Agree it could do, though as I said to PClipp, if you wanted to improve boys' grades it's easier to change nothing and just give them better grades than a girl would have got.
The reason I say the exams are getting easier is because of a thought experiment I came across. I forget where. But it went like this.
If you have two groups of candidates for an exam of patently different ability.
So if the exam is either very easy or very hard, the two groups' performance will look the same. Thus, as it approaches being very easy or very hard from somewhere in between, their disparate performances will converge.
Where we see converging exam performance between boys and girls, therefore, we ideally need some other piece of preferably quantitative evidence that points to whether it's converging because the exam has become easier, or because it's become harder, either of which would produce convergence. If the overall pass rate in the exam has risen, this strongly suggests the exam has got easier. If it has fallen then the scores are converging upon everyone failing, so it has got harder.
It is of course possible that scores have improved because everyone has genuinely become more intelligent, or worsened because everyone has become more stupid. Proving that is a bit circular, though.
There are lots of alternative explanations... it could be that people are choosing subjects they are better at, it could be that this year's cohort worked harder, it could be that teaching has improved, it could be that schools encouraged those likely to get bad grades to drop subjects, etc etc...
to be honest the % changes seem pretty small, I'm not convinced there's even that much of a result that needs to be explained.
Incidentally, re A Levels. If passes are up and the gap between boys' and girls' achievement is narrowing, that is a pretty unambiguous signal that the exams are getting easier, IMO.
Doesn't it suggest that less emphasis is being placed on coursework?
If you have two groups of candidates for an exam of patently different ability - 6-year-olds in one and 25-year-old PhDs in the other, say - then their scores will differ in most instances. But they will be identical if either the exam is very easy, or if it is very hard. An easy exam might be
1. Write your first name (100 marks).
Everyone in each group will score 100% on such a paper, and there will be no difference between the groups' relative performance.
The hard exam looks like this:
1. If you take a positive integer, and then divide by 2 if it is even, or multiply by 3 and add 1 if it is odd, then repeat this process with the resulting number, eventually you will end up with the number 1.
Prove that there is no positive integer of which this is untrue.
The latter (the Collatz Conjecture) is currently insoluble (nobody's found such an integer but nobody has shown there can't be one). Everyone in each group will score 0% on such a paper, and there will be no difference between the groups' relative performance.
So if the exam is either very easy or very hard, the two groups' performance will look the same. Thus, as it approaches being very easy or very hard from somewhere in between, their disparate performances will converge.
Where we see converging exam performance between boys and girls, therefore, we ideally need some other piece of preferably quantitative evidence that points to whether it's converging because the exam has become easier, or because it's become harder, either of which would produce convergence. If the overall pass rate in the exam has risen, this strongly suggests the exam has got easier. If it has fallen then the scores are converging upon everyone failing, so it has got harder.
It is of course possible that scores have improved because everyone has genuinely become more intelligent, or worsened because everyone has become more stupid. Proving that is a bit circular, though.
Would everyone taking the second paper score 0% ? The brighter students would, at the very least, be able to display knowledge and mathematical ability (for example by demonstrating other formulations of the conjecture). On most mark schemes, they would not score nothing. And who knows, someone might just prove/disprove it...
I'm far from convinced anyone would want another election.
I would
Why? What difference would it make?
PB is going through a fallow period, in terms of betting opportunities, a general election would change all that.
I'm hoping the SNP are so offended by this thread they say it is casus belli for a second Indyref.
We might get an Australian election soon as the government is teetering over a bizarre dual nationality scandal. Backing an ALP win will be free money.
That dual nationality thing is bizarre.
As far as I can work out a court interpreted something and the ramifications have rolled out from there. How many of our 650 MP's would be in a similar position (well anyone with an Irish granny for a start)? What's doubly odd is that I think they might be disqualified even if they could claim citizenship and haven't. The MP this week was "guilty" because his father had been born in N Zealand. What a crime against humanity that must be (!)
Presumably Julia Gillard ex PM is in the soup in theory, because if memory serves she was born in Penarth (Old) South Wales.
Aussie judges have delivered a serious googly there.
I blame the University of Oxford for all this nonsense and their acquiescence to the Rhodes must fall nonsense.
Sadly the debate has become so polarised, with large groups of violent idiots on both sides, that it's going to be a long and difficult road forward.
Trump is right on this one, which seems a weird thing to say. Pulling down statues serves no purpose except as a vehicle for one group of morons to provoke the other group of morons.
How does a city mayor deciding to take sides and work under cover of darkness with no public debate, demonstrably prove anything?
Well, for a start there was a public debate (just as there was in the case of Charlottesville) - "the same day the council voted unanimously to remove the four monuments..." The decision having been taken, the statues were removed with a minimum of fuss, precisely not to 'provoke the other group of morons'.
I blame the University of Oxford for all this nonsense and their acquiescence to the Rhodes must fall nonsense.
Sadly the debate has become so polarised, with large groups of violent idiots on both sides, that it's going to be a long and difficult road forward.
Trump is right on this one, which seems a weird thing to say. Pulling down statues serves no purpose except as a vehicle for one group of morons to provoke the other group of morons.
I generally don't think pulling down statues is a good thing. As others say, the past is the past and we can't delete it. On the other hand, I read that these statues weren't put up at the time of the Civil War to remember these people. They were put up in the early 1900s or in the 1960s to make a stand against equal rights in the Jim Crow and Civil Rights periods. That made me question whether it is really genuine history that is being kept up, or it white supremacist symbols. I like the idea of moving them all to a statue park like they did in ex-communist states.
The reason I say the exams are getting easier is because of a thought experiment I came across. I forget where. But it went like this.
If you have two groups of candidates for an exam of patently different ability - 6-year-olds in one and 25-year-old PhDs in the other, say - then their scores will differ in most instances. But they will be identical if either the exam is very easy, or if it is very hard. So if the exam is either very easy or very hard, the two groups' performance will look the same. Thus, as it approaches being very easy or very hard from somewhere in between, their disparate performances will converge.
Where we see converging exam performance between boys and girls, therefore, we ideally need some other piece of preferably quantitative evidence that points to whether it's converging because the exam has become easier, or because it's become harder, either of which would produce convergence. If the overall pass rate in the exam has risen, this strongly suggests the exam has got easier. If it has fallen then the scores are converging upon everyone failing, so it has got harder.
It is of course possible that scores have improved because everyone has genuinely become more intelligent, or worsened because everyone has become more stupid. Proving that is a bit circular, though.
A couple points I would take issue with in your analysis Alice:
1. Your easy and hard exam examples are valid in the sense that the extremes will reduce the spread of results between stronger and weaker candidates but your implication is therefore that the difference between the sexes is due to one or other being intrinsically less able. Maybe a view that held sway pre-1900 but not much evidence for that now and I am sure that's not what you mean.
2. "It is of course possible that scores have improved because everyone has genuinely become more intelligent" Not more intelligent (over a few years that would be evolutionary nonsense) but perhaps better taught in the subject or in how to pass exams.
In fact of course all the changes up and down are extremely marginal. The Guardian article contains the hilarious comment "The two sets of exams showed wide variation in the relative performance of boys and girls."
Which it then illustrates with variance percentages of 0.7% and 0.3%! (Article no doubt written by an arts graduate - or is that just my bias coming through!)
Not a lot of upside for the Conservatives in that list. They are likely to lose as many seats to Labour as they win off the SNP, as the Unionist tactical vote unwinds and Labour becomes more credible as winners of seats. 15 to 30 seats for Labour is entirely doable.
Yeah, the SNP has to find a new USP other than independence.
Back on topic, the SNP could never survive being the party that kept the tories in power office...
They would have to support a no confidence vote, although I bet they hope there isn't one for a while yet - long enough at least for the tories to damage their standing in Scotland.
Again - you're assuming no-one in Scotland wants to vote Tory - which is bizarre on a site like this. Many SNP voters were ex-Tories and numbers have already flooded back to the blue camp. The Tories would struggle to be the first party in Scotland but the last GE and assembly election are testimony to the fact that the brand is alive and kicking. Ask Salmond.
The SNP aren't trying to attract Tory voters though.
A few seats may be fruitful for the Blue team, but it could be that it's the unionist vote tactically punishing the SNP. They could easily go back to Labour next time.
And if they vote to keep the Tories in, they will lose their left flank for propping up the Tory government. Scottish Labour would have a field day
I blame the University of Oxford for all this nonsense and their acquiescence to the Rhodes must fall nonsense.
Sadly the debate has become so polarised, with large groups of violent idiots on both sides, that it's going to be a long and difficult road forward.
Trump is right on this one, which seems a weird thing to say. Pulling down statues serves no purpose except as a vehicle for one group of morons to provoke the other group of morons.
How does a city mayor deciding to take sides and work under cover of darkness with no public debate, demonstrably prove anything?
Well, for a start there was a public debate (just as there was in the case of Charlottesville) - "the same day the council voted unanimously to remove the four monuments..." The decision having been taken, the statues were removed with a minimum of fuss, precisely not to 'provoke the other group of morons'.
Politically, the SNP's voters would not like the SNP refusing to vote against a vote of no confidence against a Tory government. That would make them lose votes to the Lib Dems and Labour to an even larger degree at the 2020 election
Despite the risk to their MPs, no way would the SNP keep the Tories in office.
The value bet should be on who will replace Sturgeon and Murrell (aka Mr Sturgeon). There are a lot of SNP supporters and members who are very unhappy with the pair. In the meantime Sturgeon's announced a rebrand/rebirth of the SNP to be announced in September, which has led to several of the hierarchy going on manoeuvres (Hyslop, Sheppherd) in the hope of retaining the government car. Then there's Salmond. He is still dreaming of leading Scotland to Independence, while it is not beyond the bounds of possibility that he could ask a MSP to step down so that he can reclaim the FM chair and Bute House.
I blame the University of Oxford for all this nonsense and their acquiescence to the Rhodes must fall nonsense.
