"Average night in prison costs £118 to a UK tax payer.
£430,700 overall cost to tax payers. "
And how much does a new three month lockdown cost if one of these idiots brings back a vaccine evading mutation and lies to avoid the quarantine?
I knew someone would say something like that. I didn`t expect it to be you though, Max.
We`re never getting out of this are we. UK is starting to feel like prison.
No, we want to get out of this as soon as humanly possible. Given that the importation of a new vaccine-resistant strain at this point could mean the difference between opening back up and endless lockdown for the whole country, like any good (temporary) Benthamite I think we can briefly curtail the frivolities of the few to ensure the freedom of the many.
What really annoys me about Covid deniers is that they don't realise if we end the formal lockdown early/before it is medically appropriate to do so the citizens will have their own de facto lockdown as they don't want to catch the plague/give it to their families.
On topic but a little nerdy or geeky. There will be a reduction from 10 to 2 for nominations for candidates. But this year we will have a lot of multiple election in many wards. Can the same 2 people nominate more than one candidate?
Unless the rules have changed you could always nominate as many candidates as there were seats to be filled.
"Average night in prison costs £118 to a UK tax payer.
£430,700 overall cost to tax payers. "
And how much does a new three month lockdown cost if one of these idiots brings back a vaccine evading mutation and lies to avoid the quarantine?
I knew someone would say something like that. I didn`t expect it to be you though, Max.
We`re never getting out of this are we. UK is starting to feel like prison.
No, we want to get out of this as soon as humanly possible. Given that the importation of a new vaccine-resistant strain at this point could mean the difference between opening back up and endless lockdown for the whole country, like any good (temporary) Benthamite I think we can briefly curtail the frivolities of the few to ensure the freedom of the many.
I know we want to. We can`t unless we shed some of this aversion to any risk.
I`m feeling rotten today, as you can probably tell. Woke up this morning to the Hancock ten years story and the gloom hasn`t cleared.
It does strike me that the reaction to this pandemic is probably one unique to our age. In the Spanish Flu pandemic there were grim statistics piling up in your newspaper every morning but they were just that - statistics. You see the same thing in Defoe's "Journal of the Plague Year" (although he wrote it after the event) but here we have the immediacy of the visual representation of actual people, rather than numbers, beamed to our screens 24/7. You see the lives behind the statistics. That has informed the government's reaction in a way that it would not have done in earlier generations. I reckon as recently as the 90s a lockdown of this severity would not have happened - hell before 2005 how many people could work from home using dial-up?
“ immediacy of the visual representation of actual people, as cats , beamed to our screens 24/7. “
Corrected it for you. 😃
Maybe Spanish Flu is poor bench mark because of the distraction of the war? E.g. without the war on would response have been exactly the same.
The war only overlapped with it briefly - the pandemic was at its height in 1919-20. The "Russian" Flu a few decades earlier (of which there is now some hypothesis that it was a coronavirus) was the same.
As for WW1 - can you imagine any democratically elected government in this day and age risking that many lives over that long?
Fair play to Johnson, vaccine provision has been a Covid triumph for the PM, and whether the target is hit by all metrics, or not. And Covid triumphs for Johnson have been thin on the ground.
Now this IS interesting. Apparently people were already wokeway back in 1899. They objected to Cecil Rhodes of statue fame being given an honorary degree by Oxford University because Black Lives Matter
That's an interesting insight. I have a theory that the statue in Bristol was put there deliberately to 'provoke the woke' of the era, because it went up well after slavery abolition, and the caption with it is so unremittingly adoring. There was a big debate at the time between the abolitionist 'chattering classes' and the more red in tooth and claw imperialists (who accused the former group of caring little about the condition of the domestic poor). I didn't think this was a good reason to tear it down though - makes it more interesting historically in my opinion. Contrasting it with a memorial to slaves would have been far more fitting and interesting.
One of the things about Colston and others is that, even in their own time let alone subsequently, they were controversial figures. Slavery had been illegal in Britain for centuries, and everyone (them included) knew they were involved in a dark (albeit technically legal) business involving the abduction and trafficking of human beings, in the course of which death was common and misery guaranteed.
They weren't the victims of changing fashions that meant that long after their deaths people decided they were dodgy in a way they couldn't possibly have predicted. They were always dodgy, and their philanthropy was largely about buying a sort of civic respectability that everyone knew their behaviour didn't merit.
No doubt there are individuals who fall into the category of being victims of changing fashions. But they certainly aren't all like that, and Colston is a good example. And I'd not defend vandalism, but Bristol City Council did have decades to sort out a readily resolvable matter in a diverse city, and did a bloody useless job of listening to people and sorting it out.
True, but as I've indicated, I think the slave trade did gain a certain nostalgic following after the fact. There was a lot of controversy surrounding the vicious putting down of the Morant Bay uprising, with groups assembled for the defence, and the prosecution of the man in charge (I forget his name). Carlyle wrote a lot of angry screeds about how it was impossible these days to make black people in the colonies do hard work. Britain during the 19th century did become *more* racially prejudiced rather than less, as Darwin's teachings gained popularity and gave scientific credence to racist views.
I think it was in this second wave that the Colston statue was built, and I'm sure, as with the Rhodes issue, it was not without (intentional) upset during its time. Of course, to me, it makes all the more sense to keep it up. All this history is now effectively blotted out - from the passer by anyway.
Now this IS interesting. Apparently people were already wokeway back in 1899. They objected to Cecil Rhodes of statue fame being given an honorary degree by Oxford University because Black Lives Matter
That's an interesting insight. I have a theory that the statue in Bristol was put there deliberately to 'provoke the woke' of the era, because it went up well after slavery abolition, and the caption with it is so unremittingly adoring. There was a big debate at the time between the abolitionist 'chattering classes' and the more red in tooth and claw imperialists (who accused the former group of caring little about the condition of the domestic poor). I didn't think this was a good reason to tear it down though - makes it more interesting historically in my opinion. Contrasting it with a memorial to slaves would have been far more fitting and interesting.
In many cases, I think you're probably right. Perhaps not as blatantly as on the USA, where I think they were erecting the damn things in the 1960's. Ironically, it puts the "we must leave our history on display" thing in a different context.
So the polite answer is what it always was. Keep the statue somewhere discreet, where nobody has to look at it if they don't want to. Pray for his soul in the Chapel. But don't have him glaring down on the High Street (Is that right? Went to the Better Place myself). Because that's a giant raised middle finger to people aware of all the lives he ruined. It's just not polite.
"Average night in prison costs £118 to a UK tax payer.
£430,700 overall cost to tax payers. "
And how much does a new three month lockdown cost if one of these idiots brings back a vaccine evading mutation and lies to avoid the quarantine?
I knew someone would say something like that. I didn`t expect it to be you though, Max.
We`re never getting out of this are we. UK is starting to feel like prison.
You're going through the trough part of the same rollercoaster that I've been on lately, so I sympathise.
Trying to look at this dispassionately, we are going to get out of it at some point, because pandemics end.
However - I am very concerned that we're going to have to go through another cycle of introduced infection, followed by one more bloody great long lockdown as a consequence, before the Government finally, FINALLY learns the lesson that you don't eff about with this virus, and basically locks the world out until Covid is ground down to some kind of state that humanity can live with, through a combination of vaccination and treatment, without having to keep resorting to mass imprisonment. So I get where you're coming from.
We are nearly there now. Boris will reflect on previous experience and will reopen slowly.
We will have primary schools from 8 March, this is nailed on now. And limited changes such as golf, tennis etc in March.
Nothing much else before April. Possibly no secondary schools until after Easter.
Of course we will have lots of speculation up to 22 Feb, but on that date we will have clear steps with 'no earlier than' dates and maybe also other criteria eg cases. The order of reopening will not be the same as Spring/Summer 2020.
But Laura will still ask about holidays at the press briefing, around 5.15 22 Feb.
"Average night in prison costs £118 to a UK tax payer.
£430,700 overall cost to tax payers. "
And how much does a new three month lockdown cost if one of these idiots brings back a vaccine evading mutation and lies to avoid the quarantine?
I knew someone would say something like that. I didn`t expect it to be you though, Max.
We`re never getting out of this are we. UK is starting to feel like prison.
No, we want to get out of this as soon as humanly possible. Given that the importation of a new vaccine-resistant strain at this point could mean the difference between opening back up and endless lockdown for the whole country, like any good (temporary) Benthamite I think we can briefly curtail the frivolities of the few to ensure the freedom of the many.
What really annoys me about Covid deniers is that they don't realise if we end the formal lockdown early/before it is medically appropriate to do so the citizens will have their own de facto lockdown as they don't want to catch the plague/give it to their families.
A de facto citizen led lockdown would have been much more efficient and cost us a great deal less than an enforced lockdown. And would have hit our economy much less hard.
Look at South Dakota, Florida, Sweden etc.
More deaths? now maybe, but far fewer down the line from the effects of lockdown.
I can't get a haircut, go to any number of shops, have a cup of tea in cafe, travel any distance from my house, or go out for pretty much any reason other than exercise or propping up elderly relatives. Most importantly, children aren't in school.
Given that, journalists asking about going on holiday is ... rather annoying.
I'm not too bothered about haircuts, shopping or cafes. I quite like working from home. I rather miss the pub, and holidays, though. We all have different things we are missing.
I'm not really missing the haircuts or shopping either, but if you are talking about 'freedom' then I'd have thought being able to walk to a local shop would come above taking a trip to Spain.
A lot of people have basically been locked in their homes for months at a time, some of my family included. Those going on holiday abroad (and the airlines that took them there) are at least partially responsible for that. I know it wasn't banned, and perhaps it wasn't understood quite what might happen after the summer, but the results were plain to see. You could blame the government for allowing it, but given all the noise about this it isn't surprising that they didn't take the difficult option of stopping travel.
Jumping up and down because you can't do it all over again isn't a great look. Wait at least until the effects of the last unlock have passed.
Personally, I wouldn't mind a holiday either, but there are more important things to think about at the moment. The ironic thing is that I could easily go on holiday in this country (and often did) and meet almost nobody.
We are nearly there now. Boris will reflect on previous experience and will reopen slowly.
We will have primary schools from 8 March, this is nailed on now. And limited changes such as golf, tennis etc in March.
Nothing much else before April. Possibly no secondary schools until after Easter.
