The point that to end a war one may have to negotiate with people one doesn't like is less striking than the suggestion that if Ukraine doesn't succeed in this year's expected offensive, the West will need to rethink the nature of support. His comments are qualified (and translation may be an issue too) and certainly not pro-Putin but probably the clearest hint we've seen so far that a continuing military deadlock may lead to some pressure on Ukraine to negotiate for something less than total victory. Conversely the war hysteria of Russian nationalists seems to have subsided into trying to keep their current gains rather than advancing further.
You missed a few words off the end; it should be: "... into trying to keep their current gains rather than advancing further for the time being."
*Any* peace deal - whether on today's lines, on 2014's, or pre-2014 - has to ensure that Russia will not just rebuild and try again in a few years - as they have before.
And the major issue is that, absent a Russian defeat, I see no way of ensuring that. Why trust Putin and his cronies, especially if they can sell a big territorial 'win' to their populace?
Godwinning myself, It's like trying to 'negotiate' with Hitler or Stalin back in the late 1930s.
Although a major Russian defeat wouldn't necessarily guarantee that either. Just because Pilsudski hammered them into a million pieces didn't mean they gave up on the 130,000km2 of Poland they were forced to give up. They bided their time and took it back in 1940 and 1945.
No, it wouldn't guarantee it. But it may well take a lot of the capability, the advantage, and the impetus, for another attempt.
This is one to annoy that diminishing coterie of Brexit-is-shite-deniers that still protest it was a good idea despite the complete lack of evidence that it has done us any favours. No doubt their closed minds will find some reason to doubt his analysis lol.
Irish independence was a major economic error, of historic proportions. They were poorer as a result, and remained poorer for decades
Do they regret it now? Do they want to revert? No. They did it for reasons OTHER than economics
What a ridiculous comparison @Leon. Do you have ANY idea what British rule in Ireland meant? Did the EU preside over a potato famine? Did the EU send troops into the UK. Did the EU insist on having it's aristocrats run major institutions?
Don't be so fucking ridiculous. You have more cred when you talk about alien invasions.
Nonetheless, we sought our political independence, as they sought theirs
A lot of us Leavers made the choice for reasons entirely unrelated to economics. Indeed I voted for Brexit KNOWING that Brexit would be severely painful. A bit like - ooh, I dunno - having a baby? Therefore I do not regret Brexit - we are now independent - and I would vote Leave all over again
I accept there are millions of Leavers who did vote on economic grounds and that they probably regret it, that's their choice
But it is not mine. So. When will you finally wrap your tiny brain around this idea? Lots of us voted Leave for reasons of sovereignty and democracy. We have no regrets. It is done
Lol. My brain (which, by the way, is quite behemoth in its proportions) is perfectly able to comprehend that some people delude themselves even when facts are presented. It is well known that some folk, indeed most, particularly when they get to your advanced age, find it particularly difficult to accept they have been stupid.
As I love you dearly, I am completely sympathetic, even if I am unable to be empathetic, on your stupidity.
This is one to annoy that diminishing coterie of Brexit-is-shite-deniers that still protest it was a good idea despite the complete lack of evidence that it has done us any favours. No doubt their closed minds will find some reason to doubt his analysis lol.
Irish independence was a major economic error, of historic proportions. They were poorer as a result, and remained poorer for decades
Do they regret it now? Do they want to revert? No. They did it for reasons OTHER than economics
What a ridiculous comparison @Leon. Do you have ANY idea what British rule in Ireland meant? Did the EU preside over a potato famine? Did the EU send troops into the UK. Did the EU insist on having it's aristocrats run major institutions?
Don't be so fucking ridiculous. You have more cred when you talk about alien invasions.
You could make a case for 'yes' for your last point - Juncker, Selmayr, Van der Leyen, Barroso, Prodi...
However, what Leon is rather overlooking is that Ireland was very poor to start with, largely due to British misrule. In fact, leaving the UK didn't make a noticeable difference except in the non-Belfast areas of Ulster, which became poorer due to trade disruption along the partition line.
By contrast, being in the EU made Britain richer.
"You could make a case for 'yes' for your last point - Juncker, Selmayr, Van der Leyen, Barroso, Prodi..." Not really. All of these folk did not get parachuted into the UK to live here and lord it amongst us. They were also accountable to the Council of Ministers of which the UK was a member, so have slightly more democratic accountability than our head of state (who used to be Ireland's) and the House of Lords
Interestingly though several of them were parachuted into Ireland to manage its finances after the GFC.
There were of course a significant number of Irish MPs in the Commons as well, although only 28 peers in the Lords (many of whom were not Irish).
Yes, but you know that it is an almost as weak an analogy as Leon's absolutely absurd one. By the same token we could argue that we have to work with foreigners from UN (probably will be IMF after Labour have been in a while) and representatives of NATO. That said, on the latter point, the yanks do sometimes literally "parachute in". The Brexiteer self-appointed protectors of our sovereignty have less to say on the country that has airbases on our soil of course.
True. But that's one of the reasons why I felt that point was a dangerous one to drag in. The constitutional situation of Ireland was quite complex. Pointing out Leon was wrong on the economic facts where he clearly is is altogether more pertinent to what you were saying.
But I am right, Ireland got relatively POORER after Independence, only really catching up after about 1980
Here's a very fair minded IRISH analysis. Which also notes how Ireland's GDP per capita is a bit leprechauny
"It is clear that Irish living standards fell further behind in the first decades following independence, only returning to its pre-independence relative position by around 1980. Convergence with Scottish GDP per capita in the decades since then has been dramatic. Convergence did not occur for Northern Ireland: today, it is in a similar position relative to Scotland as it was in 1925."
I remember visiting the Republic in the 1960s to see relatives. The contrast between the North and the South was remarkable. It struck almost as soon as you crossed the border.
RoI really didnt get its act together until the 1990s, its a different story today where the North is looking the poor relation.
Just a brief glance at the trans debate on Twitter shows that it has lost none of its ugliness and venom. What a horrible poisonous mess I’m still bemused how we ended up here, when ten years ago trans people were generally accepted and everyone seemed to rub along What happened? Who did this? Why?
Several things have happened - quite a few of which were going on “under the radar” and have only recently become apparent.
With the arrival of Gay Marriage the LGB Charity Stonewall had run out of road - what LGB rights were left to secure? So they added QT+ and started advocating for Trans people. Nothing wrong with that. Except some LGB people don't think it's a good fit between LGB (who people are attracted to) and QT+ (who people think they are). Among the QT+ tribe are trans people, who have gender dysphoria, but also "AGPs" - heterosexual men who are sexually aroused by themselves in women's clothes. These men in particular are seen as a threat to women's safety by women's groups.
Then Stonewall started briefing employers and organisations on the Equality Law as they thought it should be, not as it actually was. They also adopted a policy of "No Debate" when it came to Trans rights, so were not only deaf to criticism, but actively hostile towards it. This ended up in the courts when employers sacked people based on "Stonewall law" and found it did not stand up. These people were predominantly women, often left wing & frequently lesbian. So much for Tory "culture war"!
Meanwhile in Scotland, safe in the progressive echo chamber the SNP at the behest of their Green partners pushed through Gender Recognition Reform - which would turn getting a gender recognition certificate into a formality - again discussion or debate was dismissed as "transphobia". When this was finally exposed to full public discussion and the case of male rapists discovering they had "Prison onset gender dysphoria - can I be housed with women?" the politicians were I suspect grateful for Westminster blocking it because they could return to safer ground "disrespecting Scotland" than a policy unpopular with voters.
Back in England the explosion in cases of "gender dysphoria" among teen girls (previously it had mainly been pre-pubescent children and middle aged men) at the Tavistock led to an investigation under a leading paediatrician - Dr Cass - which started blowing holes in the assertions of the "Affirmative Care" model - widely (and, it must be said, profitably) promoted in the USA in particular. The ripples from the NHS review are spreading across the world with Australia wondering whether it should backtrack, and some states in the US now banning so-called "affirmative care". 1/2
Thanks for the summary.
I think the difference is that after the loss on equal marriage in the US, both in the courts and the public opinion, evangelical Christians and the big money in it moved to two other causes - finding a wedge issue to make LGBT+ issues relevant again (so they picked trans people) and trying to help non Western countries (specifically those in Africa) pass homophobic laws. Trans people became the battleground in the US and UK, and a lot of the rest of the Western world, that replaced the old fight (with the same talking points).
The increase in cases of dysphoria is made much of, but surely it makes sense that the bodies of people assigned female at birth were more heavily policed than those assigned male at birth, and therefore their ability to transition was lessened. Again, the increase in dysphoria cases seem huge when put in percentage increases, but we're still typically talking about an increase in referrals, not treatment, and still a very small number of people.
Queer issues have ALWAYS been part of the struggle - the idea of challenging the nuclear family, of heteronormativity and gender roles has always been part of the struggle of LGBT+ people because we are considered an existential threat to the existence of it. If people can have same sex partners, never get married, have multiple partners, not have to fit in with societal norms of gender, they can say that the patriarchal set up of society doesn't have to exist. "We're here, we're queer, we're used to it" was a rallying cry of the 70s and 80s. Some LGBT+ activists didn't WANT equal marriage because they saw that as conforming too much to heteronormative living - that partners deserved rights without having to concede to the constricts of conservative family values. But the movement became less radical, and that seems to have helped in some ways, and failed in others; most people still look down on any queer person who isn't living a heteronormative lifestyle.
The issue is that sex, and gender transition, are both protected characteristics, under equality legislation, and sometimes rights conflict.
Gender critical feminists in the UK have very little in common with US evangelicals.
Stonewall have given advice to organisations, which implies that these protected characteristics are one and the same thing, when they are not.
This is one to annoy that diminishing coterie of Brexit-is-shite-deniers that still protest it was a good idea despite the complete lack of evidence that it has done us any favours. No doubt their closed minds will find some reason to doubt his analysis lol.
Irish independence was a major economic error, of historic proportions. They were poorer as a result, and remained poorer for decades
Do they regret it now? Do they want to revert? No. They did it for reasons OTHER than economics
What a ridiculous comparison @Leon. Do you have ANY idea what British rule in Ireland meant? Did the EU preside over a potato famine? Did the EU send troops into the UK. Did the EU insist on having it's aristocrats run major institutions?
Don't be so fucking ridiculous. You have more cred when you talk about alien invasions.
You could make a case for 'yes' for your last point - Juncker, Selmayr, Van der Leyen, Barroso, Prodi...
However, what Leon is rather overlooking is that Ireland was very poor to start with, largely due to British misrule. In fact, leaving the UK didn't make a noticeable difference except in the non-Belfast areas of Ulster, which became poorer due to trade disruption along the partition line.
By contrast, being in the EU made Britain richer.
"You could make a case for 'yes' for your last point - Juncker, Selmayr, Van der Leyen, Barroso, Prodi..." Not really. All of these folk did not get parachuted into the UK to live here and lord it amongst us. They were also accountable to the Council of Ministers of which the UK was a member, so have slightly more democratic accountability than our head of state (who used to be Ireland's) and the House of Lords
Interestingly though several of them were parachuted into Ireland to manage its finances after the GFC.
There were of course a significant number of Irish MPs in the Commons as well, although only 28 peers in the Lords (many of whom were not Irish).
Yes, but you know that it is an almost as weak an analogy as Leon's absolutely absurd one. By the same token we could argue that we have to work with foreigners from UN (probably will be IMF after Labour have been in a while) and representatives of NATO. That said, on the latter point, the yanks do sometimes literally "parachute in". The Brexiteer self-appointed protectors of our sovereignty have less to say on the country that has airbases on our soil of course.
True. But that's one of the reasons why I felt that point was a dangerous one to drag in. The constitutional situation of Ireland was quite complex. Pointing out Leon was wrong on the economic facts where he clearly is is altogether more pertinent to what you were saying.
But I am right, Ireland got relatively POORER after Independence, only really catching up after about 1980
Here's a very fair minded IRISH analysis. Which also notes how Ireland's GDP per capita is a bit leprechauny
"It is clear that Irish living standards fell further behind in the first decades following independence, only returning to its pre-independence relative position by around 1980. Convergence with Scottish GDP per capita in the decades since then has been dramatic. Convergence did not occur for Northern Ireland: today, it is in a similar position relative to Scotland as it was in 1925."
It is still a fecking ludicrous comparison that you made. Absurd. Ridiculous. Preposterous. Ludicrous. Even by the hyperbolic standards that we have been used to from the most unbelievable alcoholic or drug induced utterances that you have made on here.
This is one to annoy that diminishing coterie of Brexit-is-shite-deniers that still protest it was a good idea despite the complete lack of evidence that it has done us any favours. No doubt their closed minds will find some reason to doubt his analysis lol.
Irish independence was a major economic error, of historic proportions. They were poorer as a result, and remained poorer for decades
Do they regret it now? Do they want to revert? No. They did it for reasons OTHER than economics
What a ridiculous comparison @Leon. Do you have ANY idea what British rule in Ireland meant? Did the EU preside over a potato famine? Did the EU send troops into the UK. Did the EU insist on having it's aristocrats run major institutions?
Don't be so fucking ridiculous. You have more cred when you talk about alien invasions.
The Great Hunger removed a third of the island of Ireland's population, through death or migration. The population has never recovered. The island was occupied by soldiers, up to the modern era, who committed war crimes, even if the UK refuses to accept them. That is not the same as voting to join an economic consortium of countries that evolved into a more political consortium of countries, and the comparison is sickening.
This is one to annoy that diminishing coterie of Brexit-is-shite-deniers that still protest it was a good idea despite the complete lack of evidence that it has done us any favours. No doubt their closed minds will find some reason to doubt his analysis lol.
Irish independence was a major economic error, of historic proportions. They were poorer as a result, and remained poorer for decades
Do they regret it now? Do they want to revert? No. They did it for reasons OTHER than economics
What a ridiculous comparison @Leon. Do you have ANY idea what British rule in Ireland meant? Did the EU preside over a potato famine? Did the EU send troops into the UK. Did the EU insist on having it's aristocrats run major institutions?
Don't be so fucking ridiculous. You have more cred when you talk about alien invasions.
The Great Hunger removed a third of the island of Ireland's population, through death or migration. The population has never recovered. The island was occupied by soldiers, up to the modern era, who committed war crimes, even if the UK refuses to accept them. That is not the same as voting to join an economic consortium of countries that evolved into a more political consortium of countries, and the comparison is sickening.
Some British people have a remarkable blind spot about Ireland. The Irish are far more forgiving towards us than we have any right to expect.
We freed up a heck of a lot of parking on the West Coast, and encouraged them to diversify their agriculture away from the potato. How is this bad?
The Empire forced an entirely different method of land ownership, landlordism and free marketeerism that literally destroyed Irish civil society because 1/3rd of the island either died or had to migrate during the Great Hunger. And that's just one thing, relatively recently historically speaking! The language was made illegal, by penalty of death, Catholicisim was essentially criminalised, early "race science" was basically invented in part to justify the subjugation of the Irish (as well as slavery). Wealth, land and labour was extracted and what was given back was landlords and death. And the UK did not diversify their agriculture away from the potato - it was the over charging of farmers by English landowners that made potatoes the only profitable / substantive crop, and the method of land reform introduced reduced the incentive to improve the land with better crops / infrastructure (because landlords would use it as an argument to raise rents / find new tenants).
I really recommend the podcast Behind The Bastards and their episodes on that period of history.
This is one to annoy that diminishing coterie of Brexit-is-shite-deniers that still protest it was a good idea despite the complete lack of evidence that it has done us any favours. No doubt their closed minds will find some reason to doubt his analysis lol.
Irish independence was a major economic error, of historic proportions. They were poorer as a result, and remained poorer for decades
Do they regret it now? Do they want to revert? No. They did it for reasons OTHER than economics
What a ridiculous comparison @Leon. Do you have ANY idea what British rule in Ireland meant? Did the EU preside over a potato famine? Did the EU send troops into the UK. Did the EU insist on having it's aristocrats run major institutions?
Don't be so fucking ridiculous. You have more cred when you talk about alien invasions.
The Great Hunger removed a third of the island of Ireland's population, through death or migration. The population has never recovered. The island was occupied by soldiers, up to the modern era, who committed war crimes, even if the UK refuses to accept them. That is not the same as voting to join an economic consortium of countries that evolved into a more political consortium of countries, and the comparison is sickening.
The notion of Brexit as the fruition of a noble struggle for British independence from foreign oppression - this is absolutely risible. But it’s believed by plenty of Leavers, I'm sorry to say. What can you do?
The point that to end a war one may have to negotiate with people one doesn't like is less striking than the suggestion that if Ukraine doesn't succeed in this year's expected offensive, the West will need to rethink the nature of support. His comments are qualified (and translation may be an issue too) and certainly not pro-Putin but probably the clearest hint we've seen so far that a continuing military deadlock may lead to some pressure on Ukraine to negotiate for something less than total victory. Conversely the war hysteria of Russian nationalists seems to have subsided into trying to keep their current gains rather than advancing further.
You missed a few words off the end; it should be: "... into trying to keep their current gains rather than advancing further for the time being."
*Any* peace deal - whether on today's lines, on 2014's, or pre-2014 - has to ensure that Russia will not just rebuild and try again in a few years - as they have before.
And the major issue is that, absent a Russian defeat, I see no way of ensuring that. Why trust Putin and his cronies, especially if they can sell a big territorial 'win' to their populace?
A Russian "defeat" doesn't ensure that either. The four contested oblasts are now legally, as far as Russia is concerned, part of the RF and must be recovered. If VVP falls then it will be number one on his successor's to-do list.
The situation has been basically unchanged for 8-9 months now. The AFU can't kick RF forces out of Lugansk/Donetsk and RF can't get west of the Dneiper so you can see why fatigue might be setting in.
Just a brief glance at the trans debate on Twitter shows that it has lost none of its ugliness and venom. What a horrible poisonous mess I’m still bemused how we ended up here, when ten years ago trans people were generally accepted and everyone seemed to rub along What happened? Who did this? Why?
Several things have happened - quite a few of which were going on “under the radar” and have only recently become apparent.
With the arrival of Gay Marriage the LGB Charity Stonewall had run out of road - what LGB rights were left to secure? So they added QT+ and started advocating for Trans people. Nothing wrong with that. Except some LGB people don't think it's a good fit between LGB (who people are attracted to) and QT+ (who people think they are). Among the QT+ tribe are trans people, who have gender dysphoria, but also "AGPs" - heterosexual men who are sexually aroused by themselves in women's clothes. These men in particular are seen as a threat to women's safety by women's groups.
Then Stonewall started briefing employers and organisations on the Equality Law as they thought it should be, not as it actually was. They also adopted a policy of "No Debate" when it came to Trans rights, so were not only deaf to criticism, but actively hostile towards it. This ended up in the courts when employers sacked people based on "Stonewall law" and found it did not stand up. These people were predominantly women, often left wing & frequently lesbian. So much for Tory "culture war"!
Meanwhile in Scotland, safe in the progressive echo chamber the SNP at the behest of their Green partners pushed through Gender Recognition Reform - which would turn getting a gender recognition certificate into a formality - again discussion or debate was dismissed as "transphobia". When this was finally exposed to full public discussion and the case of male rapists discovering they had "Prison onset gender dysphoria - can I be housed with women?" the politicians were I suspect grateful for Westminster blocking it because they could return to safer ground "disrespecting Scotland" than a policy unpopular with voters.
Back in England the explosion in cases of "gender dysphoria" among teen girls (previously it had mainly been pre-pubescent children and middle aged men) at the Tavistock led to an investigation under a leading paediatrician - Dr Cass - which started blowing holes in the assertions of the "Affirmative Care" model - widely (and, it must be said, profitably) promoted in the USA in particular. The ripples from the NHS review are spreading across the world with Australia wondering whether it should backtrack, and some states in the US now banning so-called "affirmative care". 1/2
Thanks for the summary.
