In an airport hotel in a conservative suburb of Istanbul which is not only Dry, and next to the world’s biggest mosque, it is so Puritan it won’t let me comment on here via the hotel Wi-Fi. Evil betting!
When I get to Montenegro I am going to have three negronis while I wank to interracial lesbian porn stars playing naked poker
It does not seem too long ago that you advised us all to holiday in Turkey because Islam-inspired restrictions had been forgotten. Your travelogues are great but you perhaps tend to extrapolate wildly from the very small sample of wherever the FK Gazette has arranged a freebie.
And if you are not using a reputable vpn, be wary of browsing content over hotel wifi that might leave you open to blackmail.
WTF are you on about. I never said “Islam inspired restrictions have been forgotten”
You lying twat. I said levels of scarf and niqab wearing in conservative Urfa are down, and that the always secular liberal Turkish Aegean coast is even more secular and liberal than before
Erdogan’s gleaming, enormous new Istanbul airport (roughly the size of greater Chicago) is absolutely RAMMED
There’s a massive European war, the world is rocked by inflation, entire countries are going down the bog, a chunk of the globe is still closed by Covid, yet… millions of people are happily travelllng
I find it genuinely hard to reconcile these things.
Tho I guess the Roaring Twenties took place at a time of great worldwide instability
Also inflation o in Turkey at 70%, cannot see it being rammed forever
Horrors of slavery should be taught alongside Holocaust, says Prince Charles
The Prince of Wales wants slavery to be publicly acknowledged, taught in schools and given the same national level of importance as the Holocaust.
Charles, who spoke of his “personal sorrow” at the UK’s historical links with the slave trade during his visit to Rwanda last week, will campaign for greater public awareness of slavery, which has dogged the royal family’s recent overseas tours.
I’m a long time out of school, but when I was there, there seemed a massive amount of time devoted to the Nazis. Now this was the 80’s, and thus the holocaust etc was more recent and in the minds of those setting the syllabus. Some argue it’s a antique evil, but I’m not so sure. Reframing our past to look critically at the whole world and the whole of history is not easy. Was it worse to be worked to death as a slave in a roman tin mine or on a Caribbean sugar plantation? But there certainly should be balance - you should teach the British empire story, but all sides of it. Don’t celebrate Wiberforce without wondering why it was necessary.
My O level history was driven entirely by the syllabus: Britain and Europe 1815 to 1914. I learnt more about the unification of Germany and Italy than I ever did about slavery.
Edit: The unification of Germany and the unification of Italy, not the two together - at least not as I learnt it!
Pretty much ditto - we did nothing on slavery or the Holocaust. I remember a lot on the Peninsular war, the creation of Belgium and the Reform Acts! A levels was 1848, Napoleon III, the Paris Commune, the Risorgimento and German unification.
My O level in 1981 was on British economic and social history 1700-1913. Basically enclosures, Chartism, Poor laws, canals, turnpikes, and related aspects of the industrial revolution. A bit dry at times, very little politics or military, but has been very useful for understanding modern Britain.
Slavery sounds a bit like the elephant in the room on that syllabus.
Because after all, much of the original industrial growth was due to the products being made for barter for slaves in West Africa, and the profits of the slave trade being reinvested in new machinery to make more...
Interesting to read that @Foxy did the same history o level course I endured. Although my memory was that it was actually a beta test of the forthcoming GSCEs rather than a proper O level.
I loved history. Still do. But found that course a bit tedious. I wanted to do kings and wars and so on, not a history of the Factory Acts.
Horrors of slavery should be taught alongside Holocaust, says Prince Charles
The Prince of Wales wants slavery to be publicly acknowledged, taught in schools and given the same national level of importance as the Holocaust.
Charles, who spoke of his “personal sorrow” at the UK’s historical links with the slave trade during his visit to Rwanda last week, will campaign for greater public awareness of slavery, which has dogged the royal family’s recent overseas tours.
Horrors of slavery should be taught alongside Holocaust, says Prince Charles
The Prince of Wales wants slavery to be publicly acknowledged, taught in schools and given the same national level of importance as the Holocaust.
Charles, who spoke of his “personal sorrow” at the UK’s historical links with the slave trade during his visit to Rwanda last week, will campaign for greater public awareness of slavery, which has dogged the royal family’s recent overseas tours.
Prince Charles is in serious danger of sparking a republican movement on the right.
Good point. As mentioned before I ambivalent to the monarchy and enjoyed the jubilee even though in principle I guess I should be a republican, but people enjoy them, they don't have real power and they don't interfere. The queen seems a model of a constitutional monarch. However if they came out with right wing views I would be taking up the republican cause, so why shouldn't the right do the same if the monarch started interfering from the left.
I write, if I may, in defence of HYUFD, who is often maligned on here as the sole remaining Boris acolyte.
I don't think HYUFD likes Boris much at all. He has little time for him. He likes neither his character, which he thinks is disreputable, nor his policies, which are far too soggy and mushy in most respects. All he likes about Boris is that he is an election winner for the Tories. Nothing else. And he still backs Boris because he just can't see any of the current alternatives doing any better electorally. He may well be right (until recently, I thought he was, but not any more). HYUFD is a Tory loyalist, but not a Boris loyalist.
HYUFD will of course correct me if I am wrong, and I shall apologise.
Erdogan’s gleaming, enormous new Istanbul airport (roughly the size of greater Chicago) is absolutely RAMMED
There’s a massive European war, the world is rocked by inflation, entire countries are going down the bog, a chunk of the globe is still closed by Covid, yet… millions of people are happily travelllng
I find it genuinely hard to reconcile these things.
Tho I guess the Roaring Twenties took place at a time of great worldwide instability
How is your Turkish? Redundant, by the look of all that signage.
At a political rally in 2021, Miller praised Hitler & paraphrased a line that Hitler gave during a 1935 Nazi rally. Her mention of “white life” sounds about alt-righthttps://twitter.com/acyn/status/1540852015693037568
Putting aside the obvious neo-nazism, I don't follow her logic. She thinks only white woman are having abortions?
Horrors of slavery should be taught alongside Holocaust, says Prince Charles
The Prince of Wales wants slavery to be publicly acknowledged, taught in schools and given the same national level of importance as the Holocaust.
Charles, who spoke of his “personal sorrow” at the UK’s historical links with the slave trade during his visit to Rwanda last week, will campaign for greater public awareness of slavery, which has dogged the royal family’s recent overseas tours.
Prince Charles is in serious danger of sparking a republican movement on the right.
He's gone up in my estimation though.
Our estimation of the suitability if future monarchs should not be based on whether they agree or disagree with us in their public utterances, but whether they can successfully say nothing at all. Because if they can't, they and their institution are doomed.
My secondary education gave both about the same attention. Slavery in history lessons and Holocaust in religious education.
Just self seeking windbaggery due to them getting players on it at present. The clown will be back to filling his pockets soon. What is it with Tories and royals and their usage of suitcases.
Bloody auto text. Players = pelters
Morning Malc! You should see what having to dictate does to one's thoughts!
When I say, 'Malc' it's interpreted as 'milk', and milk and water you are certainly not!
Erdogan’s gleaming, enormous new Istanbul airport (roughly the size of greater Chicago) is absolutely RAMMED
There’s a massive European war, the world is rocked by inflation, entire countries are going down the bog, a chunk of the globe is still closed by Covid, yet… millions of people are happily travelllng
I find it genuinely hard to reconcile these things.
Tho I guess the Roaring Twenties took place at a time of great worldwide instability
Also inflation o in Turkey at 70%, cannot see it being rammed forever
It’s a mystery for sure
I got a long cab ride last night with an amusing young driver who has just got married (it was arranged) from a conservative Muslim family - originally from Kars in the east
We talked all the way and he explained the horrors of inflation in Turkey right now. Prices ten-tupling in a year
Interestingly, he was very anti erdogan. And anti Chinese (they built the beautiful private toll road which he took and which he cursed)
If erdogan is losing conservative Muslim Turks then he is in trouble
Erdogan’s gleaming, enormous new Istanbul airport (roughly the size of greater Chicago) is absolutely RAMMED
There’s a massive European war, the world is rocked by inflation, entire countries are going down the bog, a chunk of the globe is still closed by Covid, yet… millions of people are happily travelllng
I find it genuinely hard to reconcile these things.
Tho I guess the Roaring Twenties took place at a time of great worldwide instability
Also inflation o in Turkey at 70%, cannot see it being rammed forever
It’s a mystery for sure
I got a long cab ride last night with an amusing young driver who has just got married (it was arranged) from a conservative Muslim family - originally from Kars in the east
We talked all the way and he explained the horrors of inflation in Turkey right now. Prices ten-tupling in a year
Interestingly, he was very anti erdogan. And anti Chinese (they built the beautiful private toll road which he took and which he cursed)
If erdogan is losing conservative Muslim Turks then he is in trouble
How's BJ getting on with London cabbies I wonder...?
Johnson was excellent there in BBC interview for Broadcasting House. A fluent and persuasive interviewee, knows his mind and has a clear sense of rights and wrongs. Called MPs who join picket lines virtue signallers - which is a good way of summoning up exactly what they done this week imo.
My OB/Gyn started a new group practice one month ago in Austin. He told me that between midnight and 6am today, their office received 22 online requests for tubal ligations. In 6 hours. When most people are sleeping. The ladies are NOT okay. https://mobile.twitter.com/dremilyportermd/status/1540809853991636993
Note the discussion in the thread below about the reluctance of US doctors to offer the procedure for younger women.
Horrors of slavery should be taught alongside Holocaust, says Prince Charles
The Prince of Wales wants slavery to be publicly acknowledged, taught in schools and given the same national level of importance as the Holocaust.
Charles, who spoke of his “personal sorrow” at the UK’s historical links with the slave trade during his visit to Rwanda last week, will campaign for greater public awareness of slavery, which has dogged the royal family’s recent overseas tours.
Prince Charles is in serious danger of sparking a republican movement on the right.
And Prince William is even more woke than his father.
I've been pretty lonely on the republican right but I've been saying for years that King Charles III will ensure I'm not lonely.
Prince William has more self control and awareness than his father.
But you're right: if he intends to use his position as a platform to make forays into education policy as well as immigration policy then he's storing up hell for himself.
BBC’s Amol Rajan criticised for using phrase ‘pro-life’ in Roe v Wade interview
The term, which is considered partisan, was used twice by Amol Rajan during Saturday morning’s Today programme on Radio 4, in segments about the landmark ruling ending Americans’ constitutional right to abortion.
The BBC News style guide advises journalists to “use anti-abortion rather than pro-life, except where it is part of the title of a group’s name”.
Hannah Barham-Brown, deputy leader of the Women’s Equality party, said: “Anti-choice campaigners have long tried to hide behind the facade of being ‘pro-life’ when the reality is that they are anything but – they are really trying to restrict women’s freedoms.”
This is interesting. I can only speak for myself, but my views on this subject are not influenced by wanting to restrict women’s freedoms. I wonder if deep down the words pro life are quite difficult for some on the pro choice side of the debate?
I’m a pragmatist, but if I’m honest, once there’s a heartbeat, I think abortion is murder. But I think it’s justified murder to a point (personally I’d go for 12 weeks rather than 24 weeks). Perhaps some on the pro choice side of the debate wouldn’t like to hear that, but this is a very difficult issue, and we should be honest about what abortion is.
89% of UK abortions are in the first 10 weeks, with a similar proportion being from medical rather than surgical procedures. Peak age for abortions is 22 years, and recent years shows a sharp drop in teenage abortions, down by 2/3. I think this reflects the sharp drop in teenage pregnancies.
Later abortions are more often complex reasons, the most clear cut being for severe congenital defects. The practical issue here is often that these cannot be detected until 16-18 weeks. Many of the rest have complex social or medical issues around them.
So broadly, I am content with current UK practice.
Useful stats, and I broadly agree, though I’d like a clear “in exceptional circumstances” caveat to limit late abortions to things that don’t get picked up until late.
But, that’s another moral maze. Sally Phillips wants to ban testing for Down’s as she fears we’re going to effectively end up with no children with Down’s.
Now, I don’t actually know for sure, but I’d imagine that Phillips supports a woman’s right to choose. But it’s interesting that she wants to take that right away in some circumstances.
As far as I understand, Sally Phillips doesn't regard Downs Syndrome as a disability severe enough to warrant abortion. Indeed (via her own son with Downs) she sees Downs as an important strand in the human tapestry.
Her documentary "A world without Downs" is a very thoughtful and nuanced discussion of the issues around abortion for Downs, and fair to both sides, not the usual trench warfare that is seen on the subject. I highly recommend it. It asks the question "What sort of world do we want, and who should be allowed to live in it?"
What is considered a severe disability under Section E of the abortion Act is not defined, and is well worth discussion. Spina Bifida? Anencephally? Downs, cleft palate?
Absolutely, it’s a very interesting and difficult subject. But... there is a difficulty in arguing for the right to choose but then saying not in those cases.
And actually, as long as the limit is 24 weeks without caveat, this is purely academic. If a woman can have an abortion anyway, how we view children with Down’s doesn’t come into it.
Horrors of slavery should be taught alongside Holocaust, says Prince Charles
The Prince of Wales wants slavery to be publicly acknowledged, taught in schools and given the same national level of importance as the Holocaust.
Charles, who spoke of his “personal sorrow” at the UK’s historical links with the slave trade during his visit to Rwanda last week, will campaign for greater public awareness of slavery, which has dogged the royal family’s recent overseas tours.
Prince Charles is in serious danger of sparking a republican movement on the right.
He's gone up in my estimation though.
Our estimation of the suitability if future monarchs should not be based on whether they agree or disagree with us in their public utterances, but whether they can successfully say nothing at all. Because if they can't, they and their institution are doomed.
I was being tongue-in-cheek.
They're a bunch of wasters, the whole lot of them.
Horrors of slavery should be taught alongside Holocaust, says Prince Charles
The Prince of Wales wants slavery to be publicly acknowledged, taught in schools and given the same national level of importance as the Holocaust.
Charles, who spoke of his “personal sorrow” at the UK’s historical links with the slave trade during his visit to Rwanda last week, will campaign for greater public awareness of slavery, which has dogged the royal family’s recent overseas tours.
Prince Charles is in serious danger of sparking a republican movement on the right.
He's gone up in my estimation though.
Our estimation of the suitability if future monarchs should not be based on whether they agree or disagree with us in their public utterances, but whether they can successfully say nothing at all. Because if they can't, they and their institution are doomed.
Unfortunately, Prince Charles labours under the misapprehension that people are interested in what he thinks and what he has to say.
The problem with any history syllabus is that there's so much darned history, and the bastards keep on making more of it.
Take GCSE maths. It should be fairly easy to decide what is in a GCSE maths syllabus (will get harder at A-level though). Numbers, algebra, statistics, geometry, graphs, etc, at a basic level. A pass mark in GCSE maths should mean a pupil has enough maths skills to cope with everyday life.
But history... what do you teach about history? Of the massive amount of history out there, what do you choose to teach? And why those particular choices?
Foakes has Covid according to the BBC; I wonder whether that's going to go right through now? And if so what is that going to do to the India game later this week!
Horrors of slavery should be taught alongside Holocaust, says Prince Charles
The Prince of Wales wants slavery to be publicly acknowledged, taught in schools and given the same national level of importance as the Holocaust.
Charles, who spoke of his “personal sorrow” at the UK’s historical links with the slave trade during his visit to Rwanda last week, will campaign for greater public awareness of slavery, which has dogged the royal family’s recent overseas tours.
Prince Charles is in serious danger of sparking a republican movement on the right.
He's gone up in my estimation though.
Our estimation of the suitability if future monarchs should not be based on whether they agree or disagree with us in their public utterances, but whether they can successfully say nothing at all. Because if they can't, they and their institution are doomed.
Unfortunately, Prince Charles labours under the misapprehension that people are interested in what he thinks and what he has to say.