Of course we will have lots of speculation up to 22 Feb, but on that date we will have clear steps with 'no earlier than' dates and maybe also other criteria eg cases. The order of reopening will not be the same as Spring/Summer 2020.
But Laura will still ask about holidays at the press briefing, around 5.15 22 Feb.
You can see why authoritarian regimes have no problem finding bodies to do the enforcing.
This site would be a prime recruiting ground.
Oh - anabob your lockdown busting friend you’ve been supporting on here must have a good publicist, got her photos in the press doing charity work so we forget previous crimes.
Now this IS interesting. Apparently people were already wokeway back in 1899. They objected to Cecil Rhodes of statue fame being given an honorary degree by Oxford University because Black Lives Matter
That's an interesting insight. I have a theory that the statue in Bristol was put there deliberately to 'provoke the woke' of the era, because it went up well after slavery abolition, and the caption with it is so unremittingly adoring. There was a big debate at the time between the abolitionist 'chattering classes' and the more red in tooth and claw imperialists (who accused the former group of caring little about the condition of the domestic poor). I didn't think this was a good reason to tear it down though - makes it more interesting historically in my opinion. Contrasting it with a memorial to slaves would have been far more fitting and interesting.
In many cases, I think you're probably right. Perhaps not as blatantly as on the USA, where I think they were erecting the damn things in the 1960's. Ironically, it puts the "we must leave our history on display" thing in a different context.
So the polite answer is what it always was. Keep the statue somewhere discreet, where nobody has to look at it if they don't want to. Pray for his soul in the Chapel. But don't have him glaring down on the High Street (Is that right? Went to the Better Place myself). Because that's a giant raised middle finger to people aware of all the lives he ruined. It's just not polite.
Yes, I can see why you conclude that - as I've said, I don't agree. However, I do agree with placing his memorial within its broader historical context.
"Average night in prison costs £118 to a UK tax payer.
£430,700 overall cost to tax payers. "
And how much does a new three month lockdown cost if one of these idiots brings back a vaccine evading mutation and lies to avoid the quarantine?
I knew someone would say something like that. I didn`t expect it to be you though, Max.
We`re never getting out of this are we. UK is starting to feel like prison.
No, we want to get out of this as soon as humanly possible. Given that the importation of a new vaccine-resistant strain at this point could mean the difference between opening back up and endless lockdown for the whole country, like any good (temporary) Benthamite I think we can briefly curtail the frivolities of the few to ensure the freedom of the many.
What really annoys me about Covid deniers is that they don't realise if we end the formal lockdown early/before it is medically appropriate to do so the citizens will have their own de facto lockdown as they don't want to catch the plague/give it to their families.
A de facto citizen led lockdown would have been much more efficient and cost us a great deal less than an enforced lockdown. And would have hit our economy much less hard.
Look at South Dakota, Florida, Sweden etc.
More deaths? now maybe, but far fewer down the line from the effects of lockdown.
A de facto lockdown would likely mean no furlough/bailouts etc.
As people lose their jobs/companies their mental health and other problems would have increased.
"Average night in prison costs £118 to a UK tax payer.
£430,700 overall cost to tax payers. "
And how much does a new three month lockdown cost if one of these idiots brings back a vaccine evading mutation and lies to avoid the quarantine?
I knew someone would say something like that. I didn`t expect it to be you though, Max.
We`re never getting out of this are we. UK is starting to feel like prison.
No, we want to get out of this as soon as humanly possible. Given that the importation of a new vaccine-resistant strain at this point could mean the difference between opening back up and endless lockdown for the whole country, like any good (temporary) Benthamite I think we can briefly curtail the frivolities of the few to ensure the freedom of the many.
I know we want to. We can`t unless we shed some of this aversion to any risk.
I`m feeling rotten today, as you can probably tell. Woke up this morning to the Hancock ten years story and the gloom hasn`t cleared.
I`ll go and have a stiff drink I think.
Re: the ten years in prison uproar, apologies to whoever's mentioned this before but the sentence comes from the maximum term permitted under (I believe) the Forgery and Counterfeiting Act 1981, which is the piece of legislation being used by the Government to go after people who wilfully deceive in the forms that I assume all travellers are now going to be made to complete when they arrive through the airports. A new law which explicitly states that false form filling must result in a ten year prison sentence is absolutely not what's being proposed here.
Moreover, just because such a sentence will be available to judges doesn't mean that it will be used. In fact, most likely it never will be. One finds it hard to imagine the level of deception that would have to be committed to earn anything close to it. Inciting a whole plane load of people to make false declarations, perhaps? I don't know.
Now this IS interesting. Apparently people were already wokeway back in 1899. They objected to Cecil Rhodes of statue fame being given an honorary degree by Oxford University because Black Lives Matter
That's an interesting insight. I have a theory that the statue in Bristol was put there deliberately to 'provoke the woke' of the era, because it went up well after slavery abolition, and the caption with it is so unremittingly adoring. There was a big debate at the time between the abolitionist 'chattering classes' and the more red in tooth and claw imperialists (who accused the former group of caring little about the condition of the domestic poor). I didn't think this was a good reason to tear it down though - makes it more interesting historically in my opinion. Contrasting it with a memorial to slaves would have been far more fitting and interesting.
One of the things about Colston and others is that, even in their own time let alone subsequently, they were controversial figures. Slavery had been illegal in Britain for centuries, and everyone (them included) knew they were involved in a dark (albeit technically legal) business involving the abduction and trafficking of human beings, in the course of which death was common and misery guaranteed.
They weren't the victims of changing fashions that meant that long after their deaths people decided they were dodgy in a way they couldn't possibly have predicted. They were always dodgy, and their philanthropy was largely about buying a sort of civic respectability that everyone knew their behaviour didn't merit.
No doubt there are individuals who fall into the category of being victims of changing fashions. But they certainly aren't all like that, and Colston is a good example. And I'd not defend vandalism, but Bristol City Council did have decades to sort out a readily resolvable matter in a diverse city, and did a bloody useless job of listening to people and sorting it out.
You’re right, the failure of Bristol City Council to take action where it was obviously needed created a running sore, and there really needs to be much more interrogation of the people involved.
We are nearly there now. Boris will reflect on previous experience and will reopen slowly.
We will have primary schools from 8 March, this is nailed on now. And limited changes such as golf, tennis etc in March.
Nothing much else before April. Possibly no secondary schools until after Easter.
Of course we will have lots of speculation up to 22 Feb, but on that date we will have clear steps with 'no earlier than' dates and maybe also other criteria eg cases. The order of reopening will not be the same as Spring/Summer 2020.
But Laura will still ask about holidays at the press briefing, around 5.15 22 Feb.
More important than holiday travel is business travel. We need to be global Britain - out there making deals.
Actually Liz Truss is doing just that
rolling over agreements ex-EU morelike, and temporary in the most part.
History books won’t be kind to Liz Truss. She will go down as the biggest fraud in this government.
My concern is that she's been agreeing to any old crap just to bolster her image among the Brexit faithful. If it seems too good to be true it probably is. Have any of her discussions collapsed amid failure and acrimony yet? If not then that should set off alarm bells.
"Average night in prison costs £118 to a UK tax payer.
£430,700 overall cost to tax payers. "
And how much does a new three month lockdown cost if one of these idiots brings back a vaccine evading mutation and lies to avoid the quarantine?
It depends whether they go on to attend an illegal mass gathering such as the recent one in North London where the organiser got off with a £10,000 fine (= £25 per attendee) and of the 400 co-conspirators in attendance just 5 were issued with a £200 fine.
The 10 years jail term cited for one offence is all the more ridiculous because it contrasts with the paltry and often unenforced sanctions for other activities that may do just as much in their own way to spread the virus. A bit of consistency is called for.
We are nearly there now. Boris will reflect on previous experience and will reopen slowly.
We will have primary schools from 8 March, this is nailed on now. And limited changes such as golf, tennis etc in March.
Nothing much else before April. Possibly no secondary schools until after Easter.
Of course we will have lots of speculation up to 22 Feb, but on that date we will have clear steps with 'no earlier than' dates and maybe also other criteria eg cases. The order of reopening will not be the same as Spring/Summer 2020.
But Laura will still ask about holidays at the press briefing, around 5.15 22 Feb.
Now this IS interesting. Apparently people were already wokeway back in 1899. They objected to Cecil Rhodes of statue fame being given an honorary degree by Oxford University because Black Lives Matter
That's an interesting insight. I have a theory that the statue in Bristol was put there deliberately to 'provoke the woke' of the era, because it went up well after slavery abolition, and the caption with it is so unremittingly adoring. There was a big debate at the time between the abolitionist 'chattering classes' and the more red in tooth and claw imperialists (who accused the former group of caring little about the condition of the domestic poor). I didn't think this was a good reason to tear it down though - makes it more interesting historically in my opinion. Contrasting it with a memorial to slaves would have been far more fitting and interesting.
One of the things about Colston and others is that, even in their own time let alone subsequently, they were controversial figures. Slavery had been illegal in Britain for centuries, and everyone (them included) knew they were involved in a dark (albeit technically legal) business involving the abduction and trafficking of human beings, in the course of which death was common and misery guaranteed.
They weren't the victims of changing fashions that meant that long after their deaths people decided they were dodgy in a way they couldn't possibly have predicted. They were always dodgy, and their philanthropy was largely about buying a sort of civic respectability that everyone knew their behaviour didn't merit.
No doubt there are individuals who fall into the category of being victims of changing fashions. But they certainly aren't all like that, and Colston is a good example. And I'd not defend vandalism, but Bristol City Council did have decades to sort out a readily resolvable matter in a diverse city, and did a bloody useless job of listening to people and sorting it out.
"Slavery had been illegal in Britain for centuries" is kinda not the point, cos that's not where the money was. I think slave trade related activity was much more mainstream than you suggest: who was building and manning the (specially designed) slave ships, forging the shackles to put the slaves in and producing the trade goods with which they were bought, and consuming the tea and sugar from the plantations?
I do agree with that, but the fact that slavery itself had been illegal for centuries gives the lie to the idea that the underlying morality was in serious question.
Within that, there are degrees of responsibility. Clearly, there was a wider industry that people worked in, and people were either complicit or merely part of an economic system associated with the trade. But there's no question of Colston's degree of responsibility - he was directing operations, knew his business, knew the attrition rate on crossings, and activities involved in getting people onto the ships. He was fabulously rich out of being an out and out villain even by the standards of the time. You can also criticise the blacksmith fitting his ships to a degree, but it's on a completely different level.
