If anyone is labouring under the misapprehension that this is a man's world we're living in, they should try standing for an hour in the queue for the Edinburgh Fringe box office. Watching the behavioural patterns of those trying to drum up trade, it's very, very hard to escape the conclusion that you're much more likely to be singled out for attention (and occasionally even handed free tickets) if you're a) female, b) attractive, and c) inclined to giggle incessantly at very poor jokes. There was one South African guy in particular who was making me feel paranoid - he must have gone up and down the queue about twenty times to speak to people, but with an uncanny homing instinct always seemed to just miss me. Ah well, at least it made for a (relatively) quieter wait.
My plan was to do the same as last year, and see one contemporary play and one 'classic'. But there were no tickets available for the contemporary play I had in mind, so I ended up going for two very 'earnest' options - an adaptation of the Russian novel A Hero of Our Time, and an American production of Hedda Gabler. (Yes, that's right, more Americans with guns!) What they have in common is that they're both works I was supposed to read when I was studying literature at university, but never quite got round to doing so. In fact, I even wrote an essay on A Hero of Our Time without having read it. So, several years on, it was fascinating to finally discover what I was writing about! They were excellent productions and I'd recommend them both, although Hedda Gabler was marginally my favourite.
The highlight of the day, though, was eavesdropping on an exuberant director (or I assume he was a director) when he was introduced to a young designer who appeared to be the son of someone important in the theatre world. I drifted in and out of the conversation, but there was something about performing in Nice and Florence, 'fourteen illegitimate children', the Nazis letting someone go because he was so famous, and this -
"He said 'I'm not having a woman design my stage'. But she wasn't just A woman, she was THE woman. The greatest actress in all the world!"
No idea who he was talking about, but presumably 'the greatest actress in all the world' narrows it down to a few thousand.
Tuesday, August 16, 2011
Monday, August 15, 2011
Questions to which the answer is 'before I answer that question, can I just say how much I love what you've done with your hair'
The latest in Labour Hame's cutting-edge series of "questions for nationalists" is this :Should the largest party at Holyrood/Westminster always have the right to form a government?
Answer : No. There is an arguable case that the largest party should always be permitted the first crack at forming a viable administration (and in practice that's how it invariably works anyway) but that's as far as it goes.
But what's interesting about this is that the question was, as ever, posed by Bomber Admin, aka Tom Harris MP. A man who we already know believes that the answer to his own question is "yes" - regardless of whether that largest party has 35% of the vote, 25% of the vote or even 10% of the vote. Regardless of whether that party is pushing a regressive right-wing agenda at a time when the public have just elected a parliament with a progressive majority. Regardless of whether his own party could lead that progressive majority, if only it proved itself mature enough to set aside its tribalism and work with other parties.
So my own question to Tom is this :
Is it really such a wizard idea to go out of your way to remind people that, because of your Neanderthal belief that a winner-takes-all result had to be artificially created from an election that had disobediently failed to produce a clear winner, and because of your pigheaded unwillingness to work with other parties under any circumstances at all, you spent several days last May actively campaigning for the current Tory-led government to take power, and therefore bear a share of the responsibility for the damage that government is causing?
Sunday, August 14, 2011
Solving the mystery of the British noble savage
My exchange on gun control with Roberta X has been continuing on a thread which is now several days old, so I thought I'd switch to a fresh post for my latest response. I had asked Roberta if she hadn't told me a couple of years ago that she'd been held up at gunpoint twice, and whether the greater likelihood of that happening in her country didn't lead her to a fairly obvious conclusion. This was her response -
"Yes, I have been held up twice at gunpoint -- but I have never been beaten up, which is far more likely in London or Glasgow than Indianapolis. Nor have I ever suffered a "hot" robbery, also much more common there than here.
I do worry about you; I know where murder is most likely to strike here and what the risk factors are (illegal drugs, dating men into drugs, living in certain neighborhoods -- I got robbed in areas I should have known better than to be in at the time of day I was in them). Your rate of violent crime is higher and it is more likely to strike outside of "high risk" zones."