Absolutely, but a referendum announcement usually prompts a flurry of polls. We have… none. Which looks suspicious.
They know it is just more bluff to keep kicking it down the road . She is running out of road, all the stolen money , perjury case et c can only be held up for so long. Many of these crooks will get their day in court.
Sorry Malc, I am genuinely losing the plot. You are pro-independence but anti-Sturgeon, have I got that right?
Yes indeed, she is all talk and no action and crooked into the bargain. She is wrecking scotland, her and her bunch of self id creeps and gravy trainers. They have no principles.
I am not disagreeing with what you are saying at all. But in your mind would they deliver a different independence than ALBA? An independence self serving to their party or just different on key bits than Alba?
Alba is the perfect name for a Scottish Nationalist political party btw.
Horrors of slavery should be taught alongside Holocaust, says Prince Charles
The Prince of Wales wants slavery to be publicly acknowledged, taught in schools and given the same national level of importance as the Holocaust.
Charles, who spoke of his “personal sorrow” at the UK’s historical links with the slave trade during his visit to Rwanda last week, will campaign for greater public awareness of slavery, which has dogged the royal family’s recent overseas tours.
Prince Charles is in serious danger of sparking a republican movement on the right.
He's gone up in my estimation though.
Ok, but that's entirely the point: if he adopts a political position (and you alone saying that shows that he has) then he is doomed because he will naturally be a divisive figure and sooner or later people will demand a say in those divisions.
I write, if I may, in defence of HYUFD, who is often maligned on here as the sole remaining Boris acolyte.
I don't think HYUFD likes Boris much at all. He has little time for him. He likes neither his character, which he thinks is disreputable, nor his policies, which are far too soggy and mushy in most respects. All he likes about Boris is that he is an election winner for the Tories. Nothing else. And he still backs Boris because he just can't see any of the current alternatives doing any better electorally. He may well be right (until recently, I thought he was, but not any more). HYUFD is a Tory loyalist, but not a Boris loyalist.
HYUFD will of course correct me if I am wrong, and I shall apologise.
Not far off, if Ben Wallace or Hunt led Starmer in hypothetical polls I would switch to them now
Horrors of slavery should be taught alongside Holocaust, says Prince Charles
The Prince of Wales wants slavery to be publicly acknowledged, taught in schools and given the same national level of importance as the Holocaust.
Charles, who spoke of his “personal sorrow” at the UK’s historical links with the slave trade during his visit to Rwanda last week, will campaign for greater public awareness of slavery, which has dogged the royal family’s recent overseas tours.
Horrors of slavery should be taught alongside Holocaust, says Prince Charles
The Prince of Wales wants slavery to be publicly acknowledged, taught in schools and given the same national level of importance as the Holocaust.
Charles, who spoke of his “personal sorrow” at the UK’s historical links with the slave trade during his visit to Rwanda last week, will campaign for greater public awareness of slavery, which has dogged the royal family’s recent overseas tours.
I’m a long time out of school, but when I was there, there seemed a massive amount of time devoted to the Nazis. Now this was the 80’s, and thus the holocaust etc was more recent and in the minds of those setting the syllabus. Some argue it’s a antique evil, but I’m not so sure. Reframing our past to look critically at the whole world and the whole of history is not easy. Was it worse to be worked to death as a slave in a roman tin mine or on a Caribbean sugar plantation? But there certainly should be balance - you should teach the British empire story, but all sides of it. Don’t celebrate Wiberforce without wondering why it was necessary.
My O level history was driven entirely by the syllabus: Britain and Europe 1815 to 1914. I learnt more about the unification of Germany and Italy than I ever did about slavery.
Edit: The unification of Germany and the unification of Italy, not the two together - at least not as I learnt it!
Pretty much ditto - we did nothing on slavery or the Holocaust. I remember a lot on the Peninsular war, the creation of Belgium and the Reform Acts! A levels was 1848, Napoleon III, the Paris Commune, the Risorgimento and German unification.
My O level in 1981 was on British economic and social history 1700-1913. Basically enclosures, Chartism, Poor laws, canals, turnpikes, and related aspects of the industrial revolution. A bit dry at times, very little politics or military, but has been very useful for understanding modern Britain.
I did all of the above in my lessons at school, and my Oxford children's history of Britain volumes (published 1983) pulled no punches about slavery.
But, you've got to understand this isn't really about teaching slavery in schools: it's about teaching it incessantly and in a certain way in order to inculcate a sense of shame about Britain and guilt about its past into future generations, and is thus highly political.
Yes. This is how they intend to smuggle Critical Race Theory into British schools
Because it’s been SUCH a success in America and has, in no way, provoked intense loathing and a backlash on the American Right
I went to view a (private) secondary school we were considering for one of my daughters recently. It was painfully woke. "Some people are trans, get over it" declared posters all around the school. Barrages of newspaper headlines from the Independent about BLM, climate change and Brexit. "Join the equality society!", pupils were repeatedly urged. We looked in on a history lesson, which, naturally, was about slavery. Toilets for boys, toilets for girls and toilets for 'whatever'. Posters decrying the evils of gender stereotypes. You expect this kind of shit in schools where the council can set the agenda, but it's a bit disappointing that this is also what you get if you pay for it. It was like being in Twitter.
BBC’s Amol Rajan criticised for using phrase ‘pro-life’ in Roe v Wade interview
The term, which is considered partisan, was used twice by Amol Rajan during Saturday morning’s Today programme on Radio 4, in segments about the landmark ruling ending Americans’ constitutional right to abortion.
The BBC News style guide advises journalists to “use anti-abortion rather than pro-life, except where it is part of the title of a group’s name”.
Hannah Barham-Brown, deputy leader of the Women’s Equality party, said: “Anti-choice campaigners have long tried to hide behind the facade of being ‘pro-life’ when the reality is that they are anything but – they are really trying to restrict women’s freedoms.”
This is interesting. I can only speak for myself, but my views on this subject are not influenced by wanting to restrict women’s freedoms. I wonder if deep down the words pro life are quite difficult for some on the pro choice side of the debate?
I’m a pragmatist, but if I’m honest, once there’s a heartbeat, I think abortion is murder. But I think it’s justified murder to a point (personally I’d go for 12 weeks rather than 24 weeks). Perhaps some on the pro choice side of the debate wouldn’t like to hear that, but this is a very difficult issue, and we should be honest about what abortion is.
89% of UK abortions are in the first 10 weeks, with a similar proportion being from medical rather than surgical procedures. Peak age for abortions is 22 years, and recent years shows a sharp drop in teenage abortions, down by 2/3. I think this reflects the sharp drop in teenage pregnancies.
Later abortions are more often complex reasons, the most clear cut being for severe congenital defects. The practical issue here is often that these cannot be detected until 16-18 weeks. Many of the rest have complex social or medical issues around them.
So broadly, I am content with current UK practice.
Useful stats, and I broadly agree, though I’d like a clear “in exceptional circumstances” caveat to limit late abortions to things that don’t get picked up until late.
But, that’s another moral maze. Sally Phillips wants to ban testing for Down’s as she fears we’re going to effectively end up with no children with Down’s.
Now, I don’t actually know for sure, but I’d imagine that Phillips supports a woman’s right to choose. But it’s interesting that she wants to take that right away in some circumstances.
As far as I understand, Sally Phillips doesn't regard Downs Syndrome as a disability severe enough to warrant abortion. Indeed (via her own son with Downs) she sees Downs as an important strand in the human tapestry.
Her documentary "A world without Downs" is a very thoughtful and nuanced discussion of the issues around abortion for Downs, and fair to both sides, not the usual trench warfare that is seen on the subject. I highly recommend it. It asks the question "What sort of world do we want, and who should be allowed to live in it?"
What is considered a severe disability under Section E of the abortion Act is not defined, and is well worth discussion. Spina Bifida? Anencephally? Downs, cleft palate?
Absolutely, it’s a very interesting and difficult subject. But... there is a difficulty in arguing for the right to choose but then saying not in those cases.
And actually, as long as the limit is 24 weeks without caveat, this is purely academic. If a woman can have an abortion anyway, how we view children with Down’s doesn’t come into it.
The issue is more that the medical professionals have been known to push hard for all these tests, and then push hard on the woman to have an abortion if any of the tests are positive. There are many reports of vulnerable families being pressured into abortions, this is one of the subjects of the Sally Philips documentary referenced above.
This is kind of mostly pointless because they'll just end up shuffling other production around so India buys more from Russia and less from somebody else then the UK buys more from somebody else.
What they should be doing is reducing *overall demand* for gold. They could start by putting VAT on it even when bought as an "investment", like Japan does. Raises some tax revenue, and defunds China a little bit as well.
Horrors of slavery should be taught alongside Holocaust, says Prince Charles
The Prince of Wales wants slavery to be publicly acknowledged, taught in schools and given the same national level of importance as the Holocaust.
Charles, who spoke of his “personal sorrow” at the UK’s historical links with the slave trade during his visit to Rwanda last week, will campaign for greater public awareness of slavery, which has dogged the royal family’s recent overseas tours.
Prince Charles is in serious danger of sparking a republican movement on the right.
He's gone up in my estimation though.
Our estimation of the suitability if future monarchs should not be based on whether they agree or disagree with us in their public utterances, but whether they can successfully say nothing at all. Because if they can't, they and their institution are doomed.
Unfortunately, Prince Charles labours under the misapprehension that people are interested in what he thinks and what he has to say.
If you have no interest, why all the above comments ? And if no one has any interest in what he has to say, why do his comments matter at all ? (I actually agree with the point, which is why his comments don’t bother me in the slightest.)
Boris usually gives good interview. Upbeat, sunlit uplands in sight, never caught out or needing to pause to find an answer, etc
Yesterday's on R4 he was none of these things. As though the kryptonite was wearing off in front of our eyes.
He was (more) unsure, hesitant, unknowing than I have ever heard him.
Is this it?
"Boris usually gives good interview". Really?
"Buses, errrrrrrr, I like buses". Hiding in fridges etc.
Johnson hasn't even been convincing with the "sunny uplands" schtick since he became Prime Minister, or certainly after he won his landslide.
I am intrigued by all the Dick Dastardly stuff posted on here this morning. Could Johnson really utilise Raab and Braverman's unparalleled legal expertise to manipulate the electoral system in order to retain power for a third term? Bear n mind Dick Dastardly's fate at the end of each Wacky Races episode.
Erdogan’s gleaming, enormous new Istanbul airport (roughly the size of greater Chicago) is absolutely RAMMED
There’s a massive European war, the world is rocked by inflation, entire countries are going down the bog, a chunk of the globe is still closed by Covid, yet… millions of people are happily travelllng
I find it genuinely hard to reconcile these things.
Tho I guess the Roaring Twenties took place at a time of great worldwide instability
How is your Turkish? Redundant, by the look of all that signage.
Where are you off to after Montenegro?
English has completely overwhelmed global travel. It’s a striking change even from 5 years ago
Erdogan wants this airport to be a global hub like Dubai or Singapore (and so far so good, judging by the crowds). Ergo they have yielded to reality and 60% of the signs and 90% of the ads are in English and all the staff speak perfect English
I have to be back in london in mid July ish so Montenegro might be my last stop for now. Tho I am enjoying - unexpectedly - the completely gypsy lifestyle
This is kind of mostly pointless because they'll just end up shuffling other production around so India buys more from Russia and less from somebody else then the UK buys more from somebody else.
What they should be doing is reducing *overall demand* for gold. They could start by putting VAT on it even when bought as an "investment", like Japan does. Raises some tax revenue, and defunds China a little bit as well.
Can they afford to do that? After all what will it do to Conservative party finances?
Erdogan’s gleaming, enormous new Istanbul airport (roughly the size of greater Chicago) is absolutely RAMMED
There’s a massive European war, the world is rocked by inflation, entire countries are going down the bog, a chunk of the globe is still closed by Covid, yet… millions of people are happily travelllng
I find it genuinely hard to reconcile these things.
Tho I guess the Roaring Twenties took place at a time of great worldwide instability
Also inflation o in Turkey at 70%, cannot see it being rammed forever
The two are probably connected. Roaring inflation means that people with access to harder currencies are getting a better and better deal….
Sad news from Ukraine overnight, a number of missiles launched from Belarus into Ukraine, targeting cities including Kiev, and hitting residential buildings - places where things had started to return to some sense of normality, even as war continues to rage in the East of the country. https://t.me/dtpkiev/297578
Nah. It might have been true of 30 years ago but not now. There is drugs of course but no more than any other town and not generally amongst the oil workers themselves. At least not in the UK.
Constant and random drug testing both on and offshore with immediate dismissal tends to limit its use. Plus the fact that anyone known to be using will be grassed up in short order by their colleagues. Being stuck on a metal box filled with dangerous machinery and high pressure hydrocarbons tends to concentrate the mind somewhat and no one wants to be working alongside someone who might be flaky.
I'm in Sozopol starograd in Bulgaria, founded by Greek colonists in the 7th Century BC, about 35km south of Borgas I'm sitting at a wonderful seafood restaurant commanding spectacular views of the Black Sea.
My lunch: grilled octopus with chorizo and roast potatoes, with a lemon mayonnaise and a light garlic jus.
Horrors of slavery should be taught alongside Holocaust, says Prince Charles
The Prince of Wales wants slavery to be publicly acknowledged, taught in schools and given the same national level of importance as the Holocaust.
Charles, who spoke of his “personal sorrow” at the UK’s historical links with the slave trade during his visit to Rwanda last week, will campaign for greater public awareness of slavery, which has dogged the royal family’s recent overseas tours.
Prince Charles is in serious danger of sparking a republican movement on the right.
The monarch is popular because she doesn't get involved in politics in the slightest. The rest of the royals don't seem to understand that crucial point.
Horrors of slavery should be taught alongside Holocaust, says Prince Charles
The Prince of Wales wants slavery to be publicly acknowledged, taught in schools and given the same national level of importance as the Holocaust.
Charles, who spoke of his “personal sorrow” at the UK’s historical links with the slave trade during his visit to Rwanda last week, will campaign for greater public awareness of slavery, which has dogged the royal family’s recent overseas tours.
Prince Charles is in serious danger of sparking a republican movement on the right.
The monarch is popular because she doesn't get involved in politics in the slightest. The rest of the royals don't seem to understand that crucial point.
The Tories have been in power for 12 years. No party has won a general election in the last 100 years after more than 10 years in power apart from Major's Tories in 1992.
However even then that was partly about keeping Kinnock out and Starmer is less feared by middle England than Kinnock was. So yes replacing Johnson would not be enough. It would be more about trying to limit the damage if Labour got a consistent poll lead of say 10% or more
More fundamentally from your point of view, when Johnson is finally forced out your party is going to be in a hell of a mess, divided, without any over-arching strategy, no real policy prospectus, and with an electoral coalition impossible to hold together - and that's before you consider all the internal organisational staffing issues and personal conflicts that Johnson's chaos will have left unresolved.
Every week you hang onto the clown is another week before someone else gets to start on the long, long task of rebuilding from the ruins.
Yes but that someone would need to be someone with clear electoral appeal relative to Starmer and little evidence of any viable alternative making much difference at present
Actually it doesn't, since the next election may probably be lost already and just getting rid of the dishonest buffoon will be progress. You'll be needing someone to do the Kinnock or Howard role - if (as you suggested above) the party instead picks a nutter then you will just waste a term going through the Hague/IDS cycle before eventually getting real.
The choice is, I think, between losing, and losing big. Even (especially ?) those with sizeable majorities should be thinking of their own futures in parliament.
The hyper-rational thing to do, the thing Spock would do, would be to acknowledge some things that, whilst they may not be facts, are definitely strong probabilities.
First, as things stand, the Conservatives are going down. And that's before the worst of the economic mess. 2024 is probably a loss under anyone, quite possibly a rout under Johnson.