Sadly the debate has become so polarised, with large groups of violent idiots on both sides, that it's going to be a long and difficult road forward.
Trump is right on this one, which seems a weird thing to say. Pulling down statues serves no purpose except as a vehicle for one group of morons to provoke the other group of morons.
I generally don't think pulling down statues is a good thing. As others say, the past is the past and we can't delete it. On the other hand, I read that these statues weren't put up at the time of the Civil War to remember these people. They were put up in the early 1900s or in the 1960s to make a stand against equal rights in the Jim Crow and Civil Rights periods. That made me question whether it is really genuine history that is being kept up, or it white supremacist symbols. I like the idea of moving them all to a statue park like they did in ex-communist states.
Not a lot of upside for the Conservatives in that list. They are likely to lose as many seats to Labour as they win off the SNP, as the Unionist tactical vote unwinds and Labour becomes more credible as winners of seats. 15 to 30 seats for Labour is entirely doable.
Not especially likely at all. Not a single Tory seat where Labour are anywhere near them. You'd need a landslide performance to achieve that and current polling [ yes, I know] suggests no such thing.
I blame the University of Oxford for all this nonsense and their acquiescence to the Rhodes must fall nonsense.
Sadly the debate has become so polarised, with large groups of violent idiots on both sides, that it's going to be a long and difficult road forward.
Trump is right on this one, which seems a weird thing to say. Pulling down statues serves no purpose except as a vehicle for one group of morons to provoke the other group of morons.
How does a city mayor deciding to take sides and work under cover of darkness with no public debate, demonstrably prove anything?
Well, for a start there was a public debate (just as there was in the case of Charlottesville) - "the same day the council voted unanimously to remove the four monuments..." The decision having been taken, the statues were removed with a minimum of fuss, precisely not to 'provoke the other group of morons'.
If Trump pulls out of an unreformed NAFTA or manages to get it substantially reformed that is his reelection almost guaranteed. The Obama-Trump Dems would stick with him.
Obama of course rallied against NAFTA during the Primaries against Hillary, but he didn't do anything about it.
On topic, well quite. The SNP are almost certainly reliable enemies of the Conservatives for the foreseeable future. The prospect of an early general election that the Conservatives are opposed to is remote for so long as the SNP look set to lose further seats at one.
The party may be - but many of their voters take a different view about the merits of the alternatives.
I struggle to see how the Scottish National Party could be other than opposed to the Conservative and Unionist Party.
It's opposed only in the way that Berwick on Tweed is still at war with Russia from 1856, of course.
Back on topic, the SNP could never survive being the party that kept the tories in power office...
They would have to support a no confidence vote, although I bet they hope there isn't one for a while yet - long enough at least for the tories to damage their standing in Scotland.
Again - you're assuming no-one in Scotland wants to vote Tory - which is bizarre on a site like this. Many SNP voters were ex-Tories and numbers have already flooded back to the blue camp. The Tories would struggle to be the first party in Scotland but the last GE and assembly election are testimony to the fact that the brand is alive and kicking. Ask Salmond.
The SNP aren't trying to attract Tory voters though.
A few seats may be fruitful for the Blue team, but it could be that it's the unionist vote tactically punishing the SNP. They could easily go back to Labour next time.
And if they vote to keep the Tories in, they will lose their left flank for propping up the Tory government. Scottish Labour would have a field day
Most of the rural and m/c seats were won by the SNP attracting ex-Tory voters. Ruth Davidson has made the tory brand acceptable in much of Scotland. the tories could easily get another 4/5 seats from the SNP next time.
I blame the University of Oxford for all this nonsense and their acquiescence to the Rhodes must fall nonsense.
Sadly the debate has become so polarised, with large groups of violent idiots on both sides, that it's going to be a long and difficult road forward.
Trump is right on this one, which seems a weird thing to say. Pulling down statues serves no purpose except as a vehicle for one group of morons to provoke the other group of morons.
How does a city mayor deciding to take sides and work under cover of darkness with no public debate, demonstrably prove anything?
Well, for a start there was a public debate (just as there was in the case of Charlottesville) - "the same day the council voted unanimously to remove the four monuments..." The decision having been taken, the statues were removed with a minimum of fuss, precisely not to 'provoke the other group of morons'.
On topic, well quite. The SNP are almost certainly reliable enemies of the Conservatives for the foreseeable future. The prospect of an early general election that the Conservatives are opposed to is remote for so long as the SNP look set to lose further seats at one.
The party may be - but many of their voters take a different view about the merits of the alternatives.
I struggle to see how the Scottish National Party could be other than opposed to the Conservative and Unionist Party.
It's opposed only in the way that Berwick on Tweed is still at war with Russia from 1856, of course.
You appear to know little of the history of the SNP in Scotland. It succeeded spectacularly by attracting almost as many exTory voters as others. It's not about the parties - it's about the voters.
Back on topic, the SNP could never survive being the party that kept the tories in power office...
They would have to support a no confidence vote, although I bet they hope there isn't one for a while yet - long enough at least for the tories to damage their standing in Scotland.
Again - you're assuming no-one in Scotland wants to vote Tory - which is bizarre on a site like this. Many SNP voters were ex-Tories and numbers have already flooded back to the blue camp. The Tories would struggle to be the first party in Scotland but the last GE and assembly election are testimony to the fact that the brand is alive and kicking. Ask Salmond.
The SNP aren't trying to attract Tory voters though.
A few seats may be fruitful for the Blue team, but it could be that it's the unionist vote tactically punishing the SNP. They could easily go back to Labour next time.
And if they vote to keep the Tories in, they will lose their left flank for propping up the Tory government. Scottish Labour would have a field day
Most of the rural and m/c seats were won by the SNP attracting ex-Tory voters. Ruth Davidson has made the tory brand acceptable in much of Scotland. the tories could easily get another 4/5 seats from the SNP next time.
The Scottish Conservative seats (apart from Stirling) don't look vulnerable to Labour.
Back on topic, the SNP could never survive being the party that kept the tories in power office...
They would have to support a no confidence vote, although I bet they hope there isn't one for a while yet - long enough at least for the tories to damage their standing in Scotland.
Again - you're assuming no-one in Scotland wants to vote Tory - which is bizarre on a site like this. Many SNP voters were ex-Tories and numbers have already flooded back to the blue camp. The Tories would struggle to be the first party in Scotland but the last GE and assembly election are testimony to the fact that the brand is alive and kicking. Ask Salmond.
I think you are imbibing too much wishful thinking tbh. You only have to go back to 2010 to see what happened before the SNP surge: Lab 41, LD 11, SNP 6, Con 1. History never repeats itself and it's difficult to make predictions (especially about the future ) but I don't think the tories will make big (or any) gains in Scotland at the next GE.
Back on topic, the SNP could never survive being the party that kept the tories in power office...
They would have to support a no confidence vote, although I bet they hope there isn't one for a while yet - long enough at least for the tories to damage their standing in Scotland.
Again - you're assuming no-one in Scotland wants to vote Tory - which is bizarre on a site like this. Many SNP voters were ex-Tories and numbers have already flooded back to the blue camp. The Tories would struggle to be the first party in Scotland but the last GE and assembly election are testimony to the fact that the brand is alive and kicking. Ask Salmond.
The SNP aren't trying to attract Tory voters though.
A few seats may be fruitful for the Blue team, but it could be that it's the unionist vote tactically punishing the SNP. They could easily go back to Labour next time.
And if they vote to keep the Tories in, they will lose their left flank for propping up the Tory government. Scottish Labour would have a field day
Most of the rural and m/c seats were won by the SNP attracting ex-Tory voters. Ruth Davidson has made the tory brand acceptable in much of Scotland. the tories could easily get another 4/5 seats from the SNP next time.
The Scottish Conservative seats (apart from Stirling) don't look vulnerable to Labour.
Yes - and even there they are around 7000 votes adrift.
Back on topic, the SNP could never survive being the party that kept the tories in power office...
They would have to support a no confidence vote, although I bet they hope there isn't one for a while yet - long enough at least for the tories to damage their standing in Scotland.
Again - you're assuming no-one in Scotland wants to vote Tory - which is bizarre on a site like this. Many SNP voters were ex-Tories and numbers have already flooded back to the blue camp. The Tories would struggle to be the first party in Scotland but the last GE and assembly election are testimony to the fact that the brand is alive and kicking. Ask Salmond.
I think you are imbibing too much wishful thinking tbh. You only have to go back to 2010 to see what happened before the SNP surge: Lab 41, LD 11, SNP 6, Con 1. History never repeats itself and it's difficult to make predictions (especially about the future ) but I don't think the tories will make big (or any) gains in Scotland at the next GE.
Much has changed since 2010, and surges rarely unwind the same way they built...
Back on topic, the SNP could never survive being the party that kept the tories in power office...
They would have to support a no confidence vote, although I bet they hope there isn't one for a while yet - long enough at least for the tories to damage their standing in Scotland.
Again - you're assuming no-one in Scotland wants to vote Tory - which is bizarre on a site like this. Many SNP voters were ex-Tories and numbers have already flooded back to the blue camp. The Tories would struggle to be the first party in Scotland but the last GE and assembly election are testimony to the fact that the brand is alive and kicking. Ask Salmond.
I think you are imbibing too much wishful thinking tbh. You only have to go back to 2010 to see what happened before the SNP surge: Lab 41, LD 11, SNP 6, Con 1. History never repeats itself and making prediction is hard (especially about the future ) but I don't think the tories will make big (or any) gains in Scotland at the next GE.
The Tories now have a substantial minority that would automatically identify with them, which they didn't have in 2010 - Scots who oppose both independence and the EU. I can't see any Tory breakthrough in the Central Belt, but I think they'll to very well in the North East and Borders for some time.
If Trump pulls out of an unreformed NAFTA or manages to get it substantially reformed that is his reelection almost guaranteed. The Obama-Trump Dems would stick with him.
Obama of course rallied against NAFTA during the Primaries against Hillary, but he didn't do anything about it.
