Honestly @Leon - at one point I had 3 toddlers under the age of 5 and was also dealing with City traders. So I am well used to dealing with the hyperactive "it's all about me" lot. And I actually went on the March against Anti-Semitism. So I care about that too.
But FFS for once couldn't you just pretend to pay attention - even for a moment - to one of my headers. Just once. Just like we pretend to pay attention to the photos of your glasses of wine as you chew on dogs in some ghastly beige hotel somewhere and whine about the "W" word .....
Well said! And apologies for responding to Leon's wind-ups rather than your excellent header.
Over the months you have changed my perspective on this issue and think it's one of the very few things I think the government have got right.
Yes, up to a point.
The difficulty of the issue is that while there are a small number of violent perverts wanting access to women's spaces, there are considerable numbers of Trans people who just wish to be accepted as who they are and live unobtrusively as their expressed gender.
While @Cyclefree makes excellent points, particularly on prisons and refuges, my views have also been influenced by Foxjr2's housemate, who I have known for a decade and is one of his oldest friends, coming out as MtF Trans.
It takes a bit of adapting to, but they have been saved from suicide by coming out, though considerable psychological issues remain. Access to any gender clinic that could formally diagnose Gender Dysphoria and start the clock for 2 years living as a woman* before issuing a GRC is years away on the NHS, and this is a person of very modest means. If they had to wait that long it could be a tragic death.
Laws have to protect us from a very dangerous minority, but also have to protect the psychologically vulnerable. I hope this discernment of a way forward is directed by compassion rather than ideology.
*how is this even possible without access to women's spaces such as toilets and changing rooms?
Good morning all. Today’s 00z GFs model run ends, on the morning of the 24th, primed to give us a nailed on white Christmas.
Something to unite the woke and non-woke. Unlikely to happen though.
I'm rather pre-occupied (obsessed as Mrs Stocky would have it) about weather in the Alps - it's the best start to a season for many years and when the snow relents and the sun comes out I'm away.
Antisemitism is a serious problem with the American Left.
Also, I salute you for realising that when Sam Altman talked about left wing antisemitism, he was really talking about woke. Not a lot of people would have picked that up. Sam Altman, for example, never did.
Why do you think anti-Semitism is now a problem on the Left? Try and work out the philosophy that might have led progressive leftwing people to perceive Jews as an oppressor, colonial class, and therefore justifiable subjects of persecution and not worthy of protection (as happened to whites, white males, etc, before them)
There. That wasn't so hard, was it?
TBF to you Sam Altman hasn't worked it out either - "i still don't understand it, really" - but he will get there, too
One wouldn't say antisemitism coming from the left is 'wokeness' as it long predates it, and is hardly the preserve of those who completely buy into modern progressivism. No one would describe George Galloway or Peter Willsman as 'woke'. Or any of the various dinosaurs who briefly re-emerged during Corbyn's leadership.
Rather it's deeper and goes back to Lenin and Marx. It is that oppressed versus oppressor distinction and the notion that not loudly and aggressively siding with the former, your are complicit in the crimes of the latter.
It's a way of thinking that is disastrously reductive and simplistic - and of course quite often leads to antisemitism if you place Israel as irredeemably in the latter category and the likes of Hamas and its ideological brethren in the former and then attack Jews for understandably not sharing that classification. Even if they are very critical of Israel's actions. And of course it led to antisemitism long before Israel's existence when antisemitic stereotypes also placed Jews in said 'oppressor class'. (See J.A. Hobson).
'Wokeness' is more of a fad ideological offshoot that nonetheless shares the same problems the far left has always had by using the same flawed concepts. It's just because it's faddish and has fashionable less dry additions, it's caught on beyond the usual circles, meaning it's much more visible.
And, therefore, more dangerous and insidious - like a tumour inside academe that now spreads through the lymph nodes into journalism, the arts, law, science….
Interesting article. I wasn’t aware of the position of voluntary organisations. It seems to me that they also should be able to avail themselves of the “proportionate means for legitimate exclusion.”
I tend not to comment on this topic, because I am not Scottish or female or trans. But it has always struck me that eliding sex with gender is the root of all chaos here. Gender is fluid through time and location. What it means to be a man or a woman changes. However, sex although not completely binary mostly is.
Overall in most cases, I think if we were a bit clearer on what should be exclusive on the basis of sex and what should be exclusive on the basis of gender we may get some sense. For the most part I don’t see why there should be many gender-based exclusions - and I am sure many agree with that. However, clearly where there are risks - support groups for female survivors of rape and abuse - it makes sense to sex exclusion. Same with most sports (whether contact based or otherwise) - if you’ve been through a male puberty it is daft to put females against you.
However, in protecting females in prison and what not, we should not lose sight of trans victims of violence and rape. I read an article in the LRB that suggested that trans women in male prisons can also be victims of horrific levels of violence and rape. Apparently the same to can be said in society in genreral.
So like most issues it’s complicated and there is an element of risk to manage to protect folk. Of course that doesn’t help for arguments on the internets.
Men in prison who claim to be trans and are at risk of rape and violence are at risk of this from other men. This is a problem of male violence and needs to be resolved within male prisons. It is NOT for women to solve this or to take on the burden and risk of solving this. Women are not support animals for men...
Men in prison who claim to be trans and are at risk of rape and violence are at risk of this from other men. This is a problem of male violence and needs to be resolved within male prisons. It is NOT for women to solve this or to take on the burden and risk of solving this. Women are not support animals for men.
Ditto for other female only spaces. If men are violent to trans identified men - let men solve this. This is not women's problem. There is nothing complicated about this. It is only made so by the almost automatic suggestion that women should somehow sort out or share or bear the risk of male violence which is fundamentally misogynistic.
Women deserve better than 'not been raped, assaulted or murdered'. There's simple respite, privacy, comfort, mental and bodily dignity and religious observance to name but a few. Women should be able to set their own boundaries and society should respect women enough to honour those.
My point wasn’t not that the answer is to simply throw all trans prisoners into female only prisons. And at no point did I say that. You have inferred that from my point about managing risks of violence to trans people in prisons and to trans people more generally. I stand by that view - I don’t want a society where any group (females, trans males, ethnic minorities, etc) are exposed to a greater risk of violence.
Further I made the point that there should explicitly be sex-based exclusions. In general female prisons would, in broad terms, be an appropriate place for applying such exclusions. But, I am not convinced a women’s choir should always be able to ban trans people from joining it.
On prison, what I really think is that if the state is going to lock folk up it has to minimise the risk of violence against them because of their specific characteristics (or indeed the risks of them committing violence). How you solve that in an environment with no money and a base level of extreme violence, I do not know. But the answer won’t be simple.
Why shouldn't women be allowed to have a female only choir or book group?
That is what freedom of association means. It is what the law has permitted for years. But now some men want to stop that. Just as they have stopped lesbians in Scotland meeting in groups greater than 25. Why should women's existing rights be taken away to satisfy the demands of some men with some sort of mental condition or inner feeling? Why are these men's feelings so much more important than women's freedoms and feelings?
The great thing about having someone hyper-rich as prime minister is that his conceptions are on a much grander scale than most people's.
But Sunak thinks nothing of spending a quarter of a billion pounds of public money on a fantasy scheme that now has the sole aim of saving his career.
Sunak needs the flights to take off just before the election. A big gap is dangerous if the boats keep coming. The sensible thing to do was to have dropped the policy when he came in , that was his window of opportunity but then of course he’d made a deal with Braverman.
There is a Terrible Danger. The flights may well be loaded. And then held on the ground as person after person is pulled off under legal challenge. And then the flight lands in Rwanda and is turned back because we have broken our agreement with the Rwandans.
I rewatched that presser yesterday. Sunak rightly points out that there is no point having a law which the Rwandans won't agree to. But the bill already crosses that line on page 1. He says that the "new treaty" makes things possible that were not before; Not so says the Rwandan minister who co-signed.
Sunak is trying to claim credit for fewer boats crossing. But he pledged - check the lectern - to Stop the Boats. Not reduce them. And he can't stop them. The audience he is pitching to don't care if the numbers have slowed - they want them to STOP. And then the foreigners to be sent away. Its impossible to satisfy them.
It's much worse.
Rishi Sunak was told by lawyers that his emergency Rwanda scheme will be “seriously impeded” from working because it “provides an easy way” for migrants to avoid deportation.
The prime minister insisted on Thursday that his new law aimed at reviving the policy was the only approach that would prevent further legal challenges scuppering flights. He said he was confident that flights would take off before the general election and pledged to “finish the job”.
However, The Times has been told that Downing Street was warned by two senior lawyers that the scheme risked failure because it would continue to allow migrants to lodge challenges against their individual removal to Rwanda. Legal advice from a senior government lawyer said “the scheme would be seriously impeded” if the bill did not include a so-called “ouster clause” that barred individual legal challenges.
Separate external legal counsel that was sought by the government warned that the failure to bar individual challenges “is inconsistent with the intellectual underpinning of the bill and also would provide an easy way for many applicants to avoid the effects of the bill”....
...The Safety of Rwanda Bill, presented to parliament on Thursday, will bar systematic challenges being brought against the policy by instructing immigration officers, courts and tribunals to treat Rwanda as a “conclusively safe country”. However, clause four of the bill is seen by critics of the legislation as a weakness because it says that people can make claims if there is “compelling evidence relating specifically to a person’s individual circumstances”.
A senior Conservative MP and lawyer said that this would leave the courts “inundated” with legal claims from migrants helped by immigration lawyers who would “come up with a whole range of innovative reasons why Rwanda is unsafe for a particular individual”.
The fascinating thing about PMQs was the way that Sunak tore the bill apart line by line. "Have you read it?" he kept asking Sunak. Clearly they haven't - Sunak knows the spin lines but not the detail which rather show up the spin lines as ignorant lies.
As an "have you read it" practitioner I make Good Money from reading such documents and pulling out details that others have missed. So bravo Starmer.
Then we turn back to the Tories and their PB shills. "We have a plan, what is Labour's plan." They do not have a plan. What they claim to be a plan is unworkable. Laughable. Have they read their "plan". Have they *understood* it? This is crayon politics , sketched by idiots to placate morons.
I'll say it again, Brexit and the referendum campaign with its focus on immigration, has radicalised the Tories.
At some point Starmer or Farage is going to point out the Tories are focussed on a few thousand illegal migrants and not on the 1.5 million legal migration.
It's a Penrose staircase.
Older people are the defining part of the electorate and they want good health and social care and lower immigration at the same time.
The government calculate that not fixing the former carries the greater electoral penalty and there is no other way to do it quickly other than high immigration.
We could always finish off the oldies with large doses of ayahuasca
I had a 94 year old patient the other day, with razor sharp mind and good physical health otherwise. She asked if her follow up appointment could be in the afternoon, as her husband works mornings and needs to drive her in. He is 98...
“Public opinion is also deeply split on how to bring the war to an end, with 44 per cent of Ukrainians believing compromise is needed, vs 48 per cent who wish to continue fighting for victory.”
Honestly @Leon - at one point I had 3 toddlers under the age of 5 and was also dealing with City traders. So I am well used to dealing with the hyperactive "it's all about me" lot. And I actually went on the March against Anti-Semitism. So I care about that too.
But FFS for once couldn't you just pretend to pay attention - even for a moment - to one of my headers. Just once. Just like we pretend to pay attention to the photos of your glasses of wine as you chew on dogs in some ghastly beige hotel somewhere and whine about the "W" word .....
Well said! And apologies for responding to Leon's wind-ups rather than your excellent header.
Over the months you have changed my perspective on this issue and think it's one of the very few things I think the government have got right.
Yes, up to a point.
The difficulty of the issue is that while there are a small number of violent perverts wanting access to women's spaces, there are considerable numbers of Trans people who just wish to be accepted as who they are and live unobtrusively as their expressed gender.
While @Cyclefree makes excellent points, particularly on prisons and refuges, my views have also been influenced by Foxjr2's housemate, who I have known for a decade and is one of his oldest friends, coming out as MtF Trans.
It takes a bit of adapting to, but they have been saved from suicide by coming out, though considerable psychological issues remain. Access to any gender clinic that could formally diagnose Gender Dysphoria and start the clock for 2 years living as a woman* before issuing a GRC is years away on the NHS, and this is a person of very modest means. If they had to wait that long it could be a tragic death.
Laws have to protect us from a very dangerous minority, but also have to protect the psychologically vulnerable. I hope this discernment of a way forward is directed by compassion rather than ideology.
*how is this even possible without access to women's spaces such as toilets and changing rooms?
Echoes of the tragedy of Israel/Palestine.
Two groups of people, both treated badly in the past, both utterly deserving of better treatment from the fortunate.
But both justly wanting/needing something that can only really be achieved at the expense of the other. And both exploited by faux allies.
"In this The Economist/YouGov poll from December 2-5, 20% of young adults slightly (12%) or strongly (8%) agreed with the statement "the Holocaust is a myth".
Another THIRTY percent of young people neither agree nor disagree that "the Holocaust is a myth"
Which should give pause to those who think 18-29 year olds are more “enlightened” than older age cohorts.
We have enabled a Terrible Stupidity
I am going to agree with you on this point (and set aside the interminable rantings about whatever "woke" is this week).
I keep saying that the Tories have weaponised ignorance and stupidity. Ignorance is not an insult - we are all ignorant on a huge number of subjects we are aware of but have no idea how something works or why. That is why we go to see a doctor or a mechanic - because we are ignorant. Stupidity isn't new either - plenty of people are dumb. But most normal people knew the things they didn't know.
The new phenomena is "we've had enough of experts". Of my ignorant opinion somehow having equal (or higher) worth than expertise or facts. The right exploit this for votes - keep them ignorant and angry and they will vote for you.
Social media? A phenomenon. My bit of social media only does EVs and Tesla specifically. The number of times the same untruth is typed - or sometimes just pasted - is astonishing. The poster could find out the truth in 2 seconds. But does not. They know their truth and it has been cut up and fed to them to reinforce their ignorance.
No idea how we combat this. But the ignorance isn't "woke". Its been weaponised by the people who are against "woke".
Eventually, you will understand why Wokeness is pivotal, and you will agree with me
It will take you about 3 years, is my highly educated guess
People much brighter than you - eg Sam Altman of openAI (see below) - are nearly there already; people much stupider than you - sadly, an awful lot of people - will likely NEVER get there. Which is quite chilling
I don't accept your definition of woke - which is that of the right wing blob.
There is no definition of 'woke' - that is the brilliance of it being used as a right-wing slur.
This government is too woke apparently according to some but also, extreme left anti-semitism is woke.
Presumably by deduction this government is a government of extreme left anti-semitism, which may come as a surprise to Sunak and co.
I mean, do you really honestly not get it? How the Woke obsession with intersectionality and decolonialism leads the Jews being seen as an oppressor class, worthy of persecution, or at least unworthy of protection from persecution?
Is that honestly beyond your reasoning capacity?
If it is then I despair. Because you are not the stupidest on here
If you used only a modicum of your prodigious IQ to stop and think about this rather than funnelling the latest alt-right obsession you’d realise it’s really rather obvious. Many/most groups of people are both oppressors and oppressed.
Indeed I’d go so far as to say that’s a big part of the point of intersectionality. That being said, both you and I fall into the category where we are very much more oppressor than oppressed. I’m just a little less fragile about it.
The Harvard, MIT etc furore is a good example of another aspect of woke: that prejudice can often be institutionalised without any individual actively promoting such prejudice. Funnily enough that is what BLM argue, but you struggle to see that when it doesn’t accord with your particular biases.
“Public opinion is also deeply split on how to bring the war to an end, with 44 per cent of Ukrainians believing compromise is needed, vs 48 per cent who wish to continue fighting for victory.”
"In this The Economist/YouGov poll from December 2-5, 20% of young adults slightly (12%) or strongly (8%) agreed with the statement "the Holocaust is a myth".
Another THIRTY percent of young people neither agree nor disagree that "the Holocaust is a myth"
Which should give pause to those who think 18-29 year olds are more “enlightened” than older age cohorts.
We have enabled a Terrible Stupidity
I am going to agree with you on this point (and set aside the interminable rantings about whatever "woke" is this week).
I keep saying that the Tories have weaponised ignorance and stupidity. Ignorance is not an insult - we are all ignorant on a huge number of subjects we are aware of but have no idea how something works or why. That is why we go to see a doctor or a mechanic - because we are ignorant. Stupidity isn't new either - plenty of people are dumb. But most normal people knew the things they didn't know.
The new phenomena is "we've had enough of experts". Of my ignorant opinion somehow having equal (or higher) worth than expertise or facts. The right exploit this for votes - keep them ignorant and angry and they will vote for you.
Social media? A phenomenon. My bit of social media only does EVs and Tesla specifically. The number of times the same untruth is typed - or sometimes just pasted - is astonishing. The poster could find out the truth in 2 seconds. But does not. They know their truth and it has been cut up and fed to them to reinforce their ignorance.
No idea how we combat this. But the ignorance isn't "woke". Its been weaponised by the people who are against "woke".
Eventually, you will understand why Wokeness is pivotal, and you will agree with me
It will take you about 3 years, is my highly educated guess
People much brighter than you - eg Sam Altman of openAI (see below) - are nearly there already; people much stupider than you - sadly, an awful lot of people - will likely NEVER get there. Which is quite chilling
I don't accept your definition of woke - which is that of the right wing blob.
There is no definition of 'woke' - that is the brilliance of it being used as a right-wing slur.
This government is too woke apparently according to some but also, extreme left anti-semitism is woke.
Presumably by deduction this government is a government of extreme left anti-semitism, which may come as a surprise to Sunak and co.
I mean, do you really honestly not get it? How the Woke obsession with intersectionality and decolonialism leads the Jews being seen as an oppressor class, worthy of persecution, or at least unworthy of protection from persecution?
Is that honestly beyond your reasoning capacity?
If it is then I despair. Because you are not the stupidest on here
If you used only a modicum of your prodigious IQ to stop and think about this rather than funnelling the latest alt-right obsession you’d realise it’s really rather obvious. Many/most groups of people are both oppressors and oppressed.
Indeed I’d go so far as to say that’s a big part of the point of intersectionality. That being said, both you and I fall into the category where we are very much more oppressor than oppressed. I’m just a little less fragile about it.
The Harvard, MIT etc furore is a good example of another aspect of woke: that prejudice can often be institutionalised without any individual actively promoting such prejudice. Funnily enough that is what BLM argue, but you struggle to see that when it doesn’t accord with your particular biases.
Interesting but irrelevant. We are way beyond all that now
“Public opinion is also deeply split on how to bring the war to an end, with 44 per cent of Ukrainians believing compromise is needed, vs 48 per cent who wish to continue fighting for victory.”
Antisemitism is a serious problem with the American Left.
Also, I salute you for realising that when Sam Altman talked about left wing antisemitism, he was really talking about woke. Not a lot of people would have picked that up. Sam Altman, for example, never did.
Why do you think anti-Semitism is now a problem on the Left? Try and work out the philosophy that might have led progressive leftwing people to perceive Jews as an oppressor, colonial class, and therefore justifiable subjects of persecution and not worthy of protection (as happened to whites, white males, etc, before them)
There. That wasn't so hard, was it?
TBF to you Sam Altman hasn't worked it out either - "i still don't understand it, really" - but he will get there, too
One wouldn't say antisemitism coming from the left is 'wokeness' as it long predates it, and is hardly the preserve of those who completely buy into modern progressivism. No one would describe George Galloway or Peter Willsman as 'woke'. Or any of the various dinosaurs who briefly re-emerged during Corbyn's leadership.
Rather it's deeper and goes back to Lenin and Marx. It is that oppressed versus oppressor distinction and the notion that not loudly and aggressively siding with the former, your are complicit in the crimes of the latter.
It's a way of thinking that is disastrously reductive and simplistic - and of course quite often leads to antisemitism if you place Israel as irredeemably in the latter category and the likes of Hamas and its ideological brethren in the former and then attack Jews for understandably not sharing that classification. Even if they are very critical of Israel's actions. And of course it led to antisemitism long before Israel's existence when antisemitic stereotypes also placed Jews in said 'oppressor class'. (See J.A. Hobson).
'Wokeness' is more of a fad ideological offshoot that nonetheless shares the same problems the far left has always had by using the same flawed concepts. It's just because it's faddish and has fashionable less dry additions, it's caught on beyond the usual circles, meaning it's much more visible.
Antisemitism has always been the socialism of fools. Far left and far right alike tend to view the world as a simple battle between some majority "in" group (defined along either racial or class lines) and some small group of outsiders who are responsible for all of the problems of the majority. Jews have found themselves identified with this group on both racial and class lines, by right and left respectively. The persecution by the right has tended to be more absolute because it's easier for a Jew to not be a capitalist than to not be a Jew. But the issue of antisemitism on the left has always been there too. For that matter, there's always been some antisemitism in the political centre as well, it is a sadly prevalent phenomenon. This isn't a "woke" issue imho: if anything, by focusing on cultural and racial injustices more than economic issues, I'd have thought that the whole debate around woke on the far left might have made it less prone to antisemitism not more. I think what has happened is that social media has made political arguments more polarised and more visible on all sides. What might have previously been twenty childish undergrads spouting nonsense in private in a draughty university meeting room has become a thousand people arguing online, for all to see.
I didn't have any PPI and my two previous diesel car purchases were each too early & too late to be eligible for the emissions lark I haven't kept a record since 2007 of all my mobile phone transactions tbh.
"In this The Economist/YouGov poll from December 2-5, 20% of young adults slightly (12%) or strongly (8%) agreed with the statement "the Holocaust is a myth".
Another THIRTY percent of young people neither agree nor disagree that "the Holocaust is a myth"
Which should give pause to those who think 18-29 year olds are more “enlightened” than older age cohorts.
We have enabled a Terrible Stupidity
I am going to agree with you on this point (and set aside the interminable rantings about whatever "woke" is this week).
I keep saying that the Tories have weaponised ignorance and stupidity. Ignorance is not an insult - we are all ignorant on a huge number of subjects we are aware of but have no idea how something works or why. That is why we go to see a doctor or a mechanic - because we are ignorant. Stupidity isn't new either - plenty of people are dumb. But most normal people knew the things they didn't know.
The new phenomena is "we've had enough of experts". Of my ignorant opinion somehow having equal (or higher) worth than expertise or facts. The right exploit this for votes - keep them ignorant and angry and they will vote for you.
Social media? A phenomenon. My bit of social media only does EVs and Tesla specifically. The number of times the same untruth is typed - or sometimes just pasted - is astonishing. The poster could find out the truth in 2 seconds. But does not. They know their truth and it has been cut up and fed to them to reinforce their ignorance.
No idea how we combat this. But the ignorance isn't "woke". Its been weaponised by the people who are against "woke".
Eventually, you will understand why Wokeness is pivotal, and you will agree with me
It will take you about 3 years, is my highly educated guess
People much brighter than you - eg Sam Altman of openAI (see below) - are nearly there already; people much stupider than you - sadly, an awful lot of people - will likely NEVER get there. Which is quite chilling
I don't accept your definition of woke - which is that of the right wing blob.
There is no definition of 'woke' - that is the brilliance of it being used as a right-wing slur.
This government is too woke apparently according to some but also, extreme left anti-semitism is woke.
Presumably by deduction this government is a government of extreme left anti-semitism, which may come as a surprise to Sunak and co.
I mean, do you really honestly not get it? How the Woke obsession with intersectionality and decolonialism leads the Jews being seen as an oppressor class, worthy of persecution, or at least unworthy of protection from persecution?
Is that honestly beyond your reasoning capacity?
If it is then I despair. Because you are not the stupidest on here
If you used only a modicum of your prodigious IQ to stop and think about this rather than funnelling the latest alt-right obsession you’d realise it’s really rather obvious. Many/most groups of people are both oppressors and oppressed.
Indeed I’d go so far as to say that’s a big part of the point of intersectionality. That being said, both you and I fall into the category where we are very much more oppressor than oppressed. I’m just a little less fragile about it.
The Harvard, MIT etc furore is a good example of another aspect of woke: that prejudice can often be institutionalised without any individual actively promoting such prejudice. Funnily enough that is what BLM argue, but you struggle to see that when it doesn’t accord with your particular biases.
I don't think that either you or Leon count as "oppressor" simply by virute of which group you belong to.
Honestly @Leon - at one point I had 3 toddlers under the age of 5 and was also dealing with City traders. So I am well used to dealing with the hyperactive "it's all about me" lot. And I actually went on the March against Anti-Semitism. So I care about that too.
But FFS for once couldn't you just pretend to pay attention - even for a moment - to one of my headers. Just once. Just like we pretend to pay attention to the photos of your glasses of wine as you chew on dogs in some ghastly beige hotel somewhere and whine about the "W" word .....
Well said! And apologies for responding to Leon's wind-ups rather than your excellent header.
Over the months you have changed my perspective on this issue and think it's one of the very few things I think the government have got right.
Yes, up to a point.
The difficulty of the issue is that while there are a small number of violent perverts wanting access to women's spaces, there are considerable numbers of Trans people who just wish to be accepted as who they are and live unobtrusively as their expressed gender.
While @Cyclefree makes excellent points, particularly on prisons and refuges, my views have also been influenced by Foxjr2's housemate, who I have known for a decade and is one of his oldest friends, coming out as MtF Trans.
It takes a bit of adapting to, but they have been saved from suicide by coming out, though considerable psychological issues remain. Access to any gender clinic that could formally diagnose Gender Dysphoria and start the clock for 2 years living as a woman* before issuing a GRC is years away on the NHS, and this is a person of very modest means. If they had to wait that long it could be a tragic death.
Laws have to protect us from a very dangerous minority, but also have to protect the psychologically vulnerable. I hope this discernment of a way forward is directed by compassion rather than ideology.
*how is this even possible without access to women's spaces such as toilets and changing rooms?