Second, the Frost/JRM route is a one-way ticket to Obscurityville. Even if it attracts some voters back, it will mean that the LibLabScot attacks will be even more focused on the Conservatives than they are now.
So what would Spock do? Find someone inoffensive to captain the Titanic as it sinks. Make the best of the available lifeboats. Ensure the best brandy is consumed and the band play some absolute bangers as the ship sinks. Aim to leave the wreck somewhere that salvage is feasible.
But real parties are made of humans, not intelligent half-Vulcans. So the more likely path is to deny the problem and then assume it can be solved by self-indulgence.
I write, if I may, in defence of HYUFD, who is often maligned on here as the sole remaining Boris acolyte.
I don't think HYUFD likes Boris much at all. He has little time for him. He likes neither his character, which he thinks is disreputable, nor his policies, which are far too soggy and mushy in most respects. All he likes about Boris is that he is an election winner for the Tories. Nothing else. And he still backs Boris because he just can't see any of the current alternatives doing any better electorally. He may well be right (until recently, I thought he was, but not any more). HYUFD is a Tory loyalist, but not a Boris loyalist.
HYUFD will of course correct me if I am wrong, and I shall apologise.
Not far off, if Ben Wallace or Hunt led Starmer in hypothetical polls I would switch to them now
Are such polls biased to the crown wearer?
Take crown from one put on another after a contest, those hypothetical polls remain same? No they don’t! they flipperoooos!
Being so into politics, this is the sort of thing you should be telling us, not us telling you.
Horrors of slavery should be taught alongside Holocaust, says Prince Charles
The Prince of Wales wants slavery to be publicly acknowledged, taught in schools and given the same national level of importance as the Holocaust.
Charles, who spoke of his “personal sorrow” at the UK’s historical links with the slave trade during his visit to Rwanda last week, will campaign for greater public awareness of slavery, which has dogged the royal family’s recent overseas tours.
Prince Charles is in serious danger of sparking a republican movement on the right.
He's gone up in my estimation though.
Our estimation of the suitability if future monarchs should not be based on whether they agree or disagree with us in their public utterances, but whether they can successfully say nothing at all. Because if they can't, they and their institution are doomed.
Unfortunately, Prince Charles labours under the misapprehension that people are interested in what he thinks and what he has to say.
If you have no interest, why all the above comments ? And if no one has any interest in what he has to say, why do his comments matter at all ? (I actually agree with the point, which is why his comments don’t bother me in the slightest.)
I'm interested in his comments in respect of what they mean for the future of the monarchy.
On topic: 2022 may come to be seen, in retrospect, as the end of a 30-year period of consistently low inflation...[which will] sharpen political choices: do you raise taxes or cut spending? Subsidise energy bills, or let the market decide? Inflation is already reopening debates about monetary policy, public ownership and the independence of the Bank of England, while wages, industrial action and the cost of living are all surging up the political agenda. The effect is to bring economic and distributional questions back into the political mainstream, opening up questions on which the [Conservative] party is deeply divided.
Such questions play to all of Johnson’s weaknesses and none of his strengths. Tax rates, wage bills, fuel costs and supermarket bills are not susceptible to his peculiar brand of rhetorical mystification; and voters struggling with rising bills and falling living standards may be less forgiving of a politics of distraction.
Johnson himself has no economic policy to speak of. On economic questions, at least, “to govern is to choose”. Yet every choice Johnson makes on tax rates, energy bills or public spending infuriates some wing of his party, eager for higher spending, lower taxes, more intervention or more deregulation. And as Brexit moves from rhetoric to reality, the choices already made grow harder to ignore. Johnson can give his party no star to steer by, for he has none. His political compass points only at himself.
Johnson’s leadership is a symptom, not a cause, of his party’s loss of cohesion and direction. For that reason, it cannot also be a cure — though it may, like a fever, bring the illusion of vigour and short-lived colour to the cheeks. Whether or not Johnson survives the consequences of yesterday’s vote, Conservatism is in a parlous state. It will take a very different skill-set than his to restore it to health and vitality.
Doesn’t Boris have a point? Everyone knew he was a shit, but Tory MPs nominated him anyway, Tory members confirmed him and he was elected with a big majority by his his blukip style coalition. A section of the Tory party getting buyers remorse three years on is a little weak.
We should still take the opportunity to laugh at the idiots who thought the office would change the man. Ha ha.
As expected Boris has remained the same dishonest, incompetent, lazy, bumbling idiot he has always been. He's so plainly out of his depth it's not funny. He was just as bad when Mayor, and should never have risen to the heights of being the Foreign Secretary, him being the PM is a bad joke that has been taken too far.
Any remotely sensible political party would have acted by now. We know the PM is not fit for office, and now we know that neither are the Tories.
Horrors of slavery should be taught alongside Holocaust, says Prince Charles
The Prince of Wales wants slavery to be publicly acknowledged, taught in schools and given the same national level of importance as the Holocaust.
Charles, who spoke of his “personal sorrow” at the UK’s historical links with the slave trade during his visit to Rwanda last week, will campaign for greater public awareness of slavery, which has dogged the royal family’s recent overseas tours.
Prince Charles is in serious danger of sparking a republican movement on the right.
He's gone up in my estimation though.
Our estimation of the suitability if future monarchs should not be based on whether they agree or disagree with us in their public utterances, but whether they can successfully say nothing at all. Because if they can't, they and their institution are doomed.
Unfortunately, Prince Charles labours under the misapprehension that people are interested in what he thinks and what he has to say.
If you have no interest, why all the above comments ? And if no one has any interest in what he has to say, why do his comments matter at all ? (I actually agree with the point, which is why his comments don’t bother me in the slightest.)
The problem for most republicans is that, being progressive, they have to grit their teeth and admit that Prince Charles has long been on “their” side on many issues.
Oh, and the slave trade should be taught in schools. As it, er… actually is. My daughters learnt all about the triangular trade. They even appreciated my story about giving a lesson on it way back in the day…
Horrors of slavery should be taught alongside Holocaust, says Prince Charles
The Prince of Wales wants slavery to be publicly acknowledged, taught in schools and given the same national level of importance as the Holocaust.
Charles, who spoke of his “personal sorrow” at the UK’s historical links with the slave trade during his visit to Rwanda last week, will campaign for greater public awareness of slavery, which has dogged the royal family’s recent overseas tours.
I’m a long time out of school, but when I was there, there seemed a massive amount of time devoted to the Nazis. Now this was the 80’s, and thus the holocaust etc was more recent and in the minds of those setting the syllabus. Some argue it’s a antique evil, but I’m not so sure. Reframing our past to look critically at the whole world and the whole of history is not easy. Was it worse to be worked to death as a slave in a roman tin mine or on a Caribbean sugar plantation? But there certainly should be balance - you should teach the British empire story, but all sides of it. Don’t celebrate Wiberforce without wondering why it was necessary.
My O level history was driven entirely by the syllabus: Britain and Europe 1815 to 1914. I learnt more about the unification of Germany and Italy than I ever did about slavery.
Edit: The unification of Germany and the unification of Italy, not the two together - at least not as I learnt it!
Pretty much ditto - we did nothing on slavery or the Holocaust. I remember a lot on the Peninsular war, the creation of Belgium and the Reform Acts! A levels was 1848, Napoleon III, the Paris Commune, the Risorgimento and German unification.
My O level in 1981 was on British economic and social history 1700-1913. Basically enclosures, Chartism, Poor laws, canals, turnpikes, and related aspects of the industrial revolution. A bit dry at times, very little politics or military, but has been very useful for understanding modern Britain.
I did all of the above in my lessons at school, and my Oxford children's history of Britain volumes (published 1983) pulled no punches about slavery.
But, you've got to understand this isn't really about teaching slavery in schools: it's about teaching it incessantly and in a certain way in order to inculcate a sense of shame about Britain and guilt about its past into future generations, and is thus highly political.
Yes. This is how they intend to smuggle Critical Race Theory into British schools
Because it’s been SUCH a success in America and has, in no way, provoked intense loathing and a backlash on the American Right
I went to view a (private) secondary school we were considering for one of my daughters recently. It was painfully woke. "Some people are trans, get over it" declared posters all around the school. Barrages of newspaper headlines from the Independent about BLM, climate change and Brexit. "Join the equality society!", pupils were repeatedly urged. We looked in on a history lesson, which, naturally, was about slavery. Toilets for boys, toilets for girls and toilets for 'whatever'. Posters decrying the evils of gender stereotypes. You expect this kind of shit in schools where the council can set the agenda, but it's a bit disappointing that this is also what you get if you pay for it. It was like being in Twitter.
One of the subjects that keeps coming up out here in Expatville is education. There are people taking jobs out here specifically for the schools - international, UK, US and IB curriculum, but with none of the woke nonesense on top of it.
Horrors of slavery should be taught alongside Holocaust, says Prince Charles
The Prince of Wales wants slavery to be publicly acknowledged, taught in schools and given the same national level of importance as the Holocaust.
Charles, who spoke of his “personal sorrow” at the UK’s historical links with the slave trade during his visit to Rwanda last week, will campaign for greater public awareness of slavery, which has dogged the royal family’s recent overseas tours.
I’m a long time out of school, but when I was there, there seemed a massive amount of time devoted to the Nazis. Now this was the 80’s, and thus the holocaust etc was more recent and in the minds of those setting the syllabus. Some argue it’s a antique evil, but I’m not so sure. Reframing our past to look critically at the whole world and the whole of history is not easy. Was it worse to be worked to death as a slave in a roman tin mine or on a Caribbean sugar plantation? But there certainly should be balance - you should teach the British empire story, but all sides of it. Don’t celebrate Wiberforce without wondering why it was necessary.
My O level history was driven entirely by the syllabus: Britain and Europe 1815 to 1914. I learnt more about the unification of Germany and Italy than I ever did about slavery.
Edit: The unification of Germany and the unification of Italy, not the two together - at least not as I learnt it!
Pretty much ditto - we did nothing on slavery or the Holocaust. I remember a lot on the Peninsular war, the creation of Belgium and the Reform Acts! A levels was 1848, Napoleon III, the Paris Commune, the Risorgimento and German unification.
My O level in 1981 was on British economic and social history 1700-1913. Basically enclosures, Chartism, Poor laws, canals, turnpikes, and related aspects of the industrial revolution. A bit dry at times, very little politics or military, but has been very useful for understanding modern Britain.
I did all of the above in my lessons at school, and my Oxford children's history of Britain volumes (published 1983) pulled no punches about slavery.
But, you've got to understand this isn't really about teaching slavery in schools: it's about teaching it incessantly and in a certain way in order to inculcate a sense of shame about Britain and guilt about its past into future generations, and is thus highly political.
Yes. This is how they intend to smuggle Critical Race Theory into British schools
Because it’s been SUCH a success in America and has, in no way, provoked intense loathing and a backlash on the American Right
I went to view a (private) secondary school we were considering for one of my daughters recently. It was painfully woke. "Some people are trans, get over it" declared posters all around the school. Barrages of newspaper headlines from the Independent about BLM, climate change and Brexit. "Join the equality society!", pupils were repeatedly urged. We looked in on a history lesson, which, naturally, was about slavery. Toilets for boys, toilets for girls and toilets for 'whatever'. Posters decrying the evils of gender stereotypes. You expect this kind of shit in schools where the council can set the agenda, but it's a bit disappointing that this is also what you get if you pay for it. It was like being in Twitter.
Sadly, there's probably a market for it amongst certain well-off guardianista types.
It's quite simple for me: I'll pull my daughter out of any school that tries to pull shit like that on her.
1. Who said anything about Brexit? The issues of your party is that it is corrupt. That it commits malfeasance. That it ignores basic principles like the rule of law and now democracy is under attack. That it embeds lies in the heart of government. None of those things are Brexit.
Brexit is all of those things
Brexit is none of those things. Any more than democracy is. That you think otherwise just highlights how little you understand about either.
BBC’s Amol Rajan criticised for using phrase ‘pro-life’ in Roe v Wade interview
The term, which is considered partisan, was used twice by Amol Rajan during Saturday morning’s Today programme on Radio 4, in segments about the landmark ruling ending Americans’ constitutional right to abortion.
The BBC News style guide advises journalists to “use anti-abortion rather than pro-life, except where it is part of the title of a group’s name”.
Hannah Barham-Brown, deputy leader of the Women’s Equality party, said: “Anti-choice campaigners have long tried to hide behind the facade of being ‘pro-life’ when the reality is that they are anything but – they are really trying to restrict women’s freedoms.”
This is interesting. I can only speak for myself, but my views on this subject are not influenced by wanting to restrict women’s freedoms. I wonder if deep down the words pro life are quite difficult for some on the pro choice side of the debate?
I’m a pragmatist, but if I’m honest, once there’s a heartbeat, I think abortion is murder. But I think it’s justified murder to a point (personally I’d go for 12 weeks rather than 24 weeks). Perhaps some on the pro choice side of the debate wouldn’t like to hear that, but this is a very difficult issue, and we should be honest about what abortion is.
89% of UK abortions are in the first 10 weeks, with a similar proportion being from medical rather than surgical procedures. Peak age for abortions is 22 years, and recent years shows a sharp drop in teenage abortions, down by 2/3. I think this reflects the sharp drop in teenage pregnancies.
Later abortions are more often complex reasons, the most clear cut being for severe congenital defects. The practical issue here is often that these cannot be detected until 16-18 weeks. Many of the rest have complex social or medical issues around them.
So broadly, I am content with current UK practice.
Useful stats, and I broadly agree, though I’d like a clear “in exceptional circumstances” caveat to limit late abortions to things that don’t get picked up until late.
But, that’s another moral maze. Sally Phillips wants to ban testing for Down’s as she fears we’re going to effectively end up with no children with Down’s.
Now, I don’t actually know for sure, but I’d imagine that Phillips supports a woman’s right to choose. But it’s interesting that she wants to take that right away in some circumstances.
As far as I understand, Sally Phillips doesn't regard Downs Syndrome as a disability severe enough to warrant abortion. Indeed (via her own son with Downs) she sees Downs as an important strand in the human tapestry.
Her documentary "A world without Downs" is a very thoughtful and nuanced discussion of the issues around abortion for Downs, and fair to both sides, not the usual trench warfare that is seen on the subject. I highly recommend it. It asks the question "What sort of world do we want, and who should be allowed to live in it?"
What is considered a severe disability under Section E of the abortion Act is not defined, and is well worth discussion. Spina Bifida? Anencephally? Downs, cleft palate?
Absolutely, it’s a very interesting and difficult subject. But... there is a difficulty in arguing for the right to choose but then saying not in those cases.
And actually, as long as the limit is 24 weeks without caveat, this is purely academic. If a woman can have an abortion anyway, how we view children with Down’s doesn’t come into it.
The issue is more that the medical professionals have been known to push hard for all these tests, and then push hard on the woman to have an abortion if any of the tests are positive. There are many reports of vulnerable families being pressured into abortions, this is one of the subjects of the Sally Philips documentary referenced above.
That’s obviously a very different issue. I don’t think you’ll find too many in favour of forced abortions.
Horrors of slavery should be taught alongside Holocaust, says Prince Charles
The Prince of Wales wants slavery to be publicly acknowledged, taught in schools and given the same national level of importance as the Holocaust.
Charles, who spoke of his “personal sorrow” at the UK’s historical links with the slave trade during his visit to Rwanda last week, will campaign for greater public awareness of slavery, which has dogged the royal family’s recent overseas tours.
Prince Charles is in serious danger of sparking a republican movement on the right.
He's gone up in my estimation though.
You can vote for him once we have a Republic then.
The reason the Queen is popular is that she doesn't express any opinion, except the least contentious things, without having it passed by HMG first. I expect there have been a few times when HMG would have liked her to say something and she's toned it down.
I'm all for a debate about teaching slavery to British school kids (with a practical component, obvs) but if Charles thinks that is the role of a constitutional monarchy then he is mistaken. It is a divisive move (even if it is right) and the role of a constitutional monarch is to unite.