"Average night in prison costs £118 to a UK tax payer.
£430,700 overall cost to tax payers. "
And how much does a new three month lockdown cost if one of these idiots brings back a vaccine evading mutation and lies to avoid the quarantine?
I knew someone would say something like that. I didn`t expect it to be you though, Max.
We`re never getting out of this are we. UK is starting to feel like prison.
The answer is simple though, don't lie about it and do the 10 day quarantine. Failing that don't go overseas until there is a mechanism to legally avoid the 10 day quarantine.
Now this IS interesting. Apparently people were already wokeway back in 1899. They objected to Cecil Rhodes of statue fame being given an honorary degree by Oxford University because Black Lives Matter
That's an interesting insight. I have a theory that the statue in Bristol was put there deliberately to 'provoke the woke' of the era, because it went up well after slavery abolition, and the caption with it is so unremittingly adoring. There was a big debate at the time between the abolitionist 'chattering classes' and the more red in tooth and claw imperialists (who accused the former group of caring little about the condition of the domestic poor). I didn't think this was a good reason to tear it down though - makes it more interesting historically in my opinion. Contrasting it with a memorial to slaves would have been far more fitting and interesting.
I think you are absolutely spot on Lucky. I think this is a piece of the history poorly debated.
Colston was long gone when the statue went up. His charitable works being honoured by it long in the tooth by then. The argument it was charity paid for by slavery very well known. Yet up it went.
There is something about the politics of that era.
Fortunately this site is blessed with historians who can help us.
Was there something particularly entrenched and divided of the politics of that era, 1880s and 90’s? The imperialists utterly emboldened?
"Average night in prison costs £118 to a UK tax payer.
£430,700 overall cost to tax payers. "
And how much does a new three month lockdown cost if one of these idiots brings back a vaccine evading mutation and lies to avoid the quarantine?
I knew someone would say something like that. I didn`t expect it to be you though, Max.
We`re never getting out of this are we. UK is starting to feel like prison.
No, we want to get out of this as soon as humanly possible. Given that the importation of a new vaccine-resistant strain at this point could mean the difference between opening back up and endless lockdown for the whole country, like any good (temporary) Benthamite I think we can briefly curtail the frivolities of the few to ensure the freedom of the many.
I know we want to. We can`t unless we shed some of this aversion to any risk.
I`m feeling rotten today, as you can probably tell. Woke up this morning to the Hancock ten years story and the gloom hasn`t cleared.
I`ll go and have a stiff drink I think.
Sorry you're feeling like that - it's been happening to all of us in waves, I think. The fact is though that we're genuinely closer to the end of this thing than we ever have been, and we are going to be free again unless we're very careless and / or very unlucky.
We are nearly there now. Boris will reflect on previous experience and will reopen slowly.
We will have primary schools from 8 March, this is nailed on now. And limited changes such as golf, tennis etc in March.
Nothing much else before April. Possibly no secondary schools until after Easter.
Of course we will have lots of speculation up to 22 Feb, but on that date we will have clear steps with 'no earlier than' dates and maybe also other criteria eg cases. The order of reopening will not be the same as Spring/Summer 2020.
But Laura will still ask about holidays at the press briefing, around 5.15 22 Feb.
What about the gym? At least give me that.
First week of April - you heard it here first!
Well Mr Pubman what about.....er.....pubs
Sat 1 May. Will be with restricted group sizes possibly 6 maximum per group. Mandatory table service, provision of contact details and masks in the toilet. No curfew. No substantial meal rule. Restaurants the same, outside chance of earlier reopening of restaurants late April.
More important than holiday travel is business travel. We need to be global Britain - out there making deals.
Actually Liz Truss is doing just that
Nice try.
I'm still smarting at her cars for cheese contra deal with the lactose intolerant Japanese.
The Truss certainly tickles the Tory fancy. I suspect it's the blonde thing - the current Next Maggie.
There are worse people than Liz Truss. But she is being fetishised somewhat at the moment by a certain type of Tory (and I don't particularly blame her for that).
I ask myself the question... does she have the chops to lead, to speak convincingly to the wider public, to do battle with political big hitters? I've got to say no - she's a second division performer, a paint by numbers politico. Perhaps I'm wrong and have missed something, but that's where my betting is.
More important than holiday travel is business travel. We need to be global Britain - out there making deals.
Actually Liz Truss is doing just that
rolling over agreements ex-EU morelike, and temporary in the most part.
History books won’t be kind to Liz Truss. She will go down as the biggest fraud in this government.
My concern is that she's been agreeing to any old crap just to bolster her image among the Brexit faithful. If it seems too good to be true it probably is. Have any of her discussions collapsed amid failure and acrimony yet? If not then that should set off alarm bells.
Alternatively she's good at her job and isn't dealing with petty fools acting like a jilted ex lover.
Now this IS interesting. Apparently people were already wokeway back in 1899. They objected to Cecil Rhodes of statue fame being given an honorary degree by Oxford University because Black Lives Matter
That's an interesting insight. I have a theory that the statue in Bristol was put there deliberately to 'provoke the woke' of the era, because it went up well after slavery abolition, and the caption with it is so unremittingly adoring. There was a big debate at the time between the abolitionist 'chattering classes' and the more red in tooth and claw imperialists (who accused the former group of caring little about the condition of the domestic poor). I didn't think this was a good reason to tear it down though - makes it more interesting historically in my opinion. Contrasting it with a memorial to slaves would have been far more fitting and interesting.
I think you are absolutely spot on Lucky. I think this is a piece of the history poorly debated.
Colston was long gone when the statue went up. His charitable works being honoured by it long in the tooth by then. The argument it was charity paid for by slavery very well known. Yet up it went.
There is something about the politics of that era.
Fortunately this site is blessed with historians who can help us.
Was there something particularly entrenched and divided of the politics of that era, 1880s and 90’s? The imperialists utterly emboldened?
This is not just about a statue. Colton Street, Colston School and The Colston Hall (did they ever think that the failure to attract black people to classical concerts might just have something to do with the name?) The failure of the council to do anything about such egregious offensiveness was what caused the problem.
It's only a few weeks since I would have predicted that by this Easter you'd be able to go to most places you would reasonably want to go to. My son is in Canada and I haven't seen him for a year. I thought I'd be skiing with him in late April. I am now seriously depressed in a way I haven't yet been throughout the whole thing.
A slight, but important, correction: the signatures for the nomination for County, District or Unitary are unchanged; a proposer, a seconder and eight assenters. The changes only apply to Mayoral and PCC elections. I have just checked the text of the Order.
More important than holiday travel is business travel. We need to be global Britain - out there making deals.
Actually Liz Truss is doing just that
Nice try.
I'm still smarting at her cars for cheese contra deal with the lactose intolerant Japanese.
The Truss certainly tickles the Tory fancy. I suspect it's the blonde thing - the current Next Maggie.
There are worse people than Liz Truss. But she is being fetishised somewhat at the moment by a certain type of Tory (and I don't particularly blame her for that).
I ask myself the question... does she have the chops to lead, to speak convincingly to the wider public, to do battle with political big hitters? I've got to say no - she's a second division performer, a paint by numbers politico. Perhaps I'm wrong and have missed something, but that's where my betting is.
I don't blame her in making whatever deals she can, she can only work with what she's given. It's the blonde in charge who's really to blame.
A slight, but important, correction: the signatures for the nomination for County, District or Unitary are unchanged; a proposer, a seconder and eight assenters. The changes only apply to Mayoral and PCC elections. I have just checked the text of the Order.
More important than holiday travel is business travel. We need to be global Britain - out there making deals.
Actually Liz Truss is doing just that
rolling over agreements ex-EU morelike, and temporary in the most part.
History books won’t be kind to Liz Truss. She will go down as the biggest fraud in this government.
My concern is that she's been agreeing to any old crap just to bolster her image among the Brexit faithful. If it seems too good to be true it probably is. Have any of her discussions collapsed amid failure and acrimony yet? If not then that should set off alarm bells.
Alternatively she's good at her job and isn't dealing with petty fools acting like a jilted ex lover.
When the cases are very low in the spring and, as RCS put it, we are awash with vaccines, I wonder how the average voter is going to take statements like this.
Now this IS interesting. Apparently people were already wokeway back in 1899. They objected to Cecil Rhodes of statue fame being given an honorary degree by Oxford University because Black Lives Matter
That's an interesting insight. I have a theory that the statue in Bristol was put there deliberately to 'provoke the woke' of the era, because it went up well after slavery abolition, and the caption with it is so unremittingly adoring. There was a big debate at the time between the abolitionist 'chattering classes' and the more red in tooth and claw imperialists (who accused the former group of caring little about the condition of the domestic poor). I didn't think this was a good reason to tear it down though - makes it more interesting historically in my opinion. Contrasting it with a memorial to slaves would have been far more fitting and interesting.
One of the things about Colston and others is that, even in their own time let alone subsequently, they were controversial figures. Slavery had been illegal in Britain for centuries, and everyone (them included) knew they were involved in a dark (albeit technically legal) business involving the abduction and trafficking of human beings, in the course of which death was common and misery guaranteed.
They weren't the victims of changing fashions that meant that long after their deaths people decided they were dodgy in a way they couldn't possibly have predicted. They were always dodgy, and their philanthropy was largely about buying a sort of civic respectability that everyone knew their behaviour didn't merit.
No doubt there are individuals who fall into the category of being victims of changing fashions. But they certainly aren't all like that, and Colston is a good example. And I'd not defend vandalism, but Bristol City Council did have decades to sort out a readily resolvable matter in a diverse city, and did a bloody useless job of listening to people and sorting it out.
"Slavery had been illegal in Britain for centuries" is kinda not the point, cos that's not where the money was. I think slave trade related activity was much more mainstream than you suggest: who was building and manning the (specially designed) slave ships, forging the shackles to put the slaves in and producing the trade goods with which they were bought, and consuming the tea and sugar from the plantations?
Yebbut isn't the interesting bit about how much moral accommodation the folk involved were making to forge their shackles and drink their tea? 'I know this is bad but me being poor/thirsty would be worse.' I daresay that there were also plenty of amoral ****s that didn't give a toss as well.
I'm not saying it's unique to that time and place, people made money from Zyklon B and are making it from cluster bombs.
