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Chesham Tory Peter Fleet was on a losing run right from his selection as candidate – politicalbettin

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  • AnabobazinaAnabobazina Posts: 23,596
    alex_ said:

    Johnson: "the priority has got to be to keep the country safe and stop the virus coming back in.'


    Sounds like a zero covid strategy to me.

    That is an absolutely barmy strategy if that is the road we’re going down
    Sounds like New Zealand. The more thoroughly the virus is crushed, the more extreme the reaction to any cases that are left will become. It will end with the Zero Covidians screaming for a hard lockdown each time a single case appears.
    There was a great article in the Economist saying that Aus and NZ have a massive problem incoming: potentially they can’t open up. The fear is so great now of a single case that their populations won’t be able to tolerate it even with vaccines. Not sure it will play out like that, but you can see the risk.
    I think it's definitely the case. New Zealand has had 26 deaths! It's quite possible that more people in New Zealand will die of some complication relating to the vaccines than from Covid itself.

    And of course there is the massive catch-22 that their vaccination levels will quite likely never meet high enough levels given that many people know that if they favour the current situation then the best way to avoid things changing is to not get the vaccine in high enough numbers. It's far harder for a Govt to dismiss the health risks caused by vaccine refuseniks when they form a materially large proportion of the population.
    I hadn’t thought of that eventuality. Do you think people are that calculating?
  • Philip_ThompsonPhilip_Thompson Posts: 65,826
    alex_ said:

    RH1992 said:

    Managed to move forward my second Moderna dose to the 4th of August, a full 3 weeks sooner than the initial booking and 8 weeks to the day from my first dose (9th June). At least the NHS booking system lets you view potential appointments before cancelling now otherwise wouldn't have dared do it.

    I tried moving mine (AZ, first done in late April) last night, but couldn't see an option except for "cancel/rebook".
    Someone said that you have to click the "cancel/rebook" option, and that is when you get to see the appointments available before confirming. Don't quote me on that though!
    The website was updated earlier this week so you can 'peak' at what the other options are before you cancel yours.
  • StuartinromfordStuartinromford Posts: 17,303

    Charles said:

    Cookie said:

    rcs1000 said:

    Andy_JS said:

    ping said:

    That labour poster is depressing.

    Will we ever build enough homes so that our young people can grow up and have, like, families?

    The country is committing a slow suicide.

    F£&k the nimbys.

    In my local area a huge amount of housebuilding has been taking place recently, and yet house prices still continue to rise. This is what happens when the population of the country increases by 10 million in 20 years, whereas in the 1970s and 80s it hardly increased at all. That's why people could afford to buy homes at that time.
    That being said, house prices rose a lot more in the 80s and 90s than they have done in the 2000s. So immigration clearly can't be the only (or even the dominant) factor.
    But inflation was much bigger back then. So, I think, price rises relative to earnings have been bigger this century.
    I don't have the data and am happy to be contradicted.
    Big rise in multiples was about 95-07

    https://www.schroders.com/en/uk/private-investor/insights/markets/what-174-years-of-data-tell-us-about-house-price-affordability-in-the-uk/
    When population growth really took off, but before housing construction growth did.

    What a strange coincidence. Or not.
    More likely the substantial fall in interest rates that started in about '93 and was really established by '95. If mortgage rates fall from 10-15% to 5-7%, you would expect prices to go up to absorb the savings.

    Brilliant double bubble if you bought prior to about 1993- massive capital growth on your leveraged assets and lower repayments to boot.
    Just don't ask where all that free money came from. Or what happens if interest rates need to rise, even a little bit, from here.
  • alex_alex_ Posts: 7,518

    alex_ said:

    Johnson: "the priority has got to be to keep the country safe and stop the virus coming back in.'


    Sounds like a zero covid strategy to me.

    That is an absolutely barmy strategy if that is the road we’re going down
    Sounds like New Zealand. The more thoroughly the virus is crushed, the more extreme the reaction to any cases that are left will become. It will end with the Zero Covidians screaming for a hard lockdown each time a single case appears.
    There was a great article in the Economist saying that Aus and NZ have a massive problem incoming: potentially they can’t open up. The fear is so great now of a single case that their populations won’t be able to tolerate it even with vaccines. Not sure it will play out like that, but you can see the risk.
    I think it's definitely the case. New Zealand has had 26 deaths! It's quite possible that more people in New Zealand will die of some complication relating to the vaccines than from Covid itself.

    And of course there is the massive catch-22 that their vaccination levels will quite likely never meet high enough levels given that many people know that if they favour the current situation then the best way to avoid things changing is to not get the vaccine in high enough numbers. It's far harder for a Govt to dismiss the health risks caused by vaccine refuseniks when they form a materially large proportion of the population.
    I hadn’t thought of that eventuality. Do you think people are that calculating?
    Not consciously. But i wouldn't be surprised if significant numbers don't get vaccinated and then form a politically significant group that the Government finds it hard to dismiss. Hell, some people are even arguing for continued restrictions in this country because of vaccine refuseniks!
  • MattWMattW Posts: 23,442
    I have to admit that I am rather enjoying the Statue of Ghandi unveiled by Mr Drakeford in 2017 coming under fire from his anti-colonialism advisers.

    https://twitter.com/fmwales/status/914874061548867585

    Very proud to unveil the statute of Mahatma Gandhi with the Hindu Council of Wales in Cardiff Bay on his birthday and UN Day of non-violence
  • YBarddCwscYBarddCwsc Posts: 7,172
    MattW said:

    kle4 said:

    Oxford Student Union is planning to hire 'sensitivity readers' to stop student newspapers including historic campus sheet Cherwell publishing 'problematic' articles that are 'implicitly racist or sexist'.

    Officials at the student body are planning to set up a 'Student Consultancy of Sensitivity Readers' who would be elected and paid to check articles across various newspapers for signs of supposed insensitivity.

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9707701/Oxford-students-employ-sensitivity-readers-CUT-problematic-articles-newspaper.html

    I feel like wanting to be sensitive is technically a reasonable aim, but you don't want it to be your starting point, as you are likely to overdo it and be far too oversensitive.
    https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2021/jun/21/we-didnt-want-it-named-after-a-person-how-residents-of-cecil-rhodes-house-feel-about-its-new-name

    Total minefield....going to just have to name everything A1, A2, A3...
    From the Guardian article, " ......Virginia Woolf, whose writing has been criticised as racist and antisemitic”

    My distinct recollection is that Virginia's husband, Leonard Woolf, was Jewish.

    I suspect the whole of the Bloomsbury Group is going to end up cancelled at this rate
    If they want to, they can get Virginia Woolf (and many of the socialist pioneers) for Eugenic views. For such campaigns, context means nothing.

    (1915)
    “we met & had to pass a long line of imbeciles. the first was a very tall young man, just queer enough to look at twice, but no more; the second shuffled, & looked aside; and then one realised that everyone in that long line was a miserable ineffective shuffling idiotic creature, with no forehead, or no chin, & an imbecile grin, or a wild suspicious stare. It was perfectly horrible. They should certainly be killed.”

    https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=9iNred5Ctn4C&pg=PA440&dq=virginia+woolf+diary+"everyone+in+that+long+line+was+a+miserable+ineffective"&hl=en&sa=X&ei=iMy6VM3TJY_4yQSpq4CIBQ&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q=virginia woolf diary "everyone in that long line was a miserable ineffective"&f=false
    Sure. almost all of Bloomsbury (& the intellectual Left of the 1920s and 1930s) was eugenicist.

    The staunch Marxist Karl Pearson has already had his name removed from UCL buildings.
  • SlackbladderSlackbladder Posts: 9,773
    Foxy said:

    I see Chris Williamson has turned up in Batley.

    I bet the good folk of the constituency can't wait for this circus to be over.

    Who is he campaigning for?
    Galloway
  • kle4kle4 Posts: 96,237
    Foxy said:

    I see Chris Williamson has turned up in Batley.

    I bet the good folk of the constituency can't wait for this circus to be over.

    Who is he campaigning for?
    In his mind, the true Labour option no doubt. That is, not Labour.

  • ydoethurydoethur Posts: 71,478

    Foxy said:

    I see Chris Williamson has turned up in Batley.

    I bet the good folk of the constituency can't wait for this circus to be over.

    Who is he campaigning for?
    Galloway
    At last, some good news for Labour.
  • geoffwgeoffw Posts: 8,745
    Foxy said:

    Leon said:

    ‘The aliens might be here. Or at least their probes’

    - Scientific American

    https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/maybe-the-aliens-really-are-here/

    Probes? You must be speaking out of your anus...
    This your analysis.

  • ydoethurydoethur Posts: 71,478
    geoffw said:

    Foxy said:

    Leon said:

    ‘The aliens might be here. Or at least their probes’

    - Scientific American

    https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/maybe-the-aliens-really-are-here/

    Probes? You must be speaking out of your anus...
    This your analysis.

    Enough of the wise cracks.
  • Philip_ThompsonPhilip_Thompson Posts: 65,826

    Charles said:

    Cookie said:

    rcs1000 said:

    Andy_JS said:

    ping said:

    That labour poster is depressing.

    Will we ever build enough homes so that our young people can grow up and have, like, families?

    The country is committing a slow suicide.

    F£&k the nimbys.

    In my local area a huge amount of housebuilding has been taking place recently, and yet house prices still continue to rise. This is what happens when the population of the country increases by 10 million in 20 years, whereas in the 1970s and 80s it hardly increased at all. That's why people could afford to buy homes at that time.
    That being said, house prices rose a lot more in the 80s and 90s than they have done in the 2000s. So immigration clearly can't be the only (or even the dominant) factor.
    But inflation was much bigger back then. So, I think, price rises relative to earnings have been bigger this century.
    I don't have the data and am happy to be contradicted.
    Big rise in multiples was about 95-07

    https://www.schroders.com/en/uk/private-investor/insights/markets/what-174-years-of-data-tell-us-about-house-price-affordability-in-the-uk/
    When population growth really took off, but before housing construction growth did.

    What a strange coincidence. Or not.
    More likely the substantial fall in interest rates that started in about '93 and was really established by '95. If mortgage rates fall from 10-15% to 5-7%, you would expect prices to go up to absorb the savings.

    Brilliant double bubble if you bought prior to about 1993- massive capital growth on your leveraged assets and lower repayments to boot.
    Just don't ask where all that free money came from. Or what happens if interest rates need to rise, even a little bit, from here.
    Except if that was the case then the fall in rates from 5% to 0% should have seen an even bigger ratchet in the multiple, but that didn't happen.

    The problem with thinking that interest rates are a key determinant is that many people buy homes for cash, especially buy-to-let most are bought for cash, so interest rates affect mortgage purchasers but not cash purchasers.

    Instead the ratio rise occured when demand spiked and supply didn't keep up. Since then demand and supply have risen in tandem which has kept the multiple stable. If supply goes up more than demand then the ratio will go back down, which is what many NIMBYs are worried about.
  • geoffwgeoffw Posts: 8,745
    Finnish better half: "I can't watch this"
      - "Why not?"   
      - "Too embarrassing"
  • Philip_ThompsonPhilip_Thompson Posts: 65,826
    Foxy said:

    I see Chris Williamson has turned up in Batley.

    I bet the good folk of the constituency can't wait for this circus to be over.

    Who is he campaigning for?
    I thought you were referring to Gavin Williamson at first.

    Chris or Gavin - hardly a good advertisement for the Williamson name either of them.
  • ydoethurydoethur Posts: 71,478

    Foxy said:

    I see Chris Williamson has turned up in Batley.

    I bet the good folk of the constituency can't wait for this circus to be over.

    Who is he campaigning for?
    I thought you were referring to Gavin Williamson at first.

    Chris or Gavin - hardly a good advertisement for the Williamson name either of them.
    Imagine a by election where Chris Williamson campaigned for the pussycat, Gavin Williamson for the Tories and Nick Clegg for the Lib Dems.