Trump looks like achieving jack-shit on any of his promises tbh... If that continues I suspect the backlash against him from WC Dems will be spectacular!
Back on topic, the SNP could never survive being the party that kept the tories in power office...
They would have to support a no confidence vote, although I bet they hope there isn't one for a while yet - long enough at least for the tories to damage their standing in Scotland.
Again - you're assuming no-one in Scotland wants to vote Tory - which is bizarre on a site like this. Many SNP voters were ex-Tories and numbers have already flooded back to the blue camp. The Tories would struggle to be the first party in Scotland but the last GE and assembly election are testimony to the fact that the brand is alive and kicking. Ask Salmond.
I think you are imbibing too much wishful thinking tbh. You only have to go back to 2010 to see what happened before the SNP surge: Lab 41, LD 11, SNP 6, Con 1. History never repeats itself and it's difficult to make predictions (especially about the future ) but I don't think the tories will make big (or any) gains in Scotland at the next GE.
They could easily make 5 gains on current trends. I'm not a wishful thinker as I only expected 3/4 Tory seats last time. Ruthie achieved spectacular results for the party and is head and shoulders above the current SLab leadership. You only need to look at the table above to see the possibilities. If the SNP shed a few votes to Labour that could easily produce other gains as well. Going back to 2010 assumes that the country will automatically revert back to that result which is neither more or less likely than other scenarios
1. Your easy and hard exam examples are valid in the sense that the extremes will reduce the spread of results between stronger and weaker candidates but your implication is therefore that the difference between the sexes is due to one or other being intrinsically less able. Maybe a view that held sway pre-1900 but not much evidence for that now and I am sure that's not what you mean.
Correct, all I am doing is elaborating a bit on a presupposition in the articles we have all read on this over the last 20-odd years. This is that there is some property common to all boys and all girls that gives rise to disparate exam scores, and that if that disparity reduces, it must be welcome evidence that the laggards are catching up. I'm agnostic about that, and my thought experiment sets out a simplified set of circumstances in which that development can be seen not to be real.
2. "It is of course possible that scores have improved because everyone has genuinely become more intelligent" Not more intelligent (over a few years that would be evolutionary nonsense) but perhaps better taught in the subject or in how to pass exams.
I'm not convinced that would explain a convergence in scores, though, because it's hard to think of how such factors could affect only the boys. And if it did it would be because the girls had previously benefited and the boys were now doing so (so not a real improvement) or because only the boys have yet done so and when the girls do there will be an offsetting divergence.
In fact of course all the changes up and down are extremely marginal.
Oh yes. Agreed. There's nothing to see here, on this occasion, so it's the usual story accompanied by the usual photos of levitating grammar school girls.
Back on topic, the SNP could never survive being the party that kept the tories in power office...
They would have to support a no confidence vote, although I bet they hope there isn't one for a while yet - long enough at least for the tories to damage their standing in Scotland.
Again - you're assuming no-one in Scotland wants to vote Tory - which is bizarre on a site like this. Many SNP voters were ex-Tories and numbers have already flooded back to the blue camp. The Tories would struggle to be the first party in Scotland but the last GE and assembly election are testimony to the fact that the brand is alive and kicking. Ask Salmond.
I think you are imbibing too much wishful thinking tbh. You only have to go back to 2010 to see what happened before the SNP surge: Lab 41, LD 11, SNP 6, Con 1. History never repeats itself and it's difficult to make predictions (especially about the future ) but I don't think the tories will make big (or any) gains in Scotland at the next GE.
Go back just a little further -- before the poll tax, Conservatives invariably ran up double figure scores north of Hadrian's Wall. Scotland was never a socialist paradise -- hence Alex Salmond and the SNP's business-friendly policies.
Back on topic, the SNP could never survive being the party that kept the tories in power office...
They would have to support a no confidence vote, although I bet they hope there isn't one for a while yet - long enough at least for the tories to damage their standing in Scotland.
Again - you're assuming no-one in Scotland wants to vote Tory - which is bizarre on a site like this. Many SNP voters were ex-Tories and numbers have already flooded back to the blue camp. The Tories would struggle to be the first party in Scotland but the last GE and assembly election are testimony to the fact that the brand is alive and kicking. Ask Salmond.
I think you are imbibing too much wishful thinking tbh. You only have to go back to 2010 to see what happened before the SNP surge: Lab 41, LD 11, SNP 6, Con 1. History never repeats itself and making prediction is hard (especially about the future ) but I don't think the tories will make big (or any) gains in Scotland at the next GE.
The Tories now have a substantial minority that would automatically identify with them, which they didn't have in 2010 - Scots who oppose both independence and the EU. I can't see any Tory breakthrough in the Central Belt, but I think they'll to very well in the North East and Borders for some time.
Agreed. The Corbyn Labour option is unlikely to attract m/c Scotland anytime soon.
If Trump pulls out of an unreformed NAFTA or manages to get it substantially reformed that is his reelection almost guaranteed. The Obama-Trump Dems would stick with him.
Obama of course rallied against NAFTA during the Primaries against Hillary, but he didn't do anything about it.
Trump looks like achieving jack-shit on any of his promises tbh... If that continues I suspect the backlash against him from WC Dems will be spectacular!
The key to Trump's future is his plan for a partial amnesty on companies reshoring overseas cash. If he gets that through, it comes with around $100bn war chest for infrastructure projects that will create a million jobs across mainly rural states.
If he can't get that through, he's probably going to get primaried by his own side, at which point he's the proverbial cooked bread.
I blame the University of Oxford for all this nonsense and their acquiescence to the Rhodes must fall nonsense.
Sadly the debate has become so polarised, with large groups of violent idiots on both sides, that it's going to be a long and difficult road forward.
Trump is right on this one, which seems a weird thing to say. Pulling down statues serves no purpose except as a vehicle for one group of morons to provoke the other group of morons.
How does a city mayor deciding to take sides and work under cover of darkness with no public debate, demonstrably prove anything?
Well, for a start there was a public debate (just as there was in the case of Charlottesville) - "the same day the council voted unanimously to remove the four monuments..." The decision having been taken, the statues were removed with a minimum of fuss, precisely not to 'provoke the other group of morons'.
That you think both sides in the debate morons perhaps says as much about you as it does them.
I didn't say both sides were morons, I said that the moderates on both sides are having their voices drowned out by the morons.
Should Oxford University have also given into the protests and removed the statue of Cecil Rhodes?
"In some ways, Trump would rather have people calling him racist than say he backed down the minute he was wrong,” one adviser to the White House said on Wednesday about Charlottesville. “This may turn into the biggest mess of his presidency because he is stubborn and doesn't realize how bad this is getting.” http://www.politico.com/story/2017/08/16/trump-charlottesville-temper-chaos-241721
Back on topic, the SNP could never survive being the party that kept the tories in power office...
They would have to support a no confidence vote, although I bet they hope there isn't one for a while yet - long enough at least for the tories to damage their standing in Scotland.
Again - you're assuming no-one in Scotland wants to vote Tory - which is bizarre on a site like this. Many SNP voters were ex-Tories and numbers have already flooded back to the blue camp. The Tories would struggle to be the first party in Scotland but the last GE and assembly election are testimony to the fact that the brand is alive and kicking. Ask Salmond.
I think you are imbibing too much wishful thinking tbh. You only have to go back to 2010 to see what happened before the SNP surge: Lab 41, LD 11, SNP 6, Con 1. History never repeats itself and it's difficult to make predictions (especially about the future ) but I don't think the tories will make big (or any) gains in Scotland at the next GE.
Much has changed since 2010, and surges rarely unwind the same way they built...
The unwind of kippers to Corbynite Labour shows most voters return from whence they came. I expect 20 SLAB gains or more next GE.
Back on topic, the SNP could never survive being the party that kept the tories in power office...
They would have to support a no confidence vote, although I bet they hope there isn't one for a while yet - long enough at least for the tories to damage their standing in Scotland.
Again - you're assuming no-one in Scotland wants to vote Tory - which is bizarre on a site like this. Many SNP voters were ex-Tories and numbers have already flooded back to the blue camp. The Tories would struggle to be the first party in Scotland but the last GE and assembly election are testimony to the fact that the brand is alive and kicking. Ask Salmond.
I think you are imbibing too much wishful thinking tbh. You only have to go back to 2010 to see what happened before the SNP surge: Lab 41, LD 11, SNP 6, Con 1. History never repeats itself and making prediction is hard (especially about the future ) but I don't think the tories will make big (or any) gains in Scotland at the next GE.
The Tories now have a substantial minority that would automatically identify with them, which they didn't have in 2010 - Scots who oppose both independence and the EU. I can't see any Tory breakthrough in the Central Belt, but I think they'll to very well in the North East and Borders for some time.
Much as I personally wish it were otherwise, both the Tories and Labour are committed to exiting the EU. And both are against independence.
By the time of the next GE either the EU will be a non-issue (if Brexit goes well) or not a vote winner (if it's going badly).
In any event, neither of those points are reasons why "many of the SNP voters were ex-Tories" as Felix asserts
You have to ask yourself what's more likely if the SNP lose votes, a return to the period up to 2010, when Labour were the largest party or do we go all the way back to the 1951 when the Tories were (briefly) the largest party?
Back on topic, the SNP could never survive being the party that kept the tories in power office...
They would have to support a no confidence vote, although I bet they hope there isn't one for a while yet - long enough at least for the tories to damage their standing in Scotland.
Again - you're assuming no-one in Scotland wants to vote Tory - which is bizarre on a site like this. Many SNP voters were ex-Tories and numbers have already flooded back to the blue camp. The Tories would struggle to be the first party in Scotland but the last GE and assembly election are testimony to the fact that the brand is alive and kicking. Ask Salmond.
I think you are imbibing too much wishful thinking tbh. You only have to go back to 2010 to see what happened before the SNP surge: Lab 41, LD 11, SNP 6, Con 1. History never repeats itself and making prediction is hard (especially about the future ) but I don't think the tories will make big (or any) gains in Scotland at the next GE.