Now this IS interesting. Apparently people were already wokeway back in 1899. They objected to Cecil Rhodes of statue fame being given an honorary degree by Oxford University because Black Lives Matter
They objected to Rhodes being honoured due to his actions after 1892, which included the Jameson Raid which got found out and led to his downfall as Prime Minister.
You can see why authoritarian regimes have no problem finding bodies to do the enforcing.
This site would be a prime recruiting ground.
As we know, this populist government takes a lot of notice of polls and focus groups. Trouble is the majority of individuals who participate in both don`t go abroad every year. There must be a high degree of resentment against those who do in these polls. I effing hate populism. 51% say ten years is about right? 13% not harsh enough? Unbelievable. What a shite country we live in.
For some, closing the borders is not so much a requirement of fighting Covid as a substantial fringe benefit.
Absolutely right. You`re going up in estimation these days! (I`d now do a smiley thing and a wink emoji but I don`t know how.)
Showing my "classic lib" side. I must be more careful. Don't want you getting the wrong idea. Thing is, I remain a Covid hawk - it's constantly underestimated - but I do find the tone and balance a bit "off" in places when it comes to the borders.
The (probable) ban on summer holidays makes sense. We've got a big stock of a vaccine that works well against existing variants but perhaps less well against new mutations - other nations are also going to be behind us in the pace of vaccinations. Besides with shutting out the rest of the world, our domestic tourism industry could do with a boost ! Hopefully we can enjoy a great British summer
There's been a lot of mood music over the last couple of weeks about people either booking Summer holidays in the UK, or Autumn holidays abroad. The suggestion that the former will be possible but the latter not seems about right to me, although if the Government continues to be as blasé about imported Covid as it is now then I guess that the return of travel corridors later in the year ought not to be ruled out. The EU oughtn't to be a million miles behind us with its vaccination scheme once it gets started in earnest, and you can imagine that a suite of lower-risk destinations (perhaps Greece, Cyprus, Malta, the Canaries and the Balearics) might become a realistic option by July or August time.
Personally I'm not setting my sights beyond this country at the moment, and the first thing on the agenda if and when travel does become possible will be parental visits. Those last happened in September.
Now this IS interesting. Apparently people were already wokeway back in 1899. They objected to Cecil Rhodes of statue fame being given an honorary degree by Oxford University because Black Lives Matter
That's an interesting insight. I have a theory that the statue in Bristol was put there deliberately to 'provoke the woke' of the era, because it went up well after slavery abolition, and the caption with it is so unremittingly adoring. There was a big debate at the time between the abolitionist 'chattering classes' and the more red in tooth and claw imperialists (who accused the former group of caring little about the condition of the domestic poor). I didn't think this was a good reason to tear it down though - makes it more interesting historically in my opinion. Contrasting it with a memorial to slaves would have been far more fitting and interesting.
I think you are absolutely spot on Lucky. I think this is a piece of the history poorly debated.
Colston was long gone when the statue went up. His charitable works being honoured by it long in the tooth by then. The argument it was charity paid for by slavery very well known. Yet up it went.
There is something about the politics of that era.
Fortunately this site is blessed with historians who can help us.
Was there something particularly entrenched and divided of the politics of that era, 1880s and 90’s? The imperialists utterly emboldened?
I don't know enough about that to say but I know that many of the statues to the Confederate generals went up in the first two decades of the 20th century - 50 years after the events they commemorate - at the height of the Jim Crow era.
Interestingly when you read the articles bout it, whilst most statues went up in the years immediately after the war they are almost entirely remembering men who fell - so could be considered a reasonable excuse. But those statues that went up just before and after the turn of the century were mostly of the leaders and generals and were designed to send a message about the valour of the Confederate cause. That is not supposition, it was the stated aim of the organisations which raised money for the statues.
It's only a few weeks since I would have predicted that by this Easter you'd be able to go to most places you would reasonably want to go to. My son is in Canada and I haven't seen him for a year. I thought I'd be skiing with him in late April. I am now seriously depressed in a way I haven't yet been throughout the whole thing.
Sorry to hear that - but its not just the UK's vaccination program you need to consider - intended visited countries too - and Canada has been slow.
When the cases are very low in the spring and, as RCS put it, we are awash with vaccines, I wonder how the average voter is going to take statements like this.
the phrase 'go f8ck yourself' comes to mind.
But I could be wrong.
There is the small issue of being allowed into the country at the other end.
I would be very surprised if anywhere will be allowing in people without evidence of a completed course of vaccination, 21 days before entry......
"Average night in prison costs £118 to a UK tax payer.
£430,700 overall cost to tax payers. "
And how much does a new three month lockdown cost if one of these idiots brings back a vaccine evading mutation and lies to avoid the quarantine?
I knew someone would say something like that. I didn`t expect it to be you though, Max.
We`re never getting out of this are we. UK is starting to feel like prison.
No, we want to get out of this as soon as humanly possible. Given that the importation of a new vaccine-resistant strain at this point could mean the difference between opening back up and endless lockdown for the whole country, like any good (temporary) Benthamite I think we can briefly curtail the frivolities of the few to ensure the freedom of the many.
I know we want to. We can`t unless we shed some of this aversion to any risk.
I`m feeling rotten today, as you can probably tell. Woke up this morning to the Hancock ten years story and the gloom hasn`t cleared.
I`ll go and have a stiff drink I think.
Re: the ten years in prison uproar, apologies to whoever's mentioned this before but the sentence comes from the maximum term permitted under (I believe) the Forgery and Counterfeiting Act 1981, which is the piece of legislation being used by the Government to go after people who wilfully deceive in the forms that I assume all travellers are now going to be made to complete when they arrive through the airports. A new law which explicitly states that false form filling must result in a ten year prison sentence is absolutely not what's being proposed here.
Moreover, just because such a sentence will be available to judges doesn't mean that it will be used. In fact, most likely it never will be. One finds it hard to imagine the level of deception that would have to be committed to earn anything close to it. Inciting a whole plane load of people to make false declarations, perhaps? I don't know.
You are absolutely right. I am a fan of using legislation that exists, rather than pushing redundant measures through Parliament, and what is effectively happening here is the Government is reminding us of what the law actually is.
If the government were in a position to frame it as "you can't go on foreign holidays but the upside of that is you can go on domestic holidays with fewer restrictions", I think plenty of people would buy that trade-off.
Whether that's actually a factor in the equation though is probably a different story.
Now this IS interesting. Apparently people were already wokeway back in 1899. They objected to Cecil Rhodes of statue fame being given an honorary degree by Oxford University because Black Lives Matter
That's an interesting insight. I have a theory that the statue in Bristol was put there deliberately to 'provoke the woke' of the era, because it went up well after slavery abolition, and the caption with it is so unremittingly adoring. There was a big debate at the time between the abolitionist 'chattering classes' and the more red in tooth and claw imperialists (who accused the former group of caring little about the condition of the domestic poor). I didn't think this was a good reason to tear it down though - makes it more interesting historically in my opinion. Contrasting it with a memorial to slaves would have been far more fitting and interesting.
One of the things about Colston and others is that, even in their own time let alone subsequently, they were controversial figures. Slavery had been illegal in Britain for centuries, and everyone (them included) knew they were involved in a dark (albeit technically legal) business involving the abduction and trafficking of human beings, in the course of which death was common and misery guaranteed.
They weren't the victims of changing fashions that meant that long after their deaths people decided they were dodgy in a way they couldn't possibly have predicted. They were always dodgy, and their philanthropy was largely about buying a sort of civic respectability that everyone knew their behaviour didn't merit.
No doubt there are individuals who fall into the category of being victims of changing fashions. But they certainly aren't all like that, and Colston is a good example. And I'd not defend vandalism, but Bristol City Council did have decades to sort out a readily resolvable matter in a diverse city, and did a bloody useless job of listening to people and sorting it out.
"Slavery had been illegal in Britain for centuries" is kinda not the point, cos that's not where the money was. I think slave trade related activity was much more mainstream than you suggest: who was building and manning the (specially designed) slave ships, forging the shackles to put the slaves in and producing the trade goods with which they were bought, and consuming the tea and sugar from the plantations?
Yebbut isn't the interesting bit about how much moral accommodation the folk involved were making to forge their shackles and drink their tea? 'I know this is bad but me being poor/thirsty would be worse.' I daresay that there were also plenty of amoral ****s that didn't give a toss as well.
I'm not saying it's unique to that time and place, people made money from Zyklon B and are making it from cluster bombs.
I think we all make moral accommodations all the time. We all currently own thousands of items made somewhere East of Suez, and we know there's a reason they are so affordable.
I find it easier to sympathise with the shackle-forgers (rank and file, not the business owners) than the tea drinkers.
"Average night in prison costs £118 to a UK tax payer.
£430,700 overall cost to tax payers. "
And how much does a new three month lockdown cost if one of these idiots brings back a vaccine evading mutation and lies to avoid the quarantine?
I knew someone would say something like that. I didn`t expect it to be you though, Max.
We`re never getting out of this are we. UK is starting to feel like prison.
No, we want to get out of this as soon as humanly possible. Given that the importation of a new vaccine-resistant strain at this point could mean the difference between opening back up and endless lockdown for the whole country, like any good (temporary) Benthamite I think we can briefly curtail the frivolities of the few to ensure the freedom of the many.
I know we want to. We can`t unless we shed some of this aversion to any risk.
I`m feeling rotten today, as you can probably tell. Woke up this morning to the Hancock ten years story and the gloom hasn`t cleared.
I`ll go and have a stiff drink I think.
Re: the ten years in prison uproar, apologies to whoever's mentioned this before but the sentence comes from the maximum term permitted under (I believe) the Forgery and Counterfeiting Act 1981, which is the piece of legislation being used by the Government to go after people who wilfully deceive in the forms that I assume all travellers are now going to be made to complete when they arrive through the airports. A new law which explicitly states that false form filling must result in a ten year prison sentence is absolutely not what's being proposed here.
Moreover, just because such a sentence will be available to judges doesn't mean that it will be used. In fact, most likely it never will be. One finds it hard to imagine the level of deception that would have to be committed to earn anything close to it. Inciting a whole plane load of people to make false declarations, perhaps? I don't know.
You are absolutely right. I am a fan of using legislation that exists, rather than pushing redundant measures through Parliament, and what is effectively happening here is the Government is reminding us of what the law actually is.
