have been a stronger ground, but TBF they've done an awesome job of that themselves.
He did bring the corporation into disrepute. He compared one of the leading policies of the Government of the day, which commands majority support, to be similar to the Nazis.
He's one of their leading staffers on a massive salary. He fronts one of their biggest shows. And how many days a week he works at it or his contractual arrangements are irrelevant. He's strongly associated with them and their brand and they pay him, using licence fee payers money. Under IR35 he would be considered a disguised employee. And he crossed the line.
The BBC were right to enter talks with him over the issue, and to suspend him when he refused to discuss any moderation whatsoever.
It's not a free speech issue.
First of all - no he didn't. He said the language used was reminiscent of the Nazis. Which may be an exaggeration but given the increasingly authoritarian and xenophobic behaviour of Braverman in particular can hardly be said to be utterly outrageous. Clamping down on protests, attacking the press, demonising 'otherness' and routine flouting of the law as Braverman has done were all things the Nazis did. True, she has not gone nearly so far as they did, but she is going much too far for a fully democratic system to be healthy.
Under the guidelines as explained by the corporation's own former officer, a sports presenter on a freelance contract making comments, including political comments on a non-BBC platform is not considered to be a breach of impartiality.
Therefore, ironically, in reacting as they did and taking him off air for his political views, the BBC have - in fact - not acted with political impartiality.
They have also broken his contract, breached their own rules, wrecked their programme schedules, caused the whole tweet to dominate several news cycles and made themselves a national laughing stock.
This is not an employment issue. It is not even a free speech issue. It is an example of How To Look Incredibly Thick and Politically Biased.
If they had just quietly said to Lineker 'dial it down please, we're getting complaints' the whole stupid mess could have been avoided.
The problem with this argument is that plenty of your fellow travellers, including @RochdalePioneers, say it absolutely was a comparion to the Nazis and rightly so.
It insults all our intelligence to pretend it wasn't. So let's move on from this shall we.
I do not for one minute believe that the term 'language that is not dissimilar to that used by Germany in the 30s' would stand as a synonym for 'Nazis' in a court of law, e.g in a libel case.
I don’t think anyone actually thinks it was a comparison to the Nazis. Just bad faith actors who funnily enough support the Government.
Of course it was a comparison to the Nazis.
There are some people who regard making a comparison to the Nazis as something like an argument version of a trump card, so that their opponent in the argument instantly loses. It's a boring and lazy way to conduct a debate, but it's not something anyone should lose their job over.
Of course, sometimes such a comparison will be warranted, but nearly as often as it is invoked.
Gary is not thick. And he’s never been afraid to say big accusations before, if he thought Nazis he’d have said Nazis.
As I pointed out a few day's ago, he said 1930s Germany, not 1940s Germany, so he was drawing a distinction between the period under the Nazis when the final solution was in full swing, and the gas chambers were operational, and the period before that, to invoke the slippery slope argument.
if he'd said Nazis then he wouldn't have been able to draw that distinction, but it was Nazis in the 1930s and Nazis in the 1940s all the same.
I think we’re all over-analysing. One tweet, sent in a moment of exasperation that people were telling him he shouldn’t express an opinion on the Rwanda policy. The 30s German reference was throwaway, yes a bit Godwin, but I doubt he took more than a couple of minutes to compose it.
Twitter is full of bombast and exaggeration. We’re all analysing it as if it’s Xi’s foreign policy speech at the latest national congress of the Chinese Communist party.
That's fair enough, but it's still the case that a reference to 1930s Germany was a reference to the Nazis, and not to some other minor party of the right-wing in late Weimar Republic Germany.
Again, you and others are overanalysing. Of course he was referring to Nazi Germany. Does anyone think he’s thought long and hard about the different factions in 30s Germany and is making some subtle reference to pre-Nazi rumblings from other parties? He’s done the same GCSEs we all did. This is at the level of “The Nazis, a warning from history”.
Yet this one tweet is being picked apart like the meaning of “this is my body” during the Protestant Reformation.
Only on here. For the vast majority it's a much loved TV presenter being suspended for not supporting the government.
Free speech: talking positively about Gary Lineker, who can say whatever he likes Not Free Speech: talking negatively about Gary Lineker, where you cannot say whatever you like
Gary Lineker cannot say what he likes. He cannot libel people (well he can but it might be expensive)
We can talk as negatively as we like about Gary Lineker again as long as we don't libel him.
Seems pretty simple to me.
Gary Lineker can libel anyone he likes, because he's fucking minted. Anyone taking him on in a libel case would live to regret it.
OGH OTOH...
Yes, sadly, it's effectively a privilege of wealth. It's why Gary Lineker and J K Rowling can do things mere mortals cannot.
If you were on £25k a year as a BBC staffer, or contractor, you'd be put back in your box very quickly for even a minor political comment.
Well, yes, because different rules would apply.
But he was a part time freelancer talking in his personal capacity on a separate platform. Whether you agree with what he said or not, it's difficult to argue that the BBC should suspend him for impartiality reasons.
Bringing the corporation into disrepute would have been a stronger ground, but TBF they've done an awesome job of that themselves.
He did bring the corporation into disrepute. He compared one of the leading policies of the Government of the day, which commands majority support, to be similar to the Nazis.
He's one of their leading staffers on a massive salary. He fronts one of their biggest shows. And how many days a week he works at it or his contractual arrangements are irrelevant. He's strongly associated with them and their brand and they pay him, using licence fee payers money. Under IR35 he would be considered a disguised employee. And he crossed the line.
The BBC were right to enter talks with him over the issue, and to suspend him when he refused to discuss any moderation whatsoever.
It's not a free speech issue.
First of all - no he didn't. He said the language used was reminiscent of the Nazis. Which may be an exaggeration but given the increasingly authoritarian and xenophobic behaviour of Braverman in particular can hardly be said to be utterly outrageous. Clamping down on protests, attacking the press, demonising 'otherness' and routine flouting of the law as Braverman has done were all things the Nazis did. True, she has not gone nearly so far as they did, but she is going much too far for a fully democratic system to be healthy.
Under the guidelines as explained by the corporation's own former officer, a sports presenter on a freelance contract making comments, including political comments on a non-BBC platform is not considered to be a breach of impartiality.
Therefore, ironically, in reacting as they did and taking him off air for his political views, the BBC have - in fact - not acted with political impartiality.
They have also broken his contract, breached their own rules, wrecked their programme schedules, caused the whole tweet to dominate several news cycles and made themselves a national laughing stock.
This is not an employment issue. It is not even a free speech issue. It is an example of How To Look Incredibly Thick and Politically Biased.
If they had just quietly said to Lineker 'dial it down please, we're getting complaints' the whole stupid mess could have been avoided.
The problem with this argument is that plenty of your fellow travellers, including @RochdalePioneers, say it absolutely was a comparion to the Nazis and rightly so.
It insults all our intelligence to pretend it wasn't. So let's move on from this shall we.
I do not for one minute believe that the term 'language that is not dissimilar to that used by Germany in the 30s' would stand as a synonym for 'Nazis' in a court of law, e.g in a libel case.
I don’t think anyone actually thinks it was a comparison to the Nazis. Just bad faith actors who funnily enough support the Government.
Of course it was a comparison to the Nazis.
There are some people who regard making a comparison to the Nazis as something like an argument version of a trump card, so that their opponent in the argument instantly loses. It's a boring and lazy way to conduct a debate, but it's not something anyone should lose their job over.
Of course, sometimes such a comparison will be warranted, but nearly as often as it is invoked.
Gary is not thick. And he’s never been afraid to say big accusations before, if he thought Nazis he’d have said Nazis.
As I pointed out a few day's ago, he said 1930s Germany, not 1940s Germany, so he was drawing a distinction between the period under the Nazis when the final solution was in full swing, and the gas chambers were operational, and the period before that, to invoke the slippery slope argument.
if he'd said Nazis then he wouldn't have been able to draw that distinction, but it was Nazis in the 1930s and Nazis in the 1940s all the same.
I think we’re all over-analysing. One tweet, sent in a moment of exasperation that people were telling him he shouldn’t express an opinion on the Rwanda policy. The 30s German reference was throwaway, yes a bit Godwin, but I doubt he took more than a couple of minutes to compose it.
Twitter is full of bombast and exaggeration. We’re all analysing it as if it’s Xi’s foreign policy speech at the latest national congress of the Chinese Communist party.
That's fair enough, but it's still the case that a reference to 1930s Germany was a reference to the Nazis, and not to some other minor party of the right-wing in late Weimar Republic Germany.
Again, you and others are overanalysing. Of course he was referring to Nazi Germany. Does anyone think he’s thought long and hard about the different factions in 30s Germany and is making some subtle reference to pre-Nazi rumblings from other parties?
I have literally had someone in real life claim he was not calling anything Nazi like with his comment, which I felt was just plain silly given its been done to death on here that him being right to do so is not even the main point.
The thing is that I don’t think Gary’s comments were dumb. I think he was spot on.
This Government dehumanises and treats immigrants like cattle.
Yes, I think he has a point. He should be allowed to make that point. The BBC has once again made itself look foolish. Just as with the dodgy editing of the Queen, the Brand/Ross affair and many other issues.
The free speech brigade want him cancelled.
He isn’t a BBC employee, he is no more restricted than you or I - but the BBC think they can silence a man who talks about sport and is hired as a contractor from speaking.
All because the Tories don’t like him.
That’s an important point. In employment law and IR35 there’s a “control test”. Crudely employees are subject to a fairly high level of control, though clearly this does vary depending on the circumstances in each case. Contractors necessarily have more freedom. The more control the BBC exercise over Lineker there is a possibility, albeit remote, that HMRC may come and ask it for PAYE and employers NI contributions rather than chasing Lineker.
This is why most companies have used blanket decisions to put all their contractors inside IR35 rather than run the risk of being caught out by HMRC. I know that is not how they are supposed to work but that is what almost all companies are doing irrespective of whether the contractor should be inside or outside as far as HMRC are concerned.
The whole issue of employment status (both for statutory protection and for tax purposes) is a mess and has been for decades.
I was surprised to find out it was the BBC that was asking or advising presenters to use this tax avoidance structure. I had assumed it was the other way around.
Was this for recruitment purposes, that is - work for us, this way and you'll take home more pay?
Sorry, I am not sure. Doug gave some possible reasons in his reply a few comments ago.
Very simplistically capital gains tax is at a lower rate than income tax. So if you are engaged as a contractor via your own company and, rather than take a salary, receive the profits of the company, you pay less tax than you would if you were employed directly. In the U.K. there’s a compulsory withholding scheme on income from employment called “Pay As You Earn” (PAYE) as well, meaning employees receive income net of tax, rather than gross as “self employed” contractors do.
The Home Secretary wanting to put electronic tags on asylum seekers.
David Blunkett being the Home Secretary.
And how about this from the following year:
The Home Office is in negotiation with Tanzania over a £4m aid deal to take failed Somali asylum seekers from Britain and house them in a camp, the Guardian has learned.
A Home Office team went to Dar es Salaam last year for discussions with their counterparts in the Tanzanian government.
As part of the negotiations, the Tanzanian government has been offered an extra £4m a year in aid.
The Home Secretary wanting to electronic tags on asylum seekers.
David Blunkett being the Home Secretary.
And how about this from the following year:
The Home Office is in negotiation with Tanzania over a £4m aid deal to take failed Somali asylum seekers from Britain and house them in a camp, the Guardian has learned.
A Home Office team went to Dar es Salaam last year for discussions with their counterparts in the Tanzanian government.
As part of the negotiations, the Tanzanian government has been offered an extra £4m a year in aid.
@DougSeal you’re not a loser and that poster who called you that is an arsehole.
You have many friends here including me, please reach out if you need help as I do understand how difficult life can be at times.
Sending you my best and also was sorry to read about your dog. When our black lab passed away I lost the last connection I had to my granny and I was very distressed about it. I lost a very loyal friend and connection all in one go.
Don't worry, that's one of Malcolm's highest complements.
The thing is that I don’t think Gary’s comments were dumb. I think he was spot on.
This Government dehumanises and treats immigrants like cattle.
Yes, I think he has a point. He should be allowed to make that point. The BBC has once again made itself look foolish. Just as with the dodgy editing of the Queen, the Brand/Ross affair and many other issues.
The free speech brigade want him cancelled.
He isn’t a BBC employee, he is no more restricted than you or I - but the BBC think they can silence a man who talks about sport and is hired as a contractor from speaking.
All because the Tories don’t like him.
Witness also the shitstorm whipped up against Rashford in 2020/21 as he shamed the government into doing more for poor families.
Indeed. The right have been outed as the chief protagonists of cancel culture, thanks to Garygate. These snowflakes are pathetic: free speech is a precious thing and it’s under attack from the authoritarians in government.