I thought perhaps he had mellowed in age and now had more sense, but it's clear Charles wants to achieve things while he is monarch.
Horrors of slavery should be taught alongside Holocaust, says Prince Charles
The Prince of Wales wants slavery to be publicly acknowledged, taught in schools and given the same national level of importance as the Holocaust.
Charles, who spoke of his “personal sorrow” at the UK’s historical links with the slave trade during his visit to Rwanda last week, will campaign for greater public awareness of slavery, which has dogged the royal family’s recent overseas tours.
I’m a long time out of school, but when I was there, there seemed a massive amount of time devoted to the Nazis. Now this was the 80’s, and thus the holocaust etc was more recent and in the minds of those setting the syllabus. Some argue it’s a antique evil, but I’m not so sure. Reframing our past to look critically at the whole world and the whole of history is not easy. Was it worse to be worked to death as a slave in a roman tin mine or on a Caribbean sugar plantation? But there certainly should be balance - you should teach the British empire story, but all sides of it. Don’t celebrate Wiberforce without wondering why it was necessary.
My O level history was driven entirely by the syllabus: Britain and Europe 1815 to 1914. I learnt more about the unification of Germany and Italy than I ever did about slavery.
Edit: The unification of Germany and the unification of Italy, not the two together - at least not as I learnt it!
Pretty much ditto - we did nothing on slavery or the Holocaust. I remember a lot on the Peninsular war, the creation of Belgium and the Reform Acts! A levels was 1848, Napoleon III, the Paris Commune, the Risorgimento and German unification.
My O level in 1981 was on British economic and social history 1700-1913. Basically enclosures, Chartism, Poor laws, canals, turnpikes, and related aspects of the industrial revolution. A bit dry at times, very little politics or military, but has been very useful for understanding modern Britain.
I did all of the above in my lessons at school, and my Oxford children's history of Britain volumes (published 1983) pulled no punches about slavery.
But, you've got to understand this isn't really about teaching slavery in schools: it's about teaching it incessantly and in a certain way in order to inculcate a sense of shame about Britain and guilt about its past into future generations, and is thus highly political.
Yes. This is how they intend to smuggle Critical Race Theory into British schools
Because it’s been SUCH a success in America and has, in no way, provoked intense loathing and a backlash on the American Right
I went to view a (private) secondary school we were considering for one of my daughters recently. It was painfully woke. "Some people are trans, get over it" declared posters all around the school. Barrages of newspaper headlines from the Independent about BLM, climate change and Brexit. "Join the equality society!", pupils were repeatedly urged. We looked in on a history lesson, which, naturally, was about slavery. Toilets for boys, toilets for girls and toilets for 'whatever'. Posters decrying the evils of gender stereotypes. You expect this kind of shit in schools where the council can set the agenda, but it's a bit disappointing that this is also what you get if you pay for it. It was like being in Twitter.
Sadly, there's probably a market for it amongst certain well-off guardianista types.
It's quite simple for me: I'll pull my daughter out of any school that tries to pull shit like that on her.
Horrors of slavery should be taught alongside Holocaust, says Prince Charles
The Prince of Wales wants slavery to be publicly acknowledged, taught in schools and given the same national level of importance as the Holocaust.
Charles, who spoke of his “personal sorrow” at the UK’s historical links with the slave trade during his visit to Rwanda last week, will campaign for greater public awareness of slavery, which has dogged the royal family’s recent overseas tours.
Prince Charles is in serious danger of sparking a republican movement on the right.
He's gone up in my estimation though.
Our estimation of the suitability if future monarchs should not be based on whether they agree or disagree with us in their public utterances, but whether they can successfully say nothing at all. Because if they can't, they and their institution are doomed.
Unfortunately, Prince Charles labours under the misapprehension that people are interested in what he thinks and what he has to say.
If you have no interest, why all the above comments ? And if no one has any interest in what he has to say, why do his comments matter at all ? (I actually agree with the point, which is why his comments don’t bother me in the slightest.)
The problem for most republicans is that, being progressive, they have to grit their teeth and admit that Prince Charles has long been on “their” side on many issues.
Oh, and the slave trade should be taught in schools. As it, er… actually is. My daughters learnt all about the triangular trade. They even appreciated my story about giving a lesson on it way back in the day…
I'd argue that more can be learnt about Britain today by learning about the triangular trade than can be learnt from anything (everything?) from 1066 to Lizzie I. So many areas of interest can spring off it: not just slavery, but the way empires grow, spread and decay; the rise of different countries; wealth; even the start of the industrial revolution (via resources and finance).
Boris usually gives good interview. Upbeat, sunlit uplands in sight, never caught out or needing to pause to find an answer, etc
Yesterday's on R4 he was none of these things. As though the kryptonite was wearing off in front of our eyes.
He was (more) unsure, hesitant, unknowing than I have ever heard him.
Is this it?
"Boris usually gives good interview". Really?
"Buses, errrrrrrr, I like buses". Hiding in fridges etc.
Johnson hasn't even been convincing with the "sunny uplands" schtick since he became Prime Minister, or certainly after he won his landslide.
I am intrigued by all the Dick Dastardly stuff posted on here this morning. Could Johnson really utilise Raab and Braverman's unparalleled legal expertise to manipulate the electoral system in order to retain power for a third term? Bear n mind Dick Dastardly's fate at the end of each Wacky Races episode.
It will be fascinating to watch.
The Boris Blether is a good interview trick. At its best, it gives the impression of answering questions without doing so- you only notice the lack of an answer when it's too late. At worst, it gives time to think of an answer.
If he can't even do that, it's an indication that something's not right.
Horrors of slavery should be taught alongside Holocaust, says Prince Charles
The Prince of Wales wants slavery to be publicly acknowledged, taught in schools and given the same national level of importance as the Holocaust.
Charles, who spoke of his “personal sorrow” at the UK’s historical links with the slave trade during his visit to Rwanda last week, will campaign for greater public awareness of slavery, which has dogged the royal family’s recent overseas tours.
Prince Charles is in serious danger of sparking a republican movement on the right.
And Prince William is even more woke than his father.
I've been pretty lonely on the republican right but I've been saying for years that King Charles III will ensure I'm not lonely.
In terms of winning over young people for the monarchy they are both right though, a pure anti Woke agenda is not sustainable long term for the right
That's right (and note that it's HYUFD saying it, not the Guardian).
Personally I don't think the monarch or soon-to-be-monarch should express an opinion on anything - not slavery, not architecture, not GM. Nothing. But I can see a case for the monarch, supposedly representing all the people of all the countries in the Commonwealth, showing that they are alive to the significance of slavery in the context of Imperial history.
Bottom line, though, is that a fundamental point of monarchy is that none of us have the slightest right to tell the monarch what to do and say. They can be woke, anti-woke, communist, fascist, devil-worshipping, whatever. If one believes in monarchy one accepts that the outcome is entirely out of our control. That's why, ultimately, it's a daft way to choose the national leader.
Horrors of slavery should be taught alongside Holocaust, says Prince Charles
The Prince of Wales wants slavery to be publicly acknowledged, taught in schools and given the same national level of importance as the Holocaust.
Charles, who spoke of his “personal sorrow” at the UK’s historical links with the slave trade during his visit to Rwanda last week, will campaign for greater public awareness of slavery, which has dogged the royal family’s recent overseas tours.
I’m a long time out of school, but when I was there, there seemed a massive amount of time devoted to the Nazis. Now this was the 80’s, and thus the holocaust etc was more recent and in the minds of those setting the syllabus. Some argue it’s a antique evil, but I’m not so sure. Reframing our past to look critically at the whole world and the whole of history is not easy. Was it worse to be worked to death as a slave in a roman tin mine or on a Caribbean sugar plantation? But there certainly should be balance - you should teach the British empire story, but all sides of it. Don’t celebrate Wiberforce without wondering why it was necessary.
My O level history was driven entirely by the syllabus: Britain and Europe 1815 to 1914. I learnt more about the unification of Germany and Italy than I ever did about slavery.
Edit: The unification of Germany and the unification of Italy, not the two together - at least not as I learnt it!
Pretty much ditto - we did nothing on slavery or the Holocaust. I remember a lot on the Peninsular war, the creation of Belgium and the Reform Acts! A levels was 1848, Napoleon III, the Paris Commune, the Risorgimento and German unification.
My O level in 1981 was on British economic and social history 1700-1913. Basically enclosures, Chartism, Poor laws, canals, turnpikes, and related aspects of the industrial revolution. A bit dry at times, very little politics or military, but has been very useful for understanding modern Britain.
I did all of the above in my lessons at school, and my Oxford children's history of Britain volumes (published 1983) pulled no punches about slavery.
But, you've got to understand this isn't really about teaching slavery in schools: it's about teaching it incessantly and in a certain way in order to inculcate a sense of shame about Britain and guilt about its past into future generations, and is thus highly political.
Yes. This is how they intend to smuggle Critical Race Theory into British schools
Because it’s been SUCH a success in America and has, in no way, provoked intense loathing and a backlash on the American Right
I went to view a (private) secondary school we were considering for one of my daughters recently. It was painfully woke. "Some people are trans, get over it" declared posters all around the school. Barrages of newspaper headlines from the Independent about BLM, climate change and Brexit. "Join the equality society!", pupils were repeatedly urged. We looked in on a history lesson, which, naturally, was about slavery. Toilets for boys, toilets for girls and toilets for 'whatever'. Posters decrying the evils of gender stereotypes. You expect this kind of shit in schools where the council can set the agenda, but it's a bit disappointing that this is also what you get if you pay for it. It was like being in Twitter.
One of the subjects that keeps coming up out here in Expatville is education. There are people taking jobs out here specifically for the schools - international, UK, US and IB curriculum, but with none of the woke nonesense on top of it.
of course in many countries where "British" education is provided privately, being gay is a criminal offence (capital in some) so obviously "woke nonsense" is avoided.....
The problem with any history syllabus is that there's so much darned history, and the bastards keep on making more of it.
Take GCSE maths. It should be fairly easy to decide what is in a GCSE maths syllabus (will get harder at A-level though). Numbers, algebra, statistics, geometry, graphs, etc, at a basic level. A pass mark in GCSE maths should mean a pupil has enough maths skills to cope with everyday life.
But history... what do you teach about history? Of the massive amount of history out there, what do you choose to teach? And why those particular choices?
It is not just that there is lots of history; after all, there are lots of French words and even more numbers. In olden times, history was taught as a gentle amble through the history of wherever you lived and then Britain, in chronological order, with emphasis on regnal dates and battles. That is what Michael Gove wanted to return to. It will have included slavery.
Now, GCSE history has been chopped up into modules, presented out of order. Lots is left out; some is included about foreigners like the unification of Italy; some barely history at all like Middle East wars since the 1990s. Maybe Prince Charles is saying there should be a compulsory slavery topic; possibly he is struggling to remember what he learned at school in 1960s Scotland.
There is also the problem that history does not get harder in the same way that other subjects do, like maths or physics (even though those subjects are taught in opposite directions) so if you did teach in chronological order, children will necessarily be younger at the slave trade than at the Holocaust, although they might have dropped history by then.
Absolutely, but a referendum announcement usually prompts a flurry of polls. We have… none. Which looks suspicious.
They know it is just more bluff to keep kicking it down the road . She is running out of road, all the stolen money , perjury case et c can only be held up for so long. Many of these crooks will get their day in court.
Sorry Malc, I am genuinely losing the plot. You are pro-independence but anti-Sturgeon, have I got that right?
Yes indeed, she is all talk and no action and crooked into the bargain. She is wrecking scotland, her and her bunch of self id creeps and gravy trainers. They have no principles.
I am not disagreeing with what you are saying at all. But in your mind would they deliver a different independence than ALBA? An independence self serving to their party or just different on key bits than Alba?
Alba is the perfect name for a Scottish Nationalist political party btw.
Alba would be a good name if the cheap hifi brand had not got their first.
Boris usually gives good interview. Upbeat, sunlit uplands in sight, never caught out or needing to pause to find an answer, etc
Yesterday's on R4 he was none of these things. As though the kryptonite was wearing off in front of our eyes.
He was (more) unsure, hesitant, unknowing than I have ever heard him.
Is this it?
"Boris usually gives good interview". Really?
"Buses, errrrrrrr, I like buses". Hiding in fridges etc.
Johnson hasn't even been convincing with the "sunny uplands" schtick since he became Prime Minister, or certainly after he won his landslide.
I am intrigued by all the Dick Dastardly stuff posted on here this morning. Could Johnson really utilise Raab and Braverman's unparalleled legal expertise to manipulate the electoral system in order to retain power for a third term? Bear n mind Dick Dastardly's fate at the end of each Wacky Races episode.
It will be fascinating to watch.
The Boris Blether is a good interview trick. At its best, it gives the impression of answering questions without doing so- you only notice the lack of an answer when it's too late. At worst, it gives time to think of an answer.
If he can't even do that, it's an indication that something's not right.
As that unherd article I linked nails, I think, the problem he has is that the issues of economics and finance that we increasingly face aren't as susceptible to the sort of humorous dissembling that he has got away with previously. They will need hard answers and clear decisions.
Sad news from Ukraine overnight, a number of missiles launched from Belarus into Ukraine, targeting cities including Kiev, and hitting residential buildings - places where things had started to return to some sense of normality, even as war continues to rage in the East of the country. https://t.me/dtpkiev/297578
The missiles were, of course, Russian.
It’s a pretty obvious attempt by Russia to provoke Ukrainian retaliation and so draw Belarus into the war, which it has so far largely avoided, despite Lukashenko’s cooperation with Putin.
Horrors of slavery should be taught alongside Holocaust, says Prince Charles
The Prince of Wales wants slavery to be publicly acknowledged, taught in schools and given the same national level of importance as the Holocaust.
Charles, who spoke of his “personal sorrow” at the UK’s historical links with the slave trade during his visit to Rwanda last week, will campaign for greater public awareness of slavery, which has dogged the royal family’s recent overseas tours.
Prince Charles is in serious danger of sparking a republican movement on the right.
He's gone up in my estimation though.
You can vote for him once we have a Republic then.
The reason the Queen is popular is that she doesn't express any opinion, except the least contentious things, without having it passed by HMG first. I expect there have been a few times when HMG would have liked her to say something and she's toned it down.
I'm all for a debate about teaching slavery to British school kids (with a practical component, obvs) but if Charles thinks that is the role of a constitutional monarchy then he is mistaken. It is a divisive move (even if it is right) and the role of a constitutional monarch is to unite.
I thought perhaps he had mellowed in age and now had more sense, but it's clear Charles wants to achieve things while he is monarch.
I think he just can't help himself.
He's 50% The Duke of Edinburgh after all, and has a lifetime of resentments on top going all the way back to abandonment issues as a child and his experiences at Gordonstoun.
Horrors of slavery should be taught alongside Holocaust, says Prince Charles
The Prince of Wales wants slavery to be publicly acknowledged, taught in schools and given the same national level of importance as the Holocaust.
Charles, who spoke of his “personal sorrow” at the UK’s historical links with the slave trade during his visit to Rwanda last week, will campaign for greater public awareness of slavery, which has dogged the royal family’s recent overseas tours.
Prince Charles is in serious danger of sparking a republican movement on the right.
And Prince William is even more woke than his father.
I've been pretty lonely on the republican right but I've been saying for years that King Charles III will ensure I'm not lonely.
In terms of winning over young people for the monarchy they are both right though, a pure anti Woke agenda is not sustainable long term for the right
That's right (and note that it's HYUFD saying it, not the Guardian).
Personally I don't think the monarch or soon-to-be-monarch should express an opinion on anything - not slavery, not architecture, not GM. Nothing. But I can see a case for the monarch, supposedly representing all the people of all the countries in the Commonwealth, showing that they are alive to the significance of slavery in the context of Imperial history.
