The War on Political Correctness

[Mr T.]

From The Scotsman. I wonder whether Bloom's famed pin-striped suit might now need to made from Kevlar? My edits in parentheses [[ ]].


GEOFFREY Bloom may well be Britain’s most politically-incorrect man. The 54-year old, who became the UK Independence Party’s MEP for Yorkshire and East Humber in June, announced his credentials last month, upon arriving for work at the European Parliament.

He wanted to focus on women’s issues, he announced, because "I just don’t think they clean behind the fridge enough". Yorkshire women were to be excepted from any criticism he added, because they "always have dinner on the table when you get home". Generally speaking, Bloom added, that was the right place for them to remain. "No self-respecting small businessman with a brain in the right place would ever employ a lady of child-bearing age."

He wears a bowler hat and pin-stripe suit to work ("as did my father and his father before him") is a keen supporter of country sports and admits to drinking too much at the bar of his local rugby club where he is vice-president. He represents the woolly liberals’ perfect hate-figure, and was widely castigated after airing the above views. But, seated in his York office last Friday, Bloom offered another view. Far from being reviled, he claims he has become something of a folk hero.

Bloom laughs. "My postbag has been almost totally supportive, with about half of them from women. I’ve also had lots of letters from small businessmen backing me up, who know what I mean. I’ve been on 12 radio phone-ins and they all were inundated with people supporting me," he says.

A small businessmen himself, Bloom claims that such firms simply cannot afford to risk employing women who might soon be on maternity leave.

"I have had some really heart-rending letters from people. I got one from a woman who had been made redundant - she had no children but she had been laid off because two of her colleagues had gone off on maternity leave and the company couldn’t keep her.

"I got another from a female nurse who said she was being run ragged because so many of her colleagues were off on maternity leave. Paradoxically, it is women who are suffering most from this.

"The luvvies hate me but now people are beginning to see that perhaps I had a point. These woolly liberals might mean well but it is the law of unintended consequences. They don’t realise all the damage they cause. People like me are far more in touch with what people really think than ordinary politicians."

Largely due to the deliberately provocative language he used, Bloom has been dismissed as a crackpot right-winger who belongs in the 1950s. [[Bren's Edit: Whilst I don't agree with Bloom, it's ironic that Blair blames the nation's woes on "the 1960s" - which followed, chronologically, and presumably by allusion and extension, the 1950s?!]] But in truth, his views now seem to be nearer the 21st century centre ground than ever. Bloom may carve an outrageous course - but last week revealed that the backlash against political correctness he represents is now in full sail.

Conservative leader Michael Howard chose the north-east town of Middlesborough to launch his own assault. The location was deliberate; he was introduced by the local mayor Ray Mallon, the city’s former police chief who became known as ‘Robocop’ for his no-nonsense method of policing. Based on New York’s ‘broken windows’ policy, all acts of vandalism are pursued with the same vigour as more serious offences in order to nip the descent into crime in the bud. In his speech, Howard also turned to New York - to Leonard Bernstein’s West Side Story, and to the passage where a gang of hoods excuse their actions, singing: "I’m depraved on account of I’m deprived." "Juvenile delinquency is purely a social disease," sings another.

"West Side Story may have been written by an American at the tail end of the 1950s, but these attitudes are all too prevalent in British society today," Howard said.

"The decline of responsibility and the proliferation of rights have left us in an ethical quagmire, which is undermining our fight against crime. The clear distinction between right and wrong has been lost in sociological mumbo-jumbo and politically correct nonsense."

Zero tolerance was the only solution, he added. Under the Tories, more prisons would be created and longer jail sentences would follow. And, perhaps most controversially, Howard announced that the Tories would also scrap plans by Home Secretary David Blunkett to implement one of the major recommendations of the Stephen Lawrence inquiry. The inquiry recommended that police officers should have to give a receipt to people they stop in the street, in a bid to crack down on those who unfairly target blacks and Asians. But Howard will not implement it.

Race campaigners and civil liberty activists immediately cried foul. But the response from the public was the reverse. In a poll for Channel 4 News that night, 5,357 people responded to the question ‘Are police being constrained by political correctness?’ Eighty-five per cent said yes.

The instructive lesson from Howard’s speech was Labour’s response. No major criticism was forthcoming. Instead, they simply tried to outdo him. Home Secretary David Blunkett announced that police in England and Wales are to be given powers to arrest people for such minor offences as graffiti or litter. He also announced that those arrested could be forced to undergo drug tests. Meanwhile, community wardens will be given powers to remove unruly beggars from the street.

In case nobody had got the message, Blunkett also decided to leap on the bandwagon which had begun rolling after it emerged on Tuesday that a convicted rapist had won £7m on the National Lottery. Writing in the Sun, [[Bren's Edit: tsk, tsk, David!!]] the Home Secretary declared: "We can’t stop a prisoner or their family from buying a ticket, but we can "look closely" [[Bren's Edit: a politico's euphemism for doing fuck-all]] at making sure they don’t benefit from a single penny while in prison." [[Perhaps by allowing the victims of his crimes (rape and molestation) to sue his arse for the amount of his winnings?]]