"Average night in prison costs £118 to a UK tax payer.
£430,700 overall cost to tax payers. "
And how much does a new three month lockdown cost if one of these idiots brings back a vaccine evading mutation and lies to avoid the quarantine?
I knew someone would say something like that. I didn`t expect it to be you though, Max.
We`re never getting out of this are we. UK is starting to feel like prison.
No, we want to get out of this as soon as humanly possible. Given that the importation of a new vaccine-resistant strain at this point could mean the difference between opening back up and endless lockdown for the whole country, like any good (temporary) Benthamite I think we can briefly curtail the frivolities of the few to ensure the freedom of the many.
I know we want to. We can`t unless we shed some of this aversion to any risk.
I`m feeling rotten today, as you can probably tell. Woke up this morning to the Hancock ten years story and the gloom hasn`t cleared.
I`ll go and have a stiff drink I think.
Re: the ten years in prison uproar, apologies to whoever's mentioned this before but the sentence comes from the maximum term permitted under (I believe) the Forgery and Counterfeiting Act 1981, which is the piece of legislation being used by the Government to go after people who wilfully deceive in the forms that I assume all travellers are now going to be made to complete when they arrive through the airports. A new law which explicitly states that false form filling must result in a ten year prison sentence is absolutely not what's being proposed here.
Moreover, just because such a sentence will be available to judges doesn't mean that it will be used. In fact, most likely it never will be. One finds it hard to imagine the level of deception that would have to be committed to earn anything close to it. Inciting a whole plane load of people to make false declarations, perhaps? I don't know.
You are absolutely right. I am a fan of using legislation that exists, rather than pushing redundant measures through Parliament, and what is effectively happening here is the Government is reminding us of what the law actually is.
Interesting - so everyone in media and politics has missed this?
It's only a few weeks since I would have predicted that by this Easter you'd be able to go to most places you would reasonably want to go to. My son is in Canada and I haven't seen him for a year. I thought I'd be skiing with him in late April. I am now seriously depressed in a way I haven't yet been throughout the whole thing.
Sorry to hear that - but its not just the UK's vaccination program you need to consider - intended visited countries too - and Canada has been slow.
I think this is the key - and I have huge sympathy for Ishmael on this.
It may well be irrelevant for many holiday destinations whether the UK is allowing travel or not. Much of Europe and the rest of the world including many of the most popular holiday destinations look like they will be no where near ready to receive visitors by this summer. What the UK Government dictates may well be moot.
I should also say in passing that in terms of sympathy and understanding there is a world of difference between wanting to see close relatives after long gaps and wanting a jolly in Ibiza.
When the cases are very low in the spring and, as RCS put it, we are awash with vaccines, I wonder how the average voter is going to take statements like this.
the phrase 'go f8ck yourself' comes to mind.
But I could be wrong.
There is the small issue of being allowed into the country at the other end.
I would be very surprised if anywhere will be allowing in people without evidence of a completed course of vaccination, 21 days before entry......
Huh, details, mere details.
But its surely a mistake to say you can't book a domestic holiday yet.
When the cases are very low in the spring and, as RCS put it, we are awash with vaccines, I wonder how the average voter is going to take statements like this.
the phrase 'go f8ck yourself' comes to mind.
But I could be wrong.
What was the flaw in RCS argument?
Is it over estimating vaccine production ramping up. He’s convinced me it isn’t that.
Is it over estimating speed of roll out? He’s convinced me it isn’t that.
Is it over estimating the impact of vaccination on quickly changing the picture?
Or maybe RCS is spot on. Whatever, it’s clear RCS and his back to normal tribe, and the government messaging is not on the same page tonight, Is it?
It's only a few weeks since I would have predicted that by this Easter you'd be able to go to most places you would reasonably want to go to. My son is in Canada and I haven't seen him for a year. I thought I'd be skiing with him in late April. I am now seriously depressed in a way I haven't yet been throughout the whole thing.
Sorry to hear that - but its not just the UK's vaccination program you need to consider - intended visited countries too - and Canada has been slow.
I think this is the key - and I have huge sympathy for Ishmael on this.
It may well be irrelevant for many holiday destinations whether the UK is allowing travel or not. Much of Europe and the rest of the world including many of the most popular holiday destinations look like they will be no where near ready to receive visitors by this summer. What the UK Government dictates may well be moot.
I should also say in passing that in terms of sympathy and understanding there is a world of difference between wanting to see close relatives after long gaps and wanting a jolly in Ibiza.
Hence the negotiations about travel vaccination passports. A vaccination course, completed 21 days before entry, might well be the standard fro re-opening travel around the world...
Now this IS interesting. Apparently people were already wokeway back in 1899. They objected to Cecil Rhodes of statue fame being given an honorary degree by Oxford University because Black Lives Matter
That's an interesting insight. I have a theory that the statue in Bristol was put there deliberately to 'provoke the woke' of the era, because it went up well after slavery abolition, and the caption with it is so unremittingly adoring. There was a big debate at the time between the abolitionist 'chattering classes' and the more red in tooth and claw imperialists (who accused the former group of caring little about the condition of the domestic poor). I didn't think this was a good reason to tear it down though - makes it more interesting historically in my opinion. Contrasting it with a memorial to slaves would have been far more fitting and interesting.
I think you are absolutely spot on Lucky. I think this is a piece of the history poorly debated.
Colston was long gone when the statue went up. His charitable works being honoured by it long in the tooth by then. The argument it was charity paid for by slavery very well known. Yet up it went.
There is something about the politics of that era.
Fortunately this site is blessed with historians who can help us.
Was there something particularly entrenched and divided of the politics of that era, 1880s and 90’s? The imperialists utterly emboldened?
This is not just about a statue. Colton Street, Colston School and The Colston Hall (did they ever think that the failure to attract black people to classical concerts might just have something to do with the name?) The failure of the council to do anything about such egregious offensiveness was what caused the problem.
Re Bristol Mayoral election, Marvin Rees the Labour incumbent has had his profile raised after Colston's statue went into the drink. His backing for the failed council owned energy firm, might not help. There is some disquiet over the plans for the Western end of the harbour, but how far that works against him is another matter.
The Lib Dems, and Tories have recently dropped their candidates. I would be surprised if they make up ground. The Green's candidate is a youth worker, with a double barrelled name.
I would be very surprised if Labour lose the Mayoral Election in Bristol.
As for the Council, I've no real idea. Quite a few councillors are standing down, Labour have a majority of 1, but it wouldn't surprise me if Bristol turns back into a council with no overall control, with an elected Labour Mayor.
When the cases are very low in the spring and, as RCS put it, we are awash with vaccines, I wonder how the average voter is going to take statements like this.
the phrase 'go f8ck yourself' comes to mind.
But I could be wrong.
As I said yesterday, the average voter hates lockdown and restriction, but regards it as a necessary evil to cure a malady. No one likes having their leg in plaster for months on end but will accept the restriction for as long as it takes to fix the leg. They know that the rest of the world may be in a very different place to us. You will say that the Govt wants to keep the plaster on long after the bone has healed because they are on some sort of power trip - to which I say b***ocks. Scientists and politicians like trips away in the sun as much as we civilians do and you don't become a medic because you have much of a will to power.
This, to my mind, is a two year long pandemic meaning that by March 2022 it will be functionally over. I'm not alone in that - Dr Fauci in the States is on record saying similar. 2 years - 730 days - 104 weeks - of which we have seen through nearly half already. People on this site have money tied up in elections that are further away than that.
When the cases are very low in the spring and, as RCS put it, we are awash with vaccines, I wonder how the average voter is going to take statements like this.
the phrase 'go f8ck yourself' comes to mind.
But I could be wrong.
The average voter can't understand the difference between vaccination programmes here and vaccination programmes in other countries?
When the cases are very low in the spring and, as RCS put it, we are awash with vaccines, I wonder how the average voter is going to take statements like this.
the phrase 'go f8ck yourself' comes to mind.
But I could be wrong.
There is the small issue of being allowed into the country at the other end.
I would be very surprised if anywhere will be allowing in people without evidence of a completed course of vaccination, 21 days before entry......
Huh, details, mere details.
But its surely a mistake to say you can't book a domestic holiday yet.
I have a confirmed booking in this country for September - so you can book "subject to change"
If the government were in a position to frame it as "you can't go on foreign holidays but the upside of that is you can go on domestic holidays with fewer restrictions", I think plenty of people would buy that trade-off.
Whether that's actually a factor in the equation though is probably a different story.
Now maybe the would buy it In six weeks time, with COVID disappearing and new vaccines and treatments coming on line all the time, not so much.
PLus the downsides of lockdown will start to become more apparent. Tax increases. Huge job losses when furlough ends. Maybe the return of inflation.
Now this IS interesting. Apparently people were already wokeway back in 1899. They objected to Cecil Rhodes of statue fame being given an honorary degree by Oxford University because Black Lives Matter
That's an interesting insight. I have a theory that the statue in Bristol was put there deliberately to 'provoke the woke' of the era, because it went up well after slavery abolition, and the caption with it is so unremittingly adoring. There was a big debate at the time between the abolitionist 'chattering classes' and the more red in tooth and claw imperialists (who accused the former group of caring little about the condition of the domestic poor). I didn't think this was a good reason to tear it down though - makes it more interesting historically in my opinion. Contrasting it with a memorial to slaves would have been far more fitting and interesting.
One of the things about Colston and others is that, even in their own time let alone subsequently, they were controversial figures. Slavery had been illegal in Britain for centuries, and everyone (them included) knew they were involved in a dark (albeit technically legal) business involving the abduction and trafficking of human beings, in the course of which death was common and misery guaranteed.
They weren't the victims of changing fashions that meant that long after their deaths people decided they were dodgy in a way they couldn't possibly have predicted. They were always dodgy, and their philanthropy was largely about buying a sort of civic respectability that everyone knew their behaviour didn't merit.
No doubt there are individuals who fall into the category of being victims of changing fashions. But they certainly aren't all like that, and Colston is a good example. And I'd not defend vandalism, but Bristol City Council did have decades to sort out a readily resolvable matter in a diverse city, and did a bloody useless job of listening to people and sorting it out.
"Slavery had been illegal in Britain for centuries" is kinda not the point, cos that's not where the money was. I think slave trade related activity was much more mainstream than you suggest: who was building and manning the (specially designed) slave ships, forging the shackles to put the slaves in and producing the trade goods with which they were bought, and consuming the tea and sugar from the plantations?