Bottom line, though, is that a fundamental point of monarchy is that none of us have the slightest right to tell the monarch what to do and say. They can be woke, anti-woke, communist, fascist, devil-worshipping, whatever. If one believes in monarchy one accepts that the outcome is entirely out of our control. That's why, ultimately, it's a daft way to choose the national leader.
A daft way to choose the national figurehead. The monarch is not the national leader: head of state but not head of government.
Horrors of slavery should be taught alongside Holocaust, says Prince Charles
The Prince of Wales wants slavery to be publicly acknowledged, taught in schools and given the same national level of importance as the Holocaust.
Charles, who spoke of his “personal sorrow” at the UK’s historical links with the slave trade during his visit to Rwanda last week, will campaign for greater public awareness of slavery, which has dogged the royal family’s recent overseas tours.
I’m a long time out of school, but when I was there, there seemed a massive amount of time devoted to the Nazis. Now this was the 80’s, and thus the holocaust etc was more recent and in the minds of those setting the syllabus. Some argue it’s a antique evil, but I’m not so sure. Reframing our past to look critically at the whole world and the whole of history is not easy. Was it worse to be worked to death as a slave in a roman tin mine or on a Caribbean sugar plantation? But there certainly should be balance - you should teach the British empire story, but all sides of it. Don’t celebrate Wiberforce without wondering why it was necessary.
My O level history was driven entirely by the syllabus: Britain and Europe 1815 to 1914. I learnt more about the unification of Germany and Italy than I ever did about slavery.
Edit: The unification of Germany and the unification of Italy, not the two together - at least not as I learnt it!
Pretty much ditto - we did nothing on slavery or the Holocaust. I remember a lot on the Peninsular war, the creation of Belgium and the Reform Acts! A levels was 1848, Napoleon III, the Paris Commune, the Risorgimento and German unification.
My O level in 1981 was on British economic and social history 1700-1913. Basically enclosures, Chartism, Poor laws, canals, turnpikes, and related aspects of the industrial revolution. A bit dry at times, very little politics or military, but has been very useful for understanding modern Britain.
I did all of the above in my lessons at school, and my Oxford children's history of Britain volumes (published 1983) pulled no punches about slavery.
But, you've got to understand this isn't really about teaching slavery in schools: it's about teaching it incessantly and in a certain way in order to inculcate a sense of shame about Britain and guilt about its past into future generations, and is thus highly political.
Yes. This is how they intend to smuggle Critical Race Theory into British schools
Because it’s been SUCH a success in America and has, in no way, provoked intense loathing and a backlash on the American Right
I went to view a (private) secondary school we were considering for one of my daughters recently. It was painfully woke. "Some people are trans, get over it" declared posters all around the school. Barrages of newspaper headlines from the Independent about BLM, climate change and Brexit. "Join the equality society!", pupils were repeatedly urged. We looked in on a history lesson, which, naturally, was about slavery. Toilets for boys, toilets for girls and toilets for 'whatever'. Posters decrying the evils of gender stereotypes. You expect this kind of shit in schools where the council can set the agenda, but it's a bit disappointing that this is also what you get if you pay for it. It was like being in Twitter.
Sadly, there's probably a market for it amongst certain well-off guardianista types.
It's quite simple for me: I'll pull my daughter out of any school that tries to pull shit like that on her.
Horrors of slavery should be taught alongside Holocaust, says Prince Charles
The Prince of Wales wants slavery to be publicly acknowledged, taught in schools and given the same national level of importance as the Holocaust.
Charles, who spoke of his “personal sorrow” at the UK’s historical links with the slave trade during his visit to Rwanda last week, will campaign for greater public awareness of slavery, which has dogged the royal family’s recent overseas tours.
I’m a long time out of school, but when I was there, there seemed a massive amount of time devoted to the Nazis. Now this was the 80’s, and thus the holocaust etc was more recent and in the minds of those setting the syllabus. Some argue it’s a antique evil, but I’m not so sure. Reframing our past to look critically at the whole world and the whole of history is not easy. Was it worse to be worked to death as a slave in a roman tin mine or on a Caribbean sugar plantation? But there certainly should be balance - you should teach the British empire story, but all sides of it. Don’t celebrate Wiberforce without wondering why it was necessary.
My O level history was driven entirely by the syllabus: Britain and Europe 1815 to 1914. I learnt more about the unification of Germany and Italy than I ever did about slavery.
Edit: The unification of Germany and the unification of Italy, not the two together - at least not as I learnt it!
Pretty much ditto - we did nothing on slavery or the Holocaust. I remember a lot on the Peninsular war, the creation of Belgium and the Reform Acts! A levels was 1848, Napoleon III, the Paris Commune, the Risorgimento and German unification.
My O level in 1981 was on British economic and social history 1700-1913. Basically enclosures, Chartism, Poor laws, canals, turnpikes, and related aspects of the industrial revolution. A bit dry at times, very little politics or military, but has been very useful for understanding modern Britain.
I did all of the above in my lessons at school, and my Oxford children's history of Britain volumes (published 1983) pulled no punches about slavery.
But, you've got to understand this isn't really about teaching slavery in schools: it's about teaching it incessantly and in a certain way in order to inculcate a sense of shame about Britain and guilt about its past into future generations, and is thus highly political.
Yes. This is how they intend to smuggle Critical Race Theory into British schools
Because it’s been SUCH a success in America and has, in no way, provoked intense loathing and a backlash on the American Right
I went to view a (private) secondary school we were considering for one of my daughters recently. It was painfully woke. "Some people are trans, get over it" declared posters all around the school. Barrages of newspaper headlines from the Independent about BLM, climate change and Brexit. "Join the equality society!", pupils were repeatedly urged. We looked in on a history lesson, which, naturally, was about slavery. Toilets for boys, toilets for girls and toilets for 'whatever'. Posters decrying the evils of gender stereotypes. You expect this kind of shit in schools where the council can set the agenda, but it's a bit disappointing that this is also what you get if you pay for it. It was like being in Twitter.
Save your money - you don't get that in most state secondary schools these days. And as for "the council can set the agenda" - nonsense. 80% of secondary schools are academies or free schools, where the council has no power whatsoever. And in the remaining 20%, councils don't have any real say. It's not like the LEAs of the 1980s. If state schools are too 'woke', blame the DfE, not the councils.
Horrors of slavery should be taught alongside Holocaust, says Prince Charles
The Prince of Wales wants slavery to be publicly acknowledged, taught in schools and given the same national level of importance as the Holocaust.
Charles, who spoke of his “personal sorrow” at the UK’s historical links with the slave trade during his visit to Rwanda last week, will campaign for greater public awareness of slavery, which has dogged the royal family’s recent overseas tours.
I’m a long time out of school, but when I was there, there seemed a massive amount of time devoted to the Nazis. Now this was the 80’s, and thus the holocaust etc was more recent and in the minds of those setting the syllabus. Some argue it’s a antique evil, but I’m not so sure. Reframing our past to look critically at the whole world and the whole of history is not easy. Was it worse to be worked to death as a slave in a roman tin mine or on a Caribbean sugar plantation? But there certainly should be balance - you should teach the British empire story, but all sides of it. Don’t celebrate Wiberforce without wondering why it was necessary.
My O level history was driven entirely by the syllabus: Britain and Europe 1815 to 1914. I learnt more about the unification of Germany and Italy than I ever did about slavery.
Edit: The unification of Germany and the unification of Italy, not the two together - at least not as I learnt it!
Pretty much ditto - we did nothing on slavery or the Holocaust. I remember a lot on the Peninsular war, the creation of Belgium and the Reform Acts! A levels was 1848, Napoleon III, the Paris Commune, the Risorgimento and German unification.
My O level in 1981 was on British economic and social history 1700-1913. Basically enclosures, Chartism, Poor laws, canals, turnpikes, and related aspects of the industrial revolution. A bit dry at times, very little politics or military, but has been very useful for understanding modern Britain.
I did all of the above in my lessons at school, and my Oxford children's history of Britain volumes (published 1983) pulled no punches about slavery.
But, you've got to understand this isn't really about teaching slavery in schools: it's about teaching it incessantly and in a certain way in order to inculcate a sense of shame about Britain and guilt about its past into future generations, and is thus highly political.
Yes. This is how they intend to smuggle Critical Race Theory into British schools
Because it’s been SUCH a success in America and has, in no way, provoked intense loathing and a backlash on the American Right
I went to view a (private) secondary school we were considering for one of my daughters recently. It was painfully woke. "Some people are trans, get over it" declared posters all around the school. Barrages of newspaper headlines from the Independent about BLM, climate change and Brexit. "Join the equality society!", pupils were repeatedly urged. We looked in on a history lesson, which, naturally, was about slavery. Toilets for boys, toilets for girls and toilets for 'whatever'. Posters decrying the evils of gender stereotypes. You expect this kind of shit in schools where the council can set the agenda, but it's a bit disappointing that this is also what you get if you pay for it. It was like being in Twitter.
The strange thing is, the private schools apparently have it worse than state schools. My older daughter has just finished her GCSEs at a very good London comp. It’s Wokeness is, so far, quite modest (albeit growing). Ditto my other daughter at another good state school near Sydney, Oz
Contrast that with an experience like ex-PBer Charles, and now you, in the private sector
Are there really enough horribly Woke Viz-style “Modern Parents” to sustain this? The point about private education is that you CAN choose, and I reckon most parents will choose No
The problem with any history syllabus is that there's so much darned history, and the bastards keep on making more of it.
Take GCSE maths. It should be fairly easy to decide what is in a GCSE maths syllabus (will get harder at A-level though). Numbers, algebra, statistics, geometry, graphs, etc, at a basic level. A pass mark in GCSE maths should mean a pupil has enough maths skills to cope with everyday life.
But history... what do you teach about history? Of the massive amount of history out there, what do you choose to teach? And why those particular choices?
It is not just that there is lots of history; after all, there are lots of French words and even more numbers. In olden times, history was taught as a gentle amble through the history of wherever you lived and then Britain, in chronological order, with emphasis on regnal dates and battles. That is what Michael Gove wanted to return to. It will have included slavery.
Now, GCSE history has been chopped up into modules, presented out of order. Lots is left out; some is included about foreigners like the unification of Italy; some barely history at all like Middle East wars since the 1990s. Maybe Prince Charles is saying there should be a compulsory slavery topic; possibly he is struggling to remember what he learned at school in 1960s Scotland.
There is also the problem that history does not get harder in the same way that other subjects do, like maths or physics (even though those subjects are taught in opposite directions) so if you did teach in chronological order, children will necessarily be younger at the slave trade than at the Holocaust, although they might have dropped history by then.
I agree, but not sure what you mean about opposite directions for maths and physics?.....
Doesn’t Boris have a point? Everyone knew he was a shit, but Tory MPs nominated him anyway, Tory members confirmed him and he was elected with a big majority by his his blukip style coalition. A section of the Tory party getting buyers remorse three years on is a little weak.
We should still take the opportunity to laugh at the idiots who thought the office would change the man. Ha ha.
As expected Boris has remained the same dishonest, incompetent, lazy, bumbling idiot he has always been. He's so plainly out of his depth it's not funny. He was just as bad when Mayor, and should never have risen to the heights of being the Foreign Secretary, him being the PM is a bad joke that has been taken too far.
Any remotely sensible political party would have acted by now. We know the PM is not fit for office, and now we know that neither are the Tories.
Horrors of slavery should be taught alongside Holocaust, says Prince Charles
The Prince of Wales wants slavery to be publicly acknowledged, taught in schools and given the same national level of importance as the Holocaust.
Charles, who spoke of his “personal sorrow” at the UK’s historical links with the slave trade during his visit to Rwanda last week, will campaign for greater public awareness of slavery, which has dogged the royal family’s recent overseas tours.
Prince Charles is in serious danger of sparking a republican movement on the right.
And Prince William is even more woke than his father.
I've been pretty lonely on the republican right but I've been saying for years that King Charles III will ensure I'm not lonely.
In terms of winning over young people for the monarchy they are both right though, a pure anti Woke agenda is not sustainable long term for the right
That's right (and note that it's HYUFD saying it, not the Guardian).
Personally I don't think the monarch or soon-to-be-monarch should express an opinion on anything - not slavery, not architecture, not GM. Nothing. But I can see a case for the monarch, supposedly representing all the people of all the countries in the Commonwealth, showing that they are alive to the significance of slavery in the context of Imperial history.
Bottom line, though, is that a fundamental point of monarchy is that none of us have the slightest right to tell the monarch what to do and say. They can be woke, anti-woke, communist, fascist, devil-worshipping, whatever. If one believes in monarchy one accepts that the outcome is entirely out of our control. That's why, ultimately, it's a daft way to choose the national leader.
The other option, if you accept a constitutional monarchy, is for everyone to pay no heed at all to the musings of any given monarch.
Unless they are being actually offensive, accept that like everyone else they have opinions, and that unlike politicians with power, those opinions carry only the weight of their inherent sense, or lack of it.
That not to say that HMQ is no a better example than her son is likely to be, but to recognise that a hereditary institution has to take the rough with the smooth.
BBC’s Amol Rajan criticised for using phrase ‘pro-life’ in Roe v Wade interview
The term, which is considered partisan, was used twice by Amol Rajan during Saturday morning’s Today programme on Radio 4, in segments about the landmark ruling ending Americans’ constitutional right to abortion.
The BBC News style guide advises journalists to “use anti-abortion rather than pro-life, except where it is part of the title of a group’s name”.
Hannah Barham-Brown, deputy leader of the Women’s Equality party, said: “Anti-choice campaigners have long tried to hide behind the facade of being ‘pro-life’ when the reality is that they are anything but – they are really trying to restrict women’s freedoms.”
This is interesting. I can only speak for myself, but my views on this subject are not influenced by wanting to restrict women’s freedoms. I wonder if deep down the words pro life are quite difficult for some on the pro choice side of the debate?
I’m a pragmatist, but if I’m honest, once there’s a heartbeat, I think abortion is murder. But I think it’s justified murder to a point (personally I’d go for 12 weeks rather than 24 weeks). Perhaps some on the pro choice side of the debate wouldn’t like to hear that, but this is a very difficult issue, and we should be honest about what abortion is.
Interesting to hear on the BBC the qualification about states banning abortion except where there is risk to the mother. This nuance seemed to be missing in a lot of the comments previously. I don’t agree with the decision, but it suggests that changes will be a death sentence for women with ectopic pregnancies is a bit overblown.
Trouble with that is there is always a risk to the mother in childbirth, and after. That could be the next thing to go, if it isn't already in some states.
Fair enough, but I saw a lot of nonsense about ectopic pregnancies yesterday/Friday, including on PB.
The Louisianna trigger law banned in all cases including ectopic pregnancy.
Three days ago the Dem governor signed a compromise ammendment that made an exception for ectopic pregnancies but still allows individual counties to ban even in the case of ectopic pregnancies.
At a political rally in 2021, Miller praised Hitler & paraphrased a line that Hitler gave during a 1935 Nazi rally. Her mention of “white life” sounds about alt-righthttps://twitter.com/acyn/status/1540852015693037568
Putting aside the obvious neo-nazism, I don't follow her logic. She thinks only white woman are having abortions?
It's actually the other way around: black women are more likely to have abortions than white ones. So, she's actually supporting a policy that makes the Great Replacement more likely.
This is kind of mostly pointless because they'll just end up shuffling other production around so India buys more from Russia and less from somebody else then the UK buys more from somebody else.
What they should be doing is reducing *overall demand* for gold. They could start by putting VAT on it even when bought as an "investment", like Japan does. Raises some tax revenue, and defunds China a little bit as well.
Can they afford to do that? After all what will it do to Conservative party finances?
I've never understood how it was made VAT exempt in the first place.
Horrors of slavery should be taught alongside Holocaust, says Prince Charles
The Prince of Wales wants slavery to be publicly acknowledged, taught in schools and given the same national level of importance as the Holocaust.
