The shocking death of Lee Rigby quite naturally appals us all. The intention of the crazed little group who conceived this killing was to make it as horrible as possible in order to scare people.
Horrible, sociopathic violence happens to people from time to time. They have done since Cain killed Abel, metaphorically or literally as you choose. Here is another headline today, just as horrific:
A British soldier has been jailed for stabbing a 10-year-old boy after getting drunk on vodka while serving in Afghanistan.
Both that obscene attack and Michael Adebolajo’s appalling actions are borne out of the same conflict. But it is reasonable to suppose that both these incidents involved people with, for whatever reason, a pre-disposition to murderous violence.
Such people have always been with us and will always be with us, but fortunately they are very, very few. In a nation of 60 million, involvement in violent crime is very low. If you are the victim of criminal violence, the odds over the last decade are about one in twenty thousand that the violence inflicted on you will have any linkage to political or terrorist causation. And the odds that you will suffer any kind of violent attack are thankfully pretty remote.
We should not panic from theatrical violence, just deplore and take sober stock. Sadly if a lunatic on the bus decides to strangle you tomorrow, there are no pre-emptive laws that can stop that. We should stop pretending that the state can always prevent.
Einstein: good catch.
Machete: illiterate journo-school fodder. It is well known that black people spend their time murdering each other with machetes, therefore this was a machete…
One that bothered me: R4 Today programme yesterday reported: “The suspects are said to be of Muslim appearance” (the announcer was careful to stress “said to be”…conclusion – this was an early police press release delivered verbatim)
Well, damn me. I’d have put my foot in it and said they were both of African appearance (see link). And it turns out the parents of one (who have my complete sympathy, incidentally) were devout Christians. But now I know what a Muslim looks like*, I’ll never make the same mistake again.
*Nothing like Menendez…
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/terrorism-in-the-uk/10076239/Woolwich-attack-suspects-were-known-to-security-services.html
Before the usual suspects weigh in with the usual stuff, yes, it was a disgusting act by complete bastards professing ( but I doubt if they were practising, since crack cocaine has been mentioned in the context of their lifestyle) to be Muslims. Most Muslims will be as appalled by this as you profess to be, usual ones. If you’re a British Muslim, whether of Muslim appearance or not, you’re British, and you don’t hack British people to death…this is widely understood. Still.
The RI is so-ooo silly. That synopsis was not written by me. It comes from the Northern Stage website.
A Northern Stage Production
Written by Dennis Potter
Directed by Psyche Stott
Into my heart an air that kills
From yon far country blows:
What are those blue remembered hills,
What spires, what farms are those?
AE Housman
Almost 20 years after his death, Dennis Potter’s BAFTA-winning play is moving, funny and unforgettable.
On an idyllic summer afternoon in wartime, seven children play, tease and fight their day away. Willie is pretending to be a Spitfire, Raymond is dressed as a cowboy and Angela doesn’t want to share her china doll with Audrey. And while John and Peter are vying to be leader of the gang, who is that little boy left alone in the barn…? Amidst their hilarious games and complex friendships the merriment turns sour when they stumble into a sudden and unexpected tragedy that will change their lives forever.
Potter’s charming and profound play captures humanity, his wicked humour and his fierce intolerance of cruelty, reminding us that no-one is ever truly innocent.
Visit blueremembered.co.uk for more about the show.
~~
He/she/it suggests that I am no Harold Hobson as if I had put myself up as some theatrical reviewer. Suggest that he/she/it could be a latter day stand in for Kelvin McKenzie or the like if we are speaking of the press.
Brixton 1983. Not terrorists. (then, terrorists had Irish accents and were not of Muslim appearance) Probable folk-memory of machetes formed here. Murder still unsolved. RIP.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Death_of_Keith_Blakelock
“The RI is so-ooo silly. That synopsis was not written by me. It comes from the Northern Stage website.”
Mary, if you can’t use italics or blockquotes, perhaps more frequent use of quotation marks might be in order? For example, you seem (?) to have taken a large copy and paste from John Hilley at 8:10 am, and then, after ‘Jewish appearance’?’ you carry on in your own words with no apparent break.
I had just come from John Hilley (via Brian’s link), and I didn’t need your large excerpt, thanks, but if you’re going to use copy and pastes, you might find a way to differentiate clearly between them and your own words. It would help. Thanks!
—————-
As for Help for Heroes, links would have been more than enough, for me. The word “Hero” has become badly debased. One assumes that a British soldier who stabs a young Afghan child, or perhaps tortures an Afghan adult, and is later wounded himself and flown home, is considered one of these “heroes”. Either there or on the Sky Wall
http://news.sky.com/story/951515/fallen-heroes-tributes-to-the-fallen-british-military-personnel-in-afghanistan
Dreoilin to April Showers :
“…but if you’re going to use copy and pastes, you might find a way to differentiate clearly between them and your own words. It would help. Thanks!”