I think the difference is that after the loss on equal marriage in the US, both in the courts and the public opinion, evangelical Christians and the big money in it moved to two other causes - finding a wedge issue to make LGBT+ issues relevant again (so they picked trans people) and trying to help non Western countries (specifically those in Africa) pass homophobic laws. Trans people became the battleground in the US and UK, and a lot of the rest of the Western world, that replaced the old fight (with the same talking points).
The increase in cases of dysphoria is made much of, but surely it makes sense that the bodies of people assigned female at birth were more heavily policed than those assigned male at birth, and therefore their ability to transition was lessened. Again, the increase in dysphoria cases seem huge when put in percentage increases, but we're still typically talking about an increase in referrals, not treatment, and still a very small number of people.
Queer issues have ALWAYS been part of the struggle - the idea of challenging the nuclear family, of heteronormativity and gender roles has always been part of the struggle of LGBT+ people because we are considered an existential threat to the existence of it. If people can have same sex partners, never get married, have multiple partners, not have to fit in with societal norms of gender, they can say that the patriarchal set up of society doesn't have to exist. "We're here, we're queer, we're used to it" was a rallying cry of the 70s and 80s. Some LGBT+ activists didn't WANT equal marriage because they saw that as conforming too much to heteronormative living - that partners deserved rights without having to concede to the constricts of conservative family values. But the movement became less radical, and that seems to have helped in some ways, and failed in others; most people still look down on any queer person who isn't living a heteronormative lifestyle.
The issue is that sex, and gender transition, are both protected characteristics, under equality legislation, and sometimes rights conflict.
Gender critical feminists in the UK have very little in common with US evangelicals.
They get most of their money from them, and use the same kind of arguments as the old homophobic ones. And LGB rights are also protected by sex and gender (as Gorsuch argued in the USA), due to the fact that for same sex couples is still based in sex and gender based discrimination.
The point that to end a war one may have to negotiate with people one doesn't like is less striking than the suggestion that if Ukraine doesn't succeed in this year's expected offensive, the West will need to rethink the nature of support. His comments are qualified (and translation may be an issue too) and certainly not pro-Putin but probably the clearest hint we've seen so far that a continuing military deadlock may lead to some pressure on Ukraine to negotiate for something less than total victory. Conversely the war hysteria of Russian nationalists seems to have subsided into trying to keep their current gains rather than advancing further.
You missed a few words off the end; it should be: "... into trying to keep their current gains rather than advancing further for the time being."
*Any* peace deal - whether on today's lines, on 2014's, or pre-2014 - has to ensure that Russia will not just rebuild and try again in a few years - as they have before.
And the major issue is that, absent a Russian defeat, I see no way of ensuring that. Why trust Putin and his cronies, especially if they can sell a big territorial 'win' to their populace?
A Russian "defeat" doesn't ensure that either. The four contested oblasts are now legally, as far as Russia is concerned, part of the RF and must be recovered. If VVP falls then it will be number one on his successor's to-do list.
The situation has been basically unchanged for 8-9 months now. The AFU can't kick RF forces out of Lugansk/Donetsk and RF can't get west of the Dneiper so you can see why fatigue might be setting in.
But without a defeat, Russia is in a much better position for another attack.
"The situation has been basically unchanged for 8-9 months now. The AFU can't kick RF forces out of Lugansk/Donetsk and RF can't get west of the Dneiper so you can see why fatigue might be setting in."
That might not be the case. The Russians certainly seem to be running near empty, and their economy is hurting. Whilst we know Ukraine has been getting a heck of a lot of kit that has not shown up as destroyed in febrile pro-Russian propaganda - despite their claim to have destroyed three times as many himars systems than have been sent ...
It all depends on this rumoured Ukrainian offensive, when it occurs. I doubt it'll be enough to totally force the issue, but I would not be surprised if it regains much more territory than the autumn offensives last year did.
Just a brief glance at the trans debate on Twitter shows that it has lost none of its ugliness and venom. What a horrible poisonous mess I’m still bemused how we ended up here, when ten years ago trans people were generally accepted and everyone seemed to rub along What happened? Who did this? Why?
Several things have happened - quite a few of which were going on “under the radar” and have only recently become apparent.
With the arrival of Gay Marriage the LGB Charity Stonewall had run out of road - what LGB rights were left to secure? So they added QT+ and started advocating for Trans people. Nothing wrong with that. Except some LGB people don't think it's a good fit between LGB (who people are attracted to) and QT+ (who people think they are). Among the QT+ tribe are trans people, who have gender dysphoria, but also "AGPs" - heterosexual men who are sexually aroused by themselves in women's clothes. These men in particular are seen as a threat to women's safety by women's groups.
Then Stonewall started briefing employers and organisations on the Equality Law as they thought it should be, not as it actually was. They also adopted a policy of "No Debate" when it came to Trans rights, so were not only deaf to criticism, but actively hostile towards it. This ended up in the courts when employers sacked people based on "Stonewall law" and found it did not stand up. These people were predominantly women, often left wing & frequently lesbian. So much for Tory "culture war"!
Meanwhile in Scotland, safe in the progressive echo chamber the SNP at the behest of their Green partners pushed through Gender Recognition Reform - which would turn getting a gender recognition certificate into a formality - again discussion or debate was dismissed as "transphobia". When this was finally exposed to full public discussion and the case of male rapists discovering they had "Prison onset gender dysphoria - can I be housed with women?" the politicians were I suspect grateful for Westminster blocking it because they could return to safer ground "disrespecting Scotland" than a policy unpopular with voters.
Back in England the explosion in cases of "gender dysphoria" among teen girls (previously it had mainly been pre-pubescent children and middle aged men) at the Tavistock led to an investigation under a leading paediatrician - Dr Cass - which started blowing holes in the assertions of the "Affirmative Care" model - widely (and, it must be said, profitably) promoted in the USA in particular. The ripples from the NHS review are spreading across the world with Australia wondering whether it should backtrack, and some states in the US now banning so-called "affirmative care". 1/2
Thanks for the summary.
I think the difference is that after the loss on equal marriage in the US, both in the courts and the public opinion, evangelical Christians and the big money in it moved to two other causes - finding a wedge issue to make LGBT+ issues relevant again (so they picked trans people) and trying to help non Western countries (specifically those in Africa) pass homophobic laws. Trans people became the battleground in the US and UK, and a lot of the rest of the Western world, that replaced the old fight (with the same talking points).
The increase in cases of dysphoria is made much of, but surely it makes sense that the bodies of people assigned female at birth were more heavily policed than those assigned male at birth, and therefore their ability to transition was lessened. Again, the increase in dysphoria cases seem huge when put in percentage increases, but we're still typically talking about an increase in referrals, not treatment, and still a very small number of people.
Queer issues have ALWAYS been part of the struggle - the idea of challenging the nuclear family, of heteronormativity and gender roles has always been part of the struggle of LGBT+ people because we are considered an existential threat to the existence of it. If people can have same sex partners, never get married, have multiple partners, not have to fit in with societal norms of gender, they can say that the patriarchal set up of society doesn't have to exist. "We're here, we're queer, we're used to it" was a rallying cry of the 70s and 80s. Some LGBT+ activists didn't WANT equal marriage because they saw that as conforming too much to heteronormative living - that partners deserved rights without having to concede to the constricts of conservative family values. But the movement became less radical, and that seems to have helped in some ways, and failed in others; most people still look down on any queer person who isn't living a heteronormative lifestyle.
The issue is that sex, and gender transition, are both protected characteristics, under equality legislation, and sometimes rights conflict.
Gender critical feminists in the UK have very little in common with US evangelicals.
They get most of their money from them, and use the same kind of arguments as the old homophobic ones. And LGB rights are also protected by sex and gender (as Gorsuch argued in the USA), due to the fact that for same sex couples is still based in sex and gender based discrimination.
You’re just seeing it as Conservatives/evangelicals/Republicans v Liberals/gays/ trans people when it’s a whole lot more nuanced than that.
There are many people on the political left who would oppose you on this matter.
This is one to annoy that diminishing coterie of Brexit-is-shite-deniers that still protest it was a good idea despite the complete lack of evidence that it has done us any favours. No doubt their closed minds will find some reason to doubt his analysis lol.
Irish independence was a major economic error, of historic proportions. They were poorer as a result, and remained poorer for decades
Do they regret it now? Do they want to revert? No. They did it for reasons OTHER than economics
What a ridiculous comparison @Leon. Do you have ANY idea what British rule in Ireland meant? Did the EU preside over a potato famine? Did the EU send troops into the UK. Did the EU insist on having it's aristocrats run major institutions?
Don't be so fucking ridiculous. You have more cred when you talk about alien invasions.
You could make a case for 'yes' for your last point - Juncker, Selmayr, Van der Leyen, Barroso, Prodi...
However, what Leon is rather overlooking is that Ireland was very poor to start with, largely due to British misrule. In fact, leaving the UK didn't make a noticeable difference except in the non-Belfast areas of Ulster, which became poorer due to trade disruption along the partition line.
By contrast, being in the EU made Britain richer.
"You could make a case for 'yes' for your last point - Juncker, Selmayr, Van der Leyen, Barroso, Prodi..." Not really. All of these folk did not get parachuted into the UK to live here and lord it amongst us. They were also accountable to the Council of Ministers of which the UK was a member, so have slightly more democratic accountability than our head of state (who used to be Ireland's) and the House of Lords
Interestingly though several of them were parachuted into Ireland to manage its finances after the GFC.
There were of course a significant number of Irish MPs in the Commons as well, although only 28 peers in the Lords (many of whom were not Irish).
Yes, but you know that it is an almost as weak an analogy as Leon's absolutely absurd one. By the same token we could argue that we have to work with foreigners from UN (probably will be IMF after Labour have been in a while) and representatives of NATO. That said, on the latter point, the yanks do sometimes literally "parachute in". The Brexiteer self-appointed protectors of our sovereignty have less to say on the country that has airbases on our soil of course.
True. But that's one of the reasons why I felt that point was a dangerous one to drag in. The constitutional situation of Ireland was quite complex. Pointing out Leon was wrong on the economic facts where he clearly is is altogether more pertinent to what you were saying.
But I am right, Ireland got relatively POORER after Independence, only really catching up after about 1980...
You mean it's a political event analogous to having a baby? If only there was somebody on PB who could craft a narrative about such a thing, just as one chips away at the rock to reveal the pulsing, writhing thing below.
This is one to annoy that diminishing coterie of Brexit-is-shite-deniers that still protest it was a good idea despite the complete lack of evidence that it has done us any favours. No doubt their closed minds will find some reason to doubt his analysis lol.
Irish independence was a major economic error, of historic proportions. They were poorer as a result, and remained poorer for decades
Do they regret it now? Do they want to revert? No. They did it for reasons OTHER than economics
What a ridiculous comparison @Leon. Do you have ANY idea what British rule in Ireland meant? Did the EU preside over a potato famine? Did the EU send troops into the UK. Did the EU insist on having it's aristocrats run major institutions?
Don't be so fucking ridiculous. You have more cred when you talk about alien invasions.
The Great Hunger removed a third of the island of Ireland's population, through death or migration. The population has never recovered. The island was occupied by soldiers, up to the modern era, who committed war crimes, even if the UK refuses to accept them. That is not the same as voting to join an economic consortium of countries that evolved into a more political consortium of countries, and the comparison is sickening.
Some British people have a remarkable blind spot about Ireland. The Irish are far more forgiving towards us than we have any right to expect.
We freed up a heck of a lot of parking on the West Coast, and encouraged them to diversify their agriculture away from the potato. How is this bad?
The Empire forced an entirely different method of land ownership, landlordism and free marketeerism that literally destroyed Irish civil society because 1/3rd of the island either died or had to migrate during the Great Hunger. And that's just one thing, relatively recently historically speaking! The language was made illegal, by penalty of death, Catholicisim was essentially criminalised, early "race science" was basically invented in part to justify the subjugation of the Irish (as well as slavery). Wealth, land and labour was extracted and what was given back was landlords and death. And the UK did not diversify their agriculture away from the potato - it was the over charging of farmers by English landowners that made potatoes the only profitable / substantive crop, and the method of land reform introduced reduced the incentive to improve the land with better crops / infrastructure (because landlords would use it as an argument to raise rents / find new tenants).
I really recommend the podcast Behind The Bastards and their episodes on that period of history.
Some echoes there with the Gaelic areas of Scotland, of course. No wonder their remnants went solidly Liberal in the teeth of the Tory landowners, for pretty much a century or so, after Gladstone sort of did something about it with the crofting areas legislation.
Trump's fundamental problem is that he thinks he can treat the criminal law in a similar manner to the tactics he employs in civil disputes. None if his lawyers have sufficient influence to get across the message that such a thing is impossible.
Unscheduled flight arrivals in Miensk. Rumours that Lukashenka has died.
What happens next there, a takeover of the western-looking moderates, or Putin getting a placeman in charge? Huge implications for Ukraine.
95% of Belarusians want the white-red-white flag and a democratic future. Any Russian place man is unlikely to survive for long. It will take a lot to provoke the Belarusians to violence, but it could happen. There is already a government in exile and in the Kaliniauski battalion now regiment, an army in exile too
Tikhanovskaya is in exile and has an 8 year prison sentence hanging over her so it's hard to see a route into the Palace of Independence from that starting point. If Batka (who has been a pain in VVP's dick for decades over his flexible loyalty) has megged it then surely his replacement will be somebody more Russia adjacent who is likely to throw the full military might of Belarus into the SMO like Kochanova or Golovchenko.
In the short term, no question that Russia would put in a puppet, but the situation could move very fast. My friends in Miensk (BY versus Rus Minck) think that a Kalinauski move like the Free Russians in Belgorod could go a lot further.
The situation in BY is pretty unstable
That transliteration seems like a bit of an affectation. The Belarusian spelling is Мінск and the letter і is transliterated as i in all of the major systems.
There are many people on the political left who would oppose you on this matter.
Many, most, some...
Consider an election in a country with ten states. The winner wins 6, some by a landslide, and loses 4, some by a small margin. You can truthfully write the following paragraph for the other side
"Yes they won, but the victory was by a very small margin in some states and most were close. Every state had many people that supported us. Some say that..."
Just a brief glance at the trans debate on Twitter shows that it has lost none of its ugliness and venom. What a horrible poisonous mess I’m still bemused how we ended up here, when ten years ago trans people were generally accepted and everyone seemed to rub along What happened? Who did this? Why?
Several things have happened - quite a few of which were going on “under the radar” and have only recently become apparent.
With the arrival of Gay Marriage the LGB Charity Stonewall had run out of road - what LGB rights were left to secure? So they added QT+ and started advocating for Trans people. Nothing wrong with that. Except some LGB people don't think it's a good fit between LGB (who people are attracted to) and QT+ (who people think they are). Among the QT+ tribe are trans people, who have gender dysphoria, but also "AGPs" - heterosexual men who are sexually aroused by themselves in women's clothes. These men in particular are seen as a threat to women's safety by women's groups.
Then Stonewall started briefing employers and organisations on the Equality Law as they thought it should be, not as it actually was. They also adopted a policy of "No Debate" when it came to Trans rights, so were not only deaf to criticism, but actively hostile towards it. This ended up in the courts when employers sacked people based on "Stonewall law" and found it did not stand up. These people were predominantly women, often left wing & frequently lesbian. So much for Tory "culture war"!
Meanwhile in Scotland, safe in the progressive echo chamber the SNP at the behest of their Green partners pushed through Gender Recognition Reform - which would turn getting a gender recognition certificate into a formality - again discussion or debate was dismissed as "transphobia". When this was finally exposed to full public discussion and the case of male rapists discovering they had "Prison onset gender dysphoria - can I be housed with women?" the politicians were I suspect grateful for Westminster blocking it because they could return to safer ground "disrespecting Scotland" than a policy unpopular with voters.
Back in England the explosion in cases of "gender dysphoria" among teen girls (previously it had mainly been pre-pubescent children and middle aged men) at the Tavistock led to an investigation under a leading paediatrician - Dr Cass - which started blowing holes in the assertions of the "Affirmative Care" model - widely (and, it must be said, profitably) promoted in the USA in particular. The ripples from the NHS review are spreading across the world with Australia wondering whether it should backtrack, and some states in the US now banning so-called "affirmative care". 1/2
Thanks for the summary.
I think the difference is that after the loss on equal marriage in the US, both in the courts and the public opinion, evangelical Christians and the big money in it moved to two other causes - finding a wedge issue to make LGBT+ issues relevant again (so they picked trans people) and trying to help non Western countries (specifically those in Africa) pass homophobic laws. Trans people became the battleground in the US and UK, and a lot of the rest of the Western world, that replaced the old fight (with the same talking points).
The increase in cases of dysphoria is made much of, but surely it makes sense that the bodies of people assigned female at birth were more heavily policed than those assigned male at birth, and therefore their ability to transition was lessened. Again, the increase in dysphoria cases seem huge when put in percentage increases, but we're still typically talking about an increase in referrals, not treatment, and still a very small number of people.
Queer issues have ALWAYS been part of the struggle - the idea of challenging the nuclear family, of heteronormativity and gender roles has always been part of the struggle of LGBT+ people because we are considered an existential threat to the existence of it. If people can have same sex partners, never get married, have multiple partners, not have to fit in with societal norms of gender, they can say that the patriarchal set up of society doesn't have to exist. "We're here, we're queer, we're used to it" was a rallying cry of the 70s and 80s. Some LGBT+ activists didn't WANT equal marriage because they saw that as conforming too much to heteronormative living - that partners deserved rights without having to concede to the constricts of conservative family values. But the movement became less radical, and that seems to have helped in some ways, and failed in others; most people still look down on any queer person who isn't living a heteronormative lifestyle.
The issue is that sex, and gender transition, are both protected characteristics, under equality legislation, and sometimes rights conflict.
Gender critical feminists in the UK have very little in common with US evangelicals.
They get most of their money from them, and use the same kind of arguments as the old homophobic ones. And LGB rights are also protected by sex and gender (as Gorsuch argued in the USA), due to the fact that for same sex couples is still based in sex and gender based discrimination.
You think JK Rowling is in the pocket of American Christian fundamentalists?
I lived in Germany for 10 years and so learned to speak German reasonably proficiently, but I still tended to be confused for a Dutchman whenever I opened my mouth (we lived quite close to the Dutch border).
Similarly, I got mistaken for Swiss when I visited Austria recently, which I felt wasn't too bad as it's 26 years since I lived there - it's remarkable how languages stick once you learn them.
Recently chatted with one of our diplomats who had done stints in China and Afghanistan and discovered that the Foreign Office now requires extensive language training for anyone posted abroad, up to two years of intense lessons - accordingly, he's proficient in Mandarin and Farsi, which to my lay mind sounds pretty impressive. I still had the vague prejudice that our diplomats turn up in foreign lands and think they can get by through speaking English loudly - good to hear that's completely out of date.
My father (and mother) definitely got French language training before he was posted to the British Embassy in Bruxelles in the 70s. However, he got zero Yoruba instruction before his punishment detail to the High Commission in Nigeria and did indeed rely on SHOUTING LOUDLY. Our gardener thought "For Fuck's Sake" was some sort of English benediction as he heard it 20 times a day.
My brother got trained well on government service in Arabic and a number of other languages. He always sounds English* but speaks well enough for complex conversations.
*I think people rarely lose the accent of their upbringing with out major effort. My sister in law still sounds German after 40 years, and in cosmopolitan Leicester people often have the accent of when they arrived here, even if they have added some Leicester vocabulary too.
My French mother has lived in England for nearly 60 years, and she still sounds like something off Allo Allo. Conversely when she's in France people sometimes think she isn't French so she must have picked up something over here!