    Easiest ever Labour hold. It would make Bootle look like a marginal.
  • Re: the NZ vaccine thing. Is it possible that we may be approaching a situation where some island nations cut themselves off from the rest of the world to isolate themselves from Covid and it’s descendants? Sounds whacky but if they don’t want to vaccinate and their susceptibility rises then it may happen.
  • geoffwgeoffw Posts: 8,745

    Re: the NZ vaccine thing. Is it possible that we may be approaching a situation where some island nations cut themselves off from the rest of the world to isolate themselves from Covid and it’s descendants? Sounds whacky but if they don’t want to vaccinate and their susceptibility rises then it may happen.

    Shades of Neville Shute's "On the beach"

  • geoffw said:

    Finnish better half: "I can't watch this"
      - "Why not?"   
      - "Too embarrassing"

    The Finnish kit is by far the best in the tournament so I am supporting them as my non-English team in this tournament.
  • ydoethurydoethur Posts: 71,478
    geoffw said:

    Re: the NZ vaccine thing. Is it possible that we may be approaching a situation where some island nations cut themselves off from the rest of the world to isolate themselves from Covid and it’s descendants? Sounds whacky but if they don’t want to vaccinate and their susceptibility rises then it may happen.

    Shades of Neville Shute's "On the beach"

    More like John Wyndham’s The Chrysalids.
  • geoffw said:

    Re: the NZ vaccine thing. Is it possible that we may be approaching a situation where some island nations cut themselves off from the rest of the world to isolate themselves from Covid and it’s descendants? Sounds whacky but if they don’t want to vaccinate and their susceptibility rises then it may happen.

    Shades of Neville Shute's "On the beach"

    Indeed. It sounds very odd but we are living in strange times with everyone seemingly scared of everything.
  • Sean_FSean_F Posts: 37,407


    MattW said:

    kle4 said:

    Oxford Student Union is planning to hire 'sensitivity readers' to stop student newspapers including historic campus sheet Cherwell publishing 'problematic' articles that are 'implicitly racist or sexist'.

    Officials at the student body are planning to set up a 'Student Consultancy of Sensitivity Readers' who would be elected and paid to check articles across various newspapers for signs of supposed insensitivity.

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9707701/Oxford-students-employ-sensitivity-readers-CUT-problematic-articles-newspaper.html

    I feel like wanting to be sensitive is technically a reasonable aim, but you don't want it to be your starting point, as you are likely to overdo it and be far too oversensitive.
    https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2021/jun/21/we-didnt-want-it-named-after-a-person-how-residents-of-cecil-rhodes-house-feel-about-its-new-name

    Total minefield....going to just have to name everything A1, A2, A3...
    From the Guardian article, " ......Virginia Woolf, whose writing has been criticised as racist and antisemitic”

    My distinct recollection is that Virginia's husband, Leonard Woolf, was Jewish.

    I suspect the whole of the Bloomsbury Group is going to end up cancelled at this rate
    If they want to, they can get Virginia Woolf (and many of the socialist pioneers) for Eugenic views. For such campaigns, context means nothing.

    (1915)
    “we met & had to pass a long line of imbeciles. the first was a very tall young man, just queer enough to look at twice, but no more; the second shuffled, & looked aside; and then one realised that everyone in that long line was a miserable ineffective shuffling idiotic creature, with no forehead, or no chin, & an imbecile grin, or a wild suspicious stare. It was perfectly horrible. They should certainly be killed.”

    https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=9iNred5Ctn4C&pg=PA440&dq=virginia+woolf+diary+"everyone+in+that+long+line+was+a+miserable+ineffective"&hl=en&sa=X&ei=iMy6VM3TJY_4yQSpq4CIBQ&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q=virginia woolf diary "everyone in that long line was a miserable ineffective"&f=false
    Sure. almost all of Bloomsbury (& the intellectual Left of the 1920s and 1930s) was eugenicist.

    The staunch Marxist Karl Pearson has already had his name removed from UCL buildings.
    The Guardian article seemed rather satirical to me. The councillors were all getting offended on behalf of people who couldn’t be arsed.
  • Very o/t but, as my wife and son dislike butter I have taken to baking cakes for them with fat free Greek yogurt instead. It is surprisingly good.
  • Daveyboy1961Daveyboy1961 Posts: 3,893

    geoffw said:

    Re: the NZ vaccine thing. Is it possible that we may be approaching a situation where some island nations cut themselves off from the rest of the world to isolate themselves from Covid and it’s descendants? Sounds whacky but if they don’t want to vaccinate and their susceptibility rises then it may happen.

    Shades of Neville Shute's "On the beach"

    Indeed. It sounds very odd but we are living in strange times with everyone seemingly scared of everything.
    excellent book and film
  • geoffw said:

    Re: the NZ vaccine thing. Is it possible that we may be approaching a situation where some island nations cut themselves off from the rest of the world to isolate themselves from Covid and it’s descendants? Sounds whacky but if they don’t want to vaccinate and their susceptibility rises then it may happen.

    Shades of Neville Shute's "On the beach"

    Indeed. It sounds very odd but we are living in strange times with everyone seemingly scared of everything.
    excellent book and film
    Never read it but just looked at the summary. I think I should invest in a copy.
  • geoffwgeoffw Posts: 8,745


    MattW said:

    kle4 said:

    Oxford Student Union is planning to hire 'sensitivity readers' to stop student newspapers including historic campus sheet Cherwell publishing 'problematic' articles that are 'implicitly racist or sexist'.

    Officials at the student body are planning to set up a 'Student Consultancy of Sensitivity Readers' who would be elected and paid to check articles across various newspapers for signs of supposed insensitivity.

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9707701/Oxford-students-employ-sensitivity-readers-CUT-problematic-articles-newspaper.html

    I feel like wanting to be sensitive is technically a reasonable aim, but you don't want it to be your starting point, as you are likely to overdo it and be far too oversensitive.
    https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2021/jun/21/we-didnt-want-it-named-after-a-person-how-residents-of-cecil-rhodes-house-feel-about-its-new-name

    Total minefield....going to just have to name everything A1, A2, A3...
    From the Guardian article, " ......Virginia Woolf, whose writing has been criticised as racist and antisemitic”

    My distinct recollection is that Virginia's husband, Leonard Woolf, was Jewish.

    I suspect the whole of the Bloomsbury Group is going to end up cancelled at this rate
    If they want to, they can get Virginia Woolf (and many of the socialist pioneers) for Eugenic views. For such campaigns, context means nothing.

    (1915)
    “we met & had to pass a long line of imbeciles. the first was a very tall young man, just queer enough to look at twice, but no more; the second shuffled, & looked aside; and then one realised that everyone in that long line was a miserable ineffective shuffling idiotic creature, with no forehead, or no chin, & an imbecile grin, or a wild suspicious stare. It was perfectly horrible. They should certainly be killed.”

    https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=9iNred5Ctn4C&pg=PA440&dq=virginia+woolf+diary+"everyone+in+that+long+line+was+a+miserable+ineffective"&hl=en&sa=X&ei=iMy6VM3TJY_4yQSpq4CIBQ&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q=virginia woolf diary "everyone in that long line was a miserable ineffective"&f=false
    Sure. almost all of Bloomsbury (& the intellectual Left of the 1920s and 1930s) was eugenicist.

    The staunch Marxist Karl Pearson has already had his name removed from UCL buildings.
    For his eugenics rather than his Marxism I suppose. Never mind his statistics, that doesn't count. :)

  • StuartDicksonStuartDickson Posts: 12,146
    MattW said:

    kle4 said:

    Oxford Student Union is planning to hire 'sensitivity readers' to stop student newspapers including historic campus sheet Cherwell publishing 'problematic' articles that are 'implicitly racist or sexist'.

    Officials at the student body are planning to set up a 'Student Consultancy of Sensitivity Readers' who would be elected and paid to check articles across various newspapers for signs of supposed insensitivity.

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9707701/Oxford-students-employ-sensitivity-readers-CUT-problematic-articles-newspaper.html

    I feel like wanting to be sensitive is technically a reasonable aim, but you don't want it to be your starting point, as you are likely to overdo it and be far too oversensitive.
    https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2021/jun/21/we-didnt-want-it-named-after-a-person-how-residents-of-cecil-rhodes-house-feel-about-its-new-name

    Total minefield....going to just have to name everything A1, A2, A3...
    From the Guardian article, " ......Virginia Woolf, whose writing has been criticised as racist and antisemitic”

    My distinct recollection is that Virginia's husband, Leonard Woolf, was Jewish.

    I suspect the whole of the Bloomsbury Group is going to end up cancelled at this rate
    If they want to, they can get Virginia Woolf (and many of the socialist pioneers) for Eugenic views. For such campaigns, context means nothing.

    (1915)
    “we met & had to pass a long line of imbeciles. the first was a very tall young man, just queer enough to look at twice, but no more; the second shuffled, & looked aside; and then one realised that everyone in that long line was a miserable ineffective shuffling idiotic creature, with no forehead, or no chin, & an imbecile grin, or a wild suspicious stare. It was perfectly horrible. They should certainly be killed.”

    https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=9iNred5Ctn4C&pg=PA440&dq=virginia+woolf+diary+"everyone+in+that+long+line+was+a+miserable+ineffective"&hl=en&sa=X&ei=iMy6VM3TJY_4yQSpq4CIBQ&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q=virginia woolf diary "everyone in that long line was a miserable ineffective"&f=false
    Indeed.

    Keir Hardie was a nasty xenophobe, at least according to former Labour First Minister Henry McLeish.
  • alex_alex_ Posts: 7,518

    geoffw said:

    Re: the NZ vaccine thing. Is it possible that we may be approaching a situation where some island nations cut themselves off from the rest of the world to isolate themselves from Covid and it’s descendants? Sounds whacky but if they don’t want to vaccinate and their susceptibility rises then it may happen.

    Shades of Neville Shute's "On the beach"

    Indeed. It sounds very odd but we are living in strange times with everyone seemingly scared of everything.
    Of course the "incompetence" argument is far more popular, but i do wonder if somewhere within the UK Government's approach to Covid border security has on some level been motivated by a fear that once you go down the route of completely sealing yourself off from the world, there is no knowing whether the political circumstances will allow them to be opened again.

    Certainly right from the start, it was very easy to foresee the possible problems the likes of New Zealand might face down the line and it was not unjustified to ask the question of whether that was really a scenario that a country like the UK should want to pursue. Democratic political forces are powerful things, and (as we are seeing in a different way with the popularity for continued restrictions - which personally i'm sure is influencing Johnson against what he instinctively wants to do), once a course is embarked upon it is very difficult to reverse course if the democratic will is against it.
  • geoffw said:

    Re: the NZ vaccine thing. Is it possible that we may be approaching a situation where some island nations cut themselves off from the rest of the world to isolate themselves from Covid and it’s descendants? Sounds whacky but if they don’t want to vaccinate and their susceptibility rises then it may happen.

    Shades of Neville Shute's "On the beach"

    Indeed. It sounds very odd but we are living in strange times with everyone seemingly scared of everything.
    excellent book and film
    Never read it but just looked at the summary. I think I should invest in a copy.
    Edit. I meant the chrysalids. Read on the beach as a kid. One of the saddest books imaginable
  • ydoethurydoethur Posts: 71,478

    geoffw said:

    Re: the NZ vaccine thing. Is it possible that we may be approaching a situation where some island nations cut themselves off from the rest of the world to isolate themselves from Covid and it’s descendants? Sounds whacky but if they don’t want to vaccinate and their susceptibility rises then it may happen.

    Shades of Neville Shute's "On the beach"

    Indeed. It sounds very odd but we are living in strange times with everyone seemingly scared of everything.
    excellent book and film
    Never read it but just looked at the summary. I think I should invest in a copy.
    Edit. I meant the chrysalids. Read on the beach as a kid. One of the saddest books imaginable
    Certainly a remarkably powerful and emotional ending. Striking to compare it with both the tragic but more upbeat finish of The Rainbow and the Rose and the sheer cosiness of Trustee from the Toolroom.
  • ydoethur said:

    geoffw said:

    Re: the NZ vaccine thing. Is it possible that we may be approaching a situation where some island nations cut themselves off from the rest of the world to isolate themselves from Covid and it’s descendants? Sounds whacky but if they don’t want to vaccinate and their susceptibility rises then it may happen.