The thing is that I don’t think Gary’s comments were dumb. I think he was spot on.
This Government dehumanises and treats immigrants like cattle.
Yes, I think he has a point. He should be allowed to make that point. The BBC has once again made itself look foolish. Just as with the dodgy editing of the Queen, the Brand/Ross affair and many other issues.
The free speech brigade want him cancelled.
He isn’t a BBC employee, he is no more restricted than you or I - but the BBC think they can silence a man who talks about sport and is hired as a contractor from speaking.
All because the Tories don’t like him.
That’s an important point. In employment law and IR35 there’s a “control test”. Crudely employees are subject to a fairly high level of control, though clearly this does vary depending on the circumstances in each case. Contractors necessarily have more freedom. The more control the BBC exercise over Lineker there is a possibility, albeit remote, that HMRC may come and ask it for PAYE and employers NI contributions rather than chasing Lineker.
This is why most companies have used blanket decisions to put all their contractors inside IR35 rather than run the risk of being caught out by HMRC. I know that is not how they are supposed to work but that is what almost all companies are doing irrespective of whether the contractor should be inside or outside as far as HMRC are concerned.
The whole issue of employment status (both for statutory protection and for tax purposes) is a mess and has been for decades.
I was surprised to find out it was the BBC that was asking or advising presenters to use this tax avoidance structure. I had assumed it was the other way around.
Was this for recruitment purposes, that is - work for us, this way and you'll take home more pay?
Sorry, I am not sure. Doug gave some possible reasons in his reply a few comments ago.
What i'm gropping at is, BBC wants to hold the line, or actually reduce (as in GL's case) the amount it pays out, by structuring deals in a way that minimizes their costs, while maximizing the payout for the person getting paid, in some fashion.
Isn't this kind of thing pretty common in the wide world of prime-time sports? And media?
This really isn't complicated All of the following are true.
1. The government's Illegal Immigration Bill is unworkable, probably contrary to international law, and cynical. 2. It is however right that the boats need to be discouraged, the issue isn't the principle, but the practicalities. 3. Yes, some of the language used by some ministers is unacceptable. 4. No it's not like the language used by the Nazis. 5. However Gary Lineker should be perfectly free, in a private capacity outside his role on TV, to make the argument that it is 6. The BBC has made an unholy mess of this.
Bang on. Good, hopefully now we can move on to another topic, like the SNP or HS2.
It's amusing and depressing at the same time that this has basically been the sole topic of conversation for the last few days. Probably a more pleasant experience than our five-thousandth discussion about indyref though.
I certainly think it's true to say that the Lineker saga is not panning out quite as the Daily Mail envisaged when it decided to go for him. I suspect that the Government is also less than thrilled that Sharp and Davie are right back in the spotlight again.
The thing is that I don’t think Gary’s comments were dumb. I think he was spot on.
This Government dehumanises and treats immigrants like cattle.
Yes, I think he has a point. He should be allowed to make that point. The BBC has once again made itself look foolish. Just as with the dodgy editing of the Queen, the Brand/Ross affair and many other issues.
The free speech brigade want him cancelled.
He isn’t a BBC employee, he is no more restricted than you or I - but the BBC think they can silence a man who talks about sport and is hired as a contractor from speaking.
All because the Tories don’t like him.
That’s an important point. In employment law and IR35 there’s a “control test”. Crudely employees are subject to a fairly high level of control, though clearly this does vary depending on the circumstances in each case. Contractors necessarily have more freedom. The more control the BBC exercise over Lineker there is a possibility, albeit remote, that HMRC may come and ask it for PAYE and employers NI contributions rather than chasing Lineker.
This is why most companies have used blanket decisions to put all their contractors inside IR35 rather than run the risk of being caught out by HMRC. I know that is not how they are supposed to work but that is what almost all companies are doing irrespective of whether the contractor should be inside or outside as far as HMRC are concerned.
The whole issue of employment status (both for statutory protection and for tax purposes) is a mess and has been for decades.
I was surprised to find out it was the BBC that was asking or advising presenters to use this tax avoidance structure. I had assumed it was the other way around.
That’s right. Having a contractor is far easier and cheaper than having an employee. No employers NI, no PAYE hassle, fewer statutory protections (no statutory redundancy or unfair dismissal for example). I once acted against a company in Bradford that listed all its manual labour workforce as being members of various LLPs. That didn’t end well.
You clearly don’t know how much my end client currently pays for my time. It’s not cheap and even tse would regard it as a nice pay rise
The thing is that I don’t think Gary’s comments were dumb. I think he was spot on.
This Government dehumanises and treats immigrants like cattle.
Yes, I think he has a point. He should be allowed to make that point. The BBC has once again made itself look foolish. Just as with the dodgy editing of the Queen, the Brand/Ross affair and many other issues.
The free speech brigade want him cancelled.
He isn’t a BBC employee, he is no more restricted than you or I - but the BBC think they can silence a man who talks about sport and is hired as a contractor from speaking.
All because the Tories don’t like him.
That’s an important point. In employment law and IR35 there’s a “control test”. Crudely employees are subject to a fairly high level of control, though clearly this does vary depending on the circumstances in each case. Contractors necessarily have more freedom. The more control the BBC exercise over Lineker there is a possibility, albeit remote, that HMRC may come and ask it for PAYE and employers NI contributions rather than chasing Lineker.
This is why most companies have used blanket decisions to put all their contractors inside IR35 rather than run the risk of being caught out by HMRC. I know that is not how they are supposed to work but that is what almost all companies are doing irrespective of whether the contractor should be inside or outside as far as HMRC are concerned.
The whole issue of employment status (both for statutory protection and for tax purposes) is a mess and has been for decades.
I was surprised to find out it was the BBC that was asking or advising presenters to use this tax avoidance structure. I had assumed it was the other way around.
Was this for recruitment purposes, that is - work for us, this way and you'll take home more pay?
Sorry, I am not sure. Doug gave some possible reasons in his reply a few comments ago.
Very simplistically capital gains tax is at a lower rate than income tax. So if you are engaged as a contractor via your own company and, rather than take a salary, receive the profits of the company, you pay less tax than you would if you were employed directly. In the U.K. there’s a compulsory withholding scheme on income from employment called “Pay As You Earn” (PAYE) as well, meaning employees receive income net of tax, rather than gross as “self employed” contractors do.
Sorry, I’m tired, I meant corporation tax rather than capital gains. There’s tax on the share dividends you pay yourself. Oh I need to go to bed…
Have the Tories largely shredded their own "War of Woke" by the Wack way they've engineered (or so it appears) perhaps the most famous example of Cancel Culture, since proto-wokeists beheaded Charles I of blessed memory?
Clearly not among true-blue believers, though seems they've dented even their morale & confidence somewhat. Anti-woke still a rallying cry for rallying the base, esp. parts flaking off toward Reform.
However, with swing-voters, whose votes are up for grabs between Conservatives and a LESS right-wing option, the story, reckon it's a different story.
About time for someone with the PM's and CUP's interest(s) at heart, to start giving direction to stop digging, and start re-filling the hole the Tories have dug for themselves.
Maybe George Osborne's statement is part of that?
I recognise you won't have any sympathies politically with this, but as I have said, there are aspects of the kerfuffle that feel to me like a staged media event to reverse the current migration bill. 'Take the proles' football away and they will soon turn away from the migrant bill'.
Every piece of legislative progress than diverges us from the EU, puts us on a secure footing as an independent country in control of our borders, or can lead to economic growth in a post-EU context, is being dropped, quietly or noisily, by the Sunak Government.
Osborne's commentary within that context reminds me of that slithery man in the Lord of the Rings who was advising the King of the Horse Riders.
Yes, of course, the political classes are some giant conspiracy.
Of course, it does rather raise the question of why the Remain camp in the referendum was quite so extraordinarily incompetent. But, don't worry, I'm sure you can think of a couple of good (albeit absurd) explanations.
Quick question for you: who exactly is in on this plan? Presumably, the government would need to be, because otherwise they might have very sensibly ignored his ridiculous comments.
There isn't much of a conspiracy, there are openly proposed changes, ones that are extremely deleterious to the wealth and wellbeing of the vast majority of people, because they amount to an enormous misappropriation of peoples' money, and unacceptable encroachments on peoples' freedoms, primarily but not exclusively by dangling the theat of a man-made climate catastrophe. Careerist politicians, who are fairly easily identified, have decided that this is the way that the wind is blowing, so they will go along with it. Careerist civil servants likewise. It is important that there is no real political choice. If there were, decisions that are going to be massively unpopular would be overturned. Britain has ended up with a choice of Davos man one or Davos man two. Given that the Davos prospectus is one that nobody voted for, and if it were in a manifesto, nobody would, that cannot be right.
Regarding the referendum, I don't think the remain campaign was particularly terrible, but it was fairly typical, with a combination of dire threats about the future, and the attempt to denigrate, if not dehumanise, those supporting leave. I don't think many at the top of the remain campaign thought seriously that they would lose.
Been reading Ian Leslie's 'How to Disagree' book today. Some pretty obvious examples of productive and unproductive conflict in there, such as looking at Mandela, but can't say I expected an extended look at negotiation attempts with the Branch Davidians.
The thing is that I don’t think Gary’s comments were dumb. I think he was spot on.
This Government dehumanises and treats immigrants like cattle.
Yes, I think he has a point. He should be allowed to make that point. The BBC has once again made itself look foolish. Just as with the dodgy editing of the Queen, the Brand/Ross affair and many other issues.
The free speech brigade want him cancelled.
He isn’t a BBC employee, he is no more restricted than you or I - but the BBC think they can silence a man who talks about sport and is hired as a contractor from speaking.
All because the Tories don’t like him.
That’s an important point. In employment law and IR35 there’s a “control test”. Crudely employees are subject to a fairly high level of control, though clearly this does vary depending on the circumstances in each case. Contractors necessarily have more freedom. The more control the BBC exercise over Lineker there is a possibility, albeit remote, that HMRC may come and ask it for PAYE and employers NI contributions rather than chasing Lineker.
This is why most companies have used blanket decisions to put all their contractors inside IR35 rather than run the risk of being caught out by HMRC. I know that is not how they are supposed to work but that is what almost all companies are doing irrespective of whether the contractor should be inside or outside as far as HMRC are concerned.
The whole issue of employment status (both for statutory protection and for tax purposes) is a mess and has been for decades.
I was surprised to find out it was the BBC that was asking or advising presenters to use this tax avoidance structure. I had assumed it was the other way around.
Was this for recruitment purposes, that is - work for us, this way and you'll take home more pay?
Nope it was we don’t want you as an employee for “reasons” but will happily keep you on if you use a limited company.
To say the bbc deserve to be presented with a very large bill from hmrc would be an understatement given the stories I’ve hear
Free speech: talking positively about Gary Lineker, who can say whatever he likes Not Free Speech: talking negatively about Gary Lineker, where you cannot say whatever you like
Gary Lineker cannot say what he likes. He cannot libel people (well he can but it might be expensive)
We can talk as negatively as we like about Gary Lineker again as long as we don't libel him.
Seems pretty simple to me.
Gary Lineker can libel anyone he likes, because he's fucking minted. Anyone taking him on in a libel case would live to regret it.
OGH OTOH...
Yes, sadly, it's effectively a privilege of wealth. It's why Gary Lineker and J K Rowling can do things mere mortals cannot.
If you were on £25k a year as a BBC staffer, or contractor, you'd be put back in your box very quickly for even a minor political comment.
Well, yes, because different rules would apply.
But he was a part time freelancer talking in his personal capacity on a separate platform. Whether you agree with what he said or not, it's difficult to argue that the BBC should suspend him for impartiality reasons.
Bringing the corporation into disrepute would have been a stronger ground, but TBF they've done an awesome job of that themselves.
He did bring the corporation into disrepute. He compared one of the leading policies of the Government of the day, which commands majority support, to be similar to the Nazis.
He's one of their leading staffers on a massive salary. He fronts one of their biggest shows. And how many days a week he works at it or his contractual arrangements are irrelevant. He's strongly associated with them and their brand and they pay him, using licence fee payers money. Under IR35 he would be considered a disguised employee. And he crossed the line.
The BBC were right to enter talks with him over the issue, and to suspend him when he refused to discuss any moderation whatsoever.
It's not a free speech issue.
First of all - no he didn't. He said the language used was reminiscent of the Nazis. Which may be an exaggeration but given the increasingly authoritarian and xenophobic behaviour of Braverman in particular can hardly be said to be utterly outrageous. Clamping down on protests, attacking the press, demonising 'otherness' and routine flouting of the law as Braverman has done were all things the Nazis did. True, she has not gone nearly so far as they did, but she is going much too far for a fully democratic system to be healthy.
Under the guidelines as explained by the corporation's own former officer, a sports presenter on a freelance contract making comments, including political comments on a non-BBC platform is not considered to be a breach of impartiality.