The answer to your question is that to get a GRC does not require any proof of the person going to a woman's loo or changing room. So my friend who has done it says. Changes of name, etc are needed. But you don't need to post photos of yourself in a woman's changing room. The practical answer is to use those loos which are effectively unisex ie a locked room with washbasin. There are plenty around. To recognise that while you may mean no harm other women may be upset at your presence and you need to be sensitive to that. Asking politely would go a long way. It is the aggressive demands and insistence regardless of what women feel which is so threatening. A man who disregards a woman's feelings is a threat.
The issue of waiting for a dysphoria diagnosis is a very real and difficult one. The NHS has increased funding in this area. This recently came out in a legal case brought by the Good Law Project against the NHS. But despite the funding increase they were simply not able to find doctors and others willing to practise in this area. How one addresses that I don't know. But removing any sort of requirement is not the answer.
Good morning all. Today’s 00z GFs model run ends, on the morning of the 24th, primed to give us a nailed on white Christmas.
Something to unite the woke and non-woke. Unlikely to happen though.
I'm rather pre-occupied (obsessed as Mrs Stocky would have it) about weather in the Alps - it's the best start to a season for many years and when the snow relents and the sun comes out I'm away.
I'm going to be in Burgundy for Christmas so I'm also looking in that direction, and when I was there last week the Alps were properly snowy already, as was the Jura. It is a pretty good start to the season. But 2 weeks of no snow and temperature inversions to come now, before Christmas.
From the River (Rhone) to the German Bight, Europe's Christmas will be white!
I didn't have any PPI and my two previous diesel car purchases were each too early & too late to be eligible for the emissions lark I haven't kept a record since 2007 of all my mobile phone transactions tbh.
O2 have split the airtime and handset costs since 2011.
"In this The Economist/YouGov poll from December 2-5, 20% of young adults slightly (12%) or strongly (8%) agreed with the statement "the Holocaust is a myth".
Another THIRTY percent of young people neither agree nor disagree that "the Holocaust is a myth"
Which should give pause to those who think 18-29 year olds are more “enlightened” than older age cohorts.
We have enabled a Terrible Stupidity
I am going to agree with you on this point (and set aside the interminable rantings about whatever "woke" is this week).
I keep saying that the Tories have weaponised ignorance and stupidity. Ignorance is not an insult - we are all ignorant on a huge number of subjects we are aware of but have no idea how something works or why. That is why we go to see a doctor or a mechanic - because we are ignorant. Stupidity isn't new either - plenty of people are dumb. But most normal people knew the things they didn't know.
The new phenomena is "we've had enough of experts". Of my ignorant opinion somehow having equal (or higher) worth than expertise or facts. The right exploit this for votes - keep them ignorant and angry and they will vote for you.
Social media? A phenomenon. My bit of social media only does EVs and Tesla specifically. The number of times the same untruth is typed - or sometimes just pasted - is astonishing. The poster could find out the truth in 2 seconds. But does not. They know their truth and it has been cut up and fed to them to reinforce their ignorance.
No idea how we combat this. But the ignorance isn't "woke". Its been weaponised by the people who are against "woke".
Eventually, you will understand why Wokeness is pivotal, and you will agree with me
It will take you about 3 years, is my highly educated guess
People much brighter than you - eg Sam Altman of openAI (see below) - are nearly there already; people much stupider than you - sadly, an awful lot of people - will likely NEVER get there. Which is quite chilling
I don't accept your definition of woke - which is that of the right wing blob.
There is no definition of 'woke' - that is the brilliance of it being used as a right-wing slur.
This government is too woke apparently according to some but also, extreme left anti-semitism is woke.
Presumably by deduction this government is a government of extreme left anti-semitism, which may come as a surprise to Sunak and co.
I mean, do you really honestly not get it? How the Woke obsession with intersectionality and decolonialism leads the Jews being seen as an oppressor class, worthy of persecution, or at least unworthy of protection from persecution?
Is that honestly beyond your reasoning capacity?
If it is then I despair. Because you are not the stupidest on here
If you used only a modicum of your prodigious IQ to stop and think about this rather than funnelling the latest alt-right obsession you’d realise it’s really rather obvious. Many/most groups of people are both oppressors and oppressed.
Indeed I’d go so far as to say that’s a big part of the point of intersectionality. That being said, both you and I fall into the category where we are very much more oppressor than oppressed. I’m just a little less fragile about it.
The Harvard, MIT etc furore is a good example of another aspect of woke: that prejudice can often be institutionalised without any individual actively promoting such prejudice. Funnily enough that is what BLM argue, but you struggle to see that when it doesn’t accord with your particular biases.
I don't think that either you or Leon count as "oppressor" simply by virute of which group you belong to.
As an outspoken Putin fanboy I think @Leon can be considered oppressor aligned rather than oppressor in person. His legendary cowardice is physical as well as moral so likely to be limited to keyboard trolling rather than anything more direct.
On topic, I’ve sometimes wondered if many of the issues around transgender people in prison are due, in large part, to the dreadful overcrowding in our prisons.
One might naively hope that prisons were heavily supervised environments were no crimes can take place, of any sort. But sadly that is not true. Underfunding and sending too many people to prison has produced an ever less safe environment.
"In this The Economist/YouGov poll from December 2-5, 20% of young adults slightly (12%) or strongly (8%) agreed with the statement "the Holocaust is a myth".
Another THIRTY percent of young people neither agree nor disagree that "the Holocaust is a myth"
Which should give pause to those who think 18-29 year olds are more “enlightened” than older age cohorts.
We have enabled a Terrible Stupidity
I am going to agree with you on this point (and set aside the interminable rantings about whatever "woke" is this week).
I keep saying that the Tories have weaponised ignorance and stupidity. Ignorance is not an insult - we are all ignorant on a huge number of subjects we are aware of but have no idea how something works or why. That is why we go to see a doctor or a mechanic - because we are ignorant. Stupidity isn't new either - plenty of people are dumb. But most normal people knew the things they didn't know.
The new phenomena is "we've had enough of experts". Of my ignorant opinion somehow having equal (or higher) worth than expertise or facts. The right exploit this for votes - keep them ignorant and angry and they will vote for you.
Social media? A phenomenon. My bit of social media only does EVs and Tesla specifically. The number of times the same untruth is typed - or sometimes just pasted - is astonishing. The poster could find out the truth in 2 seconds. But does not. They know their truth and it has been cut up and fed to them to reinforce their ignorance.
No idea how we combat this. But the ignorance isn't "woke". Its been weaponised by the people who are against "woke".
Eventually, you will understand why Wokeness is pivotal, and you will agree with me
It will take you about 3 years, is my highly educated guess
People much brighter than you - eg Sam Altman of openAI (see below) - are nearly there already; people much stupider than you - sadly, an awful lot of people - will likely NEVER get there. Which is quite chilling
I don't accept your definition of woke - which is that of the right wing blob.
There is no definition of 'woke' - that is the brilliance of it being used as a right-wing slur.
This government is too woke apparently according to some but also, extreme left anti-semitism is woke.
Presumably by deduction this government is a government of extreme left anti-semitism, which may come as a surprise to Sunak and co.
I mean, do you really honestly not get it? How the Woke obsession with intersectionality and decolonialism leads the Jews being seen as an oppressor class, worthy of persecution, or at least unworthy of protection from persecution?
Is that honestly beyond your reasoning capacity?
If it is then I despair. Because you are not the stupidest on here
No, you don't get it. If 'woke' means anything - which it probably doesn't now idiots like you have adopted it as a term of right wing abuse - it means being alive to the reality of groups other than your own. That, of course, includes Jewish people.
What you are critiquing isn't woke at all.
What do you call people who follow that path to anti-semitism?
“Public opinion is also deeply split on how to bring the war to an end, with 44 per cent of Ukrainians believing compromise is needed, vs 48 per cent who wish to continue fighting for victory.”
How do you seek peace with an enemy who doesn't want peace?
It’s a very good question
The article is quite acute on splits at the top of Ukrainian politics
Maryna Bardyna (Deputy of the Rada from the ruling Thick of It Party) recently went on FaceyB and said the military had no plan for 2024 and should be mobilising 20,000 people per month. Zelensky shot back that she was a threat to national security. ie shut up before you get locked up.
"In this The Economist/YouGov poll from December 2-5, 20% of young adults slightly (12%) or strongly (8%) agreed with the statement "the Holocaust is a myth".
Another THIRTY percent of young people neither agree nor disagree that "the Holocaust is a myth"
Which should give pause to those who think 18-29 year olds are more “enlightened” than older age cohorts.
We have enabled a Terrible Stupidity
I am going to agree with you on this point (and set aside the interminable rantings about whatever "woke" is this week).
I keep saying that the Tories have weaponised ignorance and stupidity. Ignorance is not an insult - we are all ignorant on a huge number of subjects we are aware of but have no idea how something works or why. That is why we go to see a doctor or a mechanic - because we are ignorant. Stupidity isn't new either - plenty of people are dumb. But most normal people knew the things they didn't know.
The new phenomena is "we've had enough of experts". Of my ignorant opinion somehow having equal (or higher) worth than expertise or facts. The right exploit this for votes - keep them ignorant and angry and they will vote for you.
Social media? A phenomenon. My bit of social media only does EVs and Tesla specifically. The number of times the same untruth is typed - or sometimes just pasted - is astonishing. The poster could find out the truth in 2 seconds. But does not. They know their truth and it has been cut up and fed to them to reinforce their ignorance.
No idea how we combat this. But the ignorance isn't "woke". Its been weaponised by the people who are against "woke".
Eventually, you will understand why Wokeness is pivotal, and you will agree with me
It will take you about 3 years, is my highly educated guess
People much brighter than you - eg Sam Altman of openAI (see below) - are nearly there already; people much stupider than you - sadly, an awful lot of people - will likely NEVER get there. Which is quite chilling
I don't accept your definition of woke - which is that of the right wing blob.
There is no definition of 'woke' - that is the brilliance of it being used as a right-wing slur.
This government is too woke apparently according to some but also, extreme left anti-semitism is woke.
Presumably by deduction this government is a government of extreme left anti-semitism, which may come as a surprise to Sunak and co.
I mean, do you really honestly not get it? How the Woke obsession with intersectionality and decolonialism leads the Jews being seen as an oppressor class, worthy of persecution, or at least unworthy of protection from persecution?
Is that honestly beyond your reasoning capacity?
If it is then I despair. Because you are not the stupidest on here
If you used only a modicum of your prodigious IQ to stop and think about this rather than funnelling the latest alt-right obsession you’d realise it’s really rather obvious. Many/most groups of people are both oppressors and oppressed.
Indeed I’d go so far as to say that’s a big part of the point of intersectionality. That being said, both you and I fall into the category where we are very much more oppressor than oppressed. I’m just a little less fragile about it.
The Harvard, MIT etc furore is a good example of another aspect of woke: that prejudice can often be institutionalised without any individual actively promoting such prejudice. Funnily enough that is what BLM argue, but you struggle to see that when it doesn’t accord with your particular biases.
I don't think that either you or Leon count as "oppressor" simply by virute of which group you belong to.
As an outspoken Putin fanboy I think @Leon can be considered oppressor aligned rather than oppressor in person. His legendary cowardice is physical as well as moral so likely to be limited to keyboard trolling rather than anything more direct.
Would that be the legendary cowardice that actually took me to Ukraine, and into several bomb shelters, while you pontificated about the war from your petit bourgeois domicile in provincial Leicester?
"In this The Economist/YouGov poll from December 2-5, 20% of young adults slightly (12%) or strongly (8%) agreed with the statement "the Holocaust is a myth".
Another THIRTY percent of young people neither agree nor disagree that "the Holocaust is a myth"
Which should give pause to those who think 18-29 year olds are more “enlightened” than older age cohorts.
We have enabled a Terrible Stupidity
I am going to agree with you on this point (and set aside the interminable rantings about whatever "woke" is this week).
I keep saying that the Tories have weaponised ignorance and stupidity. Ignorance is not an insult - we are all ignorant on a huge number of subjects we are aware of but have no idea how something works or why. That is why we go to see a doctor or a mechanic - because we are ignorant. Stupidity isn't new either - plenty of people are dumb. But most normal people knew the things they didn't know.
The new phenomena is "we've had enough of experts". Of my ignorant opinion somehow having equal (or higher) worth than expertise or facts. The right exploit this for votes - keep them ignorant and angry and they will vote for you.
Social media? A phenomenon. My bit of social media only does EVs and Tesla specifically. The number of times the same untruth is typed - or sometimes just pasted - is astonishing. The poster could find out the truth in 2 seconds. But does not. They know their truth and it has been cut up and fed to them to reinforce their ignorance.
No idea how we combat this. But the ignorance isn't "woke". Its been weaponised by the people who are against "woke".
Eventually, you will understand why Wokeness is pivotal, and you will agree with me
It will take you about 3 years, is my highly educated guess
People much brighter than you - eg Sam Altman of openAI (see below) - are nearly there already; people much stupider than you - sadly, an awful lot of people - will likely NEVER get there. Which is quite chilling
I don't accept your definition of woke - which is that of the right wing blob.
There is no definition of 'woke' - that is the brilliance of it being used as a right-wing slur.
This government is too woke apparently according to some but also, extreme left anti-semitism is woke.
Presumably by deduction this government is a government of extreme left anti-semitism, which may come as a surprise to Sunak and co.
I mean, do you really honestly not get it? How the Woke obsession with intersectionality and decolonialism leads the Jews being seen as an oppressor class, worthy of persecution, or at least unworthy of protection from persecution?
Is that honestly beyond your reasoning capacity?
If it is then I despair. Because you are not the stupidest on here
No, you don't get it. If 'woke' means anything - which it probably doesn't now idiots like you have adopted it as a term of right wing abuse - it means being alive to the reality of groups other than your own. That, of course, includes Jewish people.
What you are critiquing isn't woke at all.
What do you call people who follow that path to anti-semitism?
"In this The Economist/YouGov poll from December 2-5, 20% of young adults slightly (12%) or strongly (8%) agreed with the statement "the Holocaust is a myth".
Another THIRTY percent of young people neither agree nor disagree that "the Holocaust is a myth"
Which should give pause to those who think 18-29 year olds are more “enlightened” than older age cohorts.
We have enabled a Terrible Stupidity
I am going to agree with you on this point (and set aside the interminable rantings about whatever "woke" is this week).
I keep saying that the Tories have weaponised ignorance and stupidity. Ignorance is not an insult - we are all ignorant on a huge number of subjects we are aware of but have no idea how something works or why. That is why we go to see a doctor or a mechanic - because we are ignorant. Stupidity isn't new either - plenty of people are dumb. But most normal people knew the things they didn't know.
The new phenomena is "we've had enough of experts". Of my ignorant opinion somehow having equal (or higher) worth than expertise or facts. The right exploit this for votes - keep them ignorant and angry and they will vote for you.
Social media? A phenomenon. My bit of social media only does EVs and Tesla specifically. The number of times the same untruth is typed - or sometimes just pasted - is astonishing. The poster could find out the truth in 2 seconds. But does not. They know their truth and it has been cut up and fed to them to reinforce their ignorance.
No idea how we combat this. But the ignorance isn't "woke". Its been weaponised by the people who are against "woke".
Eventually, you will understand why Wokeness is pivotal, and you will agree with me
It will take you about 3 years, is my highly educated guess
People much brighter than you - eg Sam Altman of openAI (see below) - are nearly there already; people much stupider than you - sadly, an awful lot of people - will likely NEVER get there. Which is quite chilling
I don't accept your definition of woke - which is that of the right wing blob.
There is no definition of 'woke' - that is the brilliance of it being used as a right-wing slur.
This government is too woke apparently according to some but also, extreme left anti-semitism is woke.
Presumably by deduction this government is a government of extreme left anti-semitism, which may come as a surprise to Sunak and co.
I mean, do you really honestly not get it? How the Woke obsession with intersectionality and decolonialism leads the Jews being seen as an oppressor class, worthy of persecution, or at least unworthy of protection from persecution?
Is that honestly beyond your reasoning capacity?
If it is then I despair. Because you are not the stupidest on here
If you used only a modicum of your prodigious IQ to stop and think about this rather than funnelling the latest alt-right obsession you’d realise it’s really rather obvious. Many/most groups of people are both oppressors and oppressed.
Indeed I’d go so far as to say that’s a big part of the point of intersectionality. That being said, both you and I fall into the category where we are very much more oppressor than oppressed. I’m just a little less fragile about it.
The Harvard, MIT etc furore is a good example of another aspect of woke: that prejudice can often be institutionalised without any individual actively promoting such prejudice. Funnily enough that is what BLM argue, but you struggle to see that when it doesn’t accord with your particular biases.
Interesting but irrelevant. We are way beyond all that now
You're right. You have abandoned any reasoned debate on the issue.
"In this The Economist/YouGov poll from December 2-5, 20% of young adults slightly (12%) or strongly (8%) agreed with the statement "the Holocaust is a myth".
Another THIRTY percent of young people neither agree nor disagree that "the Holocaust is a myth"
Which should give pause to those who think 18-29 year olds are more “enlightened” than older age cohorts.
We have enabled a Terrible Stupidity
I am going to agree with you on this point (and set aside the interminable rantings about whatever "woke" is this week).
I keep saying that the Tories have weaponised ignorance and stupidity. Ignorance is not an insult - we are all ignorant on a huge number of subjects we are aware of but have no idea how something works or why. That is why we go to see a doctor or a mechanic - because we are ignorant. Stupidity isn't new either - plenty of people are dumb. But most normal people knew the things they didn't know.
The new phenomena is "we've had enough of experts". Of my ignorant opinion somehow having equal (or higher) worth than expertise or facts. The right exploit this for votes - keep them ignorant and angry and they will vote for you.
Social media? A phenomenon. My bit of social media only does EVs and Tesla specifically. The number of times the same untruth is typed - or sometimes just pasted - is astonishing. The poster could find out the truth in 2 seconds. But does not. They know their truth and it has been cut up and fed to them to reinforce their ignorance.
No idea how we combat this. But the ignorance isn't "woke". Its been weaponised by the people who are against "woke".
Eventually, you will understand why Wokeness is pivotal, and you will agree with me
It will take you about 3 years, is my highly educated guess
People much brighter than you - eg Sam Altman of openAI (see below) - are nearly there already; people much stupider than you - sadly, an awful lot of people - will likely NEVER get there. Which is quite chilling
I don't accept your definition of woke - which is that of the right wing blob.
There is no definition of 'woke' - that is the brilliance of it being used as a right-wing slur.
This government is too woke apparently according to some but also, extreme left anti-semitism is woke.
Presumably by deduction this government is a government of extreme left anti-semitism, which may come as a surprise to Sunak and co.
I mean, do you really honestly not get it? How the Woke obsession with intersectionality and decolonialism leads the Jews being seen as an oppressor class, worthy of persecution, or at least unworthy of protection from persecution?
Is that honestly beyond your reasoning capacity?
If it is then I despair. Because you are not the stupidest on here
If you used only a modicum of your prodigious IQ to stop and think about this rather than funnelling the latest alt-right obsession you’d realise it’s really rather obvious. Many/most groups of people are both oppressors and oppressed.
Indeed I’d go so far as to say that’s a big part of the point of intersectionality. That being said, both you and I fall into the category where we are very much more oppressor than oppressed. I’m just a little less fragile about it.
The Harvard, MIT etc furore is a good example of another aspect of woke: that prejudice can often be institutionalised without any individual actively promoting such prejudice. Funnily enough that is what BLM argue, but you struggle to see that when it doesn’t accord with your particular biases.
I don't think that either you or Leon count as "oppressor" simply by virute of which group you belong to.
As an outspoken Putin fanboy I think @Leon can be considered oppressor aligned rather than oppressor in person. His legendary cowardice is physical as well as moral so likely to be limited to keyboard trolling rather than anything more direct.
Would that be the legendary cowardice that actually took me to Ukraine, and into several bomb shelters, while you pontificated about the war from your petit bourgeois domicile in provincial Leicester?
Was that after you went to Penarth in a spacesuit during lockdown, while I worked face to face throughout, including covid ICU?
On topic, I’ve sometimes wondered if many of the issues around transgender people in prison are due, in large part, to the dreadful overcrowding in our prisons.
One might naively hope that prisons were heavily supervised environments were no crimes can take place, of any sort. But sadly that is not true. Underfunding and sending too many people to prison has produced an ever less safe environment.
"In this The Economist/YouGov poll from December 2-5, 20% of young adults slightly (12%) or strongly (8%) agreed with the statement "the Holocaust is a myth".
Another THIRTY percent of young people neither agree nor disagree that "the Holocaust is a myth"
Which should give pause to those who think 18-29 year olds are more “enlightened” than older age cohorts.
We have enabled a Terrible Stupidity
I am going to agree with you on this point (and set aside the interminable rantings about whatever "woke" is this week).
I keep saying that the Tories have weaponised ignorance and stupidity. Ignorance is not an insult - we are all ignorant on a huge number of subjects we are aware of but have no idea how something works or why. That is why we go to see a doctor or a mechanic - because we are ignorant. Stupidity isn't new either - plenty of people are dumb. But most normal people knew the things they didn't know.
The new phenomena is "we've had enough of experts". Of my ignorant opinion somehow having equal (or higher) worth than expertise or facts. The right exploit this for votes - keep them ignorant and angry and they will vote for you.
Social media? A phenomenon. My bit of social media only does EVs and Tesla specifically. The number of times the same untruth is typed - or sometimes just pasted - is astonishing. The poster could find out the truth in 2 seconds. But does not. They know their truth and it has been cut up and fed to them to reinforce their ignorance.
No idea how we combat this. But the ignorance isn't "woke". Its been weaponised by the people who are against "woke".
Eventually, you will understand why Wokeness is pivotal, and you will agree with me
It will take you about 3 years, is my highly educated guess
People much brighter than you - eg Sam Altman of openAI (see below) - are nearly there already; people much stupider than you - sadly, an awful lot of people - will likely NEVER get there. Which is quite chilling
I still have not found a clear definition of "woke". It changes and adapts and shifts dependent on whatever the moral crisis is that the person shouting "woke" is unhappy about. This week its anti-semitism apparently.
I gave you a working definition the other day - wait - oh here it is:
Woke = awoken = was applied initially to civil rights and the oppression, and the rising up, of in particular black Americans. It has since come to mean supporting any perceived oppressed community, a common version of which is the transgender community. Critically it supports these communities to the exclusion of others because it perceives of these issues as binary: the powerful vs the powerless. There are no shades of grey.
wrt anti-semitism, woke orthodoxy perceives Israel and the Jews not to be an oppressed community, moreover it believes Israel/the Jews to be doing a lot of oppressing right now, and throughout history. So in the vernacular, and as we see on the streets of our capitals, the left perceives the powerful to be Israel, while Hamas, or at least the ordinary decent Gazans, to be powerless and the latter group therefore to be supported and the former condemned. Remember this is a binary process there are no on the one hands arguments allowed.
The same rules as those which are used in particular by the left to protect the eg transgender community are the same ones that lead to condemnation of Israel and the Jews as an oppressing community.
And hence Harvard, MIT, Penn we saw the other day. And left-wing anti-semitism in general.
"In this The Economist/YouGov poll from December 2-5, 20% of young adults slightly (12%) or strongly (8%) agreed with the statement "the Holocaust is a myth".
Another THIRTY percent of young people neither agree nor disagree that "the Holocaust is a myth"
Which should give pause to those who think 18-29 year olds are more “enlightened” than older age cohorts.
We have enabled a Terrible Stupidity
I am going to agree with you on this point (and set aside the interminable rantings about whatever "woke" is this week).
I keep saying that the Tories have weaponised ignorance and stupidity. Ignorance is not an insult - we are all ignorant on a huge number of subjects we are aware of but have no idea how something works or why. That is why we go to see a doctor or a mechanic - because we are ignorant. Stupidity isn't new either - plenty of people are dumb. But most normal people knew the things they didn't know.
The new phenomena is "we've had enough of experts". Of my ignorant opinion somehow having equal (or higher) worth than expertise or facts. The right exploit this for votes - keep them ignorant and angry and they will vote for you.
Social media? A phenomenon. My bit of social media only does EVs and Tesla specifically. The number of times the same untruth is typed - or sometimes just pasted - is astonishing. The poster could find out the truth in 2 seconds. But does not. They know their truth and it has been cut up and fed to them to reinforce their ignorance.
No idea how we combat this. But the ignorance isn't "woke". Its been weaponised by the people who are against "woke".
Eventually, you will understand why Wokeness is pivotal, and you will agree with me
It will take you about 3 years, is my highly educated guess
People much brighter than you - eg Sam Altman of openAI (see below) - are nearly there already; people much stupider than you - sadly, an awful lot of people - will likely NEVER get there. Which is quite chilling
I don't accept your definition of woke - which is that of the right wing blob.
There is no definition of 'woke' - that is the brilliance of it being used as a right-wing slur.
This government is too woke apparently according to some but also, extreme left anti-semitism is woke.
Presumably by deduction this government is a government of extreme left anti-semitism, which may come as a surprise to Sunak and co.
I mean, do you really honestly not get it? How the Woke obsession with intersectionality and decolonialism leads the Jews being seen as an oppressor class, worthy of persecution, or at least unworthy of protection from persecution?
Is that honestly beyond your reasoning capacity?
If it is then I despair. Because you are not the stupidest on here
If you used only a modicum of your prodigious IQ to stop and think about this rather than funnelling the latest alt-right obsession you’d realise it’s really rather obvious. Many/most groups of people are both oppressors and oppressed.
Indeed I’d go so far as to say that’s a big part of the point of intersectionality. That being said, both you and I fall into the category where we are very much more oppressor than oppressed. I’m just a little less fragile about it.
The Harvard, MIT etc furore is a good example of another aspect of woke: that prejudice can often be institutionalised without any individual actively promoting such prejudice. Funnily enough that is what BLM argue, but you struggle to see that when it doesn’t accord with your particular biases.