    Shades of Neville Shute's "On the beach"

    Indeed. It sounds very odd but we are living in strange times with everyone seemingly scared of everything.
    excellent book and film
    Never read it but just looked at the summary. I think I should invest in a copy.
    Edit. I meant the chrysalids. Read on the beach as a kid. One of the saddest books imaginable
    Certainly a remarkably powerful and emotional ending. Striking to compare it with both the tragic but more upbeat finish of The Rainbow and the Rose and the sheer cosiness of Trustee from the Toolroom.
    Aaaargh! Now I have to go and buy them as well. I am off for my first trip to London for a while on Wednesday for a little celebration of the fifth anniversary of the referendum vote so I will have to dip into some bookshops on the way. Going into bookshops is a dangerous and expensive hobby for me. Plus I have already had to build more bookshelves at home since I packed in working. I will need a bigger house or invade the spare room and kick out the gym equipment.
    Problems, problems, problems.
  • Black_RookBlack_Rook Posts: 8,905

    kle4 said:

    Oxford Student Union is planning to hire 'sensitivity readers' to stop student newspapers including historic campus sheet Cherwell publishing 'problematic' articles that are 'implicitly racist or sexist'.

    Officials at the student body are planning to set up a 'Student Consultancy of Sensitivity Readers' who would be elected and paid to check articles across various newspapers for signs of supposed insensitivity.

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9707701/Oxford-students-employ-sensitivity-readers-CUT-problematic-articles-newspaper.html

    I feel like wanting to be sensitive is technically a reasonable aim, but you don't want it to be your starting point, as you are likely to overdo it and be far too oversensitive.
    https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2021/jun/21/we-didnt-want-it-named-after-a-person-how-residents-of-cecil-rhodes-house-feel-about-its-new-name

    Total minefield....going to just have to name everything A1, A2, A3...
    From the Guardian article, " ......Virginia Woolf, whose writing has been criticised as racist and antisemitic”

    My distinct recollection is that Virginia's husband, Leonard Woolf, was Jewish.

    I suspect the whole of the Bloomsbury Group is going to end up cancelled at this rate
    Virtually everyone who's ever been famous for anything will eventually end up being cancelled, or at any rate some group or another will claim to be offended and try. It's just the way things are going. The more tolerant and inclusive society becomes, the less tolerant and inclusive the belligerent axe grinders claim it to be - and then set out to try to make things worse again.
  • LeonLeon Posts: 55,748
    Sean_F said:


    MattW said:

    kle4 said:

    Oxford Student Union is planning to hire 'sensitivity readers' to stop student newspapers including historic campus sheet Cherwell publishing 'problematic' articles that are 'implicitly racist or sexist'.

    Officials at the student body are planning to set up a 'Student Consultancy of Sensitivity Readers' who would be elected and paid to check articles across various newspapers for signs of supposed insensitivity.

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9707701/Oxford-students-employ-sensitivity-readers-CUT-problematic-articles-newspaper.html

    I feel like wanting to be sensitive is technically a reasonable aim, but you don't want it to be your starting point, as you are likely to overdo it and be far too oversensitive.
    https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2021/jun/21/we-didnt-want-it-named-after-a-person-how-residents-of-cecil-rhodes-house-feel-about-its-new-name

    Total minefield....going to just have to name everything A1, A2, A3...
    From the Guardian article, " ......Virginia Woolf, whose writing has been criticised as racist and antisemitic”

    My distinct recollection is that Virginia's husband, Leonard Woolf, was Jewish.

    I suspect the whole of the Bloomsbury Group is going to end up cancelled at this rate
    If they want to, they can get Virginia Woolf (and many of the socialist pioneers) for Eugenic views. For such campaigns, context means nothing.

    (1915)
    “we met & had to pass a long line of imbeciles. the first was a very tall young man, just queer enough to look at twice, but no more; the second shuffled, & looked aside; and then one realised that everyone in that long line was a miserable ineffective shuffling idiotic creature, with no forehead, or no chin, & an imbecile grin, or a wild suspicious stare. It was perfectly horrible. They should certainly be killed.”

    https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=9iNred5Ctn4C&pg=PA440&dq=virginia+woolf+diary+"everyone+in+that+long+line+was+a+miserable+ineffective"&hl=en&sa=X&ei=iMy6VM3TJY_4yQSpq4CIBQ&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q=virginia woolf diary "everyone in that long line was a miserable ineffective"&f=false
    Sure. almost all of Bloomsbury (& the intellectual Left of the 1920s and 1930s) was eugenicist.

    The staunch Marxist Karl Pearson has already had his name removed from UCL buildings.
    The Guardian article seemed rather satirical to me. The councillors were all getting offended on behalf of people who couldn’t be arsed.
    Loved the bit where the council sat with all the reluctant residents and subjected them to a Two Minutes Hate, sorry, gave them a presentation with slides and videos showing how Cecil Rhodes was a terrible old racist

    The residents' reluctance is perhaps understandable, when you learn that the same Camden Council tried to rename the same block "Robert Mugabe House", 20 years ago
  • Black_RookBlack_Rook Posts: 8,905

    Re: the NZ vaccine thing. Is it possible that we may be approaching a situation where some island nations cut themselves off from the rest of the world to isolate themselves from Covid and it’s descendants? Sounds whacky but if they don’t want to vaccinate and their susceptibility rises then it may happen.

    It would not be unprecedented in history. Japan tried to isolate itself for hundreds of years, and was ultimately only opened back up to the outside world by force. I'm not suggesting that this will end up happening to New Zealand, of course, but they are now in a tricky situation. Unsealing the borders will result in an exit wave of Covid and far more sickness and death than the country has hitherto suffered. It's simply inevitable. If they're too scared to let that process happen then there is no other endgame than eternal self-isolation. So which way do they jump?
  • FrancisUrquhartFrancisUrquhart Posts: 82,271
    edited June 2021

    kle4 said:

    Oxford Student Union is planning to hire 'sensitivity readers' to stop student newspapers including historic campus sheet Cherwell publishing 'problematic' articles that are 'implicitly racist or sexist'.

    Officials at the student body are planning to set up a 'Student Consultancy of Sensitivity Readers' who would be elected and paid to check articles across various newspapers for signs of supposed insensitivity.

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9707701/Oxford-students-employ-sensitivity-readers-CUT-problematic-articles-newspaper.html

    I feel like wanting to be sensitive is technically a reasonable aim, but you don't want it to be your starting point, as you are likely to overdo it and be far too oversensitive.
    https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2021/jun/21/we-didnt-want-it-named-after-a-person-how-residents-of-cecil-rhodes-house-feel-about-its-new-name

    Total minefield....going to just have to name everything A1, A2, A3...
    From the Guardian article, " ......Virginia Woolf, whose writing has been criticised as racist and antisemitic”

    My distinct recollection is that Virginia's husband, Leonard Woolf, was Jewish.

    I suspect the whole of the Bloomsbury Group is going to end up cancelled at this rate
    Virtually everyone who's ever been famous for anything will eventually end up being cancelled, or at any rate some group or another will claim to be offended and try. It's just the way things are going. The more tolerant and inclusive society becomes, the less tolerant and inclusive the belligerent axe grinders claim it to be - and then set out to try to make things worse again.
    Doesn't take long to go from widely heralded by the likes of NYT and bestselling author to cancelled...5 years....for one passage in a semi-autobiographical book, that was clearly hyperbolic version of reality.

    https://www.vox.com/recode/2021/5/13/22435266/apple-employees-petition-controversial-antonio-garcia-martinez-new-hire-departure

  • YBarddCwscYBarddCwsc Posts: 7,172

    kle4 said:

    Oxford Student Union is planning to hire 'sensitivity readers' to stop student newspapers including historic campus sheet Cherwell publishing 'problematic' articles that are 'implicitly racist or sexist'.

    Officials at the student body are planning to set up a 'Student Consultancy of Sensitivity Readers' who would be elected and paid to check articles across various newspapers for signs of supposed insensitivity.

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9707701/Oxford-students-employ-sensitivity-readers-CUT-problematic-articles-newspaper.html

    I feel like wanting to be sensitive is technically a reasonable aim, but you don't want it to be your starting point, as you are likely to overdo it and be far too oversensitive.
    https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2021/jun/21/we-didnt-want-it-named-after-a-person-how-residents-of-cecil-rhodes-house-feel-about-its-new-name

    Total minefield....going to just have to name everything A1, A2, A3...
    From the Guardian article, " ......Virginia Woolf, whose writing has been criticised as racist and antisemitic”

    My distinct recollection is that Virginia's husband, Leonard Woolf, was Jewish.

    I suspect the whole of the Bloomsbury Group is going to end up cancelled at this rate
    Virtually everyone who's ever been famous for anything will eventually end up being cancelled, or at any rate some group or another will claim to be offended and try. It's just the way things are going. The more tolerant and inclusive society becomes, the less tolerant and inclusive the belligerent axe grinders claim it to be - and then set out to try to make things worse again.
    Well, we are already at the stage where Einstein & Gandhi -- two of the most admirable humans who have ever lived -- are being routinely dismissed as racists.
  • LeonLeon Posts: 55,748

    kle4 said:

    Oxford Student Union is planning to hire 'sensitivity readers' to stop student newspapers including historic campus sheet Cherwell publishing 'problematic' articles that are 'implicitly racist or sexist'.

    Officials at the student body are planning to set up a 'Student Consultancy of Sensitivity Readers' who would be elected and paid to check articles across various newspapers for signs of supposed insensitivity.

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9707701/Oxford-students-employ-sensitivity-readers-CUT-problematic-articles-newspaper.html

    I feel like wanting to be sensitive is technically a reasonable aim, but you don't want it to be your starting point, as you are likely to overdo it and be far too oversensitive.
    https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2021/jun/21/we-didnt-want-it-named-after-a-person-how-residents-of-cecil-rhodes-house-feel-about-its-new-name

    Total minefield....going to just have to name everything A1, A2, A3...
    From the Guardian article, " ......Virginia Woolf, whose writing has been criticised as racist and antisemitic”

    My distinct recollection is that Virginia's husband, Leonard Woolf, was Jewish.

    I suspect the whole of the Bloomsbury Group is going to end up cancelled at this rate
    Virtually everyone who's ever been famous for anything will eventually end up being cancelled, or at any rate some group or another will claim to be offended and try. It's just the way things are going. The more tolerant and inclusive society becomes, the less tolerant and inclusive the belligerent axe grinders claim it to be - and then set out to try to make things worse again.
    Doesn't take long to go from widely heralded by the likes of NYT and bestselling author to cancelled...5 years....for one passage in a semi-autobiographical book, that was clearly hyperbolic version of reality.

    https://www.vox.com/recode/2021/5/13/22435266/apple-employees-petition-controversial-antonio-garcia-martinez-new-hire-departure

    In the future, everyone will be famously cancelled for fifteen minutes of nothing
  • tlg86tlg86 Posts: 26,183
    Nicely poised in the football tonight. Denmark leading, but they really want to win 2-0 so that if Finland do get a point tonight then Denmark go above Ukraine in the third place table.
  • FrancisUrquhartFrancisUrquhart Posts: 82,271
    Leon said:

    kle4 said:

    Oxford Student Union is planning to hire 'sensitivity readers' to stop student newspapers including historic campus sheet Cherwell publishing 'problematic' articles that are 'implicitly racist or sexist'.

    Officials at the student body are planning to set up a 'Student Consultancy of Sensitivity Readers' who would be elected and paid to check articles across various newspapers for signs of supposed insensitivity.

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9707701/Oxford-students-employ-sensitivity-readers-CUT-problematic-articles-newspaper.html

    I feel like wanting to be sensitive is technically a reasonable aim, but you don't want it to be your starting point, as you are likely to overdo it and be far too oversensitive.
    https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2021/jun/21/we-didnt-want-it-named-after-a-person-how-residents-of-cecil-rhodes-house-feel-about-its-new-name

    Total minefield....going to just have to name everything A1, A2, A3...
    From the Guardian article, " ......Virginia Woolf, whose writing has been criticised as racist and antisemitic”

    My distinct recollection is that Virginia's husband, Leonard Woolf, was Jewish.