Therefore, ironically, in reacting as they did and taking him off air for his political views, the BBC have - in fact - not acted with political impartiality.
They have also broken his contract, breached their own rules, wrecked their programme schedules, caused the whole tweet to dominate several news cycles and made themselves a national laughing stock.
This is not an employment issue. It is not even a free speech issue. It is an example of How To Look Incredibly Thick and Politically Biased.
If they had just quietly said to Lineker 'dial it down please, we're getting complaints' the whole stupid mess could have been avoided.
The problem with this argument is that plenty of your fellow travellers, including @RochdalePioneers, say it absolutely was a comparion to the Nazis and rightly so.
It insults all our intelligence to pretend it wasn't. So let's move on from this shall we.
I do not for one minute believe that the term 'language that is not dissimilar to that used by Germany in the 30s' would stand as a synonym for 'Nazis' in a court of law, e.g in a libel case.
I don’t think anyone actually thinks it was a comparison to the Nazis. Just bad faith actors who funnily enough support the Government.
Of course it was a comparison to the Nazis.
There are some people who regard making a comparison to the Nazis as something like an argument version of a trump card, so that their opponent in the argument instantly loses. It's a boring and lazy way to conduct a debate, but it's not something anyone should lose their job over.
Of course, sometimes such a comparison will be warranted, but nearly as often as it is invoked.
Gary is not thick. And he’s never been afraid to say big accusations before, if he thought Nazis he’d have said Nazis.
As I pointed out a few day's ago, he said 1930s Germany, not 1940s Germany, so he was drawing a distinction between the period under the Nazis when the final solution was in full swing, and the gas chambers were operational, and the period before that, to invoke the slippery slope argument.
if he'd said Nazis then he wouldn't have been able to draw that distinction, but it was Nazis in the 1930s and Nazis in the 1940s all the same.
I think we’re all over-analysing. One tweet, sent in a moment of exasperation that people were telling him he shouldn’t express an opinion on the Rwanda policy. The 30s German reference was throwaway, yes a bit Godwin, but I doubt he took more than a couple of minutes to compose it.
Twitter is full of bombast and exaggeration. We’re all analysing it as if it’s Xi’s foreign policy speech at the latest national congress of the Chinese Communist party.
That's fair enough, but it's still the case that a reference to 1930s Germany was a reference to the Nazis, and not to some other minor party of the right-wing in late Weimar Republic Germany.
Again, you and others are overanalysing. Of course he was referring to Nazi Germany. Does anyone think he’s thought long and hard about the different factions in 30s Germany and is making some subtle reference to pre-Nazi rumblings from other parties? He’s done the same GCSEs we all did. This is at the level of “The Nazis, a warning from history”.
Yet this one tweet is being picked apart like the meaning of “this is my body” during the Protestant Reformation.
I don't think that's fair.
I was initially attracted to this site because there were a bunch of people who appreciated overanalysis of interesting patterns in opinion poll subsamples. Overanalysing is what I do. It's who I am. Criticising someone on pb.com for overanalysing is like being annoyed at someone in a desert being thirsty.
This really isn't complicated All of the following are true.
1. The government's Illegal Immigration Bill is unworkable, probably contrary to international law, and cynical. 2. It is however right that the boats need to be discouraged, the issue isn't the principle, but the practicalities. 3. Yes, some of the language used by some ministers is unacceptable. 4. No it's not like the language used by the Nazis. 5. However Gary Lineker should be perfectly free, in a private capacity outside his role on TV, to make the argument that it is 6. The BBC has made an unholy mess of this.
Bang on. Good, hopefully now we can move on to another topic, like the SNP or HS2.
It's amusing and depressing at the same time that this has basically been the sole topic of conversation for the last few days. Probably a more pleasant experience than our five-thousandth discussion about indyref though.
There’s always What3Words and Guess The Weight of Boris to fall back on…
The Home Secretary wanting to put electronic tags on asylum seekers.
David Blunkett being the Home Secretary.
And how about this from the following year:
The Home Office is in negotiation with Tanzania over a £4m aid deal to take failed Somali asylum seekers from Britain and house them in a camp, the Guardian has learned.
A Home Office team went to Dar es Salaam last year for discussions with their counterparts in the Tanzanian government.
As part of the negotiations, the Tanzanian government has been offered an extra £4m a year in aid.
I wonder how many are now frustrated this story is continuing when both sides need to shake hands, move on and Lineker back on MOD
Hopefully according to the news this could happen in the morning
Fingers crossed
Not gonna happen with Sharp and Davie in place. One or other, preferably both, will have to go. More widely. BBC news presenters aren't going be cowed to the same extent. Result Daily Mail.
Free speech: talking positively about Gary Lineker, who can say whatever he likes Not Free Speech: talking negatively about Gary Lineker, where you cannot say whatever you like
Gary Lineker cannot say what he likes. He cannot libel people (well he can but it might be expensive)
We can talk as negatively as we like about Gary Lineker again as long as we don't libel him.
Seems pretty simple to me.
Gary Lineker can libel anyone he likes, because he's fucking minted. Anyone taking him on in a libel case would live to regret it.
OGH OTOH...
Yes, sadly, it's effectively a privilege of wealth. It's why Gary Lineker and J K Rowling can do things mere mortals cannot.
If you were on £25k a year as a BBC staffer, or contractor, you'd be put back in your box very quickly for even a minor political comment.
Well, yes, because different rules would apply.
But he was a part time freelancer talking in his personal capacity on a separate platform. Whether you agree with what he said or not, it's difficult to argue that the BBC should suspend him for impartiality reasons.
Bringing the corporation into disrepute would have been a stronger ground, but TBF they've done an awesome job of that themselves.
He did bring the corporation into disrepute. He compared one of the leading policies of the Government of the day, which commands majority support, to be similar to the Nazis.
He's one of their leading staffers on a massive salary. He fronts one of their biggest shows. And how many days a week he works at it or his contractual arrangements are irrelevant. He's strongly associated with them and their brand and they pay him, using licence fee payers money. Under IR35 he would be considered a disguised employee. And he crossed the line.
The BBC were right to enter talks with him over the issue, and to suspend him when he refused to discuss any moderation whatsoever.
It's not a free speech issue.
First of all - no he didn't. He said the language used was reminiscent of the Nazis. Which may be an exaggeration but given the increasingly authoritarian and xenophobic behaviour of Braverman in particular can hardly be said to be utterly outrageous. Clamping down on protests, attacking the press, demonising 'otherness' and routine flouting of the law as Braverman has done were all things the Nazis did. True, she has not gone nearly so far as they did, but she is going much too far for a fully democratic system to be healthy.
Under the guidelines as explained by the corporation's own former officer, a sports presenter on a freelance contract making comments, including political comments on a non-BBC platform is not considered to be a breach of impartiality.
Therefore, ironically, in reacting as they did and taking him off air for his political views, the BBC have - in fact - not acted with political impartiality.
They have also broken his contract, breached their own rules, wrecked their programme schedules, caused the whole tweet to dominate several news cycles and made themselves a national laughing stock.
This is not an employment issue. It is not even a free speech issue. It is an example of How To Look Incredibly Thick and Politically Biased.
If they had just quietly said to Lineker 'dial it down please, we're getting complaints' the whole stupid mess could have been avoided.
The problem with this argument is that plenty of your fellow travellers, including @RochdalePioneers, say it absolutely was a comparion to the Nazis and rightly so.
It insults all our intelligence to pretend it wasn't. So let's move on from this shall we.
I do not for one minute believe that the term 'language that is not dissimilar to that used by Germany in the 30s' would stand as a synonym for 'Nazis' in a court of law, e.g in a libel case.
I don’t think anyone actually thinks it was a comparison to the Nazis. Just bad faith actors who funnily enough support the Government.
Of course it was a comparison to the Nazis.
There are some people who regard making a comparison to the Nazis as something like an argument version of a trump card, so that their opponent in the argument instantly loses. It's a boring and lazy way to conduct a debate, but it's not something anyone should lose their job over.
Of course, sometimes such a comparison will be warranted, but nearly as often as it is invoked.
Gary is not thick. And he’s never been afraid to say big accusations before, if he thought Nazis he’d have said Nazis.
As I pointed out a few day's ago, he said 1930s Germany, not 1940s Germany, so he was drawing a distinction between the period under the Nazis when the final solution was in full swing, and the gas chambers were operational, and the period before that, to invoke the slippery slope argument.
if he'd said Nazis then he wouldn't have been able to draw that distinction, but it was Nazis in the 1930s and Nazis in the 1940s all the same.
I think we’re all over-analysing. One tweet, sent in a moment of exasperation that people were telling him he shouldn’t express an opinion on the Rwanda policy. The 30s German reference was throwaway, yes a bit Godwin, but I doubt he took more than a couple of minutes to compose it.
Twitter is full of bombast and exaggeration. We’re all analysing it as if it’s Xi’s foreign policy speech at the latest national congress of the Chinese Communist party.
That's fair enough, but it's still the case that a reference to 1930s Germany was a reference to the Nazis, and not to some other minor party of the right-wing in late Weimar Republic Germany.
Again, you and others are overanalysing. Of course he was referring to Nazi Germany. Does anyone think he’s thought long and hard about the different factions in 30s Germany and is making some subtle reference to pre-Nazi rumblings from other parties? He’s done the same GCSEs we all did. This is at the level of “The Nazis, a warning from history”.
Yet this one tweet is being picked apart like the meaning of “this is my body” during the Protestant Reformation.
I don't think that's fair.
I was initially attracted to this site because there were a bunch of people who appreciated overanalysis of interesting patterns in opinion poll subsamples. Overanalysing is what I do. It's who I am. Criticising someone on pb.com for overanalysing is like being annoyed at someone in a desert being thirsty.
True that. In a couple of hours time we can all start overanalysing the percentage falls on the Nikkei, followed an hour or so later by the Hang Seng.
Free speech: talking positively about Gary Lineker, who can say whatever he likes Not Free Speech: talking negatively about Gary Lineker, where you cannot say whatever you like
Gary Lineker cannot say what he likes. He cannot libel people (well he can but it might be expensive)
We can talk as negatively as we like about Gary Lineker again as long as we don't libel him.
Seems pretty simple to me.
Gary Lineker can libel anyone he likes, because he's fucking minted. Anyone taking him on in a libel case would live to regret it.
OGH OTOH...
Yes, sadly, it's effectively a privilege of wealth. It's why Gary Lineker and J K Rowling can do things mere mortals cannot.
If you were on £25k a year as a BBC staffer, or contractor, you'd be put back in your box very quickly for even a minor political comment.
Well, yes, because different rules would apply.
But he was a part time freelancer talking in his personal capacity on a separate platform. Whether you agree with what he said or not, it's difficult to argue that the BBC should suspend him for impartiality reasons.
Bringing the corporation into disrepute would have been a stronger ground, but TBF they've done an awesome job of that themselves.
He did bring the corporation into disrepute. He compared one of the leading policies of the Government of the day, which commands majority support, to be similar to the Nazis.
He's one of their leading staffers on a massive salary. He fronts one of their biggest shows. And how many days a week he works at it or his contractual arrangements are irrelevant. He's strongly associated with them and their brand and they pay him, using licence fee payers money. Under IR35 he would be considered a disguised employee. And he crossed the line.
The BBC were right to enter talks with him over the issue, and to suspend him when he refused to discuss any moderation whatsoever.
It's not a free speech issue.
First of all - no he didn't. He said the language used was reminiscent of the Nazis. Which may be an exaggeration but given the increasingly authoritarian and xenophobic behaviour of Braverman in particular can hardly be said to be utterly outrageous. Clamping down on protests, attacking the press, demonising 'otherness' and routine flouting of the law as Braverman has done were all things the Nazis did. True, she has not gone nearly so far as they did, but she is going much too far for a fully democratic system to be healthy.
Under the guidelines as explained by the corporation's own former officer, a sports presenter on a freelance contract making comments, including political comments on a non-BBC platform is not considered to be a breach of impartiality.
Therefore, ironically, in reacting as they did and taking him off air for his political views, the BBC have - in fact - not acted with political impartiality.
They have also broken his contract, breached their own rules, wrecked their programme schedules, caused the whole tweet to dominate several news cycles and made themselves a national laughing stock.
This is not an employment issue. It is not even a free speech issue. It is an example of How To Look Incredibly Thick and Politically Biased.
If they had just quietly said to Lineker 'dial it down please, we're getting complaints' the whole stupid mess could have been avoided.
The problem with this argument is that plenty of your fellow travellers, including @RochdalePioneers, say it absolutely was a comparion to the Nazis and rightly so.
It insults all our intelligence to pretend it wasn't. So let's move on from this shall we.