I don't think that either you or Leon count as "oppressor" simply by virute of which group you belong to.
As an outspoken Putin fanboy I think @Leon can be considered oppressor aligned rather than oppressor in person. His legendary cowardice is physical as well as moral so likely to be limited to keyboard trolling rather than anything more direct.
Would that be the legendary cowardice that actually took me to Ukraine, and into several bomb shelters, while you pontificated about the war from your petit bourgeois domicile in provincial Leicester?
Was that after you went to Penarth in a spacesuit during lockdown, while I worked face to face throughout, including covid ICU?
Antisemitism is a serious problem with the American Left.
Also, I salute you for realising that when Sam Altman talked about left wing antisemitism, he was really talking about woke. Not a lot of people would have picked that up. Sam Altman, for example, never did.
Why do you think anti-Semitism is now a problem on the Left? Try and work out the philosophy that might have led progressive leftwing people to perceive Jews as an oppressor, colonial class, and therefore justifiable subjects of persecution and not worthy of protection (as happened to whites, white males, etc, before them)
There. That wasn't so hard, was it?
TBF to you Sam Altman hasn't worked it out either - "i still don't understand it, really" - but he will get there, too
One wouldn't say antisemitism coming from the left is 'wokeness' as it long predates it, and is hardly the preserve of those who completely buy into modern progressivism. No one would describe George Galloway or Peter Willsman as 'woke'. Or any of the various dinosaurs who briefly re-emerged during Corbyn's leadership.
Rather it's deeper and goes back to Lenin and Marx. It is that oppressed versus oppressor distinction and the notion that not loudly and aggressively siding with the former, your are complicit in the crimes of the latter.
It's a way of thinking that is disastrously reductive and simplistic - and of course quite often leads to antisemitism if you place Israel as irredeemably in the latter category and the likes of Hamas and its ideological brethren in the former and then attack Jews for understandably not sharing that classification. Even if they are very critical of Israel's actions. And of course it led to antisemitism long before Israel's existence when antisemitic stereotypes also placed Jews in said 'oppressor class'. (See J.A. Hobson).
'Wokeness' is more of a fad ideological offshoot that nonetheless shares the same problems the far left has always had by using the same flawed concepts. It's just because it's faddish and has fashionable less dry additions, it's caught on beyond the usual circles, meaning it's much more visible.
Antisemitism has always been the socialism of fools. Far left and far right alike tend to view the world as a simple battle between some majority "in" group (defined along either racial or class lines) and some small group of outsiders who are responsible for all of the problems of the majority. Jews have found themselves identified with this group on both racial and class lines, by right and left respectively. The persecution by the right has tended to be more absolute because it's easier for a Jew to not be a capitalist than to not be a Jew. But the issue of antisemitism on the left has always been there too. For that matter, there's always been some antisemitism in the political centre as well, it is a sadly prevalent phenomenon. This isn't a "woke" issue imho: if anything, by focusing on cultural and racial injustices more than economic issues, I'd have thought that the whole debate around woke on the far left might have made it less prone to antisemitism not more. I think what has happened is that social media has made political arguments more polarised and more visible on all sides. What might have previously been twenty childish undergrads spouting nonsense in private in a draughty university meeting room has become a thousand people arguing online, for all to see.
There's a lot in that. But I do think that what's happening in Gaza and even more what's happening on the West Bank is actively stirring antisemitism (the West Bank is worse in many ways, as it doesn't have the excuse of retaliation for Hamas's pogrom). The media unselfconsciously report that "Jewish settlers" are increasingly driving people out of their homes, and interview nutters who effectively say yeah, that's what we're doing, because Old Testament. As someone who is technically Jewish I see that as alien as a Flat Earther trying to impose his views by force, and it certainly does stir the "sympathy for the underdog" spirit that informs a lot of left-wing atittudes.
I realise that the key characteristic here is being a nutter, not being a Jew. But I do think it's going to stir up people who've never thought about it into knee-jerk antisemitism. And the fact that that stirring is being indulged by the Israeli Government is just incredible and utterly deplorable. Biden should threaten to cut off aid to Israel unless it stops.
"In this The Economist/YouGov poll from December 2-5, 20% of young adults slightly (12%) or strongly (8%) agreed with the statement "the Holocaust is a myth".
Another THIRTY percent of young people neither agree nor disagree that "the Holocaust is a myth"
Which should give pause to those who think 18-29 year olds are more “enlightened” than older age cohorts.
We have enabled a Terrible Stupidity
I am going to agree with you on this point (and set aside the interminable rantings about whatever "woke" is this week).
I keep saying that the Tories have weaponised ignorance and stupidity. Ignorance is not an insult - we are all ignorant on a huge number of subjects we are aware of but have no idea how something works or why. That is why we go to see a doctor or a mechanic - because we are ignorant. Stupidity isn't new either - plenty of people are dumb. But most normal people knew the things they didn't know.
The new phenomena is "we've had enough of experts". Of my ignorant opinion somehow having equal (or higher) worth than expertise or facts. The right exploit this for votes - keep them ignorant and angry and they will vote for you.
Social media? A phenomenon. My bit of social media only does EVs and Tesla specifically. The number of times the same untruth is typed - or sometimes just pasted - is astonishing. The poster could find out the truth in 2 seconds. But does not. They know their truth and it has been cut up and fed to them to reinforce their ignorance.
No idea how we combat this. But the ignorance isn't "woke". Its been weaponised by the people who are against "woke".
Eventually, you will understand why Wokeness is pivotal, and you will agree with me
It will take you about 3 years, is my highly educated guess
People much brighter than you - eg Sam Altman of openAI (see below) - are nearly there already; people much stupider than you - sadly, an awful lot of people - will likely NEVER get there. Which is quite chilling
I don't accept your definition of woke - which is that of the right wing blob.
There is no definition of 'woke' - that is the brilliance of it being used as a right-wing slur.
This government is too woke apparently according to some but also, extreme left anti-semitism is woke.
Presumably by deduction this government is a government of extreme left anti-semitism, which may come as a surprise to Sunak and co.
I mean, do you really honestly not get it? How the Woke obsession with intersectionality and decolonialism leads the Jews being seen as an oppressor class, worthy of persecution, or at least unworthy of protection from persecution?
Is that honestly beyond your reasoning capacity?
If it is then I despair. Because you are not the stupidest on here
If you used only a modicum of your prodigious IQ to stop and think about this rather than funnelling the latest alt-right obsession you’d realise it’s really rather obvious. Many/most groups of people are both oppressors and oppressed.
Indeed I’d go so far as to say that’s a big part of the point of intersectionality. That being said, both you and I fall into the category where we are very much more oppressor than oppressed. I’m just a little less fragile about it.
The Harvard, MIT etc furore is a good example of another aspect of woke: that prejudice can often be institutionalised without any individual actively promoting such prejudice. Funnily enough that is what BLM argue, but you struggle to see that when it doesn’t accord with your particular biases.
Interesting but irrelevant. We are way beyond all that now
Not true. The part of the Jewish community pushing for genocide in Gaza are both oppressor and oppressed. Jews are not an oppressor class, but some Jews are oppressors.
Though I would definitely concede that more people than I thought consider Jews in general as responsible for Israel’s fascism. That’s deeply worrying, but doesn’t follow from intersectionality and decolonialism. It follows from stupidity and ignorance.
Antisemitism is a serious problem with the American Left.
Also, I salute you for realising that when Sam Altman talked about left wing antisemitism, he was really talking about woke. Not a lot of people would have picked that up. Sam Altman, for example, never did.
Why do you think anti-Semitism is now a problem on the Left? Try and work out the philosophy that might have led progressive leftwing people to perceive Jews as an oppressor, colonial class, and therefore justifiable subjects of persecution and not worthy of protection (as happened to whites, white males, etc, before them)
There. That wasn't so hard, was it?
TBF to you Sam Altman hasn't worked it out either - "i still don't understand it, really" - but he will get there, too
One wouldn't say antisemitism coming from the left is 'wokeness' as it long predates it, and is hardly the preserve of those who completely buy into modern progressivism. No one would describe George Galloway or Peter Willsman as 'woke'. Or any of the various dinosaurs who briefly re-emerged during Corbyn's leadership.
Rather it's deeper and goes back to Lenin and Marx. It is that oppressed versus oppressor distinction and the notion that not loudly and aggressively siding with the former, your are complicit in the crimes of the latter.
It's a way of thinking that is disastrously reductive and simplistic - and of course quite often leads to antisemitism if you place Israel as irredeemably in the latter category and the likes of Hamas and its ideological brethren in the former and then attack Jews for understandably not sharing that classification. Even if they are very critical of Israel's actions. And of course it led to antisemitism long before Israel's existence when antisemitic stereotypes also placed Jews in said 'oppressor class'. (See J.A. Hobson).
'Wokeness' is more of a fad ideological offshoot that nonetheless shares the same problems the far left has always had by using the same flawed concepts. It's just because it's faddish and has fashionable less dry additions, it's caught on beyond the usual circles, meaning it's much more visible.
Antisemitism has always been the socialism of fools. Far left and far right alike tend to view the world as a simple battle between some majority "in" group (defined along either racial or class lines) and some small group of outsiders who are responsible for all of the problems of the majority. Jews have found themselves identified with this group on both racial and class lines, by right and left respectively. The persecution by the right has tended to be more absolute because it's easier for a Jew to not be a capitalist than to not be a Jew. But the issue of antisemitism on the left has always been there too. For that matter, there's always been some antisemitism in the political centre as well, it is a sadly prevalent phenomenon. This isn't a "woke" issue imho: if anything, by focusing on cultural and racial injustices more than economic issues, I'd have thought that the whole debate around woke on the far left might have made it less prone to antisemitism not more. I think what has happened is that social media has made political arguments more polarised and more visible on all sides. What might have previously been twenty childish undergrads spouting nonsense in private in a draughty university meeting room has become a thousand people arguing online, for all to see.
I would say there are 2 types of bigotry out there, each as bad as the other in its own way, but qualitatively different. Sometimes of course both are directed at a single group.
1. Superiority complex bigotry
This is the behaviour and beliefs of people in powerful or dominant groups (males, the rich, the established religion, higher castes etc) towards those in weak groups, and is about maintaining the status quo. It usually involves condescension and bullying, pseudo-science or religion (women can't do science, blacks are unintelligent, dalits are unclean, the Irish are bumpkins), and dismissive and defensive attitudes when challenged.
The main victims of this through history have been Black Africans, lower classes and castes in most societies, women, peasants and rural communities, and national minorities like the Ukrainians in the Russian and Soviet empires. The form of violence or oppression tends to be chronic - a boot stamping down on a group forever.
In terms of the Palestine conflict this is essentially how the settlers and far right in Israel behave.
2. The bigotry of fear or resentment
This is the bigotry that forms out of hatred and suspicion of groups that are seen as either too powerful or somehow subversive to the dominant culture. It's sometimes about maintaining the status quo but often also about overturning it. It's revolutionary bigotry. Resentment is the dominant emotion. It may be about the fear of culture being overwhelmed or diluted (e.g. by immigration), or resentment of a real or imagined ruling class that keeps the people oppressed (antisemitism, class war), or a fear of difference and subversion (homophobia).
Unlike superiority complex bigotry it's more volatile. Long periods of nothing, then a sudden extremely violent flare up. Pogroms and the Holocaust, the Armenian genocide, Hindu-Muslim communal rioting in India, the Peasants revolt, The French revolutionary terror, and in the Gaza conflict the 7th October is a classic example.
I think both sorts of bigotry probably live in all of us but they are different and I think understanding this helps to explain why groups like the far Left seem able to behave in extremely bigoted ways while considering themselves virtuous.
"In this The Economist/YouGov poll from December 2-5, 20% of young adults slightly (12%) or strongly (8%) agreed with the statement "the Holocaust is a myth".
Another THIRTY percent of young people neither agree nor disagree that "the Holocaust is a myth"
Which should give pause to those who think 18-29 year olds are more “enlightened” than older age cohorts.
We have enabled a Terrible Stupidity
I am going to agree with you on this point (and set aside the interminable rantings about whatever "woke" is this week).
I keep saying that the Tories have weaponised ignorance and stupidity. Ignorance is not an insult - we are all ignorant on a huge number of subjects we are aware of but have no idea how something works or why. That is why we go to see a doctor or a mechanic - because we are ignorant. Stupidity isn't new either - plenty of people are dumb. But most normal people knew the things they didn't know.
The new phenomena is "we've had enough of experts". Of my ignorant opinion somehow having equal (or higher) worth than expertise or facts. The right exploit this for votes - keep them ignorant and angry and they will vote for you.
Social media? A phenomenon. My bit of social media only does EVs and Tesla specifically. The number of times the same untruth is typed - or sometimes just pasted - is astonishing. The poster could find out the truth in 2 seconds. But does not. They know their truth and it has been cut up and fed to them to reinforce their ignorance.
No idea how we combat this. But the ignorance isn't "woke". Its been weaponised by the people who are against "woke".
Eventually, you will understand why Wokeness is pivotal, and you will agree with me
It will take you about 3 years, is my highly educated guess
People much brighter than you - eg Sam Altman of openAI (see below) - are nearly there already; people much stupider than you - sadly, an awful lot of people - will likely NEVER get there. Which is quite chilling
I don't accept your definition of woke - which is that of the right wing blob.
There is no definition of 'woke' - that is the brilliance of it being used as a right-wing slur.
This government is too woke apparently according to some but also, extreme left anti-semitism is woke.
Presumably by deduction this government is a government of extreme left anti-semitism, which may come as a surprise to Sunak and co.
I mean, do you really honestly not get it? How the Woke obsession with intersectionality and decolonialism leads the Jews being seen as an oppressor class, worthy of persecution, or at least unworthy of protection from persecution?
Is that honestly beyond your reasoning capacity?
If it is then I despair. Because you are not the stupidest on here
If you used only a modicum of your prodigious IQ to stop and think about this rather than funnelling the latest alt-right obsession you’d realise it’s really rather obvious. Many/most groups of people are both oppressors and oppressed.
Indeed I’d go so far as to say that’s a big part of the point of intersectionality. That being said, both you and I fall into the category where we are very much more oppressor than oppressed. I’m just a little less fragile about it.
The Harvard, MIT etc furore is a good example of another aspect of woke: that prejudice can often be institutionalised without any individual actively promoting such prejudice. Funnily enough that is what BLM argue, but you struggle to see that when it doesn’t accord with your particular biases.
Interesting but irrelevant. We are way beyond all that now
Not true. The part of the Jewish community pushing for genocide in Gaza are both oppressor and oppressed. Jews are not an oppressor class, but some Jews are oppressors.
Though I would definitely concede that more people than I thought consider Jews in general as responsible for Israel’s fascism. That’s deeply worrying, but doesn’t follow from intersectionality and decolonialism. It follows from stupidity and ignorance.
"In this The Economist/YouGov poll from December 2-5, 20% of young adults slightly (12%) or strongly (8%) agreed with the statement "the Holocaust is a myth".
Another THIRTY percent of young people neither agree nor disagree that "the Holocaust is a myth"
Which should give pause to those who think 18-29 year olds are more “enlightened” than older age cohorts.
We have enabled a Terrible Stupidity
I am going to agree with you on this point (and set aside the interminable rantings about whatever "woke" is this week).
I keep saying that the Tories have weaponised ignorance and stupidity. Ignorance is not an insult - we are all ignorant on a huge number of subjects we are aware of but have no idea how something works or why. That is why we go to see a doctor or a mechanic - because we are ignorant. Stupidity isn't new either - plenty of people are dumb. But most normal people knew the things they didn't know.
The new phenomena is "we've had enough of experts". Of my ignorant opinion somehow having equal (or higher) worth than expertise or facts. The right exploit this for votes - keep them ignorant and angry and they will vote for you.
Social media? A phenomenon. My bit of social media only does EVs and Tesla specifically. The number of times the same untruth is typed - or sometimes just pasted - is astonishing. The poster could find out the truth in 2 seconds. But does not. They know their truth and it has been cut up and fed to them to reinforce their ignorance.
No idea how we combat this. But the ignorance isn't "woke". Its been weaponised by the people who are against "woke".
Eventually, you will understand why Wokeness is pivotal, and you will agree with me
It will take you about 3 years, is my highly educated guess
People much brighter than you - eg Sam Altman of openAI (see below) - are nearly there already; people much stupider than you - sadly, an awful lot of people - will likely NEVER get there. Which is quite chilling
I still have not found a clear definition of "woke". It changes and adapts and shifts dependent on whatever the moral crisis is that the person shouting "woke" is unhappy about. This week its anti-semitism apparently.
I gave you a working definition the other day - wait - oh here it is:
Woke = awoken = was applied initially to civil rights and the oppression, and the rising up, of in particular black Americans. It has since come to mean supporting any perceived oppressed community, a common version of which is the transgender community. Critically it supports these communities to the exclusion of others because it perceives of these issues as binary: the powerful vs the powerless. There are no shades of grey.
wrt anti-semitism, woke orthodoxy perceives Israel and the Jews not to be an oppressed community, moreover it believes Israel/the Jews to be doing a lot of oppressing right now, and throughout history. So in the vernacular, and as we see on the streets of our capitals, the left perceives the powerful to be Israel, while Hamas, or at least the ordinary decent Gazans, to be powerless and the latter group therefore to be supported and the former condemned. Remember this is a binary process there are no on the one hands arguments allowed.
The same rules as those which are used in particular by the left to protect the eg transgender community are the same ones that lead to condemnation of Israel and the Jews as an oppressing community.
And hence Harvard, MIT, Penn we saw the other day. And left-wing anti-semitism in general.
Your welcome.
Ask another 100 people get about 90 different answers. It is a pointless word for those seeking to communicate successfully rather than score points against each other.
"In this The Economist/YouGov poll from December 2-5, 20% of young adults slightly (12%) or strongly (8%) agreed with the statement "the Holocaust is a myth".
Another THIRTY percent of young people neither agree nor disagree that "the Holocaust is a myth"
I don't see Holocaust deniers as a clear and present danger, I see them as a clear and future danger.
Deborah Lipstadt, May 2000.
She was right
How is it possible we have ended up with 50% of young people either beliving the Holocaust is a myth, or not being sure??
It must be social media, and, within that, Tik Tok
It’s almost as if that application is the tool of a foreign adversary’s government, set up with the explicit intention of sowing negative discord across the Western world.
"In this The Economist/YouGov poll from December 2-5, 20% of young adults slightly (12%) or strongly (8%) agreed with the statement "the Holocaust is a myth".
Another THIRTY percent of young people neither agree nor disagree that "the Holocaust is a myth"
Which should give pause to those who think 18-29 year olds are more “enlightened” than older age cohorts.
We have enabled a Terrible Stupidity
I am going to agree with you on this point (and set aside the interminable rantings about whatever "woke" is this week).
I keep saying that the Tories have weaponised ignorance and stupidity. Ignorance is not an insult - we are all ignorant on a huge number of subjects we are aware of but have no idea how something works or why. That is why we go to see a doctor or a mechanic - because we are ignorant. Stupidity isn't new either - plenty of people are dumb. But most normal people knew the things they didn't know.
The new phenomena is "we've had enough of experts". Of my ignorant opinion somehow having equal (or higher) worth than expertise or facts. The right exploit this for votes - keep them ignorant and angry and they will vote for you.
Social media? A phenomenon. My bit of social media only does EVs and Tesla specifically. The number of times the same untruth is typed - or sometimes just pasted - is astonishing. The poster could find out the truth in 2 seconds. But does not. They know their truth and it has been cut up and fed to them to reinforce their ignorance.
No idea how we combat this. But the ignorance isn't "woke". Its been weaponised by the people who are against "woke".
Eventually, you will understand why Wokeness is pivotal, and you will agree with me
It will take you about 3 years, is my highly educated guess
People much brighter than you - eg Sam Altman of openAI (see below) - are nearly there already; people much stupider than you - sadly, an awful lot of people - will likely NEVER get there. Which is quite chilling
I don't accept your definition of woke - which is that of the right wing blob.
There is no definition of 'woke' - that is the brilliance of it being used as a right-wing slur.
This government is too woke apparently according to some but also, extreme left anti-semitism is woke.
Presumably by deduction this government is a government of extreme left anti-semitism, which may come as a surprise to Sunak and co.
I mean, do you really honestly not get it? How the Woke obsession with intersectionality and decolonialism leads the Jews being seen as an oppressor class, worthy of persecution, or at least unworthy of protection from persecution?
Is that honestly beyond your reasoning capacity?
If it is then I despair. Because you are not the stupidest on here
No, you don't get it. If 'woke' means anything - which it probably doesn't now idiots like you have adopted it as a term of right wing abuse - it means being alive to the reality of groups other than your own. That, of course, includes Jewish people.
What you are critiquing isn't woke at all.
What do you call people who follow that path to anti-semitism?
"In this The Economist/YouGov poll from December 2-5, 20% of young adults slightly (12%) or strongly (8%) agreed with the statement "the Holocaust is a myth".
“Public opinion is also deeply split on how to bring the war to an end, with 44 per cent of Ukrainians believing compromise is needed, vs 48 per cent who wish to continue fighting for victory.”
"In this The Economist/YouGov poll from December 2-5, 20% of young adults slightly (12%) or strongly (8%) agreed with the statement "the Holocaust is a myth".
Another THIRTY percent of young people neither agree nor disagree that "the Holocaust is a myth"
Which should give pause to those who think 18-29 year olds are more “enlightened” than older age cohorts.
We have enabled a Terrible Stupidity
I am going to agree with you on this point (and set aside the interminable rantings about whatever "woke" is this week).
I keep saying that the Tories have weaponised ignorance and stupidity. Ignorance is not an insult - we are all ignorant on a huge number of subjects we are aware of but have no idea how something works or why. That is why we go to see a doctor or a mechanic - because we are ignorant. Stupidity isn't new either - plenty of people are dumb. But most normal people knew the things they didn't know.
The new phenomena is "we've had enough of experts". Of my ignorant opinion somehow having equal (or higher) worth than expertise or facts. The right exploit this for votes - keep them ignorant and angry and they will vote for you.
Social media? A phenomenon. My bit of social media only does EVs and Tesla specifically. The number of times the same untruth is typed - or sometimes just pasted - is astonishing. The poster could find out the truth in 2 seconds. But does not. They know their truth and it has been cut up and fed to them to reinforce their ignorance.
No idea how we combat this. But the ignorance isn't "woke". Its been weaponised by the people who are against "woke".
Eventually, you will understand why Wokeness is pivotal, and you will agree with me
It will take you about 3 years, is my highly educated guess
People much brighter than you - eg Sam Altman of openAI (see below) - are nearly there already; people much stupider than you - sadly, an awful lot of people - will likely NEVER get there. Which is quite chilling
I still have not found a clear definition of "woke". It changes and adapts and shifts dependent on whatever the moral crisis is that the person shouting "woke" is unhappy about. This week its anti-semitism apparently.
QED. 3 years. Maybe 4
I've seen the nonsense you posted last night about the Baltics, I've upgraded you from a fucking appeaser to Putin's catamite.
Yes, that was clearly a joke: the reference to eastern Europe being mainly full of "hopping chickens" was a tiny tiny clue
Good morning, one and all! And in one post, we see clearly the effect of the cold light of day on a thought from the previous, slightly fuddled, night.
I wasn’t remotely drunk. As I’ve explained, Wegovy has halved - at least - my booze intake
I WAS trolling @Cicero which is probably bad and juvenile, but his earnest exhortations from Estonia do start to chafe, just a little
Noted about the drinking. I must, maybe, think about it. Cicero posts are infrequent, perhaps infrequent enough to warrant serious consideration. As opposed, perhaps, to yours, and maybe mine, which are perhaps too common to always be taken seriously.
That’s fair, and nicely phrased
The weird thing is that I generally lark about on here, or seek out arguments for the sake of it - ergo, much of what I say is chaff. But I am deadly earnest about Wokeness. I believe it is a mortal threat to the west and the enlightenment
I don’t like being the lone voice on this. It can get lonely. It would be SO much easier for me to ignore the issue or go along with everyone else and laugh it off, or whatever
But I can’t. Something wicked this way comes. it is what I honestly believe and I’ve thought about
it a lot - it is some modest relief that people in America are finally becoming aware of it - through this revelation of anti Semitism pervading academe and elsewhere
If you don’t like my comments about wokeness scroll past. But I won’t shut up about it because I deeply believe it is a terrible danger
Wokeness reminds me of two Viz comic strips. Firstly ‘The Modern Parents’ who captured the essence of woke about thirty years ago, and secondly ‘The Bottom Inspectors’ who were a type of hardline police/enforcers that found any flimsy excuse to punish/embarrass anyone who had stayed on the toilet too long/not wiped properly/ had the wrong colour pubes. They were based on Nazis
Invoking Godwin here, but the enforcement of woke and the constant rewriting of what’s allowed to be thought or said is similar to the Third Reich. I’ve just watched a series on that called ‘The Abyss’ so it’s fresh in my mind. They make up their mind about a certain type of people, won’t listen to any argument, and want them liquidated from public life, all on the basis of some odd world view they’ve been force fed, probably at University
"In this The Economist/YouGov poll from December 2-5, 20% of young adults slightly (12%) or strongly (8%) agreed with the statement "the Holocaust is a myth".
Another THIRTY percent of young people neither agree nor disagree that "the Holocaust is a myth"
Which should give pause to those who think 18-29 year olds are more “enlightened” than older age cohorts.
We have enabled a Terrible Stupidity
I am going to agree with you on this point (and set aside the interminable rantings about whatever "woke" is this week).
I keep saying that the Tories have weaponised ignorance and stupidity. Ignorance is not an insult - we are all ignorant on a huge number of subjects we are aware of but have no idea how something works or why. That is why we go to see a doctor or a mechanic - because we are ignorant. Stupidity isn't new either - plenty of people are dumb. But most normal people knew the things they didn't know.