    I suspect the whole of the Bloomsbury Group is going to end up cancelled at this rate
    Virtually everyone who's ever been famous for anything will eventually end up being cancelled, or at any rate some group or another will claim to be offended and try. It's just the way things are going. The more tolerant and inclusive society becomes, the less tolerant and inclusive the belligerent axe grinders claim it to be - and then set out to try to make things worse again.
    Doesn't take long to go from widely heralded by the likes of NYT and bestselling author to cancelled...5 years....for one passage in a semi-autobiographical book, that was clearly hyperbolic version of reality.

    https://www.vox.com/recode/2021/5/13/22435266/apple-employees-petition-controversial-antonio-garcia-martinez-new-hire-departure

    In the future, everyone will be famously cancelled for fifteen minutes of nothing
    I am glad not in the same game as that seanT bloke, must be constantly walking on eggshells.
  • LeonLeon Posts: 55,748
    edited June 2021

    kle4 said:

    Oxford Student Union is planning to hire 'sensitivity readers' to stop student newspapers including historic campus sheet Cherwell publishing 'problematic' articles that are 'implicitly racist or sexist'.

    Officials at the student body are planning to set up a 'Student Consultancy of Sensitivity Readers' who would be elected and paid to check articles across various newspapers for signs of supposed insensitivity.

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9707701/Oxford-students-employ-sensitivity-readers-CUT-problematic-articles-newspaper.html

    I feel like wanting to be sensitive is technically a reasonable aim, but you don't want it to be your starting point, as you are likely to overdo it and be far too oversensitive.
    https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2021/jun/21/we-didnt-want-it-named-after-a-person-how-residents-of-cecil-rhodes-house-feel-about-its-new-name

    Total minefield....going to just have to name everything A1, A2, A3...
    From the Guardian article, " ......Virginia Woolf, whose writing has been criticised as racist and antisemitic”

    My distinct recollection is that Virginia's husband, Leonard Woolf, was Jewish.

    I suspect the whole of the Bloomsbury Group is going to end up cancelled at this rate
    Virtually everyone who's ever been famous for anything will eventually end up being cancelled, or at any rate some group or another will claim to be offended and try. It's just the way things are going. The more tolerant and inclusive society becomes, the less tolerant and inclusive the belligerent axe grinders claim it to be - and then set out to try to make things worse again.
    Well, we are already at the stage where Einstein & Gandhi -- two of the most admirable humans who have ever lived -- are being routinely dismissed as racists.
    Gandhi was quite racist, however

    We have two choices, either we accept that humans are made from crooked timber, and everyone has major but tolerable flaws, including sexism and racism (especially as perceived by different eras), OR we demand moral purity - by our standards - from every human with any kind of fame. or even without, and so we end up cancelling everyone

    Of course the first choice is the sane option, but I fear we must go through several iterations of the insane alternative, until we wise up. Sanity will only prevail when the cancellers start getting viciously cancelled themselves - as they will. Cf Robespierre
  • GallowgateGallowgate Posts: 19,478

    Very o/t but, as my wife and son dislike butter I have taken to baking cakes for them with fat free Greek yogurt instead. It is surprisingly good.

    Sounds dangerously woke
  • Black_RookBlack_Rook Posts: 8,905
    Leon said:

    kle4 said:

    Oxford Student Union is planning to hire 'sensitivity readers' to stop student newspapers including historic campus sheet Cherwell publishing 'problematic' articles that are 'implicitly racist or sexist'.

    Officials at the student body are planning to set up a 'Student Consultancy of Sensitivity Readers' who would be elected and paid to check articles across various newspapers for signs of supposed insensitivity.

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9707701/Oxford-students-employ-sensitivity-readers-CUT-problematic-articles-newspaper.html

    I feel like wanting to be sensitive is technically a reasonable aim, but you don't want it to be your starting point, as you are likely to overdo it and be far too oversensitive.
    https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2021/jun/21/we-didnt-want-it-named-after-a-person-how-residents-of-cecil-rhodes-house-feel-about-its-new-name

    Total minefield....going to just have to name everything A1, A2, A3...
    From the Guardian article, " ......Virginia Woolf, whose writing has been criticised as racist and antisemitic”

    My distinct recollection is that Virginia's husband, Leonard Woolf, was Jewish.

    I suspect the whole of the Bloomsbury Group is going to end up cancelled at this rate
    Virtually everyone who's ever been famous for anything will eventually end up being cancelled, or at any rate some group or another will claim to be offended and try. It's just the way things are going. The more tolerant and inclusive society becomes, the less tolerant and inclusive the belligerent axe grinders claim it to be - and then set out to try to make things worse again.
    Well, we are already at the stage where Einstein & Gandhi -- two of the most admirable humans who have ever lived -- are being routinely dismissed as racists.
    Gandhi was quite racist, however

    We have two choices, either we accept that humans are made from crooked timber, and everyone has major but tolerable flaws, including sexism and racism (especially as perceived by different eras), OR we demand moral purity - by our standards - from every human with any kind of fame. or even without, and so we end up cancelling everyone

    Of course the first choice is the sane option, but I fear we must go through several iterations of the insane alternative, until we wise up. Sanity will only prevail when the cancellers start getting viciously cancelled themselves - as they will. Cf Robespierre
    Indeed, the revolution eating itself.

    I believe that the statue topplers actually targeted a monument to Gandhi in Leicester for destruction but were told by the locals to take a running jump, so there is still a glimmer of hope.
  • LeonLeon Posts: 55,748
    Why is Gareth Southgate such a useless twat?
  • Very o/t but, as my wife and son dislike butter I have taken to baking cakes for them with fat free Greek yogurt instead. It is surprisingly good.

    Sounds dangerously woke
    Cancel me.
  • FrancisUrquhartFrancisUrquhart Posts: 82,271
    Leon said:

    kle4 said:

    Oxford Student Union is planning to hire 'sensitivity readers' to stop student newspapers including historic campus sheet Cherwell publishing 'problematic' articles that are 'implicitly racist or sexist'.

    Officials at the student body are planning to set up a 'Student Consultancy of Sensitivity Readers' who would be elected and paid to check articles across various newspapers for signs of supposed insensitivity.

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9707701/Oxford-students-employ-sensitivity-readers-CUT-problematic-articles-newspaper.html

    I feel like wanting to be sensitive is technically a reasonable aim, but you don't want it to be your starting point, as you are likely to overdo it and be far too oversensitive.
    https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2021/jun/21/we-didnt-want-it-named-after-a-person-how-residents-of-cecil-rhodes-house-feel-about-its-new-name

    Total minefield....going to just have to name everything A1, A2, A3...
    From the Guardian article, " ......Virginia Woolf, whose writing has been criticised as racist and antisemitic”

    My distinct recollection is that Virginia's husband, Leonard Woolf, was Jewish.

    I suspect the whole of the Bloomsbury Group is going to end up cancelled at this rate
    Virtually everyone who's ever been famous for anything will eventually end up being cancelled, or at any rate some group or another will claim to be offended and try. It's just the way things are going. The more tolerant and inclusive society becomes, the less tolerant and inclusive the belligerent axe grinders claim it to be - and then set out to try to make things worse again.
    Doesn't take long to go from widely heralded by the likes of NYT and bestselling author to cancelled...5 years....for one passage in a semi-autobiographical book, that was clearly hyperbolic version of reality.

    https://www.vox.com/recode/2021/5/13/22435266/apple-employees-petition-controversial-antonio-garcia-martinez-new-hire-departure

    In the future, everyone will be famously cancelled for fifteen minutes of nothing
    8 complaints....cancelled.

    Jess de Wahls: Artist wants apology from Royal Academy over transphobia row

    https://www.bbc.com/news/entertainment-arts-57552016
  • gealbhangealbhan Posts: 2,362
    When I grow up I want to be famous so I can be cancelled.
  • noneoftheabovenoneoftheabove Posts: 22,945

    Charles said:

    Cookie said:

    rcs1000 said:

    Andy_JS said:

    ping said:

    That labour poster is depressing.

    Will we ever build enough homes so that our young people can grow up and have, like, families?

    The country is committing a slow suicide.

    F£&k the nimbys.

    In my local area a huge amount of housebuilding has been taking place recently, and yet house prices still continue to rise. This is what happens when the population of the country increases by 10 million in 20 years, whereas in the 1970s and 80s it hardly increased at all. That's why people could afford to buy homes at that time.
    That being said, house prices rose a lot more in the 80s and 90s than they have done in the 2000s. So immigration clearly can't be the only (or even the dominant) factor.
    But inflation was much bigger back then. So, I think, price rises relative to earnings have been bigger this century.
    I don't have the data and am happy to be contradicted.
    Big rise in multiples was about 95-07

    https://www.schroders.com/en/uk/private-investor/insights/markets/what-174-years-of-data-tell-us-about-house-price-affordability-in-the-uk/
    When population growth really took off, but before housing construction growth did.

    What a strange coincidence. Or not.
    More likely the substantial fall in interest rates that started in about '93 and was really established by '95. If mortgage rates fall from 10-15% to 5-7%, you would expect prices to go up to absorb the savings.

    Brilliant double bubble if you bought prior to about 1993- massive capital growth on your leveraged assets and lower repayments to boot.
    Just don't ask where all that free money came from. Or what happens if interest rates need to rise, even a little bit, from here.
    Except if that was the case then the fall in rates from 5% to 0% should have seen an even bigger ratchet in the multiple, but that didn't happen.

    The problem with thinking that interest rates are a key determinant is that many people buy homes for cash, especially buy-to-let most are bought for cash, so interest rates affect mortgage purchasers but not cash purchasers.

    Instead the ratio rise occured when demand spiked and supply didn't keep up. Since then demand and supply have risen in tandem which has kept the multiple stable. If supply goes up more than demand then the ratio will go back down, which is what many NIMBYs are worried about.
    Interest rates don't impact cash purchasers valuations of property?

    Quite interesting that they would value a house the same regardless of whether they can get 5% or 1% from cash savings, which are heavily correlated with interest rates.

    There was me thinking a typical cash buyer valuation would be based on getting a yield that reflected a premium to cash, plus something for the added costs of holding property vs cash, less something for potential capital appreciation.
  • FrancisUrquhartFrancisUrquhart Posts: 82,271
    gealbhan said:

    When I grow up I want to be famous so I can be cancelled.

    I am happy to never be famous.
  • rottenboroughrottenborough Posts: 62,885

    Very o/t but, as my wife and son dislike butter I have taken to baking cakes for them with fat free Greek yogurt instead. It is surprisingly good.

    Sounds dangerously woke
    Nah. Greeks had slaves. They've been cancelled. Plato is banned in many universities as it triggers the undergrads.
  • Andy_JSAndy_JS Posts: 32,692
    Leon said:

    kle4 said:

    Oxford Student Union is planning to hire 'sensitivity readers' to stop student newspapers including historic campus sheet Cherwell publishing 'problematic' articles that are 'implicitly racist or sexist'.

    Officials at the student body are planning to set up a 'Student Consultancy of Sensitivity Readers' who would be elected and paid to check articles across various newspapers for signs of supposed insensitivity.

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9707701/Oxford-students-employ-sensitivity-readers-CUT-problematic-articles-newspaper.html

    I feel like wanting to be sensitive is technically a reasonable aim, but you don't want it to be your starting point, as you are likely to overdo it and be far too oversensitive.
    https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2021/jun/21/we-didnt-want-it-named-after-a-person-how-residents-of-cecil-rhodes-house-feel-about-its-new-name

    Total minefield....going to just have to name everything A1, A2, A3...
    From the Guardian article, " ......Virginia Woolf, whose writing has been criticised as racist and antisemitic”

    My distinct recollection is that Virginia's husband, Leonard Woolf, was Jewish.