The Tories now have a substantial minority that would automatically identify with them, which they didn't have in 2010 - Scots who oppose both independence and the EU. I can't see any Tory breakthrough in the Central Belt, but I think they'll to very well in the North East and Borders for some time.
Much as I personally wish it were otherwise, both the Tories and Labour are committed to exiting the EU. And both are against independence.
By the time of the next GE either the EU will be a non-issue (if Brexit goes well) or not a vote winner (if it's going badly).
In any event, neither of those points are reasons why "many of the SNP voters were ex-Tories" as Felix asserts
You have to ask yourself what's more likely if the SNP lose votes, a return to the period up to 2010, when Labour were the largest party or do we go all the way back to the 1951 when the Tories were (briefly) the largest party?
I think the likeliest outcome is a reversion to the politics from the early sixties to the early nineties - Labour come first North of the Border, but the Conservatives have significant representation in rural areas, small towns, the Borders, and some wealthy suburban areas.
In areas of historic Conservative strength, some Conservative voters had switched to the SNP, not because they favoured independence, but because they saw it as standing up for Scottish interests.
A further point is that the decline in the Lib Dem vote is very beneficial to the Scottish Conservatives.
If Trump pulls out of an unreformed NAFTA or manages to get it substantially reformed that is his reelection almost guaranteed. The Obama-Trump Dems would stick with him.
Obama of course rallied against NAFTA during the Primaries against Hillary, but he didn't do anything about it.
If Trump pulls out of an unreformed NAFTA or manages to get it substantially reformed that is his reelection almost guaranteed. The Obama-Trump Dems would stick with him.
Obama of course rallied against NAFTA during the Primaries against Hillary, but he didn't do anything about it.
I doubt it. He couldn't get an Obama repeal through!
Collatz Conjecture - One can prove it is probably true...
Every time an odd number is hit in the sequence, it can be expressed as '2N + 1', where N is an integer. 3(2N + 1) + 1 = 6N + 4,
6N + 4 which can be expressed as 2k, k = 3N + 2 so this integer is even.
This means the sequence never 'goes up' twice in a row.. so given we can only come down and a one up, two down sequence yields.
(3N + 1)/4 < N, All N > 1 we should 'probably' get back to 1 in time..
I suspect the full proof involves delving into the properties of primes.
Jeffrey Lagarias* in 2010 claimed that based only on known information about this problem, "this is an extraordinarily difficult problem, completely out of reach of present day mathematics."
One can pick any insoluble problem one likes. The point is simply that if an exam is hard enough everyone will fail, no matter whether they are 6 years old or a maths PHD. Starting with an easy exam everyone will pass, and proceeding to one nobody can pass, you will see a difference first emerge and then disappear in the performance of groups of different exam-passing ability.
The assumption that boys converging on girls is good news includes a presupposition that they are two such groups, and that the convergence is a good thing. Even accepting for argument's sake the first, it's possible to show that it could be a bad thing because you're passing everyone regardless.
* a mathematician and professor at the University of Michigan, apparently
Back on topic, the SNP could never survive being the party that kept the tories in power office...
They would have to support a no confidence vote, although I bet they hope there isn't one for a while yet - long enough at least for the tories to damage their standing in Scotland.
Again - you're assuming no-one in Scotland wants to vote Tory - which is bizarre on a site like this. Many SNP voters were ex-Tories and numbers have already flooded back to the blue camp. The Tories would struggle to be the first party in Scotland but the last GE and assembly election are testimony to the fact that the brand is alive and kicking. Ask Salmond.
I think you are imbibing too much wishful thinking tbh. You only have to go back to 2010 to see what happened before the SNP surge: Lab 41, LD 11, SNP 6, Con 1. History never repeats itself and making prediction is hard (especially about the future ) but I don't think the tories will make big (or any) gains in Scotland at the next GE.
The Tories now have a substantial minority that would automatically identify with them, which they didn't have in 2010 - Scots who oppose both independence and the EU. I can't see any Tory breakthrough in the Central Belt, but I think they'll to very well in the North East and Borders for some time.
Much as I personally wish it were otherwise, both the Tories and Labour are committed to exiting the EU. And both are against independence.
By the time of the next GE either the EU will be a non-issue (if Brexit goes well) or not a vote winner (if it's going badly).
In any event, neither of those points are reasons why "many of the SNP voters were ex-Tories" as Felix asserts
You have to ask yourself what's more likely if the SNP lose votes, a return to the period up to 2010, when Labour were the largest party or do we go all the way back to the 1951 when the Tories were (briefly) the largest party?
Or do we go back to the mid-50s to 92 where both parties were in contention in different areas.
Back on topic, the SNP could never survive being the party that kept the tories in power office...
They would have to support a no confidence vote, although I bet they hope there isn't one for a while yet - long enough at least for the tories to damage their standing in Scotland.
Again - you're assuming no-one in Scotland wants to vote Tory - which is bizarre on a site like this. Many SNP voters were ex-Tories and numbers have already flooded back to the blue camp. The Tories would struggle to be the first party in Scotland but the last GE and assembly election are testimony to the fact that the brand is alive and kicking. Ask Salmond.
I think you are imbibing too much wishful thinking tbh. You only have to go back to 2010 to see what happened before the SNP surge: Lab 41, LD 11, SNP 6, Con 1. History never repeats itself and it's difficult to make predictions (especially about the future ) but I don't think the tories will make big (or any) gains in Scotland at the next GE.
Go back just a little further -- before the poll tax, Conservatives invariably ran up double figure scores north of Hadrian's Wall. Scotland was never a socialist paradise -- hence Alex Salmond and the SNP's business-friendly policies.
Well yes, double-figure scores but you have to go back to the 50s until you find more than 24 Tory MPs. Through all that time Labour never dipped below 40 MPs until the post-IndyRef wipeout.
How does a city mayor deciding to take sides and work under cover of darkness with no public debate, demonstrably prove anything?
Well, for a start there was a public debate (just as there was in the case of Charlottesville) - "the same day the council voted unanimously to remove the four monuments..." The decision having been taken, the statues were removed with a minimum of fuss, precisely not to 'provoke the other group of morons'.
That you think both sides in the debate morons perhaps says as much about you as it does them.
I didn't say both sides were morons, I said that the moderates on both sides are having their voices drowned out by the morons.
Should Oxford University have also given into the protests and removed the statue of Cecil Rhodes?
Fair enough - but you're still wrong, IMO. There are plenty of moderate voices in favour of removing the statues, and they seem to be the ones which are being heard.
Rhodes ? I don't really have a strong opinion either way. Postulating a south of England liberally sprinkled with Rhodes statues erected in the '20s as a message to a downtrodden 10% of the population not to be uppity, then perhaps I would. As it is, there are reasoned and less reasoned arguments on both sides, and I'm happy to accept Oxford's decision in the matter, and would have done so had it gone the other way.
And conversely, I'd strongly oppose (for example) the removal of Cromwell's Westminster statue, though I believe him to have been an evil man. There comes a point when history has to be accepted as just history.
I blame the University of Oxford for all this nonsense and their acquiescence to the Rhodes must fall nonsense.
Sadly the debate has become so polarised, with large groups of violent idiots on both sides, that it's going to be a long and difficult road forward.
Trump is right on this one, which seems a weird thing to say. Pulling down statues serves no purpose except as a vehicle for one group of morons to provoke the other group of morons.
I generally don't think pulling down statues is a good thing. As others say, the past is the past and we can't delete it. On the other hand, I read that these statues weren't put up at the time of the Civil War to remember these people. They were put up in the early 1900s or in the 1960s to make a stand against equal rights in the Jim Crow and Civil Rights periods. That made me question whether it is really genuine history that is being kept up, or it white supremacist symbols. I like the idea of moving them all to a statue park like they did in ex-communist states.
In the 1950-60's after Brown vs Board of Education there was a trend for renaming schools after Confederates.
Historical significance: low. Intent to intimidate African Americans: high.
I blame the University of Oxford for all this nonsense and their acquiescence to the Rhodes must fall nonsense.
Sadly the debate has become so polarised, with large groups of violent idiots on both sides, that it's going to be a long and difficult road forward.
Trump is right on this one, which seems a weird thing to say. Pulling down statues serves no purpose except as a vehicle for one group of morons to provoke the other group of morons.
How does a city mayor deciding to take sides and work under cover of darkness with no public debate, demonstrably prove anything?
Well, for a start there was a public debate (just as there was in the case of Charlottesville) - "the same day the council voted unanimously to remove the four monuments..." The decision having been taken, the statues were removed with a minimum of fuss, precisely not to 'provoke the other group of morons'.
That you think both sides in the debate morons perhaps says as much about you as it does them.
I didn't say both sides were morons, I said that the moderates on both sides are having their voices drowned out by the morons.
Should Oxford University have also given into the protests and removed the statue of Cecil Rhodes?
"In some ways, Trump would rather have people calling him racist than say he backed down the minute he was wrong,” one adviser to the White House said on Wednesday about Charlottesville. “This may turn into the biggest mess of his presidency because he is stubborn and doesn't realize how bad this is getting.” http://www.politico.com/story/2017/08/16/trump-charlottesville-temper-chaos-241721
I'm far from certain that this row is damaging for Trump. It will upset country-club Republicans, but will probably reassure many blue collar voters that he's on their side.
Back on topic, the SNP could never survive being the party that kept the tories in power office...
They would have to support a no confidence vote, although I bet they hope there isn't one for a while yet - long enough at least for the tories to damage their standing in Scotland.
Again - you're assuming no-one in Scotland wants to vote Tory - which is bizarre on a site like this. Many SNP voters were ex-Tories and numbers have already flooded back to the blue camp. The Tories would struggle to be the first party in Scotland but the last GE and assembly election are testimony to the fact that the brand is alive and kicking. Ask Salmond.
I think you are imbibing too much wishful thinking tbh. You only have to go back to 2010 to see what happened before the SNP surge: Lab 41, LD 11, SNP 6, Con 1. History never repeats itself and making prediction is hard (especially about the future ) but I don't think the tories will make big (or any) gains in Scotland at the next GE.