The new phenomena is "we've had enough of experts". Of my ignorant opinion somehow having equal (or higher) worth than expertise or facts. The right exploit this for votes - keep them ignorant and angry and they will vote for you.
Social media? A phenomenon. My bit of social media only does EVs and Tesla specifically. The number of times the same untruth is typed - or sometimes just pasted - is astonishing. The poster could find out the truth in 2 seconds. But does not. They know their truth and it has been cut up and fed to them to reinforce their ignorance.
No idea how we combat this. But the ignorance isn't "woke". Its been weaponised by the people who are against "woke".
Eventually, you will understand why Wokeness is pivotal, and you will agree with me
It will take you about 3 years, is my highly educated guess
People much brighter than you - eg Sam Altman of openAI (see below) - are nearly there already; people much stupider than you - sadly, an awful lot of people - will likely NEVER get there. Which is quite chilling
I don't accept your definition of woke - which is that of the right wing blob.
There is no definition of 'woke' - that is the brilliance of it being used as a right-wing slur.
This government is too woke apparently according to some but also, extreme left anti-semitism is woke.
Presumably by deduction this government is a government of extreme left anti-semitism, which may come as a surprise to Sunak and co.
I mean, do you really honestly not get it? How the Woke obsession with intersectionality and decolonialism leads the Jews being seen as an oppressor class, worthy of persecution, or at least unworthy of protection from persecution?
Is that honestly beyond your reasoning capacity?
If it is then I despair. Because you are not the stupidest on here
If you used only a modicum of your prodigious IQ to stop and think about this rather than funnelling the latest alt-right obsession you’d realise it’s really rather obvious. Many/most groups of people are both oppressors and oppressed.
Indeed I’d go so far as to say that’s a big part of the point of intersectionality. That being said, both you and I fall into the category where we are very much more oppressor than oppressed. I’m just a little less fragile about it.
The Harvard, MIT etc furore is a good example of another aspect of woke: that prejudice can often be institutionalised without any individual actively promoting such prejudice. Funnily enough that is what BLM argue, but you struggle to see that when it doesn’t accord with your particular biases.
I don't think that either you or Leon count as "oppressor" simply by virute of which group you belong to.
We are both part of a group live in and participate in a system that oppresses poor people in UK and much of the global south systematically. It’s not our fault, I don’t feel guilty, but we should be prepared to dismantle that system eg by promoting policies that benefit the global south at the expense of rich people in the UK.
A wealth tax hypothecated for international development would be a good example.
“Public opinion is also deeply split on how to bring the war to an end, with 44 per cent of Ukrainians believing compromise is needed, vs 48 per cent who wish to continue fighting for victory.”
How do you seek peace with an enemy who doesn't want peace?
I don't think you do "seek peace". But you allow intermediaries to explore possibilities, while maintaining an absolutist front. I doubt if Putin thinks total conquest of Ukraine is now either possible or desirable, but what do I know? Finding out what he'd accept and what he'd concede is sensible. Conversely the Russians need to know if it's worth even thinking about a ceasefire or Zelensky really will fight for the last inch of the Donbas. Ignorance on both sides is just unhelpful in considering options.
"In this The Economist/YouGov poll from December 2-5, 20% of young adults slightly (12%) or strongly (8%) agreed with the statement "the Holocaust is a myth".
Another THIRTY percent of young people neither agree nor disagree that "the Holocaust is a myth"
Which should give pause to those who think 18-29 year olds are more “enlightened” than older age cohorts.
We have enabled a Terrible Stupidity
I am going to agree with you on this point (and set aside the interminable rantings about whatever "woke" is this week).
I keep saying that the Tories have weaponised ignorance and stupidity. Ignorance is not an insult - we are all ignorant on a huge number of subjects we are aware of but have no idea how something works or why. That is why we go to see a doctor or a mechanic - because we are ignorant. Stupidity isn't new either - plenty of people are dumb. But most normal people knew the things they didn't know.
The new phenomena is "we've had enough of experts". Of my ignorant opinion somehow having equal (or higher) worth than expertise or facts. The right exploit this for votes - keep them ignorant and angry and they will vote for you.
Social media? A phenomenon. My bit of social media only does EVs and Tesla specifically. The number of times the same untruth is typed - or sometimes just pasted - is astonishing. The poster could find out the truth in 2 seconds. But does not. They know their truth and it has been cut up and fed to them to reinforce their ignorance.
No idea how we combat this. But the ignorance isn't "woke". Its been weaponised by the people who are against "woke".
Eventually, you will understand why Wokeness is pivotal, and you will agree with me
It will take you about 3 years, is my highly educated guess
People much brighter than you - eg Sam Altman of openAI (see below) - are nearly there already; people much stupider than you - sadly, an awful lot of people - will likely NEVER get there. Which is quite chilling
I don't accept your definition of woke - which is that of the right wing blob.
There is no definition of 'woke' - that is the brilliance of it being used as a right-wing slur.
This government is too woke apparently according to some but also, extreme left anti-semitism is woke.
Presumably by deduction this government is a government of extreme left anti-semitism, which may come as a surprise to Sunak and co.
I mean, do you really honestly not get it? How the Woke obsession with intersectionality and decolonialism leads the Jews being seen as an oppressor class, worthy of persecution, or at least unworthy of protection from persecution?
Is that honestly beyond your reasoning capacity?
If it is then I despair. Because you are not the stupidest on here
If you used only a modicum of your prodigious IQ to stop and think about this rather than funnelling the latest alt-right obsession you’d realise it’s really rather obvious. Many/most groups of people are both oppressors and oppressed.
Indeed I’d go so far as to say that’s a big part of the point of intersectionality. That being said, both you and I fall into the category where we are very much more oppressor than oppressed. I’m just a little less fragile about it.
The Harvard, MIT etc furore is a good example of another aspect of woke: that prejudice can often be institutionalised without any individual actively promoting such prejudice. Funnily enough that is what BLM argue, but you struggle to see that when it doesn’t accord with your particular biases.
I don't think that either you or Leon count as "oppressor" simply by virute of which group you belong to.
As an outspoken Putin fanboy I think @Leon can be considered oppressor aligned rather than oppressor in person. His legendary cowardice is physical as well as moral so likely to be limited to keyboard trolling rather than anything more direct.
Would that be the legendary cowardice that actually took me to Ukraine, and into several bomb shelters, while you pontificated about the war from your petit bourgeois domicile in provincial Leicester?
Was that after you went to Penarth in a spacesuit during lockdown, while I worked face to face throughout, including covid ICU?
"In this The Economist/YouGov poll from December 2-5, 20% of young adults slightly (12%) or strongly (8%) agreed with the statement "the Holocaust is a myth".
Another THIRTY percent of young people neither agree nor disagree that "the Holocaust is a myth"
Which should give pause to those who think 18-29 year olds are more “enlightened” than older age cohorts.
We have enabled a Terrible Stupidity
I am going to agree with you on this point (and set aside the interminable rantings about whatever "woke" is this week).
I keep saying that the Tories have weaponised ignorance and stupidity. Ignorance is not an insult - we are all ignorant on a huge number of subjects we are aware of but have no idea how something works or why. That is why we go to see a doctor or a mechanic - because we are ignorant. Stupidity isn't new either - plenty of people are dumb. But most normal people knew the things they didn't know.
The new phenomena is "we've had enough of experts". Of my ignorant opinion somehow having equal (or higher) worth than expertise or facts. The right exploit this for votes - keep them ignorant and angry and they will vote for you.
Social media? A phenomenon. My bit of social media only does EVs and Tesla specifically. The number of times the same untruth is typed - or sometimes just pasted - is astonishing. The poster could find out the truth in 2 seconds. But does not. They know their truth and it has been cut up and fed to them to reinforce their ignorance.
No idea how we combat this. But the ignorance isn't "woke". Its been weaponised by the people who are against "woke".
Eventually, you will understand why Wokeness is pivotal, and you will agree with me
It will take you about 3 years, is my highly educated guess
People much brighter than you - eg Sam Altman of openAI (see below) - are nearly there already; people much stupider than you - sadly, an awful lot of people - will likely NEVER get there. Which is quite chilling
I still have not found a clear definition of "woke". It changes and adapts and shifts dependent on whatever the moral crisis is that the person shouting "woke" is unhappy about. This week its anti-semitism apparently.
QED. 3 years. Maybe 4
I've seen the nonsense you posted last night about the Baltics, I've upgraded you from a fucking appeaser to Putin's catamite.
Yes, that was clearly a joke: the reference to eastern Europe being mainly full of "hopping chickens" was a tiny tiny clue
Good morning, one and all! And in one post, we see clearly the effect of the cold light of day on a thought from the previous, slightly fuddled, night.
I wasn’t remotely drunk. As I’ve explained, Wegovy has halved - at least - my booze intake
I WAS trolling @Cicero which is probably bad and juvenile, but his earnest exhortations from Estonia do start to chafe, just a little
Noted about the drinking. I must, maybe, think about it. Cicero posts are infrequent, perhaps infrequent enough to warrant serious consideration. As opposed, perhaps, to yours, and maybe mine, which are perhaps too common to always be taken seriously.
That’s fair, and nicely phrased
The weird thing is that I generally lark about on here, or seek out arguments for the sake of it - ergo, much of what I say is chaff. But I am deadly earnest about Wokeness. I believe it is a mortal threat to the west and the enlightenment
I don’t like being the lone voice on this. It can get lonely. It would be SO much easier for me to ignore the issue or go along with everyone else and laugh it off, or whatever
But I can’t. Something wicked this way comes. it is what I honestly believe and I’ve thought about
it a lot - it is some modest relief that people in America are finally becoming aware of it - through this revelation of anti Semitism pervading academe and elsewhere
If you don’t like my comments about wokeness scroll past. But I won’t shut up about it because I deeply believe it is a terrible danger
Wokeness reminds me of two Viz comic strips. Firstly ‘The Modern Parents’ who captured the essence of woke about thirty years ago, and secondly ‘The Bottom Inspectors’ who were a type of hardline police/enforcers that found any flimsy excuse to punish/embarrass anyone who had stayed on the toilet too long/not wiped properly/ had the wrong colour pubes
It's interesting how Viz has gradually tacked left over the years. I'm sure they get most of the material for "The Male Online" from the usual suspects on here.
"In this The Economist/YouGov poll from December 2-5, 20% of young adults slightly (12%) or strongly (8%) agreed with the statement "the Holocaust is a myth".
Another THIRTY percent of young people neither agree nor disagree that "the Holocaust is a myth"
Which should give pause to those who think 18-29 year olds are more “enlightened” than older age cohorts.
We have enabled a Terrible Stupidity
I am going to agree with you on this point (and set aside the interminable rantings about whatever "woke" is this week).
I keep saying that the Tories have weaponised ignorance and stupidity. Ignorance is not an insult - we are all ignorant on a huge number of subjects we are aware of but have no idea how something works or why. That is why we go to see a doctor or a mechanic - because we are ignorant. Stupidity isn't new either - plenty of people are dumb. But most normal people knew the things they didn't know.
The new phenomena is "we've had enough of experts". Of my ignorant opinion somehow having equal (or higher) worth than expertise or facts. The right exploit this for votes - keep them ignorant and angry and they will vote for you.
Social media? A phenomenon. My bit of social media only does EVs and Tesla specifically. The number of times the same untruth is typed - or sometimes just pasted - is astonishing. The poster could find out the truth in 2 seconds. But does not. They know their truth and it has been cut up and fed to them to reinforce their ignorance.
No idea how we combat this. But the ignorance isn't "woke". Its been weaponised by the people who are against "woke".
Eventually, you will understand why Wokeness is pivotal, and you will agree with me
It will take you about 3 years, is my highly educated guess
People much brighter than you - eg Sam Altman of openAI (see below) - are nearly there already; people much stupider than you - sadly, an awful lot of people - will likely NEVER get there. Which is quite chilling
I still have not found a clear definition of "woke". It changes and adapts and shifts dependent on whatever the moral crisis is that the person shouting "woke" is unhappy about. This week its anti-semitism apparently.
QED. 3 years. Maybe 4
I've seen the nonsense you posted last night about the Baltics, I've upgraded you from a fucking appeaser to Putin's catamite.
Yes, that was clearly a joke: the reference to eastern Europe being mainly full of "hopping chickens" was a tiny tiny clue
Good morning, one and all! And in one post, we see clearly the effect of the cold light of day on a thought from the previous, slightly fuddled, night.
I wasn’t remotely drunk. As I’ve explained, Wegovy has halved - at least - my booze intake
I WAS trolling @Cicero which is probably bad and juvenile, but his earnest exhortations from Estonia do start to chafe, just a little
Noted about the drinking. I must, maybe, think about it. Cicero posts are infrequent, perhaps infrequent enough to warrant serious consideration. As opposed, perhaps, to yours, and maybe mine, which are perhaps too common to always be taken seriously.
That’s fair, and nicely phrased
The weird thing is that I generally lark about on here, or seek out arguments for the sake of it - ergo, much of what I say is chaff. But I am deadly earnest about Wokeness. I believe it is a mortal threat to the west and the enlightenment
I don’t like being the lone voice on this. It can get lonely. It would be SO much easier for me to ignore the issue or go along with everyone else and laugh it off, or whatever
But I can’t. Something wicked this way comes. it is what I honestly believe and I’ve thought about
it a lot - it is some modest relief that people in America are finally becoming aware of it - through this revelation of anti Semitism pervading academe and elsewhere
If you don’t like my comments about wokeness scroll past. But I won’t shut up about it because I deeply believe it is a terrible danger
Wokeness reminds me of two Viz comic strips. Firstly ‘The Modern Parents’ who captured the essence of woke about thirty years ago, and secondly ‘The Bottom Inspectors’ who were a type of hardline police/enforcers that found any flimsy excuse to punish/embarrass anyone who had stayed on the toilet too long/not wiped properly/ had the wrong colour pubes
An apt comparison
God viz was funny, when it was funny
I remember when I first came across it - they were literally selling it by hand in pubs in Soho - right at the beginning
"In this The Economist/YouGov poll from December 2-5, 20% of young adults slightly (12%) or strongly (8%) agreed with the statement "the Holocaust is a myth".
Another THIRTY percent of young people neither agree nor disagree that "the Holocaust is a myth"
Which should give pause to those who think 18-29 year olds are more “enlightened” than older age cohorts.
We have enabled a Terrible Stupidity
I am going to agree with you on this point (and set aside the interminable rantings about whatever "woke" is this week).
I keep saying that the Tories have weaponised ignorance and stupidity. Ignorance is not an insult - we are all ignorant on a huge number of subjects we are aware of but have no idea how something works or why. That is why we go to see a doctor or a mechanic - because we are ignorant. Stupidity isn't new either - plenty of people are dumb. But most normal people knew the things they didn't know.
The new phenomena is "we've had enough of experts". Of my ignorant opinion somehow having equal (or higher) worth than expertise or facts. The right exploit this for votes - keep them ignorant and angry and they will vote for you.
Social media? A phenomenon. My bit of social media only does EVs and Tesla specifically. The number of times the same untruth is typed - or sometimes just pasted - is astonishing. The poster could find out the truth in 2 seconds. But does not. They know their truth and it has been cut up and fed to them to reinforce their ignorance.
No idea how we combat this. But the ignorance isn't "woke". Its been weaponised by the people who are against "woke".
Eventually, you will understand why Wokeness is pivotal, and you will agree with me
It will take you about 3 years, is my highly educated guess
People much brighter than you - eg Sam Altman of openAI (see below) - are nearly there already; people much stupider than you - sadly, an awful lot of people - will likely NEVER get there. Which is quite chilling
I still have not found a clear definition of "woke". It changes and adapts and shifts dependent on whatever the moral crisis is that the person shouting "woke" is unhappy about. This week its anti-semitism apparently.
QED. 3 years. Maybe 4
I've seen the nonsense you posted last night about the Baltics, I've upgraded you from a fucking appeaser to Putin's catamite.
Yes, that was clearly a joke: the reference to eastern Europe being mainly full of "hopping chickens" was a tiny tiny clue
Good morning, one and all! And in one post, we see clearly the effect of the cold light of day on a thought from the previous, slightly fuddled, night.
I wasn’t remotely drunk. As I’ve explained, Wegovy has halved - at least - my booze intake
I WAS trolling @Cicero which is probably bad and juvenile, but his earnest exhortations from Estonia do start to chafe, just a little
Noted about the drinking. I must, maybe, think about it. Cicero posts are infrequent, perhaps infrequent enough to warrant serious consideration. As opposed, perhaps, to yours, and maybe mine, which are perhaps too common to always be taken seriously.
That’s fair, and nicely phrased
The weird thing is that I generally lark about on here, or seek out arguments for the sake of it - ergo, much of what I say is chaff. But I am deadly earnest about Wokeness. I believe it is a mortal threat to the west and the enlightenment
I don’t like being the lone voice on this. It can get lonely. It would be SO much easier for me to ignore the issue or go along with everyone else and laugh it off, or whatever
But I can’t. Something wicked this way comes. it is what I honestly believe and I’ve thought about
it a lot - it is some modest relief that people in America are finally becoming aware of it - through this revelation of anti Semitism pervading academe and elsewhere
If you don’t like my comments about wokeness scroll past. But I won’t shut up about it because I deeply believe it is a terrible danger
Wokeness reminds me of two Viz comic strips. Firstly ‘The Modern Parents’ who captured the essence of woke about thirty years ago, and secondly ‘The Bottom Inspectors’ who were a type of hardline police/enforcers that found any flimsy excuse to punish/embarrass anyone who had stayed on the toilet too long/not wiped properly/ had the wrong colour pubes
It's interesting how Viz has gradually tacked left over the years. I'm sure they get most of the material for "The Male Online" from the usual suspects on here.
It is, as they say, not as funny as it used to be. It also sells about 6 copies online rather than 200,000 per issue
Antisemitism is a serious problem with the American Left.
Also, I salute you for realising that when Sam Altman talked about left wing antisemitism, he was really talking about woke. Not a lot of people would have picked that up. Sam Altman, for example, never did.
Why do you think anti-Semitism is now a problem on the Left? Try and work out the philosophy that might have led progressive leftwing people to perceive Jews as an oppressor, colonial class, and therefore justifiable subjects of persecution and not worthy of protection (as happened to whites, white males, etc, before them)
There. That wasn't so hard, was it?
TBF to you Sam Altman hasn't worked it out either - "i still don't understand it, really" - but he will get there, too
One wouldn't say antisemitism coming from the left is 'wokeness' as it long predates it, and is hardly the preserve of those who completely buy into modern progressivism. No one would describe George Galloway or Peter Willsman as 'woke'. Or any of the various dinosaurs who briefly re-emerged during Corbyn's leadership.
Rather it's deeper and goes back to Lenin and Marx. It is that oppressed versus oppressor distinction and the notion that not loudly and aggressively siding with the former, your are complicit in the crimes of the latter.
It's a way of thinking that is disastrously reductive and simplistic - and of course quite often leads to antisemitism if you place Israel as irredeemably in the latter category and the likes of Hamas and its ideological brethren in the former and then attack Jews for understandably not sharing that classification. Even if they are very critical of Israel's actions. And of course it led to antisemitism long before Israel's existence when antisemitic stereotypes also placed Jews in said 'oppressor class'. (See J.A. Hobson).
'Wokeness' is more of a fad ideological offshoot that nonetheless shares the same problems the far left has always had by using the same flawed concepts. It's just because it's faddish and has fashionable less dry additions, it's caught on beyond the usual circles, meaning it's much more visible.
Antisemitism has always been the socialism of fools. Far left and far right alike tend to view the world as a simple battle between some majority "in" group (defined along either racial or class lines) and some small group of outsiders who are responsible for all of the problems of the majority. Jews have found themselves identified with this group on both racial and class lines, by right and left respectively. The persecution by the right has tended to be more absolute because it's easier for a Jew to not be a capitalist than to not be a Jew. But the issue of antisemitism on the left has always been there too. For that matter, there's always been some antisemitism in the political centre as well, it is a sadly prevalent phenomenon. This isn't a "woke" issue imho: if anything, by focusing on cultural and racial injustices more than economic issues, I'd have thought that the whole debate around woke on the far left might have made it less prone to antisemitism not more. I think what has happened is that social media has made political arguments more polarised and more visible on all sides. What might have previously been twenty childish undergrads spouting nonsense in private in a draughty university meeting room has become a thousand people arguing online, for all to see.
"This isn't a "woke" issue imho: if anything, by focusing on cultural and racial injustices more than economic issues, I'd have thought that the whole debate around woke on the far left might have made it less prone to antisemitism not more."
I think this is wrong for one simple reason - that 'woke' focus on "cultural and racial injustices" is very shallow and is almost never extended to Jews due to its very black-and-white view of race - even in some cases blaming them for injustice as seen as 'white' or powerful. For an obvious and egregious example, you can look at Whoopi Goldberg saying the Holocaust "wasn't about race" because it was white people killing white people. David Baddiel got a whole book out of how modern social justice movements are incapable of or unwilling to include Jews in their conceptual framework. Because are not an easy fit with it, and may give the lie to the whole thing in its current simplistic form.
There is a specific problem with the far left and antisemitism - other sides of politics have their own issues. However, this one has been especially damaging in recent years, given it blows up or poisons the very progressive institutions and movements that are supposed to be helping fight racism, leading to them enabling or promoting it instead.
Briefly, there are very few women in prison in Norway, some are in mixed-sex prisons but not allowed to socalise with men beyond some voluntary joint sports etc., and conditions, as for men, are on the whole not bad.
“Public opinion is also deeply split on how to bring the war to an end, with 44 per cent of Ukrainians believing compromise is needed, vs 48 per cent who wish to continue fighting for victory.”
How do you seek peace with an enemy who doesn't want peace?
I don't think you do "seek peace". But you allow intermediaries to explore possibilities, while maintaining an absolutist front. I doubt if Putin thinks total conquest of Ukraine is now either possible or desirable, but what do I know? Finding out what he'd accept and what he'd concede is sensible. Conversely the Russians need to know if it's worth even thinking about a ceasefire or Zelensky really will fight for the last inch of the Donbas. Ignorance on both sides is just unhelpful in considering options.
Nick, have you not been paying attention to what Russia has been saying - let alone doing?
But let me ask you a simple question: why do you evidently trust anything Russia, or Putin, says?
Labour lead unchanged at 23 points in latest YouGov poll for The Times
CON 22 (=) LAB 45 (=) LIB DEM 10 (+1) REF UK 11 (+1) GREEN 7 (=)
RefUK now up to 11% and in a clear 3rd place with Yougov and almost the same as the 12% UKIP got in 2015 when Lord Dave last led the Tories at a general election
"In this The Economist/YouGov poll from December 2-5, 20% of young adults slightly (12%) or strongly (8%) agreed with the statement "the Holocaust is a myth".
Another THIRTY percent of young people neither agree nor disagree that "the Holocaust is a myth"
Which should give pause to those who think 18-29 year olds are more “enlightened” than older age cohorts.
We have enabled a Terrible Stupidity
I am going to agree with you on this point (and set aside the interminable rantings about whatever "woke" is this week).
I keep saying that the Tories have weaponised ignorance and stupidity. Ignorance is not an insult - we are all ignorant on a huge number of subjects we are aware of but have no idea how something works or why. That is why we go to see a doctor or a mechanic - because we are ignorant. Stupidity isn't new either - plenty of people are dumb. But most normal people knew the things they didn't know.
The new phenomena is "we've had enough of experts". Of my ignorant opinion somehow having equal (or higher) worth than expertise or facts. The right exploit this for votes - keep them ignorant and angry and they will vote for you.
Social media? A phenomenon. My bit of social media only does EVs and Tesla specifically. The number of times the same untruth is typed - or sometimes just pasted - is astonishing. The poster could find out the truth in 2 seconds. But does not. They know their truth and it has been cut up and fed to them to reinforce their ignorance.
No idea how we combat this. But the ignorance isn't "woke". Its been weaponised by the people who are against "woke".
Eventually, you will understand why Wokeness is pivotal, and you will agree with me
It will take you about 3 years, is my highly educated guess
People much brighter than you - eg Sam Altman of openAI (see below) - are nearly there already; people much stupider than you - sadly, an awful lot of people - will likely NEVER get there. Which is quite chilling
I don't accept your definition of woke - which is that of the right wing blob.
There is no definition of 'woke' - that is the brilliance of it being used as a right-wing slur.
This government is too woke apparently according to some but also, extreme left anti-semitism is woke.
Presumably by deduction this government is a government of extreme left anti-semitism, which may come as a surprise to Sunak and co.
I mean, do you really honestly not get it? How the Woke obsession with intersectionality and decolonialism leads the Jews being seen as an oppressor class, worthy of persecution, or at least unworthy of protection from persecution?
Is that honestly beyond your reasoning capacity?
If it is then I despair. Because you are not the stupidest on here
If you used only a modicum of your prodigious IQ to stop and think about this rather than funnelling the latest alt-right obsession you’d realise it’s really rather obvious. Many/most groups of people are both oppressors and oppressed.
Indeed I’d go so far as to say that’s a big part of the point of intersectionality. That being said, both you and I fall into the category where we are very much more oppressor than oppressed. I’m just a little less fragile about it.
The Harvard, MIT etc furore is a good example of another aspect of woke: that prejudice can often be institutionalised without any individual actively promoting such prejudice. Funnily enough that is what BLM argue, but you struggle to see that when it doesn’t accord with your particular biases.
I don't think that either you or Leon count as "oppressor" simply by virute of which group you belong to.
We are both part of a group live in and participate in a system that oppresses poor people in UK and much of the global south systematically. It’s not our fault, I don’t feel guilty, but we should be prepared to dismantle that system eg by promoting policies that benefit the global south at the expense of rich people in the UK.
A wealth tax hypothecated for international development would be a good example.