Charles, who spoke of his “personal sorrow” at the UK’s historical links with the slave trade during his visit to Rwanda last week, will campaign for greater public awareness of slavery, which has dogged the royal family’s recent overseas tours.
I’m a long time out of school, but when I was there, there seemed a massive amount of time devoted to the Nazis. Now this was the 80’s, and thus the holocaust etc was more recent and in the minds of those setting the syllabus. Some argue it’s a antique evil, but I’m not so sure. Reframing our past to look critically at the whole world and the whole of history is not easy. Was it worse to be worked to death as a slave in a roman tin mine or on a Caribbean sugar plantation? But there certainly should be balance - you should teach the British empire story, but all sides of it. Don’t celebrate Wiberforce without wondering why it was necessary.
My O level history was driven entirely by the syllabus: Britain and Europe 1815 to 1914. I learnt more about the unification of Germany and Italy than I ever did about slavery.
Edit: The unification of Germany and the unification of Italy, not the two together - at least not as I learnt it!
Pretty much ditto - we did nothing on slavery or the Holocaust. I remember a lot on the Peninsular war, the creation of Belgium and the Reform Acts! A levels was 1848, Napoleon III, the Paris Commune, the Risorgimento and German unification.
My O level in 1981 was on British economic and social history 1700-1913. Basically enclosures, Chartism, Poor laws, canals, turnpikes, and related aspects of the industrial revolution. A bit dry at times, very little politics or military, but has been very useful for understanding modern Britain.
I did all of the above in my lessons at school, and my Oxford children's history of Britain volumes (published 1983) pulled no punches about slavery.
But, you've got to understand this isn't really about teaching slavery in schools: it's about teaching it incessantly and in a certain way in order to inculcate a sense of shame about Britain and guilt about its past into future generations, and is thus highly political.
Yes. This is how they intend to smuggle Critical Race Theory into British schools
Because it’s been SUCH a success in America and has, in no way, provoked intense loathing and a backlash on the American Right
I went to view a (private) secondary school we were considering for one of my daughters recently. It was painfully woke. "Some people are trans, get over it" declared posters all around the school. Barrages of newspaper headlines from the Independent about BLM, climate change and Brexit. "Join the equality society!", pupils were repeatedly urged. We looked in on a history lesson, which, naturally, was about slavery. Toilets for boys, toilets for girls and toilets for 'whatever'. Posters decrying the evils of gender stereotypes. You expect this kind of shit in schools where the council can set the agenda, but it's a bit disappointing that this is also what you get if you pay for it. It was like being in Twitter.
Statistically, it's hard to have more than one-in-twenty history lessons over an eight year secondary period being about slavery.
So, it is more likely that the school thought that it's audience - i.e. you - care about it.
Horrors of slavery should be taught alongside Holocaust, says Prince Charles
The Prince of Wales wants slavery to be publicly acknowledged, taught in schools and given the same national level of importance as the Holocaust.
Charles, who spoke of his “personal sorrow” at the UK’s historical links with the slave trade during his visit to Rwanda last week, will campaign for greater public awareness of slavery, which has dogged the royal family’s recent overseas tours.
Prince Charles is in serious danger of sparking a republican movement on the right.
And Prince William is even more woke than his father.
I've been pretty lonely on the republican right but I've been saying for years that King Charles III will ensure I'm not lonely.
In terms of winning over young people for the monarchy they are both right though, a pure anti Woke agenda is not sustainable long term for the right
That's right (and note that it's HYUFD saying it, not the Guardian).
Personally I don't think the monarch or soon-to-be-monarch should express an opinion on anything - not slavery, not architecture, not GM. Nothing. But I can see a case for the monarch, supposedly representing all the people of all the countries in the Commonwealth, showing that they are alive to the significance of slavery in the context of Imperial history.
Bottom line, though, is that a fundamental point of monarchy is that none of us have the slightest right to tell the monarch what to do and say. They can be woke, anti-woke, communist, fascist, devil-worshipping, whatever. If one believes in monarchy one accepts that the outcome is entirely out of our control. That's why, ultimately, it's a daft way to choose the national leader.
We have a constitutional monarchy, not an absolute one, which means the hereditary absolutists lost that argument more than three hundred years ago. We had a refresher course on this principle with the monarch before the one before the incumbent.
It's one of the absurdities of the current situation (or one of the typically perfect British compromises if you're a supporter).
On the monarchy it's interesting to compare ours with the situation in Thailand. The previous King was regarded almost as a saint; however his successor seems to be doing very little to earn the same respect! Indeed it was even suggested semi-seriously that one of his sisters take over the throne!
Horrors of slavery should be taught alongside Holocaust, says Prince Charles
The Prince of Wales wants slavery to be publicly acknowledged, taught in schools and given the same national level of importance as the Holocaust.
Charles, who spoke of his “personal sorrow” at the UK’s historical links with the slave trade during his visit to Rwanda last week, will campaign for greater public awareness of slavery, which has dogged the royal family’s recent overseas tours.
I’m a long time out of school, but when I was there, there seemed a massive amount of time devoted to the Nazis. Now this was the 80’s, and thus the holocaust etc was more recent and in the minds of those setting the syllabus. Some argue it’s a antique evil, but I’m not so sure. Reframing our past to look critically at the whole world and the whole of history is not easy. Was it worse to be worked to death as a slave in a roman tin mine or on a Caribbean sugar plantation? But there certainly should be balance - you should teach the British empire story, but all sides of it. Don’t celebrate Wiberforce without wondering why it was necessary.
My O level history was driven entirely by the syllabus: Britain and Europe 1815 to 1914. I learnt more about the unification of Germany and Italy than I ever did about slavery.
Edit: The unification of Germany and the unification of Italy, not the two together - at least not as I learnt it!
Pretty much ditto - we did nothing on slavery or the Holocaust. I remember a lot on the Peninsular war, the creation of Belgium and the Reform Acts! A levels was 1848, Napoleon III, the Paris Commune, the Risorgimento and German unification.
My O level in 1981 was on British economic and social history 1700-1913. Basically enclosures, Chartism, Poor laws, canals, turnpikes, and related aspects of the industrial revolution. A bit dry at times, very little politics or military, but has been very useful for understanding modern Britain.
I was taught about the slave triangle at about the age of 9 but purely as a geographical-economic phenomenon - never a hint there was moral question marks over any of it
Charles is of course right. The slave trade was morally on a par with the holocaust, and wins by a country mile in terms of total human misery produced, despite the revoltingly batty Nazi death camp bad, splendid Empire death camp good mentality one quite often comes across.
Apparently the SCOTUS is also gunning for Affirmative action
It occurred to me this morning as I sat in my alcohol-free hotel having breakfast, what if the SCOTUS decision on Roe-v-Wade is not some anomalous case temporarily halting the progressive tide, but is actually a harbinger: of the turning of the tide. What if America decides it quite likes this seriously conservative new agenda - if it leads to safer cities and better education and No More Woke and fewer fat people? What if America becomes, not Gilead, but Singapore with guns? An American China?
I consider it possible. And, just to make this clear, I reckon their decision on abortion was harmful and dangerous
On topic the thing that bemuses me most is that the damage that seems to have really wound up Tory grandees isn't the byelection losses. Its Johnson's response to them. His "I am sick of people whining on about my position" and "blah blah blah" and "I will go on and on and on" is what has really wound them up. Why?
Because it demonstrates that he has no clue what people care about. Probably because the only person he truly cares about is himself. Not his colleagues. Not his discarded wives mistresses and children. Not the country or the people. Just himself.
Happily he has fiilled his cabinet with liars and charlatans like Patel and Dorries and Braverman who also only care about themselves. But thats not enough any more. Both byelection and council election results show that the anti-Tory tactical vote is getting stronger and better organised. That is what scares them.
I am just waiting to see how the Tories try to use the control of the Electoral Commission they gave themselves to try to make tactical voting much more difficult. Whatever they choose to do, Braverman will give legal cover for.
They have two basic problems: 1. They can't just change the electoral process to rig elections. Or "ban" tactical voting. The Lords won;t allow it. And the courts will stop it. 2. Braverman is off the chart stupid. Her consent writes the legal appeal against her consent.
Fundamental problem. (Soon to be Lord) Dacre screeches on about evil electoral plots. But Labour ran in Tiverton, and the LibDems ran in Wakefield. It is the *electorate* who are choosing how to vote. The fundamental principle of our democratic system.
How do you stop this? Force people to vote for a particular party?
You don't, it is democracy in action and is the benefit of First Past the Post.
Despite getting the most votes across the two seats, the Tories deservedly got zero seats because neither seat chose them. The system works. Each seat has the representative their voters preferred. 👍
Its a baffling attack line. Back in 2019 BXP actually withdrew candidates in scores of seats to ensure their voters backed the Tories. THAT is an electoral pact even a one-sided one. But here we have both parties standing candidates in both seats.
So what is the complaint? That Labour didn't campaign hard enough in T&H? How do they mount a legal challenge against that? And how do they use people choosing how to vote to motivate others? "Because some people chose the LibDems instead of Labour its proof of a conspiracy against the Tories so you must vote Tory"?
And HYUFD is always going on about the need for pro-Tory (as part of pro-Unionist) tactical voting in Scotland.
Absolutely, but a referendum announcement usually prompts a flurry of polls. We have… none. Which looks suspicious.
They know it is just more bluff to keep kicking it down the road . She is running out of road, all the stolen money , perjury case et c can only be held up for so long. Many of these crooks will get their day in court.
Sorry Malc, I am genuinely losing the plot. You are pro-independence but anti-Sturgeon, have I got that right?
Yes indeed, she is all talk and no action and crooked into the bargain. She is wrecking scotland, her and her bunch of self id creeps and gravy trainers. They have no principles.
I am not disagreeing with what you are saying at all. But in your mind would they deliver a different independence than ALBA? An independence self serving to their party or just different on key bits than Alba?
Alba is the perfect name for a Scottish Nationalist political party btw.
Alba would be a good name if the cheap hifi brand had not got their first.
Maybe the two entities can merge into one and share the name?
It’s far better than SNP.
This all reminds me, where’s my PB friend Farooq? 😕
Horrors of slavery should be taught alongside Holocaust, says Prince Charles
The Prince of Wales wants slavery to be publicly acknowledged, taught in schools and given the same national level of importance as the Holocaust.
Charles, who spoke of his “personal sorrow” at the UK’s historical links with the slave trade during his visit to Rwanda last week, will campaign for greater public awareness of slavery, which has dogged the royal family’s recent overseas tours.
Prince Charles is in serious danger of sparking a republican movement on the right.
He's gone up in my estimation though.
Our estimation of the suitability if future monarchs should not be based on whether they agree or disagree with us in their public utterances, but whether they can successfully say nothing at all. Because if they can't, they and their institution are doomed.
Unfortunately, Prince Charles labours under the misapprehension that people are interested in what he thinks and what he has to say.
If you have no interest, why all the above comments ? And if no one has any interest in what he has to say, why do his comments matter at all ? (I actually agree with the point, which is why his comments don’t bother me in the slightest.)
The problem for most republicans is that, being progressive, they have to grit their teeth and admit that Prince Charles has long been on “their” side on many issues.
Oh, and the slave trade should be taught in schools. As it, er… actually is. My daughters learnt all about the triangular trade. They even appreciated my story about giving a lesson on it way back in the day…
I'd argue that more can be learnt about Britain today by learning about the triangular trade than can be learnt from anything (everything?) from 1066 to Lizzie I. So many areas of interest can spring off it: not just slavery, but the way empires grow, spread and decay; the rise of different countries; wealth; even the start of the industrial revolution (via resources and finance).
I think it's much more complicated than that.
The triangular trade ended in Britain in 1807 when the industrial revolution was only really just getting started, and the vast majority of our rise in national wealth happened well after abolition. European countries later achieved the same industrialisation and rise incomes without any recourse to slavery.
Slavery was an ethics-free solution to a labour problem in a really quite primitive global pre-capitalist economy; later, capital and the market economy proved a much better way of attracting people to do hard labour for low wages, with movement around the world to suit, that affected people in the British isles as well as overseas, and that persisted until we became more well-off and enlightened to reform.
It's a hugely complex and hotly contested period of history but no more significant than any other; I want my children to be taught about it - as I have no doubt that children are today, as I was - but have no desire it to be propagandised into stark simplicities that are grounded in our gross discomforts about the politics of the present day and manipulated by some who have more sinister motives.
The problem with any history syllabus is that there's so much darned history, and the bastards keep on making more of it.
Take GCSE maths. It should be fairly easy to decide what is in a GCSE maths syllabus (will get harder at A-level though). Numbers, algebra, statistics, geometry, graphs, etc, at a basic level. A pass mark in GCSE maths should mean a pupil has enough maths skills to cope with everyday life.
But history... what do you teach about history? Of the massive amount of history out there, what do you choose to teach? And why those particular choices?
It is not just that there is lots of history; after all, there are lots of French words and even more numbers. In olden times, history was taught as a gentle amble through the history of wherever you lived and then Britain, in chronological order, with emphasis on regnal dates and battles. That is what Michael Gove wanted to return to. It will have included slavery.
Now, GCSE history has been chopped up into modules, presented out of order. Lots is left out; some is included about foreigners like the unification of Italy; some barely history at all like Middle East wars since the 1990s. Maybe Prince Charles is saying there should be a compulsory slavery topic; possibly he is struggling to remember what he learned at school in 1960s Scotland.
There is also the problem that history does not get harder in the same way that other subjects do, like maths or physics (even though those subjects are taught in opposite directions) so if you did teach in chronological order, children will necessarily be younger at the slave trade than at the Holocaust, although they might have dropped history by then.
I agree, but not sure what you mean about opposite directions for maths and physics?.....
Subjects like maths and French start with the basics and work up from there. Physics starts with gross phenomena and breaks them down, as does biology. They get harder, but in opposite directions.
Horrors of slavery should be taught alongside Holocaust, says Prince Charles
The Prince of Wales wants slavery to be publicly acknowledged, taught in schools and given the same national level of importance as the Holocaust.
Charles, who spoke of his “personal sorrow” at the UK’s historical links with the slave trade during his visit to Rwanda last week, will campaign for greater public awareness of slavery, which has dogged the royal family’s recent overseas tours.
I’m a long time out of school, but when I was there, there seemed a massive amount of time devoted to the Nazis. Now this was the 80’s, and thus the holocaust etc was more recent and in the minds of those setting the syllabus. Some argue it’s a antique evil, but I’m not so sure. Reframing our past to look critically at the whole world and the whole of history is not easy. Was it worse to be worked to death as a slave in a roman tin mine or on a Caribbean sugar plantation? But there certainly should be balance - you should teach the British empire story, but all sides of it. Don’t celebrate Wiberforce without wondering why it was necessary.
My O level history was driven entirely by the syllabus: Britain and Europe 1815 to 1914. I learnt more about the unification of Germany and Italy than I ever did about slavery.
Edit: The unification of Germany and the unification of Italy, not the two together - at least not as I learnt it!
Pretty much ditto - we did nothing on slavery or the Holocaust. I remember a lot on the Peninsular war, the creation of Belgium and the Reform Acts! A levels was 1848, Napoleon III, the Paris Commune, the Risorgimento and German unification.
My O level in 1981 was on British economic and social history 1700-1913. Basically enclosures, Chartism, Poor laws, canals, turnpikes, and related aspects of the industrial revolution. A bit dry at times, very little politics or military, but has been very useful for understanding modern Britain.
I did all of the above in my lessons at school, and my Oxford children's history of Britain volumes (published 1983) pulled no punches about slavery.
But, you've got to understand this isn't really about teaching slavery in schools: it's about teaching it incessantly and in a certain way in order to inculcate a sense of shame about Britain and guilt about its past into future generations, and is thus highly political.