    I suspect the whole of the Bloomsbury Group is going to end up cancelled at this rate
    Virtually everyone who's ever been famous for anything will eventually end up being cancelled, or at any rate some group or another will claim to be offended and try. It's just the way things are going. The more tolerant and inclusive society becomes, the less tolerant and inclusive the belligerent axe grinders claim it to be - and then set out to try to make things worse again.
    Well, we are already at the stage where Einstein & Gandhi -- two of the most admirable humans who have ever lived -- are being routinely dismissed as racists.
    Gandhi was quite racist, however

    We have two choices, either we accept that humans are made from crooked timber, and everyone has major but tolerable flaws, including sexism and racism (especially as perceived by different eras), OR we demand moral purity - by our standards - from every human with any kind of fame. or even without, and so we end up cancelling everyone

    Of course the first choice is the sane option, but I fear we must go through several iterations of the insane alternative, until we wise up. Sanity will only prevail when the cancellers start getting viciously cancelled themselves - as they will. Cf Robespierre
    Demanding moral purity is ridiculous.
  • LeonLeon Posts: 55,748

    Leon said:

    kle4 said:

    Oxford Student Union is planning to hire 'sensitivity readers' to stop student newspapers including historic campus sheet Cherwell publishing 'problematic' articles that are 'implicitly racist or sexist'.

    Officials at the student body are planning to set up a 'Student Consultancy of Sensitivity Readers' who would be elected and paid to check articles across various newspapers for signs of supposed insensitivity.

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9707701/Oxford-students-employ-sensitivity-readers-CUT-problematic-articles-newspaper.html

    I feel like wanting to be sensitive is technically a reasonable aim, but you don't want it to be your starting point, as you are likely to overdo it and be far too oversensitive.
    https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2021/jun/21/we-didnt-want-it-named-after-a-person-how-residents-of-cecil-rhodes-house-feel-about-its-new-name

    Total minefield....going to just have to name everything A1, A2, A3...
    From the Guardian article, " ......Virginia Woolf, whose writing has been criticised as racist and antisemitic”

    My distinct recollection is that Virginia's husband, Leonard Woolf, was Jewish.

    I suspect the whole of the Bloomsbury Group is going to end up cancelled at this rate
    Virtually everyone who's ever been famous for anything will eventually end up being cancelled, or at any rate some group or another will claim to be offended and try. It's just the way things are going. The more tolerant and inclusive society becomes, the less tolerant and inclusive the belligerent axe grinders claim it to be - and then set out to try to make things worse again.
    Doesn't take long to go from widely heralded by the likes of NYT and bestselling author to cancelled...5 years....for one passage in a semi-autobiographical book, that was clearly hyperbolic version of reality.

    https://www.vox.com/recode/2021/5/13/22435266/apple-employees-petition-controversial-antonio-garcia-martinez-new-hire-departure

    In the future, everyone will be famously cancelled for fifteen minutes of nothing
    8 complaints....cancelled.

    Jess de Wahls: Artist wants apology from Royal Academy over transphobia row

    https://www.bbc.com/news/entertainment-arts-57552016
    Cancelled for believing there are.... two biological genders. FFS

    These cancelled folk need to start taking institutions - like the RA or the BBC or whatever - to court, where they must sue them for trillions. And win. Any jury would find for the sensible types

    Wokeness is a rotting disease, and it must be cut away, like gangrene
  • MaxPBMaxPB Posts: 38,883

    Very o/t but, as my wife and son dislike butter I have taken to baking cakes for them with fat free Greek yogurt instead. It is surprisingly good.

    Try it with the full fat stuff!
  • Black_RookBlack_Rook Posts: 8,905
    Andy_JS said:

    Leon said:

    kle4 said:

    Oxford Student Union is planning to hire 'sensitivity readers' to stop student newspapers including historic campus sheet Cherwell publishing 'problematic' articles that are 'implicitly racist or sexist'.

    Officials at the student body are planning to set up a 'Student Consultancy of Sensitivity Readers' who would be elected and paid to check articles across various newspapers for signs of supposed insensitivity.

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9707701/Oxford-students-employ-sensitivity-readers-CUT-problematic-articles-newspaper.html

    I feel like wanting to be sensitive is technically a reasonable aim, but you don't want it to be your starting point, as you are likely to overdo it and be far too oversensitive.
    https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2021/jun/21/we-didnt-want-it-named-after-a-person-how-residents-of-cecil-rhodes-house-feel-about-its-new-name

    Total minefield....going to just have to name everything A1, A2, A3...
    From the Guardian article, " ......Virginia Woolf, whose writing has been criticised as racist and antisemitic”

    My distinct recollection is that Virginia's husband, Leonard Woolf, was Jewish.

    I suspect the whole of the Bloomsbury Group is going to end up cancelled at this rate
    Virtually everyone who's ever been famous for anything will eventually end up being cancelled, or at any rate some group or another will claim to be offended and try. It's just the way things are going. The more tolerant and inclusive society becomes, the less tolerant and inclusive the belligerent axe grinders claim it to be - and then set out to try to make things worse again.
    Well, we are already at the stage where Einstein & Gandhi -- two of the most admirable humans who have ever lived -- are being routinely dismissed as racists.
    Gandhi was quite racist, however

    We have two choices, either we accept that humans are made from crooked timber, and everyone has major but tolerable flaws, including sexism and racism (especially as perceived by different eras), OR we demand moral purity - by our standards - from every human with any kind of fame. or even without, and so we end up cancelling everyone

    Of course the first choice is the sane option, but I fear we must go through several iterations of the insane alternative, until we wise up. Sanity will only prevail when the cancellers start getting viciously cancelled themselves - as they will. Cf Robespierre
    Demanding moral purity is ridiculous.
    But it happens nonetheless and will continue to do so.
  • gealbhangealbhan Posts: 2,362
    Leon said:

    Why is Gareth Southgate such a useless twat?

    Because he is not.

    Two solid performances. Unbeaten in yonks. Got shape and tactics spot on first game, Rice screen and Phillips very advanced ball winner was inspired. Slightly wrong formation in second match he didn’t change, the front three allowed Scotland too much press and pass in midfield area and too much territory.

    He is chip off the old Alf, most tournament winners don’t entertain, least not till late stages, just got to be hard to beat to get through rounds.

    It’s actually the football media and England fans who are clueless twats.
  • rottenboroughrottenborough Posts: 62,885
    As every day passes the modelling that extended lockdown into mid July looks more and more woeful.

    How angry must backbench Tories be looking at the numbers?
  • alex_alex_ Posts: 7,518
    Leon said:

    Leon said:

    kle4 said:

    Oxford Student Union is planning to hire 'sensitivity readers' to stop student newspapers including historic campus sheet Cherwell publishing 'problematic' articles that are 'implicitly racist or sexist'.

    Officials at the student body are planning to set up a 'Student Consultancy of Sensitivity Readers' who would be elected and paid to check articles across various newspapers for signs of supposed insensitivity.

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9707701/Oxford-students-employ-sensitivity-readers-CUT-problematic-articles-newspaper.html

    I feel like wanting to be sensitive is technically a reasonable aim, but you don't want it to be your starting point, as you are likely to overdo it and be far too oversensitive.
    https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2021/jun/21/we-didnt-want-it-named-after-a-person-how-residents-of-cecil-rhodes-house-feel-about-its-new-name

    Total minefield....going to just have to name everything A1, A2, A3...
    From the Guardian article, " ......Virginia Woolf, whose writing has been criticised as racist and antisemitic”

    My distinct recollection is that Virginia's husband, Leonard Woolf, was Jewish.

    I suspect the whole of the Bloomsbury Group is going to end up cancelled at this rate
    Virtually everyone who's ever been famous for anything will eventually end up being cancelled, or at any rate some group or another will claim to be offended and try. It's just the way things are going. The more tolerant and inclusive society becomes, the less tolerant and inclusive the belligerent axe grinders claim it to be - and then set out to try to make things worse again.
    Doesn't take long to go from widely heralded by the likes of NYT and bestselling author to cancelled...5 years....for one passage in a semi-autobiographical book, that was clearly hyperbolic version of reality.

    https://www.vox.com/recode/2021/5/13/22435266/apple-employees-petition-controversial-antonio-garcia-martinez-new-hire-departure

    In the future, everyone will be famously cancelled for fifteen minutes of nothing
    8 complaints....cancelled.

    Jess de Wahls: Artist wants apology from Royal Academy over transphobia row

    https://www.bbc.com/news/entertainment-arts-57552016
    Cancelled for believing there are.... two biological genders. FFS

    These cancelled folk need to start taking institutions - like the RA or the BBC or whatever - to court, where they must sue them for trillions. And win. Any jury would find for the sensible types

    Wokeness is a rotting disease, and it must be cut away, like gangrene
    I really do wonder how they teach sex education and the facts of life in schools these days.

    "If you are a boy, you will go through these changes. If you are a girl you will go through these changes. If you are a boy who identifies as a girl you will go through the same changes as a boy anyway... etc".

    Perhaps it would be best to stick to the birds and the bees.

    And whilst the above is intended to be a bit satirical, i really do wonder. There's a hell of a lot that goes on in schools these days that people only have a vague awareness of. It was interesting some of the anecdotal stories of parents expressing astonishment about some of the things that their kids were learning when they were all at home during the first lockdown (of course that was mostly weird things in English grammar etc - double negative adjunctives or whatever)
  • LeonLeon Posts: 55,748
    gealbhan said:

    Leon said:

    Why is Gareth Southgate such a useless twat?

    Because he is not.

    Two solid performances. Unbeaten in yonks. Got shape and tactics spot on first game, Rice screen and Phillips very advanced ball winner was inspired. Slightly wrong formation in second match he didn’t change, the front three allowed Scotland too much press and pass in midfield area and too much territory.

    He is chip off the old Alf, most tournament winners don’t entertain, least not till late stages, just got to be hard to beat to get through rounds.

    It’s actually the football media and England fans who are clueless twats.
    A fair defence

    I still believe he is a useless twat. Another in a long line of mediocre but worthy England managers, earnest and well meaning, but lacking that vital spark or great tactical insight. However Southgate is worse than most, because, Like Erikson, he actually has a lot of talent at his disposal, and he is wasting it

    I would love if I were proven wrong. Love it
  • BromBrom Posts: 3,760
    gealbhan said:

    Leon said:

    Why is Gareth Southgate such a useless twat?

    Because he is not.

    Two solid performances. Unbeaten in yonks. Got shape and tactics spot on first game, Rice screen and Phillips very advanced ball winner was inspired. Slightly wrong formation in second match he didn’t change, the front three allowed Scotland too much press and pass in midfield area and too much territory.

    He is chip off the old Alf, most tournament winners don’t entertain, least not till late stages, just got to be hard to beat to get through rounds.

    It’s actually the football media and England fans who are clueless twats.
    We lost back to back matches in October/November, in fact we also lost a qualifier to the Czechs in September. Our form and performances have been poor since 2019 I’m afraid and the Scotland game was considerably below ‘solid’. Derby aside if you can’t outplay a smaller football nation at home then you’re not in a good place.

    Worth remembering the Czechs best Scotland away from home.

  • TomsToms Posts: 2,478

    Very o/t but, as my wife and son dislike butter I have taken to baking cakes for them with fat free Greek yogurt instead. It is surprisingly good.

    Sounds good.
    I only like butter on my (very) soft-boiled eggs. Of those I reckon to have eaten at least 45,000 so far.
  • OnlyLivingBoyOnlyLivingBoy Posts: 15,819
    Leon said:

    kle4 said:

    Oxford Student Union is planning to hire 'sensitivity readers' to stop student newspapers including historic campus sheet Cherwell publishing 'problematic' articles that are 'implicitly racist or sexist'.

    Officials at the student body are planning to set up a 'Student Consultancy of Sensitivity Readers' who would be elected and paid to check articles across various newspapers for signs of supposed insensitivity.

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9707701/Oxford-students-employ-sensitivity-readers-CUT-problematic-articles-newspaper.html

    I feel like wanting to be sensitive is technically a reasonable aim, but you don't want it to be your starting point, as you are likely to overdo it and be far too oversensitive.
    https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2021/jun/21/we-didnt-want-it-named-after-a-person-how-residents-of-cecil-rhodes-house-feel-about-its-new-name

    Total minefield....going to just have to name everything A1, A2, A3...
    From the Guardian article, " ......Virginia Woolf, whose writing has been criticised as racist and antisemitic”

    My distinct recollection is that Virginia's husband, Leonard Woolf, was Jewish.