The Tories now have a substantial minority that would automatically identify with them, which they didn't have in 2010 - Scots who oppose both independence and the EU. I can't see any Tory breakthrough in the Central Belt, but I think they'll to very well in the North East and Borders for some time.
Much as I personally wish it were otherwise, both the Tories and Labour are committed to exiting the EU. And both are against independence.
By the time of the next GE either the EU will be a non-issue (if Brexit goes well) or not a vote winner (if it's going badly).
In any event, neither of those points are reasons why "many of the SNP voters were ex-Tories" as Felix asserts
You have to ask yourself what's more likely if the SNP lose votes, a return to the period up to 2010, when Labour were the largest party or do we go all the way back to the 1951 when the Tories were (briefly) the largest party?
Neither is more likely. The SNP won in m/c Scotland by taking Tory votes. They've now lost many of those voters back to the Tories. there is no obvious reason fpr those voters to switch to Labour. No-one by the way suggested a return to 1951 but the idea that Labour will suddenly win back as many as 2010 and the Tories go down to just one is equally unlikely. Study the Tory wins on Electoral Calculus. The SNP lost many voters this time - and a lot of them voted blue. You also assume that w/c Scotland will revert to Labour next time in even greater numbers - that may equally be your own wishful thinking.
Back on topic, the SNP could never survive being the party that kept the tories in power office...
They would have to support a no confidence vote, although I bet they hope there isn't one for a while yet - long enough at least for the tories to damage their standing in Scotland.
Again - you're assuming no-one in Scotland wants to vote Tory - which is bizarre on a site like this. Many SNP voters were ex-Tories and numbers have already flooded back to the blue camp. The Tories would struggle to be the first party in Scotland but the last GE and assembly election are testimony to the fact that the brand is alive and kicking. Ask Salmond.
I think you are imbibing too much wishful thinking tbh. You only have to go back to 2010 to see what happened before the SNP surge: Lab 41, LD 11, SNP 6, Con 1. History never repeats itself and making prediction is hard (especially about the future ) but I don't think the tories will make big (or any) gains in Scotland at the next GE.
The Tories now have a substantial minority that would automatically identify with them, which they didn't have in 2010 - Scots who oppose both independence and the EU. I can't see any Tory breakthrough in the Central Belt, but I think they'll to very well in the North East and Borders for some time.
Much as I personally wish it were otherwise, both the Tories and Labour are committed to exiting the EU. And both are against independence.
By the time of the next GE either the EU will be a non-issue (if Brexit goes well) or not a vote winner (if it's going badly).
In any event, neither of those points are reasons why "many of the SNP voters were ex-Tories" as Felix asserts
You have to ask yourself what's more likely if the SNP lose votes, a return to the period up to 2010, when Labour were the largest party or do we go all the way back to the 1951 when the Tories were (briefly) the largest party?
Or do we go back to the mid-50s to 92 where both parties were in contention in different areas.
That is where we are now with more potential upside for the blues given the Ruth Davidson brand of Tartan Tory.
Back on topic, the SNP could never survive being the party that kept the tories in power office...
They would have to support a no confidence vote, although I bet they hope there isn't one for a while yet - long enough at least for the tories to damage their standing in Scotland.
Again - you're assuming no-one in Scotland wants to vote Tory - which is bizarre on a site like this. Many SNP voters were ex-Tories and numbers have already flooded back to the blue camp. The Tories would struggle to be the first party in Scotland but the last GE and assembly election are testimony to the fact that the brand is alive and kicking. Ask Salmond.
I think you are imbibing too much wishful thinking tbh. You only have to go back to 2010 to see what happened before the SNP surge: Lab 41, LD 11, SNP 6, Con 1. History never repeats itself and it's difficult to make predictions (especially about the future ) but I don't think the tories will make big (or any) gains in Scotland at the next GE.
Much has changed since 2010, and surges rarely unwind the same way they built...
The unwind of kippers to Corbynite Labour shows most voters return from whence they came. I expect 20 SLAB gains or more next GE.
If that happens those gains would be from the SNP and might not materially change the overall GE result. I'd expect maybe 8-10 such gains.
How does a city mayor deciding to take sides and work under cover of darkness with no public debate, demonstrably prove anything?
Well, for a start there was a public debate (just as there was in the case of Charlottesville) - "the same day the council voted unanimously to remove the four monuments..." The decision having been taken, the statues were removed with a minimum of fuss, precisely not to 'provoke the other group of morons'.
That you think both sides in the debate morons perhaps says as much about you as it does them.
I didn't say both sides were morons, I said that the moderates on both sides are having their voices drowned out by the morons.
Should Oxford University have also given into the protests and removed the statue of Cecil Rhodes?
Fair enough - but you're still wrong, IMO. There are plenty of moderate voices in favour of removing the statues, and they seem to be the ones which are being heard.
Rhodes ? I don't really have a strong opinion either way. Postulating a south of England liberally sprinkled with Rhodes statues erected in the '20s as a message to a downtrodden 10% of the population not to be uppity, then perhaps I would. As it is, there are reasoned and less reasoned arguments on both sides, and I'm happy to accept Oxford's decision in the matter, and would have done so had it gone the other way.
And conversely, I'd strongly oppose (for example) the removal of Cromwell's Westminster statue, though I believe him to have been an evil man. There comes a point when history has to be accepted as just history.
Back on topic, the SNP could never survive being the party that kept the tories in power office...
They would have to support a no confidence vote, although I bet they hope there isn't one for a while yet - long enough at least for the tories to damage their standing in Scotland.
Again - you're assuming no-one in Scotland wants to vote Tory - which is bizarre on a site like this. Many SNP voters were ex-Tories and numbers have already flooded back to the blue camp. The Tories would struggle to be the first party in Scotland but the last GE and assembly election are testimony to the fact that the brand is alive and kicking. Ask Salmond.
I think you are imbibing too much wishful thinking tbh. You only have to go back to 2010 to see what happened before the SNP surge: Lab 41, LD 11, SNP 6, Con 1. History never repeats itself and making prediction is hard (especially about the future ) but I don't think the tories will make big (or any) gains in Scotland at the next GE.
The Tories now have a substantial minority that would automatically identify with them, which they didn't have in 2010 - Scots who oppose both independence and the EU. I can't see any Tory breakthrough in the Central Belt, but I think they'll to very well in the North East and Borders for some time.
Much as I personally wish it were otherwise, both the Tories and Labour are committed to exiting the EU. And both are against independence.
By the time of the next GE either the EU will be a non-issue (if Brexit goes well) or not a vote winner (if it's going badly).
In any event, neither of those points are reasons why "many of the SNP voters were ex-Tories" as Felix asserts
You have to ask yourself what's more likely if the SNP lose votes, a return to the period up to 2010, when Labour were the largest party or do we go all the way back to the 1951 when the Tories were (briefly) the largest party?
Neither is more likely. The SNP won in m/c Scotland by taking Tory votes. They've now lost many of those voters back to the Tories. there is no obvious reason fpr those voters to switch to Labour. No-one by the way suggested a return to 1951 but the idea that Labour will suddenly win back as many as 2010 and the Tories go down to just one is equally unlikely. Study the Tory wins on Electoral Calculus. The SNP lost many voters this time - and a lot of them voted blue. You also assume that w/c Scotland will revert to Labour next time in even greater numbers - that may equally be your own wishful thinking.
It may indeed be so Felix, that wishful thinking is a heady brew!
I blame the University of Oxford for all this nonsense and their acquiescence to the Rhodes must fall nonsense.
Sadly the debate has become so polarised, with large groups of violent idiots on both sides, that it's going to be a long and difficult road forward.
Trump is right on this one, which seems a weird thing to say. Pulling down statues serves no purpose except as a vehicle for one group of morons to provoke the other group of morons.
How does a city mayor deciding to take sides and work under cover of darkness with no public debate, demonstrably prove anything?
Well, for a start there was a public debate (just as there was in the case of Charlottesville) - "the same day the council voted unanimously to remove the four monuments..." The decision having been taken, the statues were removed with a minimum of fuss, precisely not to 'provoke the other group of morons'.
That you think both sides in the debate morons perhaps says as much about you as it does them.
I didn't say both sides were morons, I said that the moderates on both sides are having their voices drowned out by the morons.
Should Oxford University have also given into the protests and removed the statue of Cecil Rhodes?
"In some ways, Trump would rather have people calling him racist than say he backed down the minute he was wrong,” one adviser to the White House said on Wednesday about Charlottesville. “This may turn into the biggest mess of his presidency because he is stubborn and doesn't realize how bad this is getting.” http://www.politico.com/story/2017/08/16/trump-charlottesville-temper-chaos-241721
I'm far from certain that this row is damaging for Trump. It will upset country-club Republicans, but will probably reassure many blue collar voters that he's on their side.
the most interesting post on the matter today has been rcs1000 saying PB is more agitated by the statues than Los Angeles
Back on topic, the SNP could never survive being the party that kept the tories in power office...
They would have to support a no confidence vote, although I bet they hope there isn't one for a while yet - long enough at least for the tories to damage their standing in Scotland.
Again - you're assuming no-one in Scotland wants to vote Tory - which is bizarre on a site like this. Many SNP voters were ex-Tories and numbers have already flooded back to the blue camp. The Tories would struggle to be the first party in Scotland but the last GE and assembly election are testimony to the fact that the brand is alive and kicking. Ask Salmond.
I think you are imbibing too much wishful thinking tbh. You only have to go back to 2010 to see what happened before the SNP surge: Lab 41, LD 11, SNP 6, Con 1. History never repeats itself and making prediction is hard (especially about the future ) but I don't think the tories will make big (or any) gains in Scotland at the next GE.
The Tories now have a substantial minority that would automatically identify with them, which they didn't have in 2010 - Scots who oppose both independence and the EU. I can't see any Tory breakthrough in the Central Belt, but I think they'll to very well in the North East and Borders for some time.