On topic, I watched the final episode of Succession last night. Superb. What a drama. Straight into the pantheon of greats, I reckon: along with Sopranos, Breaking Bad, GOT, Spartacus, et al
We are still in a golden age of TV
I noticed, after some investigating, that the main writers on the series are Brits. Well done them. Relatedly I also noticed, in the final episode, that the Roy children - in times of extremely high emotion - lapse into British accents. At one point they are clearly doing it to mimic their British mother, but later it just seems to be a thing they do
I’ve noticed this elsewhere in American life, recently. UK accents and slang sneaking in. Peculiar
This is one to annoy that diminishing coterie of Brexit-is-shite-deniers that still protest it was a good idea despite the complete lack of evidence that it has done us any favours. No doubt their closed minds will find some reason to doubt his analysis lol.
Irish independence was a major economic error, of historic proportions. They were poorer as a result, and remained poorer for decades
Do they regret it now? Do they want to revert? No. They did it for reasons OTHER than economics
What a ridiculous comparison @Leon. Do you have ANY idea what British rule in Ireland meant? Did the EU preside over a potato famine? Did the EU send troops into the UK. Did the EU insist on having it's aristocrats run major institutions?
Don't be so fucking ridiculous. You have more cred when you talk about alien invasions.
You could make a case for 'yes' for your last point - Juncker, Selmayr, Van der Leyen, Barroso, Prodi...
However, what Leon is rather overlooking is that Ireland was very poor to start with, largely due to British misrule. In fact, leaving the UK didn't make a noticeable difference except in the non-Belfast areas of Ulster, which became poorer due to trade disruption along the partition line.
By contrast, being in the EU made Britain richer.
"You could make a case for 'yes' for your last point - Juncker, Selmayr, Van der Leyen, Barroso, Prodi..." Not really. All of these folk did not get parachuted into the UK to live here and lord it amongst us. They were also accountable to the Council of Ministers of which the UK was a member, so have slightly more democratic accountability than our head of state (who used to be Ireland's) and the House of Lords
Interestingly though several of them were parachuted into Ireland to manage its finances after the GFC.
There were of course a significant number of Irish MPs in the Commons as well, although only 28 peers in the Lords (many of whom were not Irish).
Yes, but you know that it is an almost as weak an analogy as Leon's absolutely absurd one. By the same token we could argue that we have to work with foreigners from UN (probably will be IMF after Labour have been in a while) and representatives of NATO. That said, on the latter point, the yanks do sometimes literally "parachute in". The Brexiteer self-appointed protectors of our sovereignty have less to say on the country that has airbases on our soil of course.
True. But that's one of the reasons why I felt that point was a dangerous one to drag in. The constitutional situation of Ireland was quite complex. Pointing out Leon was wrong on the economic facts where he clearly is is altogether more pertinent to what you were saying.
But I am right, Ireland got relatively POORER after Independence, only really catching up after about 1980
Here's a very fair minded IRISH analysis. Which also notes how Ireland's GDP per capita is a bit leprechauny
"It is clear that Irish living standards fell further behind in the first decades following independence, only returning to its pre-independence relative position by around 1980. Convergence with Scottish GDP per capita in the decades since then has been dramatic. Convergence did not occur for Northern Ireland: today, it is in a similar position relative to Scotland as it was in 1925."
It is still a fecking ludicrous comparison that you made. Absurd. Ridiculous. Preposterous. Ludicrous. Even by the hyperbolic standards that we have been used to from the most unbelievable alcoholic or drug induced utterances that you have made on here.
This is one to annoy that diminishing coterie of Brexit-is-shite-deniers that still protest it was a good idea despite the complete lack of evidence that it has done us any favours. No doubt their closed minds will find some reason to doubt his analysis lol.
Irish independence was a major economic error, of historic proportions. They were poorer as a result, and remained poorer for decades
Do they regret it now? Do they want to revert? No. They did it for reasons OTHER than economics
What a ridiculous comparison @Leon. Do you have ANY idea what British rule in Ireland meant? Did the EU preside over a potato famine? Did the EU send troops into the UK. Did the EU insist on having it's aristocrats run major institutions?
Don't be so fucking ridiculous. You have more cred when you talk about alien invasions.
The Great Hunger removed a third of the island of Ireland's population, through death or migration. The population has never recovered. The island was occupied by soldiers, up to the modern era, who committed war crimes, even if the UK refuses to accept them. That is not the same as voting to join an economic consortium of countries that evolved into a more political consortium of countries, and the comparison is sickening.
Some British people have a remarkable blind spot about Ireland. The Irish are far more forgiving towards us than we have any right to expect.
We freed up a heck of a lot of parking on the West Coast, and encouraged them to diversify their agriculture away from the potato. How is this bad?
The Empire forced an entirely different method of land ownership, landlordism and free marketeerism that literally destroyed Irish civil society because 1/3rd of the island either died or had to migrate during the Great Hunger. And that's just one thing, relatively recently historically speaking! The language was made illegal, by penalty of death, Catholicisim was essentially criminalised, early "race science" was basically invented in part to justify the subjugation of the Irish (as well as slavery). Wealth, land and labour was extracted and what was given back was landlords and death. And the UK did not diversify their agriculture away from the potato - it was the over charging of farmers by English landowners that made potatoes the only profitable / substantive crop, and the method of land reform introduced reduced the incentive to improve the land with better crops / infrastructure (because landlords would use it as an argument to raise rents / find new tenants).
I really recommend the podcast Behind The Bastards and their episodes on that period of history.
I note that you completely avoid my point about the extra parking post 1850. Have you been to Cahersiveen recently? Tons of it. Parking. Everywhere. Just pull up and hop out
This is one to annoy that diminishing coterie of Brexit-is-shite-deniers that still protest it was a good idea despite the complete lack of evidence that it has done us any favours. No doubt their closed minds will find some reason to doubt his analysis lol.
Irish independence was a major economic error, of historic proportions. They were poorer as a result, and remained poorer for decades
Do they regret it now? Do they want to revert? No. They did it for reasons OTHER than economics
What a ridiculous comparison @Leon. Do you have ANY idea what British rule in Ireland meant? Did the EU preside over a potato famine? Did the EU send troops into the UK. Did the EU insist on having it's aristocrats run major institutions?
Don't be so fucking ridiculous. You have more cred when you talk about alien invasions.
The Great Hunger removed a third of the island of Ireland's population, through death or migration. The population has never recovered. The island was occupied by soldiers, up to the modern era, who committed war crimes, even if the UK refuses to accept them. That is not the same as voting to join an economic consortium of countries that evolved into a more political consortium of countries, and the comparison is sickening.
Some British people have a remarkable blind spot about Ireland. The Irish are far more forgiving towards us than we have any right to expect.
We freed up a heck of a lot of parking on the West Coast, and encouraged them to diversify their agriculture away from the potato. How is this bad?
The Empire forced an entirely different method of land ownership, landlordism and free marketeerism that literally destroyed Irish civil society because 1/3rd of the island either died or had to migrate during the Great Hunger. And that's just one thing, relatively recently historically speaking! The language was made illegal, by penalty of death, Catholicisim was essentially criminalised, early "race science" was basically invented in part to justify the subjugation of the Irish (as well as slavery). Wealth, land and labour was extracted and what was given back was landlords and death. And the UK did not diversify their agriculture away from the potato - it was the over charging of farmers by English landowners that made potatoes the only profitable / substantive crop, and the method of land reform introduced reduced the incentive to improve the land with better crops / infrastructure (because landlords would use it as an argument to raise rents / find new tenants).
I really recommend the podcast Behind The Bastards and their episodes on that period of history.
I note that you completely avoid my point about the extra parking post 1850. Have you been to Cahersiveen recently? Tons of it. Parking. Everywhere. Just pull up and hop out
No doubt you would complain that the wheels tend to get stuck in the ainneoir which the peasantry were so inconsiderate as to leave behind.
Unscheduled flight arrivals in Miensk. Rumours that Lukashenka has died.
What happens next there, a takeover of the western-looking moderates, or Putin getting a placeman in charge? Huge implications for Ukraine.
I'd wager the latter. Anyways. Be more significant if it is Lukashenko. Lukashenka would be his wife or daughter. (No idea if he has either. But it's vital to start the month as pedantically as you mean to go on).
The 'Lukashenko' surname, like most -o surnames, has neutral grammatical gender and therefore does not change when used by female. Hence AGL's unlucky Mrs (imagine being fucking drilled by that) known as Галина Родионовна Лукашенко in Russian - which is all we care about. Other examples are Ludmilla Radchenko (actress, model, whatever) and Natasha Stefanenko (also actress, model, whatever).
In an educated Moscow accent, which everybody should strive to affect, the terminal 'o' is sounded as 'a' which adds to the confusion.
How the hell did you learn Russian? I’ve been trying to learn it for a decade, and failed miserably. Do you just have to live somewhere that speaks it for a few years, and avoid all the youngsters who see you as a way to practice the English skills that will get them out of their own hellhole?
Recently I heard a podcast with an American military bod who was put forward for language training. They gave the recruits an invented language, gave them a short time to learn a little of it, and then tested them. The language was an invented one so that no-one had any chance of knowing it - unlike (say) Spanish.
It showed a candidate's ability to learn a language. This guy said he hated languages at school, but he came top in that class and loved learning Russian.
The British forces have recently and finally started doing language proficiency pay like the Americans and Australians. It can be quite a lot of money. Entirely consistent with the MoD's longstanding strategy of being excellently prepared for the last war but one Arabic attracts the highest premium at 11 grand/year.
The British forces have zero L3+ Ukrainian speakers and are forced to rely on contracted translators who are probably 50% GRU agents.
Within arms length is the Elliott & Shukman book, Secret Classrooms, about Russian language schools in the Cold War. And wasn't the Dennis Potter series, Lipstick on Your Collar set in a RAF Russian language unit?
FPT... regarding the largely synthesised outrage over RAF recruitment.
There are about 770 crew in the training system at the moment Of these about 430 are "holding" (that is doing made up ground jobs) due to lack of, well, everything in the training system. This total mismanagement has a far greater effect on the RAF's combat power than the demographic conditioning of the intake. Which is, in itself, a worthy endeavour.
I look forward to some middle aged white men getting agitated over that.
All down to a bodged privatisation of fast jet training wasn't it?
"Bodged" and "privatisation" go together like a horse and carriage.
I think "bodged" goes with anything our envy-of-the-world (tm) state agencies deliver really doesn't it. "Bodged NHS IT project".
This is one to annoy that diminishing coterie of Brexit-is-shite-deniers that still protest it was a good idea despite the complete lack of evidence that it has done us any favours. No doubt their closed minds will find some reason to doubt his analysis lol.
Irish independence was a major economic error, of historic proportions. They were poorer as a result, and remained poorer for decades
Do they regret it now? Do they want to revert? No. They did it for reasons OTHER than economics
What a ridiculous comparison @Leon. Do you have ANY idea what British rule in Ireland meant? Did the EU preside over a potato famine? Did the EU send troops into the UK. Did the EU insist on having it's aristocrats run major institutions?
Don't be so fucking ridiculous. You have more cred when you talk about alien invasions.
The Great Hunger removed a third of the island of Ireland's population, through death or migration. The population has never recovered. The island was occupied by soldiers, up to the modern era, who committed war crimes, even if the UK refuses to accept them. That is not the same as voting to join an economic consortium of countries that evolved into a more political consortium of countries, and the comparison is sickening.
Some British people have a remarkable blind spot about Ireland. The Irish are far more forgiving towards us than we have any right to expect.
We freed up a heck of a lot of parking on the West Coast, and encouraged them to diversify their agriculture away from the potato. How is this bad?
The Empire forced an entirely different method of land ownership, landlordism and free marketeerism that literally destroyed Irish civil society because 1/3rd of the island either died or had to migrate during the Great Hunger. And that's just one thing, relatively recently historically speaking! The language was made illegal, by penalty of death, Catholicisim was essentially criminalised, early "race science" was basically invented in part to justify the subjugation of the Irish (as well as slavery). Wealth, land and labour was extracted and what was given back was landlords and death. And the UK did not diversify their agriculture away from the potato - it was the over charging of farmers by English landowners that made potatoes the only profitable / substantive crop, and the method of land reform introduced reduced the incentive to improve the land with better crops / infrastructure (because landlords would use it as an argument to raise rents / find new tenants).
I really recommend the podcast Behind The Bastards and their episodes on that period of history.
And once the British left most of Ireland (after an early terror campaign by the IRA including murdering British soldiers and government officials and burning down homes of Anglo Irish nobility) Catholicism dominated Irish society in such a way that divorce, abortion and homosexuality remained illegal in the Republic of Ireland long after they had been legalised in mainland GB.
Just a brief glance at the trans debate on Twitter shows that it has lost none of its ugliness and venom. What a horrible poisonous mess I’m still bemused how we ended up here, when ten years ago trans people were generally accepted and everyone seemed to rub along What happened? Who did this? Why?
Several things have happened - quite a few of which were going on “under the radar” and have only recently become apparent.
With the arrival of Gay Marriage the LGB Charity Stonewall had run out of road - what LGB rights were left to secure? So they added QT+ and started advocating for Trans people. Nothing wrong with that. Except some LGB people don't think it's a good fit between LGB (who people are attracted to) and QT+ (who people think they are). Among the QT+ tribe are trans people, who have gender dysphoria, but also "AGPs" - heterosexual men who are sexually aroused by themselves in women's clothes. These men in particular are seen as a threat to women's safety by women's groups.
Then Stonewall started briefing employers and organisations on the Equality Law as they thought it should be, not as it actually was. They also adopted a policy of "No Debate" when it came to Trans rights, so were not only deaf to criticism, but actively hostile towards it. This ended up in the courts when employers sacked people based on "Stonewall law" and found it did not stand up. These people were predominantly women, often left wing & frequently lesbian. So much for Tory "culture war"!
Meanwhile in Scotland, safe in the progressive echo chamber the SNP at the behest of their Green partners pushed through Gender Recognition Reform - which would turn getting a gender recognition certificate into a formality - again discussion or debate was dismissed as "transphobia". When this was finally exposed to full public discussion and the case of male rapists discovering they had "Prison onset gender dysphoria - can I be housed with women?" the politicians were I suspect grateful for Westminster blocking it because they could return to safer ground "disrespecting Scotland" than a policy unpopular with voters.
Back in England the explosion in cases of "gender dysphoria" among teen girls (previously it had mainly been pre-pubescent children and middle aged men) at the Tavistock led to an investigation under a leading paediatrician - Dr Cass - which started blowing holes in the assertions of the "Affirmative Care" model - widely (and, it must be said, profitably) promoted in the USA in particular. The ripples from the NHS review are spreading across the world with Australia wondering whether it should backtrack, and some states in the US now banning so-called "affirmative care". 1/2
Thanks for the summary.
I think the difference is that after the loss on equal marriage in the US, both in the courts and the public opinion, evangelical Christians and the big money in it moved to two other causes - finding a wedge issue to make LGBT+ issues relevant again (so they picked trans people) and trying to help non Western countries (specifically those in Africa) pass homophobic laws. Trans people became the battleground in the US and UK, and a lot of the rest of the Western world, that replaced the old fight (with the same talking points).
The increase in cases of dysphoria is made much of, but surely it makes sense that the bodies of people assigned female at birth were more heavily policed than those assigned male at birth, and therefore their ability to transition was lessened. Again, the increase in dysphoria cases seem huge when put in percentage increases, but we're still typically talking about an increase in referrals, not treatment, and still a very small number of people.
Queer issues have ALWAYS been part of the struggle - the idea of challenging the nuclear family, of heteronormativity and gender roles has always been part of the struggle of LGBT+ people because we are considered an existential threat to the existence of it. If people can have same sex partners, never get married, have multiple partners, not have to fit in with societal norms of gender, they can say that the patriarchal set up of society doesn't have to exist. "We're here, we're queer, we're used to it" was a rallying cry of the 70s and 80s. Some LGBT+ activists didn't WANT equal marriage because they saw that as conforming too much to heteronormative living - that partners deserved rights without having to concede to the constricts of conservative family values. But the movement became less radical, and that seems to have helped in some ways, and failed in others; most people still look down on any queer person who isn't living a heteronormative lifestyle.
The issue is that sex, and gender transition, are both protected characteristics, under equality legislation, and sometimes rights conflict.
Gender critical feminists in the UK have very little in common with US evangelicals.
Stonewall have given advice to organisations, which implies that these protected characteristics are one and the same thing, when they are not.
The whole concept of "protected characteristics" is daft beyond words.
Unscheduled flight arrivals in Miensk. Rumours that Lukashenka has died.
What happens next there, a takeover of the western-looking moderates, or Putin getting a placeman in charge? Huge implications for Ukraine.
I'd wager the latter. Anyways. Be more significant if it is Lukashenko. Lukashenka would be his wife or daughter. (No idea if he has either. But it's vital to start the month as pedantically as you mean to go on).
The 'Lukashenko' surname, like most -o surnames, has neutral grammatical gender and therefore does not change when used by female. Hence AGL's unlucky Mrs (imagine being fucking drilled by that) known as Галина Родионовна Лукашенко in Russian - which is all we care about. Other examples are Ludmilla Radchenko (actress, model, whatever) and Natasha Stefanenko (also actress, model, whatever).
In an educated Moscow accent, which everybody should strive to affect, the terminal 'o' is sounded as 'a' which adds to the confusion.
How the hell did you learn Russian? I’ve been trying to learn it for a decade, and failed miserably. Do you just have to live somewhere that speaks it for a few years, and avoid all the youngsters who see you as a way to practice the English skills that will get them out of their own hellhole?
Recently I heard a podcast with an American military bod who was put forward for language training. They gave the recruits an invented language, gave them a short time to learn a little of it, and then tested them. The language was an invented one so that no-one had any chance of knowing it - unlike (say) Spanish.
It showed a candidate's ability to learn a language. This guy said he hated languages at school, but he came top in that class and loved learning Russian.
The British forces have recently and finally started doing language proficiency pay like the Americans and Australians. It can be quite a lot of money. Entirely consistent with the MoD's longstanding strategy of being excellently prepared for the last war but one Arabic attracts the highest premium at 11 grand/year.
The British forces have zero L3+ Ukrainian speakers and are forced to rely on contracted translators who are probably 50% GRU agents.
Within arms length is the Elliott & Shukman book, Secret Classrooms, about Russian language schools in the Cold War. And wasn't the Dennis Potter series, Lipstick on Your Collar set in a RAF Russian language unit?
Anthony Burgess was one such also; hence 'nadsat','moloko', etc. in A Clockwork Orange.
Those were dedicated linguists though. Now you get paid for language proficiency no matter what the role.
Just a brief glance at the trans debate on Twitter shows that it has lost none of its ugliness and venom. What a horrible poisonous mess I’m still bemused how we ended up here, when ten years ago trans people were generally accepted and everyone seemed to rub along What happened? Who did this? Why?
Several things have happened - quite a few of which were going on “under the radar” and have only recently become apparent.
With the arrival of Gay Marriage the LGB Charity Stonewall had run out of road - what LGB rights were left to secure? So they added QT+ and started advocating for Trans people. Nothing wrong with that. Except some LGB people don't think it's a good fit between LGB (who people are attracted to) and QT+ (who people think they are). Among the QT+ tribe are trans people, who have gender dysphoria, but also "AGPs" - heterosexual men who are sexually aroused by themselves in women's clothes. These men in particular are seen as a threat to women's safety by women's groups.
Then Stonewall started briefing employers and organisations on the Equality Law as they thought it should be, not as it actually was. They also adopted a policy of "No Debate" when it came to Trans rights, so were not only deaf to criticism, but actively hostile towards it. This ended up in the courts when employers sacked people based on "Stonewall law" and found it did not stand up. These people were predominantly women, often left wing & frequently lesbian. So much for Tory "culture war"!
Meanwhile in Scotland, safe in the progressive echo chamber the SNP at the behest of their Green partners pushed through Gender Recognition Reform - which would turn getting a gender recognition certificate into a formality - again discussion or debate was dismissed as "transphobia". When this was finally exposed to full public discussion and the case of male rapists discovering they had "Prison onset gender dysphoria - can I be housed with women?" the politicians were I suspect grateful for Westminster blocking it because they could return to safer ground "disrespecting Scotland" than a policy unpopular with voters.