You’re very carefully talking about robberies, violent crime, etc – but not murders. There’s a good reason why you’re avoiding that subject, namely the fact that the murder rate is three times higher in your own country, a statistic that can in no small part be attributed to the rate of gun ownership. I’m not in any way diminishing the terrible trauma caused by robberies, but life goes on after them. Life does not go on if you’ve just been murdered. Therefore, if gun control helps prevent murders, it’s fulfilling its primary objective, regardless of whether we give any credence to your deeply implausible suggestion that it's somehow increasing the rate at which lesser crimes are committed.
And as I’ve already pointed out, you and Kevin Baker are unwittingly harming your own case by harping on about Britain’s violent crime rate – if we’re such a violent society in comparison to the United States and yet have a much, much lower homicide rate, what can possibly explain that discrepancy other than obvious factors such as the extent of gun control? You simply don’t have a credible answer to that question, and Kevin ludicrously flaunts his own inability to answer – “Cultural differences! Oooh, la mystère!” Well, as I said on the previous thread, it must be a hell of a weird “cultural phenomenon” that makes British thugs more likely than their American counterparts to beat someone senseless, but simultaneously far more likely to refrain from actually killing anyone.
The mystery Kevin needs to solve for us is the mystery of the British noble savage. Alternatively he could just consider the obvious explanation – thugs in this country are much less likely to be armed with guns.
"As for riots, given that the States are far larger than Scotland and much more diverse, it is not at all surprising "we" have had riots more recently. Culturally, you've a lot more in common with England and they've had riots even more recently. (Indianapolis, the last riot per se was over a decade ago, smallish and actually resulted in some resolution of the specific issue)."
The point about cultural similarities with England is monumentally silly. We’re culturally closer to the Republic of Ireland than we are to the parts of England that suffered riots – when was the last serious riot in Dublin? We’re culturally closer to New Zealand than America – when was the last serious riot in Auckland? I’m sure we’re very grateful for your “Riot Forecast” service, but your time might be better spent explaining your extraordinary proposition that arming the rioters with guns will somehow assist matters in the unlikely event that we have such a major incident in the near future.
"As for ABB, he failed to obtain guns illegally *once.* He tried via legal means and succeeded. Do you really think if he had been stymied there, he would have folded his hands and said, "That's it for me, then"? I don't think just "any criminal" can lay hands of a gun in either of our countries (it helps to be a careerist instead of a whackjob); but I am sure that a determined one can. ABB had determination."
First point – you still haven’t answered the question of whether it would have been a good thing if, having failed in a serious attempt to obtain guns illegally, he had been prevented from doing so legally. Your implicit answer seems to be “it doesn’t matter”, which is frankly bizarre. However, you raise an interesting point about the determination of criminals to lay their hands on weapons, and this probably gets to the nub of why gun control is such a successful tool in suppressing the murder rate – as you openly conceded yourself, not all criminals will go to any lengths to obtain a gun illegally. Some may, but others will just commit crime opportunistically, and if they don’t happen to have a gun to hand at the time, it doesn’t take a genius to work out that they’re much less likely to kill anyone.
"You cannot get rid of guns. It's impossible; not even totalitarian states manage to do so. All you can do is reduce the law-abiding to a pool of helpless victims for any lunatic or predator.
That is an unacceptable outcome."
Nobody is claiming we can “get rid of guns”. But people certainly are claiming that we can limit access to them, and as a result suppress both the gun death rate and the overall homicide rate. The statistical evidence from our two countries leaves you on very weak ground in attempting to dispute that.
"Yes, I have been held up twice at gunpoint -- but I have never been beaten up, which is far more likely in London or Glasgow than Indianapolis. Nor have I ever suffered a "hot" robbery, also much more common there than here.
I do worry about you; I know where murder is most likely to strike here and what the risk factors are (illegal drugs, dating men into drugs, living in certain neighborhoods -- I got robbed in areas I should have known better than to be in at the time of day I was in them). Your rate of violent crime is higher and it is more likely to strike outside of "high risk" zones."
