Stop the country - I want to get off.

[Monium]

If not politicians, should we put our trust in the police?

‘Well, you’re not exactly carrying a knife, are you?!’ Sner sner, oi lads look at the sweet little white girl in her cardie trying to be clever.

I had a similar experience in 2006. You remember when the liquid bomb thing happened, and they suddenly started getting really really tight about you carrying liquids on board a plane?

I'd been to Sri Lanka, and stopped off in Dubai on my way back - it was whilst I was in Sri Lanka that the ban on liquids was introduced, but not until I was flying back to London that it was enforced on the flight.

I'd dutifully stripped my handbaggage of *anything* remotely liquid-like, but as it was August in Dubai, and around 50 degrees, I had a large bottle of water with me. They were doing a final security check at the boarding gate - largely involving turfing liquids out of peoples' handbags.

Everyone in the queue is leaving all liquidy stuff - lipstick, bottled water, whatever - in a big pile. If they don't do it themselves they're being told to by the security guys. I get to the front of the queue, hand my bag to the bloke to check. He gives me my bag back, happy there's nothing in there there shouldn't be. I then hand him my 2 litre bottle of water (half drunk) to add to the pile of bottles.

He handed me back my water and let me get on the plane.

I wasn't going to argue because it was fecking hot and I needed all the hydration I could get. But I did notice that everyone else getting on the plane - and being made to hand over their water - seemed to be either middle eastern or Asian. No other westerners that I could see.

I came to the conclusion there and then that the most effective terrorist would probably be a nicely-spoken young-ish white female.

Amy.

[Jeremy H]

I was dismayed to see a wall of armoured police surrounding a pair of electronic weapons-detecting barriers through which the good residents of Wood Green were being made to walk.

I found the article a bit sanctimonious as I actually lived in Wood Green (it certainly wasn't green and woody!) for quite a few years and believe me I would not have been dismayed to see weapon detectors in the tube hall or in the area around it.

I'm a great libertarian but on a couple of occasions when living there - my liberty and rights were heavily infringed by the sort of people who the police might well have had their eye out for that evening...

[Lazlo]

I found the article a bit sanctimonious as I actually lived in Wood Green (it certainly wasn't green and woody!) for quite a few years and believe me I would not have been dismayed to see weapon detectors in the tube hall or in the area around it.

I'm a great libertarian but on a couple of occasions when living there - my liberty and rights were heavily infringed by the sort of people who the police might well have had their eye out for that evening...

This was only yesterday. The time your referring to was some time ago, and though I can't speak for her, I rather doubt that the author would have been that put out then.

The broader point about weapon detectors, and other "security theatre" (i.e. the difference between real and perceived security) is not really what this thread is about. You might like to go here, which sums up how I feel about it.

[chrisch]

This l can't understand, you're quiet happy for fuel costs and everything else thats related to to go up, so your obviously not finaciallly motivated so why not move and to a lesser paid job abroad? or is it that you may then have to change your mind about fuel costs?

You're right its not about the money. I have now the opportunity to do something I like doing. My missus was fed up with the Luxembourg job and also enjoys what she does now. We were financially better off there and would be again if we went back. We lost money coming to live here, this is a high cost economy and has a lower standard of living than much of the rest of Europe.

In all honesty I quite like working in London - its a cosmopolitan city with all the world there in one place. Its the tube I hate. Twat head Boris should double the congestion charge and spend it making the tube fit to travel on, I'd eat my words about him and apologise then. He's more likely to scrap the charge though

I will never change my mind about fuel costs. They are no where near high enough. This is a fact and independent of where I may happen to live or work.

I loathe the government, Blair was an arsehole and a disgrace to everything the Labour party stood for. The prick that has replaced him is no better. The Tories are and always were just for the rich and laugh at the idiot working class that vote for them. Their contempt for people of that background (myself included) eclipses anything I could ever feel or say.

I express myself badly I think. I hate England because we, the English, are stupid enough to vote for people like Blair, pathetic enough to let our basic human rights be thrown down the toilet in case some bloke sets fire to a car in an airport car park and constantly whine about the people that come to this country to work hard and pay into the tax system and put to shame the lazy useless English tossers that will for ever be on the dole but cannot spell "unemployed".

We demonise our kids and feed them McShit rather than food, we love our clapped out old cars more than the air we breathe and cheer on our favourite football teams made up of 80% foreigners, owned by shareholders and managed by people that cannot speak English without even the slightest notion of irony.

I apologise for pointing out the obvious and something people don't want to hear. Much of this country is a shit hole.