For liberty campaigners, such tactics are deeply depressing [[Bren's Edit: weclome to the world]]. Politicians of all hues, they argue, are simply pandering to the unwarranted fears of Britain’s curtain-twitchers about a rising tide of crime which doesn’t exist.

Rosemary Mcilwhan, director of the Scottish Human Rights Centre, says: "An obvious example is the way they are treating asylum and terrorism, implying that anyone from another country is a terrorist.

"It is tantamount to out-and-out racism. It’s basically all about saying they will be as tough as possible simply in order to win votes." [[Bollocks - defence of the realm and the protection of its citizens (from both crime and terrorism) mean anything to you, Rosemary??!]]

But to those politicians on the front line, they are simply responding as they see it, to the growing public clamour to ditch the politically correct approach to law and order which has dominated the last 20 years - and to show some moral fibre.

As the MSP for Scotland’s most deprived constituency, Glasgow Springburn, you would have thought Labour’s Paul Martin would have some sympathy for the deprived depraved. None of it. Martin, whose father is Michael Martin, speaker of the House of Commons, is as tough as old boots.

"I came from a previous generation that had absolutely nothing and they brought me up well and to recognise values and I don’t see why just because you are deprived or unemployed that you therefore have an excuse to act poorly," he says. [[Amen to that!]]

Martin is one of the group of grass-roots Labour MSPs who was instrumental in forcing through new Anti-Social Behaviour laws. Amongst other things, they introduce parenting orders, in which mothers and fathers may be forced to attend lessons on how to bring up their children; Community Reparation Orders, in which vandals will be forced to repair the damage they have done to their community, and on-the-spot fines for everything from being drunk in public, to disturbing the neighbours by singing in the shower.

They are long overdue, says Martin. "I remember raising the issue of parental responsibility and the PC-brigade were saying that it would just reinforce deprivation [[Although, and notable, they signally failed to say how or why it might do so!]]. But I know parents in really tough circumstances who are doing a good job.

"What we’ve done in the past is to allow the politically correct brigade to say that if you come from a deprived background then that means you can smash up the concierge block on the scheme.

"I would get police officers and politicians saying we should look at the reasons why they are behaving in such a manner." [[Merely 'looking at why they do it' is a worthwhile endeavour; doing nothing either to address and correct it in tandem is unacceptable.]]

Martin raises the suggestion that Labour’s tough new line is partly due to a growing exasperation with the very deprived areas they have attempted to help. Billions of pounds of public cash has been poured into New Deal schemes, work credits and benefits designed to improve the lot of the deprived. Unemployment has been reduced, Labour points out; opportunities created. Now there is no reason why you can use poverty as an excuse for crime ["Now"??! It has never been a valid excuse and explanation for poor behaviour]]. Plus, say political scientists, perhaps Labour is simply waking up to the fact that Britons are, by their very nature, keen on the harsher approach. [[As this penny drops, you can just see the tumbleweed and hear deafening silence from the brow-beaters of the Numpty Brigade's chief exponents - like Polly Toynbee]].

John Curtice, professor of politics at Strathclyde University says: "We have never been keen on criminals as is shown by the fact that a majority of people still back the death penalty [[Which I don't!]]. We’ve always been in favour of locking up people; that is why we have relatively high levels of imprisonment.

"There are two forces at work here: one, Tony Blair has always been on the right on this subject. And two, I suppose there is a recognition in the Labour party that while getting rid of poverty is a long-term thing, anti-social behaviour and crime might give them a quick kill in improving the lives of these people in deprived areas." [[And what about the rest of us who might 'live in deprived areas' and are on the receiving end of their fuckwittage?? Do we not count? The arrogance of the liberal cognoscenti is staggering - they'll go into bat to make the lives of these 'deprived' as comfy as possible (whilst demanding our tax ££s to pay for their schemes and we get what by way of return? Do we feel safer in our homes or on the streets? I would hazard not]].

And with political correctness now being air-brushed out of law and order, is its influence over the rest of society to follow? It seems so. Last week, Diane Winship, a former £70,000-a-year executive, revealed how she was told by a Job Centre to hide the fact that she had a child if she wanted a job, after she had been rejected by six firms - thus appearing to accept that a mother cannot have a career [[this is palpably wrong and unfair]]. Meanwhile, at the High Court in Edinburgh, a judge jailed two British Muslim men for seven years for kidnapping a relative who had rebelled against her arranged marriage - insisting that their religious honour could not excuse their crime. [[Amen]].

If political correctness is on the wane, it may be that men like Geoffrey Bloom may soon have to be taken more seriously. [[Unfortunate, Bloom being such a Muppet; but if the gains to be had from its removal are there, then let's rock!]]

"Go into any pub, or golf club, or rugby club," he says, "and they’ll all agree about the large sections of the media and politicians who are all part of this politically correct brigade and don’t have an original thought in their head. [[Amen again]].