You’re very carefully talking about robberies, violent crime, etc – but not murders. There’s a good reason why you’re avoiding that subject, namely the fact that the murder rate is three times higher in your own country, a statistic that can in no small part be attributed to the rate of gun ownership. I’m not in any way diminishing the terrible trauma caused by robberies, but life goes on after them. Life does not go on if you’ve just been murdered. Therefore, if gun control helps prevent murders, it’s fulfilling its primary objective, regardless of whether we give any credence to your deeply implausible suggestion that it's somehow increasing the rate at which lesser crimes are committed.
And as I’ve already pointed out, you and Kevin Baker are unwittingly harming your own case by harping on about Britain’s violent crime rate – if we’re such a violent society in comparison to the United States and yet have a much, much lower homicide rate, what can possibly explain that discrepancy other than obvious factors such as the extent of gun control? You simply don’t have a credible answer to that question, and Kevin ludicrously flaunts his own inability to answer – “Cultural differences! Oooh, la mystère!” Well, as I said on the previous thread, it must be a hell of a weird “cultural phenomenon” that makes British thugs more likely than their American counterparts to beat someone senseless, but simultaneously far more likely to refrain from actually killing anyone.
The mystery Kevin needs to solve for us is the mystery of the British noble savage. Alternatively he could just consider the obvious explanation – thugs in this country are much less likely to be armed with guns.
"As for riots, given that the States are far larger than Scotland and much more diverse, it is not at all surprising "we" have had riots more recently. Culturally, you've a lot more in common with England and they've had riots even more recently. (Indianapolis, the last riot per se was over a decade ago, smallish and actually resulted in some resolution of the specific issue)."
The point about cultural similarities with England is monumentally silly. We’re culturally closer to the Republic of Ireland than we are to the parts of England that suffered riots – when was the last serious riot in Dublin? We’re culturally closer to New Zealand than America – when was the last serious riot in Auckland? I’m sure we’re very grateful for your “Riot Forecast” service, but your time might be better spent explaining your extraordinary proposition that arming the rioters with guns will somehow assist matters in the unlikely event that we have such a major incident in the near future.
"As for ABB, he failed to obtain guns illegally *once.* He tried via legal means and succeeded. Do you really think if he had been stymied there, he would have folded his hands and said, "That's it for me, then"? I don't think just "any criminal" can lay hands of a gun in either of our countries (it helps to be a careerist instead of a whackjob); but I am sure that a determined one can. ABB had determination."
First point – you still haven’t answered the question of whether it would have been a good thing if, having failed in a serious attempt to obtain guns illegally, he had been prevented from doing so legally. Your implicit answer seems to be “it doesn’t matter”, which is frankly bizarre. However, you raise an interesting point about the determination of criminals to lay their hands on weapons, and this probably gets to the nub of why gun control is such a successful tool in suppressing the murder rate – as you openly conceded yourself, not all criminals will go to any lengths to obtain a gun illegally. Some may, but others will just commit crime opportunistically, and if they don’t happen to have a gun to hand at the time, it doesn’t take a genius to work out that they’re much less likely to kill anyone.
"You cannot get rid of guns. It's impossible; not even totalitarian states manage to do so. All you can do is reduce the law-abiding to a pool of helpless victims for any lunatic or predator.
That is an unacceptable outcome."
Nobody is claiming we can “get rid of guns”. But people certainly are claiming that we can limit access to them, and as a result suppress both the gun death rate and the overall homicide rate. The statistical evidence from our two countries leaves you on very weak ground in attempting to dispute that.
Saturday, August 13, 2011
Retribution against the rioters? You must be joking - I'm a taxpayer.