My own view is that international trade, and capitalism generally, have done a huge amount to reduce levels of poverty in the Global South. When I was born, 55% of the world’s population lived in absolute poverty, compared to 8% now.
It is difficult to understand why so many think the Holocaust is a myth. The only thing I can think of is that as time passes stuff becomes more historical and our knowledge of history generally becomes less as we go back in time. My children's knowledge of the second world war and the cold war is much less than mine but that is because one was very recent history for me and the other I lived through. However that explains lack of knowledge, not incorrect knowledge. If the only reference to the Holocaust is from deniers on the internet and many are so disinterested to then follow it up, maybe that explains it.
Briefly, there are very few women in prison in Norway, some are in mixed-sex prisons but not allowed to socalise with men beyond some voluntary joint sports etc., and conditions, as for men, are on the whole not bad.
We have 80,000+ prisoners. All but about 60 of them are coming out at some point. This pragmatic point alone should be enough (but isn't) to ensure that 100% of effort in prisons needs to go into making bad people less bad and more good. At the moment it is mostly a very expensive way of making bad people worse.
"In this The Economist/YouGov poll from December 2-5, 20% of young adults slightly (12%) or strongly (8%) agreed with the statement "the Holocaust is a myth".
Another THIRTY percent of young people neither agree nor disagree that "the Holocaust is a myth"
Which should give pause to those who think 18-29 year olds are more “enlightened” than older age cohorts.
We have enabled a Terrible Stupidity
I am going to agree with you on this point (and set aside the interminable rantings about whatever "woke" is this week).
I keep saying that the Tories have weaponised ignorance and stupidity. Ignorance is not an insult - we are all ignorant on a huge number of subjects we are aware of but have no idea how something works or why. That is why we go to see a doctor or a mechanic - because we are ignorant. Stupidity isn't new either - plenty of people are dumb. But most normal people knew the things they didn't know.
The new phenomena is "we've had enough of experts". Of my ignorant opinion somehow having equal (or higher) worth than expertise or facts. The right exploit this for votes - keep them ignorant and angry and they will vote for you.
Social media? A phenomenon. My bit of social media only does EVs and Tesla specifically. The number of times the same untruth is typed - or sometimes just pasted - is astonishing. The poster could find out the truth in 2 seconds. But does not. They know their truth and it has been cut up and fed to them to reinforce their ignorance.
No idea how we combat this. But the ignorance isn't "woke". Its been weaponised by the people who are against "woke".
Eventually, you will understand why Wokeness is pivotal, and you will agree with me
It will take you about 3 years, is my highly educated guess
People much brighter than you - eg Sam Altman of openAI (see below) - are nearly there already; people much stupider than you - sadly, an awful lot of people - will likely NEVER get there. Which is quite chilling
I still have not found a clear definition of "woke". It changes and adapts and shifts dependent on whatever the moral crisis is that the person shouting "woke" is unhappy about. This week its anti-semitism apparently.
QED. 3 years. Maybe 4
I've seen the nonsense you posted last night about the Baltics, I've upgraded you from a fucking appeaser to Putin's catamite.
Yes, that was clearly a joke: the reference to eastern Europe being mainly full of "hopping chickens" was a tiny tiny clue
Good morning, one and all! And in one post, we see clearly the effect of the cold light of day on a thought from the previous, slightly fuddled, night.
I wasn’t remotely drunk. As I’ve explained, Wegovy has halved - at least - my booze intake
I WAS trolling @Cicero which is probably bad and juvenile, but his earnest exhortations from Estonia do start to chafe, just a little
Noted about the drinking. I must, maybe, think about it. Cicero posts are infrequent, perhaps infrequent enough to warrant serious consideration. As opposed, perhaps, to yours, and maybe mine, which are perhaps too common to always be taken seriously.
That’s fair, and nicely phrased
The weird thing is that I generally lark about on here, or seek out arguments for the sake of it - ergo, much of what I say is chaff. But I am deadly earnest about Wokeness. I believe it is a mortal threat to the west and the enlightenment
I don’t like being the lone voice on this. It can get lonely. It would be SO much easier for me to ignore the issue or go along with everyone else and laugh it off, or whatever
But I can’t. Something wicked this way comes. it is what I honestly believe and I’ve thought about
it a lot - it is some modest relief that people in America are finally becoming aware of it - through this revelation of anti Semitism pervading academe and elsewhere
If you don’t like my comments about wokeness scroll past. But I won’t shut up about it because I deeply believe it is a terrible danger
Wokeness reminds me of two Viz comic strips. Firstly ‘The Modern Parents’ who captured the essence of woke about thirty years ago, and secondly ‘The Bottom Inspectors’ who were a type of hardline police/enforcers that found any flimsy excuse to punish/embarrass anyone who had stayed on the toilet too long/not wiped properly/ had the wrong colour pubes
It's interesting how Viz has gradually tacked left over the years. I'm sure they get most of the material for "The Male Online" from the usual suspects on here.
It is, as they say, not as funny as it used to be. It also sells about 6 copies online rather than 200,000 per issue
My Dad still gets it delivered and my Mum buys me the Annual for Christmas every year! She’d be horrified if she ever read it. To be honest I’ve not read it in about a decade, keep meaning to. In the 90s it was unmissable
"In this The Economist/YouGov poll from December 2-5, 20% of young adults slightly (12%) or strongly (8%) agreed with the statement "the Holocaust is a myth".
Another THIRTY percent of young people neither agree nor disagree that "the Holocaust is a myth"
Which should give pause to those who think 18-29 year olds are more “enlightened” than older age cohorts.
We have enabled a Terrible Stupidity
I am going to agree with you on this point (and set aside the interminable rantings about whatever "woke" is this week).
I keep saying that the Tories have weaponised ignorance and stupidity. Ignorance is not an insult - we are all ignorant on a huge number of subjects we are aware of but have no idea how something works or why. That is why we go to see a doctor or a mechanic - because we are ignorant. Stupidity isn't new either - plenty of people are dumb. But most normal people knew the things they didn't know.
The new phenomena is "we've had enough of experts". Of my ignorant opinion somehow having equal (or higher) worth than expertise or facts. The right exploit this for votes - keep them ignorant and angry and they will vote for you.
Social media? A phenomenon. My bit of social media only does EVs and Tesla specifically. The number of times the same untruth is typed - or sometimes just pasted - is astonishing. The poster could find out the truth in 2 seconds. But does not. They know their truth and it has been cut up and fed to them to reinforce their ignorance.
No idea how we combat this. But the ignorance isn't "woke". Its been weaponised by the people who are against "woke".
Eventually, you will understand why Wokeness is pivotal, and you will agree with me
It will take you about 3 years, is my highly educated guess
People much brighter than you - eg Sam Altman of openAI (see below) - are nearly there already; people much stupider than you - sadly, an awful lot of people - will likely NEVER get there. Which is quite chilling
I don't accept your definition of woke - which is that of the right wing blob.
There is no definition of 'woke' - that is the brilliance of it being used as a right-wing slur.
This government is too woke apparently according to some but also, extreme left anti-semitism is woke.
Presumably by deduction this government is a government of extreme left anti-semitism, which may come as a surprise to Sunak and co.
I mean, do you really honestly not get it? How the Woke obsession with intersectionality and decolonialism leads the Jews being seen as an oppressor class, worthy of persecution, or at least unworthy of protection from persecution?
Is that honestly beyond your reasoning capacity?
If it is then I despair. Because you are not the stupidest on here
If you used only a modicum of your prodigious IQ to stop and think about this rather than funnelling the latest alt-right obsession you’d realise it’s really rather obvious. Many/most groups of people are both oppressors and oppressed.
Indeed I’d go so far as to say that’s a big part of the point of intersectionality. That being said, both you and I fall into the category where we are very much more oppressor than oppressed. I’m just a little less fragile about it.
The Harvard, MIT etc furore is a good example of another aspect of woke: that prejudice can often be institutionalised without any individual actively promoting such prejudice. Funnily enough that is what BLM argue, but you struggle to see that when it doesn’t accord with your particular biases.
I don't think that either you or Leon count as "oppressor" simply by virute of which group you belong to.
We are both part of a group live in and participate in a system that oppresses poor people in UK and much of the global south systematically. It’s not our fault, I don’t feel guilty, but we should be prepared to dismantle that system eg by promoting policies that benefit the global south at the expense of rich people in the UK.
A wealth tax hypothecated for international development would be a good example.
My own view is that international trade, and capitalism generally, have done a huge amount to reduce levels of poverty in the Global South. When I was born, 55% of the world’s population lived in absolute poverty, compared to 8% now.
I’m just finishing off Frank Dikotter’s The Cultural Revolution - a fine book
Right into the late 70s the poverty in China was mindblowing. Dikotter describes a party official doing a rural tour and finding entire families sleeping on straw and bare earth, with their sole possessions “a few broken pots” - and then being told this was absolutely normal
Famine was widespread until about 1980. Even the students at Beijing University were horribly undernourished - the top university of the country
Then Deng allowed capitalism, and it swiftly lifted these 800m people out of despair and hunger. A modern miracle
"In this The Economist/YouGov poll from December 2-5, 20% of young adults slightly (12%) or strongly (8%) agreed with the statement "the Holocaust is a myth".
Another THIRTY percent of young people neither agree nor disagree that "the Holocaust is a myth"
Which should give pause to those who think 18-29 year olds are more “enlightened” than older age cohorts.
We have enabled a Terrible Stupidity
I am going to agree with you on this point (and set aside the interminable rantings about whatever "woke" is this week).
I keep saying that the Tories have weaponised ignorance and stupidity. Ignorance is not an insult - we are all ignorant on a huge number of subjects we are aware of but have no idea how something works or why. That is why we go to see a doctor or a mechanic - because we are ignorant. Stupidity isn't new either - plenty of people are dumb. But most normal people knew the things they didn't know.
The new phenomena is "we've had enough of experts". Of my ignorant opinion somehow having equal (or higher) worth than expertise or facts. The right exploit this for votes - keep them ignorant and angry and they will vote for you.
Social media? A phenomenon. My bit of social media only does EVs and Tesla specifically. The number of times the same untruth is typed - or sometimes just pasted - is astonishing. The poster could find out the truth in 2 seconds. But does not. They know their truth and it has been cut up and fed to them to reinforce their ignorance.
No idea how we combat this. But the ignorance isn't "woke". Its been weaponised by the people who are against "woke".
Eventually, you will understand why Wokeness is pivotal, and you will agree with me
It will take you about 3 years, is my highly educated guess
People much brighter than you - eg Sam Altman of openAI (see below) - are nearly there already; people much stupider than you - sadly, an awful lot of people - will likely NEVER get there. Which is quite chilling
I still have not found a clear definition of "woke". It changes and adapts and shifts dependent on whatever the moral crisis is that the person shouting "woke" is unhappy about. This week its anti-semitism apparently.
I gave you a working definition the other day - wait - oh here it is:
Woke = awoken = was applied initially to civil rights and the oppression, and the rising up, of in particular black Americans. It has since come to mean supporting any perceived oppressed community, a common version of which is the transgender community. Critically it supports these communities to the exclusion of others because it perceives of these issues as binary: the powerful vs the powerless. There are no shades of grey.
wrt anti-semitism, woke orthodoxy perceives Israel and the Jews not to be an oppressed community, moreover it believes Israel/the Jews to be doing a lot of oppressing right now, and throughout history. So in the vernacular, and as we see on the streets of our capitals, the left perceives the powerful to be Israel, while Hamas, or at least the ordinary decent Gazans, to be powerless and the latter group therefore to be supported and the former condemned. Remember this is a binary process there are no on the one hands arguments allowed.
The same rules as those which are used in particular by the left to protect the eg transgender community are the same ones that lead to condemnation of Israel and the Jews as an oppressing community.
And hence Harvard, MIT, Penn we saw the other day. And left-wing anti-semitism in general.
Your welcome.
We're this goes wrong is that "Woke Orthodoxy" doesn't exist. It is a fiction rather like The Protocols of The Elders of Zion.
Being Woke is about recognising structural injustices in societies, so there are as many different Woke interpretations of the world as individuals.
I consider Woke as a synonym for "enlightened". So it is Woke to be on both sides of the debate on Trans-rights. @Cyclefree is Woke to the sex-based violence and threat of violence against women, but it can also be Woke to oppose the structural discrimination against Trans people.
It's the intersection of this collision where "Intersectionality" becomes the central theme. It is a debate that needs to happen.
It is difficult to understand why so many think the Holocaust is a myth. The only thing I can think of is that as time passes stuff becomes more historical and our knowledge of history generally becomes less as we go back in time. My children's knowledge of the second world war and the cold war is much less than mine but that is because one was very recent history for me and the other I lived through. However that explains lack of knowledge, not incorrect knowledge. If the only reference to the Holocaust is from deniers on the internet and many are so disinterested to then follow it up, maybe that explains it.
There is a heck of a lot of disinformation online about this sort of thing. I won't let my son play online-only games because of some of the stuff friends of his openly say they are being told on gaming channels. From 'Ukraine is filled with Nazis' to openly anti-Semitic tropes. And if things like that get instilled young, they can be hard to dislodge. It's not just about grooming.
I fear gaming is a wide-open channel for disinformation, especially to the young.
I also think most of us would prefer it not to be true; that people could not be that beastly to one another.
Labour lead unchanged at 23 points in latest YouGov poll for The Times
CON 22 (=) LAB 45 (=) LIB DEM 10 (+1) REF UK 11 (+1) GREEN 7 (=)
RefUK now up to 11% and in a clear 3rd place with Yougov and almost the same as the 12% UKIP got in 2015 when Lord Dave last led the Tories at a general election
“Clear third place” i.e. moe tie with the Lib Dems. Christ.
It is difficult to understand why so many think the Holocaust is a myth. The only thing I can think of is that as time passes stuff becomes more historical and our knowledge of history generally becomes less as we go back in time. My children's knowledge of the second world war and the cold war is much less than mine but that is because one was very recent history for me and the other I lived through. However that explains lack of knowledge, not incorrect knowledge. If the only reference to the Holocaust is from deniers on the internet and many are so disinterested to then follow it up, maybe that explains it.
The effluxion of time. It is quite possible to write laudatory stuff about Napoleon. Indeed the Economist did so just recently.
“Public opinion is also deeply split on how to bring the war to an end, with 44 per cent of Ukrainians believing compromise is needed, vs 48 per cent who wish to continue fighting for victory.”
"In this The Economist/YouGov poll from December 2-5, 20% of young adults slightly (12%) or strongly (8%) agreed with the statement "the Holocaust is a myth".
Another THIRTY percent of young people neither agree nor disagree that "the Holocaust is a myth"
Which should give pause to those who think 18-29 year olds are more “enlightened” than older age cohorts.
We have enabled a Terrible Stupidity
I am going to agree with you on this point (and set aside the interminable rantings about whatever "woke" is this week).
I keep saying that the Tories have weaponised ignorance and stupidity. Ignorance is not an insult - we are all ignorant on a huge number of subjects we are aware of but have no idea how something works or why. That is why we go to see a doctor or a mechanic - because we are ignorant. Stupidity isn't new either - plenty of people are dumb. But most normal people knew the things they didn't know.
The new phenomena is "we've had enough of experts". Of my ignorant opinion somehow having equal (or higher) worth than expertise or facts. The right exploit this for votes - keep them ignorant and angry and they will vote for you.
Social media? A phenomenon. My bit of social media only does EVs and Tesla specifically. The number of times the same untruth is typed - or sometimes just pasted - is astonishing. The poster could find out the truth in 2 seconds. But does not. They know their truth and it has been cut up and fed to them to reinforce their ignorance.
No idea how we combat this. But the ignorance isn't "woke". Its been weaponised by the people who are against "woke".
Eventually, you will understand why Wokeness is pivotal, and you will agree with me
It will take you about 3 years, is my highly educated guess
People much brighter than you - eg Sam Altman of openAI (see below) - are nearly there already; people much stupider than you - sadly, an awful lot of people - will likely NEVER get there. Which is quite chilling
I still have not found a clear definition of "woke". It changes and adapts and shifts dependent on whatever the moral crisis is that the person shouting "woke" is unhappy about. This week its anti-semitism apparently.
I gave you a working definition the other day - wait - oh here it is:
Woke = awoken = was applied initially to civil rights and the oppression, and the rising up, of in particular black Americans. It has since come to mean supporting any perceived oppressed community, a common version of which is the transgender community. Critically it supports these communities to the exclusion of others because it perceives of these issues as binary: the powerful vs the powerless. There are no shades of grey.
wrt anti-semitism, woke orthodoxy perceives Israel and the Jews not to be an oppressed community, moreover it believes Israel/the Jews to be doing a lot of oppressing right now, and throughout history. So in the vernacular, and as we see on the streets of our capitals, the left perceives the powerful to be Israel, while Hamas, or at least the ordinary decent Gazans, to be powerless and the latter group therefore to be supported and the former condemned. Remember this is a binary process there are no on the one hands arguments allowed.
The same rules as those which are used in particular by the left to protect the eg transgender community are the same ones that lead to condemnation of Israel and the Jews as an oppressing community.
And hence Harvard, MIT, Penn we saw the other day. And left-wing anti-semitism in general.
Your welcome.
We're this goes wrong is that "Woke Orthodoxy" doesn't exist. It is a fiction rather like The Protocols of The Elders of Zion.
Being Woke is about recognising structural injustices in societies, so there are as many different Woke interpretations of the world as individuals.
I consider Woke as a synonym for "enlightened". So it is Woke to be on both sides of the debate on Trans-rights. @Cyclefree is Woke to the sex-based violence and threat of violence against women, but it can also be Woke to oppose the structural discrimination against Trans people.
It's the intersection of this collision where "Intersectionality" becomes the central theme. It is a debate that needs to happen.
This stuff is a stretch for you, isn’t it?
You’re good on other stuff tho, so don’t be disheartened
Off topic but @MightyAlex made a post last night that I didn't see until this morning and I wanted to mention it because it deserved a reply from me. He was disagreeing (sort of) with me and siding with @hyufd (sort of) and I thought it an excellent post, not least because I was posting something similar only a week or so previously, so it made me think twice about what I was arguing.
Also like to thank @hyufd for an excellent argument.
I do have a reply to square the circle and get myself out of my contradiction, but we have moved on from that argument now.
"In this The Economist/YouGov poll from December 2-5, 20% of young adults slightly (12%) or strongly (8%) agreed with the statement "the Holocaust is a myth".
Another THIRTY percent of young people neither agree nor disagree that "the Holocaust is a myth"
Which should give pause to those who think 18-29 year olds are more “enlightened” than older age cohorts.
We have enabled a Terrible Stupidity
I am going to agree with you on this point (and set aside the interminable rantings about whatever "woke" is this week).
I keep saying that the Tories have weaponised ignorance and stupidity. Ignorance is not an insult - we are all ignorant on a huge number of subjects we are aware of but have no idea how something works or why. That is why we go to see a doctor or a mechanic - because we are ignorant. Stupidity isn't new either - plenty of people are dumb. But most normal people knew the things they didn't know.
The new phenomena is "we've had enough of experts". Of my ignorant opinion somehow having equal (or higher) worth than expertise or facts. The right exploit this for votes - keep them ignorant and angry and they will vote for you.
Social media? A phenomenon. My bit of social media only does EVs and Tesla specifically. The number of times the same untruth is typed - or sometimes just pasted - is astonishing. The poster could find out the truth in 2 seconds. But does not. They know their truth and it has been cut up and fed to them to reinforce their ignorance.
No idea how we combat this. But the ignorance isn't "woke". Its been weaponised by the people who are against "woke".
Eventually, you will understand why Wokeness is pivotal, and you will agree with me
It will take you about 3 years, is my highly educated guess
People much brighter than you - eg Sam Altman of openAI (see below) - are nearly there already; people much stupider than you - sadly, an awful lot of people - will likely NEVER get there. Which is quite chilling
I don't accept your definition of woke - which is that of the right wing blob.
There is no definition of 'woke' - that is the brilliance of it being used as a right-wing slur.
This government is too woke apparently according to some but also, extreme left anti-semitism is woke.
Presumably by deduction this government is a government of extreme left anti-semitism, which may come as a surprise to Sunak and co.
I mean, do you really honestly not get it? How the Woke obsession with intersectionality and decolonialism leads the Jews being seen as an oppressor class, worthy of persecution, or at least unworthy of protection from persecution?
Is that honestly beyond your reasoning capacity?
If it is then I despair. Because you are not the stupidest on here
If you used only a modicum of your prodigious IQ to stop and think about this rather than funnelling the latest alt-right obsession you’d realise it’s really rather obvious. Many/most groups of people are both oppressors and oppressed.
Indeed I’d go so far as to say that’s a big part of the point of intersectionality. That being said, both you and I fall into the category where we are very much more oppressor than oppressed. I’m just a little less fragile about it.
The Harvard, MIT etc furore is a good example of another aspect of woke: that prejudice can often be institutionalised without any individual actively promoting such prejudice. Funnily enough that is what BLM argue, but you struggle to see that when it doesn’t accord with your particular biases.
I don't think that either you or Leon count as "oppressor" simply by virute of which group you belong to.
We are both part of a group live in and participate in a system that oppresses poor people in UK and much of the global south systematically. It’s not our fault, I don’t feel guilty, but we should be prepared to dismantle that system eg by promoting policies that benefit the global south at the expense of rich people in the UK.
A wealth tax hypothecated for international development would be a good example.
My own view is that international trade, and capitalism generally, have done a huge amount to reduce levels of poverty in the Global South. When I was born, 55% of the world’s population lived in absolute poverty, compared to 8% now.
Steven Pinker has got quite a few books out of this one. The best time to have ever been alive is right now, yet many political activists in the West act as if we have never been in a worse place financially and socially. The only better time to be born than today, is tomorrow.
“Public opinion is also deeply split on how to bring the war to an end, with 44 per cent of Ukrainians believing compromise is needed, vs 48 per cent who wish to continue fighting for victory.”
How do you seek peace with an enemy who doesn't want peace?
I don't think you do "seek peace". But you allow intermediaries to explore possibilities, while maintaining an absolutist front. I doubt if Putin thinks total conquest of Ukraine is now either possible or desirable, but what do I know? Finding out what he'd accept and what he'd concede is sensible. Conversely the Russians need to know if it's worth even thinking about a ceasefire or Zelensky really will fight for the last inch of the Donbas. Ignorance on both sides is just unhelpful in considering options.
Nick, have you not been paying attention to what Russia has been saying - let alone doing?
But let me ask you a simple question: why do you evidently trust anything Russia, or Putin, says?
I don't. But facts can be created on the ground to make a deal irreversible. For example, a conceivable deal would be a ceasefire on current lines and NATO troops guarding them as a permanent peacekeeping force. Eventually a deal could lead to recognition of Russian sovereignty in Crimea and Donbas and Ukrainian integration into NATO. There are loads of people on both sides who will say they'd never accept any of that, but it doesn't require trust (if we accept, as I think most people do, that Russia will not actually attack American troops and start WW3).
It's possible that either side (or both) are not up for any of that (yet). OK. But not allowing intermediaries to find out is a mistake, when the alternative is years of mass slaughter.
The Gender Recognition Act and GRCs are surely supposed to confer on recipients the same rights as those born with the sex matching the GRC confirmed gender, so I find the Dorrian judgement wholly unsurprising (and CF is a bit naughty with the mis-gendering in the numbered points). Point 5 seems odd, but is that due to CF not considering a lesbian trans woman to be a lesbian, for example?
The point of contention, for me, is the qualification for a GRC. You can have the status quo ante in England at least, with the period living in assumed gender required, which probably weeds out opportunist sex pests, but does require people genuinely trans to spend a prolonged period forced to use facilities not matching their gender - and likely open to abuse if e.g. a trans woman, living as a woman is forced into male toilets. Equally, I see potential problems with simple self-ID for a GRC and all the rights that confers - the Goodness Gracious Me being a Christian sketch comes to mind if it's that easy and I can see it's open to abuse (although I do think there's a middle ground where it's relatively easy for people to get a GRC, but requires e.g. no criminal record in problematic areas and some references from others, such as GP etc and also a time limit before being able to change back, for example, so it's not something done lightly. There's also the more extreme position, where you move to physical sex (i.e. sex organs present) either for segregation or - due to not generally checking tackle at the door to facilities - to obtaining a GRC - which would tend to remove abuse as I don't think many male rapists would consent to having their penises cut off just to get close to women - but that would also require genuinely trans people to spend potentially years waiting (and some, I expect, have perfectly legitimate reasons to never have an op).
Some of this is dealing in hypotheticals, anyway. How many people are actually asked to produce GRCs at present? Are there doormenpeople demanding them before access to toilets and changing rooms etc? It probably happens for prisons, I guess, but the numbers can't be huge and again considering the type of crime seems relevant in safeguarding.
TLDR: Genuinely trans people should have the right to live in their new gender in all respects, subject to some safeguards (and penalties for any abuse of those rights). There are issues with the existing GRC process in England and I do also have concerns about the proposed process in Scotland lacking some safeguards and potentially being open to abuse by a small minority.
The government's attempt to toughen up immigration legislation for Xmas had one reader keen to figure out precisely how many storylines in 2003's Love Actually would become impossible under 2023's new proposals.
Their assessment:
* Thomas Brodie-Sangster: Love interest is the dependant child of a non-EU citizen
* Liam Neeson: Claudia Schiffer is a non-UK citizen, so would need to earn £38K+
* Kris Marshall: Fine to go to America on holiday; couldn't bring his nymphomaniac models back permanently
* Laura Linney: Glassdoor has the current average salary for a graphic designer as £37,154 – so she'd fall below the required earning threshold
* Colin Firth: Leaving aside the post-Brexit complications of keeping a holiday home in France, his Portuguese fiancée wouldn't get leave to remain - and he'd struggle to get all his Christmas presents back through customs too.
