David Cameron’s hilarious fight against his better self on gay rights issues was wonderful entertainment. But the cause of his embarassment was not really gay rights, but Europe.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2010/mar/24/david-cameron-stumbles-gay-rights
Cameron’s decision that in the European Parliament the Tories whould ally with the far right homophobe and racist grouping centred on Poland and the Baltic Republics, was always going to be a timebomb. Persecuting homosexuals in Eastern Europe was entirely predictable as the issue which would trigger it. Thoroughly deserved.
What kind of party can’t ally any more with the parties of Angela Merkel, Jacques Chirac and Silvio Berlusconi because they are too left wing? If that question doesn’t give pause to any sensible person considering voting Tory, then I don’t know what will.
But the worst thing about censurship is
–Arsalan
Are you pulling my leg again?
That’s interesting, dreoilin, what kind of female? Not a very good one, I sadly predict. On the other hand, I picture you in front of a warm turf fire, surrounded by beautiful artworks (made by friends) and perhaps a cat. Am I right?
In fact, dreoilin, I think you’re Dervla Murphy, and I claim my £5!
You think I’m 78???
Holy cow.
yes ma’am, why not? One of my best friends was 96. Sharp and curious as a sack of ferrets!
Glenn,
Thank you for your kind comment. My complaint was mostly tongue in cheek. The sometimes crazy, irrelevant comments here, are often highly entertaining. Craig attracts some very bright people.
Actually, though, what I wrote above was prompted in part by the failure of my over-serious, and possibly unintelligible comment on another thread to generate any discussion of education and social mobility.
CheebaCow,
You may be right about teenage pregnancy not helping social mobility, although I’ve heard it said that having children is a good thing for a girl to get out of the way early in life so that she can get on with a career in her thirties.
What I object to about the permeation of education with social conditioning about sex is that it has disrupted the basic British method of reproduction ?” you know, in the spring time pretty ring time, etc.
In the fifties, a third or more of all children were conceived out of wedlock (as we used to say). Often there was a hasty marriage. Otherwise, the poor girl was subject to the probably humiliating experience of spending the gestation period in a home for unmarried mothers. On delivery, the the child would be placed with what were usually very loving adoptive parents.
This was an excellent arrangement. Unmarried girls who became pregnant faced social censure, humiliation, etc. Hence they were generally cautions about sex, which meant VD, as we used to call it, was not so common. However, when a girl was totally swept away, then you had the possibility of a very fine little bastard. What I think is involved here is some very important basic biology. Essentially, it is the girls who chose, and if a fellow is totally irresistible, then it’s best (judged in terms of evolutionary biology) not to resist. (This incidentally is the basis of the Ghengis effect, why some males have more luck than others. But I won’t go into that.)
There’s a website somewhere I believe dedicated to exceptional bastards. People like German Chancellor, Willi Brandt, who I met on a beach in Victoria ?” very charming person, Labour Foreign Secretary Ernest Bevin, and of course Slick Willi Clinton, a remarkably well-adapted individual, who it is hard not to like.
As it is, the Brits can hardly reproduce themselves at all now, and can only maintain their numbers by importing people.
As for homosexuals showing some discretion, would that be a hardship? I find it amusing to see a young, good-looking heterosexual couple obviously mutually engaged, but on the whole, I think public expressions of sexuality somewhat distasteful.
Technicolour,
Yes, CanSpeccy here. I seem to have an identity problem.
I’m sure the kids at rotten schools have immense potential. But it must be difficult to work with them to the best effect when you have little discipline and the curriculum is permeated with a load of bollocks about how to be a good citizen of the New Labor Utopia.
You are right, I think, to question the value of social mobility. Meritocracy sounds like a good thing. But do we want a society in which every dustman is a guaranteed gamma minus moron?
Sorry if I upset you by using the term ‘miscegenation’, if I did. I suspect this is a term that has various meanings according to culture. To me, if I used, it, it was just a polysyllabic way of saying mixing (probably genes?). It’s presumably like the term “nigger”. When I was a kid in Devon there were no colored or other foreign people so there was no racism ?” it would have made no sense (classism was our vice then). However, in the warehouse where I sometimes worked as a student there were sweaters and cardigans in a nice shade of brown called “nigger,” a Latinate word referring strictly to color. This is why not all seemingly offensive language is intended to be so, and why people tend to resist political correctness in language: “It’s my bloody language and the words mean whatever I want them to mean, neither more nor less.”