Just a brief thought for the day : it now looks quite possible that parliament will debate the draconian idea of withdrawing benefits from those convicted of looting, after the e-petition demanding that no taxpayers' money should be spent on the rioters passed the 'magic number' of 100,000 signatures (ie. less than 0.2% of the UK population). But it strikes me that an awful lot of those 100,000 people would probably also demand that those found guilty should spend a significant period of time in prison - which would, of course, entail 'putting them up' at taxpayers' expense.
Perhaps we should instead begin by working out what our objective in punishing criminals actually is, and then we can devise a more coherent way forward. Do we want retribution at any cost, or do we want to claw back every last penny of public money from the "unworthy"? We really can't do both.
And dare I mention the dirty word 'rehabilitation' at this point...?
Perhaps we should instead begin by working out what our objective in punishing criminals actually is, and then we can devise a more coherent way forward. Do we want retribution at any cost, or do we want to claw back every last penny of public money from the "unworthy"? We really can't do both.
And dare I mention the dirty word 'rehabilitation' at this point...?
Friday, August 12, 2011
It's the way 'e tells 'em...
If you're feeling brave enough, let me take you by the hand and lead you away from the comforting inanity of Labour Hame, and back to the scary right-wing swamp that is Political Betting in its current state. Now, long-term readers of this blog may recall me referring in the past to 'Chris g00', one of the thoroughbred PB nutjobs. He once 'interrogated' me for hours, nay days, on why the SNP had "reneged" on its 2003 manifesto promise to hold an independence referendum. The answer was of course remarkably straightforward, ie. "the SNP lost the 2003 election", and as you'll appreciate it didn't change much no matter how many different ways he found of posing the question. But the poor chap was genuinely labouring under the misapprehension that he had me on the ropes, and repeatedly returned to the subject whenever he spotted me posting on the site in an effort to "embarrass" me. This delusional pattern has repeated itself in a number of slightly different forms ever since. But last night really took the biscuit, not least for the fact that one or two of the ostensibly saner Tory contributers to PB (including the Deputy Editor, no less) piled in on Mr g00's behalf, apparently unaware or unconcerned that they had become cheerleaders for a familiar and truly cretinous repertoire.
It started when g00 made this comment -
"Black youths beating English youths right now on virginmedia channel 525"
I immediately asked him if by "English" he really meant "white" - ie. was it impossible for black people to be English in his eyes? A different poster called 'Notme' immediately jumped in and claimed that English was indeed an exclusively ethnic identity, and that black people could be British, but not English. He even made the extraordinary claim that the English are "the indigenous ethnic group of these islands", before swiftly spotting the difficulty of trying to persuade a Scotsman to accept such a nonsensical line of argument.
And then Mr. g00 returned to the fray. He triumphantly informed me that he had not in fact been making a comment about black youths beating white youths in English cities, but had instead been making a joke about the Nigerian under-20 football team beating England.
Boom boom.
Now of course, this changed absolutely nothing - the 'humour' in his thoroughly tasteless joke hinged entirely on an assumed clear distinction between 'English' people and 'black' people. If you don't feel there's such a distinction, the joke would never occur to you in the first place, and if you didn't expect to share that world view with others you wouldn't tell them the joke, because it wouldn't work. But in classic g00 fashion, all that mattered to him was that I had "fallen into his trap", and my queries about how the joke could possibly work (as he claimed) on an entirely "non-racial basis" were swatted away with the observation that I was continuing to dig a hole for myself and it was all highly entertaining. He promised to gloat about his little triumph at regular intervals over the coming days (just as he had done with my "inability to explain why the SNP had reneged on its 2003 manifesto pledges") - but then put that wizard plan on hold for a little while in favour of some shuteye.
Things then took a distinctly ugly turn as a number of g00's fellow Tory posters refused to countenance even the vaguest possibility that one of their own had told a tasteless joke, and claimed that the real issue was my own lack of a sense of humour. One of them eventually tried to "pull rank" on me by declaring that he was an Asian, that he found the joke funny, and that I should therefore "get over myself". I replied that his opinion of the joke was a matter for him, just as it would be if he also found Bernard Manning a riot. I was then informed that simply by mentioning the words "Bernard Manning" I had implied that the poster in question was a "coconut" and an "Uncle Tom". At some point "implied" mutated into "said", and by the morning it was an accepted truth among the PB Tory fraternity that I had not merely "called" an Asian poster a coconut, but that I had "racially insulted him". Just when I thought things couldn't get any better, the ever-delightful Mr g00 awoke from his slumber, determined to keep his promise to show me up at every opportunity for having fallen into his 'hilarious' trap.