Back in England the explosion in cases of "gender dysphoria" among teen girls (previously it had mainly been pre-pubescent children and middle aged men) at the Tavistock led to an investigation under a leading paediatrician - Dr Cass - which started blowing holes in the assertions of the "Affirmative Care" model - widely (and, it must be said, profitably) promoted in the USA in particular. The ripples from the NHS review are spreading across the world with Australia wondering whether it should backtrack, and some states in the US now banning so-called "affirmative care". 1/2
Thanks for the summary.
I think the difference is that after the loss on equal marriage in the US, both in the courts and the public opinion, evangelical Christians and the big money in it moved to two other causes - finding a wedge issue to make LGBT+ issues relevant again (so they picked trans people) and trying to help non Western countries (specifically those in Africa) pass homophobic laws. Trans people became the battleground in the US and UK, and a lot of the rest of the Western world, that replaced the old fight (with the same talking points).
The increase in cases of dysphoria is made much of, but surely it makes sense that the bodies of people assigned female at birth were more heavily policed than those assigned male at birth, and therefore their ability to transition was lessened. Again, the increase in dysphoria cases seem huge when put in percentage increases, but we're still typically talking about an increase in referrals, not treatment, and still a very small number of people.
Queer issues have ALWAYS been part of the struggle - the idea of challenging the nuclear family, of heteronormativity and gender roles has always been part of the struggle of LGBT+ people because we are considered an existential threat to the existence of it. If people can have same sex partners, never get married, have multiple partners, not have to fit in with societal norms of gender, they can say that the patriarchal set up of society doesn't have to exist. "We're here, we're queer, we're used to it" was a rallying cry of the 70s and 80s. Some LGBT+ activists didn't WANT equal marriage because they saw that as conforming too much to heteronormative living - that partners deserved rights without having to concede to the constricts of conservative family values. But the movement became less radical, and that seems to have helped in some ways, and failed in others; most people still look down on any queer person who isn't living a heteronormative lifestyle.
The issue is that sex, and gender transition, are both protected characteristics, under equality legislation, and sometimes rights conflict.
Gender critical feminists in the UK have very little in common with US evangelicals.
Stonewall have given advice to organisations, which implies that these protected characteristics are one and the same thing, when they are not.
The whole concept of "protected characteristics" is daft beyond words.
Only if you are ignorant, or perhaps "daft beyond words" yourself.
Wonder if this fella was a PB'er back in the day (can this of a few possible candidates )
Fesshole 🧻 @fesshole · 1h Met a girl in a bar in 2007. She was heavily into Labour party politics so I pretended I voted Labour. Even claimed I was a Gordon Brown super-fan. We started banging but I was busted after 3 weeks when she found a picture of me with David Cameron on Facebook. Dumped.
I assume she can no longer wear her 'Never kissed a Tory' T-shirt...
The point that to end a war one may have to negotiate with people one doesn't like is less striking than the suggestion that if Ukraine doesn't succeed in this year's expected offensive, the West will need to rethink the nature of support. His comments are qualified (and translation may be an issue too) and certainly not pro-Putin but probably the clearest hint we've seen so far that a continuing military deadlock may lead to some pressure on Ukraine to negotiate for something less than total victory. Conversely the war hysteria of Russian nationalists seems to have subsided into trying to keep their current gains rather than advancing further.
Manufacturing UKs inflation busting recession is coming along nicely. Ordinarily, downturn data wouldn’t be best followed with by yet another interest rate rise.
I also would not expect a house price correction without stock market pressures. Let’s be careful how we are investing until UK economy is out of the woods.
This is one to annoy that diminishing coterie of Brexit-is-shite-deniers that still protest it was a good idea despite the complete lack of evidence that it has done us any favours. No doubt their closed minds will find some reason to doubt his analysis lol.
Irish independence was a major economic error, of historic proportions. They were poorer as a result, and remained poorer for decades
Do they regret it now? Do they want to revert? No. They did it for reasons OTHER than economics
What a ridiculous comparison @Leon. Do you have ANY idea what British rule in Ireland meant? Did the EU preside over a potato famine? Did the EU send troops into the UK. Did the EU insist on having it's aristocrats run major institutions?
Don't be so fucking ridiculous. You have more cred when you talk about alien invasions.
You could make a case for 'yes' for your last point - Juncker, Selmayr, Van der Leyen, Barroso, Prodi...
However, what Leon is rather overlooking is that Ireland was very poor to start with, largely due to British misrule. In fact, leaving the UK didn't make a noticeable difference except in the non-Belfast areas of Ulster, which became poorer due to trade disruption along the partition line.
By contrast, being in the EU made Britain richer.
"You could make a case for 'yes' for your last point - Juncker, Selmayr, Van der Leyen, Barroso, Prodi..." Not really. All of these folk did not get parachuted into the UK to live here and lord it amongst us. They were also accountable to the Council of Ministers of which the UK was a member, so have slightly more democratic accountability than our head of state (who used to be Ireland's) and the House of Lords
Interestingly though several of them were parachuted into Ireland to manage its finances after the GFC.
There were of course a significant number of Irish MPs in the Commons as well, although only 28 peers in the Lords (many of whom were not Irish).
Yes, but you know that it is an almost as weak an analogy as Leon's absolutely absurd one. By the same token we could argue that we have to work with foreigners from UN (probably will be IMF after Labour have been in a while) and representatives of NATO. That said, on the latter point, the yanks do sometimes literally "parachute in". The Brexiteer self-appointed protectors of our sovereignty have less to say on the country that has airbases on our soil of course.
True. But that's one of the reasons why I felt that point was a dangerous one to drag in. The constitutional situation of Ireland was quite complex. Pointing out Leon was wrong on the economic facts where he clearly is is altogether more pertinent to what you were saying.
But I am right, Ireland got relatively POORER after Independence, only really catching up after about 1980
Here's a very fair minded IRISH analysis. Which also notes how Ireland's GDP per capita is a bit leprechauny
"It is clear that Irish living standards fell further behind in the first decades following independence, only returning to its pre-independence relative position by around 1980. Convergence with Scottish GDP per capita in the decades since then has been dramatic. Convergence did not occur for Northern Ireland: today, it is in a similar position relative to Scotland as it was in 1925."
It is still a fecking ludicrous comparison that you made. Absurd. Ridiculous. Preposterous. Ludicrous. Even by the hyperbolic standards that we have been used to from the most unbelievable alcoholic or drug induced utterances that you have made on here.
Thanks!
As our American friends might say (when helping themselves to a little more of our sovereignty); "your welcome".
Wonder if this fella was a PB'er back in the day (can this of a few possible candidates )
Fesshole 🧻 @fesshole · 1h Met a girl in a bar in 2007. She was heavily into Labour party politics so I pretended I voted Labour. Even claimed I was a Gordon Brown super-fan. We started banging but I was busted after 3 weeks when she found a picture of me with David Cameron on Facebook. Dumped.
I spend a lot of time in The Village (the gay bit in Manchester) and anyone who knows me I am pro gay rights and this guy was spouting homophobic shit to which I replied something along the lines of 'don't knock it until you've tried it' in that understated and subtle way that I am associated with .
One pretty lady was impressed, had a few drink and dinner dates, ended when I said I was so proud of my boy Dave for introducing same sex marriage, she said your boy Dave?
Explained who Dave was, showed her photos of me with Dave and George and that was that.
She was fuming, she definitely wanted to be in the never kissed a Tory camp, and thanks to me, she couldn't be.
Manufacturing UKs inflation busting recession is coming along nicely. Ordinarily, downturn data wouldn’t be best followed with by yet another interest rate rise.
I also would not expect a house price correction without stock market pressures. Let’s be careful how we are investing until UK economy is out of the woods.
Manufacturing UKs inflation busting recession is coming along nicely. Ordinarily, downturn data wouldn’t be best followed with by yet another interest rate rise.
I also would not expect a house price correction without stock market pressures. Let’s be careful how we are investing until UK economy is out of the woods.
Unscheduled flight arrivals in Miensk. Rumours that Lukashenka has died.
What happens next there, a takeover of the western-looking moderates, or Putin getting a placeman in charge? Huge implications for Ukraine.
I'd wager the latter. Anyways. Be more significant if it is Lukashenko. Lukashenka would be his wife or daughter. (No idea if he has either. But it's vital to start the month as pedantically as you mean to go on).
The 'Lukashenko' surname, like most -o surnames, has neutral grammatical gender and therefore does not change when used by female. Hence AGL's unlucky Mrs (imagine being fucking drilled by that) known as Галина Родионовна Лукашенко in Russian - which is all we care about. Other examples are Ludmilla Radchenko (actress, model, whatever) and Natasha Stefanenko (also actress, model, whatever).
In an educated Moscow accent, which everybody should strive to affect, the terminal 'o' is sounded as 'a' which adds to the confusion.
How the hell did you learn Russian? I’ve been trying to learn it for a decade, and failed miserably. Do you just have to live somewhere that speaks it for a few years, and avoid all the youngsters who see you as a way to practice the English skills that will get them out of their own hellhole?
Recently I heard a podcast with an American military bod who was put forward for language training. They gave the recruits an invented language, gave them a short time to learn a little of it, and then tested them. The language was an invented one so that no-one had any chance of knowing it - unlike (say) Spanish.
It showed a candidate's ability to learn a language. This guy said he hated languages at school, but he came top in that class and loved learning Russian.
The British forces have recently and finally started doing language proficiency pay like the Americans and Australians. It can be quite a lot of money. Entirely consistent with the MoD's longstanding strategy of being excellently prepared for the last war but one Arabic attracts the highest premium at 11 grand/year.
The British forces have zero L3+ Ukrainian speakers and are forced to rely on contracted translators who are probably 50% GRU agents.
Within arms length is the Elliott & Shukman book, Secret Classrooms, about Russian language schools in the Cold War. And wasn't the Dennis Potter series, Lipstick on Your Collar set in a RAF Russian language unit?
Anthony Burgess was one such also; hence 'nadsat','moloko', etc. in A Clockwork Orange.
Those were dedicated linguists though. Now you get paid for language proficiency no matter what the role.
"There was me, that is Alexander Boris de Pfeffel, and my three droogs, that is Priti, Govey, and Dom, and we sat in the Kensington Milkbar trying to make up our Raab-oodocks what to do with the evening. The Kensington milkbar sold Milk-Plus, milk plus Corn Syrup or GM Soya or Chlorinated Chicken, which is what we were drinking. This would sharpen you up and make you ready for a bit of the old No-Deal Brexit."
I have been in near constant pain in my right leg since before Easter which has sometimes caused me complete immobility. Driving has been difficult. Physio only provided temporary alleviation. I was referred for an X-ray which finally happened last week.
This morning I have tried contacting my surgery to get an appointment with the GP to find out the results. After 35 minutes on the phone I finally get through. X-results still not back but I have a GP appointment in mid-June. So I just have to pray that the results will be back by then so that I can get an idea of what the problem is and, maybe, even start the process of waiting to get treatment.
Stoicism and/or opiate addiction. That seems the choice on offer from the NHS these days.
Meanwhile I have decided to tackle some brutal overgrown brambles in the back garden, with just my arms, gloves and secateurs. Plus a lot of sweat - it is pretty hot here. It's like doing battle with Edward Scissorhands. Heist knows how I go about getting the roots out though the mattock my other half gave me as a birthday present (I married the last romantic in Cumbria) may help.
I really need a strong gardener to assist. You'd have thought in such an area there would be plenty of gardening companies to assist - from some simple design ideas to doing the harder jobs & general maintenance etc.,. But no. It is an obvious gap in the market and should I get through my current vale of tears I may look into setting one up. There are lots of keen gardeners around but also a lot of older folks so you'd have thought there'd be the need.
Has anyone who loves the NHS ever lived in another country? It’s totally bonkers to have to wait months for scans and results, and must be costing the country billions in time off work.
The comment I had from a private consultant was the mistake the NHS makes in cases like this (I had something not dissimilar) is not doing all the possible scans and tests up front. Then sending them through the to the various consultants.
I had an X ray, MRI and nerve conduction study in 2 days. Privately. They apologised for not doing them on the same day.
This is one to annoy that diminishing coterie of Brexit-is-shite-deniers that still protest it was a good idea despite the complete lack of evidence that it has done us any favours. No doubt their closed minds will find some reason to doubt his analysis lol.
Irish independence was a major economic error, of historic proportions. They were poorer as a result, and remained poorer for decades
Do they regret it now? Do they want to revert? No. They did it for reasons OTHER than economics
What a ridiculous comparison @Leon. Do you have ANY idea what British rule in Ireland meant? Did the EU preside over a potato famine? Did the EU send troops into the UK. Did the EU insist on having it's aristocrats run major institutions?
Don't be so fucking ridiculous. You have more cred when you talk about alien invasions.
The Great Hunger removed a third of the island of Ireland's population, through death or migration. The population has never recovered. The island was occupied by soldiers, up to the modern era, who committed war crimes, even if the UK refuses to accept them. That is not the same as voting to join an economic consortium of countries that evolved into a more political consortium of countries, and the comparison is sickening.
The notion of Brexit as the fruition of a noble struggle for British independence from foreign oppression - this is absolutely risible. But it’s believed by plenty of Leavers, I'm sorry to say. What can you do?
Accept that some people are just terminally stupid?
Unscheduled flight arrivals in Miensk. Rumours that Lukashenka has died.
What happens next there, a takeover of the western-looking moderates, or Putin getting a placeman in charge? Huge implications for Ukraine.
I'd wager the latter. Anyways. Be more significant if it is Lukashenko. Lukashenka would be his wife or daughter. (No idea if he has either. But it's vital to start the month as pedantically as you mean to go on).
The 'Lukashenko' surname, like most -o surnames, has neutral grammatical gender and therefore does not change when used by female. Hence AGL's unlucky Mrs (imagine being fucking drilled by that) known as Галина Родионовна Лукашенко in Russian - which is all we care about. Other examples are Ludmilla Radchenko (actress, model, whatever) and Natasha Stefanenko (also actress, model, whatever).
In an educated Moscow accent, which everybody should strive to affect, the terminal 'o' is sounded as 'a' which adds to the confusion.
How the hell did you learn Russian? I’ve been trying to learn it for a decade, and failed miserably. Do you just have to live somewhere that speaks it for a few years, and avoid all the youngsters who see you as a way to practice the English skills that will get them out of their own hellhole?
Recently I heard a podcast with an American military bod who was put forward for language training. They gave the recruits an invented language, gave them a short time to learn a little of it, and then tested them. The language was an invented one so that no-one had any chance of knowing it - unlike (say) Spanish.
It showed a candidate's ability to learn a language. This guy said he hated languages at school, but he came top in that class and loved learning Russian.
The British forces have recently and finally started doing language proficiency pay like the Americans and Australians. It can be quite a lot of money. Entirely consistent with the MoD's longstanding strategy of being excellently prepared for the last war but one Arabic attracts the highest premium at 11 grand/year.
The British forces have zero L3+ Ukrainian speakers and are forced to rely on contracted translators who are probably 50% GRU agents.
Within arms length is the Elliott & Shukman book, Secret Classrooms, about Russian language schools in the Cold War. And wasn't the Dennis Potter series, Lipstick on Your Collar set in a RAF Russian language unit?
Anthony Burgess was one such also; hence 'nadsat','moloko', etc. in A Clockwork Orange.
Those were dedicated linguists though. Now you get paid for language proficiency no matter what the role.
"There was me, that is Alexander Boris de Pfeffel, and my three droogs, that is Priti, Govey, and Dom, and we sat in the Kensington Milkbar trying to make up our Raab-oodocks what to do with the evening. The Kensington milkbar sold Milk-Plus, milk plus Corn Syrup or GM Soya or Chlorinated Chicken, which is what we were drinking. This would sharpen you up and make you ready for a bit of the old No-Deal Brexit."
Manufacturing UKs inflation busting recession is coming along nicely. Ordinarily, downturn data wouldn’t be best followed with by yet another interest rate rise.
I also would not expect a house price correction without stock market pressures. Let’s be careful how we are investing until UK economy is out of the woods.
Let's hope for a Covid revelation that removes Sunak before he completes his mission to wreck the economy fully.
He's obviously incompetent. Liz and Kwasi could have wrecked it within a couple of months, if the men in white coats hadn't got them first.
They 'wrecked it' by supposedly being responsible for gilt yields rising to unprecedented levels. What's your excuse for Hunt and Sunak doing the same?
Manufacturing UKs inflation busting recession is coming along nicely. Ordinarily, downturn data wouldn’t be best followed with by yet another interest rate rise.
I also would not expect a house price correction without stock market pressures. Let’s be careful how we are investing until UK economy is out of the woods.
Manufacturing UKs inflation busting recession is coming along nicely. Ordinarily, downturn data wouldn’t be best followed with by yet another interest rate rise.
I also would not expect a house price correction without stock market pressures. Let’s be careful how we are investing until UK economy is out of the woods.
Manufacturing UKs inflation busting recession is coming along nicely. Ordinarily, downturn data wouldn’t be best followed with by yet another interest rate rise.
I also would not expect a house price correction without stock market pressures. Let’s be careful how we are investing until UK economy is out of the woods.
Had Boris not been ousted he was apparently on his way out as Chancellor.
If this story originates from Boris Johnson, would you all think I am a cynic if I suspect it might be a whopping great lie?
It originates from reports of contemporaneous discussions, not Boris's recollections.
It does make it quite intriguing what might be in Bojo's Whatsapps, which (contrary to the impression given by two PB headers) have now been provided by Boris to the Covid enquiry directly as the Cabinet Office (Sunak) had refused.
1. THREAT OF PROSECUTION! The Chief Constable of @HantsPolice has written to us stating that if we post this flag, and it causes anyone anxiety, we will have committed an offence contrary to Communications Act S127 part 2.
We post today in defiance. Arrest us. Charge us. Or shut up.
[4 images of the new-ish Pride flag that might cause anxiety or distress (sic) ]
I do think there are better ways to make one's case than putting a swastika over the symbol of a group selected for the concentration camps by the actual Nazis.
The swastika is a function of the “improved” pride flag which was originally just the rainbow - as that covered everybody.
But some decided to “improve” it by adding a black stripe for black people, brown stripe for brown people and baby blue and baby pink stripes for trans people, as they evidently didn’t fall under “everybody”.
There have been further iterations with a red umbrella for sex workers…and a pi symbol for “minor attracted persons” (paedophiles in old money). This has not been met with universal approval - and this push back is part of that.
I know you thought that what you were doing was
"CarlottaVance posted a swastika to demonstrate pushback against inclusion of trans/black/brown people in Pride and futher iterations"
It's gone beyond Mr Fox and it is now seen by some as a pushback against the authoritarian stance taken by TRA elements of the LGBT+ movement, and the idiocy of the police who believe its a criminal offence.
It would appear only some political commentary is permissible.
Lets see if the Chief Constable follows through on his threat of arrest.
Just a brief glance at the trans debate on Twitter shows that it has lost none of its ugliness and venom. What a horrible poisonous mess
I’m still bemused how we ended up here, when ten years ago trans people were generally accepted and everyone seemed to rub along
What happened? Who did this? Why?
Was it simply the Chinese and the Russians stirring it all up on Twitter?
Several things have happened - quite a few of which were going on “under the radar” and have only recently become apparent.
With the arrival of Gay Marriage the LGB Charity Stonewall had run out of road - what LGB rights were left to secure? So they added QT+ and started advocating for Trans people. Nothing wrong with that.
...In the US the debate is catastrophically polarised - Democrats fully in the "Affirmative Care" camp (where "the science is settled" FFS - anyone who writes that doesn't understand science) and the GOP who are pursuing a "stop it all" model. Both are wrong, although I think the GOP is doing less damage...
The Republican primary season will be interesting, and the first debate is August 2023. You can track anti-trans legislation by US State here.
I’m not sure blocking so called “Affirmative Care” counts as “Anti-trans”.
Others might characterise it as potential “child abuse”.