    I suspect the whole of the Bloomsbury Group is going to end up cancelled at this rate
    Virtually everyone who's ever been famous for anything will eventually end up being cancelled, or at any rate some group or another will claim to be offended and try. It's just the way things are going. The more tolerant and inclusive society becomes, the less tolerant and inclusive the belligerent axe grinders claim it to be - and then set out to try to make things worse again.
    Well, we are already at the stage where Einstein & Gandhi -- two of the most admirable humans who have ever lived -- are being routinely dismissed as racists.
    Gandhi was quite racist, however

    We have two choices, either we accept that humans are made from crooked timber, and everyone has major but tolerable flaws, including sexism and racism (especially as perceived by different eras), OR we demand moral purity - by our standards - from every human with any kind of fame. or even without, and so we end up cancelling everyone

    Of course the first choice is the sane option, but I fear we must go through several iterations of the insane alternative, until we wise up. Sanity will only prevail when the cancellers start getting viciously cancelled themselves - as they will. Cf Robespierre
    Or we have an honest debate, stop honouring the real scumbags, and move on.
  • GardenwalkerGardenwalker Posts: 21,298
    edited June 2021
    Housing analysts agree that it very much short-term fluctuation in demand that influence house prices; with supply only influencing in the long run, and not much either as demand is quite inelastic.

    Like Murder on the Orient Express, everything is “to blame” for current house prices but based on what I’ve read the rough order of culprits is something like the following:

    1. Repressed interest rates
    2. Increased demand (more household formation)
    3. Increased demand (immigration)
    4. Increased demand (property as asset class)
    5. Supply side: lack of public housing
    6. Supply side: planning complexity
    7. Increased demand (buy to let)

    Prices ex South England are actually roughly at historic averages of price:earnings.

    They would be probably be at historic lows if it wasn’t for (1) and (2).

    Prices in South and especially London have all 7 factors in play.

    The best thing we could probably do to bring down to prices is to increase public housing in the South, along with further measures to discourage holding property as an asset versus as a home, and planning reforms to bring down the cost of land.
  • LeonLeon Posts: 55,748

    Leon said:

    kle4 said:

    Oxford Student Union is planning to hire 'sensitivity readers' to stop student newspapers including historic campus sheet Cherwell publishing 'problematic' articles that are 'implicitly racist or sexist'.

    Officials at the student body are planning to set up a 'Student Consultancy of Sensitivity Readers' who would be elected and paid to check articles across various newspapers for signs of supposed insensitivity.

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9707701/Oxford-students-employ-sensitivity-readers-CUT-problematic-articles-newspaper.html

    I feel like wanting to be sensitive is technically a reasonable aim, but you don't want it to be your starting point, as you are likely to overdo it and be far too oversensitive.
    https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2021/jun/21/we-didnt-want-it-named-after-a-person-how-residents-of-cecil-rhodes-house-feel-about-its-new-name

    Total minefield....going to just have to name everything A1, A2, A3...
    From the Guardian article, " ......Virginia Woolf, whose writing has been criticised as racist and antisemitic”

    My distinct recollection is that Virginia's husband, Leonard Woolf, was Jewish.

    I suspect the whole of the Bloomsbury Group is going to end up cancelled at this rate
    Virtually everyone who's ever been famous for anything will eventually end up being cancelled, or at any rate some group or another will claim to be offended and try. It's just the way things are going. The more tolerant and inclusive society becomes, the less tolerant and inclusive the belligerent axe grinders claim it to be - and then set out to try to make things worse again.
    Well, we are already at the stage where Einstein & Gandhi -- two of the most admirable humans who have ever lived -- are being routinely dismissed as racists.
    Gandhi was quite racist, however

    We have two choices, either we accept that humans are made from crooked timber, and everyone has major but tolerable flaws, including sexism and racism (especially as perceived by different eras), OR we demand moral purity - by our standards - from every human with any kind of fame. or even without, and so we end up cancelling everyone

    Of course the first choice is the sane option, but I fear we must go through several iterations of the insane alternative, until we wise up. Sanity will only prevail when the cancellers start getting viciously cancelled themselves - as they will. Cf Robespierre
    Or we have an honest debate, stop honouring the real scumbags, and move on.
    So, Gandhi (racist)? Churchill (racist)? Lincoln (racist)? Martin Luther King (rapist)? Darwin (racist)? Who else?

    It isn't that easy, and you are dangerously naive
  • rpjsrpjs Posts: 3,787

    Leon said:

    kle4 said:

    Oxford Student Union is planning to hire 'sensitivity readers' to stop student newspapers including historic campus sheet Cherwell publishing 'problematic' articles that are 'implicitly racist or sexist'.

    Officials at the student body are planning to set up a 'Student Consultancy of Sensitivity Readers' who would be elected and paid to check articles across various newspapers for signs of supposed insensitivity.

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9707701/Oxford-students-employ-sensitivity-readers-CUT-problematic-articles-newspaper.html

    I feel like wanting to be sensitive is technically a reasonable aim, but you don't want it to be your starting point, as you are likely to overdo it and be far too oversensitive.
    https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2021/jun/21/we-didnt-want-it-named-after-a-person-how-residents-of-cecil-rhodes-house-feel-about-its-new-name

    Total minefield....going to just have to name everything A1, A2, A3...
    From the Guardian article, " ......Virginia Woolf, whose writing has been criticised as racist and antisemitic”

    My distinct recollection is that Virginia's husband, Leonard Woolf, was Jewish.

    I suspect the whole of the Bloomsbury Group is going to end up cancelled at this rate
    Virtually everyone who's ever been famous for anything will eventually end up being cancelled, or at any rate some group or another will claim to be offended and try. It's just the way things are going. The more tolerant and inclusive society becomes, the less tolerant and inclusive the belligerent axe grinders claim it to be - and then set out to try to make things worse again.
    Well, we are already at the stage where Einstein & Gandhi -- two of the most admirable humans who have ever lived -- are being routinely dismissed as racists.
    Gandhi was quite racist, however

    We have two choices, either we accept that humans are made from crooked timber, and everyone has major but tolerable flaws, including sexism and racism (especially as perceived by different eras), OR we demand moral purity - by our standards - from every human with any kind of fame. or even without, and so we end up cancelling everyone

    Of course the first choice is the sane option, but I fear we must go through several iterations of the insane alternative, until we wise up. Sanity will only prevail when the cancellers start getting viciously cancelled themselves - as they will. Cf Robespierre
    Or we have an honest debate, stop honouring the real scumbags, and move on.
    Great in principle, but how to get agreement as to who the "real scumbags" are?
  • gealbhangealbhan Posts: 2,362
    Brom said:

    gealbhan said:

    Leon said:

    Why is Gareth Southgate such a useless twat?

    Because he is not.

    Two solid performances. Unbeaten in yonks. Got shape and tactics spot on first game, Rice screen and Phillips very advanced ball winner was inspired. Slightly wrong formation in second match he didn’t change, the front three allowed Scotland too much press and pass in midfield area and too much territory.

    He is chip off the old Alf, most tournament winners don’t entertain, least not till late stages, just got to be hard to beat to get through rounds.

    It’s actually the football media and England fans who are clueless twats.
    We lost back to back matches in October/November, in fact we also lost a qualifier to the Czechs in September. Our form and performances have been poor since 2019 I’m afraid and the Scotland game was considerably below ‘solid’. Derby aside if you can’t outplay a smaller football nation at home then you’re not in a good place.

    Worth remembering the Czechs best Scotland away from home.

    Scotland raised their game on the day, our performance only below par on paper not on the field, the players expended the energy and got closed too quickly to show the talent, very good point from hard fought game for both sides. The front four didn’t spend enough time deeper to help the midfield and this wasn’t addressed by the England bench, is something that could have made the difference, matching them up better in the midfield, any of the front three could have gone off earlier for a pressing ball winning midfielder. That was the right thing to do for a better performance, but how the media and fans would have howled!
  • rottenboroughrottenborough Posts: 62,885
    edited June 2021
    gealbhan said:

    When I grow up I want to be famous so I can be cancelled.

    They will come for the famous first. But before long the reeducation committee will be knocking on your door.
  • Housing analysts agree that it very much short-term fluctuation in demand that influence house prices; with supply only influencing in the long run, and not much either as demand is quite inelastic.

    Like Murder on the Orient Express, everything is “to blame” for current house prices but based on what I’ve read the rough order of culprits is something like the following:

    1. Repressed interest rates
    2. Increased demand (more household formation)
    3. Increased demand (immigration)
    4. Increased demand (property as asset class)
    5. Supply side: lack of public housing
    6. Supply side: planning complexity
    7. Increased demand (buy to let)

    Prices ex South England are actually roughly at historic averages of price:earnings.

    They would be probably be at historic lows if it wasn’t for (1) and (2).

    Prices in South and especially London have all 7 factors in play.

    The best thing we could probably do to bring down to prices is to increase public housing in the South, along with further measures to discourage holding property as an asset versus as a home, and planning reforms to bring down the cost of land.

    A couple of new towns in the london periphery may do the trick for now. Built by the government.
  • TheValiantTheValiant Posts: 1,878
    Back to being
    Brom said:

    gealbhan said:

    Leon said:

    Why is Gareth Southgate such a useless twat?

    Because he is not.

    Two solid performances. Unbeaten in yonks. Got shape and tactics spot on first game, Rice screen and Phillips very advanced ball winner was inspired. Slightly wrong formation in second match he didn’t change, the front three allowed Scotland too much press and pass in midfield area and too much territory.

    He is chip off the old Alf, most tournament winners don’t entertain, least not till late stages, just got to be hard to beat to get through rounds.

    It’s actually the football media and England fans who are clueless twats.
    We lost back to back matches in October/November, in fact we also lost a qualifier to the Czechs in September. Our form and performances have been poor since 2019 I’m afraid and the Scotland game was considerably below ‘solid’. Derby aside if you can’t outplay a smaller football nation at home then you’re not in a good place.

    Worth remembering the Czechs best Scotland away from home.

    England were good (relatively - by the standards of the day) from about 1964 to 1970, 1986 to 1990 and 1996.
    We were unlucky in both 1990 and 1996 not to have progressed further.
    2018 was a fluke. Goodness knows how we go to the semi-final of the World Cup. A huge amount of luck really. We lost to every decent team we came up against.
    England aren't going to win this Euros. We probably won't even progress past the round of 16.

    I'd love to be proved wrong.
  • gealbhangealbhan Posts: 2,362

    gealbhan said:

    When I grow up I want to be famous so I can be cancelled.

    They will come for the famous first. But before long the reeducation committee will be knocking on your door.
    Will I have to throw my manuscript on the fire before letting them in?
  • DecrepiterJohnLDecrepiterJohnL Posts: 28,058

    Leon said:

    kle4 said:

    Oxford Student Union is planning to hire 'sensitivity readers' to stop student newspapers including historic campus sheet Cherwell publishing 'problematic' articles that are 'implicitly racist or sexist'.

    Officials at the student body are planning to set up a 'Student Consultancy of Sensitivity Readers' who would be elected and paid to check articles across various newspapers for signs of supposed insensitivity.

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9707701/Oxford-students-employ-sensitivity-readers-CUT-problematic-articles-newspaper.html

    I feel like wanting to be sensitive is technically a reasonable aim, but you don't want it to be your starting point, as you are likely to overdo it and be far too oversensitive.
    https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2021/jun/21/we-didnt-want-it-named-after-a-person-how-residents-of-cecil-rhodes-house-feel-about-its-new-name

    Total minefield....going to just have to name everything A1, A2, A3...
    From the Guardian article, " ......Virginia Woolf, whose writing has been criticised as racist and antisemitic”

    My distinct recollection is that Virginia's husband, Leonard Woolf, was Jewish.