Well, naturally I'm not a shrinking violet in such situations, so whenever he posted something like this...
"I don’t need to try, given posters on left and right all found fault with your response. Not a single person decided that on balance you had a point, and as I said the conversation ended with most calling you humourless, and two believing you racially offensive. Not bad for a nights work."
...I immediately fired back with something like this...
"Rubbish. Every single person who disagreed with me was a Tory, apart from one very brief and indirect comment from Nick Palmer which didn’t even mention me.
The classic PB syndrome : my Tory chums all agree with me, therefore I’ve been proved right."
And unsurprisingly his chums (the usual headbanger tendency) continued to support him, and I responded to them in robust fashion as well. But what really shocked me (although it shouldn't have done) was this spectacularly ill-judged and one-sided intervention from PB's Deputy Editor David Herdson, which had the distinct feel of a semi-official reprimand about it -
"You made yourself look silly last night when most people were sensibly asleep. You’re now making yourself look silly this morning and spamming up the thread.
You’re right in your assertions about the joke. Given, however, that you were the one who misinterpreted it on racial and ethnic lines, despite all the evidence being there to work out what it was talking about, I’d suggest you have a deep look at your own instincts as regards race and identity."
This point is so misconceived on so many levels that it's difficult to know where to start. It was literally impossible to 'misinterpret' the joke on racial or ethnic lines because there is no joke without the assumption that 'black' and 'English' are mutually-exclusive concepts. It works by assuming the listener will instantly accept that "black youths beating English youths" is a perfectly natural description of what has been happening on recent nights in many cities. If that acceptance is forthcoming, then it indeed probably is a sign that the listener needs to "look deeply at his instincts regarding race and identity". But did I instinctively accept that description as natural? No, Mr Herdson, what I instead did was challenge it - immediately. And in any case the purpose of the joke's punchline is not to spark a period of mature reflection on the part of the listener about any racist instincts which have just been exposed - the 'humour' instead lies in a kind of pleasurable complicity between the teller of the joke and the recipient, ie. "we both know what you were thinking, and why you were thinking it".
Dear God. Only in PB World could it be the person who challenged the racist premise of a joke who needs to "examine their instincts", rather than the person who told the joke or the people who found it funny. And only in PB World could it be the person who rebuts Mr g00's endless cretinous gloating that receives the semi-official reprimand for "spamming up the thread", rather than Mr g00 himself. I'm pleased to say that one or two posters did eventually offer a degree of support for the points I made, but all in all this episode is yet another sad example of what has gone so terribly wrong with that once fine website.
It started when g00 made this comment -
"Black youths beating English youths right now on virginmedia channel 525"
I immediately asked him if by "English" he really meant "white" - ie. was it impossible for black people to be English in his eyes? A different poster called 'Notme' immediately jumped in and claimed that English was indeed an exclusively ethnic identity, and that black people could be British, but not English. He even made the extraordinary claim that the English are "the indigenous ethnic group of these islands", before swiftly spotting the difficulty of trying to persuade a Scotsman to accept such a nonsensical line of argument.
And then Mr. g00 returned to the fray. He triumphantly informed me that he had not in fact been making a comment about black youths beating white youths in English cities, but had instead been making a joke about the Nigerian under-20 football team beating England.
Boom boom.