Bill Nighy's platonic porn-watching bromance, Emma Thompson's cheating husband and Keira Knightley's stalker would all be free to carry on, as would sex-scene stand-ins Martin Freeman and Joanne Page.
That just leaves the Prime Minister who shags his catering staff. Something the current regime would probably also tolerate.
Labour lead unchanged at 23 points in latest YouGov poll for The Times
CON 22 (=) LAB 45 (=) LIB DEM 10 (+1) REF UK 11 (+1) GREEN 7 (=)
RefUK now up to 11% and in a clear 3rd place with Yougov and almost the same as the 12% UKIP got in 2015 when Lord Dave last led the Tories at a general election
Rounding is doing well in that poll. The net result is +2%, -0%. Or either SNP or some very minor parties have somehow conspired to lose 2% between them.
It is difficult to understand why so many think the Holocaust is a myth. The only thing I can think of is that as time passes stuff becomes more historical and our knowledge of history generally becomes less as we go back in time. My children's knowledge of the second world war and the cold war is much less than mine but that is because one was very recent history for me and the other I lived through. However that explains lack of knowledge, not incorrect knowledge. If the only reference to the Holocaust is from deniers on the internet and many are so disinterested to then follow it up, maybe that explains it.
The effluxion of time. It is quite possible to write laudatory stuff about Napoleon. Indeed the Economist did so just recently.
Aye - see also the Cromwellian conquest of Ireland and William's Harrying of the North. Eventually history becomes, well, history.
Labour lead unchanged at 23 points in latest YouGov poll for The Times
CON 22 (=) LAB 45 (=) LIB DEM 10 (+1) REF UK 11 (+1) GREEN 7 (=)
RefUK now up to 11% and in a clear 3rd place with Yougov and almost the same as the 12% UKIP got in 2015 when Lord Dave last led the Tories at a general election
“Clear third place” i.e. moe tie with the Lib Dems. Christ.
And see the very persuasive Peter Kellner article on RefUK support implying they are probably at closer to 4-5% max.
They aren't even managing to win any council byelections for heavens sake. Unlike the Lib Dems or indeed the Greens.
30% swing to Lib Dems overnight in Harpenden for example.
“Public opinion is also deeply split on how to bring the war to an end, with 44 per cent of Ukrainians believing compromise is needed, vs 48 per cent who wish to continue fighting for victory.”
How do you seek peace with an enemy who doesn't want peace?
I don't think you do "seek peace". But you allow intermediaries to explore possibilities, while maintaining an absolutist front. I doubt if Putin thinks total conquest of Ukraine is now either possible or desirable, but what do I know? Finding out what he'd accept and what he'd concede is sensible. Conversely the Russians need to know if it's worth even thinking about a ceasefire or Zelensky really will fight for the last inch of the Donbas. Ignorance on both sides is just unhelpful in considering options.
Nick, have you not been paying attention to what Russia has been saying - let alone doing?
But let me ask you a simple question: why do you evidently trust anything Russia, or Putin, says?
I don't. But facts can be created on the ground to make a deal irreversible. For example, a conceivable deal would be a ceasefire on current lines and NATO troops guarding them as a permanent peacekeeping force. Eventually a deal could lead to recognition of Russian sovereignty in Crimea and Donbas and Ukrainian integration into NATO. There are loads of people on both sides who will say they'd never accept any of that, but it doesn't require trust (if we accept, as I think most people do, that Russia will not actually attack American troops and start WW3).
It's possible that either side (or both) are not up for any of that (yet). OK. But not allowing intermediaries to find out is a mistake, when the alternative is years of mass slaughter.
And what happens when the US withdraws from NATO, which is probably about a 40-60 shot at the moment?
As long as Ukraine wants to continue the war, we need to support them as much as possible, and encourage the internal collapse of the Russian regime.
It is now more likely that the war will be ended by the collapse of the army, political system or society of one side or the other, than a battlefield breakthrough (though the latter, or a failed attempt at the latter, may lead to the former). See WWI for details.
Putin wants to restore the Russian empire. He will not stop at Kherson unless he is made to. Indeed, his regime is already making noises aimed at legitimising an attack on the Baltic states. Yes, they're in NATO, the EU and Eurozone. That will not stop him if he feels he can go again, any more than Munich sated Hitler. Or the abrogation of Munich when he occupied Prague and London and Paris stood by and looked away.
“Public opinion is also deeply split on how to bring the war to an end, with 44 per cent of Ukrainians believing compromise is needed, vs 48 per cent who wish to continue fighting for victory.”
How do you seek peace with an enemy who doesn't want peace?
I don't think you do "seek peace". But you allow intermediaries to explore possibilities, while maintaining an absolutist front. I doubt if Putin thinks total conquest of Ukraine is now either possible or desirable, but what do I know? Finding out what he'd accept and what he'd concede is sensible. Conversely the Russians need to know if it's worth even thinking about a ceasefire or Zelensky really will fight for the last inch of the Donbas. Ignorance on both sides is just unhelpful in considering options.
Nick, have you not been paying attention to what Russia has been saying - let alone doing?
But let me ask you a simple question: why do you evidently trust anything Russia, or Putin, says?
I don't. But facts can be created on the ground to make a deal irreversible. For example, a conceivable deal would be a ceasefire on current lines and NATO troops guarding them as a permanent peacekeeping force. Eventually a deal could lead to recognition of Russian sovereignty in Crimea and Donbas and Ukrainian integration into NATO. There are loads of people on both sides who will say they'd never accept any of that, but it doesn't require trust (if we accept, as I think most people do, that Russia will not actually attack American troops and start WW3).
It's possible that either side (or both) are not up for any of that (yet). OK. But not allowing intermediaries to find out is a mistake, when the alternative is years of mass slaughter.
"But facts can be created on the ground to make a deal irreversible. "
We tried that before, with the guarantees of the Budapest Memorandum and others. And they were not worth the paper they were written on. Putin knows that, and sees the west's weakness now. He'd also know that he stands a good chance of destroying NATO through political means - e.g. through Trump - and therefore he just needs to bide his time.
Remember you reaction to this war? That we 'poked' Russia into the invasion; that it was all 'our' fault? Putin will just rebuild his military, await a moment of weakness in the west, and generate excuses which many in the west - sadly probably including you - will suck up and regurgitate. Because it's our fault, and not Putin's evil.
Russia is currently a rogue nation. Your 'solution' above would in no way encourage them to change that status.
“Public opinion is also deeply split on how to bring the war to an end, with 44 per cent of Ukrainians believing compromise is needed, vs 48 per cent who wish to continue fighting for victory.”
How do you seek peace with an enemy who doesn't want peace?
I don't think you do "seek peace". But you allow intermediaries to explore possibilities, while maintaining an absolutist front. I doubt if Putin thinks total conquest of Ukraine is now either possible or desirable, but what do I know? Finding out what he'd accept and what he'd concede is sensible. Conversely the Russians need to know if it's worth even thinking about a ceasefire or Zelensky really will fight for the last inch of the Donbas. Ignorance on both sides is just unhelpful in considering options.
Nick, have you not been paying attention to what Russia has been saying - let alone doing?
But let me ask you a simple question: why do you evidently trust anything Russia, or Putin, says?
I don't. But facts can be created on the ground to make a deal irreversible. For example, a conceivable deal would be a ceasefire on current lines and NATO troops guarding them as a permanent peacekeeping force. Eventually a deal could lead to recognition of Russian sovereignty in Crimea and Donbas and Ukrainian integration into NATO. There are loads of people on both sides who will say they'd never accept any of that, but it doesn't require trust (if we accept, as I think most people do, that Russia will not actually attack American troops and start WW3).
It's possible that either side (or both) are not up for any of that (yet). OK. But not allowing intermediaries to find out is a mistake, when the alternative is years of mass slaughter.
"But facts can be created on the ground to make a deal irreversible. "
We tried that before, with the guarantees of the Budapest Memorandum and others. And they were not worth the paper they were written on. Putin knows that, and sees the west's weakness now. He'd also know that he stands a good chance of destroying NATO through political means - e.g. through Trump - and therefore he just needs to bide his time.
Remember you reaction to this war? That we 'poked' Russia into the invasion; that it was all 'our' fault? Putin will just rebuild his military, await a moment of weakness in the west, and generate excuses which many in the west - sadly probably including you - will suck up and regurgitate. Because it's our fault, and not Putin's evil.
Russia is currently a rogue nation. Your 'solution' above would in no way encourage them to change that status.
An Afghanistan-style failure might.
We did Poke the Bear
This does not exculpate Putin, but we did extend NATO right to the Russian border (in the Baltics) and we tried to bring Ukraine into the western orbit
Would the USA accept Mexico joining a Chinese military alliance?
"The most curious consequence is how the Court has effectively rewritten the definition of sexual orientation in the EA. Any association based on sexual orientation linked to same sex attraction is also now unlawful in Scotland if it numbers more than 24. Bluntly, rights which lesbians and gay men had a year ago – to associate with each other only on the basis of their sexual orientation – have been lost."
This all seems very niche. My flat at 55 Old Compton Street was directly opposite The Admiral Duncan which was number 54. I'd arranged to meet a client from Beirut who I was working with the following day.
This particular evening there was a bouncer on the door
"Sorry mate gays only" He said
I asked him if he was joking.
"Not joking" he said "We're turning it into a gay pub so we're keeping straights out. it's only for a month and after that it'll be gay and then anyone can come in"
I told him I'd arranged to meet a colleague here.
"Is he gay?" he asked
I said I didn't know but I didn't think so.
'Well go and take a look inside and if he isn't there give me his name and I'll redirect him to wherever you want"
Weird I know looking back but at least it didn't involve lawyers
"In this The Economist/YouGov poll from December 2-5, 20% of young adults slightly (12%) or strongly (8%) agreed with the statement "the Holocaust is a myth".
Another THIRTY percent of young people neither agree nor disagree that "the Holocaust is a myth"
Which should give pause to those who think 18-29 year olds are more “enlightened” than older age cohorts.
We have enabled a Terrible Stupidity
I am going to agree with you on this point (and set aside the interminable rantings about whatever "woke" is this week).
I keep saying that the Tories have weaponised ignorance and stupidity. Ignorance is not an insult - we are all ignorant on a huge number of subjects we are aware of but have no idea how something works or why. That is why we go to see a doctor or a mechanic - because we are ignorant. Stupidity isn't new either - plenty of people are dumb. But most normal people knew the things they didn't know.
The new phenomena is "we've had enough of experts". Of my ignorant opinion somehow having equal (or higher) worth than expertise or facts. The right exploit this for votes - keep them ignorant and angry and they will vote for you.
Social media? A phenomenon. My bit of social media only does EVs and Tesla specifically. The number of times the same untruth is typed - or sometimes just pasted - is astonishing. The poster could find out the truth in 2 seconds. But does not. They know their truth and it has been cut up and fed to them to reinforce their ignorance.
No idea how we combat this. But the ignorance isn't "woke". Its been weaponised by the people who are against "woke".
Eventually, you will understand why Wokeness is pivotal, and you will agree with me
It will take you about 3 years, is my highly educated guess
People much brighter than you - eg Sam Altman of openAI (see below) - are nearly there already; people much stupider than you - sadly, an awful lot of people - will likely NEVER get there. Which is quite chilling
I don't accept your definition of woke - which is that of the right wing blob.
There is no definition of 'woke' - that is the brilliance of it being used as a right-wing slur.
This government is too woke apparently according to some but also, extreme left anti-semitism is woke.
Presumably by deduction this government is a government of extreme left anti-semitism, which may come as a surprise to Sunak and co.
I mean, do you really honestly not get it? How the Woke obsession with intersectionality and decolonialism leads the Jews being seen as an oppressor class, worthy of persecution, or at least unworthy of protection from persecution?
Is that honestly beyond your reasoning capacity?
If it is then I despair. Because you are not the stupidest on here
No, you don't get it. If 'woke' means anything - which it probably doesn't now idiots like you have adopted it as a term of right wing abuse - it means being alive to the reality of groups other than your own. That, of course, includes Jewish people.
What you are critiquing isn't woke at all.
What do you call people who follow that path to anti-semitism?
Anti semites
Sure.
But we need a way to classify them separately from Stephen Christopher Yaxley-Lennon & chums. The cause of their anti-semitism is different, and the methods for dealing with it are different.
“Public opinion is also deeply split on how to bring the war to an end, with 44 per cent of Ukrainians believing compromise is needed, vs 48 per cent who wish to continue fighting for victory.”
How do you seek peace with an enemy who doesn't want peace?
I don't think you do "seek peace". But you allow intermediaries to explore possibilities, while maintaining an absolutist front. I doubt if Putin thinks total conquest of Ukraine is now either possible or desirable, but what do I know? Finding out what he'd accept and what he'd concede is sensible. Conversely the Russians need to know if it's worth even thinking about a ceasefire or Zelensky really will fight for the last inch of the Donbas. Ignorance on both sides is just unhelpful in considering options.
Nick, have you not been paying attention to what Russia has been saying - let alone doing?
But let me ask you a simple question: why do you evidently trust anything Russia, or Putin, says?
I don't. But facts can be created on the ground to make a deal irreversible. For example, a conceivable deal would be a ceasefire on current lines and NATO troops guarding them as a permanent peacekeeping force. Eventually a deal could lead to recognition of Russian sovereignty in Crimea and Donbas and Ukrainian integration into NATO. There are loads of people on both sides who will say they'd never accept any of that, but it doesn't require trust (if we accept, as I think most people do, that Russia will not actually attack American troops and start WW3).
It's possible that either side (or both) are not up for any of that (yet). OK. But not allowing intermediaries to find out is a mistake, when the alternative is years of mass slaughter.
"But facts can be created on the ground to make a deal irreversible. "
We tried that before, with the guarantees of the Budapest Memorandum and others. And they were not worth the paper they were written on. Putin knows that, and sees the west's weakness now. He'd also know that he stands a good chance of destroying NATO through political means - e.g. through Trump - and therefore he just needs to bide his time.
Remember you reaction to this war? That we 'poked' Russia into the invasion; that it was all 'our' fault? Putin will just rebuild his military, await a moment of weakness in the west, and generate excuses which many in the west - sadly probably including you - will suck up and regurgitate. Because it's our fault, and not Putin's evil.
Russia is currently a rogue nation. Your 'solution' above would in no way encourage them to change that status.
An Afghanistan-style failure might.
And what about the pre war polling that the people actually living in the disputed regions didn’t want to be in Russia?
If ethnic cleansing and Facts On The Ground are good enough for Russia, why can’t Netenyau and chums do the same in the West Bank and Gaza? It will be For Peace.
“Public opinion is also deeply split on how to bring the war to an end, with 44 per cent of Ukrainians believing compromise is needed, vs 48 per cent who wish to continue fighting for victory.”
How do you seek peace with an enemy who doesn't want peace?
I don't think you do "seek peace". But you allow intermediaries to explore possibilities, while maintaining an absolutist front. I doubt if Putin thinks total conquest of Ukraine is now either possible or desirable, but what do I know? Finding out what he'd accept and what he'd concede is sensible. Conversely the Russians need to know if it's worth even thinking about a ceasefire or Zelensky really will fight for the last inch of the Donbas. Ignorance on both sides is just unhelpful in considering options.
Nick, have you not been paying attention to what Russia has been saying - let alone doing?
But let me ask you a simple question: why do you evidently trust anything Russia, or Putin, says?
I don't. But facts can be created on the ground to make a deal irreversible. For example, a conceivable deal would be a ceasefire on current lines and NATO troops guarding them as a permanent peacekeeping force. Eventually a deal could lead to recognition of Russian sovereignty in Crimea and Donbas and Ukrainian integration into NATO. There are loads of people on both sides who will say they'd never accept any of that, but it doesn't require trust (if we accept, as I think most people do, that Russia will not actually attack American troops and start WW3).
It's possible that either side (or both) are not up for any of that (yet). OK. But not allowing intermediaries to find out is a mistake, when the alternative is years of mass slaughter.
"But facts can be created on the ground to make a deal irreversible. "
We tried that before, with the guarantees of the Budapest Memorandum and others. And they were not worth the paper they were written on. Putin knows that, and sees the west's weakness now. He'd also know that he stands a good chance of destroying NATO through political means - e.g. through Trump - and therefore he just needs to bide his time.
Remember you reaction to this war? That we 'poked' Russia into the invasion; that it was all 'our' fault? Putin will just rebuild his military, await a moment of weakness in the west, and generate excuses which many in the west - sadly probably including you - will suck up and regurgitate. Because it's our fault, and not Putin's evil.
Russia is currently a rogue nation. Your 'solution' above would in no way encourage them to change that status.
An Afghanistan-style failure might.
Were facts on the ground actually created to make the Budapest Memorandum irreversible ? Didn't it fail precisely because the facts (Nuclear weapons) were taken away from Ukraine - the "facts on the ground" were a mirage.
When you don't trust a nation an inch, (heavily militarised) facts on the ground such as the Korean 38th parallel are precisely what ensures a long term peace/ceasefire.
The government's attempt to toughen up immigration legislation for Xmas had one reader keen to figure out precisely how many storylines in 2003's Love Actually would become impossible under 2023's new proposals.
Their assessment:
* Thomas Brodie-Sangster: Love interest is the dependant child of a non-EU citizen
* Liam Neeson: Claudia Schiffer is a non-UK citizen, so would need to earn £38K+
* Kris Marshall: Fine to go to America on holiday; couldn't bring his nymphomaniac models back permanently
* Laura Linney: Glassdoor has the current average salary for a graphic designer as £37,154 – so she'd fall below the required earning threshold
* Colin Firth: Leaving aside the post-Brexit complications of keeping a holiday home in France, his Portuguese fiancée wouldn't get leave to remain - and he'd struggle to get all his Christmas presents back through customs too.
Bill Nighy's platonic porn-watching bromance, Emma Thompson's cheating husband and Keira Knightley's stalker would all be free to carry on, as would sex-scene stand-ins Martin Freeman and Joanne Page.
That just leaves the Prime Minister who shags his catering staff. Something the current regime would probably also tolerate.
The upside I suppose would be that Alan Rickman’s German Secretary wouldn’t be working there so Emma Thompson wouldn’t have to play that miserable Joni Mitchell music, Thomas Brodie- Sangster’s character wouldn’t have spent years in juvenile detention for endangering airport security and Colin Firth would never have to be crushed a year later when his annoying sister in law moves in with him and Aurelie and ruins their relationship.
And Claudia Schiffer will probably just pass the income threshold.
“Public opinion is also deeply split on how to bring the war to an end, with 44 per cent of Ukrainians believing compromise is needed, vs 48 per cent who wish to continue fighting for victory.”
How do you seek peace with an enemy who doesn't want peace?
I don't think you do "seek peace". But you allow intermediaries to explore possibilities, while maintaining an absolutist front. I doubt if Putin thinks total conquest of Ukraine is now either possible or desirable, but what do I know? Finding out what he'd accept and what he'd concede is sensible. Conversely the Russians need to know if it's worth even thinking about a ceasefire or Zelensky really will fight for the last inch of the Donbas. Ignorance on both sides is just unhelpful in considering options.
Nick, have you not been paying attention to what Russia has been saying - let alone doing?
But let me ask you a simple question: why do you evidently trust anything Russia, or Putin, says?
I don't. But facts can be created on the ground to make a deal irreversible. For example, a conceivable deal would be a ceasefire on current lines and NATO troops guarding them as a permanent peacekeeping force. Eventually a deal could lead to recognition of Russian sovereignty in Crimea and Donbas and Ukrainian integration into NATO. There are loads of people on both sides who will say they'd never accept any of that, but it doesn't require trust (if we accept, as I think most people do, that Russia will not actually attack American troops and start WW3).
It's possible that either side (or both) are not up for any of that (yet). OK. But not allowing intermediaries to find out is a mistake, when the alternative is years of mass slaughter.
And what happens when the US withdraws from NATO, which is probably about a 40-60 shot at the moment?
As long as Ukraine wants to continue the war, we need to support them as much as possible, and encourage the internal collapse of the Russian regime.
It is now more likely that the war will be ended by the collapse of the army, political system or society of one side or the other, than a battlefield breakthrough (though the latter, or a failed attempt at the latter, may lead to the former). See WWI for details.
Putin wants to restore the Russian empire. He will not stop at Kherson unless he is made to. Indeed, his regime is already making noises aimed at legitimising an attack on the Baltic states. Yes, they're in NATO, the EU and Eurozone. That will not stop him if he feels he can go again, any more than Munich sated Hitler. Or the abrogation of Munich when he occupied Prague and London and Paris stood by and looked away.
I don't think government or military collapse on either side, though both sides have come close at times. I think the most likely outcome is a stalemate on pretty much the current lines. This is more or less what happened from 2014-22, albeit with intermittent skirmishes. Neither side has been able to shift the front line significantly since the fall of Kherson a year ago. Its 1916 not 1918.
"In this The Economist/YouGov poll from December 2-5, 20% of young adults slightly (12%) or strongly (8%) agreed with the statement "the Holocaust is a myth".
Another THIRTY percent of young people neither agree nor disagree that "the Holocaust is a myth"
Which should give pause to those who think 18-29 year olds are more “enlightened” than older age cohorts.
We have enabled a Terrible Stupidity
I am going to agree with you on this point (and set aside the interminable rantings about whatever "woke" is this week).
I keep saying that the Tories have weaponised ignorance and stupidity. Ignorance is not an insult - we are all ignorant on a huge number of subjects we are aware of but have no idea how something works or why. That is why we go to see a doctor or a mechanic - because we are ignorant. Stupidity isn't new either - plenty of people are dumb. But most normal people knew the things they didn't know.
The new phenomena is "we've had enough of experts". Of my ignorant opinion somehow having equal (or higher) worth than expertise or facts. The right exploit this for votes - keep them ignorant and angry and they will vote for you.
Social media? A phenomenon. My bit of social media only does EVs and Tesla specifically. The number of times the same untruth is typed - or sometimes just pasted - is astonishing. The poster could find out the truth in 2 seconds. But does not. They know their truth and it has been cut up and fed to them to reinforce their ignorance.
No idea how we combat this. But the ignorance isn't "woke". Its been weaponised by the people who are against "woke".
Eventually, you will understand why Wokeness is pivotal, and you will agree with me
It will take you about 3 years, is my highly educated guess
People much brighter than you - eg Sam Altman of openAI (see below) - are nearly there already; people much stupider than you - sadly, an awful lot of people - will likely NEVER get there. Which is quite chilling
I still have not found a clear definition of "woke". It changes and adapts and shifts dependent on whatever the moral crisis is that the person shouting "woke" is unhappy about. This week its anti-semitism apparently.
QED. 3 years. Maybe 4
What do you make of Donald Trump saying people who chanted 'Jews will not replace us' as very fine people?
I wonder why you never spammed PB about that particular brand of antisemitism.
It’s not very interesting though?
Most people realise that Trump is a deeply unpleasant man who is potentially very dangerous. I wasn’t aware that he is anti-Semitic but I am wholly unsurprised.
What would @Leon repeating that add to the debate?
"In this The Economist/YouGov poll from December 2-5, 20% of young adults slightly (12%) or strongly (8%) agreed with the statement "the Holocaust is a myth".
Another THIRTY percent of young people neither agree nor disagree that "the Holocaust is a myth"
Which should give pause to those who think 18-29 year olds are more “enlightened” than older age cohorts.
We have enabled a Terrible Stupidity
I am going to agree with you on this point (and set aside the interminable rantings about whatever "woke" is this week).
I keep saying that the Tories have weaponised ignorance and stupidity. Ignorance is not an insult - we are all ignorant on a huge number of subjects we are aware of but have no idea how something works or why. That is why we go to see a doctor or a mechanic - because we are ignorant. Stupidity isn't new either - plenty of people are dumb. But most normal people knew the things they didn't know.
The new phenomena is "we've had enough of experts". Of my ignorant opinion somehow having equal (or higher) worth than expertise or facts. The right exploit this for votes - keep them ignorant and angry and they will vote for you.
Social media? A phenomenon. My bit of social media only does EVs and Tesla specifically. The number of times the same untruth is typed - or sometimes just pasted - is astonishing. The poster could find out the truth in 2 seconds. But does not. They know their truth and it has been cut up and fed to them to reinforce their ignorance.
No idea how we combat this. But the ignorance isn't "woke". Its been weaponised by the people who are against "woke".
Eventually, you will understand why Wokeness is pivotal, and you will agree with me
It will take you about 3 years, is my highly educated guess
People much brighter than you - eg Sam Altman of openAI (see below) - are nearly there already; people much stupider than you - sadly, an awful lot of people - will likely NEVER get there. Which is quite chilling
I still have not found a clear definition of "woke". It changes and adapts and shifts dependent on whatever the moral crisis is that the person shouting "woke" is unhappy about. This week its anti-semitism apparently.
I gave you a working definition the other day - wait - oh here it is:
Woke = awoken = was applied initially to civil rights and the oppression, and the rising up, of in particular black Americans. It has since come to mean supporting any perceived oppressed community, a common version of which is the transgender community. Critically it supports these communities to the exclusion of others because it perceives of these issues as binary: the powerful vs the powerless. There are no shades of grey.
wrt anti-semitism, woke orthodoxy perceives Israel and the Jews not to be an oppressed community, moreover it believes Israel/the Jews to be doing a lot of oppressing right now, and throughout history. So in the vernacular, and as we see on the streets of our capitals, the left perceives the powerful to be Israel, while Hamas, or at least the ordinary decent Gazans, to be powerless and the latter group therefore to be supported and the former condemned. Remember this is a binary process there are no on the one hands arguments allowed.
The same rules as those which are used in particular by the left to protect the eg transgender community are the same ones that lead to condemnation of Israel and the Jews as an oppressing community.
And hence Harvard, MIT, Penn we saw the other day. And left-wing anti-semitism in general.
Your welcome.