Much as I personally wish it were otherwise, both the Tories and Labour are committed to exiting the EU. And both are against independence.
By the time of the next GE either the EU will be a non-issue (if Brexit goes well) or not a vote winner (if it's going badly).
In any event, neither of those points are reasons why "many of the SNP voters were ex-Tories" as Felix asserts
You have to ask yourself what's more likely if the SNP lose votes, a return to the period up to 2010, when Labour were the largest party or do we go all the way back to the 1951 when the Tories were (briefly) the largest party?
Neither is more likely. The SNP won in m/c Scotland by taking Tory votes. They've now lost many of those voters back to the Tories. there is no obvious reason fpr those voters to switch to Labour. No-one by the way suggested a return to 1951 but the idea that Labour will suddenly win back as many as 2010 and the Tories go down to just one is equally unlikely. Study the Tory wins on Electoral Calculus. The SNP lost many voters this time - and a lot of them voted blue. You also assume that w/c Scotland will revert to Labour next time in even greater numbers - that may equally be your own wishful thinking.
Turnout was down massively in Scotland. Almost entirely affecting the SNP.
How does a city mayor deciding to take sides and work under cover of darkness with no public debate, demonstrably prove anything?
Well, for a start there was a public debate (just as there was in the case of Charlottesville) - "the same day the council voted unanimously to remove the four monuments..." The decision having been taken, the statues were removed with a minimum of fuss, precisely not to 'provoke the other group of morons'.
That you think both sides in the debate morons perhaps says as much about you as it does them.
I didn't say both sides were morons, I said that the moderates on both sides are having their voices drowned out by the morons.
Should Oxford University have also given into the protests and removed the statue of Cecil Rhodes?
Fair enough - but you're still wrong, IMO. There are plenty of moderate voices in favour of removing the statues, and they seem to be the ones which are being heard.
Rhodes ? I don't really have a strong opinion either way. Postulating a south of England liberally sprinkled with Rhodes statues erected in the '20s as a message to a downtrodden 10% of the population not to be uppity, then perhaps I would. As it is, there are reasoned and less reasoned arguments on both sides, and I'm happy to accept Oxford's decision in the matter, and would have done so had it gone the other way.
And conversely, I'd strongly oppose (for example) the removal of Cromwell's Westminster statue, though I believe him to have been an evil man. There comes a point when history has to be accepted as just history.
In that case, I'd try and distinguish symbols that were erected to taunt a section of the population, and those that are in the nature of genuine war memorials.
Back on topic, the SNP could never survive being the party that kept the tories in power office...
They would have to support a no confidence vote, although I bet they hope there isn't one for a while yet - long enough at least for the tories to damage their standing in Scotland.
Again - you're assuming no-one in Scotland wants to vote Tory - which is bizarre on a site like this. Many SNP voters were ex-Tories and numbers have already flooded back to the blue camp. The Tories would struggle to be the first party in Scotland but the last GE and assembly election are testimony to the fact that the brand is alive and kicking. Ask Salmond.
I think you are imbibing too much wishful thinking tbh. You only have to go back to 2010 to see what happened before the SNP surge: Lab 41, LD 11, SNP 6, Con 1. History never repeats itself and making prediction is hard (especially about the future ) but I don't think the tories will make big (or any) gains in Scotland at the next GE.
The Tories now have a substantial minority that would automatically identify with them, which they didn't have in 2010 - Scots who oppose both independence and the EU. I can't see any Tory breakthrough in the Central Belt, but I think they'll to very well in the North East and Borders for some time.
Aberdeen South is one of the biggest head-scratcher results of the election. Demographically it has a young average age, not all that many retirees, and is extremely highly-educated. It also estimated at a very high Remain vote even by Scottish standards. They struggled to even win seats in England with those kind of demographics this time, let alone in Scotland.
I blame the University of Oxford for all this nonsense and their acquiescence to the Rhodes must fall nonsense.
Sadly the debate has become so polarised, with large groups of violent idiots on both sides, that it's going to be a long and difficult road forward.
Trump is right on this one, which seems a weird thing to say. Pulling down statues serves no purpose except as a vehicle for one group of morons to provoke the other group of morons.
I generally don't think pulling down statues is a good thing. As others say, the past is the past and we can't delete it. On the other hand, I read that these statues weren't put up at the time of the Civil War to remember these people. They were put up in the early 1900s or in the 1960s to make a stand against equal rights in the Jim Crow and Civil Rights periods. That made me question whether it is really genuine history that is being kept up, or it white supremacist symbols. I like the idea of moving them all to a statue park like they did in ex-communist states.
In the 1950-60's after Brown vs Board of Education there was a trend for renaming schools after Confederates.
Historical significance: low. Intent to intimidate African Americans: high.
The other point to consider is that up until the 1980s, the lost cause myth of a noble south, fighting for states rights, was more or less historical consensus taught in US schools. It's only in recent decades that it has become more widely recognised that the South's rebellion was front and centre in defence of the right not just to retain slavery in the southern states, but to extend the institution. Robert E Lee is a national figure in the US - and solely because he led the South's armies in a revolt in defense of slavery.
It's hard to extend that argument to the Oxford brouhaha, as I doubt more than a small percentage of the UK population have any idea who Cecil Rhodes was...
How does a city mayor deciding to take sides and work under cover of darkness with no public debate, demonstrably prove anything?
Well, for a start there was a public debate (just as there was in the case of Charlottesville) - "the same day the council voted unanimously to remove the four monuments..." The decision having been taken, the statues were removed with a minimum of fuss, precisely not to 'provoke the other group of morons'.
That you think both sides in the debate morons perhaps says as much about you as it does them.
I didn't say both sides were morons, I said that the moderates on both sides are having their voices drowned out by the morons.
Should Oxford University have also given into the protests and removed the statue of Cecil Rhodes?
Fair enough - but you're still wrong, IMO. There are plenty of moderate voices in favour of removing the statues, and they seem to be the ones which are being heard.
Rhodes ? I don't really have a strong opinion either way. Postulating a south of England liberally sprinkled with Rhodes statues erected in the '20s as a message to a downtrodden 10% of the population not to be uppity, then perhaps I would. As it is, there are reasoned and less reasoned arguments on both sides, and I'm happy to accept Oxford's decision in the matter, and would have done so had it gone the other way.
And conversely, I'd strongly oppose (for example) the removal of Cromwell's Westminster statue, though I believe him to have been an evil man. There comes a point when history has to be accepted as just history.
In that case, I'd try and distinguish symbols that were erected to taunt a section of the population, and those that are in the nature of genuine war memorials.
Why not then accept the judgment of local city councils in the matter ?
Not a lot of upside for the Conservatives in that list. They are likely to lose as many seats to Labour as they win off the SNP, as the Unionist tactical vote unwinds and Labour becomes more credible as winners of seats. 15 to 30 seats for Labour is entirely doable.
Not especially likely at all. Not a single Tory seat where Labour are anywhere near them. You'd need a landslide performance to achieve that and current polling [ yes, I know] suggests no such thing.
There are maybe 3 or so SCon seats that are vulnerable to Labour. When I get a moment I'll check them out. There are probably a similar number of SNP seats that are likely to go Conservative next time, bearing in mind some of the seats marked blue above may go Labour or stay SNP on a three way fight
How does a city mayor deciding to take sides and work under cover of darkness with no public debate, demonstrably prove anything?
Well, for a start there was a public debate (just as there was in the case of Charlottesville) - "the same day the council voted unanimously to remove the four monuments..." The decision having been taken, the statues were removed with a minimum of fuss, precisely not to 'provoke the other group of morons'.
That you think both sides in the debate morons perhaps says as much about you as it does them.
I didn't say both sides were morons, I said that the moderates on both sides are having their voices drowned out by the morons.
Should Oxford University have also given into the protests and removed the statue of Cecil Rhodes?
Fair enough - but you're still wrong, IMO. There are plenty of moderate voices in favour of removing the statues, and they seem to be the ones which are being heard.
Rhodes ? I don't really have a strong opinion either way. Postulating a south of England liberally sprinkled with Rhodes statues erected in the '20s as a message to a downtrodden 10% of the population not to be uppity, then perhaps I would. As it is, there are reasoned and less reasoned arguments on both sides, and I'm happy to accept Oxford's decision in the matter, and would have done so had it gone the other way.
And conversely, I'd strongly oppose (for example) the removal of Cromwell's Westminster statue, though I believe him to have been an evil man. There comes a point when history has to be accepted as just history.
In that case, I'd try and distinguish symbols that were erected to taunt a section of the population, and those that are in the nature of genuine war memorials.
Why not then accept the judgment of local city councils in the matter ?
I'm not trying to prevent the local councils from doing what they are legally entitled to do.
I'm just putting myself in the shoes of a conservative American.
Back on topic, the SNP could never survive being the party that kept the tories in power office...
They would have to support a no confidence vote, although I bet they hope there isn't one for a while yet - long enough at least for the tories to damage their standing in Scotland.
I think you are imbibing too much wishful thinking tbh. You only have to go back to 2010 to see what happened before the SNP surge: Lab 41, LD 11, SNP 6, Con 1. History never repeats itself and making prediction is hard (especially about the future ) but I don't think the tories will make big (or any) gains in Scotland at the next GE.
The Tories now have a substantial minority that would automatically identify with them, which they didn't have in 2010 - Scots who oppose both independence and the EU. I can't see any Tory breakthrough in the Central Belt, but I think they'll to very well in the North East and Borders for some time.
Much as I personally wish it were otherwise, both the Tories and Labour are committed to exiting the EU. And both are against independence.
By the time of the next GE either the EU will be a non-issue (if Brexit goes well) or not a vote winner (if it's going badly).
In any event, neither of those points are reasons why "many of the SNP voters were ex-Tories" as Felix asserts
You have to ask yourself what's more likely if the SNP lose votes, a return to the period up to 2010, when Labour were the largest party or do we go all the way back to the 1951 when the Tories were (briefly) the largest party?