I agree accents don’t really matter. Some of them are fascinating. But if it impedes a child’s progress in the world to say “Yo” instead of “You” or “dunnum” instead of “don’t they” (as we used to say in Devon) it would be best, I think, to correct them.
Alfred, I can’t cope with everything you write in one chunk; it is too indigestible, and I need to eat supper. For now I would say ‘Yo’ means ‘hello’ (or hi, or howdy, or hey, or ‘morning, depending on the current slang). Not ‘you’. I have never seen it in an essay, anymore than I would have used the word ‘chronic’ in an essay, though it was fashionable as a criticism in my far distant youth.
‘Having little discipline’: well, it would be frustrating, if you saw teachers as people to impose discipline. Interestingly, quite often the people who lose their self control in classrooms are the teachers, not the pupils. In fact, mainly. Perhaps it gets harder as you get older?
No, the term ‘miscegenation’ doesn’t upset me; what upsets me is a person who pruriently dwells on other people’s sexual relationships, and judges them.
Actually, that’s not true; the term ‘miscegenation’ does upset every bone in my semantic body, because it is ascribing a negative – ‘mis’ – to something which is a positive – birth. And it thoroughly upsets me as a person, because of all the people I know, who are the product of their mixed melatonins and cultures, and who are only benefiting from the fact, while we pink British sit and stew in a dead-end nostaligia of our own making. Dammit. Get me a horny Brazilian now!
Tech,
I think that miscegenation is OK. It derives from Miscere (L.), to mix.
Anyway, my memory is playing tricks on me. Walking on the beach here in glorious morning sunshine it occurred to me that I could not possibly have met Willi Brandt in Victoria.
In fact, it was Chancellor Helmut Schmidt, and although he was very charming, he was/is not, so far as I am aware, a bastard.
Technicolour,
“Discipline” in the context of school can mean many things. If you have to beat them, then there’s something wrong.
Good teachers achieve discipline in other ways: charisma, making kids understand why what they are being taught matters to them, and so on. Without that kind of discipline, teaching is surely futile. And if one does not teach kids to discipline themselves, one has surely failed.
Alfred, like, ‘mixing’ is only good if you want to ‘mix’, OK. Not ‘good’ per se.
(sees future in which pink people desperately try and mate with brown people on account of global warming, blinks)
Anyway, what’s this thing about ‘bastards’? People don’t really think like that anymore. Obviously it’s nicer/more fun as a child to be around a happy community with responsible adults who are in in it for the long term; but I don’t think that necessarily means marriage.
Cross post: you’re right about teaching.
Technicolor,
Re: bastards
It was not my point to comment on how people think. What I was commenting on was a vitally important biological process: human reproduction; how we do it and how that affects the viability of our population and society. I don’t give a damn how people think. I’m only interested in the reality.
In addition, I was trying to throw a bit of grit into the smooth working of the liberal mind, so well expressed by a Canadian professor of only moderate intellect, but some charisma, named Pierre Elliot Trudeau. “The only sin,” he wrote, “is to to hurt another person.”
The blinding stupidity of the comment being apparent when one asks, how the hell does anyone know what the ultimate consequences of their actions will be, and in particular, how does the permissive, social-engineering liberal know what the consequences will be of their buggering around with social taboos and traditions?
About as much, I suggest, as the mass murdering idiots who created the soviet utopia.
What particular “buggering around with social taboos” did you have in mind, Alfred? Gay relationships and mixed-raced relationships are OK by me, and not really products of social engineering. It’s just social attitudes to these things are improving. I don’t see many gay *and* mixed-race relationships, but they’re fine too, and not harming anyone.
Perhaps you regard the teaching of tolerance as social engineering; personally, I just think it is sensible. What dark consequences might these things have, save a potential future reduction in hate crime?
Jon,
No-fault devorce? Abortion law “reform.”
These are recent examples of social engineering, the latter having resulted in the destruction of millions of perfectly healthy human beings.
As for social engineering, if you don’t believe that the Soviet experience was a disaster in social engineering, I don’t know what example I can point to as evidence of its potential dangers.
The last sentence of my last post seems to be incoherent. But anyway, how about paying unmarried girls to get pregnant, i.e., provision of public housing, welfare, etc. This is social engineering. What are the consequences? How does it impact the average IQ of the next generation — especially when clever girls are encouraged to put off marriage and child-bearing until they’ve qualified as an MD, a lawyer, etc.?