The science may yet emerge in favour of “affirmative care” but it’s far from “settled”.
But that’s the debate in American.
I mean, it is clearer in the US that anti-trans bigotry is related to evangelical Christianity, anti-LGBT+ bigotry overall and the general attack on bodily autonomy and women's rights.
The British anti-trans movement still the money of these far right evangelicals, and will campaign with the likes of Tucker Carlson, or CPAC, or the Heritage Foundation, but hides behind the idea that somehow they are approaching this from a "feminist" viewpoint. Despite the fact that people like Posie Parker openly say they are not a feminist and is against feminism, and Julie Bindel used to defend trans people, and even the idea of transwomen as lesbians, before this moral panic started and the money started flowing.
The anti-trans moral panic is the same as the anti-gay panic before it; an obsession with bathrooms as a place of predators, a general comparison with sexual predation and converting children, the idea that "surely children don't know enough about themselves to identify as gay / trans", the idea that children being educated about the existence of LGBT+ people is either sexual grooming or conversion. This was the argument against gay rights. The medicalisation issue is different, as LGB people do not have needs that are met with medical intervention, but thinking about AIDs we also have similar demonisation: the idea that this is god's judgement / general punishment for something outside the norm, it led to excess deaths within the community that governments actively ignored / made worse, and is something that medical experts don't really disagree about but enough political pressure is added to the "debate" that the medical consensus is ignored.
Unscheduled flight arrivals in Miensk. Rumours that Lukashenka has died.
What happens next there, a takeover of the western-looking moderates, or Putin getting a placeman in charge? Huge implications for Ukraine.
I'd wager the latter. Anyways. Be more significant if it is Lukashenko. Lukashenka would be his wife or daughter. (No idea if he has either. But it's vital to start the month as pedantically as you mean to go on).
The 'Lukashenko' surname, like most -o surnames, has neutral grammatical gender and therefore does not change when used by female. Hence AGL's unlucky Mrs (imagine being fucking drilled by that) known as Галина Родионовна Лукашенко in Russian - which is all we care about. Other examples are Ludmilla Radchenko (actress, model, whatever) and Natasha Stefanenko (also actress, model, whatever).
In an educated Moscow accent, which everybody should strive to affect, the terminal 'o' is sounded as 'a' which adds to the confusion.
How the hell did you learn Russian? I’ve been trying to learn it for a decade, and failed miserably. Do you just have to live somewhere that speaks it for a few years, and avoid all the youngsters who see you as a way to practice the English skills that will get them out of their own hellhole?
Recently I heard a podcast with an American military bod who was put forward for language training. They gave the recruits an invented language, gave them a short time to learn a little of it, and then tested them. The language was an invented one so that no-one had any chance of knowing it - unlike (say) Spanish.
It showed a candidate's ability to learn a language. This guy said he hated languages at school, but he came top in that class and loved learning Russian.
The British forces have recently and finally started doing language proficiency pay like the Americans and Australians. It can be quite a lot of money. Entirely consistent with the MoD's longstanding strategy of being excellently prepared for the last war but one Arabic attracts the highest premium at 11 grand/year.
The British forces have zero L3+ Ukrainian speakers and are forced to rely on contracted translators who are probably 50% GRU agents.
Within arms length is the Elliott & Shukman book, Secret Classrooms, about Russian language schools in the Cold War. And wasn't the Dennis Potter series, Lipstick on Your Collar set in a RAF Russian language unit?
Anthony Burgess was one such also; hence 'nadsat','moloko', etc. in A Clockwork Orange.
Those were dedicated linguists though. Now you get paid for language proficiency no matter what the role.
"There was me, that is Alexander Boris de Pfeffel, and my three droogs, that is Priti, Govey, and Dom, and we sat in the Kensington Milkbar trying to make up our Raab-oodocks what to do with the evening. The Kensington milkbar sold Milk-Plus, milk plus Corn Syrup or GM Soya or Chlorinated Chicken, which is what we were drinking. This would sharpen you up and make you ready for a bit of the old No-Deal Brexit."
Manufacturing UKs inflation busting recession is coming along nicely. Ordinarily, downturn data wouldn’t be best followed with by yet another interest rate rise.
I also would not expect a house price correction without stock market pressures. Let’s be careful how we are investing until UK economy is out of the woods.
Let's hope for a Covid revelation that removes Sunak before he completes his mission to wreck the economy fully.
He's obviously incompetent. Liz and Kwasi could have wrecked it within a couple of months, if the men in white coats hadn't got them first.
They 'wrecked it' by supposedly being responsible for gilt yields rising to unprecedented levels. What's your excuse for Hunt and Sunak doing the same?
This is one to annoy that diminishing coterie of Brexit-is-shite-deniers that still protest it was a good idea despite the complete lack of evidence that it has done us any favours. No doubt their closed minds will find some reason to doubt his analysis lol.
Irish independence was a major economic error, of historic proportions. They were poorer as a result, and remained poorer for decades
Do they regret it now? Do they want to revert? No. They did it for reasons OTHER than economics
What a ridiculous comparison @Leon. Do you have ANY idea what British rule in Ireland meant? Did the EU preside over a potato famine? Did the EU send troops into the UK. Did the EU insist on having it's aristocrats run major institutions?
Don't be so fucking ridiculous. You have more cred when you talk about alien invasions.
The Great Hunger removed a third of the island of Ireland's population, through death or migration. The population has never recovered. The island was occupied by soldiers, up to the modern era, who committed war crimes, even if the UK refuses to accept them. That is not the same as voting to join an economic consortium of countries that evolved into a more political consortium of countries, and the comparison is sickening.
Some British people have a remarkable blind spot about Ireland. The Irish are far more forgiving towards us than we have any right to expect.
We freed up a heck of a lot of parking on the West Coast, and encouraged them to diversify their agriculture away from the potato. How is this bad?
The Empire forced an entirely different method of land ownership, landlordism and free marketeerism that literally destroyed Irish civil society because 1/3rd of the island either died or had to migrate during the Great Hunger. And that's just one thing, relatively recently historically speaking! The language was made illegal, by penalty of death, Catholicisim was essentially criminalised, early "race science" was basically invented in part to justify the subjugation of the Irish (as well as slavery). Wealth, land and labour was extracted and what was given back was landlords and death. And the UK did not diversify their agriculture away from the potato - it was the over charging of farmers by English landowners that made potatoes the only profitable / substantive crop, and the method of land reform introduced reduced the incentive to improve the land with better crops / infrastructure (because landlords would use it as an argument to raise rents / find new tenants).
I really recommend the podcast Behind The Bastards and their episodes on that period of history.
And once the British left most of Ireland (after an early terror campaign by the IRA including murdering British soldiers and government officials and burning down homes of Anglo Irish nobility) Catholicism dominated Irish society in such a way that divorce, abortion and homosexuality remained illegal in the Republic of Ireland long after they had been legalised in mainland GB.
My mother reckons that being a Protestant in 1940's and 1950's Dublin was much better than being a Catholic, because the Catholic Church was indifferent to you, being convinced that you were going to hell, anyway. They took a lot of interest in the Catholics however, and that was not good news for the Catholics.
Ukraine war latest: 'First call' on Russian state TV for Putin to go
The Wagner Group is willing to fight on in Ukraine as long as Moscow "clowns" aren't in charge, boss Yevgeny Prigozhin says - as Russian strikes kill three people, including a girl, 9, in Kyiv.
My nephew, who is Foreign Office-adjacent, speaks fluent French (school, uni, a year doing a Masters in France, time in Senegal and Morocco), Germany (couple of years living there, then school and self-taught), Russian (self-taught), Arabic (university, time in Morocco and Jordan), and a couple of African dialects he picked up while in Senegal, one of which is specific to Saint Louis. In his current job, they've got him working on improving his Russian, and learning something else African - Yoruba maybe?
Manufacturing UKs inflation busting recession is coming along nicely. Ordinarily, downturn data wouldn’t be best followed with by yet another interest rate rise.
I also would not expect a house price correction without stock market pressures. Let’s be careful how we are investing until UK economy is out of the woods.
Let's hope for a Covid revelation that removes Sunak before he completes his mission to wreck the economy fully.
He's obviously incompetent. Liz and Kwasi could have wrecked it within a couple of months, if the men in white coats hadn't got them first.
They 'wrecked it' by supposedly being responsible for gilt yields rising to unprecedented levels. What's your excuse for Hunt and Sunak doing the same?
Ukraine war latest: 'First call' on Russian state TV for Putin to go
The Wagner Group is willing to fight on in Ukraine as long as Moscow "clowns" aren't in charge, boss Yevgeny Prigozhin says - as Russian strikes kill three people, including a girl, 9, in Kyiv.
Manufacturing UKs inflation busting recession is coming along nicely. Ordinarily, downturn data wouldn’t be best followed with by yet another interest rate rise.
I also would not expect a house price correction without stock market pressures. Let’s be careful how we are investing until UK economy is out of the woods.
Let's hope for a Covid revelation that removes Sunak before he completes his mission to wreck the economy fully.
He's obviously incompetent. Liz and Kwasi could have wrecked it within a couple of months, if the men in white coats hadn't got them first.
They 'wrecked it' by supposedly being responsible for gilt yields rising to unprecedented levels. What's your excuse for Hunt and Sunak doing the same?
Manufacturing UKs inflation busting recession is coming along nicely. Ordinarily, downturn data wouldn’t be best followed with by yet another interest rate rise.
I also would not expect a house price correction without stock market pressures. Let’s be careful how we are investing until UK economy is out of the woods.
This is one to annoy that diminishing coterie of Brexit-is-shite-deniers that still protest it was a good idea despite the complete lack of evidence that it has done us any favours. No doubt their closed minds will find some reason to doubt his analysis lol.
Irish independence was a major economic error, of historic proportions. They were poorer as a result, and remained poorer for decades
Do they regret it now? Do they want to revert? No. They did it for reasons OTHER than economics
What a ridiculous comparison @Leon. Do you have ANY idea what British rule in Ireland meant? Did the EU preside over a potato famine? Did the EU send troops into the UK. Did the EU insist on having it's aristocrats run major institutions?
Don't be so fucking ridiculous. You have more cred when you talk about alien invasions.
The Great Hunger removed a third of the island of Ireland's population, through death or migration. The population has never recovered. The island was occupied by soldiers, up to the modern era, who committed war crimes, even if the UK refuses to accept them. That is not the same as voting to join an economic consortium of countries that evolved into a more political consortium of countries, and the comparison is sickening.
Some British people have a remarkable blind spot about Ireland. The Irish are far more forgiving towards us than we have any right to expect.
We freed up a heck of a lot of parking on the West Coast, and encouraged them to diversify their agriculture away from the potato. How is this bad?
The Empire forced an entirely different method of land ownership, landlordism and free marketeerism that literally destroyed Irish civil society because 1/3rd of the island either died or had to migrate during the Great Hunger. And that's just one thing, relatively recently historically speaking! The language was made illegal, by penalty of death, Catholicisim was essentially criminalised, early "race science" was basically invented in part to justify the subjugation of the Irish (as well as slavery). Wealth, land and labour was extracted and what was given back was landlords and death. And the UK did not diversify their agriculture away from the potato - it was the over charging of farmers by English landowners that made potatoes the only profitable / substantive crop, and the method of land reform introduced reduced the incentive to improve the land with better crops / infrastructure (because landlords would use it as an argument to raise rents / find new tenants).
I really recommend the podcast Behind The Bastards and their episodes on that period of history.
I note that you completely avoid my point about the extra parking post 1850. Have you been to Cahersiveen recently? Tons of it. Parking. Everywhere. Just pull up and hop out
It can all get a bit Four Yorkshiremen. Most of our ancestors were at or near the bottom of the food chain, in the 18th and 19th centuries, which was not a good place to be, anywhere in the world.
It's easy to imagine ourselves as Roman Senators, British Aristocrats, Chinese Mandarins etc. because they're the people who have left a written record. But, it's much more likely we would have been slaves, or peasants living just above destitution, had we lived at the time.
Ukraine war latest: 'First call' on Russian state TV for Putin to go
The Wagner Group is willing to fight on in Ukraine as long as Moscow "clowns" aren't in charge, boss Yevgeny Prigozhin says - as Russian strikes kill three people, including a girl, 9, in Kyiv.
Ukraine war latest: 'First call' on Russian state TV for Putin to go
The Wagner Group is willing to fight on in Ukraine as long as Moscow "clowns" aren't in charge, boss Yevgeny Prigozhin says - as Russian strikes kill three people, including a girl, 9, in Kyiv.
This is one to annoy that diminishing coterie of Brexit-is-shite-deniers that still protest it was a good idea despite the complete lack of evidence that it has done us any favours. No doubt their closed minds will find some reason to doubt his analysis lol.
Irish independence was a major economic error, of historic proportions. They were poorer as a result, and remained poorer for decades
Do they regret it now? Do they want to revert? No. They did it for reasons OTHER than economics
What a ridiculous comparison @Leon. Do you have ANY idea what British rule in Ireland meant? Did the EU preside over a potato famine? Did the EU send troops into the UK. Did the EU insist on having it's aristocrats run major institutions?
Don't be so fucking ridiculous. You have more cred when you talk about alien invasions.
The Great Hunger removed a third of the island of Ireland's population, through death or migration. The population has never recovered. The island was occupied by soldiers, up to the modern era, who committed war crimes, even if the UK refuses to accept them. That is not the same as voting to join an economic consortium of countries that evolved into a more political consortium of countries, and the comparison is sickening.
Some British people have a remarkable blind spot about Ireland. The Irish are far more forgiving towards us than we have any right to expect.
We freed up a heck of a lot of parking on the West Coast, and encouraged them to diversify their agriculture away from the potato. How is this bad?
The Empire forced an entirely different method of land ownership, landlordism and free marketeerism that literally destroyed Irish civil society because 1/3rd of the island either died or had to migrate during the Great Hunger. And that's just one thing, relatively recently historically speaking! The language was made illegal, by penalty of death, Catholicisim was essentially criminalised, early "race science" was basically invented in part to justify the subjugation of the Irish (as well as slavery). Wealth, land and labour was extracted and what was given back was landlords and death. And the UK did not diversify their agriculture away from the potato - it was the over charging of farmers by English landowners that made potatoes the only profitable / substantive crop, and the method of land reform introduced reduced the incentive to improve the land with better crops / infrastructure (because landlords would use it as an argument to raise rents / find new tenants).
I really recommend the podcast Behind The Bastards and their episodes on that period of history.
I note that you completely avoid my point about the extra parking post 1850. Have you been to Cahersiveen recently? Tons of it. Parking. Everywhere. Just pull up and hop out
It can all get a bit Four Yorkshiremen. Most of our ancestors were at or near the bottom of the food chain, in the 18th and 19th centuries, which was not a good place to be, anywhere in the world.
It's easy to imagine ourselves as Roman Senators, British Aristocrats, Chinese Mandarins etc. because they're the people who have left a written record. But, it's much more likely we would have been slaves, or peasants living just above destitution, had we lived at the time.
Which is why it's interesting to consider (and, one hopes, reject) the political positions of the Greens and ultra ecoradicals.
They want to roll us back to what life was like before the industrial revolution, which was really shit.
Manufacturing UKs inflation busting recession is coming along nicely. Ordinarily, downturn data wouldn’t be best followed with by yet another interest rate rise.
I also would not expect a house price correction without stock market pressures. Let’s be careful how we are investing until UK economy is out of the woods.
Let's hope for a Covid revelation that removes Sunak before he completes his mission to wreck the economy fully.
He's obviously incompetent. Liz and Kwasi could have wrecked it within a couple of months, if the men in white coats hadn't got them first.
They 'wrecked it' by supposedly being responsible for gilt yields rising to unprecedented levels. What's your excuse for Hunt and Sunak doing the same?
Ukraine war latest: 'First call' on Russian state TV for Putin to go
The Wagner Group is willing to fight on in Ukraine as long as Moscow "clowns" aren't in charge, boss Yevgeny Prigozhin says - as Russian strikes kill three people, including a girl, 9, in Kyiv.
This is one to annoy that diminishing coterie of Brexit-is-shite-deniers that still protest it was a good idea despite the complete lack of evidence that it has done us any favours. No doubt their closed minds will find some reason to doubt his analysis lol.
Irish independence was a major economic error, of historic proportions. They were poorer as a result, and remained poorer for decades
Do they regret it now? Do they want to revert? No. They did it for reasons OTHER than economics
What a ridiculous comparison @Leon. Do you have ANY idea what British rule in Ireland meant? Did the EU preside over a potato famine? Did the EU send troops into the UK. Did the EU insist on having it's aristocrats run major institutions?
Don't be so fucking ridiculous. You have more cred when you talk about alien invasions.
The Great Hunger removed a third of the island of Ireland's population, through death or migration. The population has never recovered. The island was occupied by soldiers, up to the modern era, who committed war crimes, even if the UK refuses to accept them. That is not the same as voting to join an economic consortium of countries that evolved into a more political consortium of countries, and the comparison is sickening.
Some British people have a remarkable blind spot about Ireland. The Irish are far more forgiving towards us than we have any right to expect.
We freed up a heck of a lot of parking on the West Coast, and encouraged them to diversify their agriculture away from the potato. How is this bad?
The Empire forced an entirely different method of land ownership, landlordism and free marketeerism that literally destroyed Irish civil society because 1/3rd of the island either died or had to migrate during the Great Hunger. And that's just one thing, relatively recently historically speaking! The language was made illegal, by penalty of death, Catholicisim was essentially criminalised, early "race science" was basically invented in part to justify the subjugation of the Irish (as well as slavery). Wealth, land and labour was extracted and what was given back was landlords and death. And the UK did not diversify their agriculture away from the potato - it was the over charging of farmers by English landowners that made potatoes the only profitable / substantive crop, and the method of land reform introduced reduced the incentive to improve the land with better crops / infrastructure (because landlords would use it as an argument to raise rents / find new tenants).
I really recommend the podcast Behind The Bastards and their episodes on that period of history.
I note that you completely avoid my point about the extra parking post 1850. Have you been to Cahersiveen recently? Tons of it. Parking. Everywhere. Just pull up and hop out
It can all get a bit Four Yorkshiremen. Most of our ancestors were at or near the bottom of the food chain, in the 18th and 19th centuries, which was not a good place to be, anywhere in the world.
It's easy to imagine ourselves as Roman Senators, British Aristocrats, Chinese Mandarins etc. because they're the people who have left a written record. But, it's much more likely we would have been slaves, or peasants living just above destitution, had we lived at the time.
Which is why it's interesting to consider (and, one hopes, reject) the political positions of the Greens and ultra ecoradicals.
They want to roll us back to what life was like before the industrial revolution, which was really shit.
When I hear a man advocating subsistence farming, I have a strong desire to see it practised upon him.
Sunak takes the Tories back to 1997 levels of 165 MPs with Nowcast after the sub 50 seats Truss was heading for. Smaller Starmer majority than Blair got though at 134 Nowcast Model + Interactive Map (31/05):
Ukraine war latest: 'First call' on Russian state TV for Putin to go
The Wagner Group is willing to fight on in Ukraine as long as Moscow "clowns" aren't in charge, boss Yevgeny Prigozhin says - as Russian strikes kill three people, including a girl, 9, in Kyiv.
I bet Prighozhin now insists on always staying on the ground floor.
He's going to accidentally ingest a kilogram of Polonium.
Or get an ice pick that makes his ears burn.
It's been obvious for weeks that of Putin and Prigozhin, at least one of them has to go. It doesn't seem to be true (yet) that Prigozhin has called for Putin to go. One interpretation of Prigozhin's recent actions is that he is preparing to back a less hawkish replacement for Putin. Other interpretations are available. A less hawkish replacement may well not be.
This is one to annoy that diminishing coterie of Brexit-is-shite-deniers that still protest it was a good idea despite the complete lack of evidence that it has done us any favours. No doubt their closed minds will find some reason to doubt his analysis lol.