We're this goes wrong is that "Woke Orthodoxy" doesn't exist. It is a fiction rather like The Protocols of The Elders of Zion.
Being Woke is about recognising structural injustices in societies, so there are as many different Woke interpretations of the world as individuals.
I consider Woke as a synonym for "enlightened". So it is Woke to be on both sides of the debate on Trans-rights. @Cyclefree is Woke to the sex-based violence and threat of violence against women, but it can also be Woke to oppose the structural discrimination against Trans people.
It's the intersection of this collision where "Intersectionality" becomes the central theme. It is a debate that needs to happen.
Topping is correct that "there are no shades of grey" - in his thinking. On the evidence of his comment, at least.
"In this The Economist/YouGov poll from December 2-5, 20% of young adults slightly (12%) or strongly (8%) agreed with the statement "the Holocaust is a myth".
Another THIRTY percent of young people neither agree nor disagree that "the Holocaust is a myth"
Which should give pause to those who think 18-29 year olds are more “enlightened” than older age cohorts.
We have enabled a Terrible Stupidity
I am going to agree with you on this point (and set aside the interminable rantings about whatever "woke" is this week).
I keep saying that the Tories have weaponised ignorance and stupidity. Ignorance is not an insult - we are all ignorant on a huge number of subjects we are aware of but have no idea how something works or why. That is why we go to see a doctor or a mechanic - because we are ignorant. Stupidity isn't new either - plenty of people are dumb. But most normal people knew the things they didn't know.
The new phenomena is "we've had enough of experts". Of my ignorant opinion somehow having equal (or higher) worth than expertise or facts. The right exploit this for votes - keep them ignorant and angry and they will vote for you.
Social media? A phenomenon. My bit of social media only does EVs and Tesla specifically. The number of times the same untruth is typed - or sometimes just pasted - is astonishing. The poster could find out the truth in 2 seconds. But does not. They know their truth and it has been cut up and fed to them to reinforce their ignorance.
No idea how we combat this. But the ignorance isn't "woke". Its been weaponised by the people who are against "woke".
Eventually, you will understand why Wokeness is pivotal, and you will agree with me
It will take you about 3 years, is my highly educated guess
People much brighter than you - eg Sam Altman of openAI (see below) - are nearly there already; people much stupider than you - sadly, an awful lot of people - will likely NEVER get there. Which is quite chilling
I still have not found a clear definition of "woke". It changes and adapts and shifts dependent on whatever the moral crisis is that the person shouting "woke" is unhappy about. This week its anti-semitism apparently.
QED. 3 years. Maybe 4
What do you make of Donald Trump saying people who chanted 'Jews will not replace us' as very fine people?
I wonder why you never spammed PB about that particular brand of antisemitism.
It’s not very interesting though?
Most people realise that Trump is a deeply unpleasant man who is potentially very dangerous. I wasn’t aware that he is anti-Semitic but I am wholly unsurprised.
What would @Leon repeating that add to the debate?
I’d be amazed if Trump is personally anti Semitic
He’s a narcissistic New York billionaire deal maker. He’s spent his whole life hanging out with Jews. I imagine he rather admires their business moxy and chutzpah. And he certainly didn’t mind chilling out with Epstein and Co
However he’s an amoral egomaniac and he’s quite capable of utilising anti Semitism if it suits him
"In this The Economist/YouGov poll from December 2-5, 20% of young adults slightly (12%) or strongly (8%) agreed with the statement "the Holocaust is a myth".
Another THIRTY percent of young people neither agree nor disagree that "the Holocaust is a myth"
Which should give pause to those who think 18-29 year olds are more “enlightened” than older age cohorts.
We have enabled a Terrible Stupidity
I am going to agree with you on this point (and set aside the interminable rantings about whatever "woke" is this week).
I keep saying that the Tories have weaponised ignorance and stupidity. Ignorance is not an insult - we are all ignorant on a huge number of subjects we are aware of but have no idea how something works or why. That is why we go to see a doctor or a mechanic - because we are ignorant. Stupidity isn't new either - plenty of people are dumb. But most normal people knew the things they didn't know.
The new phenomena is "we've had enough of experts". Of my ignorant opinion somehow having equal (or higher) worth than expertise or facts. The right exploit this for votes - keep them ignorant and angry and they will vote for you.
Social media? A phenomenon. My bit of social media only does EVs and Tesla specifically. The number of times the same untruth is typed - or sometimes just pasted - is astonishing. The poster could find out the truth in 2 seconds. But does not. They know their truth and it has been cut up and fed to them to reinforce their ignorance.
No idea how we combat this. But the ignorance isn't "woke". Its been weaponised by the people who are against "woke".
Eventually, you will understand why Wokeness is pivotal, and you will agree with me
It will take you about 3 years, is my highly educated guess
People much brighter than you - eg Sam Altman of openAI (see below) - are nearly there already; people much stupider than you - sadly, an awful lot of people - will likely NEVER get there. Which is quite chilling
I still have not found a clear definition of "woke". It changes and adapts and shifts dependent on whatever the moral crisis is that the person shouting "woke" is unhappy about. This week its anti-semitism apparently.
I gave you a working definition the other day - wait - oh here it is:
Woke = awoken = was applied initially to civil rights and the oppression, and the rising up, of in particular black Americans. It has since come to mean supporting any perceived oppressed community, a common version of which is the transgender community. Critically it supports these communities to the exclusion of others because it perceives of these issues as binary: the powerful vs the powerless. There are no shades of grey.
wrt anti-semitism, woke orthodoxy perceives Israel and the Jews not to be an oppressed community, moreover it believes Israel/the Jews to be doing a lot of oppressing right now, and throughout history. So in the vernacular, and as we see on the streets of our capitals, the left perceives the powerful to be Israel, while Hamas, or at least the ordinary decent Gazans, to be powerless and the latter group therefore to be supported and the former condemned. Remember this is a binary process there are no on the one hands arguments allowed.
The same rules as those which are used in particular by the left to protect the eg transgender community are the same ones that lead to condemnation of Israel and the Jews as an oppressing community.
And hence Harvard, MIT, Penn we saw the other day. And left-wing anti-semitism in general.
Your welcome.
We're this goes wrong is that "Woke Orthodoxy" doesn't exist. It is a fiction rather like The Protocols of The Elders of Zion.
Being Woke is about recognising structural injustices in societies, so there are as many different Woke interpretations of the world as individuals.
I consider Woke as a synonym for "enlightened". So it is Woke to be on both sides of the debate on Trans-rights. @Cyclefree is Woke to the sex-based violence and threat of violence against women, but it can also be Woke to oppose the structural discrimination against Trans people.
It's the intersection of this collision where "Intersectionality" becomes the central theme. It is a debate that needs to happen.
I know woke doesn't exist. I always used to say for an explanation of "woke" simply subsitute "political correctness gone mad". And as such it defies definition.
But a phenomenon does exist as we are seeing as I said on the streets of global capitals right now. Call it want you want but my reading (awoken, powerless, etc) I believe is workable (wokable?).
I mean something is happening and sometimes it's useful to group activities under a common umbrella term.
Off topic but @MightyAlex made a post last night that I didn't see until this morning and I wanted to mention it because it deserved a reply from me. He was disagreeing (sort of) with me and siding with @hyufd (sort of) and I thought it an excellent post, not least because I was posting something similar only a week or so previously, so it made me think twice about what I was arguing.
Also like to thank @hyufd for an excellent argument.
I do have a reply to square the circle and get myself out of my contradiction, but we have moved on from that argument now.
Aye, excellent post - and very true. A colleague of mine made Prof in relatively short order due in large part to a lucky* break in funding (essentially a charity she'd worked with decided to go big on research and funded her from lecturer to Prof over about five years). Now, she is an excellent academic and would no doubt have succeeded anyway, but it would have taken longer through multiple research grants to NIHR etc. She actually forced the Uni's hand a bit on the Prof thing anyway, having secured an offer of a chair elsewhere contingent on bringing her substantial charity funding - the Uni promoted (maybe slightly early, but only by a year or two) rather than lose her.
Re HYUFD, I started a reply his post last night, with the word "Bollocks" starting off, but never finished it. Needless to say I agree with what you and Carnyx were saying and, apart from anything else, we'd also lose the bright young British post-docs who start relationships with foreign PhD students and where they would both be free to both work in other countries but not here.
*she also made her own luck, of course - the charity were sufficiently impressed with her past work to be willing to bet big on her over five years, but it required the alignment of healthy charity finances and a CEO with a strong belief in the value of research beyond their core activities
"In this The Economist/YouGov poll from December 2-5, 20% of young adults slightly (12%) or strongly (8%) agreed with the statement "the Holocaust is a myth".
Another THIRTY percent of young people neither agree nor disagree that "the Holocaust is a myth"
Which should give pause to those who think 18-29 year olds are more “enlightened” than older age cohorts.
We have enabled a Terrible Stupidity
I am going to agree with you on this point (and set aside the interminable rantings about whatever "woke" is this week).
I keep saying that the Tories have weaponised ignorance and stupidity. Ignorance is not an insult - we are all ignorant on a huge number of subjects we are aware of but have no idea how something works or why. That is why we go to see a doctor or a mechanic - because we are ignorant. Stupidity isn't new either - plenty of people are dumb. But most normal people knew the things they didn't know.
The new phenomena is "we've had enough of experts". Of my ignorant opinion somehow having equal (or higher) worth than expertise or facts. The right exploit this for votes - keep them ignorant and angry and they will vote for you.
Social media? A phenomenon. My bit of social media only does EVs and Tesla specifically. The number of times the same untruth is typed - or sometimes just pasted - is astonishing. The poster could find out the truth in 2 seconds. But does not. They know their truth and it has been cut up and fed to them to reinforce their ignorance.
No idea how we combat this. But the ignorance isn't "woke". Its been weaponised by the people who are against "woke".
Eventually, you will understand why Wokeness is pivotal, and you will agree with me
It will take you about 3 years, is my highly educated guess
People much brighter than you - eg Sam Altman of openAI (see below) - are nearly there already; people much stupider than you - sadly, an awful lot of people - will likely NEVER get there. Which is quite chilling
I still have not found a clear definition of "woke". It changes and adapts and shifts dependent on whatever the moral crisis is that the person shouting "woke" is unhappy about. This week its anti-semitism apparently.
I gave you a working definition the other day - wait - oh here it is:
Woke = awoken = was applied initially to civil rights and the oppression, and the rising up, of in particular black Americans. It has since come to mean supporting any perceived oppressed community, a common version of which is the transgender community. Critically it supports these communities to the exclusion of others because it perceives of these issues as binary: the powerful vs the powerless. There are no shades of grey.
wrt anti-semitism, woke orthodoxy perceives Israel and the Jews not to be an oppressed community, moreover it believes Israel/the Jews to be doing a lot of oppressing right now, and throughout history. So in the vernacular, and as we see on the streets of our capitals, the left perceives the powerful to be Israel, while Hamas, or at least the ordinary decent Gazans, to be powerless and the latter group therefore to be supported and the former condemned. Remember this is a binary process there are no on the one hands arguments allowed.
The same rules as those which are used in particular by the left to protect the eg transgender community are the same ones that lead to condemnation of Israel and the Jews as an oppressing community.
And hence Harvard, MIT, Penn we saw the other day. And left-wing anti-semitism in general.
Your welcome.
We're this goes wrong is that "Woke Orthodoxy" doesn't exist. It is a fiction rather like The Protocols of The Elders of Zion.
Being Woke is about recognising structural injustices in societies, so there are as many different Woke interpretations of the world as individuals.
I consider Woke as a synonym for "enlightened". So it is Woke to be on both sides of the debate on Trans-rights. @Cyclefree is Woke to the sex-based violence and threat of violence against women, but it can also be Woke to oppose the structural discrimination against Trans people.
It's the intersection of this collision where "Intersectionality" becomes the central theme. It is a debate that needs to happen.
I know woke doesn't exist. I always used to say for an explanation of "woke" simply subsitute "political correctness gone mad". And as such it defies definition.
But a phenomenon does exist as we are seeing as I said on the streets of global capitals right now. Call it want you want but my reading (awoken, powerless, etc) I believe is workable (wokable?).
I mean something is happening and sometimes it's useful to group activities under a common umbrella term.
Woke is very similar to Fascism in this respect. Notoriously hard to pin down precisely, there is no one foundational text - unlike Marxism, Christianity or Islam - it is more a constellation of beliefs that cohere in a certain way
As Fascism did, disastrously, in 20th century Europe
"In this The Economist/YouGov poll from December 2-5, 20% of young adults slightly (12%) or strongly (8%) agreed with the statement "the Holocaust is a myth".
Another THIRTY percent of young people neither agree nor disagree that "the Holocaust is a myth"
Which should give pause to those who think 18-29 year olds are more “enlightened” than older age cohorts.
We have enabled a Terrible Stupidity
I am going to agree with you on this point (and set aside the interminable rantings about whatever "woke" is this week).
I keep saying that the Tories have weaponised ignorance and stupidity. Ignorance is not an insult - we are all ignorant on a huge number of subjects we are aware of but have no idea how something works or why. That is why we go to see a doctor or a mechanic - because we are ignorant. Stupidity isn't new either - plenty of people are dumb. But most normal people knew the things they didn't know.
The new phenomena is "we've had enough of experts". Of my ignorant opinion somehow having equal (or higher) worth than expertise or facts. The right exploit this for votes - keep them ignorant and angry and they will vote for you.
Social media? A phenomenon. My bit of social media only does EVs and Tesla specifically. The number of times the same untruth is typed - or sometimes just pasted - is astonishing. The poster could find out the truth in 2 seconds. But does not. They know their truth and it has been cut up and fed to them to reinforce their ignorance.
No idea how we combat this. But the ignorance isn't "woke". Its been weaponised by the people who are against "woke".
Eventually, you will understand why Wokeness is pivotal, and you will agree with me
It will take you about 3 years, is my highly educated guess
People much brighter than you - eg Sam Altman of openAI (see below) - are nearly there already; people much stupider than you - sadly, an awful lot of people - will likely NEVER get there. Which is quite chilling
I don't accept your definition of woke - which is that of the right wing blob.
There is no definition of 'woke' - that is the brilliance of it being used as a right-wing slur.
This government is too woke apparently according to some but also, extreme left anti-semitism is woke.
Presumably by deduction this government is a government of extreme left anti-semitism, which may come as a surprise to Sunak and co.
I mean, do you really honestly not get it? How the Woke obsession with intersectionality and decolonialism leads the Jews being seen as an oppressor class, worthy of persecution, or at least unworthy of protection from persecution?
Is that honestly beyond your reasoning capacity?
If it is then I despair. Because you are not the stupidest on here
No, you don't get it.
If 'woke' means anything - which it probably doesn't now idiots like you have adopted it as a term of right wing abuse - it means being alive to the reality of groups other than your own. That, of course, includes Jewish people.
What you are critiquing isn't woke at all.
I think it’s slightly stronger than that.
It’s looking at society not as being made up as individuals (the “true” liberal approach) or as a cohesive whole (the whiggish approach).
Instead it groups people into categories based on a single criteria (eg you are a white heterosexual male, you are gay, you are Muslim, you are black, etc) while ignoring the inevitable overlaps between categories.
It then ranks and orders the categories as a basis for policy rather than looking at topics based on individual merits.
That’s why you end up with things like a tolerance for what often veers into anti-semitism (vs opposition to the government of Israel) because “Jews” as a category are viewed as relatively undeserving
It’s a faulty intellectual framework with divisive and damaging real world consequences
“Public opinion is also deeply split on how to bring the war to an end, with 44 per cent of Ukrainians believing compromise is needed, vs 48 per cent who wish to continue fighting for victory.”
How do you seek peace with an enemy who doesn't want peace?
I don't think you do "seek peace". But you allow intermediaries to explore possibilities, while maintaining an absolutist front. I doubt if Putin thinks total conquest of Ukraine is now either possible or desirable, but what do I know? Finding out what he'd accept and what he'd concede is sensible. Conversely the Russians need to know if it's worth even thinking about a ceasefire or Zelensky really will fight for the last inch of the Donbas. Ignorance on both sides is just unhelpful in considering options.
Nick, have you not been paying attention to what Russia has been saying - let alone doing?
But let me ask you a simple question: why do you evidently trust anything Russia, or Putin, says?
I don't. But facts can be created on the ground to make a deal irreversible. For example, a conceivable deal would be a ceasefire on current lines and NATO troops guarding them as a permanent peacekeeping force. Eventually a deal could lead to recognition of Russian sovereignty in Crimea and Donbas and Ukrainian integration into NATO. There are loads of people on both sides who will say they'd never accept any of that, but it doesn't require trust (if we accept, as I think most people do, that Russia will not actually attack American troops and start WW3).
It's possible that either side (or both) are not up for any of that (yet). OK. But not allowing intermediaries to find out is a mistake, when the alternative is years of mass slaughter.
"But facts can be created on the ground to make a deal irreversible. "
We tried that before, with the guarantees of the Budapest Memorandum and others. And they were not worth the paper they were written on. Putin knows that, and sees the west's weakness now. He'd also know that he stands a good chance of destroying NATO through political means - e.g. through Trump - and therefore he just needs to bide his time.
Remember you reaction to this war? That we 'poked' Russia into the invasion; that it was all 'our' fault? Putin will just rebuild his military, await a moment of weakness in the west, and generate excuses which many in the west - sadly probably including you - will suck up and regurgitate. Because it's our fault, and not Putin's evil.
Russia is currently a rogue nation. Your 'solution' above would in no way encourage them to change that status.
An Afghanistan-style failure might.
And what about the pre war polling that the people actually living in the disputed regions didn’t want to be in Russia?
If ethnic cleansing and Facts On The Ground are good enough for Russia, why can’t Netenyau and chums do the same in the West Bank and Gaza? It will be For Peace.
It's far easier for Israel to create the 'facts' compared to either Ukraine or Russia.
Outwith the rights or wrongs of either conflict the facts are:
i) Hamas, whatever else it is is not a proper military force. The potential warfare there is entirely asymmetric. ii) Any Gaza line is orders of magnitude smaller than the Russia/Ukraine front line. iii) Although Palestine "wins" votes in the UN quite frequently, nations that vote in favour don't have the means, or if they do have the means (China) aren't going to get involved against Israel - whereas every US president and would be president falls over themselves to be seen to and supporting Israel as much as possible; and the US is still THE global superpower in military terms.
“Public opinion is also deeply split on how to bring the war to an end, with 44 per cent of Ukrainians believing compromise is needed, vs 48 per cent who wish to continue fighting for victory.”
"In this The Economist/YouGov poll from December 2-5, 20% of young adults slightly (12%) or strongly (8%) agreed with the statement "the Holocaust is a myth".
Another THIRTY percent of young people neither agree nor disagree that "the Holocaust is a myth"
Which should give pause to those who think 18-29 year olds are more “enlightened” than older age cohorts.
We have enabled a Terrible Stupidity
I am going to agree with you on this point (and set aside the interminable rantings about whatever "woke" is this week).
I keep saying that the Tories have weaponised ignorance and stupidity. Ignorance is not an insult - we are all ignorant on a huge number of subjects we are aware of but have no idea how something works or why. That is why we go to see a doctor or a mechanic - because we are ignorant. Stupidity isn't new either - plenty of people are dumb. But most normal people knew the things they didn't know.
The new phenomena is "we've had enough of experts". Of my ignorant opinion somehow having equal (or higher) worth than expertise or facts. The right exploit this for votes - keep them ignorant and angry and they will vote for you.
Social media? A phenomenon. My bit of social media only does EVs and Tesla specifically. The number of times the same untruth is typed - or sometimes just pasted - is astonishing. The poster could find out the truth in 2 seconds. But does not. They know their truth and it has been cut up and fed to them to reinforce their ignorance.
No idea how we combat this. But the ignorance isn't "woke". Its been weaponised by the people who are against "woke".
Eventually, you will understand why Wokeness is pivotal, and you will agree with me
It will take you about 3 years, is my highly educated guess
People much brighter than you - eg Sam Altman of openAI (see below) - are nearly there already; people much stupider than you - sadly, an awful lot of people - will likely NEVER get there. Which is quite chilling
I don't accept your definition of woke - which is that of the right wing blob.
There is no definition of 'woke' - that is the brilliance of it being used as a right-wing slur.
This government is too woke apparently according to some but also, extreme left anti-semitism is woke.
Presumably by deduction this government is a government of extreme left anti-semitism, which may come as a surprise to Sunak and co.
I mean, do you really honestly not get it? How the Woke obsession with intersectionality and decolonialism leads the Jews being seen as an oppressor class, worthy of persecution, or at least unworthy of protection from persecution?
Is that honestly beyond your reasoning capacity?
If it is then I despair. Because you are not the stupidest on here
If you used only a modicum of your prodigious IQ to stop and think about this rather than funnelling the latest alt-right obsession you’d realise it’s really rather obvious. Many/most groups of people are both oppressors and oppressed.
Indeed I’d go so far as to say that’s a big part of the point of intersectionality. That being said, both you and I fall into the category where we are very much more oppressor than oppressed. I’m just a little less fragile about it.
The Harvard, MIT etc furore is a good example of another aspect of woke: that prejudice can often be institutionalised without any individual actively promoting such prejudice. Funnily enough that is what BLM argue, but you struggle to see that when it doesn’t accord with your particular biases.
Interesting but irrelevant. We are way beyond all that now
Not true. The part of the Jewish community pushing for genocide in Gaza are both oppressor and oppressed. Jews are not an oppressor class, but some Jews are oppressors.
Though I would definitely concede that more people than I thought consider Jews in general as responsible for Israel’s fascism. That’s deeply worrying, but doesn’t follow from intersectionality and decolonialism. It follows from stupidity and ignorance.
Both you and TOPPING fall into the trap of seeing binary thinking as a feature of woke, rather than a bug brought in by the ignorant.
Binary thinking happens on both sides, it is equally foolish. Don’t indulge it. It’s easy to escape whatever your biases eg I fundamentally disagree with Rochdale on Israel/Gaza but can recognise he is thinking and arguing in a nuanced, thoughtful, not binary way.
He isn’t responsible for Netanyahu’s useful idiots who can’t see beyond ‘Israel good Hamas bad’. Nor are the work responsible for the antisemites amongst us.
“Public opinion is also deeply split on how to bring the war to an end, with 44 per cent of Ukrainians believing compromise is needed, vs 48 per cent who wish to continue fighting for victory.”
“Concern about antisemitism in the U.S. has grown following recent rises in deadly assaults, vandalism, and harassment. Public accounts of antisemitism have focused on both the ideological right and left, suggesting a “horseshoe theory” in which the far left and the far right hold a common set of anti-Jewish prejudicial attitudes that distinguish them from the ideological center. However, there is little quantitative research evaluating left-wing versus right-wing antisemitism. We conduct several experiments on an original survey of 3500 U.S. adults, including an oversample of young adults. We oversampled young adults because unlike other forms of prejudice that are more common among older people, antisemitism is theorized to be more common among younger people. Contrary to the expectation of horseshoe theory, the data show the epicenter of antisemitic attitudes is young adults on the far right.”
Do you think these people are on the “far right”?
Hint: this is in Oakland, California
“American cafe staff refuse to let a Jewish woman use their restroom.
Inside, they have “decorated” it with texts saying:
I see your carefully researched academic analysis based on a randomised stratified population survey and raise you an unverified anecdote from some random on Twitter.
There can be no justification of the conduct of the people in that cafe on twitter.
If she is not a customer they are entitled to refuse her to use the loo, unless local laws state otherwise. However subjecting her to vile antisemitism and baiting is totally inexcusable.
The government's attempt to toughen up immigration legislation for Xmas had one reader keen to figure out precisely how many storylines in 2003's Love Actually would become impossible under 2023's new proposals.
Their assessment:
* Thomas Brodie-Sangster: Love interest is the dependant child of a non-EU citizen
* Liam Neeson: Claudia Schiffer is a non-UK citizen, so would need to earn £38K+
* Kris Marshall: Fine to go to America on holiday; couldn't bring his nymphomaniac models back permanently
* Laura Linney: Glassdoor has the current average salary for a graphic designer as £37,154 – so she'd fall below the required earning threshold
* Colin Firth: Leaving aside the post-Brexit complications of keeping a holiday home in France, his Portuguese fiancée wouldn't get leave to remain - and he'd struggle to get all his Christmas presents back through customs too.
Bill Nighy's platonic porn-watching bromance, Emma Thompson's cheating husband and Keira Knightley's stalker would all be free to carry on, as would sex-scene stand-ins Martin Freeman and Joanne Page.
That just leaves the Prime Minister who shags his catering staff. Something the current regime would probably also tolerate.
The upside I suppose would be that Alan Rickman’s German Secretary wouldn’t be working there so Emma Thompson wouldn’t have to play that miserable Joni Mitchell music, Thomas Brodie- Sangster’s character wouldn’t have spent years in juvenile detention for endangering airport security and Colin Firth would never have to be crushed a year later when his annoying sister in law moves in with him and Aurelie and ruins their relationship.
And Claudia Schiffer will probably just pass the income threshold.
My Woke review of "Love Actually" is that it is not about love, but rather is deeply misogynistic. Each of the interlinked sub plots is a different variation on male fantasy.
Seducing the hired help, the compliant wife turning a blind eye to an office affair for the sake of the kids, seducing a different sort of hired help with the frisson of being foreign, that porn permits love, that even a plain bloke with an English accent is a babe magnet to nymphomaniacs in America, that learning to play music gets the girl of your dreams and even of latent homosexuality.
It is all delivered with charm but is deeply suspect when looked at in this light.
“Public opinion is also deeply split on how to bring the war to an end, with 44 per cent of Ukrainians believing compromise is needed, vs 48 per cent who wish to continue fighting for victory.”
How do you seek peace with an enemy who doesn't want peace?