I do not for one minute believe that the term 'language that is not dissimilar to that used by Germany in the 30s' would stand as a synonym for 'Nazis' in a court of law, e.g in a libel case.
I don’t think anyone actually thinks it was a comparison to the Nazis. Just bad faith actors who funnily enough support the Government.
Of course it was a comparison to the Nazis.
There are some people who regard making a comparison to the Nazis as something like an argument version of a trump card, so that their opponent in the argument instantly loses. It's a boring and lazy way to conduct a debate, but it's not something anyone should lose their job over.
Of course, sometimes such a comparison will be warranted, but nearly as often as it is invoked.
Gary is not thick. And he’s never been afraid to say big accusations before, if he thought Nazis he’d have said Nazis.
As I pointed out a few day's ago, he said 1930s Germany, not 1940s Germany, so he was drawing a distinction between the period under the Nazis when the final solution was in full swing, and the gas chambers were operational, and the period before that, to invoke the slippery slope argument.
if he'd said Nazis then he wouldn't have been able to draw that distinction, but it was Nazis in the 1930s and Nazis in the 1940s all the same.
I think we’re all over-analysing. One tweet, sent in a moment of exasperation that people were telling him he shouldn’t express an opinion on the Rwanda policy. The 30s German reference was throwaway, yes a bit Godwin, but I doubt he took more than a couple of minutes to compose it.
Twitter is full of bombast and exaggeration. We’re all analysing it as if it’s Xi’s foreign policy speech at the latest national congress of the Chinese Communist party.
That's fair enough, but it's still the case that a reference to 1930s Germany was a reference to the Nazis, and not to some other minor party of the right-wing in late Weimar Republic Germany.
Again, you and others are overanalysing. Of course he was referring to Nazi Germany. Does anyone think he’s thought long and hard about the different factions in 30s Germany and is making some subtle reference to pre-Nazi rumblings from other parties? He’s done the same GCSEs we all did. This is at the level of “The Nazis, a warning from history”.
Yet this one tweet is being picked apart like the meaning of “this is my body” during the Protestant Reformation.
Only on here. For the vast majority it's a much loved TV presenter being suspended for not supporting the government.
Exactly. Rest is insider baseball. (Or charmed circle cricket?)
NOT a good look for government. Any government. But especially this government.
This really isn't complicated All of the following are true.
1. The government's Illegal Immigration Bill is unworkable, probably contrary to international law, and cynical. 2. It is however right that the boats need to be discouraged, the issue isn't the principle, but the practicalities. 3. Yes, some of the language used by some ministers is unacceptable. 4. No it's not like the language used by the Nazis. 5. However Gary Lineker should be perfectly free, in a private capacity outside his role on TV, to make the argument that it is 6. The BBC has made an unholy mess of this.
Bang on. Good, hopefully now we can move on to another topic, like the SNP or HS2.
It's amusing and depressing at the same time that this has basically been the sole topic of conversation for the last few days. Probably a more pleasant experience than our five-thousandth discussion about indyref though.
There’s always What3Words and Guess The Weight of Boris to fall back on…
The Home Secretary wanting to put electronic tags on asylum seekers.
David Blunkett being the Home Secretary.
And how about this from the following year:
The Home Office is in negotiation with Tanzania over a £4m aid deal to take failed Somali asylum seekers from Britain and house them in a camp, the Guardian has learned.
A Home Office team went to Dar es Salaam last year for discussions with their counterparts in the Tanzanian government.
As part of the negotiations, the Tanzanian government has been offered an extra £4m a year in aid.
My wife’s reminded me Lineker is 62 years old. 62! So he didn’t do GCSEs, he did O’Levels. Incredible.
I'm amazed anyone is amazed by this. He was top scorer in the 1986 World Cup. Which was 37 years ago. How old did folk think he was then? I did O Levels too. I'm 56.
A leading leftwing thinktank has come out in support of home secretary David Blunkett's controversial plan to send all asylum seekers to processing centres outside the EU.
But Demos says in a study published today that the British government's plan for international transit processing centres is unlikely to work unless it is part of a comprehensive system to handle all those who want to come to Europe, including tourists and other visitors.
European commission officials have been asked to submit a detailed working paper on Mr Blunkett's radical scheme to deal with asylum seekers in time for the next European summit in June.
The idea of offshore processing centres has been floated at a time when Tony Blair has announced a commitment to halving the monthly total of asylum applications in Britain by September. The prime minister is believed to have met Downing Street and Home Office officials last Thursday to review progress.
Nick Tyrone @NicholasTyrone “Lineker’s tweets aren’t grounds to cancel him – but they do make the case for scrapping the BBC,” says Dan Hannan. And that nicely cuts to the chase, why we’re on this merry-go-round in the first place. Another cherished British institution the Tories want to trash.
This really isn't complicated All of the following are true.
1. The government's Illegal Immigration Bill is unworkable, probably contrary to international law, and cynical. 2. It is however right that the boats need to be discouraged, the issue isn't the principle, but the practicalities. 3. Yes, some of the language used by some ministers is unacceptable. 4. No it's not like the language used by the Nazis. 5. However Gary Lineker should be perfectly free, in a private capacity outside his role on TV, to make the argument that it is 6. The BBC has made an unholy mess of this.
7. Several loudmouth Tory backbenchers have the political nous to spot an open goal when they see it. And slam the ball home in a Gary Lineker stylee. 8. Unfortunately. They can't distinguish their own goal from the opposition's. 9. The Daily Mail is a fuming mess. Increasingly riling up only its own readership. Whilst being a figure of mockery to outsiders. It's a liability to the Tories. 10. Defending free speech and opposing "cancel culture" has been exposed as laughable bollocks. 11. You can be out of order and still assume the moral high ground if your opponents overstretch like a trainee contortionist on a month's work experience.
This really isn't complicated All of the following are true.
1. The government's Illegal Immigration Bill is unworkable, probably contrary to international law, and cynical. 2. It is however right that the boats need to be discouraged, the issue isn't the principle, but the practicalities. 3. Yes, some of the language used by some ministers is unacceptable. 4. No it's not like the language used by the Nazis. 5. However Gary Lineker should be perfectly free, in a private capacity outside his role on TV, to make the argument that it is 6. The BBC has made an unholy mess of this.
Bang on. Good, hopefully now we can move on to another topic, like the SNP or HS2.
It's amusing and depressing at the same time that this has basically been the sole topic of conversation for the last few days. Probably a more pleasant experience than our five-thousandth discussion about indyref though.
There’s always What3Words and Guess The Weight of Boris to fall back on…
1780 - "the Influence of the Crown had increased, was increasing, and ought to be diminished'
2023 - the weight of Boris Johnson had increased, was increasing, and ought to be diminished.
Nick Tyrone @NicholasTyrone “Lineker’s tweets aren’t grounds to cancel him – but they do make the case for scrapping the BBC,” says Dan Hannan. And that nicely cuts to the chase, why we’re on this merry-go-round in the first place. Another cherished British institution the Tories want to trash.
It's not cherished by young people. The BBC will either change that or effectively scrap itself.
This really isn't complicated All of the following are true.
1. The government's Illegal Immigration Bill is unworkable, probably contrary to international law, and cynical. 2. It is however right that the boats need to be discouraged, the issue isn't the principle, but the practicalities. 3. Yes, some of the language used by some ministers is unacceptable. 4. No it's not like the language used by the Nazis. 5. However Gary Lineker should be perfectly free, in a private capacity outside his role on TV, to make the argument that it is 6. The BBC has made an unholy mess of this.
7. Several loudmouth Tory backbenchers have the political nous to spot an open goal when they see it. And slam the ball home in a Gary Lineker stylee. 8. Unfortunately. They can't distinguish their own goal from the opposition's. 9. The Daily Mail is a fuming mess. Increasingly riling up only its own readership. Whilst being a figure of mockery to outsiders. It's a liability to the Tories. 10. Defending free speech and opposing "cancel culture" has been exposed as laughable bollocks. 11. You can be out of order and still assume the moral high ground if your opponents overstretch like a trainee contortionist on a month's work experience.
12. Where's Leon?
Vietnam, still, I expect. Probably having a lot more fun now that he's been put in the PB sin bin for making comments that could provoke legal trouble for OGH.
Gary Lineker has a track record as a shit-stirrer against this Government. (I don't know how far back that extends.)
Fair enough. He can say that if he wishes.
However, he does have contractual restrictions placed upon him by his employer as to what he can say. He would probably be in deep shit if he just came out and said "this Government is as bad as the Nazis in the 1930s in its attitude to migrants." So he couches it in terms that he thinks gives him an out.
But really, it doesn't. There is no semantic difference between what he says and what people were intended to interpret him as saying. He hasn't taken the opportunity to say "that is not what I meant". Because it is what he meant.
Anybody arguing otherwise is being anti-semantic.
Oh dear.
Yes there have been criticisms of Lineker in the Jewish Chronicle, but he has also had support from less militant Jewish commentators.
You are not attacking Lineker here, you are attacking fellow posters who have a different view to yourself on this issue. That post is an appalling slur.
We have crossed swords in the past and your likely assessment of me as thick as mince, vile Remainer scum is fine, but I am no anti- Semite.
The thing is that I don’t think Gary’s comments were dumb. I think he was spot on.
This Government dehumanises and treats immigrants like cattle.
Yes, I think he has a point. He should be allowed to make that point. The BBC has once again made itself look foolish. Just as with the dodgy editing of the Queen, the Brand/Ross affair and many other issues.
The free speech brigade want him cancelled.
He isn’t a BBC employee, he is no more restricted than you or I - but the BBC think they can silence a man who talks about sport and is hired as a contractor from speaking.
All because the Tories don’t like him.
That’s an important point. In employment law and IR35 there’s a “control test”. Crudely employees are subject to a fairly high level of control, though clearly this does vary depending on the circumstances in each case. Contractors necessarily have more freedom. The more control the BBC exercise over Lineker there is a possibility, albeit remote, that HMRC may come and ask it for PAYE and employers NI contributions rather than chasing Lineker.
As far as I'm concerned if he isn't on PAYE he isn't an employee. However I think the rules on impartiality obviously have to provide to all people 'on' the BBC, whether or not they are employees. I just think in this day and age it is unsustainable to expect no-one appearing on the BBC to air their own views off air. The main thing is that newscasters do as best they can to remain impartial on air. And if some of them like to be quite controversial in their views off air that is likely to be taken into account when the next contract comes along.
“ As far as I'm concerned if he isn't on PAYE he isn't an employee. “
If it were that simple I wouldn’t have a job…
But surely the BBC do not class him as an employee? Now maybe he ought to be classed as such based on the rules, which is what HMRC are investigating.
This really isn't complicated All of the following are true.
1. The government's Illegal Immigration Bill is unworkable, probably contrary to international law, and cynical. 2. It is however right that the boats need to be discouraged, the issue isn't the principle, but the practicalities. 3. Yes, some of the language used by some ministers is unacceptable. 4. No it's not like the language used by the Nazis. 5. However Gary Lineker should be perfectly free, in a private capacity outside his role on TV, to make the argument that it is 6. The BBC has made an unholy mess of this.
Bang on. Good, hopefully now we can move on to another topic, like the SNP or HS2.
It's amusing and depressing at the same time that this has basically been the sole topic of conversation for the last few days. Probably a more pleasant experience than our five-thousandth discussion about indyref though.
I certainly think it's true to say that the Lineker saga is not panning out quite as the Daily Mail envisaged when it decided to go for him. I suspect that the Government is also less than thrilled that Sharp and Davie are right back in the
spotlight again.
One only wonders where the Daily Mail’s news editor’s head was at when he thought that going for one of England’s greatest ever centre forwards was a good idea.
Sharp lied (by deliberate omission of relevant facts that a 10 year old would understand should have been disclosed) to the committee looking into his appointment, which could reasonably have led them to conclude he had too poor judgement for the position. A review might conclude it was fatally flawed as a result, though I would think such a definitive view is unlikely.
This really isn't complicated All of the following are true.
1. The government's Illegal Immigration Bill is unworkable, probably contrary to international law, and cynical. 2. It is however right that the boats need to be discouraged, the issue isn't the principle, but the practicalities. 3. Yes, some of the language used by some ministers is unacceptable. 4. No it's not like the language used by the Nazis. 5. However Gary Lineker should be perfectly free, in a private capacity outside his role on TV, to make the argument that it is 6. The BBC has made an unholy mess of this.
7. Several loudmouth Tory backbenchers have the political nous to spot an open goal when they see it. And slam the ball home in a Gary Lineker stylee. 8. Unfortunately. They can't distinguish their own goal from the opposition's. 9. The Daily Mail is a fuming mess. Increasingly riling up only its own readership. Whilst being a figure of mockery to outsiders. It's a liability to the Tories. 10. Defending free speech and opposing "cancel culture" has been exposed as laughable bollocks. 11. You can be out of order and still assume the moral high ground if your opponents overstretch like a trainee contortionist on a month's work experience.