——–
My thoughts exactly. Thank you, Dreoilin.
Of course April/Mary does this deliberately, it gives her an escape route (“oh, it wasn’t me, I was just quoting”). Very courageous!
“as if I had put myself up as some theatrical reviewer.”
Doesn’t she? Poetry too, on occasion. No William Empson either.
In the video notice the blue car and the person casually walking between the car and the railings. If you then look at the aerial shot of the car it is clear that the person would have had to have walked right through the middle of a large pool of freshly spilled blood, no doubt that person would have even smelled the warm moist odour of that congealing blood, that person could not have failed to notice that the wide and long smear of blood that led into the road, whereupon a headless corpse lay – how can it appear that none of this is of the slightest concern to the person?
So, what is happening to people that seeing someone beheaded in the street appears to be just part and parcel of everyday life? That people wander up to a headless corpse lying in the street, sit down beside it, rub it on the back, jump back up and continue chatting with other bystanders whilst hanging around doing nothing and with the corpse at their feet and while to fully armed murders are still present?
This attack was as fake as the Boston bombings. There was no blood on the street around the victim even though they are said to have tried to cut off his head. There is no blood on the clothes of either attacker when they are pictured. If I came across two men trying to cut off someone’s head in the street I would run for my life or vomit not stand around watching and I certainly wouldn’t try and video a madman with two knives make a speech.
Dad!
You are at it again!
Dreoilin dealt effectively and politely with April’s literary crimes. Issue dealt with n’est pas?
But not for Dad. Instead of answering my (simplified) question you went and told April off with your unique vindictive flair.
I’m “On- Topic” for a change and I’m still waiting.
“oh it wasn’t me, I was just clucking” Don’t worry, we know you cluck when you have typed your egg, and it wasn’t you that devised this Wollywood film of hacking an innocent victim without blood so that the real hacking job of bugging us all could go through parliament.
I listened to pickles on R4 this morning. Bdok-bdok-bdok-bdok bdaaaargh bdaargh bdaargh bdaaargh bdaaaargh bdaargh bdaargh bdaaargh . You’d have thought he’d just fertilised an entire battery of chickens, so pleased and smug was he to have found the false-flag ammunition to bring back the spyers’ charter bill.
Incidentally hahachuckle chickens do also make g***o.
It is now coming out that the soldier was in fact not decapitated. So, no machete and no decapitation. Gosh, if it wan’t for that ranting interview people could be mistaken for thinking that this was just a brutal murder instead of the dawn of a new era of a new type of Islamic terrorist threat, one that David Cameron was already totally versed in even as the story was developing.
Soufflé
You’re so quick to rise to the slightest thing your dad does. I hate to split up a loving family, but do you not think it would be better if you left him alone for a while to do his own thing. No eggs and the cake will fall apart, but too many eggs and it will turn out like rock. We can cope with a little bit of proud neo-natal boasting.
Jesuit Atheist.
Why let facts get in the way of a good story?
As Mr Komodo pointed out “machette” carries powerful imagery of dark-skinned foreign savages and “beheading” is guaranteed to evoke strong visceral feelings in the target population. So why not throw them both in?
You’d have thought (Eric Pickles had) just fertilised an entire battery of chickens…
Perish the thought that he’d just eaten them instead. Along with all the pies and his weight in chips. Eh, Fred?
A large man has just hacked someone to death, his hands are covered in his victims blood, he walks towards you still carrying the weapons. Naturally you just stand there filming him….
The more I watch that interview the more bollocks it is. At the end he turns to walk back to the corpse, look at him looking for his marker* on the road, you can even see it. The whole interview appears to have been prearranged right down to the camera angle, ensuring that we have the potent images of murderer with victim in the background – the directors cut.
*actors will understand.
Guano.
What? Like I can change my genes?
Ah, here we go – as I was expecting, a conspiracy theory (discount version)is emerging (MJones, Jesuit Atheist). All aboard, chaps and chapesses!
Dad.
I’m still waiting for you to answer a simple question.
Touché Soufflé
Which came first? I suggest you modify his genes and wait for Mr Pickles to do the rest.
Yes Habba conspiracy. Messy I know, but to make a good Home=lette, you have to break a few – precious – eggs.
Habbabkuk (La vita è bella!)
23 May, 2013 – 9:13 pm
My nomination for the idiotic comment of the day :
Doug Scorgie (for it was he), who wrote at 0h59
“In the final analysis the machete was supplied by the Foreign Office.”
Halfakunt doesn’t know what a metaphor is!!