Yes. This is how they intend to smuggle Critical Race Theory into British schools
Because it’s been SUCH a success in America and has, in no way, provoked intense loathing and a backlash on the American Right
I went to view a (private) secondary school we were considering for one of my daughters recently. It was painfully woke. "Some people are trans, get over it" declared posters all around the school. Barrages of newspaper headlines from the Independent about BLM, climate change and Brexit. "Join the equality society!", pupils were repeatedly urged. We looked in on a history lesson, which, naturally, was about slavery. Toilets for boys, toilets for girls and toilets for 'whatever'. Posters decrying the evils of gender stereotypes. You expect this kind of shit in schools where the council can set the agenda, but it's a bit disappointing that this is also what you get if you pay for it. It was like being in Twitter.
Statistically, it's hard to have more than one-in-twenty history lessons over an eight year secondary period being about slavery.
So, it is more likely that the school thought that it's audience - i.e. you - care about it.
It'll be partly about fitting into thr world of work. Actually, fitting into university before that. Get your head around other people being different.
At a political rally in 2021, Miller praised Hitler & paraphrased a line that Hitler gave during a 1935 Nazi rally. Her mention of “white life” sounds about alt-righthttps://twitter.com/acyn/status/1540852015693037568
Putting aside the obvious neo-nazism, I don't follow her logic. She thinks only white woman are having abortions?
It's actually the other way around: black women are more likely to have abortions than white ones. So, she's actually supporting a policy that makes the Great Replacement more likely.
Erdogan’s gleaming, enormous new Istanbul airport (roughly the size of greater Chicago) is absolutely RAMMED
There’s a massive European war, the world is rocked by inflation, entire countries are going down the bog, a chunk of the globe is still closed by Covid, yet… millions of people are happily travelllng
I find it genuinely hard to reconcile these things.
Tho I guess the Roaring Twenties took place at a time of great worldwide instability
TK fly to more destinations than any other airline so Istanbul is the world's hub.
I was mildly surprised by how much Turkish TV our Ukrainians watch and had no idea Turkey was becoming a cultural superpower by making their TV and films very cheaply available in global markets.
They love Midnight at the Pera Palace (in which the British are universally portrayed as supercilliously treacherous.)
At a political rally in 2021, Miller praised Hitler & paraphrased a line that Hitler gave during a 1935 Nazi rally. Her mention of “white life” sounds about alt-righthttps://twitter.com/acyn/status/1540852015693037568
Putting aside the obvious neo-nazism, I don't follow her logic. She thinks only white woman are having abortions?
It's actually the other way around: black women are more likely to have abortions than white ones. So, she's actually supporting a policy that makes the Great Replacement more likely.
So neo-nazi and plain stupid?
Until they start mass sterilisation. Been done before, with the mentally challenged, and I'm not thinking (only) of Germany in the NS-Zeit.
Horrors of slavery should be taught alongside Holocaust, says Prince Charles
The Prince of Wales wants slavery to be publicly acknowledged, taught in schools and given the same national level of importance as the Holocaust.
Charles, who spoke of his “personal sorrow” at the UK’s historical links with the slave trade during his visit to Rwanda last week, will campaign for greater public awareness of slavery, which has dogged the royal family’s recent overseas tours.
I’m a long time out of school, but when I was there, there seemed a massive amount of time devoted to the Nazis. Now this was the 80’s, and thus the holocaust etc was more recent and in the minds of those setting the syllabus. Some argue it’s a antique evil, but I’m not so sure. Reframing our past to look critically at the whole world and the whole of history is not easy. Was it worse to be worked to death as a slave in a roman tin mine or on a Caribbean sugar plantation? But there certainly should be balance - you should teach the British empire story, but all sides of it. Don’t celebrate Wiberforce without wondering why it was necessary.
My O level history was driven entirely by the syllabus: Britain and Europe 1815 to 1914. I learnt more about the unification of Germany and Italy than I ever did about slavery.
Edit: The unification of Germany and the unification of Italy, not the two together - at least not as I learnt it!
Pretty much ditto - we did nothing on slavery or the Holocaust. I remember a lot on the Peninsular war, the creation of Belgium and the Reform Acts! A levels was 1848, Napoleon III, the Paris Commune, the Risorgimento and German unification.
My O level in 1981 was on British economic and social history 1700-1913. Basically enclosures, Chartism, Poor laws, canals, turnpikes, and related aspects of the industrial revolution. A bit dry at times, very little politics or military, but has been very useful for understanding modern Britain.
I was taught about the slave triangle at about the age of 9 but purely as a geographical-economic phenomenon - never a hint there was moral question marks over any of it
Charles is of course right. The slave trade was morally on a par with the holocaust, and wins by a country mile in terms of total human misery produced, despite the revoltingly batty Nazi death camp bad, splendid Empire death camp good mentality one quite often comes across.
He’s right if you include ALL the slave trades
My objection to the way it is taught is that total focus on the Atlantic slave trade (which was of course repulsive) at the exclusion of all the others. i was taught a lot about the slave trade at my state schools, and I was definitely taught it was bad, but if I had not gone on to read around the subject as an adult I would be blissfully unaware the the Islamic trade in slaves (African and white European) was much older, longer lasting, and considerably larger in absolute terms. And arguably even crueller (the use of automatic castration, for example)
But the Woke educators don’t want kids to know about this. They just want to teach White = Bad
On topic the thing that bemuses me most is that the damage that seems to have really wound up Tory grandees isn't the byelection losses. Its Johnson's response to them. His "I am sick of people whining on about my position" and "blah blah blah" and "I will go on and on and on" is what has really wound them up. Why?
Because it demonstrates that he has no clue what people care about. Probably because the only person he truly cares about is himself. Not his colleagues. Not his discarded wives mistresses and children. Not the country or the people. Just himself.
Happily he has fiilled his cabinet with liars and charlatans like Patel and Dorries and Braverman who also only care about themselves. But thats not enough any more. Both byelection and council election results show that the anti-Tory tactical vote is getting stronger and better organised. That is what scares them.
I am just waiting to see how the Tories try to use the control of the Electoral Commission they gave themselves to try to make tactical voting much more difficult. Whatever they choose to do, Braverman will give legal cover for.
They have two basic problems: 1. They can't just change the electoral process to rig elections. Or "ban" tactical voting. The Lords won;t allow it. And the courts will stop it. 2. Braverman is off the chart stupid. Her consent writes the legal appeal against her consent.
Fundamental problem. (Soon to be Lord) Dacre screeches on about evil electoral plots. But Labour ran in Tiverton, and the LibDems ran in Wakefield. It is the *electorate* who are choosing how to vote. The fundamental principle of our democratic system.
How do you stop this? Force people to vote for a particular party?
It's politics not law. Lab and Lib are going to try to get the best of both worlds by giving each other a clear run on the ground where appropriate, but not actually saying they're in an alliance. This allows the Libs in particular to maintain distance from the other party in seats where the other party isn't popular. If you're a Tory with an LD challenger you obviously don't want to let them get away with that last part. So you want to raise the salience of the pact-not-a-pact in the hope of communicating to those voters that there's a pact.
It doesn't really matter what the method is to do that: If they can get people talking about it by putting out a press release saying they appealed to Lil Nas X to raise the issue with Ed Davey, they'll put out a press release saying they appealed to Lil Nas X to raise the issue with Ed Davey.
I agree - its a political issue. But I can't see how they benefit at all. Labour and the LibDems will not only deny there is a formal agreement, but will point to the fact they are running against each other as proof.
And what impact will this have on an increasingly anti-Tory electorate? Can't see that it will scare anyone back to voting Tory in protest. Next will be "in the pockets of the SNP!!!!" This was very effective in 2015 when it was Handy Alex running the SNP. Now that its Sturgeon? She's popular *in England*.
On topic the thing that bemuses me most is that the damage that seems to have really wound up Tory grandees isn't the byelection losses. Its Johnson's response to them. His "I am sick of people whining on about my position" and "blah blah blah" and "I will go on and on and on" is what has really wound them up. Why?
Because it demonstrates that he has no clue what people care about. Probably because the only person he truly cares about is himself. Not his colleagues. Not his discarded wives mistresses and children. Not the country or the people. Just himself.
Happily he has fiilled his cabinet with liars and charlatans like Patel and Dorries and Braverman who also only care about themselves. But thats not enough any more. Both byelection and council election results show that the anti-Tory tactical vote is getting stronger and better organised. That is what scares them.
I am just waiting to see how the Tories try to use the control of the Electoral Commission they gave themselves to try to make tactical voting much more difficult. Whatever they choose to do, Braverman will give legal cover for.
They have two basic problems: 1. They can't just change the electoral process to rig elections. Or "ban" tactical voting. The Lords won;t allow it. And the courts will stop it. 2. Braverman is off the chart stupid. Her consent writes the legal appeal against her consent.
Fundamental problem. (Soon to be Lord) Dacre screeches on about evil electoral plots. But Labour ran in Tiverton, and the LibDems ran in Wakefield. It is the *electorate* who are choosing how to vote. The fundamental principle of our democratic system.
How do you stop this? Force people to vote for a particular party?
I genuinely would not put anything past this government. It has absolutely no commitment to either democracy or the rule of law. It was very interesting yesterday to see the Bruges Group singing the praises of Viktor Orban. The Spectator is a huge admirer of his as well. That's the modern Conservative party right there.
As I said (to some derision) - proto-fascist. Was interesting to see the russian troll pop up singing songs about LGBT people like me needing to be put back in our deviant box. Dorries bangs on about the evil state-funded Channel 4 broadcasting woke into people's heads. So yeah, it's their direction of travel. Not because they see LGBT (as an example) to be morally wrong. Just politically advantageous as a wedge issue.
But we will all be ok. Because they don't even have the majority in their own party any more. And that doesn't have the monopoly of public opinion. So "woke" has already won.
If “Woke” has already won, why are you wetting your bi-curious undercrackers, quite ridiculously, about “proto Fascism” in the Tories?
Call out bad when you see it. By the way daaaarling there is nothing only curious about my sexuality
Apparently the SCOTUS is also gunning for Affirmative action
It occurred to me this morning as I sat in my alcohol-free hotel having breakfast, what if the SCOTUS decision on Roe-v-Wade is not some anomalous case temporarily halting the progressive tide, but is actually a harbinger: of the turning of the tide. What if America decides it quite likes this seriously conservative new agenda - if it leads to safer cities and better education and No More Woke and fewer fat people? What if America becomes, not Gilead, but Singapore with guns? An American China?
I consider it possible. And, just to make this clear, I reckon their decision on abortion was harmful and dangerous
Given the SC also struck down a century old law in NYC regarding concealed carry, I think it is unlikely to lead to safer cities.
Unless you are one of the people who think that the more people that carry guns, the safer everyone is. (The parents in Ulvade, Texas might disagree with you.)
Horrors of slavery should be taught alongside Holocaust, says Prince Charles
The Prince of Wales wants slavery to be publicly acknowledged, taught in schools and given the same national level of importance as the Holocaust.
Charles, who spoke of his “personal sorrow” at the UK’s historical links with the slave trade during his visit to Rwanda last week, will campaign for greater public awareness of slavery, which has dogged the royal family’s recent overseas tours.
I’m a long time out of school, but when I was there, there seemed a massive amount of time devoted to the Nazis. Now this was the 80’s, and thus the holocaust etc was more recent and in the minds of those setting the syllabus. Some argue it’s a antique evil, but I’m not so sure. Reframing our past to look critically at the whole world and the whole of history is not easy. Was it worse to be worked to death as a slave in a roman tin mine or on a Caribbean sugar plantation? But there certainly should be balance - you should teach the British empire story, but all sides of it. Don’t celebrate Wiberforce without wondering why it was necessary.
My O level history was driven entirely by the syllabus: Britain and Europe 1815 to 1914. I learnt more about the unification of Germany and Italy than I ever did about slavery.
Edit: The unification of Germany and the unification of Italy, not the two together - at least not as I learnt it!
Pretty much ditto - we did nothing on slavery or the Holocaust. I remember a lot on the Peninsular war, the creation of Belgium and the Reform Acts! A levels was 1848, Napoleon III, the Paris Commune, the Risorgimento and German unification.
My O level in 1981 was on British economic and social history 1700-1913. Basically enclosures, Chartism, Poor laws, canals, turnpikes, and related aspects of the industrial revolution. A bit dry at times, very little politics or military, but has been very useful for understanding modern Britain.
I was taught about the slave triangle at about the age of 9 but purely as a geographical-economic phenomenon - never a hint there was moral question marks over any of it
Charles is of course right. The slave trade was morally on a par with the holocaust, and wins by a country mile in terms of total human misery produced, despite the revoltingly batty Nazi death camp bad, splendid Empire death camp good mentality one quite often comes across.
He’s right if you include ALL the slave trades
My objection to the way it is taught is that total focus on the Atlantic slave trade (which was of course repulsive) at the exclusion of all the others. i was taught a lot about the slave trade at my state schools, and I was definitely taught it was bad, but if I had not gone on to read around the subject as an adult I would be blissfully unaware the the Islamic trade in slaves (African and white European) was much older, longer lasting, and considerably larger in absolute terms. And arguably even crueller (the use of automatic castration, for example)
But the Woke educators don’t want kids to know about this. They just want to teach White = Bad
Nah. It might have been true of 30 years ago but not now. There is drugs of course but no more than any other town and not generally amongst the oil workers themselves. At least not in the UK.
Constant and random drug testing both on and offshore with immediate dismissal tends to limit its use. Plus the fact that anyone known to be using will be grassed up in short order by their colleagues. Being stuck on a metal box filled with dangerous machinery and high pressure hydrocarbons tends to concentrate the mind somewhat and no one wants to be working alongside someone who might be flaky.
Except the article isn't really about oil refinery workers at all. It is about the menial workers in the town. The cashiers, the cleaners, the night time porters, the fast food cooks. People in crap jobs.
It has been a long time since I took cocaine, but my experience of it was that it was extremely democratic in that it would bring you into contact with all sorts of people - not just the typical profile of the middle class, white collar professional or media type. Plenty of people in crap jobs do coke.
From the article:
"Cocaine use is rife in night jobs. I sometimes wonder what would happen if they brought testing into the sector. I think the night-time economy would probably collapse. It is hard to keep going when the body wants to be in bed; to clean tables, scrub floors and count money, after a full shift on your feet."
I learned absolutely nothing about the British Empire at school (turned 18 in 2010).
I'm a similar age, and that's pretty much the case with me. It might have been alluded to when we did the industrial revolution, but by the time we got to WWI and WWII at the end of year 9 it was suddenly there that it was like 'Also, European Countries had big overseas Empires and Britain's was the biggest.' It came up more for GCSE and then A Level, but we never looked at the whys and hows of it. We also studied the Atlantic slave trade, but not really in the context of Empire.
Horrors of slavery should be taught alongside Holocaust, says Prince Charles
The Prince of Wales wants slavery to be publicly acknowledged, taught in schools and given the same national level of importance as the Holocaust.
Charles, who spoke of his “personal sorrow” at the UK’s historical links with the slave trade during his visit to Rwanda last week, will campaign for greater public awareness of slavery, which has dogged the royal family’s recent overseas tours.
I’m a long time out of school, but when I was there, there seemed a massive amount of time devoted to the Nazis. Now this was the 80’s, and thus the holocaust etc was more recent and in the minds of those setting the syllabus. Some argue it’s a antique evil, but I’m not so sure. Reframing our past to look critically at the whole world and the whole of history is not easy. Was it worse to be worked to death as a slave in a roman tin mine or on a Caribbean sugar plantation? But there certainly should be balance - you should teach the British empire story, but all sides of it. Don’t celebrate Wiberforce without wondering why it was necessary.
My O level history was driven entirely by the syllabus: Britain and Europe 1815 to 1914. I learnt more about the unification of Germany and Italy than I ever did about slavery.
Edit: The unification of Germany and the unification of Italy, not the two together - at least not as I learnt it!