"I was branded a Neanderthal [[you are mate]]. But the amount of letters I get from people saying ‘thank God somebody is speaking up at last.’ You wouldn’t believe it."

source- The Scotsman

[ahar]

As someone happy to be called a 'woolly liberal', there's some interesting points in the article. The debate on all these points could last for pages, but there is one that drives me nuts more than most - that's the idea that building more prisons and sending more people to jail will bring down the crime rate. Short term - yes, long term no. The US have tried and failed this approach and it doesn't address the problems.

What would my approach be you ask ? At a very high level :

Compulsory drug treatment for those convicted and test positive for anything harder than cannabis

A Ruldolph Guilliani 'broken window' approach in towns and cities

A large expansion of the Restorative Justice measures (e.g. vandels cleaning up the mess they made etc)

Compulsory parenting measures (parenting classes, curfews etc) for people with criminal kids

Creation of many more special units in schools to take disruptive kids, rather than excluding them or sending all the little buggers to one place where they can learn off each othert

Large expansion of the tutorial programme in schools to bring in role models to speak to kids

Large expansion of after school clubs and activities (probably with a large sporting element) - naughty kids could be made to attend

Will it cost a lot to do ? Yes. Will it cost less than building and staffing loads more prisons ? Undoubtly

[Gavin Yates]

Restorative Justice, Supervised attendence orders, Drug treatment and testing orders are all expensive alternatives to custody but cheaper than prison.

It costs £30,000 to send someone to prison for a year which the "non-deprived" have to pay for.

Reducing reoffending is the key to a better society for all and although poverty is no excuse for offending or anti-social behaviour the link between the two is proven.

Nothing liberal about that ...

Bloom and the rest of the UKIPers are all still bonkers tho' :-)

[aclivity]

Originally Posted by Gavin Yates

Reducing reoffending is the key to a better society for all

I favour hanging for a first offence. That'll put a stop to reoffending. Sure, it'll be tough to start with, but the long term benefits are immense.

After all, the occasional fatal beating never harmed anyone.

[Fathoms Down]

Politically correct cacti

[Reeve]

Originally Posted by Nick Bown

Politically correct cacti

LOL. I like the bit about the Jedhi option from the last census

[Dominic]

I never once heard of a crime being committed where I lived when I was a kid.

Mind you, that was Saudi Arabia - public flogging and the possible loss of a hand for theft might have had something to do with it

[Mr T.]

Originally Posted by Dominic

I never once heard of a crime being committed where I lived when I was a kid.

Mind you, that was Saudi Arabia - public flogging and the possible loss of a hand for theft might have had something to do with it

Aye, having been hurded into 'Chop-Chop Square' by the local religious police so we might 'benefit from seeing justice in action', I have to say that watching a chap being beheaded with a sword does somewhat 'focus the mind a little'.

Barbarians or, as the PC whallas might have it "merely exercising a different belief system..."

Bollocks.

[turbanator]

Originally Posted by Bren Tierney

Aye, having been hurded into 'Chop-Chop Square' by the local religious police so we might 'benefit from seeing justice in action', I have to say that watching a chap being beheaded with a sword does somewhat 'focus the mind a little'.

Barbarians or, as the PC whallas might have it "merely exercising a different belief system..."

Bollocks.

One wonders if hanging would have lasted so long here if it was done in public.

If you are going to execute someone, there is no really humane way of doing it, because even if it is physically painless, the there is the anticipation and knowledge that it is going to happen.

That said, I still believe that we should have capital punishment for certain crimes - whatever the method.
I don't think that whether the method is humane or not is relevant when you take into account the consideration some murderers give their victims.

r
Paul

[markg]

Originally Posted by ahar

As someone happy to be called a 'woolly liberal', there's some interesting points in the article. The debate on all these points could last for pages, but there is one that drives me nuts more than most - that's the idea that building more prisons and sending more people to jail will bring down the crime rate. Short term - yes, long term no. The US have tried and failed this approach and it doesn't address the problems.

What would my approach be you ask ? At a very high level :

Compulsory drug treatment for those convicted and test positive for anything harder than cannabis

A Ruldolph Guilliani 'broken window' approach in towns and cities

A large expansion of the Restorative Justice measures (e.g. vandels cleaning up the mess they made etc)

Compulsory parenting measures (parenting classes, curfews etc) for people with criminal kids

Creation of many more special units in schools to take disruptive kids, rather than excluding them or sending all the little buggers to one place where they can learn off each othert

Large expansion of the tutorial programme in schools to bring in role models to speak to kids

Large expansion of after school clubs and activities (probably with a large sporting element) - naughty kids could be made to attend

Will it cost a lot to do ? Yes. Will it cost less than building and staffing loads more prisons ? Undoubtly

i've got a far cheaper and easier method, shoot the serial criminals

shotgun cartridges 1 @ 10p
no more re offending
job sorted
tony martin should have got a medal
just my opinion of course