Neither is more likely. The SNP won in m/c Scotland by taking Tory votes. They've now lost many of those voters back to the Tories. there is no obvious reason fpr those voters to switch to Labour. No-one by the way suggested a return to 1951 but the idea that Labour will suddenly win back as many as 2010 and the Tories go down to just one is equally unlikely. Study the Tory wins on Electoral Calculus. The SNP lost many voters this time - and a lot of them voted blue. You also assume that w/c Scotland will revert to Labour next time in even greater numbers - that may equally be your own wishful thinking.
It may indeed be so Felix, that wishful thinking is a heady brew!
Yup - to remind you I expected 3/4 Tory seats in Scotland this time around.
Back on topic, the SNP could never survive being the party that kept the tories in power office...
They would have to support a no confidence vote, although I bet they hope there isn't one for a while yet - long enough at least for the tories to damage their standing in Scotland.
Again - you're assuming no-one in Scotland wants to vote Tory - which is bizarre on a site like this. Many SNP voters were ex-Tories and numbers have already flooded back to the blue camp. The Tories would struggle to be the first party in Scotland but the last GE and assembly election are testimony to the fact that the brand is alive and kicking. Ask Salmond.
I think you are imbibing too much wishful thinking tbh. You only have to go back to 2010 to see what happened before the SNP surge: Lab 41, LD 11, SNP 6, Con 1. History never repeats itself and making prediction is hard (especially about the future ) but I don't think the tories will make big (or any) gains in Scotland at the next GE.
The Tories now have a substantial minority that would automatically identify with them, which they didn't have in 2010 - Scots who oppose both independence and the EU. I can't see any Tory breakthrough in the Central Belt, but I think they'll to very well in the North East and Borders for some time.
Aberdeen South is one of the biggest head-scratcher results of the election. Demographically it has a young average age, not all that many retirees, and is extremely highly-educated. It also estimated at a very high Remain vote even by Scottish standards. They struggled to even win seats in England with those kind of demographics this time, let alone in Scotland.
I blame the University of Oxford for all this nonsense and their acquiescence to the Rhodes must fall nonsense.
Sadly the debate has become so polarised, with large groups of violent idiots on both sides, that it's going to be a long and difficult road forward.
Trump is right on this one, which seems a weird thing to say. Pulling down statues serves no purpose except as a vehicle for one group of morons to provoke the other group of morons.
How does a city mayor deciding to take sides and work under cover of darkness with no public debate, demonstrably prove anything?
Well, for a start there was a public debate (just as there was in the case of Charlottesville) - "the same day the council voted unanimously to remove the four monuments..." The decision having been taken, the statues were removed with a minimum of fuss, precisely not to 'provoke the other group of morons'.
That you think both sides in the debate morons perhaps says as much about you as it does them.
I didn't say both sides were morons, I said that the moderates on both sides are having their voices drowned out by the morons.
Should Oxford University have also given into the protests and removed the statue of Cecil Rhodes?
"In some ways, Trump would rather have people calling him racist than say he backed down the minute he was wrong,” one adviser to the White House said on Wednesday about Charlottesville. “This may turn into the biggest mess of his presidency because he is stubborn and doesn't realize how bad this is getting.” http://www.politico.com/story/2017/08/16/trump-charlottesville-temper-chaos-241721
I'm far from certain that this row is damaging for Trump. It will upset country-club Republicans, but will probably reassure many blue collar voters that he's on their side.
I blame the University of Oxford for all this nonsense and their acquiescence to the Rhodes must fall nonsense.
How does removing a statue change history TSE?
A lot of those statues are relatively recent. "A timeline of the genesis of the Confederate sites shows two notable spikes. One comes around the turn of the 20th century, just after Plessy v. Ferguson, and just as many Southern states were establishing repressive race laws. The second runs from the mid-1950s to the mid-1960s—the peak of the civil-rights movement. In other words, the erection of Confederate monuments has been a way to perform cultural resistance to black equality." https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2016/04/the-stubborn-persistence-of-confederate-monuments/479751/
I'm far from certain that this row is damaging for Trump. It will upset country-club Republicans, but will probably reassure many blue collar voters that he's on their side.
It seems to be upsetting the Republican Establishment - the people who are in a position to make his Presidency a failure.
Never forget that in politics, the other party is the opposition. Your true enemy sits behind you on your own benches.
I blame the University of Oxford for all this nonsense and their acquiescence to the Rhodes must fall nonsense.
Of course you can. People rewrite history all the time - Stalin, The Nazis, Holocaust Denial, Mao ....
A fairer comparison in this case might be the US army removal of Nazi symbols and monuments in postwar occupied Germany. (Where interestingly provision was made for the preservation of items of particular artistic or historical value.) I'm not quite seeing the comparison with Holocaust Denial...
I blame the University of Oxford for all this nonsense and their acquiescence to the Rhodes must fall nonsense.
Sadly the debate has become so polarised, with large groups of violent idiots on both sides, that it's going to be a long and difficult road forward.
Trump is right on this one, which seems a weird thing to say. Pulling down statues serves no purpose except as a vehicle for one group of morons to provoke the other group of morons.
How does a city mayor deciding to take sides and work under cover of darkness with no public debate, demonstrably prove anything?
Well, for a start there was a public debate (just as there was in the case of Charlottesville) - "the same day the council voted unanimously to remove the four monuments..." The decision having been taken, the statues were removed with a minimum of fuss, precisely not to 'provoke the other group of morons'.
I blame the University of Oxford for all this nonsense and their acquiescence to the Rhodes must fall nonsense.
Sadly the debate has become so polarised, with large groups of violent idiots on both sides, that it's going to be a long and difficult road forward.
Trump is right on this one, which seems a weird thing to say. Pulling down statues serves no purpose except as a vehicle for one group of morons to provoke the other group of morons.
How does a city mayor deciding to take sides and work under cover of darkness with no public debate, demonstrably prove anything?
Well, for a start there was a public debate (just as there was in the case of Charlottesville) - "the same day the council voted unanimously to remove the four monuments..." The decision having been taken, the statues were removed with a minimum of fuss, precisely not to 'provoke the other group of morons'.
That you think both sides in the debate morons perhaps says as much about you as it does them.
I didn't say both sides were morons, I said that the moderates on both sides are having their voices drowned out by the morons.
Should Oxford University have also given into the protests and removed the statue of Cecil Rhodes?
They would have done, had donors not made it plain they would hit the College where it hurt, in their wallets.
Which is the most worrying point.
Whoever has the money ultimately calls the rest of society's values.
I largely disagree with you about the statues but agree with you about this.
If it was right to take down the statues, the statues should be taken down, regardless of the views of donors. Principles aren't worth anything unless they cost you something sometimes.
I'm surprised to see LDs are not second in more of these - I knew their vote in Scotland was clustered, and they were jolly unlucky not to get Fife, and that traditional places of support in a few areas switched in a big way to SCON this time, but still a surprise. I didn't realise how much SLAB recovered in Glasgow either.
I blame the University of Oxford for all this nonsense and their acquiescence to the Rhodes must fall nonsense.
How does removing a statue change history TSE?
It defines the boundaries of what is acceptable history or not. And when you do that you end up shutting down debate and discussion.
Plenty of human history doesn't measure up to today's standards. But, it's shaped who we are today, and it's important it's in the public eye, debated and not forgotten.
I blame the University of Oxford for all this nonsense and their acquiescence to the Rhodes must fall nonsense.
I'm not intrinsically opposed to trying to dissuade glorification of things that, in the modern era, we generally in society think should not be glorified, but I think it becomes a fine line at times to pretending something didn't happen, or was other than it was, to, ironically, whitewashing the past by removing the reminders to it, getting angry at factual statements as well as glorification of the unglorious. The counterpoint extreme is to nazi symbol removal, but that has to be at the upper end? Is the harm caused by retention so much that it justifies erasure? Maybe, but I think it can be a harder discussion than it seems at first glance, and best left to them right now I guess.
*As an example of what I mean, I was watching Last Week Tonight, and John Oliver made a point about that communications director who stated that the famous poem associated with the statue of liberty (Bring me your poor, etc) was not originally included with the statue, and Oliver argued that while that was the case it has become inextricably linked with it now, which is not an unreasonable point. However the studio audience was gasping in horror merely at the statement that it was not originally a part of the statue, which apparently is true.
I blame the University of Oxford for all this nonsense and their acquiescence to the Rhodes must fall nonsense.
How does removing a statue change history TSE?
It defines the boundaries of what is acceptable history or not. And when you do that you end up shutting down debate and discussion.
Plenty of human history doesn't measure up to today's standards. But, it's shaped who we are today, and it's important it's in the public eye, debated and not forgotten.
Are you really making the case that the US civil war isn't being discussed ? It's precisely because its legacy is front and centre in US politics that statues are being removed. Is Hitler's legacy no longer discussed because the US army , and later the German government, destroyed or banned Nazi symbols and memorials ?
I blame the University of Oxford for all this nonsense and their acquiescence to the Rhodes must fall nonsense.
Of course you can. People rewrite history all the time - Stalin, The Nazis, Holocaust Denial, Mao ....
A fairer comparison in this case might be the US army removal of Nazi symbols and monuments in postwar occupied Germany. (Where interestingly provision was made for the preservation of items of particular artistic or historical value.) I'm not quite seeing the comparison with Holocaust Denial...
Denying the Holocaust means that historical revisionism is needed. You either blame the victims or pretend it never happened but either way history as it stands would need changing.
I once talked to a man who showed me his tattoo from his time in the Nazi death camps. I fail to understand how anyone could attempt to deny something that is so well documented.
Perhaps in one respect, Trump is right - leave the statues up.
Maybe we need to remind the people of today of the horrors others had to endure in the past and the usually flimsy basis on which most of the bigotry and prejudice of those days were based. Change the inscriptions underneath to read along the lines of "This statue is to remind us that others deserve respect, tolerance and humanity regardless of the colour of their skin or whichever religion they choose to follow. Do not be a b****rd like the person on this plinth"
I blame the University of Oxford for all this nonsense and their acquiescence to the Rhodes must fall nonsense.