Yebbut isn't the interesting bit about how much moral accommodation the folk involved were making to forge their shackles and drink their tea? 'I know this is bad but me being poor/thirsty would be worse.' I daresay that there were also plenty of amoral ****s that didn't give a toss as well.
I'm not saying it's unique to that time and place, people made money from Zyklon B and are making it from cluster bombs.
I think we all make moral accommodations all the time. We all currently own thousands of items made somewhere East of Suez, and we know there's a reason they are so affordable.
I find it easier to sympathise with the shackle-forgers (rank and file, not the business owners) than the tea drinkers.
Aye, of course, the hypocrisies and blind eye turnings are always with us, me included. I guess I'm interested in the point when whole societies realise that they're involved in a great crime (and if sometimes they never fully realise). I wonder if we're on the brink of something of the sort with nature/ecology.
FPT - worth noting that one very big reason that Britain was victorious in WW1 and WW2 was that could effectively command the foreign policy and defence forces of Australia, Canada, NZ, South Africa and India - so it was effectively already four eyes plus India as the status quo. Not to mention the contribution made by West/East Africa. That's what made us a force to be reckoned with.
We'd have been largely fucked if it has really just been the "UK alone" because our 'punch' would only have been about 30-35% of what we had combined
It will be quite close, but I think the government should beat the target by approx 300k, assuming no more acceleration. It might reach 15 million by Sunday without requiring the final counting day on Monday.
If it has a bumper weekend, it could smash the target.
Having spoken to staff at the vaccine site in Bath, I now believe we are trying hard to ensure NO-ONE in categories 1-4 has not had the chance of a jab by the 15th, to prevent the inevitable wankers in the media proclaiming Government lies about vaccination, when they claim to have done all in 1-4. (Awful sentence construction...). They could clearly have done many more in Bath this week, but I think they are holding back from calling say over 65 or over 60s up until the 1-4 are complete.
That would be a little disappointing. More death and disease would be prevented by getting on with some of groups 5-6 now, but if you're right then politics is causing them to do the suboptimal thing. At least it's not a huge difference and hopefully they will be increasing the rate soon.
On a personal note, one (not very close) member of my family is now on a ventilator, and being considered for ECMO. He's only 40, wife and two kids.
--AS
Sorry to hear it, 40 is no age. This disease really is a lottery. ECMO can do the trick, but in Covid is often needed for 2 weeks or more. Best wishes.
O/T looks like Joss Whedon will soon become a non person, which is an utter shame, as I loved Buffy, Firefly, and the first Avengers film.
I don't know. In spite of what she says, Carpenter has been making these accusations for 20 years or more. And if you look at the substance of her accusations it would apply equally to practically every director in the 20th century. Yes it sounds like he was a bit of a shit to work with but all the accusations from all quarters amount to 'he was nasty to me'. No excuse but certainly not something that should be career ending.
It does strike me that the reaction to this pandemic is probably one unique to our age. In the Spanish Flu pandemic there were grim statistics piling up in your newspaper every morning but they were just that - statistics. You see the same thing in Defoe's "Journal of the Plague Year" (although he wrote it after the event) but here we have the immediacy of the visual representation of actual people, rather than numbers, beamed to our screens 24/7. You see the lives behind the statistics. That has informed the government's reaction in a way that it would not have done in earlier generations. I reckon as recently as the 90s a lockdown of this severity would not have happened - hell before 2005 how many people could work from home using dial-up?
Surely there would still have been a 90s lockdown.
It would have been a bit more sedate. We would have been spared constant babbling contact on Zoom -- which passes as "work" among life's chatterers.
The TV would have been used to broadcast educational services (much like the Open University then did at the graduate level). Some materials, assignments, etc, would have been delivered using the regular mail. rather like old-fashioned correspondence courses.
Lock downs are as old as plague itself.
When a recently graduated mathematician locked down in Woolsthorpe Manor to avoid the Great Plague, he managed to develop the calculus, optics, and the law of gravitation. That is a good lockdown.
O/T looks like Joss Whedon will soon become a non person, which is an utter shame, as I loved Buffy, Firefly, and the first Avengers film.
I don't know. In spite of what she says, Carpenter has been making these accusations for 20 years or more. And if you look at the substance of her accusations it would apply equally to practically every director in the 20th century. Yes it sounds like he was a bit of a shit to work with but all the accusations from all quarters amount to 'he was nasty to me'. No excuse but certainly not something that should be career ending.
The campaign against Whedon has been going on for a while, and I don't really understand the accusations. The idea that "he's not a real feminist because he cheated on his wife" seems really weird (also I'm unclear if the same logic would apply to a woman in a same-sex relationship - I suspect not) and it hardly seems to stack up with the venom of the campaign, which feels like it should be reserved for much more serious accusations. I often have to remind myself he's not actually been accused of molesting anyone, which is what the tone of stories about him imply these days.
Looks like they have a lockdown AND a curfew in SA currently.
It was relaxed about 10 days ago. There is a theory there that the lockdown in the slums there made things worse - people living on top of each other simply cannot socially distance with no-where to go - which has resulted in early signs of herd immunity. That theory will be tested within the next week if cases start to go back up again as a result of that relaxation.
I've looked it up, it's a fairly moderate relaxation of restrictions, while nominally still staying in their level 3. Alcohol sales are allowed again, public spaces such as beaches reopen, religious gatherings are permitted, and the curfew is pushed back. Those are all measures that we don't have in the first place.
When the cases are very low in the spring and, as RCS put it, we are awash with vaccines, I wonder how the average voter is going to take statements like this.
the phrase 'go f8ck yourself' comes to mind.
But I could be wrong.
Yes, half my lot are in Italy. I was hoping to get out there by Sept/Oct, even if in a limited way.
I imagine upstart long haul destinations e.g. Dubai will start a 'come on in if you have a vaccine certificate' policy as soon as they can.
You can see why authoritarian regimes have no problem finding bodies to do the enforcing.
I'd love to see data that mapped that question onto people's views on the world. Is it the Knights of Gammon who are the authoritarian lovers or the Warriors of Woke?
There is no ‘or’; you will find authoritarians at both extremes of the political divide. I have my own ideas of what the split between the two might be, as I’m sure do you.
"Average night in prison costs £118 to a UK tax payer.
£430,700 overall cost to tax payers. "
And how much does a new three month lockdown cost if one of these idiots brings back a vaccine evading mutation and lies to avoid the quarantine?
I knew someone would say something like that. I didn`t expect it to be you though, Max.
We`re never getting out of this are we. UK is starting to feel like prison.
No, we want to get out of this as soon as humanly possible. Given that the importation of a new vaccine-resistant strain at this point could mean the difference between opening back up and endless lockdown for the whole country, like any good (temporary) Benthamite I think we can briefly curtail the frivolities of the few to ensure the freedom of the many.
What really annoys me about Covid deniers is that they don't realise if we end the formal lockdown early/before it is medically appropriate to do so the citizens will have their own de facto lockdown as they don't want to catch the plague/give it to their families.
A de facto citizen led lockdown would have been much more efficient and cost us a great deal less than an enforced lockdown. And would have hit our economy much less hard.
Look at South Dakota, Florida, Sweden etc.
More deaths? now maybe, but far fewer down the line from the effects of lockdown.
So, if people chose en masse not to go to the pub, the pub would be better off than if it was closed by the Government? How is that better? They're still not at the pub...
O/T looks like Joss Whedon will soon become a non person, which is an utter shame, as I loved Buffy, Firefly, and the first Avengers film.
I don't know. In spite of what she says, Carpenter has been making these accusations for 20 years or more. And if you look at the substance of her accusations it would apply equally to practically every director in the 20th century. Yes it sounds like he was a bit of a shit to work with but all the accusations from all quarters amount to 'he was nasty to me'. No excuse but certainly not something that should be career ending.
I think the specific allegation of making her work at 1am/longer hours when she was pregnant and against medical advice is the kicker.
With them following on from the Ray Fisher allegations and the fact that Amber Benson has endorsed Carpenter's allegations means in the court of public opinion means it is very problematic for him.
O/T looks like Joss Whedon will soon become a non person, which is an utter shame, as I loved Buffy, Firefly, and the first Avengers film.
I don't know. In spite of what she says, Carpenter has been making these accusations for 20 years or more. And if you look at the substance of her accusations it would apply equally to practically every director in the 20th century. Yes it sounds like he was a bit of a shit to work with but all the accusations from all quarters amount to 'he was nasty to me'. No excuse but certainly not something that should be career ending.
The campaign against Whedon has been going on for a while, and I don't really understand the accusations. The idea that "he's not a real feminist because he cheated on his wife" seems really weird (also I'm unclear if the same logic would apply to a woman in a same-sex relationship - I suspect not) and it hardly seems to stack up with the venom of the campaign, which feels like it should be reserved for much more serious accusations. I often have to remind myself he's not actually been accused of molesting anyone, which is what the tone of stories about him imply these days.
Well, exactly - it's not as if he Whedon someone against their will.
O/T looks like Joss Whedon will soon become a non person, which is an utter shame, as I loved Buffy, Firefly, and the first Avengers film.
I don't know. In spite of what she says, Carpenter has been making these accusations for 20 years or more. And if you look at the substance of her accusations it would apply equally to practically every director in the 20th century. Yes it sounds like he was a bit of a shit to work with but all the accusations from all quarters amount to 'he was nasty to me'. No excuse but certainly not something that should be career ending.
The campaign against Whedon has been going on for a while, and I don't really understand the accusations. The idea that "he's not a real feminist because he cheated on his wife" seems really weird (also I'm unclear if the same logic would apply to a woman in a same-sex relationship - I suspect not) and it hardly seems to stack up with the venom of the campaign, which feels like it should be reserved for much more serious accusations. I often have to remind myself he's not actually been accused of molesting anyone, which is what the tone of stories about him imply these days.
Indeed. A lot of the Whedon hate away from the immediate accusations seems to be driven by the fact the DC fanboys hated his Justice League. I mean really hated it. This apparently makes him an evil man who should be driven out of the business for ever.
When the cases are very low in the spring and, as RCS put it, we are awash with vaccines, I wonder how the average voter is going to take statements like this.
the phrase 'go f8ck yourself' comes to mind.
But I could be wrong.
What was the flaw in RCS argument?