Chris

[mark g]

a couple of our friends are off to australia shortly because of the labour govt, they are both teachers and labour supporters to the core, i suggested to them that they might like to stay and support through thier higher taxes the principal that they voted for answer came there none
although when they arrive in oz they will find the same crap starting there as they have now gone labour numpties
politicians may be all as bad as each other but at least the tories start out with the precept of reducing interference in your daily life, and reducing taxation

[chrisch]

.... at least the tories start out with the precept of reducing interference in your daily life, and reducing taxation

Are you rich or just stupid? The Tories reduce tax for the rich (fair enough rich person - your point is valid) at the expense of the rest of us. Get rid of red tape too. The kind of dumb arse legislation that stops banks lending money to no-hopers and then wrapping the debt up into a bond to sell to another twat that lands against the "asset". Wouldn't want that kind of thing - who knows where it might lead, even stupid rich people might lose money....

If only the pricks in government were any different.......

Wonderful thing the market economy.

Chris

[tom]

I have now the opportunity to do something I like doing.

you mean someone is actually paying you to whine endlessly on the internet?

[ridge]

What is the correct view? - There probably isn't one.

One thing is for sure, there are too many people out there in our society and particularly in parts of society that control our lives and make important decisions on our behalf, whom do not actually even have the real experience or credentials necessary to do so. Whereas their historical predecessors were far more likely to have the real experience or credentials that bred a form of respect and order that most could understand.

One certainly doesn't want war, but the lessons from our countries situation during a major one, make a very powerful comparison with today.

Where there has not been a conflict of WWII proportions for too many generations, the national personality \ identity \ psyche, call it what you will, doesn't cast aside specious political differences and disregard small issues then pull together in strength, instead it gradually pulls apart and falls apart.

Unfortunately unless we are prepared to keep a 'majority' 'national' identity, (whatever that means) and only entertain diversity in religion, culture, morals, politics, education, lifestyles, in the minority, the outcome is inescapable, the majority will no longer be.

There is no doubt the national identity benefits considerably from minority influences, but only when they remain in that proportion - Eddie Izzard's famous documentary Mongrel Britain highlights this ( the first governor of the bank of england was dutch - he's on the back of the current £50 note etc etc)

Where that easily understood identity existed, my grandparents could give a guided upbringling to my parents, which in turn was pretty much exactly the same as my parents gave to me; not extreme, boringly straight forward and surprisingly tolerant - morals, religion, culture, education, politics.

Now the question I ask myself is: Why is it now made virtually impossible for me to cascade the same down to my children? (whom, in case some might be wondering whether there might be a hidden nazi agenda here, gratefully have an Indian grandfather a japanese cousin, a west indian uncle and religions range from Cof E, 7th day adventist, Catholic, Shinto, Hindu, Parsi, Agnostic, Atheist and so on)

Well I think it is the loss of trust and confidence in the common way, in that 'national' identity etc above.

When I worked/served in the government and the military that trust and confidence still existed but was already noticeably on the wain.

Unfortunately I do not think there now are enough common strengths in our society to pull it back together in peacetime, and I think most of us would not otherwise choose to have another WWII to make it happen.

We now suffer from the very liberalism we otherwise enjoy, and are not prepared to make sacrifices unless they are human ones from someone elses family on far away shores like Afganistan or Iraq.

And incidentally as I understand the fact (please correct me on forum if I'm wrong)
1. There is not actually freedom of speech in this country although we think there is......er try it out
2. This country is not actually a true democracy in the strict meaning of the word
3. There is no UK bill of rights save the parameters loosley set down in the Magna Carta (whoops isn't that where Mr Davis comes in?) so we actually don't have any.

Personally I find it increasingly difficult to return to the UK from overseas and feel glad to be back, or proud of being British. I'm also finding other countries (Egypt etc) without most of this crap very appealing to plan to live in for my retirement even if the safety, stability and security in those countries is deceptive.

Is it because I'm older and wiser, or is it because I'm older and growing bitter and twisted? - (yep I know its the last one)

Some interesting and evocative quotes that frame different views on what is the freedom\liberty versus safety\security balance:

When everything is alternate there is no alternative
When everything is chosen there is no choice
When everything is diverse there is no diversity
When everything is liberal there, actually, is, no liberty at all.
GP

"In Germany, they came first for the Communists, And I didn’t speak up because I wasn’t a Communist;
And then they came for the trade unionists, And I didn’t speak up because I wasn’t a trade unionist;
And then they came for the Jews, And I didn’t speak up because I wasn’t a Jew;
And then . . . they came for me . . . And by that time there was no one left to speak up."
Niemöller said he was not quite sure when he had said the famous words but, if people insist upon citing them, he preferred this version