Now of course, this changed absolutely nothing - the 'humour' in his thoroughly tasteless joke hinged entirely on an assumed clear distinction between 'English' people and 'black' people. If you don't feel there's such a distinction, the joke would never occur to you in the first place, and if you didn't expect to share that world view with others you wouldn't tell them the joke, because it wouldn't work. But in classic g00 fashion, all that mattered to him was that I had "fallen into his trap", and my queries about how the joke could possibly work (as he claimed) on an entirely "non-racial basis" were swatted away with the observation that I was continuing to dig a hole for myself and it was all highly entertaining. He promised to gloat about his little triumph at regular intervals over the coming days (just as he had done with my "inability to explain why the SNP had reneged on its 2003 manifesto pledges") - but then put that wizard plan on hold for a little while in favour of some shuteye.
Things then took a distinctly ugly turn as a number of g00's fellow Tory posters refused to countenance even the vaguest possibility that one of their own had told a tasteless joke, and claimed that the real issue was my own lack of a sense of humour. One of them eventually tried to "pull rank" on me by declaring that he was an Asian, that he found the joke funny, and that I should therefore "get over myself". I replied that his opinion of the joke was a matter for him, just as it would be if he also found Bernard Manning a riot. I was then informed that simply by mentioning the words "Bernard Manning" I had implied that the poster in question was a "coconut" and an "Uncle Tom". At some point "implied" mutated into "said", and by the morning it was an accepted truth among the PB Tory fraternity that I had not merely "called" an Asian poster a coconut, but that I had "racially insulted him". Just when I thought things couldn't get any better, the ever-delightful Mr g00 awoke from his slumber, determined to keep his promise to show me up at every opportunity for having fallen into his 'hilarious' trap.
Well, naturally I'm not a shrinking violet in such situations, so whenever he posted something like this...
"I don’t need to try, given posters on left and right all found fault with your response. Not a single person decided that on balance you had a point, and as I said the conversation ended with most calling you humourless, and two believing you racially offensive. Not bad for a nights work."
...I immediately fired back with something like this...
"Rubbish. Every single person who disagreed with me was a Tory, apart from one very brief and indirect comment from Nick Palmer which didn’t even mention me.
The classic PB syndrome : my Tory chums all agree with me, therefore I’ve been proved right."
And unsurprisingly his chums (the usual headbanger tendency) continued to support him, and I responded to them in robust fashion as well. But what really shocked me (although it shouldn't have done) was this spectacularly ill-judged and one-sided intervention from PB's Deputy Editor David Herdson, which had the distinct feel of a semi-official reprimand about it -
"You made yourself look silly last night when most people were sensibly asleep. You’re now making yourself look silly this morning and spamming up the thread.
You’re right in your assertions about the joke. Given, however, that you were the one who misinterpreted it on racial and ethnic lines, despite all the evidence being there to work out what it was talking about, I’d suggest you have a deep look at your own instincts as regards race and identity."
This point is so misconceived on so many levels that it's difficult to know where to start. It was literally impossible to 'misinterpret' the joke on racial or ethnic lines because there is no joke without the assumption that 'black' and 'English' are mutually-exclusive concepts. It works by assuming the listener will instantly accept that "black youths beating English youths" is a perfectly natural description of what has been happening on recent nights in many cities. If that acceptance is forthcoming, then it indeed probably is a sign that the listener needs to "look deeply at his instincts regarding race and identity". But did I instinctively accept that description as natural? No, Mr Herdson, what I instead did was challenge it - immediately. And in any case the purpose of the joke's punchline is not to spark a period of mature reflection on the part of the listener about any racist instincts which have just been exposed - the 'humour' instead lies in a kind of pleasurable complicity between the teller of the joke and the recipient, ie. "we both know what you were thinking, and why you were thinking it".
Dear God. Only in PB World could it be the person who challenged the racist premise of a joke who needs to "examine their instincts", rather than the person who told the joke or the people who found it funny. And only in PB World could it be the person who rebuts Mr g00's endless cretinous gloating that receives the semi-official reprimand for "spamming up the thread", rather than Mr g00 himself. I'm pleased to say that one or two posters did eventually offer a degree of support for the points I made, but all in all this episode is yet another sad example of what has gone so terribly wrong with that once fine website.