Is it over estimating vaccine production ramping up. He’s convinced me it isn’t that.
Is it over estimating speed of roll out? He’s convinced me it isn’t that.
Is it over estimating the impact of vaccination on quickly changing the picture?
Or maybe RCS is spot on. Whatever, it’s clear RCS and his back to normal tribe, and the government messaging is not on the same page tonight, Is it?
The Government cannot afford to be wrong. RCS can. I like RCS's optimistic analysis, he is certainly more convincing than Bloomberg's fatuous projection of vaccination proceeding at exactly the same rate as now for 7 years, but the Government has not had the greatest pandemic and you can understand the caution.
"Average night in prison costs £118 to a UK tax payer.
£430,700 overall cost to tax payers. "
And how much does a new three month lockdown cost if one of these idiots brings back a vaccine evading mutation and lies to avoid the quarantine?
I knew someone would say something like that. I didn`t expect it to be you though, Max.
We`re never getting out of this are we. UK is starting to feel like prison.
No, we want to get out of this as soon as humanly possible. Given that the importation of a new vaccine-resistant strain at this point could mean the difference between opening back up and endless lockdown for the whole country, like any good (temporary) Benthamite I think we can briefly curtail the frivolities of the few to ensure the freedom of the many.
I know we want to. We can`t unless we shed some of this aversion to any risk.
I`m feeling rotten today, as you can probably tell. Woke up this morning to the Hancock ten years story and the gloom hasn`t cleared.
I`ll go and have a stiff drink I think.
Re: the ten years in prison uproar, apologies to whoever's mentioned this before but the sentence comes from the maximum term permitted under (I believe) the Forgery and Counterfeiting Act 1981, which is the piece of legislation being used by the Government to go after people who wilfully deceive in the forms that I assume all travellers are now going to be made to complete when they arrive through the airports. A new law which explicitly states that false form filling must result in a ten year prison sentence is absolutely not what's being proposed here.
Moreover, just because such a sentence will be available to judges doesn't mean that it will be used. In fact, most likely it never will be. One finds it hard to imagine the level of deception that would have to be committed to earn anything close to it. Inciting a whole plane load of people to make false declarations, perhaps? I don't know.
You are absolutely right. I am a fan of using legislation that exists, rather than pushing redundant measures through Parliament, and what is effectively happening here is the Government is reminding us of what the law actually is.
"Average night in prison costs £118 to a UK tax payer.
£430,700 overall cost to tax payers. "
And how much does a new three month lockdown cost if one of these idiots brings back a vaccine evading mutation and lies to avoid the quarantine?
I knew someone would say something like that. I didn`t expect it to be you though, Max.
We`re never getting out of this are we. UK is starting to feel like prison.
No, we want to get out of this as soon as humanly possible. Given that the importation of a new vaccine-resistant strain at this point could mean the difference between opening back up and endless lockdown for the whole country, like any good (temporary) Benthamite I think we can briefly curtail the frivolities of the few to ensure the freedom of the many.
I know we want to. We can`t unless we shed some of this aversion to any risk.
I`m feeling rotten today, as you can probably tell. Woke up this morning to the Hancock ten years story and the gloom hasn`t cleared.
I`ll go and have a stiff drink I think.
Re: the ten years in prison uproar, apologies to whoever's mentioned this before but the sentence comes from the maximum term permitted under (I believe) the Forgery and Counterfeiting Act 1981, which is the piece of legislation being used by the Government to go after people who wilfully deceive in the forms that I assume all travellers are now going to be made to complete when they arrive through the airports. A new law which explicitly states that false form filling must result in a ten year prison sentence is absolutely not what's being proposed here.
Moreover, just because such a sentence will be available to judges doesn't mean that it will be used. In fact, most likely it never will be. One finds it hard to imagine the level of deception that would have to be committed to earn anything close to it. Inciting a whole plane load of people to make false declarations, perhaps? I don't know.
You are absolutely right. I am a fan of using legislation that exists, rather than pushing redundant measures through Parliament, and what is effectively happening here is the Government is reminding us of what the law actually is.
Interesting - so everyone in media and politics has missed this?
Not everybody, I found out because I read it on the BBC live blog earlier today, but it hasn't been picked up on.
As I said earlier, until 1832 you could be hanged for forgery, indeed many were.
Now this IS interesting. Apparently people were already wokeway back in 1899. They objected to Cecil Rhodes of statue fame being given an honorary degree by Oxford University because Black Lives Matter
That's an interesting insight. I have a theory that the statue in Bristol was put there deliberately to 'provoke the woke' of the era, because it went up well after slavery abolition, and the caption with it is so unremittingly adoring. There was a big debate at the time between the abolitionist 'chattering classes' and the more red in tooth and claw imperialists (who accused the former group of caring little about the condition of the domestic poor). I didn't think this was a good reason to tear it down though - makes it more interesting historically in my opinion. Contrasting it with a memorial to slaves would have been far more fitting and interesting.
I think you are absolutely spot on Lucky. I think this is a piece of the history poorly debated.
Colston was long gone when the statue went up. His charitable works being honoured by it long in the tooth by then. The argument it was charity paid for by slavery very well known. Yet up it went.
There is something about the politics of that era.
Fortunately this site is blessed with historians who can help us.
Was there something particularly entrenched and divided of the politics of that era, 1880s and 90’s? The imperialists utterly emboldened?
I don't know enough about that to say but I know that many of the statues to the Confederate generals went up in the first two decades of the 20th century - 50 years after the events they commemorate - at the height of the Jim Crow era.
Interestingly when you read the articles bout it, whilst most statues went up in the years immediately after the war they are almost entirely remembering men who fell - so could be considered a reasonable excuse. But those statues that went up just before and after the turn of the century were mostly of the leaders and generals and were designed to send a message about the valour of the Confederate cause. That is not supposition, it was the stated aim of the organisations which raised money for the statues.
That’s an interesting point Richard.
Yesterday a statue was posted spouting confederate doctrine putting the words in Winston Churchill’s mouth to legitimate it.
I’m not hot on US civil war history, so correct me where I am wrong historians, but I know enough that the leaders of the confederacy didn’t whole heartedly believe in everything they were doing, so retrospect statue of them might represent a more current idea than what they actually believed in themselves. Like aforementioned Churchill Statue. They certainly believed in fighting for the autonomy of states, and against federalism. But who was it spoke against slave ownership then inherited a whole load of them?
It’s certainly a way we should look at statues in this debate.
O/T looks like Joss Whedon will soon become a non person, which is an utter shame, as I loved Buffy, Firefly, and the first Avengers film.
I don't know. In spite of what she says, Carpenter has been making these accusations for 20 years or more. And if you look at the substance of her accusations it would apply equally to practically every director in the 20th century. Yes it sounds like he was a bit of a shit to work with but all the accusations from all quarters amount to 'he was nasty to me'. No excuse but certainly not something that should be career ending.
The campaign against Whedon has been going on for a while, and I don't really understand the accusations. The idea that "he's not a real feminist because he cheated on his wife" seems really weird (also I'm unclear if the same logic would apply to a woman in a same-sex relationship - I suspect not) and it hardly seems to stack up with the venom of the campaign, which feels like it should be reserved for much more serious accusations. I often have to remind myself he's not actually been accused of molesting anyone, which is what the tone of stories about him imply these days.
Well, exactly - it's not as if he Whedon someone against their will.
It does strike me that the reaction to this pandemic is probably one unique to our age. In the Spanish Flu pandemic there were grim statistics piling up in your newspaper every morning but they were just that - statistics. You see the same thing in Defoe's "Journal of the Plague Year" (although he wrote it after the event) but here we have the immediacy of the visual representation of actual people, rather than numbers, beamed to our screens 24/7. You see the lives behind the statistics. That has informed the government's reaction in a way that it would not have done in earlier generations. I reckon as recently as the 90s a lockdown of this severity would not have happened - hell before 2005 how many people could work from home using dial-up?
Surely there would still have been a 90s lockdown.
It would have been a bit more sedate. We would have been spared constant babbling contact on Zoom -- which passes as "work" among life's chatterers.
The TV would have been used to broadcast educational services (much like the Open University then did at the graduate level). Some materials, assignments, etc, would have been delivered using the regular mail. rather like old-fashioned correspondence courses.
Lock downs are as old as plague itself.
When a recently graduated mathematician locked down in Woolsthorpe Manor to avoid the Great Plague, he managed to develop the calculus, optics, and the law of gravitation. That is a good lockdown.
Now this IS interesting. Apparently people were already wokeway back in 1899. They objected to Cecil Rhodes of statue fame being given an honorary degree by Oxford University because Black Lives Matter
That's an interesting insight. I have a theory that the statue in Bristol was put there deliberately to 'provoke the woke' of the era, because it went up well after slavery abolition, and the caption with it is so unremittingly adoring. There was a big debate at the time between the abolitionist 'chattering classes' and the more red in tooth and claw imperialists (who accused the former group of caring little about the condition of the domestic poor). I didn't think this was a good reason to tear it down though - makes it more interesting historically in my opinion. Contrasting it with a memorial to slaves would have been far more fitting and interesting.
One of the things about Colston and others is that, even in their own time let alone subsequently, they were controversial figures. Slavery had been illegal in Britain for centuries, and everyone (them included) knew they were involved in a dark (albeit technically legal) business involving the abduction and trafficking of human beings, in the course of which death was common and misery guaranteed.
They weren't the victims of changing fashions that meant that long after their deaths people decided they were dodgy in a way they couldn't possibly have predicted. They were always dodgy, and their philanthropy was largely about buying a sort of civic respectability that everyone knew their behaviour didn't merit.
No doubt there are individuals who fall into the category of being victims of changing fashions. But they certainly aren't all like that, and Colston is a good example. And I'd not defend vandalism, but Bristol City Council did have decades to sort out a readily resolvable matter in a diverse city, and did a bloody useless job of listening to people and sorting it out.
"Slavery had been illegal in Britain for centuries" is kinda not the point, cos that's not where the money was. I think slave trade related activity was much more mainstream than you suggest: who was building and manning the (specially designed) slave ships, forging the shackles to put the slaves in and producing the trade goods with which they were bought, and consuming the tea and sugar from the plantations?
Yebbut isn't the interesting bit about how much moral accommodation the folk involved were making to forge their shackles and drink their tea? 'I know this is bad but me being poor/thirsty would be worse.' I daresay that there were also plenty of amoral ****s that didn't give a toss as well.