Irish independence was a major economic error, of historic proportions. They were poorer as a result, and remained poorer for decades
Do they regret it now? Do they want to revert? No. They did it for reasons OTHER than economics
What a ridiculous comparison @Leon. Do you have ANY idea what British rule in Ireland meant? Did the EU preside over a potato famine? Did the EU send troops into the UK. Did the EU insist on having it's aristocrats run major institutions?
Don't be so fucking ridiculous. You have more cred when you talk about alien invasions.
The Great Hunger removed a third of the island of Ireland's population, through death or migration. The population has never recovered. The island was occupied by soldiers, up to the modern era, who committed war crimes, even if the UK refuses to accept them. That is not the same as voting to join an economic consortium of countries that evolved into a more political consortium of countries, and the comparison is sickening.
Some British people have a remarkable blind spot about Ireland. The Irish are far more forgiving towards us than we have any right to expect.
We freed up a heck of a lot of parking on the West Coast, and encouraged them to diversify their agriculture away from the potato. How is this bad?
The Empire forced an entirely different method of land ownership, landlordism and free marketeerism that literally destroyed Irish civil society because 1/3rd of the island either died or had to migrate during the Great Hunger. And that's just one thing, relatively recently historically speaking! The language was made illegal, by penalty of death, Catholicisim was essentially criminalised, early "race science" was basically invented in part to justify the subjugation of the Irish (as well as slavery). Wealth, land and labour was extracted and what was given back was landlords and death. And the UK did not diversify their agriculture away from the potato - it was the over charging of farmers by English landowners that made potatoes the only profitable / substantive crop, and the method of land reform introduced reduced the incentive to improve the land with better crops / infrastructure (because landlords would use it as an argument to raise rents / find new tenants).
I really recommend the podcast Behind The Bastards and their episodes on that period of history.
I note that you completely avoid my point about the extra parking post 1850. Have you been to Cahersiveen recently? Tons of it. Parking. Everywhere. Just pull up and hop out
It can all get a bit Four Yorkshiremen. Most of our ancestors were at or near the bottom of the food chain, in the 18th and 19th centuries, which was not a good place to be, anywhere in the world.
It's easy to imagine ourselves as Roman Senators, British Aristocrats, Chinese Mandarins etc. because they're the people who have left a written record. But, it's much more likely we would have been slaves, or peasants living just above destitution, had we lived at the time.
Which is why it's interesting to consider (and, one hopes, reject) the political positions of the Greens and ultra ecoradicals.
They want to roll us back to what life was like before the industrial revolution, which was really shit.
Interesting that they never really promote this aspect of their economic policy.
"Vote Green for a return to the Dark Ages when no-one felt a compulsion to glue themselves to tarmac"
or
"Vote Green to ensure a reduction in your living standards and possible famine. You know it makes sense"
Manufacturing UKs inflation busting recession is coming along nicely. Ordinarily, downturn data wouldn’t be best followed with by yet another interest rate rise.
I also would not expect a house price correction without stock market pressures. Let’s be careful how we are investing until UK economy is out of the woods.
Ukraine war latest: 'First call' on Russian state TV for Putin to go
The Wagner Group is willing to fight on in Ukraine as long as Moscow "clowns" aren't in charge, boss Yevgeny Prigozhin says - as Russian strikes kill three people, including a girl, 9, in Kyiv.
Just a brief glance at the trans debate on Twitter shows that it has lost none of its ugliness and venom. What a horrible poisonous mess I’m still bemused how we ended up here, when ten years ago trans people were generally accepted and everyone seemed to rub along What happened? Who did this? Why?
Several things have happened - quite a few of which were going on “under the radar” and have only recently become apparent.
With the arrival of Gay Marriage the LGB Charity Stonewall had run out of road - what LGB rights were left to secure? So they added QT+ and started advocating for Trans people. Nothing wrong with that. Except some LGB people don't think it's a good fit between LGB (who people are attracted to) and QT+ (who people think they are). Among the QT+ tribe are trans people, who have gender dysphoria, but also "AGPs" - heterosexual men who are sexually aroused by themselves in women's clothes. These men in particular are seen as a threat to women's safety by women's groups.
Then Stonewall started briefing employers and organisations on the Equality Law as they thought it should be, not as it actually was. They also adopted a policy of "No Debate" when it came to Trans rights, so were not only deaf to criticism, but actively hostile towards it. This ended up in the courts when employers sacked people based on "Stonewall law" and found it did not stand up. These people were predominantly women, often left wing & frequently lesbian. So much for Tory "culture war"!
Meanwhile in Scotland, safe in the progressive echo chamber the SNP at the behest of their Green partners pushed through Gender Recognition Reform - which would turn getting a gender recognition certificate into a formality - again discussion or debate was dismissed as "transphobia". When this was finally exposed to full public discussion and the case of male rapists discovering they had "Prison onset gender dysphoria - can I be housed with women?" the politicians were I suspect grateful for Westminster blocking it because they could return to safer ground "disrespecting Scotland" than a policy unpopular with voters.
Back in England the explosion in cases of "gender dysphoria" among teen girls (previously it had mainly been pre-pubescent children and middle aged men) at the Tavistock led to an investigation under a leading paediatrician - Dr Cass - which started blowing holes in the assertions of the "Affirmative Care" model - widely (and, it must be said, profitably) promoted in the USA in particular. The ripples from the NHS review are spreading across the world with Australia wondering whether it should backtrack, and some states in the US now banning so-called "affirmative care". 1/2
Thanks for the summary.
I think the difference is that after the loss on equal marriage in the US, both in the courts and the public opinion, evangelical Christians and the big money in it moved to two other causes - finding a wedge issue to make LGBT+ issues relevant again (so they picked trans people) and trying to help non Western countries (specifically those in Africa) pass homophobic laws. Trans people became the battleground in the US and UK, and a lot of the rest of the Western world, that replaced the old fight (with the same talking points).
The increase in cases of dysphoria is made much of, but surely it makes sense that the bodies of people assigned female at birth were more heavily policed than those assigned male at birth, and therefore their ability to transition was lessened. Again, the increase in dysphoria cases seem huge when put in percentage increases, but we're still typically talking about an increase in referrals, not treatment, and still a very small number of people.
Queer issues have ALWAYS been part of the struggle - the idea of challenging the nuclear family, of heteronormativity and gender roles has always been part of the struggle of LGBT+ people because we are considered an existential threat to the existence of it. If people can have same sex partners, never get married, have multiple partners, not have to fit in with societal norms of gender, they can say that the patriarchal set up of society doesn't have to exist. "We're here, we're queer, we're used to it" was a rallying cry of the 70s and 80s. Some LGBT+ activists didn't WANT equal marriage because they saw that as conforming too much to heteronormative living - that partners deserved rights without having to concede to the constricts of conservative family values. But the movement became less radical, and that seems to have helped in some ways, and failed in others; most people still look down on any queer person who isn't living a heteronormative lifestyle.
The issue is that sex, and gender transition, are both protected characteristics, under equality legislation, and sometimes rights conflict.
Gender critical feminists in the UK have very little in common with US evangelicals.
They get most of their money from them, and use the same kind of arguments as the old homophobic ones. And LGB rights are also protected by sex and gender (as Gorsuch argued in the USA), due to the fact that for same sex couples is still based in sex and gender based discrimination.
Not that you're not welcome, but are you from these shores?
The idea that a Left Wing Feminist like Julie Bindell or a Black Lesbian Barrister like Allison Bailey or an SNP MP like Joanna Cherry, SNP (sorry, Scottish National Party) MP KC (King's Counsel) are in hock to US Christian Fundamentalist strains credulity.....
FYI, most UK Conservative MPs (if not all of their voters) map to US Democrats, if not to the left of them.....
This is one to annoy that diminishing coterie of Brexit-is-shite-deniers that still protest it was a good idea despite the complete lack of evidence that it has done us any favours. No doubt their closed minds will find some reason to doubt his analysis lol.
Irish independence was a major economic error, of historic proportions. They were poorer as a result, and remained poorer for decades
Do they regret it now? Do they want to revert? No. They did it for reasons OTHER than economics
What a ridiculous comparison @Leon. Do you have ANY idea what British rule in Ireland meant? Did the EU preside over a potato famine? Did the EU send troops into the UK. Did the EU insist on having it's aristocrats run major institutions?
Don't be so fucking ridiculous. You have more cred when you talk about alien invasions.
The Great Hunger removed a third of the island of Ireland's population, through death or migration. The population has never recovered. The island was occupied by soldiers, up to the modern era, who committed war crimes, even if the UK refuses to accept them. That is not the same as voting to join an economic consortium of countries that evolved into a more political consortium of countries, and the comparison is sickening.
Some British people have a remarkable blind spot about Ireland. The Irish are far more forgiving towards us than we have any right to expect.
We freed up a heck of a lot of parking on the West Coast, and encouraged them to diversify their agriculture away from the potato. How is this bad?
The Empire forced an entirely different method of land ownership, landlordism and free marketeerism that literally destroyed Irish civil society because 1/3rd of the island either died or had to migrate during the Great Hunger. And that's just one thing, relatively recently historically speaking! The language was made illegal, by penalty of death, Catholicisim was essentially criminalised, early "race science" was basically invented in part to justify the subjugation of the Irish (as well as slavery). Wealth, land and labour was extracted and what was given back was landlords and death. And the UK did not diversify their agriculture away from the potato - it was the over charging of farmers by English landowners that made potatoes the only profitable / substantive crop, and the method of land reform introduced reduced the incentive to improve the land with better crops / infrastructure (because landlords would use it as an argument to raise rents / find new tenants).
I really recommend the podcast Behind The Bastards and their episodes on that period of history.
And once the British left most of Ireland (after an early terror campaign by the IRA including murdering British soldiers and government officials and burning down homes of Anglo Irish nobility) Catholicism dominated Irish society in such a way that divorce, abortion and homosexuality remained illegal in the Republic of Ireland long after they had been legalised in mainland GB.
My mother reckons that being a Protestant in 1940's and 1950's Dublin was much better than being a Catholic, because the Catholic Church was indifferent to you, being convinced that you were going to hell, anyway. They took a lot of interest in the Catholics however, and that was not good news for the Catholics.
I was somewhat shocked to read that de Valera essentially aspired to run Ireland as a Catholic theocracy.
Manufacturing UKs inflation busting recession is coming along nicely. Ordinarily, downturn data wouldn’t be best followed with by yet another interest rate rise.
I also would not expect a house price correction without stock market pressures. Let’s be careful how we are investing until UK economy is out of the woods.
Manufacturing UKs inflation busting recession is coming along nicely. Ordinarily, downturn data wouldn’t be best followed with by yet another interest rate rise.
I also would not expect a house price correction without stock market pressures. Let’s be careful how we are investing until UK economy is out of the woods.
Had Boris not been ousted he was apparently on his way out as Chancellor.
If this story originates from Boris Johnson, would you all think I am a cynic if I suspect it might be a whopping great lie?
It originates from reports of contemporaneous discussions, not Boris's recollections.
It does make it quite intriguing what might be in Bojo's Whatsapps, which (contrary to the impression given by two PB headers) have now been provided by Boris to the Covid enquiry directly as the Cabinet Office (Sunak) had refused.
Would those be "contemporaneous" discussions that are recalled by Johnson, Dorries, and Rees-Mogg perhaps.
I have a bridge to sell you. Or a ludicrous economically damaging referendum to vote in favour of.
Ukraine war latest: 'First call' on Russian state TV for Putin to go
The Wagner Group is willing to fight on in Ukraine as long as Moscow "clowns" aren't in charge, boss Yevgeny Prigozhin says - as Russian strikes kill three people, including a girl, 9, in Kyiv.
I bet Prighozhin now insists on always staying on the ground floor.
He's going to accidentally ingest a kilogram of Polonium.
Or get an ice pick that makes his ears burn.
It's been obvious for weeks that of Putin and Prigozhin, at least one of them has to go. It doesn't seem to be true (yet) that Prigozhin has called for Putin to go. One interpretation of Prigozhin's recent actions is that he is preparing to back a less hawkish replacement for Putin. Other interpretations are available. A less hawkish replacement may well not be.
As ever, it's a question of what the people in question want. Prigozhin has used his connections to build up a nice little business over the last decade or more; one that was bringing in lots of money and influence for himself. Would he actually want the top job, or would he prefer to continue running his enterprise (which has been damaged, physically and reputationally, by Bakhmut) ?
What Putin wants is a much more complex question. At its heart probably lies a nationalistic (and fascist) concept of Russia stronk.
This is one to annoy that diminishing coterie of Brexit-is-shite-deniers that still protest it was a good idea despite the complete lack of evidence that it has done us any favours. No doubt their closed minds will find some reason to doubt his analysis lol.
Irish independence was a major economic error, of historic proportions. They were poorer as a result, and remained poorer for decades
Do they regret it now? Do they want to revert? No. They did it for reasons OTHER than economics
What a ridiculous comparison @Leon. Do you have ANY idea what British rule in Ireland meant? Did the EU preside over a potato famine? Did the EU send troops into the UK. Did the EU insist on having it's aristocrats run major institutions?
Don't be so fucking ridiculous. You have more cred when you talk about alien invasions.
The Great Hunger removed a third of the island of Ireland's population, through death or migration. The population has never recovered. The island was occupied by soldiers, up to the modern era, who committed war crimes, even if the UK refuses to accept them. That is not the same as voting to join an economic consortium of countries that evolved into a more political consortium of countries, and the comparison is sickening.
Some British people have a remarkable blind spot about Ireland. The Irish are far more forgiving towards us than we have any right to expect.
We freed up a heck of a lot of parking on the West Coast, and encouraged them to diversify their agriculture away from the potato. How is this bad?
The Empire forced an entirely different method of land ownership, landlordism and free marketeerism that literally destroyed Irish civil society because 1/3rd of the island either died or had to migrate during the Great Hunger. And that's just one thing, relatively recently historically speaking! The language was made illegal, by penalty of death, Catholicisim was essentially criminalised, early "race science" was basically invented in part to justify the subjugation of the Irish (as well as slavery). Wealth, land and labour was extracted and what was given back was landlords and death. And the UK did not diversify their agriculture away from the potato - it was the over charging of farmers by English landowners that made potatoes the only profitable / substantive crop, and the method of land reform introduced reduced the incentive to improve the land with better crops / infrastructure (because landlords would use it as an argument to raise rents / find new tenants).
I really recommend the podcast Behind The Bastards and their episodes on that period of history.
And once the British left most of Ireland (after an early terror campaign by the IRA including murdering British soldiers and government officials and burning down homes of Anglo Irish nobility) Catholicism dominated Irish society in such a way that divorce, abortion and homosexuality remained illegal in the Republic of Ireland long after they had been legalised in mainland GB.
My mother reckons that being a Protestant in 1940's and 1950's Dublin was much better than being a Catholic, because the Catholic Church was indifferent to you, being convinced that you were going to hell, anyway. They took a lot of interest in the Catholics however, and that was not good news for the Catholics.
I was somewhat shocked to read that de Valera essentially aspired to run Ireland as a Catholic theocracy.
I think that would have been a "good luck with that idea" moment. I think a lot of English people are quite shocked to discover that while there are a small number of RC zealots in Ireland, the majority of Irish people see the Catholic Church as part of their identity but something to be ignored when inconvenient. A little how most southern European governments see the EU; the rules are only for the obeyance of fools.
This is one to annoy that diminishing coterie of Brexit-is-shite-deniers that still protest it was a good idea despite the complete lack of evidence that it has done us any favours. No doubt their closed minds will find some reason to doubt his analysis lol.
Irish independence was a major economic error, of historic proportions. They were poorer as a result, and remained poorer for decades
Do they regret it now? Do they want to revert? No. They did it for reasons OTHER than economics
What a ridiculous comparison @Leon. Do you have ANY idea what British rule in Ireland meant? Did the EU preside over a potato famine? Did the EU send troops into the UK. Did the EU insist on having it's aristocrats run major institutions?
Don't be so fucking ridiculous. You have more cred when you talk about alien invasions.
The Great Hunger removed a third of the island of Ireland's population, through death or migration. The population has never recovered. The island was occupied by soldiers, up to the modern era, who committed war crimes, even if the UK refuses to accept them. That is not the same as voting to join an economic consortium of countries that evolved into a more political consortium of countries, and the comparison is sickening.
Some British people have a remarkable blind spot about Ireland. The Irish are far more forgiving towards us than we have any right to expect.
We freed up a heck of a lot of parking on the West Coast, and encouraged them to diversify their agriculture away from the potato. How is this bad?
The Empire forced an entirely different method of land ownership, landlordism and free marketeerism that literally destroyed Irish civil society because 1/3rd of the island either died or had to migrate during the Great Hunger. And that's just one thing, relatively recently historically speaking! The language was made illegal, by penalty of death, Catholicisim was essentially criminalised, early "race science" was basically invented in part to justify the subjugation of the Irish (as well as slavery). Wealth, land and labour was extracted and what was given back was landlords and death. And the UK did not diversify their agriculture away from the potato - it was the over charging of farmers by English landowners that made potatoes the only profitable / substantive crop, and the method of land reform introduced reduced the incentive to improve the land with better crops / infrastructure (because landlords would use it as an argument to raise rents / find new tenants).
I really recommend the podcast Behind The Bastards and their episodes on that period of history.
And once the British left most of Ireland (after an early terror campaign by the IRA including murdering British soldiers and government officials and burning down homes of Anglo Irish nobility) Catholicism dominated Irish society in such a way that divorce, abortion and homosexuality remained illegal in the Republic of Ireland long after they had been legalised in mainland GB.
My mother reckons that being a Protestant in 1940's and 1950's Dublin was much better than being a Catholic, because the Catholic Church was indifferent to you, being convinced that you were going to hell, anyway. They took a lot of interest in the Catholics however, and that was not good news for the Catholics.
I was somewhat shocked to read that de Valera essentially aspired to run Ireland as a Catholic theocracy.
After the Vatican city itself, the Republic of Ireland was probably the most Catholic nation in Europe in the 20th century, certainly until the Soviet block fell
This is one to annoy that diminishing coterie of Brexit-is-shite-deniers that still protest it was a good idea despite the complete lack of evidence that it has done us any favours. No doubt their closed minds will find some reason to doubt his analysis lol.
Irish independence was a major economic error, of historic proportions. They were poorer as a result, and remained poorer for decades
Do they regret it now? Do they want to revert? No. They did it for reasons OTHER than economics
What a ridiculous comparison @Leon. Do you have ANY idea what British rule in Ireland meant? Did the EU preside over a potato famine? Did the EU send troops into the UK. Did the EU insist on having it's aristocrats run major institutions?
Don't be so fucking ridiculous. You have more cred when you talk about alien invasions.
The Great Hunger removed a third of the island of Ireland's population, through death or migration. The population has never recovered. The island was occupied by soldiers, up to the modern era, who committed war crimes, even if the UK refuses to accept them. That is not the same as voting to join an economic consortium of countries that evolved into a more political consortium of countries, and the comparison is sickening.
Some British people have a remarkable blind spot about Ireland. The Irish are far more forgiving towards us than we have any right to expect.
We freed up a heck of a lot of parking on the West Coast, and encouraged them to diversify their agriculture away from the potato. How is this bad?
The Empire forced an entirely different method of land ownership, landlordism and free marketeerism that literally destroyed Irish civil society because 1/3rd of the island either died or had to migrate during the Great Hunger. And that's just one thing, relatively recently historically speaking! The language was made illegal, by penalty of death, Catholicisim was essentially criminalised, early "race science" was basically invented in part to justify the subjugation of the Irish (as well as slavery). Wealth, land and labour was extracted and what was given back was landlords and death. And the UK did not diversify their agriculture away from the potato - it was the over charging of farmers by English landowners that made potatoes the only profitable / substantive crop, and the method of land reform introduced reduced the incentive to improve the land with better crops / infrastructure (because landlords would use it as an argument to raise rents / find new tenants).