Thursday, August 11, 2011
A statement from the Irish Prime Minister on the British Isles riots
This just in from Enda Kenny -
"The events of the last few days have collectively shamed us as an island people. It has been suggested to me that we in Ireland should in some way distance ourselves from what has been happening in order to protect our tourist industry, and indeed some have even suggested that events which are confined to English cities are self-evidently nothing to do with Ireland. I find that as incomprehensible as I do disgusting and petty-minded.
Yes, the riots may be confined to the territory of England, but the underlying causes are not. Are cities an "English" or a British Isles phenomenon? The latter, obviously, and moreover they are an exclusively British Isles phenomenon. There are no cities in France, or in Panama, or in Indonesia. Are inner cities and disaffected inner city youth "English" or British Isles phenomena? The latter, clearly, and moreover they are exclusively British Isles phenomena. There are no inner cities or disaffected inner city youth in Germany, the United States or Russia. Are social divisions, unemployment, poverty, hopelessness, criminality, greed, etc. "English" or British Isles phenomena? The latter (duh), and moreover they are exclusively British Isles phenomena. There is no social division, unemployment, poverty, hopelessness, criminality or greed in South Africa, Turkey or Brazil. These are very specifically British Isles sicknesses, and to try to somehow get Ireland an exemption card from them is to run away from our very character as a people.
Last month we showed our solidarity with the people of Norway by saying "we are all Norwegians now", but that is simply insufficient for a tragedy that involves our fellow islanders. What we must say this time is not "we are English", but that we are Irish, and that these are Irish riots. The fact that they aren't taking place on Irish soil and don't involve Irish people is a mere technical detail. And am I prepared to sacrifice the Irish tourism industry to speak that truth? You bet I am. British Isles solidarity demands nothing less, and I shall not be found wanting."
This has been an exclusive report from a parallel universe occasionally visited by contributers to the website Labour Hame.
"The events of the last few days have collectively shamed us as an island people. It has been suggested to me that we in Ireland should in some way distance ourselves from what has been happening in order to protect our tourist industry, and indeed some have even suggested that events which are confined to English cities are self-evidently nothing to do with Ireland. I find that as incomprehensible as I do disgusting and petty-minded.
Yes, the riots may be confined to the territory of England, but the underlying causes are not. Are cities an "English" or a British Isles phenomenon? The latter, obviously, and moreover they are an exclusively British Isles phenomenon. There are no cities in France, or in Panama, or in Indonesia. Are inner cities and disaffected inner city youth "English" or British Isles phenomena? The latter, clearly, and moreover they are exclusively British Isles phenomena. There are no inner cities or disaffected inner city youth in Germany, the United States or Russia. Are social divisions, unemployment, poverty, hopelessness, criminality, greed, etc. "English" or British Isles phenomena? The latter (duh), and moreover they are exclusively British Isles phenomena. There is no social division, unemployment, poverty, hopelessness, criminality or greed in South Africa, Turkey or Brazil. These are very specifically British Isles sicknesses, and to try to somehow get Ireland an exemption card from them is to run away from our very character as a people.
Last month we showed our solidarity with the people of Norway by saying "we are all Norwegians now", but that is simply insufficient for a tragedy that involves our fellow islanders. What we must say this time is not "we are English", but that we are Irish, and that these are Irish riots. The fact that they aren't taking place on Irish soil and don't involve Irish people is a mere technical detail. And am I prepared to sacrifice the Irish tourism industry to speak that truth? You bet I am. British Isles solidarity demands nothing less, and I shall not be found wanting."
This has been an exclusive report from a parallel universe occasionally visited by contributers to the website Labour Hame.