I'm not intrinsically opposed to trying to dissuade glorification of things that, in the modern era, we generally in society think should not be glorified, but I think it becomes a fine line at times to pretending something didn't happen, or was other than it was, to, ironically, whitewashing the past by removing the reminders to it. The counterpoint extreme is to nazi symbol removal, but that has to be at the upper end?
As an example of what I mean, I was watching Last Week Tonight, and John Oliver made a point about that communications director who stated that the famous poem associated with the statue of liberty (Bring me your poor, etc) was not originally included with the statue, and Oliver argued that while that was the case it has become inextricably linked with it now, which is not an unreasonable point. However the studio audience was gasping in horror merely at the statement that it was not originally a part of the statue, which apparently is true.
Indeed. It is little known in the US that the official motto "In God We Trust", was only adopted in 1956. It replaced e pluribus unum, and was intended to differentiate the US from the Soviets. It is a relatively recent bit of historical invention. I'm sure there are many who would gasp in horror at that.
Like a mirrored trump.....The alt-white gets a mention.
BBC: “Do you not think there’s a particular problem with Pakistani men, because we’ve seen in Rochdale, we’ve seen in Rotherham, in Newcastle and Oxford, that’s been the problem.”
Corbyn: “The problem is the crime that’s committed against women from any community. Much crime is committed by white people, crime is committed by people of other communities as well. I think it is wrong to designate an entire community as a problem.”
Comments
to be honest the % changes seem pretty small, I'm not convinced there's even that much of a result that needs to be explained.
The brighter students would, at the very least, be able to display knowledge and mathematical ability (for example by demonstrating other formulations of the conjecture). On most mark schemes, they would not score nothing.
And who knows, someone might just prove/disprove it...
Otherwise, I agree.
As far as I can work out a court interpreted something and the ramifications have rolled out from there. How many of our 650 MP's would be in a similar position (well anyone with an Irish granny for a start)? What's doubly odd is that I think they might be disqualified even if they could claim citizenship and haven't. The MP this week was "guilty" because his father had been born in N Zealand. What a crime against humanity that must be (!)
Presumably Julia Gillard ex PM is in the soup in theory, because if memory serves she was born in Penarth (Old) South Wales.
Aussie judges have delivered a serious googly there.
The decision having been taken, the statues were removed with a minimum of fuss, precisely not to 'provoke the other group of morons'.
Plenty of other purposes have been put forward, which do not include provoking anyone:
http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/politics/2017/08/stonewall_jackson_s_grandsons_the_monuments_must_go.html
That you think both sides in the debate morons perhaps says as much about you as it does them.
1. Your easy and hard exam examples are valid in the sense that the extremes will reduce the spread of results between stronger and weaker candidates but your implication is therefore that the difference between the sexes is due to one or other being intrinsically less able. Maybe a view that held sway pre-1900 but not much evidence for that now and I am sure that's not what you mean.
2. "It is of course possible that scores have improved because everyone has genuinely become more intelligent" Not more intelligent (over a few years that would be evolutionary nonsense) but perhaps better taught in the subject or in how to pass exams.
In fact of course all the changes up and down are extremely marginal. The Guardian article contains the hilarious comment "The two sets of exams showed wide variation in the relative performance of boys and girls."
Which it then illustrates with variance percentages of 0.7% and 0.3%! (Article no doubt written by an arts graduate - or is that just my bias coming through!)
https://www.theguardian.com/education/2017/aug/17/a-level-results-show-first-rise-in-top-grades-in-six-years
A few seats may be fruitful for the Blue team, but it could be that it's the unionist vote tactically punishing the SNP. They could easily go back to Labour next time.
And if they vote to keep the Tories in, they will lose their left flank for propping up the Tory government. Scottish Labour would have a field day
http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2017/08/16/regime-change-in-charlottesville-215500
Its not a heritage argument for the most part. And Trump knows it
Should Oxford University have also given into the protests and removed the statue of Cecil Rhodes?
Obama of course rallied against NAFTA during the Primaries against Hillary, but he didn't do anything about it.
It's opposed only in the way that Berwick on Tweed is still at war with Russia from 1856, of course.
Every time an odd number is hit in the sequence, it can be expressed as '2N + 1', where N is an integer. 3(2N + 1) + 1 = 6N + 4,
6N + 4 which can be expressed as 2k, k = 3N + 2 so this integer is even.
This means the sequence never 'goes up' twice in a row.. so given we can only come down and
a one up, two down sequence yields.
(3N + 1)/4 < N, All N > 1 we should 'probably' get back to 1 in time..
I suspect the full proof involves delving into the properties of primes.
If he can't get that through, he's probably going to get primaried by his own side, at which point he's the proverbial cooked bread.
http://www.politico.com/story/2017/08/16/trump-charlottesville-temper-chaos-241721
By the time of the next GE either the EU will be a non-issue (if Brexit goes well) or not a vote winner (if it's going badly).
In any event, neither of those points are reasons why "many of the SNP voters were ex-Tories" as Felix asserts
You have to ask yourself what's more likely if the SNP lose votes, a return to the period up to 2010, when Labour were the largest party or do we go all the way back to the 1951 when the Tories were (briefly) the largest party?
In areas of historic Conservative strength, some Conservative voters had switched to the SNP, not because they favoured independence, but because they saw it as standing up for Scottish interests.
A further point is that the decline in the Lib Dem vote is very beneficial to the Scottish Conservatives.
One can pick any insoluble problem one likes. The point is simply that if an exam is hard enough everyone will fail, no matter whether they are 6 years old or a maths PHD. Starting with an easy exam everyone will pass, and proceeding to one nobody can pass, you will see a difference first emerge and then disappear in the performance of groups of different exam-passing ability.
The assumption that boys converging on girls is good news includes a presupposition that they are two such groups, and that the convergence is a good thing. Even accepting for argument's sake the first, it's possible to show that it could be a bad thing because you're passing everyone regardless.
* a mathematician and professor at the University of Michigan, apparently
Rhodes ? I don't really have a strong opinion either way.
Postulating a south of England liberally sprinkled with Rhodes statues erected in the '20s as a message to a downtrodden 10% of the population not to be uppity, then perhaps I would.
As it is, there are reasoned and less reasoned arguments on both sides, and I'm happy to accept Oxford's decision in the matter, and would have done so had it gone the other way.
And conversely, I'd strongly oppose (for example) the removal of Cromwell's Westminster statue, though I believe him to have been an evil man. There comes a point when history has to be accepted as just history.
Historical significance: low. Intent to intimidate African Americans: high.
https://www.theguardian.com/education/2016/jan/28/cecil-rhodes-statue-will-not-be-removed--oxford-university
It was Fen Poly that caved on a statue:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/education/12188018/Cambridge-college-removes-African-bronze-cockerel-statue.html
Just the make weights out so far.
Cook and Root are in at the best time to face the pink ball - after 20 overs but before it gets dark.
a far away country of which we know little
I've no issues with the pink ball but lunch at 16:00 and tea at 18:40?! What's that about? Shouldn't it be tea and supper or dinner?
Robert E Lee is a national figure in the US - and solely because he led the South's armies in a revolt in defense of slavery.
It's hard to extend that argument to the Oxford brouhaha, as I doubt more than a small percentage of the UK population have any idea who Cecil Rhodes was...
I'm just putting myself in the shoes of a conservative American.
"A timeline of the genesis of the Confederate sites shows two notable spikes. One comes around the turn of the 20th century, just after Plessy v. Ferguson, and just as many Southern states were establishing repressive race laws. The second runs from the mid-1950s to the mid-1960s—the peak of the civil-rights movement. In other words, the erection of Confederate monuments has been a way to perform cultural resistance to black equality."
https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2016/04/the-stubborn-persistence-of-confederate-monuments/479751/
Never forget that in politics, the other party is the opposition. Your true enemy sits behind you on your own benches.
I'm not quite seeing the comparison with Holocaust Denial...
Whoever has the money ultimately calls the rest of society's values.
If it was right to take down the statues, the statues should be taken down, regardless of the views of donors. Principles aren't worth anything unless they cost you something sometimes.
Plenty of human history doesn't measure up to today's standards. But, it's shaped who we are today, and it's important it's in the public eye, debated and not forgotten.
*As an example of what I mean, I was watching Last Week Tonight, and John Oliver made a point about that communications director who stated that the famous poem associated with the statue of liberty (Bring me your poor, etc) was not originally included with the statue, and Oliver argued that while that was the case it has become inextricably linked with it now, which is not an unreasonable point. However the studio audience was gasping in horror merely at the statement that it was not originally a part of the statue, which apparently is true.
It's precisely because its legacy is front and centre in US politics that statues are being removed.
Is Hitler's legacy no longer discussed because the US army , and later the German government, destroyed or banned Nazi symbols and memorials ?
I'm not convinced.
Time to pile in on Next Man Out in about 10 runs time...
I once talked to a man who showed me his tattoo from his time in the Nazi death camps. I fail to understand how anyone could attempt to deny something that is so well documented.
Perhaps in one respect, Trump is right - leave the statues up.
Maybe we need to remind the people of today of the horrors others had to endure in the past and the usually flimsy basis on which most of the bigotry and prejudice of those days were based. Change the inscriptions underneath to read along the lines of "This statue is to remind us that others deserve respect, tolerance and humanity regardless of the colour of their skin or whichever religion they choose to follow. Do not be a b****rd like the person on this plinth"
It is a relatively recent bit of historical invention.
I'm sure there are many who would gasp in horror at that.
BBC: “Do you not think there’s a particular problem with Pakistani men, because we’ve seen in Rochdale, we’ve seen in Rotherham, in Newcastle and Oxford, that’s been the problem.”
Corbyn: “The problem is the crime that’s committed against women from any community. Much crime is committed by white people, crime is committed by people of other communities as well. I think it is wrong to designate an entire community as a problem.”