I really recommend the podcast Behind The Bastards and their episodes on that period of history.
And once the British left most of Ireland (after an early terror campaign by the IRA including murdering British soldiers and government officials and burning down homes of Anglo Irish nobility) Catholicism dominated Irish society in such a way that divorce, abortion and homosexuality remained illegal in the Republic of Ireland long after they had been legalised in mainland GB.
My mother reckons that being a Protestant in 1940's and 1950's Dublin was much better than being a Catholic, because the Catholic Church was indifferent to you, being convinced that you were going to hell, anyway. They took a lot of interest in the Catholics however, and that was not good news for the Catholics.
I was somewhat shocked to read that de Valera essentially aspired to run Ireland as a Catholic theocracy.
At the time, it was a popular political viewpoint, in Spain, Portugal, Latin America, Quebec, and Catholic parts of Central and Eastern Europe.
CEDA, the main right wing Spanish political party, had a programme that was mostly indistinguishable from that of Fianna Fail, and a couple of thousand Irish went out to fight for the Nationalists.
The point that to end a war one may have to negotiate with people one doesn't like is less striking than the suggestion that if Ukraine doesn't succeed in this year's expected offensive, the West will need to rethink the nature of support. His comments are qualified (and translation may be an issue too) and certainly not pro-Putin but probably the clearest hint we've seen so far that a continuing military deadlock may lead to some pressure on Ukraine to negotiate for something less than total victory. Conversely the war hysteria of Russian nationalists seems to have subsided into trying to keep their current gains rather than advancing further.
You missed a few words off the end; it should be: "... into trying to keep their current gains rather than advancing further for the time being."
*Any* peace deal - whether on today's lines, on 2014's, or pre-2014 - has to ensure that Russia will not just rebuild and try again in a few years - as they have before.
And the major issue is that, absent a Russian defeat, I see no way of ensuring that. Why trust Putin and his cronies, especially if they can sell a big territorial 'win' to their populace?
Godwinning myself, It's like trying to 'negotiate' with Hitler or Stalin back in the late 1930s.
Yes, we shouldn't trust him at all, but as others have said the potential for revanchism is going to be there anyway. Guaranteeing current lines (or whatever the lines end up as after the supposed coming offensive) is one way that the West really can actually make the peace work - accepting Ukraine into NATO and stationing some US troops there would make a fresh Russian incursion without WW3 almost impossible, and the eastern oblasts can be like the West Bank, effectively incorporated and the subject of negotiations at some distant future date. Putin wouldn't like his new NATO border, nor would nationalist zealots on either side fancy anything short of total victory, but they shouldn't get to decide that the war just goes on indefinitely.
This is one to annoy that diminishing coterie of Brexit-is-shite-deniers that still protest it was a good idea despite the complete lack of evidence that it has done us any favours. No doubt their closed minds will find some reason to doubt his analysis lol.
Irish independence was a major economic error, of historic proportions. They were poorer as a result, and remained poorer for decades
Do they regret it now? Do they want to revert? No. They did it for reasons OTHER than economics
What a ridiculous comparison @Leon. Do you have ANY idea what British rule in Ireland meant? Did the EU preside over a potato famine? Did the EU send troops into the UK. Did the EU insist on having it's aristocrats run major institutions?
Don't be so fucking ridiculous. You have more cred when you talk about alien invasions.
The Great Hunger removed a third of the island of Ireland's population, through death or migration. The population has never recovered. The island was occupied by soldiers, up to the modern era, who committed war crimes, even if the UK refuses to accept them. That is not the same as voting to join an economic consortium of countries that evolved into a more political consortium of countries, and the comparison is sickening.
Some British people have a remarkable blind spot about Ireland. The Irish are far more forgiving towards us than we have any right to expect.
We freed up a heck of a lot of parking on the West Coast, and encouraged them to diversify their agriculture away from the potato. How is this bad?
The Empire forced an entirely different method of land ownership, landlordism and free marketeerism that literally destroyed Irish civil society because 1/3rd of the island either died or had to migrate during the Great Hunger. And that's just one thing, relatively recently historically speaking! The language was made illegal, by penalty of death, Catholicisim was essentially criminalised, early "race science" was basically invented in part to justify the subjugation of the Irish (as well as slavery). Wealth, land and labour was extracted and what was given back was landlords and death. And the UK did not diversify their agriculture away from the potato - it was the over charging of farmers by English landowners that made potatoes the only profitable / substantive crop, and the method of land reform introduced reduced the incentive to improve the land with better crops / infrastructure (because landlords would use it as an argument to raise rents / find new tenants).
I really recommend the podcast Behind The Bastards and their episodes on that period of history.
And once the British left most of Ireland (after an early terror campaign by the IRA including murdering British soldiers and government officials and burning down homes of Anglo Irish nobility) Catholicism dominated Irish society in such a way that divorce, abortion and homosexuality remained illegal in the Republic of Ireland long after they had been legalised in mainland GB.
My mother reckons that being a Protestant in 1940's and 1950's Dublin was much better than being a Catholic, because the Catholic Church was indifferent to you, being convinced that you were going to hell, anyway. They took a lot of interest in the Catholics however, and that was not good news for the Catholics.
I was somewhat shocked to read that de Valera essentially aspired to run Ireland as a Catholic theocracy.
Up to a point.
De Valera was certainly highly socially Conservative, and a drag on Irish development, but did oppose proposals to make Catholicism the state religion, preferring no established religion.
I have been in near constant pain in my right leg since before Easter which has sometimes caused me complete immobility. Driving has been difficult. Physio only provided temporary alleviation. I was referred for an X-ray which finally happened last week.
This morning I have tried contacting my surgery to get an appointment with the GP to find out the results. After 35 minutes on the phone I finally get through. X-results still not back but I have a GP appointment in mid-June. So I just have to pray that the results will be back by then so that I can get an idea of what the problem is and, maybe, even start the process of waiting to get treatment.
Stoicism and/or opiate addiction. That seems the choice on offer from the NHS these days.
Meanwhile I have decided to tackle some brutal overgrown brambles in the back garden, with just my arms, gloves and secateurs. Plus a lot of sweat - it is pretty hot here. It's like doing battle with Edward Scissorhands. Heist knows how I go about getting the roots out though the mattock my other half gave me as a birthday present (I married the last romantic in Cumbria) may help.
I really need a strong gardener to assist. You'd have thought in such an area there would be plenty of gardening companies to assist - from some simple design ideas to doing the harder jobs & general maintenance etc.,. But no. It is an obvious gap in the market and should I get through my current vale of tears I may look into setting one up. There are lots of keen gardeners around but also a lot of older folks so you'd have thought there'd be the need.
Has anyone who loves the NHS ever lived in another country? It’s totally bonkers to have to wait months for scans and results, and must be costing the country billions in time off work.
The comment I had from a private consultant was the mistake the NHS makes in cases like this (I had something not dissimilar) is not doing all the possible scans and tests up front. Then sending them through the to the various consultants.
I had an X ray, MRI and nerve conduction study in 2 days. Privately. They apologised for not doing them on the same day.
Perhaps the single biggest value for money in the NHS, would be training up more radiologists to keep that expensive capital equipment running as long as possible. In an ideal world, like where I live, most MRI and CT scanners operate on a drop-in basis. You get a referral from the doc, and go stand in line for a few minutes.
I have been in near constant pain in my right leg since before Easter which has sometimes caused me complete immobility. Driving has been difficult. Physio only provided temporary alleviation. I was referred for an X-ray which finally happened last week.
This morning I have tried contacting my surgery to get an appointment with the GP to find out the results. After 35 minutes on the phone I finally get through. X-results still not back but I have a GP appointment in mid-June. So I just have to pray that the results will be back by then so that I can get an idea of what the problem is and, maybe, even start the process of waiting to get treatment.
Stoicism and/or opiate addiction. That seems the choice on offer from the NHS these days.
Meanwhile I have decided to tackle some brutal overgrown brambles in the back garden, with just my arms, gloves and secateurs. Plus a lot of sweat - it is pretty hot here. It's like doing battle with Edward Scissorhands. Heist knows how I go about getting the roots out though the mattock my other half gave me as a birthday present (I married the last romantic in Cumbria) may help.
I really need a strong gardener to assist. You'd have thought in such an area there would be plenty of gardening companies to assist - from some simple design ideas to doing the harder jobs & general maintenance etc.,. But no. It is an obvious gap in the market and should I get through my current vale of tears I may look into setting one up. There are lots of keen gardeners around but also a lot of older folks so you'd have thought there'd be the need.
Has anyone who loves the NHS ever lived in another country? It’s totally bonkers to have to wait months for scans and results, and must be costing the country billions in time off work.
The comment I had from a private consultant was the mistake the NHS makes in cases like this (I had something not dissimilar) is not doing all the possible scans and tests up front. Then sending them through the to the various consultants.
I had an X ray, MRI and nerve conduction study in 2 days. Privately. They apologised for not doing them on the same day.
Perhaps the single biggest value for money in the NHS, would be training up more radiologists to keep that expensive capital equipment running as long as possible. In an ideal world, like where I live, most MRI and CT scanners operate on a drop-in basis. You get a referral from the doc, and go stand in line for a few minutes.
How are they owned and operated? Is imaging run as a separate service?
The point that to end a war one may have to negotiate with people one doesn't like is less striking than the suggestion that if Ukraine doesn't succeed in this year's expected offensive, the West will need to rethink the nature of support. His comments are qualified (and translation may be an issue too) and certainly not pro-Putin but probably the clearest hint we've seen so far that a continuing military deadlock may lead to some pressure on Ukraine to negotiate for something less than total victory. Conversely the war hysteria of Russian nationalists seems to have subsided into trying to keep their current gains rather than advancing further.
You missed a few words off the end; it should be: "... into trying to keep their current gains rather than advancing further for the time being."
*Any* peace deal - whether on today's lines, on 2014's, or pre-2014 - has to ensure that Russia will not just rebuild and try again in a few years - as they have before.
And the major issue is that, absent a Russian defeat, I see no way of ensuring that. Why trust Putin and his cronies, especially if they can sell a big territorial 'win' to their populace?
Godwinning myself, It's like trying to 'negotiate' with Hitler or Stalin back in the late 1930s.
Yes, we shouldn't trust him at all, but as others have said the potential for revanchism is going to be there anyway. Guaranteeing current lines (or whatever the lines end up as after the supposed coming offensive) is one way that the West really can actually make the peace work - accepting Ukraine into NATO and stationing some US troops there would make a fresh Russian incursion without WW3 almost impossible, and the eastern oblasts can be like the West Bank, effectively incorporated and the subject of negotiations at some distant future date. Putin wouldn't like his new NATO border, nor would nationalist zealots on either side fancy anything short of total victory, but they shouldn't get to decide that the war just goes on indefinitely.
The Ukranians are in no mood to agree anything that sees Putin taking Ukranian land. The best-case scenario is the post-2014 border, with many pushing for the 1991 border and willing to fight for it.
The point that to end a war one may have to negotiate with people one doesn't like is less striking than the suggestion that if Ukraine doesn't succeed in this year's expected offensive, the West will need to rethink the nature of support. His comments are qualified (and translation may be an issue too) and certainly not pro-Putin but probably the clearest hint we've seen so far that a continuing military deadlock may lead to some pressure on Ukraine to negotiate for something less than total victory. Conversely the war hysteria of Russian nationalists seems to have subsided into trying to keep their current gains rather than advancing further.
You missed a few words off the end; it should be: "... into trying to keep their current gains rather than advancing further for the time being."
*Any* peace deal - whether on today's lines, on 2014's, or pre-2014 - has to ensure that Russia will not just rebuild and try again in a few years - as they have before.
And the major issue is that, absent a Russian defeat, I see no way of ensuring that. Why trust Putin and his cronies, especially if they can sell a big territorial 'win' to their populace?
Godwinning myself, It's like trying to 'negotiate' with Hitler or Stalin back in the late 1930s.
Yes, we shouldn't trust him at all, but as others have said the potential for revanchism is going to be there anyway. Guaranteeing current lines (or whatever the lines end up as after the supposed coming offensive) is one way that the West really can actually make the peace work - accepting Ukraine into NATO and stationing some US troops there would make a fresh Russian incursion without WW3 almost impossible, and the eastern oblasts can be like the West Bank, effectively incorporated and the subject of negotiations at some distant future date. Putin wouldn't like his new NATO border, nor would nationalist zealots on either side fancy anything short of total victory, but they shouldn't get to decide that the war just goes on indefinitely.
The West gave Ukraine 'guarantees' when they gave up their nukes. And we abandoned them.
A defeated Russia will be in a much, much poorer state than one if the lines were frozen where they are now. And there are plenty of people in the west who are willing to excuse Russia's actions, turn a blind eye to those actions, and even to blame us for those actions. Putin or a successor would look at breaking down that support - and it'd be easier if he could claim he won.
"nor would nationalist zealots on either side ...but they shouldn't get to decide that the war just goes on indefinitely."
If you were a Ukrainian, who had had their homes and/or land stolen by Russia, and perhaps even had kids taken away from them, would you want those homes, land and people back ASAP? I don't see them as "nationalist zealots" It's a crass way to refer to the Ukrainians in this situation.
Russia under Putin is a fascist state. They're the problem, not the Ukrainians.
The point that to end a war one may have to negotiate with people one doesn't like is less striking than the suggestion that if Ukraine doesn't succeed in this year's expected offensive, the West will need to rethink the nature of support. His comments are qualified (and translation may be an issue too) and certainly not pro-Putin but probably the clearest hint we've seen so far that a continuing military deadlock may lead to some pressure on Ukraine to negotiate for something less than total victory. Conversely the war hysteria of Russian nationalists seems to have subsided into trying to keep their current gains rather than advancing further.
You missed a few words off the end; it should be: "... into trying to keep their current gains rather than advancing further for the time being."
*Any* peace deal - whether on today's lines, on 2014's, or pre-2014 - has to ensure that Russia will not just rebuild and try again in a few years - as they have before.
And the major issue is that, absent a Russian defeat, I see no way of ensuring that. Why trust Putin and his cronies, especially if they can sell a big territorial 'win' to their populace?
Godwinning myself, It's like trying to 'negotiate' with Hitler or Stalin back in the late 1930s.
Yes, we shouldn't trust him at all, but as others have said the potential for revanchism is going to be there anyway. Guaranteeing current lines (or whatever the lines end up as after the supposed coming offensive) is one way that the West really can actually make the peace work - accepting Ukraine into NATO and stationing some US troops there would make a fresh Russian incursion without WW3 almost impossible, and the eastern oblasts can be like the West Bank, effectively incorporated and the subject of negotiations at some distant future date. Putin wouldn't like his new NATO border, nor would nationalist zealots on either side fancy anything short of total victory, but they shouldn't get to decide that the war just goes on indefinitely.
The Ukranians are in no mood to agree anything that sees Putin taking Ukranian land. The best-case scenario is the post-2014 border, with many pushing for the 1991 border and willing to fight for it.
It seems very unfair, but I can't see it ending without some sort of compromise such as Nick suggests. Perhaps a demilitarised zone with a UN mandate that recognises the ultimate sovereignty of Ukraine would be how I would expect it to end. Sanctions should then continue against Russia for as long as possible while there is no regime change.
The point that to end a war one may have to negotiate with people one doesn't like is less striking than the suggestion that if Ukraine doesn't succeed in this year's expected offensive, the West will need to rethink the nature of support. His comments are qualified (and translation may be an issue too) and certainly not pro-Putin but probably the clearest hint we've seen so far that a continuing military deadlock may lead to some pressure on Ukraine to negotiate for something less than total victory. Conversely the war hysteria of Russian nationalists seems to have subsided into trying to keep their current gains rather than advancing further.
You missed a few words off the end; it should be: "... into trying to keep their current gains rather than advancing further for the time being."
*Any* peace deal - whether on today's lines, on 2014's, or pre-2014 - has to ensure that Russia will not just rebuild and try again in a few years - as they have before.
And the major issue is that, absent a Russian defeat, I see no way of ensuring that. Why trust Putin and his cronies, especially if they can sell a big territorial 'win' to their populace?
Godwinning myself, It's like trying to 'negotiate' with Hitler or Stalin back in the late 1930s.
Yes, we shouldn't trust him at all, but as others have said the potential for revanchism is going to be there anyway. Guaranteeing current lines (or whatever the lines end up as after the supposed coming offensive) is one way that the West really can actually make the peace work - accepting Ukraine into NATO and stationing some US troops there would make a fresh Russian incursion without WW3 almost impossible, and the eastern oblasts can be like the West Bank, effectively incorporated and the subject of negotiations at some distant future date. Putin wouldn't like his new NATO border, nor would nationalist zealots on either side fancy anything short of total victory, but they shouldn't get to decide that the war just goes on indefinitely.
Also Godwinning myself, but if you were around in 1942, you'd have been advocating giving Ukraine and Belarus to Germany and cautioning against the 'revanchism' of thinking that Alsace and Lorraine could ever be French again.
This is one to annoy that diminishing coterie of Brexit-is-shite-deniers that still protest it was a good idea despite the complete lack of evidence that it has done us any favours. No doubt their closed minds will find some reason to doubt his analysis lol.
Irish independence was a major economic error, of historic proportions. They were poorer as a result, and remained poorer for decades
Do they regret it now? Do they want to revert? No. They did it for reasons OTHER than economics
What a ridiculous comparison @Leon. Do you have ANY idea what British rule in Ireland meant? Did the EU preside over a potato famine? Did the EU send troops into the UK. Did the EU insist on having it's aristocrats run major institutions?
Don't be so fucking ridiculous. You have more cred when you talk about alien invasions.
The Great Hunger removed a third of the island of Ireland's population, through death or migration. The population has never recovered. The island was occupied by soldiers, up to the modern era, who committed war crimes, even if the UK refuses to accept them. That is not the same as voting to join an economic consortium of countries that evolved into a more political consortium of countries, and the comparison is sickening.
Some British people have a remarkable blind spot about Ireland. The Irish are far more forgiving towards us than we have any right to expect.
We freed up a heck of a lot of parking on the West Coast, and encouraged them to diversify their agriculture away from the potato. How is this bad?
The Empire forced an entirely different method of land ownership, landlordism and free marketeerism that literally destroyed Irish civil society because 1/3rd of the island either died or had to migrate during the Great Hunger. And that's just one thing, relatively recently historically speaking! The language was made illegal, by penalty of death, Catholicisim was essentially criminalised, early "race science" was basically invented in part to justify the subjugation of the Irish (as well as slavery). Wealth, land and labour was extracted and what was given back was landlords and death. And the UK did not diversify their agriculture away from the potato - it was the over charging of farmers by English landowners that made potatoes the only profitable / substantive crop, and the method of land reform introduced reduced the incentive to improve the land with better crops / infrastructure (because landlords would use it as an argument to raise rents / find new tenants).
I really recommend the podcast Behind The Bastards and their episodes on that period of history.
And once the British left most of Ireland (after an early terror campaign by the IRA including murdering British soldiers and government officials and burning down homes of Anglo Irish nobility) Catholicism dominated Irish society in such a way that divorce, abortion and homosexuality remained illegal in the Republic of Ireland long after they had been legalised in mainland GB.
My mother reckons that being a Protestant in 1940's and 1950's Dublin was much better than being a Catholic, because the Catholic Church was indifferent to you, being convinced that you were going to hell, anyway. They took a lot of interest in the Catholics however, and that was not good news for the Catholics.
I was somewhat shocked to read that de Valera essentially aspired to run Ireland as a Catholic theocracy.
I think that would have been a "good luck with that idea" moment. I think a lot of English people are quite shocked to discover that while there are a small number of RC zealots in Ireland, the majority of Irish people see the Catholic Church as part of their identity but something to be ignored when inconvenient. A little how most southern European governments see the EU; the rules are only for the obeyance of fools.
Well I think that's the case now. I think Catholicism was rather more important to Irish people 100 years ago.