Pretty much ditto - we did nothing on slavery or the Holocaust. I remember a lot on the Peninsular war, the creation of Belgium and the Reform Acts! A levels was 1848, Napoleon III, the Paris Commune, the Risorgimento and German unification.
My O level in 1981 was on British economic and social history 1700-1913. Basically enclosures, Chartism, Poor laws, canals, turnpikes, and related aspects of the industrial revolution. A bit dry at times, very little politics or military, but has been very useful for understanding modern Britain.
I was taught about the slave triangle at about the age of 9 but purely as a geographical-economic phenomenon - never a hint there was moral question marks over any of it
Charles is of course right. The slave trade was morally on a par with the holocaust, and wins by a country mile in terms of total human misery produced, despite the revoltingly batty Nazi death camp bad, splendid Empire death camp good mentality one quite often comes across.
He’s right if you include ALL the slave trades
My objection to the way it is taught is that total focus on the Atlantic slave trade (which was of course repulsive) at the exclusion of all the others. i was taught a lot about the slave trade at my state schools, and I was definitely taught it was bad, but if I had not gone on to read around the subject as an adult I would be blissfully unaware the the Islamic trade in slaves (African and white European) was much older, longer lasting, and considerably larger in absolute terms. And arguably even crueller (the use of automatic castration, for example)
But the Woke educators don’t want kids to know about this. They just want to teach White = Bad
So, you're objecting to the fact that a British history class focuses on the actions of the British?
Horrors of slavery should be taught alongside Holocaust, says Prince Charles
The Prince of Wales wants slavery to be publicly acknowledged, taught in schools and given the same national level of importance as the Holocaust.
Charles, who spoke of his “personal sorrow” at the UK’s historical links with the slave trade during his visit to Rwanda last week, will campaign for greater public awareness of slavery, which has dogged the royal family’s recent overseas tours.
Prince Charles is in serious danger of sparking a republican movement on the right.
And Prince William is even more woke than his father.
I've been pretty lonely on the republican right but I've been saying for years that King Charles III will ensure I'm not lonely.
Not on the right, but have swung pretty firmly from leaning republican to openly so. The Queen has been a dedicated and faithful servant of her country. And when she passes it is time to wind the Firm up and remove all this hereditary and chivalry nonsense.
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You lying twat. I said levels of scarf and niqab wearing in conservative Urfa are down, and that the always secular liberal Turkish Aegean coast is even more secular and liberal than before
And that is all true
I loved history. Still do. But found that course a bit tedious. I wanted to do kings and wars and so on, not a history of the Factory Acts.
I don't think HYUFD likes Boris much at all. He has little time for him. He likes neither his character, which he thinks is disreputable, nor his policies, which are far too soggy and mushy in most respects. All he likes about Boris is that he is an election winner for the Tories. Nothing else. And he still backs Boris because he just can't see any of the current alternatives doing any better electorally. He may well be right (until recently, I thought he was, but not any more). HYUFD is a Tory loyalist, but not a Boris loyalist.
HYUFD will of course correct me if I am wrong, and I shall apologise.
Where are you off to after Montenegro?
Because if they can't, they and their institution are doomed.
When I say, 'Malc' it's interpreted as 'milk', and milk and water you are certainly not!
I got a long cab ride last night with an amusing young driver who has just got married (it was arranged) from a conservative Muslim family - originally from Kars in the east
We talked all the way and he explained the horrors of inflation in Turkey right now. Prices ten-tupling in a year
Interestingly, he was very anti erdogan. And anti Chinese (they built the beautiful private toll road which he took and which he cursed)
If erdogan is losing conservative Muslim Turks then he is in trouble
https://mobile.twitter.com/dremilyportermd/status/1540809853991636993
Note the discussion in the thread below about the reluctance of US doctors to offer the procedure for younger women.
But you're right: if he intends to use his position as a platform to make forays into education policy as well as immigration policy then he's storing up hell for himself.
And actually, as long as the limit is 24 weeks without caveat, this is purely academic. If a woman can have an abortion anyway, how we view children with Down’s doesn’t come into it.
They're a bunch of wasters, the whole lot of them.
Take GCSE maths. It should be fairly easy to decide what is in a GCSE maths syllabus (will get harder at A-level though). Numbers, algebra, statistics, geometry, graphs, etc, at a basic level. A pass mark in GCSE maths should mean a pupil has enough maths skills to cope with everyday life.
But history... what do you teach about history? Of the massive amount of history out there, what do you choose to teach? And why those particular choices?
No one is talking about anything I think.
Alba is the perfect name for a Scottish Nationalist political party btw.
You expect this kind of shit in schools where the council can set the agenda, but it's a bit disappointing that this is also what you get if you pay for it. It was like being in Twitter.
https://twitter.com/Barnes_Joe/status/1540946338027798530
This is kind of mostly pointless because they'll just end up shuffling other production around so India buys more from Russia and less from somebody else then the UK buys more from somebody else.
What they should be doing is reducing *overall demand* for gold. They could start by putting VAT on it even when bought as an "investment", like Japan does. Raises some tax revenue, and defunds China a little bit as well.
And if no one has any interest in what he has to say, why do his comments matter at all ?
(I actually agree with the point, which is why his comments don’t bother me in the slightest.)
"Buses, errrrrrrr, I like buses". Hiding in fridges etc.
Johnson hasn't even been convincing with the "sunny uplands" schtick since he became Prime Minister, or certainly after he won his landslide.
I am intrigued by all the Dick Dastardly stuff posted on here this morning. Could Johnson really utilise Raab and Braverman's unparalleled legal expertise to manipulate the electoral system in order to retain power for a third term? Bear n mind Dick Dastardly's fate at the end of each Wacky Races episode.
It will be fascinating to watch.
Erdogan wants this airport to be a global hub like Dubai or Singapore (and so far so good, judging by the crowds). Ergo they have yielded to reality and 60% of the signs and 90% of the ads are in English and all the staff speak perfect English
I have to be back in london in mid July ish so Montenegro might be my last stop for now. Tho I am enjoying - unexpectedly - the completely gypsy lifestyle
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hugo_Stinnes
Nah. It might have been true of 30 years ago but not now. There is drugs of course but no more than any other town and not generally amongst the oil workers themselves. At least not in the UK.
Constant and random drug testing both on and offshore with immediate dismissal tends to limit its use. Plus the fact that anyone known to be using will be grassed up in short order by their colleagues. Being stuck on a metal box filled with dangerous machinery and high pressure hydrocarbons tends to concentrate the mind somewhat and no one wants to be working alongside someone who might be flaky.
Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas told his law clerks in the '90s that he wanted to serve for 43 years to make liberals' lives 'miserable'
https://news.yahoo.com/supreme-court-justice-clarence-thomas-051733128.html?
I'm in Sozopol starograd in Bulgaria, founded by Greek colonists in the 7th Century BC, about 35km south of Borgas
I'm sitting at a wonderful seafood restaurant commanding spectacular views of the Black Sea.
My lunch: grilled octopus with chorizo and roast potatoes, with a lemon mayonnaise and a light garlic jus.
You must try the wine.
First, as things stand, the Conservatives are going down. And that's before the worst of the economic mess. 2024 is probably a loss under anyone, quite possibly a rout under Johnson.
Second, the Frost/JRM route is a one-way ticket to Obscurityville. Even if it attracts some voters back, it will mean that the LibLabScot attacks will be even more focused on the Conservatives than they are now.
So what would Spock do? Find someone inoffensive to captain the Titanic as it sinks. Make the best of the available lifeboats. Ensure the best brandy is consumed and the band play some absolute bangers as the ship sinks. Aim to leave the wreck somewhere that salvage is feasible.
But real parties are made of humans, not intelligent half-Vulcans. So the more likely path is to deny the problem and then assume it can be solved by self-indulgence.
Take crown from one put on another after a contest, those hypothetical polls remain same? No they don’t! they flipperoooos!
Being so into politics, this is the sort of thing you should be telling us, not us telling you.
Such questions play to all of Johnson’s weaknesses and none of his strengths. Tax rates, wage bills, fuel costs and supermarket bills are not susceptible to his peculiar brand of rhetorical mystification; and voters struggling with rising bills and falling living standards may be less forgiving of a politics of distraction.
Johnson himself has no economic policy to speak of. On economic questions, at least, “to govern is to choose”. Yet every choice Johnson makes on tax rates, energy bills or public spending infuriates some wing of his party, eager for higher spending, lower taxes, more intervention or more deregulation. And as Brexit moves from rhetoric to reality, the choices already made grow harder to ignore. Johnson can give his party no star to steer by, for he has none. His political compass points only at himself.
Johnson’s leadership is a symptom, not a cause, of his party’s loss of cohesion and direction. For that reason, it cannot also be a cure — though it may, like a fever, bring the illusion of vigour and short-lived colour to the cheeks. Whether or not Johnson survives the consequences of yesterday’s vote, Conservatism is in a parlous state. It will take a very different skill-set than his to restore it to health and vitality.
https://unherd.com/2022/06/did-boris-kill-conservatism/
As expected Boris has remained the same dishonest, incompetent, lazy, bumbling idiot he has always been. He's so plainly out of his depth it's not funny. He was just as bad when Mayor, and should never have risen to the heights of being the Foreign Secretary, him being the PM is a bad joke that has been taken too far.
Any remotely sensible political party would have acted by now. We know the PM is not fit for office, and now we know that neither are the Tories.
Oh, and the slave trade should be taught in schools. As it, er… actually is. My daughters learnt all about the triangular trade. They even appreciated my story about giving a lesson on it way back in the day…
It's quite simple for me: I'll pull my daughter out of any school that tries to pull shit like that on her.
The reason the Queen is popular is that she doesn't express any opinion, except the least contentious things, without having it passed by HMG first. I expect there have been a few times when HMG would have liked her to say something and she's toned it down.
I'm all for a debate about teaching slavery to British school kids (with a practical component, obvs) but if Charles thinks that is the role of a constitutional monarchy then he is mistaken. It is a divisive move (even if it is right) and the role of a constitutional monarch is to unite.
I thought perhaps he had mellowed in age and now had more sense, but it's clear Charles wants to achieve things while he is monarch.
If he can't even do that, it's an indication that something's not right.
Personally I don't think the monarch or soon-to-be-monarch should express an opinion on anything - not slavery, not architecture, not GM. Nothing. But I can see a case for the monarch, supposedly representing all the people of all the countries in the Commonwealth, showing that they are alive to the significance of slavery in the context of Imperial history.
Bottom line, though, is that a fundamental point of monarchy is that none of us have the slightest right to tell the monarch what to do and say. They can be woke, anti-woke, communist, fascist, devil-worshipping, whatever. If one believes in monarchy one accepts that the outcome is entirely out of our control. That's why, ultimately, it's a daft way to choose the national leader.
Now, GCSE history has been chopped up into modules, presented out of order. Lots is left out; some is included about foreigners like the unification of Italy; some barely history at all like Middle East wars since the 1990s. Maybe Prince Charles is saying there should be a compulsory slavery topic; possibly he is struggling to remember what he learned at school in 1960s Scotland.
There is also the problem that history does not get harder in the same way that other subjects do, like maths or physics (even though those subjects are taught in opposite directions) so if you did teach in chronological order, children will necessarily be younger at the slave trade than at the Holocaust, although they might have dropped history by then.
It’s a pretty obvious attempt by Russia to provoke Ukrainian retaliation and so draw Belarus into the war, which it has so far largely avoided, despite Lukashenko’s cooperation with Putin.
He's 50% The Duke of Edinburgh after all, and has a lifetime of resentments on top going all the way back to abandonment issues as a child and his experiences at Gordonstoun.
Contrast that with an experience like ex-PBer Charles, and now you, in the private sector
Are there really enough horribly Woke Viz-style “Modern Parents” to sustain this? The point about private education is that you CAN choose, and I reckon most parents will choose No
Unless they are being actually offensive, accept that like everyone else they have opinions, and that unlike politicians with power, those opinions carry only the weight of their inherent sense, or lack of it.
That not to say that HMQ is no a better example than her son is likely to be, but to recognise that a hereditary institution has to take the rough with the smooth.
Alito’s Attack on Miranda Warnings Is Worse Than It Seems
https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2022/06/miranda-warnings-supreme-court-alito-kagan.html
The justice lays the groundwork for a direct blow to the right against self-incrimination.
Three days ago the Dem governor signed a compromise ammendment that made an exception for ectopic pregnancies but still allows individual counties to ban even in the case of ectopic pregnancies.
The lawd are incredibly vague on what is an isn't allowed to "save the life of the mother".
So, it is more likely that the school thought that it's audience - i.e. you - care about it.
It's one of the absurdities of the current situation (or one of the typically perfect British compromises if you're a supporter).
Charles is of course right. The slave trade was morally on a par with the holocaust, and wins by a country mile in terms of total human misery produced, despite the revoltingly batty Nazi death camp bad, splendid Empire death camp good mentality one quite often comes across.
It occurred to me this morning as I sat in my alcohol-free hotel having breakfast, what if the SCOTUS decision on Roe-v-Wade is not some anomalous case temporarily halting the progressive tide, but is actually a harbinger: of the turning of the tide. What if America decides it quite likes this seriously conservative new agenda - if it leads to safer cities and better education and No More Woke and fewer fat people? What if America becomes, not Gilead, but Singapore with guns? An American China?
I consider it possible. And, just to make this clear, I reckon their decision on abortion was harmful and dangerous
It’s far better than SNP.
This all reminds me, where’s my PB friend Farooq? 😕
The triangular trade ended in Britain in 1807 when the industrial revolution was only really just getting started, and the vast majority of our rise in national wealth happened well after abolition. European countries later achieved the same industrialisation and rise incomes without any recourse to slavery.
Slavery was an ethics-free solution to a labour problem in a really quite primitive global pre-capitalist economy; later, capital and the market economy proved a much better way of attracting people to do hard labour for low wages, with movement around the world to suit, that affected people in the British isles as well as overseas, and that persisted until we became more well-off and enlightened to reform.
It's a hugely complex and hotly contested period of history but no more significant than any other; I want my children to be taught about it - as I have no doubt that children are today, as I was - but have no desire it to be propagandised into stark simplicities that are grounded in our gross discomforts about the politics of the present day and manipulated by some who have more sinister motives.
I was mildly surprised by how much Turkish TV our Ukrainians watch and had no idea Turkey was becoming a cultural superpower by making their TV and films very cheaply available in global markets.
They love Midnight at the Pera Palace (in which the British are universally portrayed as supercilliously treacherous.)
My objection to the way it is taught is that total focus on the Atlantic slave trade (which was of course repulsive) at the exclusion of all the others. i was taught a lot about the slave trade at my state schools, and I was definitely taught it was bad, but if I had not gone on to read around the subject as an adult I would be blissfully unaware the the Islamic trade in slaves (African and white European) was much older, longer lasting, and considerably larger in absolute terms. And arguably even crueller (the use of automatic castration, for example)
But the Woke educators don’t want kids to know about this. They just want to teach White = Bad
And what impact will this have on an increasingly anti-Tory electorate? Can't see that it will scare anyone back to voting Tory in protest. Next will be "in the pockets of the SNP!!!!" This was very effective in 2015 when it was Handy Alex running the SNP. Now that its Sturgeon? She's popular *in England*.
A level of delusion that requires the flap of white coats I think.
Unless you are one of the people who think that the more people that carry guns, the safer everyone is. (The parents in Ulvade, Texas might disagree with you.)
https://mavisstaples.com/tour
It has been a long time since I took cocaine, but my experience of it was that it was extremely democratic in that it would bring you into contact with all sorts of people - not just the typical profile of the middle class, white collar professional or media type. Plenty of people in crap jobs do coke.
From the article:
"Cocaine use is rife in night jobs. I sometimes wonder what would happen if they brought testing into the sector. I think the night-time economy would probably collapse. It is hard to keep going when the body wants to be in bed; to clean tables, scrub floors and count money, after a full shift on your feet."
This rings entirely true to me.