Then bring in three quarters of a million highly philoprogenetive immigrants every year to compete with the locals for housing, jobs, etc.
I don’t know what the consequences will be, but I don’t hear liberals even asking.
Tolerance is often a good thing. But not always. The classic case being the intolerance of liberals for intolerance in others: even if others may simply be adhering to an ancient social code without which society may be in jeopardy.
Zbigniew Brezinski’s book “Out of Control” provides a useful discussion of these questions.
Alfred. It’s late here. Don’t worry about love & babies.
Tech,
I’m not worrying. Just trying to start an argument.
This is a rather bare medium of communication. Without gesture, expression, tone of voice, it can be difficult for people to understand one’s intent.
Anyhow, sleep well.
Talking about babies, does anyone here agree that it is sexist that I can’t get pregnant?
Arsalan, you do my heart good.
Goodnight
All I can say is, there are ‘illegitmate children’ in the current generations of my family, born to ‘unmarried mothers’ and all (of my family and others; until they became family anyway), and they’re good people. If anybody’s got a problem with that, they can stew in it. The kids are there anyway, and to hell with the theoreticians that say they shouldn’t be.
Alfred –
“although I’ve heard it said that having children is a good thing for a girl to get out of the way early in life”
I’ve been to public schools (govt run), private schools and hippie schools, and I can assure you at all of them there was a massive social stigma around getting pregnant while young. It was simply inconceivable that such behaviour would beneficial to upward social mobility. I finished high school in the late 90’s if its relevant. The same is true for all corporate environments where I have worked. All the women in senior positions had not had children while young.
“This was an excellent arrangement. Unmarried girls who became pregnant faced social censure, humiliation, etc.”
Yeah sounds like an amazing system for the guys and a real shitty system for women. All the moral, social (I guess the “bastard” child also shares some of this) and financial responsibilities fall on the woman if the guy decides he doesn’t want the burden. I guess girls sometimes had one other choice, to risk their lives having a ‘backyard abortion’.
“This incidentally is the basis of the Ghengis effect, why some males have more luck than others. But I won’t go into that.”
I can assure you that this still exists *cries* =P
“As it is, the Brits can hardly reproduce themselves at all now, and can only maintain their numbers by importing people. ”
I like to think that humans aren’t a virus, and that it isn’t necessary that our numbers continuously grow. This planet has a finite amount of resources.
“As for homosexuals showing some discretion, would that be a hardship? I think public expressions of sexuality somewhat distasteful. ”
I agree with you about public expressions of sexuality. Affection is fine in my opinion, but it can certainly cross a line. I find women sexier when they leave a little to the imagination.
You seem to be reducing homosexuality to the physical mechanics of dicks going into arses. Homosexual relationships can be just as loving and meaningful as any heterosexual relationship. Have you never spoken to friends or people you work with about non-sexual aspects of your relationship with a woman? It is obvious that you are in a relationship even when your not talking about the sex. Why should this be denied to gay people? Why should they have to fear prison or social isolation merely for expressing their love for a partner?
“The blinding stupidity of the comment being apparent when one asks, how the hell does anyone know what the ultimate consequences of their actions will be”
So your suggesting that we shouldn’t try?
“and in particular, how does the permissive, social-engineering liberal know what the consequences will be of their buggering around with social taboos and traditions?”
Ahh so conservatives know the results of their actions then? I guess they plan for young girls to die when forced to have a backyard abortion. Slavery has a nice and long tradition in human history, better start stocking up on chains for my new project. Silly liberals, introducing laws to outlaw slavery and engaging in social engineering.
You refer to social indoctrination/engineering a fair few times in your posts. However it seems to me you fail to recognise that 1950’s Britain also had similar levels of indoctrination/engineering, only the morals were different. I don’t think you could find a single anthropologist that would argue that 1950’s Britain was the inherent and natural way for a society to be organised.
“No-fault devorce? Abortion law “reform.”
These are recent examples of social engineering”
Got it, allowing people to separate whenever they feel like it is social engineering. Forcing people to stay together for life because of what a 2000 year old holy book says is the natural way of things.
“provision of public housing, welfare, etc. This is social engineering.”
Helping the poor is social engineering, but ignoring the poor and leaving them to die is the inherent instinct of humanity?
I find the arguments about genetics and IQ to be somewhat disingenuous. For starters, historically the poorest have always been a majority and had more children, while the ‘smartest’ and more ‘successful’ have had smaller families. Secondly the social taboo against mixed race relationships is actually hurting humanities genetics. It’s a simple fact that genetic diversity is greatly beneficial to humanity.