I'm not saying it's unique to that time and place, people made money from Zyklon B and are making it from cluster bombs.
I think we all make moral accommodations all the time. We all currently own thousands of items made somewhere East of Suez, and we know there's a reason they are so affordable.
I find it easier to sympathise with the shackle-forgers (rank and file, not the business owners) than the tea drinkers.
Aye, of course, the hypocrisies and blind eye turnings are always with us, me included. I guess I'm interested in the point when whole societies realise that they're involved in a great crime (and if sometimes they never fully realise). I wonder if we're on the brink of something of the sort with nature/ecology.
I would really love to see the stats as to what proportion of UK overseas trade for the 16th-19th centuries was slaves or stuff so directly connected to slaving as to amount to the same thing. I suspect as you say that the answer may suggest that the UK as a whole was fundamentally a slave-trading enterprise, if you had to define it by just one characteristic.
Comments
I`m feeling rotten today, as you can probably tell. Woke up this morning to the Hancock ten years story and the gloom hasn`t cleared.
I`ll go and have a stiff drink I think.
As for WW1 - can you imagine any democratically elected government in this day and age risking that many lives over that long?
Fair play to Johnson, vaccine provision has been a Covid triumph for the PM, and whether the target is hit by all metrics, or not. And Covid triumphs for Johnson have been thin on the ground.
I think it was in this second wave that the Colston statue was built, and I'm sure, as with the Rhodes issue, it was not without (intentional) upset during its time. Of course, to me, it makes all the more sense to keep it up. All this history is now effectively blotted out - from the passer by anyway.
So the polite answer is what it always was. Keep the statue somewhere discreet, where nobody has to look at it if they don't want to. Pray for his soul in the Chapel. But don't have him glaring down on the High Street (Is that right? Went to the Better Place myself). Because that's a giant raised middle finger to people aware of all the lives he ruined. It's just not polite.
Trying to look at this dispassionately, we are going to get out of it at some point, because pandemics end.
However - I am very concerned that we're going to have to go through another cycle of introduced infection, followed by one more bloody great long lockdown as a consequence, before the Government finally, FINALLY learns the lesson that you don't eff about with this virus, and basically locks the world out until Covid is ground down to some kind of state that humanity can live with, through a combination of vaccination and treatment, without having to keep resorting to mass imprisonment. So I get where you're coming from.
We will have primary schools from 8 March, this is nailed on now. And limited changes such as golf, tennis etc in March.
Nothing much else before April. Possibly no secondary schools until after Easter.
Of course we will have lots of speculation up to 22 Feb, but on that date we will have clear steps with 'no earlier than' dates and maybe also other criteria eg cases. The order of reopening will not be the same as Spring/Summer 2020.
But Laura will still ask about holidays at the press briefing, around 5.15 22 Feb.
Look at South Dakota, Florida, Sweden etc.
More deaths? now maybe, but far fewer down the line from the effects of lockdown.
To me a Jag is a car that way too overpriced and rubbish.
#BuyGermanOrItalian
A lot of people have basically been locked in their homes for months at a time, some of my family included. Those going on holiday abroad (and the airlines that took them there) are at least partially responsible for that. I know it wasn't banned, and perhaps it wasn't understood quite what might happen after the summer, but the results were plain to see. You could blame the government for allowing it, but given all the noise about this it isn't surprising that they didn't take the difficult option of stopping travel.
Jumping up and down because you can't do it all over again isn't a great look. Wait at least until the effects of the last unlock have passed.
Personally, I wouldn't mind a holiday either, but there are more important things to think about at the moment. The ironic thing is that I could easily go on holiday in this country (and often did) and meet almost nobody.
https://metro.co.uk/2021/02/09/kay-burley-volunteers-at-london-food-bank-after-sky-news-suspension-14047372/
What a lovely lady she is.
Always said she had heart of gold.
As people lose their jobs/companies their mental health and other problems would have increased.
Moreover, just because such a sentence will be available to judges doesn't mean that it will be used. In fact, most likely it never will be. One finds it hard to imagine the level of deception that would have to be committed to earn anything close to it. Inciting a whole plane load of people to make false declarations, perhaps? I don't know.
The 10 years jail term cited for one offence is all the more ridiculous because it contrasts with the paltry and often unenforced sanctions for other activities that may do just as much in their own way to spread the virus. A bit of consistency is called for.
Within that, there are degrees of responsibility. Clearly, there was a wider industry that people worked in, and people were either complicit or merely part of an economic system associated with the trade. But there's no question of Colston's degree of responsibility - he was directing operations, knew his business, knew the attrition rate on crossings, and activities involved in getting people onto the ships. He was fabulously rich out of being an out and out villain even by the standards of the time. You can also criticise the blacksmith fitting his ships to a degree, but it's on a completely different level.
Colston was long gone when the statue went up. His charitable works being honoured by it long in the tooth by then. The argument it was charity paid for by slavery very well known. Yet up it went.
There is something about the politics of that era.
Fortunately this site is blessed with historians who can help us.
Was there something particularly entrenched and divided of the politics of that era, 1880s and 90’s? The imperialists utterly emboldened?
I ask myself the question... does she have the chops to lead, to speak convincingly to the wider public, to do battle with political big hitters? I've got to say no - she's a second division performer, a paint by numbers politico. Perhaps I'm wrong and have missed something, but that's where my betting is.
https://twitter.com/praxisblue/status/1204159099253985282
It's only a few weeks since I would have predicted that by this Easter you'd be able to go to most places you would reasonably want to go to. My son is in Canada and I haven't seen him for a year. I thought I'd be skiing with him in late April. I am now seriously depressed in a way I haven't yet been throughout the whole thing.
the phrase 'go f8ck yourself' comes to mind.
But I could be wrong.
I'm not saying it's unique to that time and place, people made money from Zyklon B and are making it from cluster bombs.
They objected to Rhodes being honoured due to his actions after 1892, which included the Jameson Raid which got found out and led to his downfall as Prime Minister.
It was the Iraq War controversy of the day.
Besides with shutting out the rest of the world, our domestic tourism industry could do with a boost !
Hopefully we can enjoy a great British summer
Personally I'm not setting my sights beyond this country at the moment, and the first thing on the agenda if and when travel does become possible will be parental visits. Those last happened in September.
Interestingly when you read the articles bout it, whilst most statues went up in the years immediately after the war they are almost entirely remembering men who fell - so could be considered a reasonable excuse. But those statues that went up just before and after the turn of the century were mostly of the leaders and generals and were designed to send a message about the valour of the Confederate cause. That is not supposition, it was the stated aim of the organisations which raised money for the statues.
I would be very surprised if anywhere will be allowing in people without evidence of a completed course of vaccination, 21 days before entry......
Whether that's actually a factor in the equation though is probably a different story.
I find it easier to sympathise with the shackle-forgers (rank and file, not the business owners) than the tea drinkers.
It may well be irrelevant for many holiday destinations whether the UK is allowing travel or not. Much of Europe and the rest of the world including many of the most popular holiday destinations look like they will be no where near ready to receive visitors by this summer. What the UK Government dictates may well be moot.
I should also say in passing that in terms of sympathy and understanding there is a world of difference between wanting to see close relatives after long gaps and wanting a jolly in Ibiza.
But its surely a mistake to say you can't book a domestic holiday yet.
Is it over estimating vaccine production ramping up. He’s convinced me it isn’t that.
Is it over estimating speed of roll out? He’s convinced me it isn’t that.
Is it over estimating the impact of vaccination on quickly changing the picture?
Or maybe RCS is spot on. Whatever, it’s clear RCS and his back to normal tribe, and the government messaging is not on the same page tonight, Is it?
The Lib Dems, and Tories have recently dropped their candidates. I would be surprised if they make up ground. The Green's candidate is a youth worker, with a double barrelled name.
I would be very surprised if Labour lose the Mayoral Election in Bristol.
As for the Council, I've no real idea. Quite a few councillors are standing down, Labour have a majority of 1, but it wouldn't surprise me if Bristol turns back into a council with no overall control, with an elected Labour Mayor.
But under NO circumstances must you monetize the muskox.
This, to my mind, is a two year long pandemic meaning that by March 2022 it will be functionally over. I'm not alone in that - Dr Fauci in the States is on record saying similar. 2 years - 730 days - 104 weeks - of which we have seen through nearly half already. People on this site have money tied up in elections that are further away than that.
PLus the downsides of lockdown will start to become more apparent. Tax increases. Huge job losses when furlough ends. Maybe the return of inflation.
We'd have been largely fucked if it has really just been the "UK alone" because our 'punch' would only have been about 30-35% of what we had combined
It would have been a bit more sedate. We would have been spared constant babbling contact on Zoom -- which passes as "work" among life's chatterers.
The TV would have been used to broadcast educational services (much like the Open University then did at the graduate level). Some materials, assignments, etc, would have been delivered using the regular mail. rather like old-fashioned correspondence courses.
Lock downs are as old as plague itself.
When a recently graduated mathematician locked down in Woolsthorpe Manor to avoid the Great Plague, he managed to develop the calculus, optics, and the law of gravitation. That is a good lockdown.
A bunch of NHS staff waiting too
Now rebooked for tomorrow
https://businesstech.co.za/news/trending/464736/ramaphosa-announces-eased-level-3-lockdown-for-south-africa-including-changes-for-alcohol-sales-and-curfew/
I imagine upstart long haul destinations e.g. Dubai will start a 'come on in if you have a vaccine certificate' policy as soon as they can.
I have my own ideas of what the split between the two might be, as I’m sure do you.
How is that better? They're still not at the pub...
With them following on from the Ray Fisher allegations and the fact that Amber Benson has endorsed Carpenter's allegations means in the court of public opinion means it is very problematic for him.
As I said earlier, until 1832 you could be hanged for forgery, indeed many were.
Yesterday a statue was posted spouting confederate doctrine putting the words in Winston Churchill’s mouth to legitimate it.
I’m not hot on US civil war history, so correct me where I am wrong historians, but I know enough that the leaders of the confederacy didn’t whole heartedly believe in everything they were doing, so retrospect statue of them might represent a more current idea than what they actually believed in themselves. Like aforementioned Churchill Statue. They certainly believed in fighting for the autonomy of states, and against federalism. But who was it spoke against slave ownership then inherited a whole load of them?
It’s certainly a way we should look at statues in this debate.