I don't think you do "seek peace". But you allow intermediaries to explore possibilities, while maintaining an absolutist front. I doubt if Putin thinks total conquest of Ukraine is now either possible or desirable, but what do I know? Finding out what he'd accept and what he'd concede is sensible. Conversely the Russians need to know if it's worth even thinking about a ceasefire or Zelensky really will fight for the last inch of the Donbas. Ignorance on both sides is just unhelpful in considering options.
Nick, have you not been paying attention to what Russia has been saying - let alone doing?
But let me ask you a simple question: why do you evidently trust anything Russia, or Putin, says?
I don't. But facts can be created on the ground to make a deal irreversible. For example, a conceivable deal would be a ceasefire on current lines and NATO troops guarding them as a permanent peacekeeping force. Eventually a deal could lead to recognition of Russian sovereignty in Crimea and Donbas and Ukrainian integration into NATO. There are loads of people on both sides who will say they'd never accept any of that, but it doesn't require trust (if we accept, as I think most people do, that Russia will not actually attack American troops and start WW3).
It's possible that either side (or both) are not up for any of that (yet). OK. But not allowing intermediaries to find out is a mistake, when the alternative is years of mass slaughter.
"But facts can be created on the ground to make a deal irreversible. "
We tried that before, with the guarantees of the Budapest Memorandum and others. And they were not worth the paper they were written on. Putin knows that, and sees the west's weakness now. He'd also know that he stands a good chance of destroying NATO through political means - e.g. through Trump - and therefore he just needs to bide his time.
Remember you reaction to this war? That we 'poked' Russia into the invasion; that it was all 'our' fault? Putin will just rebuild his military, await a moment of weakness in the west, and generate excuses which many in the west - sadly probably including you - will suck up and regurgitate. Because it's our fault, and not Putin's evil.
Russia is currently a rogue nation. Your 'solution' above would in no way encourage them to change that status.
An Afghanistan-style failure might.
We did Poke the Bear
This does not exculpate Putin, but we did extend NATO right to the Russian border (in the Baltics) and we tried to bring Ukraine into the western orbit
Would the USA accept Mexico joining a Chinese military alliance?
Fuck off. We did not 'poke' the bear. Countries neighbouring Russia had a choice; we did not force them to join NATO. They looked at Russia's rhetoric and actions (e.g. Georgia), and decided they'd rather be in our club than theirs.
Which seems to have been a rather wise decision given events, doesn't it?
Russia is a fascist, imperialistic nation, which is keen to spread those (dis)values around the world - as long as it increases their power. I'd argue that the west - even with our problems - is a far better system than the one Putin (and China for that matter) want.
The great thing about having someone hyper-rich as prime minister is that his conceptions are on a much grander scale than most people's.
But Sunak thinks nothing of spending a quarter of a billion pounds of public money on a fantasy scheme that now has the sole aim of saving his career.
Sunak needs the flights to take off just before the election. A big gap is dangerous if the boats keep coming. The sensible thing to do was to have dropped the policy when he came in , that was his window of opportunity but then of course he’d made a deal with Braverman.
There is a Terrible Danger. The flights may well be loaded. And then held on the ground as person after person is pulled off under legal challenge. And then the flight lands in Rwanda and is turned back because we have broken our agreement with the Rwandans.
I rewatched that presser yesterday. Sunak rightly points out that there is no point having a law which the Rwandans won't agree to. But the bill already crosses that line on page 1. He says that the "new treaty" makes things possible that were not before; Not so says the Rwandan minister who co-signed.
Sunak is trying to claim credit for fewer boats crossing. But he pledged - check the lectern - to Stop the Boats. Not reduce them. And he can't stop them. The audience he is pitching to don't care if the numbers have slowed - they want them to STOP. And then the foreigners to be sent away. Its impossible to satisfy them.
It's much worse.
Rishi Sunak was told by lawyers that his emergency Rwanda scheme will be “seriously impeded” from working because it “provides an easy way” for migrants to avoid deportation.
The prime minister insisted on Thursday that his new law aimed at reviving the policy was the only approach that would prevent further legal challenges scuppering flights. He said he was confident that flights would take off before the general election and pledged to “finish the job”.
However, The Times has been told that Downing Street was warned by two senior lawyers that the scheme risked failure because it would continue to allow migrants to lodge challenges against their individual removal to Rwanda. Legal advice from a senior government lawyer said “the scheme would be seriously impeded” if the bill did not include a so-called “ouster clause” that barred individual legal challenges.
Separate external legal counsel that was sought by the government warned that the failure to bar individual challenges “is inconsistent with the intellectual underpinning of the bill and also would provide an easy way for many applicants to avoid the effects of the bill”....
...The Safety of Rwanda Bill, presented to parliament on Thursday, will bar systematic challenges being brought against the policy by instructing immigration officers, courts and tribunals to treat Rwanda as a “conclusively safe country”. However, clause four of the bill is seen by critics of the legislation as a weakness because it says that people can make claims if there is “compelling evidence relating specifically to a person’s individual circumstances”.
A senior Conservative MP and lawyer said that this would leave the courts “inundated” with legal claims from migrants helped by immigration lawyers who would “come up with a whole range of innovative reasons why Rwanda is unsafe for a particular individual”.
The fascinating thing about PMQs was the way that Sunak tore the bill apart line by line. "Have you read it?" he kept asking Sunak. Clearly they haven't - Sunak knows the spin lines but not the detail which rather show up the spin lines as ignorant lies.
As an "have you read it" practitioner I make Good Money from reading such documents and pulling out details that others have missed. So bravo Starmer.
Then we turn back to the Tories and their PB shills. "We have a plan, what is Labour's plan." They do not have a plan. What they claim to be a plan is unworkable. Laughable. Have they read their "plan". Have they *understood* it? This is crayon politics , sketched by idiots to placate morons.
I'll say it again, Brexit and the referendum campaign with its focus on immigration, has radicalised the Tories.
At some point Starmer or Farage is going to point out the Tories are focussed on a few thousand illegal migrants and not on the 1.5 million legal migration.
Except that is no longer true now. The government's new proposals mean that foreign immigrants will be banned from working in the UK unless they have a job offer for more than £38k or work in a shortage occupation like social care
Comments
The difficulty of the issue is that while there are a small number of violent perverts wanting access to women's spaces, there are considerable numbers of Trans people who just wish to be accepted as who they are and live unobtrusively as their expressed gender.
While @Cyclefree makes excellent points, particularly on prisons and refuges, my views have also been influenced by Foxjr2's housemate, who I have known for a decade and is one of his oldest friends, coming out as MtF Trans.
It takes a bit of adapting to, but they have been saved from suicide by coming out, though considerable psychological issues remain. Access to any gender clinic that could formally diagnose Gender Dysphoria and start the clock for 2 years living as a woman* before issuing a GRC is years away on the NHS, and this is a person of very modest means. If they had to wait that long it could be a tragic death.
Laws have to protect us from a very dangerous minority, but also have to protect the psychologically vulnerable. I hope this discernment of a way forward is directed by compassion rather than ideology.
*how is this even possible without access to women's spaces such as toilets and changing rooms?
How do they manage such matters in more enlightened countries, such as Norway?
Further I made the point that there should explicitly be sex-based exclusions. In general female prisons would, in broad terms, be an appropriate place for applying such exclusions. But, I am not convinced a women’s choir should always be able to ban trans people from joining it.
On prison, what I really think is that if the state is going to lock folk up it has to minimise the risk of violence against them because of their specific characteristics (or indeed the risks of them committing violence). How you solve that in an environment with no money and a base level of extreme violence, I do not know. But the answer won’t be simple.
Why shouldn't women be allowed to have a female only choir or book group?
That is what freedom of association means. It is what the law has permitted for years. But now some men want to stop that. Just as they have stopped lesbians in Scotland meeting in groups greater than 25. Why should women's existing rights be taken away to satisfy the demands of some men with some sort of mental condition or inner feeling? Why are these men's feelings so much more important than women's freedoms and feelings?
Two groups of people, both treated badly in the past, both utterly deserving of better treatment from the fortunate.
But both justly wanting/needing something that can only really be achieved at the expense of the other. And both exploited by faux allies.
Indeed I’d go so far as to say that’s a big part of the point of intersectionality. That being said, both you and I fall into the category where we are very much more oppressor than oppressed. I’m just a little less fragile about it.
The Harvard, MIT etc furore is a good example of another aspect of woke: that prejudice can often be institutionalised without any individual actively promoting such prejudice. Funnily enough that is what BLM argue, but you struggle to see that when it doesn’t accord with your particular biases.
The article is quite acute on splits at the top of Ukrainian politics
This isn't a "woke" issue imho: if anything, by focusing on cultural and racial injustices more than economic issues, I'd have thought that the whole debate around woke on the far left might have made it less prone to antisemitism not more. I think what has happened is that social media has made political arguments more polarised and more visible on all sides. What might have previously been twenty childish undergrads spouting nonsense in private in a draughty university meeting room has become a thousand people arguing online, for all to see.
How will you know if your mobile phone contracts since 2007 make you eligible for the latest PPI, diesel cars phones corporate shake down ?
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-67649539
I didn't have any PPI and my two previous diesel car purchases were each too early & too late to be eligible for the emissions lark I haven't kept a record since 2007 of all my mobile phone transactions tbh.
The issue of waiting for a dysphoria diagnosis is a very real and difficult one. The NHS has increased funding in this area. This recently came out in a legal case brought by the Good Law Project against the NHS. But despite the funding increase they were simply not able to find doctors and others willing to practise in this area. How one addresses that I don't know. But removing any sort of requirement is not the answer.
From the River (Rhone) to the German Bight, Europe's Christmas will be white!
George Galloway announces he is standing for London Mayor. Get your bets on now!*
* Laying, that is.
You have abandoned any reasoned debate on the issue.
Labour lead unchanged at 23 points in latest YouGov poll for The Times
CON 22 (=)
LAB 45 (=)
LIB DEM 10 (+1)
REF UK 11 (+1)
GREEN 7 (=)
Woke = awoken = was applied initially to civil rights and the oppression, and the rising up, of in particular black Americans. It has since come to mean supporting any perceived oppressed community, a common version of which is the transgender community. Critically it supports these communities to the exclusion of others because it perceives of these issues as binary: the powerful vs the powerless. There are no shades of grey.
wrt anti-semitism, woke orthodoxy perceives Israel and the Jews not to be an oppressed community, moreover it believes Israel/the Jews to be doing a lot of oppressing right now, and throughout history. So in the vernacular, and as we see on the streets of our capitals, the left perceives the powerful to be Israel, while Hamas, or at least the ordinary decent Gazans, to be powerless and the latter group therefore to be supported and the former condemned. Remember this is a binary process there are no on the one hands arguments allowed.
The same rules as those which are used in particular by the left to protect the eg transgender community are the same ones that lead to condemnation of Israel and the Jews as an oppressing community.
And hence Harvard, MIT, Penn we saw the other day. And left-wing anti-semitism in general.
Your welcome.
I realise that the key characteristic here is being a nutter, not being a Jew. But I do think it's going to stir up people who've never thought about it into knee-jerk antisemitism. And the fact that that stirring is being indulged by the Israeli Government is just incredible and utterly deplorable. Biden should threaten to cut off aid to Israel unless it stops.
Though I would definitely concede that more people than I thought consider Jews in general as responsible for Israel’s fascism. That’s deeply worrying, but doesn’t follow from intersectionality and decolonialism. It follows from stupidity and ignorance.
1. Superiority complex bigotry
This is the behaviour and beliefs of people in powerful or dominant groups (males, the rich, the established religion, higher castes etc) towards those in weak groups, and is about maintaining the status quo. It usually involves condescension and bullying, pseudo-science or religion (women can't do science, blacks are unintelligent, dalits are unclean, the Irish are bumpkins), and dismissive and defensive attitudes when challenged.
The main victims of this through history have been Black Africans, lower classes and castes in most societies, women, peasants and rural communities, and national minorities like the Ukrainians in the Russian and Soviet empires. The form of violence or oppression tends to be chronic - a boot stamping down on a group forever.
In terms of the Palestine conflict this is essentially how the settlers and far right in Israel behave.
2. The bigotry of fear or resentment
This is the bigotry that forms out of hatred and suspicion of groups that are seen as either too powerful or somehow subversive to the dominant culture. It's sometimes about maintaining the status quo but often also about overturning it. It's revolutionary bigotry. Resentment is the dominant emotion. It may be about the fear of culture being overwhelmed or diluted (e.g. by immigration), or resentment of a real or imagined ruling class that keeps the people oppressed (antisemitism, class war), or a fear of difference and subversion (homophobia).
Unlike superiority complex bigotry it's more volatile. Long periods of nothing, then a sudden extremely violent flare up. Pogroms and the Holocaust, the Armenian genocide, Hindu-Muslim communal rioting in India, the Peasants revolt, The French revolutionary terror, and in the Gaza conflict the 7th October is a classic example.
I think both sorts of bigotry probably live in all of us but they are different and I think understanding this helps to explain why groups like the far Left seem able to behave in extremely bigoted ways while considering themselves virtuous.
Invoking Godwin here, but the enforcement of woke and the constant rewriting of what’s allowed to be thought or said is similar to the Third Reich. I’ve just watched a series on that called ‘The Abyss’ so it’s fresh in my mind. They make up their mind about a certain type of people, won’t listen to any argument, and want them liquidated from public life, all on the basis of some odd world view they’ve been force fed, probably at University
A wealth tax hypothecated for international development would be a good example.
God viz was funny, when it was funny
I remember when I first came across it - they were literally selling it by hand in pubs in Soho - right at the beginning
I bought one and it was hilarious
But every time I open a window, an oligarch falls out.
I think this is wrong for one simple reason - that 'woke' focus on "cultural and racial injustices" is very shallow and is almost never extended to Jews due to its very black-and-white view of race - even in some cases blaming them for injustice as seen as 'white' or powerful. For an obvious and egregious example, you can look at Whoopi Goldberg saying the Holocaust "wasn't about race" because it was white people killing white people. David Baddiel got a whole book out of how modern social justice movements are incapable of or unwilling to include Jews in their conceptual framework. Because are not an easy fit with it, and may give the lie to the whole thing in its current simplistic form.
There is a specific problem with the far left and antisemitism - other sides of politics have their own issues. However, this one has been especially damaging in recent years, given it blows up or poisons the very progressive institutions and movements that are supposed to be helping fight racism, leading to them enabling or promoting it instead.
Briefly, there are very few women in prison in Norway, some are in mixed-sex prisons but not allowed to socalise with men beyond some voluntary joint sports etc., and conditions, as for men, are on the whole not bad.
But let me ask you a simple question: why do you evidently trust anything Russia, or Putin, says?
Right into the late 70s the poverty in China was mindblowing. Dikotter describes a party official doing a rural tour and finding entire families sleeping on straw and bare earth, with their sole possessions “a few broken pots” - and then being told this was absolutely normal
Famine was widespread until about 1980. Even the students at Beijing University were horribly undernourished - the top university of the country
Then Deng allowed capitalism, and it swiftly lifted these 800m people out of despair and hunger. A modern miracle
Being Woke is about recognising structural injustices in societies, so there are as many different Woke interpretations of the world as individuals.
I consider Woke as a synonym for "enlightened". So it is Woke to be on both sides of the debate on Trans-rights. @Cyclefree is Woke to the sex-based violence and threat of violence against women, but it can also be Woke to oppose the structural discrimination against Trans people.
It's the intersection of this collision where "Intersectionality" becomes the central theme. It is a debate that needs to happen.
I fear gaming is a wide-open channel for disinformation, especially to the young.
I also think most of us would prefer it not to be true; that people could not be that beastly to one another.
You’re good on other stuff tho, so don’t be disheartened
Also like to thank @hyufd for an excellent argument.
I do have a reply to square the circle and get myself out of my contradiction, but we have moved on from that argument now.
It's possible that either side (or both) are not up for any of that (yet). OK. But not allowing intermediaries to find out is a mistake, when the alternative is years of mass slaughter.
The Gender Recognition Act and GRCs are surely supposed to confer on recipients the same rights as those born with the sex matching the GRC confirmed gender, so I find the Dorrian judgement wholly unsurprising (and CF is a bit naughty with the mis-gendering in the numbered points). Point 5 seems odd, but is that due to CF not considering a lesbian trans woman to be a lesbian, for example?
The point of contention, for me, is the qualification for a GRC. You can have the status quo ante in England at least, with the period living in assumed gender required, which probably weeds out opportunist sex pests, but does require people genuinely trans to spend a prolonged period forced to use facilities not matching their gender - and likely open to abuse if e.g. a trans woman, living as a woman is forced into male toilets. Equally, I see potential problems with simple self-ID for a GRC and all the rights that confers - the Goodness Gracious Me being a Christian sketch comes to mind if it's that easy and I can see it's open to abuse (although I do think there's a middle ground where it's relatively easy for people to get a GRC, but requires e.g. no criminal record in problematic areas and some references from others, such as GP etc and also a time limit before being able to change back, for example, so it's not something done lightly. There's also the more extreme position, where you move to physical sex (i.e. sex organs present) either for segregation or - due to not generally checking tackle at the door to facilities - to obtaining a GRC - which would tend to remove abuse as I don't think many male rapists would consent to having their penises cut off just to get close to women - but that would also require genuinely trans people to spend potentially years waiting (and some, I expect, have perfectly legitimate reasons to never have an op).
Some of this is dealing in hypotheticals, anyway. How many people are actually asked to produce GRCs at present? Are there doormenpeople demanding them before access to toilets and changing rooms etc? It probably happens for prisons, I guess, but the numbers can't be huge and again considering the type of crime seems relevant in safeguarding.
TLDR: Genuinely trans people should have the right to live in their new gender in all respects, subject to some safeguards (and penalties for any abuse of those rights). There are issues with the existing GRC process in England and I do also have concerns about the proposed process in Scotland lacking some safeguards and potentially being open to abuse by a small minority.
Love actuary
Richard Curtis v Rishi Sunak
The government's attempt to toughen up immigration legislation for Xmas had one reader keen to figure out precisely how many storylines in 2003's Love Actually would become impossible under 2023's new proposals.
Their assessment:
* Thomas Brodie-Sangster: Love interest is the dependant child of a non-EU citizen
* Liam Neeson: Claudia Schiffer is a non-UK citizen, so would need to earn £38K+
* Kris Marshall: Fine to go to America on holiday; couldn't bring his nymphomaniac models back permanently
* Laura Linney: Glassdoor has the current average salary for a graphic designer as £37,154 – so she'd fall below the required earning threshold
* Colin Firth: Leaving aside the post-Brexit complications of keeping a holiday home in France, his Portuguese fiancée wouldn't get leave to remain - and he'd struggle to get all his Christmas presents back through customs too.
Bill Nighy's platonic porn-watching bromance, Emma Thompson's cheating husband and Keira Knightley's stalker would all be free to carry on, as would sex-scene stand-ins Martin Freeman and Joanne Page.
That just leaves the Prime Minister who shags his catering staff. Something the current regime would probably also tolerate.
They aren't even managing to win any council byelections for heavens sake. Unlike the Lib Dems or indeed the Greens.
30% swing to Lib Dems overnight in Harpenden for example.
As long as Ukraine wants to continue the war, we need to support them as much as possible, and encourage the internal collapse of the Russian regime.
It is now more likely that the war will be ended by the collapse of the army, political system or society of one side or the other, than a battlefield breakthrough (though the latter, or a failed attempt at the latter, may lead to the former). See WWI for details.
Putin wants to restore the Russian empire. He will not stop at Kherson unless he is made to. Indeed, his regime is already making noises aimed at legitimising an attack on the Baltic states. Yes, they're in NATO, the EU and Eurozone. That will not stop him if he feels he can go again, any more than Munich sated Hitler. Or the abrogation of Munich when he occupied Prague and London and Paris stood by and looked away.
We tried that before, with the guarantees of the Budapest Memorandum and others. And they were not worth the paper they were written on. Putin knows that, and sees the west's weakness now. He'd also know that he stands a good chance of destroying NATO through political means - e.g. through Trump - and therefore he just needs to bide his time.
Remember you reaction to this war? That we 'poked' Russia into the invasion; that it was all 'our' fault? Putin will just rebuild his military, await a moment of weakness in the west, and generate excuses which many in the west - sadly probably including you - will suck up and regurgitate. Because it's our fault, and not Putin's evil.
Russia is currently a rogue nation. Your 'solution' above would in no way encourage them to change that status.
An Afghanistan-style failure might.
This does not exculpate Putin, but we did extend NATO right to the Russian border (in the Baltics) and we tried to bring Ukraine into the western orbit
Would the USA accept Mexico joining a Chinese military alliance?
This all seems very niche. My flat at 55 Old Compton Street was directly opposite The Admiral Duncan which was number 54. I'd arranged to meet a client from Beirut who I was working with the following day.
This particular evening there was a bouncer on the door
"Sorry mate gays only" He said
I asked him if he was joking.
"Not joking" he said "We're turning it into a gay pub so we're keeping straights out. it's only for a month and after that it'll be gay and then anyone can come in"
I told him I'd arranged to meet a colleague here.
"Is he gay?" he asked
I said I didn't know but I didn't think so.
'Well go and take a look inside and if he isn't there give me his name and I'll redirect him to wherever you want"
Weird I know looking back but at least it didn't involve lawyers
But we need a way to classify them separately from Stephen Christopher Yaxley-Lennon & chums. The cause of their anti-semitism is different, and the methods for dealing with it are different.
If ethnic cleansing and Facts On The Ground are good enough for Russia, why can’t Netenyau and chums do the same in the West Bank and Gaza? It will be For Peace.
When you don't trust a nation an inch, (heavily militarised) facts on the ground such as the Korean 38th parallel are precisely what ensures a long term peace/ceasefire.
And Claudia Schiffer will probably just pass the income threshold.
Most people realise that Trump is a deeply unpleasant man who is potentially very dangerous. I wasn’t aware that he is anti-Semitic but I am wholly unsurprised.
What would @Leon repeating that add to the debate?
On the evidence of his comment, at least.
He’s a narcissistic New York billionaire deal maker. He’s spent his whole life hanging out with Jews. I imagine he rather admires their business moxy and chutzpah. And he certainly didn’t mind chilling out with Epstein and Co
However he’s an amoral egomaniac and he’s quite capable of utilising anti Semitism if it suits him
But a phenomenon does exist as we are seeing as I said on the streets of global capitals right now. Call it want you want but my reading (awoken, powerless, etc) I believe is workable (wokable?).
I mean something is happening and sometimes it's useful to group activities under a common umbrella term.
Re HYUFD, I started a reply his post last night, with the word "Bollocks" starting off, but never finished it. Needless to say I agree with what you and Carnyx were saying and, apart from anything else, we'd also lose the bright young British post-docs who start relationships with foreign PhD students and where they would both be free to both work in other countries but not here.
*she also made her own luck, of course - the charity were sufficiently impressed with her past work to be willing to bet big on her over five years, but it required the alignment of healthy charity finances and a CEO with a strong belief in the value of research beyond their core activities
Reduce their hours by a fifth by all means, but reduce their salary proportionally too.
https://www.msn.com/en-gb/money/other/civil-servants-at-defra-demand-four-day-week-for-better-work-life-balance/ar-AA1l9V0o?ocid=entnewsntp&cvid=5c0dc3ed77cc4751ab60338b7929b1e5&ei=21
As Fascism did, disastrously, in 20th century Europe
It’s looking at society not as being made up as individuals (the “true” liberal approach) or as a cohesive whole (the whiggish approach).
Instead it groups people into categories based on a single criteria (eg you are a white heterosexual male, you are gay, you are Muslim, you are black, etc) while ignoring the inevitable overlaps between categories.
It then ranks and orders the categories as a basis for policy rather than looking at topics based on individual merits.
That’s why you end up with things like a tolerance for what often veers into anti-semitism (vs opposition to the government of Israel) because “Jews” as a category are viewed as relatively undeserving
It’s a faulty intellectual framework with divisive and damaging real world consequences
Outwith the rights or wrongs of either conflict the facts are:
i) Hamas, whatever else it is is not a proper military force. The potential warfare there is entirely asymmetric.
ii) Any Gaza line is orders of magnitude smaller than the Russia/Ukraine front line.
iii) Although Palestine "wins" votes in the UN quite frequently, nations that vote in favour don't have the means, or if they do have the means (China) aren't going to get involved against Israel - whereas every US president and would be president falls over themselves to be seen to and supporting Israel as much as possible; and the US is still THE global superpower in military terms.
Public opinion alone does not decide borders.
Both you and TOPPING fall into the trap of seeing binary thinking as a feature of woke, rather than a bug brought in by the ignorant.
Binary thinking happens on both sides, it is equally foolish. Don’t indulge it. It’s easy to escape whatever your biases eg I fundamentally disagree with Rochdale on Israel/Gaza but can recognise he is thinking and arguing in a nuanced, thoughtful, not binary way.
He isn’t responsible for Netanyahu’s useful idiots who can’t see beyond ‘Israel good Hamas bad’. Nor are the work responsible for the antisemites amongst us.
If she is not a customer they are entitled to refuse her to use the loo, unless local laws state otherwise. However subjecting her to vile antisemitism and baiting is totally inexcusable.
Each of the interlinked sub plots is a different variation on male fantasy.
Seducing the hired help, the compliant wife turning a blind eye to an office affair for the sake of the kids, seducing a different sort of hired help with the frisson of being foreign, that porn permits love, that even a plain bloke with an English accent is a babe magnet to nymphomaniacs in America, that learning to play music gets the girl of your dreams and even of latent homosexuality.
It is all delivered with charm but is deeply suspect when looked at in this light.
Which seems to have been a rather wise decision given events, doesn't it?
Russia is a fascist, imperialistic nation, which is keen to spread those (dis)values around the world - as long as it increases their power. I'd argue that the west - even with our problems - is a far better system than the one Putin (and China for that matter) want.