It’s a simple fact that eugenics trumps diversity.
http://eugenics.net/
I don’t believe in Eugenics and I don’t think anyone else those.
There was a time when people did, a time when little boys had their nuts chopped off if people thought their DNA wasn’t as good as someone else.
The thing about Eugenics is everyone thinks of themselves as superior and no one sees themselves as inferior.
If you think I am wrong and think of yourself as inferior, you are welcome to chop your own nuts off.
“It’s a simple fact that eugenics trumps diversity.”
Do you know what?
There are people who agree with you!!!
Like the Ancient Egyptians and Hawaiians, they married their sisters to reserve their noble bloodlines.
Or what about the Iranians before they converted to Islam. They married their mothers and daughters as well as their sisters to preserve their superior Aryan traits.
So who are you producing children with to breed your master race?
Or are you going to lie in fear of incriminating yourself?
Well, I think I will leave that Eugenics selective breeding to you guys, because I’m happy with my diversity.
Number one is a Paki, I’m sure I can get hold of 3 others from 3 different races if the first one doesn’t mind too much.
Diversity, I Like it!!!!!!
Alfred: you appeared to start off by suggesting that, by going down the road of making minimum provision for the poor, we are flirting with Stalist Communism. But it would be rather extreme to suggest we are even close to this kind of social engineering. It seems that you might be in favour of little or no government intervention at all – perhaps libertarian? But to your credit you appeared to move away from your original statement.
The dilemma of moving girls up the public housing queue if they become pregnant is a difficult one. I think it is true, and has been for some time, that some people who languish at the bottom of the learning scale in the UK do genuinely think that getting pregnant is a good way to get a free house. They find, of course, that they are still stuck in the poverty trap, with little education and no time or inclination to get one, and meanwhile they also have a child that perhaps they did not really want anyway. It’s a bit much to suggest that these girls are being “paid” – this breadline existence is hardly a bed of roses, though I am in favour of more school classes pointing this out. (I believe little electronic plastic babies that cry in the night and that wet their nappies have been used in education, with some degree of success – what a great idea!)
I think the best we can do here is training children and young adults to use contraception, despite your horror of it; the alternative of puritanism is social engineering via religiously inspired shame, and is psychologically harmful; and the “silver ring thing” abstinence project achieved an increase in teen pregnancy under the Bush administration. (Bush’s religious cohorts in government stopped recording the figures in embarrassment when their abstinence and anti-contraception projects turned out to make things worse; I can only suppose that when these young adults gave up their abstinence, it was their lack of knowledge about contraception that resulted in increased unwanted pregnancies.)
Meanwhile the conservative alternatives are worse, I should think. Let a newly-born child starve because his mother is unmarried? This isn’t even worth entertaining. Encourage a new generation of people stuck in religious and anti-sex shame? That’s a miserable existence, and sadly it’s something that Evangelical Christians have in existence with their would-be arch-enemies, Sharia-supporting Muslims. Not recommended either. More talk of “bastards” and the “homes for unmarried mothers”? Sounds highly socially regressive to me – does it not to you also?
Personally I think despite the attitudes of modern society, we are still stuck in an age of Christian shame – it’s a historical thing in the UK, rather than a resurgence of right-wing evangelism as per the American example. This regressive social malady is not helped by a barrage of fashion and health messages being forced upon us, to the detriment of people’s sense of self and ego security. Sadly the latter is the fault of unchecked capitalism, but conservatives don’t want to look into the “social engineering” there, nor the commodification of our clothes-horse bodies – because they are in favour of it all. And all of these things feed into the problems of unprotected sex, the ignorance of the difficulties of unwanted pregancies, the mental trauma of abortion, and absent fathers.
Alfred
I know what you mean, I work on a call centre and had an older person on the phone a couple of months ago.
Forget what the conversation was about but he was moaning like hell. Came out with a classic line “In my day a pansy used to be a name of a flower, now its a term for a homosexual and I am not allowed to use it”
“In my day a pansy used to be a name of a flower, now its a term for a homosexual and I am not allowed to use it”
Now I’m puzzled. He’s not allowed to talk about his flowers ?
Richard – I think it is a call-centre thing. These days they record the call, and if a conversation is found to change from technical support to gardening, it can land the employee in trouble with their boss for timewasting.
“I think it is a call-centre thing”
Ah, I see it now, he was looking for technical support for his homosexuality.