"You can't handle the truth! Son, we live in a world that has walls, and those walls have to be guarded by men with guns. Who's gonna do it? You? You, lieutenant Weinberg? I have a greater responsibility than you can possibly fathom. You weep for Santiago, and you curse the Marines. You have that luxury. You have the luxury of not knowing what I know - that Santiago's death, while tragic, probably saved lives; and my existence, while grotesque and incomprehensible to you, saves lives.
Jack Nicholson, A Few Good Men (1992)


‘The only thing necessary for the triumph [of evil] is for good men to do nothing.’
Edmund Burke


"We Sleep Safe In Our Beds because rough men stand ready to visit violence on those that would do us harm."
George Orwell



In extended observation of the ways and works of man,
From the Four-mile Radius roughly to the Plains of Hindustan:
I have drunk with mixed assemblies, seen the racial ruction rise,
And the men of half Creation damning half Creation's eyes.

I have watched them in their tantrums, all that Pentecostal crew,
French, Italian, Arab, Spaniard, Dutch and Greek, and Russ and Jew,
Celt and savage, buff and ochre, cream and yellow, mauve and white,
But it never really mattered till the English grew polite;

Till the men with polished toppers, till the men in long frock-coats,
Till the men who do not duel, till the men who war with votes,
Till the breed that take their pleasures as Saint Lawrence took his grid,
Began to "beg your pardon" and-the knowing croupier hid.

Then the bandsmen with their fiddles, and the girls that bring the beer,
Felt the psychological moment, left the lit Casino clear;
But the uninstructed alien, from the Teuton to the Gaul,
Was entrapped, once more, my country, by that suave, deceptive drawl.

As it was in ancient Suez or 'neath wilder, milder skies,
I "observe with apprehension" how the racial ructions rise;
And with keener apprehension, if I read the times aright,
Hear the old Casino order: "Watch your man, but be polite.

“Keep your temper. Never answer (that was why they spat and swore).
Don't hit first, but move together (there's no hurry) to the door.
Back to back, and facing outward while the linguist tells 'em how -
`Nous sommes allong ar notre batteau, nous ne voulong pas un row.'

"So the hard, pent rage ate inward, till some idiot went too far...
"Let 'em have it!" and they had it, and the same was merry war -
Fist, umbrella, cane, decanter, lamp and beer-mug, chair and boot -
Till behind the fleeing legions rose the long, hoarse yell for loot.

Then the oil-cloth with its numbers, like a banner fluttered free;
Then the grand piano cantered, on three castors, down the quay;
White, and breathing through their nostrils, silent, systematic, swift -
They removed, effaced, abolished all that man could heave or lift.

Oh, my country, bless the training that from cot to castle runs -
The pitfall of the stranger but the bulwark of thy sons -
Measured speech and ordered action, sluggish soul and un - perturbed,
Till we wake our Island-Devil-nowise cool for being curbed!

When the heir of all the ages "has the honour to remain,"
When he will not hear an insult, though men make it ne'er so plain,
When his lips are schooled to meekness, when his back is bowed to blows -
Well the keen aas-vogels know it-well the waiting jackal knows.

Build on the flanks of Etna where the sullen smoke-puffs float -
Or bathe in tropic waters where the lean fin dogs the boat -
Cock the gun that is not loaded, cook the frozen dynamite -
But oh, beware my Country, when my Country grows polite!

Kipling 1896

Perhaps Chopper's got the right idea - watch this
YouTube - Ronnie Johns - Chopper - Harden the Fuck Up

Ding Ding

I’ve dived with a man who’s danced with a Begonia, who’s danced with the Prince of Wales.

[Kalahari Diver]

Actually this Labour government has widened the rich/poor gap and increased the tax burden on the lower paid!

David.

[Dizzydiver]

Sorry Chris, but l'm sick to death of you moaning about this country, no one's stopping you getting off so why don't you just fuck off and leave us to it.

What a shame you felt so keen to personalise things. The main reason we came back was for me to see more of my parents (my father having just had a heart attack and being in recovery and Chris gave me the option to return which f*cked up many of his personal plans). He was venting his spleen when he wrote his post because he had sat through vast quantities of sh*tty news, listened to the w*nkers going round the gyratory with their big pipes etc... etc... etc..... We all have bad days!

But in terms of the UK, his rant is mainly because he'd like to see it work, he'd like to see things improve for everyone. He gets ticked off with everyones laisez faire attitude. It seems so many people in the UK just want it to turn into America and take on all those wonderful American values that we know work so well (my best friend lives there, on her last visit she saw the similarities increase tenfold since her previous visit 5 years before - she was truly saddened and had no intention of returning).

Ban the Daily Mail and all its vile headlines for a start and things just might start to look up in this country.
Dizzy