Metaphorically speaking is a turn of phrase that means that what has been said has not to be taken literally.
You are an arse. (Metaphorically speaking).
Habbabkuk: Do try and add something to the debate.
Explain why everyone is talking about a soldier being decapitated with a machete when no such thing has actually happened?
And if that is not true then maybe those guys are not Muslim terrorists after all eh? Think about that bit did you?
Habbabkuk (La vita è bella!)
23 May, 2013 – 9:21 pm
When people commit crime there are no excuses but there are reasons (unless the criminal is insane).
If a man kills a woman (or vice versa) one reason could be jealousy another could be financial advantage, whatever.
If someone burgles a house it is usually to steal items to sell, perhaps to feed a drug habit, perhaps to pay off debts or just to supplement a low income.
These are reasons (motives if you prefer) not excuses.
You don’t seem to understand the difference HB.
Sofia
The reason why your Dad is ignoring you is probably because he thinks it was a stupid question – but as I am a generous soul the answer to both 1 and 2 is zero since despite what certain silly old ladies may have told you religous beliefs (or criminal beliefs for that matter) do not manifest themselves in appearances. You might also wish to reflect that numbers of victims do not have always have a bearing on the rights and wrongs of military actions e.g. the number of British and US victims of WW2 were considerably less than those of Nazi Germany but that doesn’t mean that we wrong in waging that war or that any unhinged Nazis would be justified in attacking off duty solidiers with a meat cleaver.
Pretty inefficient conspiracy, I’d say, if the murderers have to hang around for 20 minutes for the AR squad to come and shoot them. Even with blanks, if your conspiracy theory wanders that far.
Ok. Two big demented lowlifes with cleavers and a gun start on a citizen near you. You’ve probably never seen a citizen being hacked to death before, and he’s making loud and extremely distressing noises. What do you do? Interpose your person between them? Well, of course you would. Any conspiracy theorist would, wouldn’t they? Pity there wasn’t one there.
“You are an arse. (Metaphorically speaking).”
I think you’ll find that, in its current context, that’s a tautology, not a metaphor, Doug.
Komodo: “Two big demented lowlifes with cleavers and a gun start on a citizen near you… What do you do? Interpose your person between them?”
No, you just stand around casually filming them giving an after event interview? Get a grip man, it’s utter bollocks. No machete, no decapitation, but the Islamic terrorist bit is true right?
Good for the two judges here
24 May 2013
‘Iraq abuse claims: ‘Inadequate response’ by UK government
The MoD has held inquiries into abuse in Iraq
Related Stories
Iraqis claim UK forces ‘brutality’
Iraqi eyewitness: Mistreatment by UK troops
The British government’s response to claims that British troops abused and unlawfully killed civilians in Iraq was inadequate, the High Court has ruled.
Lawyers representing 180 Iraqi civilians had called for a full public inquiry in Britain.
The court stopped short of ordering such an inquiry, but said there should be a series of further investigations into the allegations.
It said “a new approach” to the inquiry into the allegations was needed.’
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-22655384
The Judgement.
‘PRESIDENT OF THE QUEEN’S BENCH DIVISION
MR JUSTICE SILBER
____________________
Between: R (ALI ZAKI MOUSA and others)
Claimants
– and –
SECRETARY OF STATE FOR DEFENCE
Defendant
____________________
Michael Fordham QC, James Maurici, Danny Friedman QC, Dan Squires (instructed by Public Interest Lawyers) for the Claimants
James Eadie QC, Philip Havers QC and Kate Grange (instructed by The Treasury Solicitor) for the Defendants
Hearing dates: 11 December 2012, 29-31 January and 22 March 2013’
http://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWHC/Admin/2013/1412.html
The multiple lawyers have done well out of the case.
Enough inverted commas there I trust for the pedantic Dreoilin?
Synonyms Pedantic – punctilious – donnish – priggish – meticulous
‘This attack was as fake as the Boston bombings. There was no blood on the street around the victim even though they are said to have tried to cut off his head.’
MJones- either you have a Ph.D in advanced bullshittery or you’re the real ‘troll’.
This you tube clip, to say the least, undermines your fanciful theory-
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vhtV7qkuNnk
I nominate you as the MI5/Mossad/ANOther Troll Of The Day and claim my £10 reward
RD.
Thanks for at least trying.
You missed the point so let me ask it again as simply in simple language.
1. How many civilians get killed by Islamic terrorists in the real world?
2. How many civilians get billed by those waging the “War on Terror” in the real world?
Is that easy enough for you to understand?
Kempe @9.40PM
I rarely agree with your comments, and you’ve had the troll handle thrown at you a few times, but you are spot-on in your criticism here.