12. Where's Leon?
Vietnam, still, I expect. Probably having a lot more fun now that he's been put in the PB sin bin for making comments that could provoke legal trouble for OGH.
Has he been banned? Getting up at 6 40 every morning for work means I miss all the fun.
Tomorrow would have been the first opportunity Russia-linked investors have had to short sell Western markets and cause serious damage since the start of the war, via their unsanctioned proxies.
Always useful at this juncture to see what Kremlin fanboy zerohedge is up to on Twitter.
Turns out he’s flagging stabilisation of Nasdaq futures after the Fed made some reassuring noises. So I’m reappraising my earlier predictions of chaos.
Gary Lineker has a track record as a shit-stirrer against this Government. (I don't know how far back that extends.)
Fair enough. He can say that if he wishes.
However, he does have contractual restrictions placed upon him by his employer as to what he can say. He would probably be in deep shit if he just came out and said "this Government is as bad as the Nazis in the 1930s in its attitude to migrants." So he couches it in terms that he thinks gives him an out.
But really, it doesn't. There is no semantic difference between what he says and what people were intended to interpret him as saying. He hasn't taken the opportunity to say "that is not what I meant". Because it is what he meant.
Anybody arguing otherwise is being anti-semantic.
Oh dear.
Yes there have been criticisms of Lineker in the Jewish Chronicle, but he has also had support from less militant Jewish commentators.
You are not attacking Lineker here, you are attacking fellow posters who have a different view to yourself on this issue. That post is an appalling slur.
We have crossed swords in the past and your likely assessment of me as thick as mince, vile Remainer scum is fine, but I am no anti- Semite.
Is that the time?
Lolololololol!
Think as mince - because you read the anti-semantic as anti-semitic.
Gary Lineker has a track record as a shit-stirrer against this Government. (I don't know how far back that extends.)
Fair enough. He can say that if he wishes.
However, he does have contractual restrictions placed upon him by his employer as to what he can say. He would probably be in deep shit if he just came out and said "this Government is as bad as the Nazis in the 1930s in its attitude to migrants." So he couches it in terms that he thinks gives him an out.
But really, it doesn't. There is no semantic difference between what he says and what people were intended to interpret him as saying. He hasn't taken the opportunity to say "that is not what I meant". Because it is what he meant.
Anybody arguing otherwise is being anti-semantic.
Oh dear.
Yes there have been criticisms of Lineker in the Jewish Chronicle, but he has also had support from less militant Jewish commentators.
You are not attacking Lineker here, you are attacking fellow posters who have a different view to yourself on this issue. That post is an appalling slur.
We have crossed swords in the past and your likely assessment of me as thick as mince, vile Remainer scum is fine, but I am no anti- Semite.
Is that the time?
Lolololololol!
Think as mince - because you read the anti-semantic as anti-semitic.
Go look up "semantics".....
I also read it as anti-Semitic. Probably brain filling in the gaps when reading too quickly.
Free speech: talking positively about Gary Lineker, who can say whatever he likes Not Free Speech: talking negatively about Gary Lineker, where you cannot say whatever you like
Gary Lineker cannot say what he likes. He cannot libel people (well he can but it might be expensive)
We can talk as negatively as we like about Gary Lineker again as long as we don't libel him.
Seems pretty simple to me.
Gary Lineker can libel anyone he likes, because he's fucking minted. Anyone taking him on in a libel case would live to regret it.
OGH OTOH...
Yes, sadly, it's effectively a privilege of wealth. It's why Gary Lineker and J K Rowling can do things mere mortals cannot.
If you were on £25k a year as a BBC staffer, or contractor, you'd be put back in your box very quickly for even a minor political comment.
Well, yes, because different rules would apply.
But he was a part time freelancer talking in his personal capacity on a separate platform. Whether you agree with what he said or not, it's difficult to argue that the BBC should suspend him for impartiality reasons.
Bringing the corporation into disrepute would have been a stronger ground, but TBF they've done an awesome job of that themselves.
He did bring the corporation into disrepute. He compared one of the leading policies of the Government of the day, which commands majority support, to be similar to the Nazis.
He's one of their leading staffers on a massive salary. He fronts one of their biggest shows. And how many days a week he works at it or his contractual arrangements are irrelevant. He's strongly associated with them and their brand and they pay him, using licence fee payers money. Under IR35 he would be considered a disguised employee. And he crossed the line.
The BBC were right to enter talks with him over the issue, and to suspend him when he refused to discuss any moderation whatsoever.
It's not a free speech issue.
First of all - no he didn't. He said the language used was reminiscent of the Nazis. Which may be an exaggeration but given the increasingly authoritarian and xenophobic behaviour of Braverman in particular can hardly be said to be utterly outrageous. Clamping down on protests, attacking the press, demonising 'otherness' and routine flouting of the law as Braverman has done were all things the Nazis did. True, she has not gone nearly so far as they did, but she is going much too far for a fully democratic system to be healthy.
Under the guidelines as explained by the corporation's own former officer, a sports presenter on a freelance contract making comments, including political comments on a non-BBC platform is not considered to be a breach of impartiality.
Therefore, ironically, in reacting as they did and taking him off air for his political views, the BBC have - in fact - not acted with political impartiality.
They have also broken his contract, breached their own rules, wrecked their programme schedules, caused the whole tweet to dominate several news cycles and made themselves a national laughing stock.
This is not an employment issue. It is not even a free speech issue. It is an example of How To Look Incredibly Thick and Politically Biased.
If they had just quietly said to Lineker 'dial it down please, we're getting complaints' the whole stupid mess could have been avoided.
The problem with this argument is that plenty of your fellow travellers, including @RochdalePioneers, say it absolutely was a comparion to the Nazis and rightly so.
It insults all our intelligence to pretend it wasn't. So let's move on from this shall we.
I do not for one minute believe that the term 'language that is not dissimilar to that used by Germany in the 30s' would stand as a synonym for 'Nazis' in a court of law, e.g in a libel case.
I don’t think anyone actually thinks it was a comparison to the Nazis. Just bad faith actors who funnily enough support the Government.
Of course it was. Naive to say it wasn’t.
So why didn’t he say Nazis then?
He didn’t need to, the allusion was enough. Did you think he was talking about Alfred Hugenbourg? Or the KPD?
I think he was talking about language used in Germany in the 30s. As he said.
Do you disagree that the government uses such language?
Language used by who in Germany in the 30s?
Lots of people?
Don't be coy now.
Anti-immigrant settlement in the 30s was pretty much ingrained in society.
I think it was particularly popular with one section of society.
Actually it was popular with mostly everyone.
So if everyone was using the same language, he was comparing it to the language used by the Nazis in the 30s.
What?
That’s like saying if I said language used in 2003 by mostly everyone actually means I was referring to Labour.
Nonsense point.
I think you need to step back and look at this issue with a clear gaze.
Lineker knew what he was doing. He does not specify Nazis, but the allusion is certainly towards the language of the Nazi Party. He quite likely has been evasive in order to be careful so as the issue would remain contained. He is not wrong with his assertion. He is not mentioning concentration camps, although the implication is, that this is where Braverman's style of language led once before.
Personally I do not believe Lineker did anything wrong, neither do I believe Sugar did anything wrong. I don't believe Clarkson breached any guidance either until he thumped Oisin Tymon.
I am not comfortable with Andrew Neil at the BBC, although to be fair on set he was very impartial, and I have a massive problem that twenty five years ago the BBC facilitated Boris Johnson. I have an even bigger issue with the substitute Johnson footage at the Cenotaph in 2019.
It was a tweet along the lines of Right Wing = Nazi.
It has nothing to do with the language used by actual leaders of the NSDAP.
This really isn't complicated All of the following are true.
1. The government's Illegal Immigration Bill is unworkable, probably contrary to international law, and cynical. 2. It is however right that the boats need to be discouraged, the issue isn't the principle, but the practicalities. 3. Yes, some of the language used by some ministers is unacceptable. 4. No it's not like the language used by the Nazis. 5. However Gary Lineker should be perfectly free, in a private capacity outside his role on TV, to make the argument that it is 6. The BBC has made an unholy mess of this.
7. Several loudmouth Tory backbenchers have the political nous to spot an open goal when they see it. And slam the ball home in a Gary Lineker stylee. 8. Unfortunately. They can't distinguish their own goal from the opposition's. 9. The Daily Mail is a fuming mess. Increasingly riling up only its own readership. Whilst being a figure of mockery to outsiders. It's a liability to the Tories. 10. Defending free speech and opposing "cancel culture" has been exposed as laughable bollocks. 11. You can be out of order and still assume the moral high ground if your opponents overstretch like a trainee contortionist on a month's work experience.
12. Where's Leon?
Vietnam, still, I expect. Probably having a lot more fun now that he's been put in the PB sin bin for making comments that could provoke legal trouble for OGH.
Has he been banned? Getting up at 6 40 every morning for work means I miss all the fun.
Yes. Yesterday. Though think he popped up aka "MacDepraved" or some such.
Though perhaps THAT was the Archbishop of Canterbury in incognito?
A leading leftwing thinktank has come out in support of home secretary David Blunkett's controversial plan to send all asylum seekers to processing centres outside the EU.
But Demos says in a study published today that the British government's plan for international transit processing centres is unlikely to work unless it is part of a comprehensive system to handle all those who want to come to Europe, including tourists and other visitors.
European commission officials have been asked to submit a detailed working paper on Mr Blunkett's radical scheme to deal with asylum seekers in time for the next European summit in June.
The idea of offshore processing centres has been floated at a time when Tony Blair has announced a commitment to halving the monthly total of asylum applications in Britain by September. The prime minister is believed to have met Downing Street and Home Office officials last Thursday to review progress.
Offshore processing centres are clearly an excellent idea, because they:
(a) make it much harder for people to disappear into the local community (b) discourage people from coming generally
However, they need to be seen as only part of the solution. Many of the people on the boats (particularly those from places like Albania) have no desire to become Asylum seekers. They'd much rather not be picked up by the authorities. So we need to put measures in place to largely shut down the "black" economy in the UK.
Gary Lineker has a track record as a shit-stirrer against this Government. (I don't know how far back that extends.)
Fair enough. He can say that if he wishes.
However, he does have contractual restrictions placed upon him by his employer as to what he can say. He would probably be in deep shit if he just came out and said "this Government is as bad as the Nazis in the 1930s in its attitude to migrants." So he couches it in terms that he thinks gives him an out.
But really, it doesn't. There is no semantic difference between what he says and what people were intended to interpret him as saying. He hasn't taken the opportunity to say "that is not what I meant". Because it is what he meant.
Anybody arguing otherwise is being anti-semantic.
Oh dear.
Yes there have been criticisms of Lineker in the Jewish Chronicle, but he has also had support from less militant Jewish commentators.
You are not attacking Lineker here, you are attacking fellow posters who have a different view to yourself on this issue. That post is an appalling slur.
We have crossed swords in the past and your likely assessment of me as thick as mince, vile Remainer scum is fine, but I am no anti- Semite.
Is that the time?
Lolololololol!
Think as mince - because you read the anti-semantic as anti-semitic.
Go look up "semantics".....
Indeed you are right. I misread your statement, probably due to auto assumption.
I do need to provide you a full apology which I am duly making.
I think it probably time I left the board.
Your analysis is indeed correct. I have made myself look utterly ridiculous.
Free speech: talking positively about Gary Lineker, who can say whatever he likes Not Free Speech: talking negatively about Gary Lineker, where you cannot say whatever you like
Gary Lineker cannot say what he likes. He cannot libel people (well he can but it might be expensive)
We can talk as negatively as we like about Gary Lineker again as long as we don't libel him.
Seems pretty simple to me.
Gary Lineker can libel anyone he likes, because he's fucking minted. Anyone taking him on in a libel case would live to regret it.
OGH OTOH...
Yes, sadly, it's effectively a privilege of wealth. It's why Gary Lineker and J K Rowling can do things mere mortals cannot.
If you were on £25k a year as a BBC staffer, or contractor, you'd be put back in your box very quickly for even a minor political comment.
Well, yes, because different rules would apply.
But he was a part time freelancer talking in his personal capacity on a separate platform. Whether you agree with what he said or not, it's difficult to argue that the BBC should suspend him for impartiality reasons.
Bringing the corporation into disrepute would have been a stronger ground, but TBF they've done an awesome job of that themselves.
He did bring the corporation into disrepute. He compared one of the leading policies of the Government of the day, which commands majority support, to be similar to the Nazis.
He's one of their leading staffers on a massive salary. He fronts one of their biggest shows. And how many days a week he works at it or his contractual arrangements are irrelevant. He's strongly associated with them and their brand and they pay him, using licence fee payers money. Under IR35 he would be considered a disguised employee. And he crossed the line.