    I suspect the whole of the Bloomsbury Group is going to end up cancelled at this rate
    Virtually everyone who's ever been famous for anything will eventually end up being cancelled, or at any rate some group or another will claim to be offended and try. It's just the way things are going. The more tolerant and inclusive society becomes, the less tolerant and inclusive the belligerent axe grinders claim it to be - and then set out to try to make things worse again.
    Well, we are already at the stage where Einstein & Gandhi -- two of the most admirable humans who have ever lived -- are being routinely dismissed as racists.
    Gandhi was quite racist, however

    We have two choices, either we accept that humans are made from crooked timber, and everyone has major but tolerable flaws, including sexism and racism (especially as perceived by different eras), OR we demand moral purity - by our standards - from every human with any kind of fame. or even without, and so we end up cancelling everyone

    Of course the first choice is the sane option, but I fear we must go through several iterations of the insane alternative, until we wise up. Sanity will only prevail when the cancellers start getting viciously cancelled themselves - as they will. Cf Robespierre
    Or we have an honest debate, stop honouring the real scumbags, and move on.
    Or we could stop pandering to upper middle class student activists scoring notches on their CVs and do something that would actually help victims or the less advantaged.
  • BromBrom Posts: 3,760
    gealbhan said:

    Brom said:

    gealbhan said:

    Leon said:

    Why is Gareth Southgate such a useless twat?

    Because he is not.

    Two solid performances. Unbeaten in yonks. Got shape and tactics spot on first game, Rice screen and Phillips very advanced ball winner was inspired. Slightly wrong formation in second match he didn’t change, the front three allowed Scotland too much press and pass in midfield area and too much territory.

    He is chip off the old Alf, most tournament winners don’t entertain, least not till late stages, just got to be hard to beat to get through rounds.

    It’s actually the football media and England fans who are clueless twats.
    We lost back to back matches in October/November, in fact we also lost a qualifier to the Czechs in September. Our form and performances have been poor since 2019 I’m afraid and the Scotland game was considerably below ‘solid’. Derby aside if you can’t outplay a smaller football nation at home then you’re not in a good place.

    Worth remembering the Czechs best Scotland away from home.

    Scotland raised their game on the day, our performance only below par on paper not on the field, the players expended the energy and got closed too quickly to show the talent, very good point from hard fought game for both sides. The front four didn’t spend enough time deeper to help the midfield and this wasn’t addressed by the England bench, is something that could have made the difference, matching them up better in the midfield, any of the front three could have gone off earlier for a pressing ball winning midfielder. That was the right thing to do for a better performance, but how the media and fans would have howled!
    Team selection was poor, Southgate proved inflexible when it came to formation changes. We had maybe 2 shots on goal in 90 minutes and tempo was off.

    I do believe there are problems behind the scenes. Hopefully we can put things right tomorrow though I’m not really looking forward to going, I might join in the boos this time if we fail to deliver.
  • gealbhan said:

    gealbhan said:

    When I grow up I want to be famous so I can be cancelled.

    They will come for the famous first. But before long the reeducation committee will be knocking on your door.
    Will I have to throw my manuscript on the fire before letting them in?
    Letting them in? You are being optimistic
  • pingping Posts: 3,805
    Bollox to VAR
  • BromBrom Posts: 3,760
    Important 30 seconds in both matches there!
  • BenpointerBenpointer Posts: 34,756

    Housing analysts agree that it very much short-term fluctuation in demand that influence house prices; with supply only influencing in the long run, and not much either as demand is quite inelastic.

    Like Murder on the Orient Express, everything is “to blame” for current house prices but based on what I’ve read the rough order of culprits is something like the following:

    1. Repressed interest rates
    2. Increased demand (more household formation)
    3. Increased demand (immigration)
    4. Increased demand (property as asset class)
    5. Supply side: lack of public housing
    6. Supply side: planning complexity
    7. Increased demand (buy to let)

    Prices ex South England are actually roughly at historic averages of price:earnings.

    They would be probably be at historic lows if it wasn’t for (1) and (2).

    Prices in South and especially London have all 7 factors in play.

    The best thing we could probably do to bring down to prices is to increase public housing in the South, along with further measures to discourage holding property as an asset versus as a home, and planning reforms to bring down the cost of land.

    I can't escape the thought that the Housing Benefit system pushes up housing costs. In effect it's a sunsidy to landlords.

    There has to be a better way - I'm just not sure what it is.
  • LeonLeon Posts: 55,748
    Denmark are going out
  • FrancisUrquhartFrancisUrquhart Posts: 82,271
    ping said:

    Bollox to VAR

    Is that the Lib Dems new slogan? I can see it being very popular.
  • DecrepiterJohnLDecrepiterJohnL Posts: 28,058

    Housing analysts agree that it very much short-term fluctuation in demand that influence house prices; with supply only influencing in the long run, and not much either as demand is quite inelastic.

    Like Murder on the Orient Express, everything is “to blame” for current house prices but based on what I’ve read the rough order of culprits is something like the following:

    1. Repressed interest rates
    2. Increased demand (more household formation)
    3. Increased demand (immigration)
    4. Increased demand (property as asset class)
    5. Supply side: lack of public housing
    6. Supply side: planning complexity
    7. Increased demand (buy to let)

    Prices ex South England are actually roughly at historic averages of price:earnings.

    They would be probably be at historic lows if it wasn’t for (1) and (2).

    Prices in South and especially London have all 7 factors in play.

    The best thing we could probably do to bring down to prices is to increase public housing in the South, along with further measures to discourage holding property as an asset versus as a home, and planning reforms to bring down the cost of land.

    A subset of item 4 is demand from overseas as bolthole investments from foreign squillionaires.

    Part of the solution is to encourage people to move north or to other disadvantaged regions, as part of the levelling up agenda. Just moving people into these towns will generate economic activity, as will building or refurbishing homes. That's before adding usual development incentives. We can't just funnel more and more people and money into London and its commuter belt. It's bad for London and it's bad for the rest of the country.
  • GardenwalkerGardenwalker Posts: 21,298
    edited June 2021

    Housing analysts agree that it very much short-term fluctuation in demand that influence house prices; with supply only influencing in the long run, and not much either as demand is quite inelastic.

    Like Murder on the Orient Express, everything is “to blame” for current house prices but based on what I’ve read the rough order of culprits is something like the following:

    1. Repressed interest rates
    2. Increased demand (more household formation)
    3. Increased demand (immigration)
    4. Increased demand (property as asset class)
    5. Supply side: lack of public housing
    6. Supply side: planning complexity
    7. Increased demand (buy to let)

    Prices ex South England are actually roughly at historic averages of price:earnings.

    They would be probably be at historic lows if it wasn’t for (1) and (2).

    Prices in South and especially London have all 7 factors in play.

    The best thing we could probably do to bring down to prices is to increase public housing in the South, along with further measures to discourage holding property as an asset versus as a home, and planning reforms to bring down the cost of land.

    I can't escape the thought that the Housing Benefit system pushes up housing costs. In effect it's a sunsidy to landlords.

    There has to be a better way - I'm just not sure what it is.
    There is; public housing.

    I know that is is associated with high-rise sink estates, but it doesn’t have to be.

    Our ideological aversion for the past 30 years has repressed supply, stopped many from getting onto some kind of ladder, and is effectively a subsidy to landlords.
  • BromBrom Posts: 3,760

    Back to being

    Brom said:

    gealbhan said:

    Leon said:

    Why is Gareth Southgate such a useless twat?

    Because he is not.

    Two solid performances. Unbeaten in yonks. Got shape and tactics spot on first game, Rice screen and Phillips very advanced ball winner was inspired. Slightly wrong formation in second match he didn’t change, the front three allowed Scotland too much press and pass in midfield area and too much territory.

    He is chip off the old Alf, most tournament winners don’t entertain, least not till late stages, just got to be hard to beat to get through rounds.

    It’s actually the football media and England fans who are clueless twats.
    We lost back to back matches in October/November, in fact we also lost a qualifier to the Czechs in September. Our form and performances have been poor since 2019 I’m afraid and the Scotland game was considerably below ‘solid’. Derby aside if you can’t outplay a smaller football nation at home then you’re not in a good place.

    Worth remembering the Czechs best Scotland away from home.

    England were good (relatively - by the standards of the day) from about 1964 to 1970, 1986 to 1990 and 1996.
    We were unlucky in both 1990 and 1996 not to have progressed further.
    2018 was a fluke. Goodness knows how we go to the semi-final of the World Cup. A huge amount of luck really. We lost to every decent team we came up against.
    England aren't going to win this Euros. We probably won't even progress past the round of 16.

    I'd love to be proved wrong.
    I agree we won’t get beyond the last 16, things don’t look or feel right and blind faith doesn’t beat better sides. I was not confident before Scotland and can’t stand the attitude of bellends like Rio Ferdinand who just assume we’ll win because we have better players. It’s been a while since we tore apart a decent side (I don’t include Iceland in November who are a shadow of the 2016 side).

    2018 however was not really a fluke, we played well and had a decent draw. Every match we won we deserved and every match we lost we deserved. It just so happened a lot of big nations did not have vintage sides.
  • TomsToms Posts: 2,478
    edited June 2021
    Racism is part of human history. We should maybe construct sections of museums, or even entire museums dedicated to racial justice/injustice. They would be good places to put egregious statues and suchlike.
    Tribalism is mankind's story. Social cooperation in the small is the root of the dominance of homo "sapiens", but disaster beckons if we cannot make it global.
  • AnExileinD4AnExileinD4 Posts: 337

    Leon said:

    kle4 said:

    Oxford Student Union is planning to hire 'sensitivity readers' to stop student newspapers including historic campus sheet Cherwell publishing 'problematic' articles that are 'implicitly racist or sexist'.

    Officials at the student body are planning to set up a 'Student Consultancy of Sensitivity Readers' who would be elected and paid to check articles across various newspapers for signs of supposed insensitivity.

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9707701/Oxford-students-employ-sensitivity-readers-CUT-problematic-articles-newspaper.html

    I feel like wanting to be sensitive is technically a reasonable aim, but you don't want it to be your starting point, as you are likely to overdo it and be far too oversensitive.
    https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2021/jun/21/we-didnt-want-it-named-after-a-person-how-residents-of-cecil-rhodes-house-feel-about-its-new-name

    Total minefield....going to just have to name everything A1, A2, A3...
    From the Guardian article, " ......Virginia Woolf, whose writing has been criticised as racist and antisemitic”

    My distinct recollection is that Virginia's husband, Leonard Woolf, was Jewish.

    I suspect the whole of the Bloomsbury Group is going to end up cancelled at this rate
    Virtually everyone who's ever been famous for anything will eventually end up being cancelled, or at any rate some group or another will claim to be offended and try. It's just the way things are going. The more tolerant and inclusive society becomes, the less tolerant and inclusive the belligerent axe grinders claim it to be - and then set out to try to make things worse again.
    Well, we are already at the stage where Einstein & Gandhi -- two of the most admirable humans who have ever lived -- are being routinely dismissed as racists.
    Gandhi was quite racist, however

    We have two choices, either we accept that humans are made from crooked timber, and everyone has major but tolerable flaws, including sexism and racism (especially as perceived by different eras), OR we demand moral purity - by our standards - from every human with any kind of fame. or even without, and so we end up cancelling everyone

    Of course the first choice is the sane option, but I fear we must go through several iterations of the insane alternative, until we wise up. Sanity will only prevail when the cancellers start getting viciously cancelled themselves - as they will. Cf Robespierre
    Or we have an honest debate, stop honouring the real scumbags, and move on.
    Who defines who “the real scumbags” are? The good people? Who chooses the good people or is it self-selection of the obviously good and right thinking?

    And down the rabbit hole we go.
  • BromBrom Posts: 3,760
    Leon said:

    Denmark are going out

    They got the favour they needed. Huge roar round the stadium
  • gealbhangealbhan Posts: 2,362

    Back to being

    Brom said:

    gealbhan said:

    Leon said:

    Why is Gareth Southgate such a useless twat?

    Because he is not.

    Two solid performances. Unbeaten in yonks. Got shape and tactics spot on first game, Rice screen and Phillips very advanced ball winner was inspired. Slightly wrong formation in second match he didn’t change, the front three allowed Scotland too much press and pass in midfield area and too much territory.

    He is chip off the old Alf, most tournament winners don’t entertain, least not till late stages, just got to be hard to beat to get through rounds.