The point that to end a war one may have to negotiate with people one doesn't like is less striking than the suggestion that if Ukraine doesn't succeed in this year's expected offensive, the West will need to rethink the nature of support. His comments are qualified (and translation may be an issue too) and certainly not pro-Putin but probably the clearest hint we've seen so far that a continuing military deadlock may lead to some pressure on Ukraine to negotiate for something less than total victory. Conversely the war hysteria of Russian nationalists seems to have subsided into trying to keep their current gains rather than advancing further.
You missed a few words off the end; it should be: "... into trying to keep their current gains rather than advancing further for the time being."
*Any* peace deal - whether on today's lines, on 2014's, or pre-2014 - has to ensure that Russia will not just rebuild and try again in a few years - as they have before.
And the major issue is that, absent a Russian defeat, I see no way of ensuring that. Why trust Putin and his cronies, especially if they can sell a big territorial 'win' to their populace?
Godwinning myself, It's like trying to 'negotiate' with Hitler or Stalin back in the late 1930s.
Yes, we shouldn't trust him at all, but as others have said the potential for revanchism is going to be there anyway. Guaranteeing current lines (or whatever the lines end up as after the supposed coming offensive) is one way that the West really can actually make the peace work - accepting Ukraine into NATO and stationing some US troops there would make a fresh Russian incursion without WW3 almost impossible, and the eastern oblasts can be like the West Bank, effectively incorporated and the subject of negotiations at some distant future date. Putin wouldn't like his new NATO border, nor would nationalist zealots on either side fancy anything short of total victory, but they shouldn't get to decide that the war just goes on indefinitely.
Also Godwinning myself, but if you were around in 1942, you'd have been advocating giving Ukraine and Belarus to Germany and cautioning against the 'revanchism' of thinking that Alsace and Lorraine could ever be French again.
I have a better idea - give land to Russia for peace. Corsica, say. Or Wales.
The point that to end a war one may have to negotiate with people one doesn't like is less striking than the suggestion that if Ukraine doesn't succeed in this year's expected offensive, the West will need to rethink the nature of support. His comments are qualified (and translation may be an issue too) and certainly not pro-Putin but probably the clearest hint we've seen so far that a continuing military deadlock may lead to some pressure on Ukraine to negotiate for something less than total victory. Conversely the war hysteria of Russian nationalists seems to have subsided into trying to keep their current gains rather than advancing further.
You missed a few words off the end; it should be: "... into trying to keep their current gains rather than advancing further for the time being."
*Any* peace deal - whether on today's lines, on 2014's, or pre-2014 - has to ensure that Russia will not just rebuild and try again in a few years - as they have before.
And the major issue is that, absent a Russian defeat, I see no way of ensuring that. Why trust Putin and his cronies, especially if they can sell a big territorial 'win' to their populace?
Godwinning myself, It's like trying to 'negotiate' with Hitler or Stalin back in the late 1930s.
Yes, we shouldn't trust him at all, but as others have said the potential for revanchism is going to be there anyway. Guaranteeing current lines (or whatever the lines end up as after the supposed coming offensive) is one way that the West really can actually make the peace work - accepting Ukraine into NATO and stationing some US troops there would make a fresh Russian incursion without WW3 almost impossible, and the eastern oblasts can be like the West Bank, effectively incorporated and the subject of negotiations at some distant future date. Putin wouldn't like his new NATO border, nor would nationalist zealots on either side fancy anything short of total victory, but they shouldn't get to decide that the war just goes on indefinitely.
The Palestinians can't win against Israel. So should they shut up and stop demanding their land?
This is one to annoy that diminishing coterie of Brexit-is-shite-deniers that still protest it was a good idea despite the complete lack of evidence that it has done us any favours. No doubt their closed minds will find some reason to doubt his analysis lol.
Irish independence was a major economic error, of historic proportions. They were poorer as a result, and remained poorer for decades
Do they regret it now? Do they want to revert? No. They did it for reasons OTHER than economics
What a ridiculous comparison @Leon. Do you have ANY idea what British rule in Ireland meant? Did the EU preside over a potato famine? Did the EU send troops into the UK. Did the EU insist on having it's aristocrats run major institutions?
Don't be so fucking ridiculous. You have more cred when you talk about alien invasions.
The Great Hunger removed a third of the island of Ireland's population, through death or migration. The population has never recovered. The island was occupied by soldiers, up to the modern era, who committed war crimes, even if the UK refuses to accept them. That is not the same as voting to join an economic consortium of countries that evolved into a more political consortium of countries, and the comparison is sickening.
Some British people have a remarkable blind spot about Ireland. The Irish are far more forgiving towards us than we have any right to expect.
We freed up a heck of a lot of parking on the West Coast, and encouraged them to diversify their agriculture away from the potato. How is this bad?
The Empire forced an entirely different method of land ownership, landlordism and free marketeerism that literally destroyed Irish civil society because 1/3rd of the island either died or had to migrate during the Great Hunger. And that's just one thing, relatively recently historically speaking! The language was made illegal, by penalty of death, Catholicisim was essentially criminalised, early "race science" was basically invented in part to justify the subjugation of the Irish (as well as slavery). Wealth, land and labour was extracted and what was given back was landlords and death. And the UK did not diversify their agriculture away from the potato - it was the over charging of farmers by English landowners that made potatoes the only profitable / substantive crop, and the method of land reform introduced reduced the incentive to improve the land with better crops / infrastructure (because landlords would use it as an argument to raise rents / find new tenants).
I really recommend the podcast Behind The Bastards and their episodes on that period of history.
And once the British left most of Ireland (after an early terror campaign by the IRA including murdering British soldiers and government officials and burning down homes of Anglo Irish nobility) Catholicism dominated Irish society in such a way that divorce, abortion and homosexuality remained illegal in the Republic of Ireland long after they had been legalised in mainland GB.
My mother reckons that being a Protestant in 1940's and 1950's Dublin was much better than being a Catholic, because the Catholic Church was indifferent to you, being convinced that you were going to hell, anyway. They took a lot of interest in the Catholics however, and that was not good news for the Catholics.
I was somewhat shocked to read that de Valera essentially aspired to run Ireland as a Catholic theocracy.
I think that would have been a "good luck with that idea" moment. I think a lot of English people are quite shocked to discover that while there are a small number of RC zealots in Ireland, the majority of Irish people see the Catholic Church as part of their identity but something to be ignored when inconvenient. A little how most southern European governments see the EU; the rules are only for the obeyance of fools.
Well I think that's the case now. I think Catholicism was rather more important to Irish people 100 years ago.
Without the benefit of a time machine I cannot agree or disagree. What I do know is that historical anti-Catholic sentiment in UK mainland makes people believe that Catholicism is rigorously adhered to by its flock, rather like some other religious fundamentalists, when in practice this is a very long way from the truth, particularly in Ireland.
I have been in near constant pain in my right leg since before Easter which has sometimes caused me complete immobility. Driving has been difficult. Physio only provided temporary alleviation. I was referred for an X-ray which finally happened last week.
This morning I have tried contacting my surgery to get an appointment with the GP to find out the results. After 35 minutes on the phone I finally get through. X-results still not back but I have a GP appointment in mid-June. So I just have to pray that the results will be back by then so that I can get an idea of what the problem is and, maybe, even start the process of waiting to get treatment.
Stoicism and/or opiate addiction. That seems the choice on offer from the NHS these days.
Meanwhile I have decided to tackle some brutal overgrown brambles in the back garden, with just my arms, gloves and secateurs. Plus a lot of sweat - it is pretty hot here. It's like doing battle with Edward Scissorhands. Heist knows how I go about getting the roots out though the mattock my other half gave me as a birthday present (I married the last romantic in Cumbria) may help.
I really need a strong gardener to assist. You'd have thought in such an area there would be plenty of gardening companies to assist - from some simple design ideas to doing the harder jobs & general maintenance etc.,. But no. It is an obvious gap in the market and should I get through my current vale of tears I may look into setting one up. There are lots of keen gardeners around but also a lot of older folks so you'd have thought there'd be the need.
Has anyone who loves the NHS ever lived in another country? It’s totally bonkers to have to wait months for scans and results, and must be costing the country billions in time off work.
The comment I had from a private consultant was the mistake the NHS makes in cases like this (I had something not dissimilar) is not doing all the possible scans and tests up front. Then sending them through the to the various consultants.
I had an X ray, MRI and nerve conduction study in 2 days. Privately. They apologised for not doing them on the same day.
Perhaps the single biggest value for money in the NHS, would be training up more radiologists to keep that expensive capital equipment running as long as possible. In an ideal world, like where I live, most MRI and CT scanners operate on a drop-in basis. You get a referral from the doc, and go stand in line for a few minutes.
How are they owned and operated? Is imaging run as a separate service?
Privately operated, either inside the larger hospitals, or run as a separate service for the smaller clinics to refer patients. Last time I had a CT, I think I paid £50 and my insurance paid £200.
It’s a scandal that the NHS runs expensive pieces of capital equipment for eight hours a day, five days a week. A commercial operator runs them for 16 hours a day, seven days a week, and does maintainance overnight. Because of course they do.
This is one to annoy that diminishing coterie of Brexit-is-shite-deniers that still protest it was a good idea despite the complete lack of evidence that it has done us any favours. No doubt their closed minds will find some reason to doubt his analysis lol.
Irish independence was a major economic error, of historic proportions. They were poorer as a result, and remained poorer for decades
Do they regret it now? Do they want to revert? No. They did it for reasons OTHER than economics
What a ridiculous comparison @Leon. Do you have ANY idea what British rule in Ireland meant? Did the EU preside over a potato famine? Did the EU send troops into the UK. Did the EU insist on having it's aristocrats run major institutions?
Don't be so fucking ridiculous. You have more cred when you talk about alien invasions.
The Great Hunger removed a third of the island of Ireland's population, through death or migration. The population has never recovered. The island was occupied by soldiers, up to the modern era, who committed war crimes, even if the UK refuses to accept them. That is not the same as voting to join an economic consortium of countries that evolved into a more political consortium of countries, and the comparison is sickening.
Some British people have a remarkable blind spot about Ireland. The Irish are far more forgiving towards us than we have any right to expect.
We freed up a heck of a lot of parking on the West Coast, and encouraged them to diversify their agriculture away from the potato. How is this bad?
The Empire forced an entirely different method of land ownership, landlordism and free marketeerism that literally destroyed Irish civil society because 1/3rd of the island either died or had to migrate during the Great Hunger. And that's just one thing, relatively recently historically speaking! The language was made illegal, by penalty of death, Catholicisim was essentially criminalised, early "race science" was basically invented in part to justify the subjugation of the Irish (as well as slavery). Wealth, land and labour was extracted and what was given back was landlords and death. And the UK did not diversify their agriculture away from the potato - it was the over charging of farmers by English landowners that made potatoes the only profitable / substantive crop, and the method of land reform introduced reduced the incentive to improve the land with better crops / infrastructure (because landlords would use it as an argument to raise rents / find new tenants).
I really recommend the podcast Behind The Bastards and their episodes on that period of history.
And once the British left most of Ireland (after an early terror campaign by the IRA including murdering British soldiers and government officials and burning down homes of Anglo Irish nobility) Catholicism dominated Irish society in such a way that divorce, abortion and homosexuality remained illegal in the Republic of Ireland long after they had been legalised in mainland GB.
My mother reckons that being a Protestant in 1940's and 1950's Dublin was much better than being a Catholic, because the Catholic Church was indifferent to you, being convinced that you were going to hell, anyway. They took a lot of interest in the Catholics however, and that was not good news for the Catholics.
I was somewhat shocked to read that de Valera essentially aspired to run Ireland as a Catholic theocracy.
I think that would have been a "good luck with that idea" moment. I think a lot of English people are quite shocked to discover that while there are a small number of RC zealots in Ireland, the majority of Irish people see the Catholic Church as part of their identity but something to be ignored when inconvenient. A little how most southern European governments see the EU; the rules are only for the obeyance of fools.
Well I think that's the case now. I think Catholicism was rather more important to Irish people 100 years ago.
Even then, the idea of turning Ireland into a Catholic State wasn't what Collins had in mind, for instance. The Forward To The Past thing was the view of a minority of those who made up the immediate post independence political scene. If Dev hadn't ended up in charge, things might well have gone very differently.
Comments
It's sunny and warm!
HUZZAH
As I love you dearly, I am completely sympathetic, even if I am unable to be empathetic, on your stupidity.
RoI really didnt get its act together until the 1990s, its a different story today where the North is looking the poor relation.
Gender critical feminists in the UK have very little in common with US evangelicals.
Stonewall have given advice to organisations, which implies that these protected characteristics are one and the same thing, when they are not.
I really recommend the podcast Behind The Bastards and their episodes on that period of history.
The situation has been basically unchanged for 8-9 months now. The AFU can't kick RF forces out of Lugansk/Donetsk and RF can't get west of the Dneiper so you can see why fatigue might be setting in.
Very low yield:
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/W54
"The situation has been basically unchanged for 8-9 months now. The AFU can't kick RF forces out of Lugansk/Donetsk and RF can't get west of the Dneiper so you can see why fatigue might be setting in."
That might not be the case. The Russians certainly seem to be running near empty, and their economy is hurting. Whilst we know Ukraine has been getting a heck of a lot of kit that has not shown up as destroyed in febrile pro-Russian propaganda - despite their claim to have destroyed three times as many himars systems than have been sent ...
It all depends on this rumoured Ukrainian offensive, when it occurs. I doubt it'll be enough to totally force the issue, but I would not be surprised if it regains much more territory than the autumn offensives last year did.
There are many people on the political left who would oppose you on this matter.
“Teaching has been a wonderful life,” says Linear Algebra champion and retiring math prof Gil Strang, who has spent 75% of his 88 years at MIT.
https://twitter.com/MITMath/status/1664001749093593089
None if his lawyers have sufficient influence to get across the message that such a thing is impossible.
Months of distrust inside Trump legal team led to top lawyer’s departure
Exclusive: Two Trump lawyers considered a ‘murder-suicide pact’ where one would resign if the other was fired
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2023/jun/01/trump-lawyers-resign-criminal-investigation
Consider an election in a country with ten states. The winner wins 6, some by a landslide, and loses 4, some by a small margin. You can truthfully write the following paragraph for the other side
"Yes they won, but the victory was by a very small margin in some states and most were close. Every state had many people that supported us. Some say that..."
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Df0j5sRgFaI
Willa. She gets a multi million dollar New York house, Connor out of the way and the chance to pursue her playwriting career backed by Connor's money.
Panic over?
Those were dedicated linguists though. Now you get paid for language proficiency no matter what the role.
You know I love you really.
I spend a lot of time in The Village (the gay bit in Manchester) and anyone who knows me I am pro gay rights and this guy was spouting homophobic shit to which I replied something along the lines of 'don't knock it until you've tried it' in that understated and subtle way that I am associated with .
One pretty lady was impressed, had a few drink and dinner dates, ended when I said I was so proud of my boy Dave for introducing same sex marriage, she said your boy Dave?
Explained who Dave was, showed her photos of me with Dave and George and that was that.
She was fuming, she definitely wanted to be in the never kissed a Tory camp, and thanks to me, she couldn't be.
https://order-order.com/2023/06/01/listen-boris-blasted-bank-manager-orthodoxy-of-sunaks-treasury/
Had Boris not been ousted he was apparently on his way out as Chancellor.
I had an X ray, MRI and nerve conduction study in 2 days. Privately. They apologised for not doing them on the same day.
'Gilt yields have continued to rise today (25 May). At the time of writing, 2-year gilt yields had risen to 4.48%, the highest level since 27 September 2022's 4.61% peak, while 10-year yields are at 4.33%, closing in on its 4.51% peak from the same day, according to data from MarketWatch.'
https://www.investmentweek.co.uk/news/4116485/gilt-yields-near-mini-budget-highs-hotter-expected-uk-inflation
It does make it quite intriguing what might be in Bojo's Whatsapps, which (contrary to the impression given by two PB headers) have now been provided by Boris to the Covid enquiry directly as the Cabinet Office (Sunak) had refused.
With the arrival of Gay Marriage the LGB Charity Stonewall had run out of road - what LGB rights were left to secure? So they added QT+ and started advocating for Trans people. Nothing wrong with that. Have you read the Cass review?
https://cass.independent-review.uk/publications/interim-report/
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lUUte2o2Sn8
Btw, I see Strang's Wikipedia page links to the wrong John von Neumann award.
The Wagner Group is willing to fight on in Ukraine as long as Moscow "clowns" aren't in charge, boss Yevgeny Prigozhin says - as Russian strikes kill three people, including a girl, 9, in Kyiv.
https://news.sky.com/story/ukraine-war-latest-first-call-on-russian-state-tv-for-putin-to-go-12541713
"Pop to the armoury and get me a nuke. Don't drop it"
"Look at this cute baby nuke. One day it will grown up to be a Mk15."
And for fun - actual firing of a Davy Crockett complete with real, live nuke
https://youtu.be/eiM-RzPHyGs?t=203
It's easy to imagine ourselves as Roman Senators, British Aristocrats, Chinese Mandarins etc. because they're the people who have left a written record. But, it's much more likely we would have been slaves, or peasants living just above destitution, had we lived at the time.
They want to roll us back to what life was like before the industrial revolution, which was really shit.
Maybe you can help by spelling it out for us.
With apologies to A. Lincoln
Nowcast Model + Interactive Map (31/05):
LAB: 392 (+190) - 44.3%
CON: 165 (-200) - 28.7%
LDM: 35 (+24) - 10.8%
SNP: 34 (-14) - 3.4%
PLC: 4 (=) - 0.5%
GRN: 1 (=) - 5.6%
RFM: 0 (=) - 5.1%
Others: 0 (=) - 1.4%
LAB Majority of 134.
https://twitter.com/ElectionMapsUK/status/1664209807572598785?s=20
It doesn't seem to be true (yet) that Prigozhin has called for Putin to go.
One interpretation of Prigozhin's recent actions is that he is preparing to back a less hawkish replacement for Putin. Other interpretations are available. A less hawkish replacement may well not be.
"Vote Green for a return to the Dark Ages when no-one felt a compulsion to glue themselves to tarmac"
or
"Vote Green to ensure a reduction in your living standards and possible famine. You know it makes sense"
The idea that a Left Wing Feminist like Julie Bindell or a Black Lesbian Barrister like Allison Bailey or an SNP MP like Joanna Cherry, SNP (sorry, Scottish National Party) MP KC (King's Counsel) are in hock to US Christian Fundamentalist strains credulity.....
FYI, most UK Conservative MPs (if not all of their voters) map to US Democrats, if not to the left of them.....
I have a bridge to sell you. Or a ludicrous economically damaging referendum to vote in favour of.
What Putin wants is a much more complex question. At its heart probably lies a nationalistic (and fascist) concept of Russia stronk.
CEDA, the main right wing Spanish political party, had a programme that was mostly indistinguishable from that of Fianna Fail, and a couple of thousand Irish went out to fight for the Nationalists.
De Valera was certainly highly socially Conservative, and a drag on Irish development, but did oppose proposals to make Catholicism the state religion, preferring no established religion.
A defeated Russia will be in a much, much poorer state than one if the lines were frozen where they are now. And there are plenty of people in the west who are willing to excuse Russia's actions, turn a blind eye to those actions, and even to blame us for those actions. Putin or a successor would look at breaking down that support - and it'd be easier if he could claim he won.
"nor would nationalist zealots on either side ...but they shouldn't get to decide that the war just goes on indefinitely."
If you were a Ukrainian, who had had their homes and/or land stolen by Russia, and perhaps even had kids taken away from them, would you want those homes, land and people back ASAP? I don't see them as "nationalist zealots" It's a crass way to refer to the Ukrainians in this situation.
Russia under Putin is a fascist state. They're the problem, not the Ukrainians.
Why not?
It’s a scandal that the NHS runs expensive pieces of capital equipment for eight hours a day, five days a week. A commercial operator runs them for 16 hours a day, seven days a week, and does maintainance overnight. Because of course they do.