The BBC were right to enter talks with him over the issue, and to suspend him when he refused to discuss any moderation whatsoever.
It's not a free speech issue.
First of all - no he didn't. He said the language used was reminiscent of the Nazis. Which may be an exaggeration but given the increasingly authoritarian and xenophobic behaviour of Braverman in particular can hardly be said to be utterly outrageous. Clamping down on protests, attacking the press, demonising 'otherness' and routine flouting of the law as Braverman has done were all things the Nazis did. True, she has not gone nearly so far as they did, but she is going much too far for a fully democratic system to be healthy.
Under the guidelines as explained by the corporation's own former officer, a sports presenter on a freelance contract making comments, including political comments on a non-BBC platform is not considered to be a breach of impartiality.
Therefore, ironically, in reacting as they did and taking him off air for his political views, the BBC have - in fact - not acted with political impartiality.
They have also broken his contract, breached their own rules, wrecked their programme schedules, caused the whole tweet to dominate several news cycles and made themselves a national laughing stock.
This is not an employment issue. It is not even a free speech issue. It is an example of How To Look Incredibly Thick and Politically Biased.
If they had just quietly said to Lineker 'dial it down please, we're getting complaints' the whole stupid mess could have been avoided.
The problem with this argument is that plenty of your fellow travellers, including @RochdalePioneers, say it absolutely was a comparion to the Nazis and rightly so.
It insults all our intelligence to pretend it wasn't. So let's move on from this shall we.
I do not for one minute believe that the term 'language that is not dissimilar to that used by Germany in the 30s' would stand as a synonym for 'Nazis' in a court of law, e.g in a libel case.
I don’t think anyone actually thinks it was a comparison to the Nazis. Just bad faith actors who funnily enough support the Government.
Of course it was. Naive to say it wasn’t.
So why didn’t he say Nazis then?
He didn’t need to, the allusion was enough. Did you think he was talking about Alfred Hugenbourg? Or the KPD?
I think he was talking about language used in Germany in the 30s. As he said.
Do you disagree that the government uses such language?
Language used by who in Germany in the 30s?
Lots of people?
Don't be coy now.
Anti-immigrant settlement in the 30s was pretty much ingrained in society.
I think it was particularly popular with one section of society.
Actually it was popular with mostly everyone.
So if everyone was using the same language, he was comparing it to the language used by the Nazis in the 30s.
What?
That’s like saying if I said language used in 2003 by mostly everyone actually means I was referring to Labour.
Nonsense point.
I think you need to step back and look at this issue with a clear gaze.
Lineker knew what he was doing. He does not specify Nazis, but the allusion is certainly towards the language of the Nazi Party. He quite likely has been evasive in order to be careful so as the issue would remain contained. He is not wrong with his assertion. He is not mentioning concentration camps, although the implication is, that this is where Braverman's style of language led once before.
Personally I do not believe Lineker did anything wrong, neither do I believe Sugar did anything wrong. I don't believe Clarkson breached any guidance either until he thumped Oisin Tymon.
I am not comfortable with Andrew Neil at the BBC, although to be fair on set he was very impartial, and I have a massive problem that twenty five years ago the BBC facilitated Boris Johnson. I have an even bigger issue with the substitute Johnson footage at the Cenotaph in 2019.
It was a tweet along the lines of Right Wing = Nazi.
It has nothing to do with the language used by actual leaders of the NSDAP.
For a start, one was talking in English and the other German.
Gary Lineker has a track record as a shit-stirrer against this Government. (I don't know how far back that extends.)
Fair enough. He can say that if he wishes.
However, he does have contractual restrictions placed upon him by his employer as to what he can say. He would probably be in deep shit if he just came out and said "this Government is as bad as the Nazis in the 1930s in its attitude to migrants." So he couches it in terms that he thinks gives him an out.
But really, it doesn't. There is no semantic difference between what he says and what people were intended to interpret him as saying. He hasn't taken the opportunity to say "that is not what I meant". Because it is what he meant.
Anybody arguing otherwise is being anti-semantic.
Oh dear.
Yes there have been criticisms of Lineker in the Jewish Chronicle, but he has also had support from less militant Jewish commentators.
You are not attacking Lineker here, you are attacking fellow posters who have a different view to yourself on this issue. That post is an appalling slur.
We have crossed swords in the past and your likely assessment of me as thick as mince, vile Remainer scum is fine, but I am no anti- Semite.
Is that the time?
Lolololololol!
Think as mince - because you read the anti-semantic as anti-semitic.
Go look up "semantics".....
Indeed you are right. I misread your statement, probably due to auto assumption.
I do need to provide you a full apology which I am duly making.
I think it probably time I left the board.
Your analysis is indeed correct. I have made myself look utterly ridiculous.
I can only apologise for my foolishness again.
Sorry.
Don't be so daft. Hang around - I enjoy your contributions on here.
Gary Lineker has a track record as a shit-stirrer against this Government. (I don't know how far back that extends.)
Fair enough. He can say that if he wishes.
However, he does have contractual restrictions placed upon him by his employer as to what he can say. He would probably be in deep shit if he just came out and said "this Government is as bad as the Nazis in the 1930s in its attitude to migrants." So he couches it in terms that he thinks gives him an out.
But really, it doesn't. There is no semantic difference between what he says and what people were intended to interpret him as saying. He hasn't taken the opportunity to say "that is not what I meant". Because it is what he meant.
Anybody arguing otherwise is being anti-semantic.
Oh dear.
Yes there have been criticisms of Lineker in the Jewish Chronicle, but he has also had support from less militant Jewish commentators.
You are not attacking Lineker here, you are attacking fellow posters who have a different view to yourself on this issue. That post is an appalling slur.
We have crossed swords in the past and your likely assessment of me as thick as mince, vile Remainer scum is fine, but I am no anti- Semite.
Is that the time?
Lolololololol!
Think as mince - because you read the anti-semantic as anti-semitic.
Go look up "semantics".....
Indeed you are right. I misread your statement, probably due to auto assumption.
I do need to provide you a full apology which I am duly making.
I think it probably time I left the board.
Your analysis is indeed correct. I have made myself look utterly ridiculous.
I can only apologise for my foolishness again.
Sorry.
Na, don't leave because of it. I made the same mistake, too.
Tomorrow would have been the first opportunity Russia-linked investors have had to short sell Western markets and cause serious damage since the start of the war, via their unsanctioned proxies.
Always useful at this juncture to see what Kremlin fanboy zerohedge is up to on Twitter.
Turns out he’s flagging stabilisation of Nasdaq futures after the Fed made some reassuring noises. So I’m reappraising my earlier predictions of chaos.
Markets never do what everyone expects. Everyone is expecting a crash next week so thats a near guarantee the markets wont crash. Mass psychology in action
Gary Lineker has a track record as a shit-stirrer against this Government. (I don't know how far back that extends.)
Fair enough. He can say that if he wishes.
However, he does have contractual restrictions placed upon him by his employer as to what he can say. He would probably be in deep shit if he just came out and said "this Government is as bad as the Nazis in the 1930s in its attitude to migrants." So he couches it in terms that he thinks gives him an out.
But really, it doesn't. There is no semantic difference between what he says and what people were intended to interpret him as saying. He hasn't taken the opportunity to say "that is not what I meant". Because it is what he meant.
Anybody arguing otherwise is being anti-semantic.
Oh dear.
Yes there have been criticisms of Lineker in the Jewish Chronicle, but he has also had support from less militant Jewish commentators.
You are not attacking Lineker here, you are attacking fellow posters who have a different view to yourself on this issue. That post is an appalling slur.
We have crossed swords in the past and your likely assessment of me as thick as mince, vile Remainer scum is fine, but I am no anti- Semite.
Is that the time?
Lolololololol!
Think as mince - because you read the anti-semantic as anti-semitic.
Go look up "semantics".....
I also read it as anti-Semitic. Probably brain filling in the gaps when reading too quickly.
The Lineker row is about semantics. The brain filling in the gaps he intended you to fill in, even if not all the words were there!
A leading leftwing thinktank has come out in support of home secretary David Blunkett's controversial plan to send all asylum seekers to processing centres outside the EU.
But Demos says in a study published today that the British government's plan for international transit processing centres is unlikely to work unless it is part of a comprehensive system to handle all those who want to come to Europe, including tourists and other visitors.
European commission officials have been asked to submit a detailed working paper on Mr Blunkett's radical scheme to deal with asylum seekers in time for the next European summit in June.
The idea of offshore processing centres has been floated at a time when Tony Blair has announced a commitment to halving the monthly total of asylum applications in Britain by September. The prime minister is believed to have met Downing Street and Home Office officials last Thursday to review progress.
Offshore processing centres are clearly an excellent idea, because they:
(a) make it much harder for people to disappear into the local community (b) discourage people from coming generally
However, they need to be seen as only part of the solution. Many of the people on the boats (particularly those from places like Albania) have no desire to become Asylum seekers. They'd much rather not be picked up by the authorities. So we need to put measures in place to largely shut down the "black" economy in the UK.
For which this site has a working model - one that lawyers would love as they could pocket £10,000 plus per illegal immigrant in a “job”
Burchill on savage form on Lineker. Almost feel sorry for the bloke by the end. It does go to show how his comments should have been addressed (in slightly more democratic terms) by the Government - playing the ball not the man would have been a far better strategy.
Free speech: talking positively about Gary Lineker, who can say whatever he likes Not Free Speech: talking negatively about Gary Lineker, where you cannot say whatever you like
Gary Lineker cannot say what he likes. He cannot libel people (well he can but it might be expensive)
We can talk as negatively as we like about Gary Lineker again as long as we don't libel him.
Seems pretty simple to me.
Gary Lineker can libel anyone he likes, because he's fucking minted. Anyone taking him on in a libel case would live to regret it.
OGH OTOH...
Yes, sadly, it's effectively a privilege of wealth. It's why Gary Lineker and J K Rowling can do things mere mortals cannot.
If you were on £25k a year as a BBC staffer, or contractor, you'd be put back in your box very quickly for even a minor political comment.
Well, yes, because different rules would apply.
But he was a part time freelancer talking in his personal capacity on a separate platform. Whether you agree with what he said or not, it's difficult to argue that the BBC should suspend him for impartiality reasons.
Bringing the corporation into disrepute would have been a stronger ground, but TBF they've done an awesome job of that themselves.
He did bring the corporation into disrepute. He compared one of the leading policies of the Government of the day, which commands majority support, to be similar to the Nazis.
He's one of their leading staffers on a massive salary. He fronts one of their biggest shows. And how many days a week he works at it or his contractual arrangements are irrelevant. He's strongly associated with them and their brand and they pay him, using licence fee payers money. Under IR35 he would be considered a disguised employee. And he crossed the line.
The BBC were right to enter talks with him over the issue, and to suspend him when he refused to discuss any moderation whatsoever.
It's not a free speech issue.
First of all - no he didn't. He said the language used was reminiscent of the Nazis. Which may be an exaggeration but given the increasingly authoritarian and xenophobic behaviour of Braverman in particular can hardly be said to be utterly outrageous. Clamping down on protests, attacking the press, demonising 'otherness' and routine flouting of the law as Braverman has done were all things the Nazis did. True, she has not gone nearly so far as they did, but she is going much too far for a fully democratic system to be healthy.
Under the guidelines as explained by the corporation's own former officer, a sports presenter on a freelance contract making comments, including political comments on a non-BBC platform is not considered to be a breach of impartiality.
Therefore, ironically, in reacting as they did and taking him off air for his political views, the BBC have - in fact - not acted with political impartiality.
They have also broken his contract, breached their own rules, wrecked their programme schedules, caused the whole tweet to dominate several news cycles and made themselves a national laughing stock.
This is not an employment issue. It is not even a free speech issue. It is an example of How To Look Incredibly Thick and Politically Biased.
If they had just quietly said to Lineker 'dial it down please, we're getting complaints' the whole stupid mess could have been avoided.
The problem with this argument is that plenty of your fellow travellers, including @RochdalePioneers, say it absolutely was a comparion to the Nazis and rightly so.
It insults all our intelligence to pretend it wasn't. So let's move on from this shall we.
I do not for one minute believe that the term 'language that is not dissimilar to that used by Germany in the 30s' would stand as a synonym for 'Nazis' in a court of law, e.g in a libel case.
I don’t think anyone actually thinks it was a comparison to the Nazis. Just bad faith actors who funnily enough support the Government.
Of course it was a comparison to the Nazis.
There are some people who regard making a comparison to the Nazis as something like an argument version of a trump card, so that their opponent in the argument instantly loses. It's a boring and lazy way to conduct a debate, but it's not something anyone should lose their job over.