    It’s actually the football media and England fans who are clueless twats.
    We lost back to back matches in October/November, in fact we also lost a qualifier to the Czechs in September. Our form and performances have been poor since 2019 I’m afraid and the Scotland game was considerably below ‘solid’. Derby aside if you can’t outplay a smaller football nation at home then you’re not in a good place.

    Worth remembering the Czechs best Scotland away from home.

    England were good (relatively - by the standards of the day) from about 1964 to 1970, 1986 to 1990 and 1996.
    We were unlucky in both 1990 and 1996 not to have progressed further.
    2018 was a fluke. Goodness knows how we go to the semi-final of the World Cup. A huge amount of luck really. We lost to every decent team we came up against.
    England aren't going to win this Euros. We probably won't even progress past the round of 16.

    I'd love to be proved wrong.
    Likely send luuuurv into retirement in r16, meet Spain in Rome, and easier semi, with Belgium and France in the other semi.

    Germany, Spain and Italians and Dutch all 50/50 winnable. Belgium France 40/60 Everyone else i’de make us favourites.

    Dutch not letting any Welsh in. Not because of Covid but to protect tulip supplies from leek blight.

    (Can I actually say that without being cancelled?)
  • OnlyLivingBoyOnlyLivingBoy Posts: 15,819
    Leon said:

    Leon said:

    kle4 said:

    Oxford Student Union is planning to hire 'sensitivity readers' to stop student newspapers including historic campus sheet Cherwell publishing 'problematic' articles that are 'implicitly racist or sexist'.

    Officials at the student body are planning to set up a 'Student Consultancy of Sensitivity Readers' who would be elected and paid to check articles across various newspapers for signs of supposed insensitivity.

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9707701/Oxford-students-employ-sensitivity-readers-CUT-problematic-articles-newspaper.html

    I feel like wanting to be sensitive is technically a reasonable aim, but you don't want it to be your starting point, as you are likely to overdo it and be far too oversensitive.
    https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2021/jun/21/we-didnt-want-it-named-after-a-person-how-residents-of-cecil-rhodes-house-feel-about-its-new-name

    Total minefield....going to just have to name everything A1, A2, A3...
    From the Guardian article, " ......Virginia Woolf, whose writing has been criticised as racist and antisemitic”

    My distinct recollection is that Virginia's husband, Leonard Woolf, was Jewish.

    I suspect the whole of the Bloomsbury Group is going to end up cancelled at this rate
    Virtually everyone who's ever been famous for anything will eventually end up being cancelled, or at any rate some group or another will claim to be offended and try. It's just the way things are going. The more tolerant and inclusive society becomes, the less tolerant and inclusive the belligerent axe grinders claim it to be - and then set out to try to make things worse again.
    Well, we are already at the stage where Einstein & Gandhi -- two of the most admirable humans who have ever lived -- are being routinely dismissed as racists.
    Gandhi was quite racist, however

    We have two choices, either we accept that humans are made from crooked timber, and everyone has major but tolerable flaws, including sexism and racism (especially as perceived by different eras), OR we demand moral purity - by our standards - from every human with any kind of fame. or even without, and so we end up cancelling everyone

    Of course the first choice is the sane option, but I fear we must go through several iterations of the insane alternative, until we wise up. Sanity will only prevail when the cancellers start getting viciously cancelled themselves - as they will. Cf Robespierre
    Or we have an honest debate, stop honouring the real scumbags, and move on.
    So, Gandhi (racist)? Churchill (racist)? Lincoln (racist)? Martin Luther King (rapist)? Darwin (racist)? Who else?

    It isn't that easy, and you are dangerously naive
    All the examples you cite are pretty obviously not scumbags. They all have important achievements to their name that far outweigh whatever criticisms one might have of them. There should be a very high bar for taking down statues, but that doesn't mean none should go. You would keep up a statue of Jimmy Saville or a Nazi. That seems naive too.
  • GardenwalkerGardenwalker Posts: 21,298
    edited June 2021

    Housing analysts agree that it very much short-term fluctuation in demand that influence house prices; with supply only influencing in the long run, and not much either as demand is quite inelastic.

    Like Murder on the Orient Express, everything is “to blame” for current house prices but based on what I’ve read the rough order of culprits is something like the following:

    1. Repressed interest rates
    2. Increased demand (more household formation)
    3. Increased demand (immigration)
    4. Increased demand (property as asset class)
    5. Supply side: lack of public housing
    6. Supply side: planning complexity
    7. Increased demand (buy to let)

    Prices ex South England are actually roughly at historic averages of price:earnings.

    They would be probably be at historic lows if it wasn’t for (1) and (2).

    Prices in South and especially London have all 7 factors in play.

    The best thing we could probably do to bring down to prices is to increase public housing in the South, along with further measures to discourage holding property as an asset versus as a home, and planning reforms to bring down the cost of land.

    A subset of item 4 is demand from overseas as bolthole investments from foreign squillionaires.

    Part of the solution is to encourage people to move north or to other disadvantaged regions, as part of the levelling up agenda. Just moving people into these towns will generate economic activity, as will building or refurbishing homes. That's before adding usual development incentives. We can't just funnel more and more people and money into London and its commuter belt. It's bad for London and it's bad for the rest of the country.
    People will move for jobs.
    Jobs will emerge where there is skilled labour.
    It’s a bit chicken and egg but the govt can help by

    - investment in public transport
    - using public spending to support key industrial clusters
    - devolving significant spending to local authorities because they are best placed to mobilise local economies.

    There may be something in the idea of economically incenting people to move north.
  • FoxyFoxy Posts: 48,821

    Housing analysts agree that it very much short-term fluctuation in demand that influence house prices; with supply only influencing in the long run, and not much either as demand is quite inelastic.

    Like Murder on the Orient Express, everything is “to blame” for current house prices but based on what I’ve read the rough order of culprits is something like the following:

    1. Repressed interest rates
    2. Increased demand (more household formation)
    3. Increased demand (immigration)
    4. Increased demand (property as asset class)
    5. Supply side: lack of public housing
    6. Supply side: planning complexity
    7. Increased demand (buy to let)

    Prices ex South England are actually roughly at historic averages of price:earnings.

    They would be probably be at historic lows if it wasn’t for (1) and (2).

    Prices in South and especially London have all 7 factors in play.

    The best thing we could probably do to bring down to prices is to increase public housing in the South, along with further measures to discourage holding property as an asset versus as a home, and planning reforms to bring down the cost of land.

    A subset of item 4 is demand from overseas as bolthole investments from foreign squillionaires.

    Part of the solution is to encourage people to move north or to other disadvantaged regions, as part of the levelling up agenda. Just moving people into these towns will generate economic activity, as will building or refurbishing homes. That's before adding usual development incentives. We can't just funnel more and more people and money into London and its commuter belt. It's bad for London and it's bad for the rest of the country.
    Yes, the levelling up agenda requires that people and businesses move to the old coalfields. Build more and cheaper housing in the SE and folk will continue to migrate there, though increasingly domestic internal migration.
  • LeonLeon Posts: 55,748
    Denmark are going through. Shame on the haters
  • Housing analysts agree that it very much short-term fluctuation in demand that influence house prices; with supply only influencing in the long run, and not much either as demand is quite inelastic.

    Like Murder on the Orient Express, everything is “to blame” for current house prices but based on what I’ve read the rough order of culprits is something like the following:

    1. Repressed interest rates
    2. Increased demand (more household formation)
    3. Increased demand (immigration)
    4. Increased demand (property as asset class)
    5. Supply side: lack of public housing
    6. Supply side: planning complexity
    7. Increased demand (buy to let)

    Prices ex South England are actually roughly at historic averages of price:earnings.

    They would be probably be at historic lows if it wasn’t for (1) and (2).

    Prices in South and especially London have all 7 factors in play.

    The best thing we could probably do to bring down to prices is to increase public housing in the South, along with further measures to discourage holding property as an asset versus as a home, and planning reforms to bring down the cost of land.

    A subset of item 4 is demand from overseas as bolthole investments from foreign squillionaires.

    Part of the solution is to encourage people to move north or to other disadvantaged regions, as part of the levelling up agenda. Just moving people into these towns will generate economic activity, as will building or refurbishing homes. That's before adding usual development incentives. We can't just funnel more and more people and money into London and its commuter belt. It's bad for London and it's bad for the rest of the country.
    People will move for jobs.
    Jobs will emerge where there is skilled labour.
    It’s a bit chicken and egg but the govt can help by

    - investment in public transport
    - using public spending to support key industrial clusters
    - devolving significant spending to local authorities because they are best placed to mobilise local economies.

    There may be something in the idea of economically incenting people to move north.
    Agree with all that except for last bit. Better to incentivise foreign business to invest in deprived areas
  • solarflaresolarflare Posts: 3,718
    Denmark game has been really good.
  • dixiedeandixiedean Posts: 29,423
    One of the unluckiest keeper own goals ever.
  • Leon said:

    Denmark are going through. Shame on the haters

    What haters? Genuine question
  • LeonLeon Posts: 55,748

    Denmark game has been really good.

    One of the best in the tourney so far. Great entertainment, and with a properly rocking crowd
  • LeonLeon Posts: 55,748
    Blimey!
  • tlg86tlg86 Posts: 26,183
    Wales v Denmark in Amsterdam will be entertaining.
  • GardenwalkerGardenwalker Posts: 21,298
    edited June 2021
    Foxy said:

    Housing analysts agree that it very much short-term fluctuation in demand that influence house prices; with supply only influencing in the long run, and not much either as demand is quite inelastic.

    Like Murder on the Orient Express, everything is “to blame” for current house prices but based on what I’ve read the rough order of culprits is something like the following:

    1. Repressed interest rates
    2. Increased demand (more household formation)
    3. Increased demand (immigration)
    4. Increased demand (property as asset class)
    5. Supply side: lack of public housing
    6. Supply side: planning complexity
    7. Increased demand (buy to let)

    Prices ex South England are actually roughly at historic averages of price:earnings.

    They would be probably be at historic lows if it wasn’t for (1) and (2).

    Prices in South and especially London have all 7 factors in play.

    The best thing we could probably do to bring down to prices is to increase public housing in the South, along with further measures to discourage holding property as an asset versus as a home, and planning reforms to bring down the cost of land.

    A subset of item 4 is demand from overseas as bolthole investments from foreign squillionaires.

    Part of the solution is to encourage people to move north or to other disadvantaged regions, as part of the levelling up agenda. Just moving people into these towns will generate economic activity, as will building or refurbishing homes. That's before adding usual development incentives. We can't just funnel more and more people and money into London and its commuter belt. It's bad for London and it's bad for the rest of the country.
    Yes, the levelling up agenda requires that people and businesses move to the old coalfields. Build more and cheaper housing in the SE and folk will continue to migrate there, though increasingly domestic internal migration.
    We already have.
    That’s one reason why house prices outside the South are “low” (actually, “average”, but well shy of London)

    The problem is there are not enough good jobs.
  • alex_alex_ Posts: 7,518
    Quite surprised Denmark let their fans travel to Russia!
  • AnExileinD4AnExileinD4 Posts: 337
    Leon said:

    Denmark game has been really good.

    One of the best in the tourney so far. Great entertainment, and with a properly rocking crowd
    The crowd makes you realise what is being missed across the British Isles as we cower in fear and celebrate the NHS.
  • GallowgateGallowgate Posts: 19,478
    I'm not sure the people of Teesside want a load of southerners moving to their towns.
  • LeonLeon Posts: 55,748
    I have not seen England play, under Southgate, like this Denmark team today. That is the problem. No fire
  • AnabobazinaAnabobazina Posts: 23,596

    As every day passes the modelling that extended lockdown into mid July looks more and more woeful.

    How angry must backbench Tories be looking at the numbers?

    Where are the headlines saying this?
  • LeonLeon Posts: 55,748

    Leon said:

    Denmark game has been really good.

    One of the best in the tourney so far. Great entertainment, and with a properly rocking crowd
    The crowd makes you realise what is being missed across the British Isles as we cower in fear and celebrate the NHS.
    Yes, absolutely. I am sure this Denmark performance is directly related to a passionate and capacity crowd
This discussion has been closed.