Wednesday, August 10, 2011
Vote for a blog that is fighting for the things that really matter now the midgies are back
If you've enjoyed this blog over the last twelve months, especially while it was covering the thrills and spills of the historic election campaign back in the spring, I wouldn't be at all put out if you consider it worthy of a vote in this year's Total Politics Blog Poll, which is now - slightly later than usual - open for business. Last time round, Scot Goes Pop finished a respectable 23rd in the Scottish section, and by the looks of things only just missed the cut for the top 300 political blogs in the UK as a whole. So it'll be interesting to see what happens this time - visitor numbers are certainly well up on last year, but I'd imagine that's the case for a lot of other Scottish blogs as well.
There's also an additional poll for individual bloggers this time round (ie. regardless of whether their writing is restricted to one blog or spread across several), so I suppose at this point I'll have to pray in aid my endless witterings on Political Betting! My only guest slot on Scottish Roundup to date was also within the last twelve months - I clearly remember that it was in the autumn, because it seemed to take me the whole autumn to finish it.
Voting is slightly easier this year - it's by online form rather than email, although you still have to provide a valid email address. There's also a rule that bloggers aren't allowed to publish a list of ten 'recommended' blogs that they think people should vote for.
So I won't do that, but I will just say good luck to everyone! Click here if you'd like to cast your votes.
There's also an additional poll for individual bloggers this time round (ie. regardless of whether their writing is restricted to one blog or spread across several), so I suppose at this point I'll have to pray in aid my endless witterings on Political Betting! My only guest slot on Scottish Roundup to date was also within the last twelve months - I clearly remember that it was in the autumn, because it seemed to take me the whole autumn to finish it.
Voting is slightly easier this year - it's by online form rather than email, although you still have to provide a valid email address. There's also a rule that bloggers aren't allowed to publish a list of ten 'recommended' blogs that they think people should vote for.
So I won't do that, but I will just say good luck to everyone! Click here if you'd like to cast your votes.
Tuesday, August 9, 2011
To what do I owe the honour this time?
I've just spotted another visit to this blog from Tucson, Arizona (ie. Mr Kevin Baker) on my stats. Now, of course we all know that the great man is ordinarily far too busy Crusading For Liberty to grace us lesser mortals with his presence, so the obvious question - to what do I owe the honour this time? A couple of weeks ago it was the Norwegian atrocity, this time it must be...of course, it's the riots in London. Presumably I'm supposed to have come to my senses by now and realised that things would be so much better if only the rioters had easy access to firearms.
And sure enough, here's the Baker post saying pretty much that. Jeez - is there any social ill that can't be instantly solved for us by an influx of these barbarous weapons?
And sure enough, here's the Baker post saying pretty much that. Jeez - is there any social ill that can't be instantly solved for us by an influx of these barbarous weapons?
Monday, August 8, 2011
George Foulkes, look away now...
Interesting to see that Yahoo 'Moneywise' has done a big splash investigating whether residents of Scotland or England get the best deal in a range of policy areas. Scotland comes out on top on three out of four counts - university fees, healthcare costs and transport costs. State benefits are declared a 'draw' - unsurprising, given that they aren't devolved!
Now, you all know the punchline here. The fact that the Scottish government is providing the public with a better financial deal is perfectly fine - but the problem is they're doing it deliberately...
Now, you all know the punchline here. The fact that the Scottish government is providing the public with a better financial deal is perfectly fine - but the problem is they're doing it deliberately...
Sunday, August 7, 2011
Questions to which the answer is "what do you mean, 'Tom'? My name is ADMIN"
Why are the SNP so reluctant to introduce even a modest measure of bus re-regulation?
This time I really will have to say 'pass', because bus regulation is not something I've ever given a lot of thought to, and I don't have any special insight into the SNP leadership's thinking on the matter. However, I'm quite sure other nationalists will have very full answers, which as usual will either be "not answers" or "incorrect". But, as ever, in posing the question, the admin has left himself and his comrades with a much trickier one to answer themselves -
If a modest measure of bus re-regulation is such an obviously sensible thing for a left-of-centre party to do, why didn't Labour do it during their rather long spell in government?
Just to make it even tougher for you, Admin, I must caution you that, while either a 'yes' or 'no' answer is acceptable, no qualifications will be permitted.
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