Of course, sometimes such a comparison will be warranted, but nearly as often as it is invoked.
Gary is not thick. And he’s never been afraid to say big accusations before, if he thought Nazis he’d have said Nazis.
As I pointed out a few day's ago, he said 1930s Germany, not 1940s Germany, so he was drawing a distinction between the period under the Nazis when the final solution was in full swing, and the gas chambers were operational, and the period before that, to invoke the slippery slope argument.
if he'd said Nazis then he wouldn't have been able to draw that distinction, but it was Nazis in the 1930s and Nazis in the 1940s all the same.
I think we’re all over-analysing. One tweet, sent in a moment of exasperation that people were telling him he shouldn’t express an opinion on the Rwanda policy. The 30s German reference was throwaway, yes a bit Godwin, but I doubt he took more than a couple of minutes to compose it.
Twitter is full of bombast and exaggeration. We’re all analysing it as if it’s Xi’s foreign policy speech at the latest national congress of the Chinese Communist party.
That's fair enough, but it's still the case that a reference to 1930s Germany was a reference to the Nazis, and not to some other minor party of the right-wing in late Weimar Republic Germany.
Again, you and others are overanalysing. Of course he was referring to Nazi Germany. Does anyone think he’s thought long and hard about the different factions in 30s Germany and is making some subtle reference to pre-Nazi rumblings from other parties? He’s done the same GCSEs we all did. This is at the level of “The Nazis, a warning from history”.
Yet this one tweet is being picked apart like the meaning of “this is my body” during the Protestant Reformation.
I don't think that's fair.
I was initially attracted to this site because there were a bunch of people who appreciated overanalysis of interesting patterns in opinion poll subsamples. Overanalysing is what I do. It's who I am. Criticising someone on pb.com for overanalysing is like being annoyed at someone in a desert being thirsty.
True that. In a couple of hours time we can all start overanalysing the percentage falls on the Nikkei, followed an hour or so later by the Hang Seng.
If its that easy why dont you short s&p futures. You would make a fortune. Or maybe it aint so easy.
Gary Lineker has a track record as a shit-stirrer against this Government. (I don't know how far back that extends.)
Fair enough. He can say that if he wishes.
However, he does have contractual restrictions placed upon him by his employer as to what he can say. He would probably be in deep shit if he just came out and said "this Government is as bad as the Nazis in the 1930s in its attitude to migrants." So he couches it in terms that he thinks gives him an out.
But really, it doesn't. There is no semantic difference between what he says and what people were intended to interpret him as saying. He hasn't taken the opportunity to say "that is not what I meant". Because it is what he meant.
Anybody arguing otherwise is being anti-semantic.
Oh dear.
Yes there have been criticisms of Lineker in the Jewish Chronicle, but he has also had support from less militant Jewish commentators.
You are not attacking Lineker here, you are attacking fellow posters who have a different view to yourself on this issue. That post is an appalling slur.
We have crossed swords in the past and your likely assessment of me as thick as mince, vile Remainer scum is fine, but I am no anti- Semite.
Is that the time?
Lolololololol!
Think as mince - because you read the anti-semantic as anti-semitic.
Go look up "semantics".....
Indeed you are right. I misread your statement, probably due to auto assumption.
I do need to provide you a full apology which I am duly making.
I think it probably time I left the board.
Your analysis is indeed correct. I have made myself look utterly ridiculous.
I can only apologise for my foolishness again.
Sorry.
Don't be so daft. Hang around - I enjoy your contributions on here.
Gary Lineker has a track record as a shit-stirrer against this Government. (I don't know how far back that extends.)
Fair enough. He can say that if he wishes.
However, he does have contractual restrictions placed upon him by his employer as to what he can say. He would probably be in deep shit if he just came out and said "this Government is as bad as the Nazis in the 1930s in its attitude to migrants." So he couches it in terms that he thinks gives him an out.
But really, it doesn't. There is no semantic difference between what he says and what people were intended to interpret him as saying. He hasn't taken the opportunity to say "that is not what I meant". Because it is what he meant.
Anybody arguing otherwise is being anti-semantic.
Oh dear.
Yes there have been criticisms of Lineker in the Jewish Chronicle, but he has also had support from less militant Jewish commentators.
You are not attacking Lineker here, you are attacking fellow posters who have a different view to yourself on this issue. That post is an appalling slur.
We have crossed swords in the past and your likely assessment of me as thick as mince, vile Remainer scum is fine, but I am no anti- Semite.
Is that the time?
Lolololololol!
Think as mince - because you read the anti-semantic as anti-semitic.
Go look up "semantics".....
Indeed you are right. I misread your statement, probably due to auto assumption.
I do need to provide you a full apology which I am duly making.
I think it probably time I left the board.
Your analysis is indeed correct. I have made myself look utterly ridiculous.
I can only apologise for my foolishness again.
Sorry.
Na, don't leave because of it. I made the same mistake, too.
Thank you for your understanding but exposing oneself as "thick as mince Remainer scum" is really quite unforgiveable. My misreading generated an egregiously offensive post.
Gary Lineker has a track record as a shit-stirrer against this Government. (I don't know how far back that extends.)
Fair enough. He can say that if he wishes.
However, he does have contractual restrictions placed upon him by his employer as to what he can say. He would probably be in deep shit if he just came out and said "this Government is as bad as the Nazis in the 1930s in its attitude to migrants." So he couches it in terms that he thinks gives him an out.
But really, it doesn't. There is no semantic difference between what he says and what people were intended to interpret him as saying. He hasn't taken the opportunity to say "that is not what I meant". Because it is what he meant.
Anybody arguing otherwise is being anti-semantic.
One, you have no idea what his contract says. Two, why does expressing strong objection to government policy and messaging make him a 'shit stirrer' ?
Have the Tories largely shredded their own "War of Woke" by the Wack way they've engineered (or so it appears) perhaps the most famous example of Cancel Culture, since proto-wokeists beheaded Charles I of blessed memory?
Clearly not among true-blue believers, though seems they've dented even their morale & confidence somewhat. Anti-woke still a rallying cry for rallying the base, esp. parts flaking off toward Reform.
However, with swing-voters, whose votes are up for grabs between Conservatives and a LESS right-wing option, the story, reckon it's a different story.
About time for someone with the PM's and CUP's interest(s) at heart, to start giving direction to stop digging, and start re-filling the hole the Tories have dug for themselves.
Maybe George Osborne's statement is part of that?
I recognise you won't have any sympathies politically with this, but as I have said, there are aspects of the kerfuffle that feel to me like a staged media event to reverse the current migration bill. 'Take the proles' football away and they will soon turn away from the migrant bill'.
Every piece of legislative progress than diverges us from the EU, puts us on a secure footing as an independent country in control of our borders, or can lead to economic growth in a post-EU context, is being dropped, quietly or noisily, by the Sunak Government.
Osborne's commentary within that context reminds me of that slithery man in the Lord of the Rings who was advising the King of the Horse Riders.
Yes, of course, the political classes are some giant conspiracy.
Of course, it does rather raise the question of why the Remain camp in the referendum was quite so extraordinarily incompetent. But, don't worry, I'm sure you can think of a couple of good (albeit absurd) explanations.
Quick question for you: who exactly is in on this plan? Presumably, the government would need to be, because otherwise they might have very sensibly ignored his ridiculous comments.
There isn't much of a conspiracy, there are openly proposed changes, ones that are extremely deleterious to the wealth and wellbeing of the vast majority of people, because they amount to an enormous misappropriation of peoples' money, and unacceptable encroachments on peoples' freedoms, primarily but not exclusively by dangling the theat of a man-made climate catastrophe. Careerist politicians, who are fairly easily identified, have decided that this is the way that the wind is blowing, so they will go along with it. Careerist civil servants likewise. It is important that there is no real political choice. If there were, decisions that are going to be massively unpopular would be overturned. Britain has ended up with a choice of Davos man one or Davos man two. Given that the Davos prospectus is one that nobody voted for, and if it were in a manifesto, nobody would, that cannot be right.
It doesnt matter to rcs anyway. He flies regularly business class london to la and is part of the privileged top 5 % who wont be impacted by climate change measures. So he can afford to support them.
This really isn't complicated All of the following are true.
1. The government's Illegal Immigration Bill is unworkable, probably contrary to international law, and cynical. 2. It is however right that the boats need to be discouraged, the issue isn't the principle, but the practicalities. 3. Yes, some of the language used by some ministers is unacceptable. 4. No it's not like the language used by the Nazis. 5. However Gary Lineker should be perfectly free, in a private capacity outside his role on TV, to make the argument that it is 6. The BBC has made an unholy mess of this.
7. Several loudmouth Tory backbenchers have the political nous to spot an open goal when they see it. And slam the ball home in a Gary Lineker stylee. 8. Unfortunately. They can't distinguish their own goal from the opposition's. 9. The Daily Mail is a fuming mess. Increasingly riling up only its own readership. Whilst being a figure of mockery to outsiders. It's a liability to the Tories. 10. Defending free speech and opposing "cancel culture" has been exposed as laughable bollocks. 11. You can be out of order and still assume the moral high ground if your opponents overstretch like a trainee contortionist on a month's work experience.
12. Where's Leon?
Vietnam, still, I expect. Probably having a lot more fun now that he's been put in the PB sin bin for making comments that could provoke legal trouble for OGH.
Has he been banned?
Getting up at 6 40 every morning for work means I miss all the fun.
Leon will return as a craft perry maker from Belize, at a forum near you.
Gary Lineker has a track record as a shit-stirrer against this Government. (I don't know how far back that extends.)
Fair enough. He can say that if he wishes.
However, he does have contractual restrictions placed upon him by his employer as to what he can say. He would probably be in deep shit if he just came out and said "this Government is as bad as the Nazis in the 1930s in its attitude to migrants." So he couches it in terms that he thinks gives him an out.
But really, it doesn't. There is no semantic difference between what he says and what people were intended to interpret him as saying. He hasn't taken the opportunity to say "that is not what I meant". Because it is what he meant.
Anybody arguing otherwise is being anti-semantic.
Oh dear.
Yes there have been criticisms of Lineker in the Jewish Chronicle, but he has also had support from less militant Jewish commentators.
You are not attacking Lineker here, you are attacking fellow posters who have a different view to yourself on this issue. That post is an appalling slur.
We have crossed swords in the past and your likely assessment of me as thick as mince, vile Remainer scum is fine, but I am no anti- Semite.
Is that the time?
Lolololololol!
Think as mince - because you read the anti-semantic as anti-semitic.
Go look up "semantics".....
Indeed you are right. I misread your statement, probably due to auto assumption.
I do need to provide you a full apology which I am duly making.
I think it probably time I left the board.
Your analysis is indeed correct. I have made myself look utterly ridiculous.
I can only apologise for my foolishness again.
Sorry.
We all make mistakes and it says a lot about you that you have apologised
Have the Tories largely shredded their own "War of Woke" by the Wack way they've engineered (or so it appears) perhaps the most famous example of Cancel Culture, since proto-wokeists beheaded Charles I of blessed memory?
Clearly not among true-blue believers, though seems they've dented even their morale & confidence somewhat. Anti-woke still a rallying cry for rallying the base, esp. parts flaking off toward Reform.
However, with swing-voters, whose votes are up for grabs between Conservatives and a LESS right-wing option, the story, reckon it's a different story.
About time for someone with the PM's and CUP's interest(s) at heart, to start giving direction to stop digging, and start re-filling the hole the Tories have dug for themselves.
Maybe George Osborne's statement is part of that?
I recognise you won't have any sympathies politically with this, but as I have said, there are aspects of the kerfuffle that feel to me like a staged media event to reverse the current migration bill. 'Take the proles' football away and they will soon turn away from the migrant bill'.
Every piece of legislative progress than diverges us from the EU, puts us on a secure footing as an independent country in control of our borders, or can lead to economic growth in a post-EU context, is being dropped, quietly or noisily, by the Sunak Government.
Osborne's commentary within that context reminds me of that slithery man in the Lord of the Rings who was advising the King of the Horse Riders.
Yes, of course, the political classes are some giant conspiracy.
Of course, it does rather raise the question of why the Remain camp in the referendum was quite so extraordinarily incompetent. But, don't worry, I'm sure you can think of a couple of good (albeit absurd) explanations.
Quick question for you: who exactly is in on this plan? Presumably, the government would need to be, because otherwise they might have very sensibly ignored his ridiculous comments.
There isn't much of a conspiracy, there are openly proposed changes, ones that are extremely deleterious to the wealth and wellbeing of the vast majority of people, because they amount to an enormous misappropriation of peoples' money, and unacceptable encroachments on peoples' freedoms, primarily but not exclusively by dangling the theat of a man-made climate catastrophe. Careerist politicians, who are fairly easily identified, have decided that this is the way that the wind is blowing, so they will go along with it. Careerist civil servants likewise. It is important that there is no real political choice. If there were, decisions that are going to be massively unpopular would be overturned. Britain has ended up with a choice of Davos man one or Davos man two. Given that the Davos prospectus is one that nobody voted for, and if it were in a manifesto, nobody would, that cannot be right.
It doesnt matter to rcs anyway. He flies regularly business class london to la and is part of the privileged top 5 % who wont be impacted by climate change measures. So he can afford to support them.
Only top 5%? Is this true @rcs1000? You've fallen in my estimation.
Free speech: talking positively about Gary Lineker, who can say whatever he likes Not Free Speech: talking negatively about Gary Lineker, where you cannot say whatever you like
Gary Lineker cannot say what he likes. He cannot libel people (well he can but it might be expensive)
We can talk as negatively as we like about Gary Lineker again as long as we don't libel him.
Seems pretty simple to me.
Gary Lineker can libel anyone he likes, because he's fucking minted. Anyone taking him on in a libel case would live to regret it.
OGH OTOH...
Yes, sadly, it's effectively a privilege of wealth. It's why Gary Lineker and J K Rowling can do things mere mortals cannot.
If you were on £25k a year as a BBC staffer, or contractor, you'd be put back in your box very quickly for even a minor political comment.
Well, yes, because different rules would apply.
But he was a part time freelancer talking in his personal capacity on a separate platform. Whether you agree with what he said or not, it's difficult to argue that the BBC should suspend him for impartiality reasons.
Bringing the corporation into disrepute would have been a stronger ground, but TBF they've done an awesome job of that themselves.
He did bring the corporation into disrepute. He compared one of the leading policies of the Government of the day, which commands majority support, to be similar to the Nazis.
He's one of their leading staffers on a massive salary. He fronts one of their biggest shows. And how many days a week he works at it or his contractual arrangements are irrelevant. He's strongly associated with them and their brand and they pay him, using licence fee payers money. Under IR35 he would be considered a disguised employee. And he crossed the line.
The BBC were right to enter talks with him over the issue, and to suspend him when he refused to discuss any moderation whatsoever.
It's not a free speech issue.
First of all - no he didn't. He said the language used was reminiscent of the Nazis. Which may be an exaggeration but given the increasingly authoritarian and xenophobic behaviour of Braverman in particular can hardly be said to be utterly outrageous. Clamping down on protests, attacking the press, demonising 'otherness' and routine flouting of the law as Braverman has done were all things the Nazis did. True, she has not gone nearly so far as they did, but she is going much too far for a fully democratic system to be healthy.
Under the guidelines as explained by the corporation's own former officer, a sports presenter on a freelance contract making comments, including political comments on a non-BBC platform is not considered to be a breach of impartiality.
Therefore, ironically, in reacting as they did and taking him off air for his political views, the BBC have - in fact - not acted with political impartiality.
They have also broken his contract, breached their own rules, wrecked their programme schedules, caused the whole tweet to dominate several news cycles and made themselves a national laughing stock.
This is not an employment issue. It is not even a free speech issue. It is an example of How To Look Incredibly Thick and Politically Biased.
If they had just quietly said to Lineker 'dial it down please, we're getting complaints' the whole stupid mess could have been avoided.
The problem with this argument is that plenty of your fellow travellers, including @RochdalePioneers, say it absolutely was a comparion to the Nazis and rightly so.
It insults all our intelligence to pretend it wasn't. So let's move on from this shall we.
I do not for one minute believe that the term 'language that is not dissimilar to that used by Germany in the 30s' would stand as a synonym for 'Nazis' in a court of law, e.g in a libel case.
I don’t think anyone actually thinks it was a comparison to the Nazis. Just bad faith actors who funnily enough support the Government.
Of course it was. Naive to say it wasn’t.
So why didn’t he say Nazis then?
He didn’t need to, the allusion was enough. Did you think he was talking about Alfred Hugenbourg? Or the KPD?
I think he was talking about language used in Germany in the 30s. As he said.
Do you disagree that the government uses such language?
Language used by who in Germany in the 30s?
Lots of people?
Don't be coy now.
Anti-immigrant settlement in the 30s was pretty much ingrained in society.
I think it was particularly popular with one section of society.
Actually it was popular with mostly everyone.
So if everyone was using the same language, he was comparing it to the language used by the Nazis in the 30s.
For goodness sake this place can be so frustrating. You have made the assumption of which you write, nonetheless you are likely as not, correct. He is clearly alluding to the practice of "othering" which was an early characteristic propaganda tool (which incidentally was later ramped up) used by Hitler and his fellow travellers.
"Othering" is defined as: "to view or treat (a person or group of people) as intrinsically different from and alien to oneself". Now tell me that was not the purpose of Braverman's rhetoric. Lineker has not mentioned or alluded to what that policy led to. He is cautioning that such scapegoating can have further ramifications. He does not call Braverman a Nazi.
I agree with most of that analysis, but I also agree with Richard T that the 30s Germany rhetoric used to express the point was badly chosen. It gave too many Tories the chance to express their own hyperbolic outrage - while ignoring the point about Braverman's inflammatory language. And piece of shit Bill.
Comments
And you most definitely are not a loser and you have many friends on here if you need support
All the very best
I'm not even convinced a culture war is a bad idea, other than the specific label war. Cultural changes big and small probably should be rigorously debate. Fiercely so in the case of significant ones, however positive or negative one side might see them.
I've not really given this specific point much thought, but just now I was thinking that is 'culture war' really just the name people use for when sides engage in hyperbole?
Yet this one tweet is being picked apart like the meaning of “this is my body” during the Protestant Reformation.
You have many friends here including me, please reach out if you need help as I do understand how difficult life can be at times.
Sending you my best and also was sorry to read about your dog. When our black lab passed away I lost the last connection I had to my granny and I was very distressed about it. I lost a very loyal friend and connection all in one go.
There are some fairly broad brush parallels that you can draw in terms of dehumanising language, but it's severely mistaken to attempt to draw to tight a parallel. It's really a very different situation. I don't think it helps.
If you do want to make a 1930s comparison the better one to make is with 1930s Britain, when there was a lot of hostility to refugees from Germany reaching Britain - despite the vomit-inducing back-slapping that now occurs when celebrating those few Britons who did help Refugees enter the country - and perhaps we might consider if we are repeating those mistakes in terms of some of the people we have abandoned in Afghanistan, or elsewhere.
Lineker knew what he was doing. He does not specify Nazis, but the allusion is certainly towards the language of the Nazi Party. He quite likely has been evasive in order to be careful so as the issue would remain contained. He is not wrong with his assertion. He is not mentioning concentration camps, although the implication is, that this is where Braverman's style of language led once before.
Personally I do not believe Lineker did anything wrong, neither do I believe Sugar did anything wrong. I don't believe Clarkson breached any guidance either until he thumped Oisin Tymon.
I am not comfortable with Andrew Neil at the BBC, although to be fair on set he was very impartial, and I have a massive problem that twenty five years ago the BBC facilitated Boris Johnson. I have an even bigger issue with the substitute Johnson footage at the Cenotaph in 2019.
For the vast majority it's a much loved TV presenter being suspended for not supporting the government.
But that was from David Cameron in 2015.
And if we go back even earlier there was Gordon Brown's "British Jobs For British Workers" frothing.
But what about this:
https://www.theguardian.com/uk/2003/nov/27/immigration.immigrationandpublicservices
The Home Secretary wanting to put electronic tags on asylum seekers.
David Blunkett being the Home Secretary.
And how about this from the following year:
The Home Office is in negotiation with Tanzania over a £4m aid deal to take failed Somali asylum seekers from Britain and house them in a camp, the Guardian has learned.
A Home Office team went to Dar es Salaam last year for discussions with their counterparts in the Tanzanian government.
As part of the negotiations, the Tanzanian government has been offered an extra £4m a year in aid.
https://www.theguardian.com/society/2004/feb/25/asylum.politics
Hopefully according to the news this could happen in the morning
Fingers crossed
Isn't this kind of thing pretty common in the wide world of prime-time sports? And media?
To say the bbc deserve to be presented with a very large bill from hmrc would be an understatement given the stories I’ve hear
Sweet dreams.
I was initially attracted to this site because there were a bunch of people who appreciated overanalysis of interesting patterns in opinion poll subsamples. Overanalysing is what I do. It's who I am. Criticising someone on pb.com for overanalysing is like being annoyed at someone in a desert being thirsty.
One or other, preferably both, will have to go.
More widely. BBC news presenters aren't going be cowed to the same extent.
Result Daily Mail.
NOT a good look for government. Any government. But especially this government.
Could they be gone tomorrow?
How old did folk think he was then?
I did O Levels too. I'm 56.
A leading leftwing thinktank has come out in support of home secretary David Blunkett's controversial plan to send all asylum seekers to processing centres outside the EU.
But Demos says in a study published today that the British government's plan for international transit processing centres is unlikely to work unless it is part of a comprehensive system to handle all those who want to come to Europe, including tourists and other visitors.
European commission officials have been asked to submit a detailed working paper on Mr Blunkett's radical scheme to deal with asylum seekers in time for the next European summit in June.
The idea of offshore processing centres has been floated at a time when Tony Blair has announced a commitment to halving the monthly total of asylum applications in Britain by September. The prime minister is believed to have met Downing Street and Home Office officials last Thursday to review progress.
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2003/apr/22/immigrationandpublicservices.thinktanks
@NicholasTyrone
“Lineker’s tweets aren’t grounds to cancel him – but they do make the case for scrapping the BBC,” says Dan Hannan. And that nicely cuts to the chase, why we’re on this merry-go-round in the first place. Another cherished British institution the Tories want to trash.
https://twitter.com/Peston/status/1635040905781710849?t=THq-qb5koTn2c-Bw8iHb6w&s=19
2023 - the weight of Boris Johnson had increased, was increasing, and ought to be diminished.
Save for one thing. Hitler is very interesting when he writes about political campaigning, and which messages work with different groups.
Yes there have been criticisms of Lineker in the Jewish Chronicle, but he has also had support from less militant Jewish commentators.
You are not attacking Lineker here, you are attacking fellow posters who have a different view to yourself on this issue. That post is an appalling slur.
We have crossed swords in the past and your likely assessment of me as thick as mince, vile Remainer scum is fine, but I am no anti- Semite.
Is that the time?
Where will the Trots go now?
Getting up at 6 40 every morning for work means I miss all the fun.
Always useful at this juncture to see what Kremlin fanboy zerohedge is up to on Twitter.
Turns out he’s flagging stabilisation of Nasdaq futures after the Fed made some reassuring noises. So I’m reappraising my earlier predictions of chaos.
https://twitter.com/zerohedge/status/1635042681239015424?s=46&t=t5L3-2apZbpMKWkRPv8MrQ
https://www.federalreserve.gov/newsevents/pressreleases/monetary20230312b.htm
Think as mince - because you read the anti-semantic as anti-semitic.
Go look up "semantics".....
The endless complaints about the size of his living room are off putting, true.
It has nothing to do with the language used by actual leaders of the NSDAP.
Though perhaps THAT was the Archbishop of Canterbury in incognito?
(a) make it much harder for people to disappear into the local community
(b) discourage people from coming generally
However, they need to be seen as only part of the solution. Many of the people on the boats (particularly those from places like Albania) have no desire to become Asylum seekers. They'd much rather not be picked up by the authorities. So we need to put measures in place to largely shut down the "black" economy in the UK.
I do need to provide you a full apology which I am duly making.
I think it probably time I left the board.
Your analysis is indeed correct. I have made myself look utterly ridiculous.
I can only apologise for my foolishness again.
Sorry.
I was driving home yesterday - and had to listen to the Spurs vs Forest game on (whisper it)…
TalkSport 2.
Mostly!
We function like clockwork with no kids.
In fact we could raise productivity by 100% and thus justify our own pay rise.
49% blame Lineker
23% the BBC
22% The Westminster government
6% all three
Burchill on savage form on Lineker. Almost feel sorry for the bloke by the end. It does go to show how his comments should have been addressed (in slightly more democratic terms) by the Government - playing the ball not the man would have been a far better strategy.
Two, why does expressing strong objection to government policy and messaging make him a 'shit stirrer' ?
18 female guards fired for having flings with prisoners at HMP Berwyn
https://www.dailypost.co.uk/news/north-wales-news/18-female-guards-fired-having-26452735#ICID=Android_DailyPostNewsApp_AppShare
Even the Telegraph acknowledged that "Polling over the weekend showed that the majority of the public sided with Lineker"
Please do not leave
https://www.federalreserve.gov/newsevents/pressreleases/monetary20230312b.htm
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Signature_Bank
It gave too many Tories the chance to express their own hyperbolic outrage - while ignoring the point about Braverman's inflammatory language. And piece of shit Bill.