Embarrassing Pasts 741


It says a huge amount about the confidence of the royal family, that they feel able to respond to their Nazi home movie with nothing other than outrage that anybody should see it. They make no denial they were giving Nazi salutes, no statement that the royal family did not support the Nazis. Of course the young children had no idea of the implications. But the adults most certainly did. The missing figure is the cameraman, future King George, who was filming his wife and brother displaying the family sympathies.

The royal family were of course German themselves – completely so. Since George I every royal marriage in line of succession had been conducted in strict accordance with the Furstenprivatrecht, to a member of a German royal family. The Queen Mother, who was of course not expected to feature in promulgating the line of succession, was the first significant exception in 220 years. She was evidently trying hard to fit in. But I am not sure German-ness has much to do with it. Nazi sympathies were much more common in the aristocracy than generally admitted. Their vast wealth and massive land ownership contrasted with the horrific poverty and malnutrition of the 1930’s, led the aristocracy to fear a very real prospect of being stood against a wall and shot. Fascism appeared to offer social amelioration for the workers with continued privilege for the aristocrats. It is completely untrue that its racism, totalitarianism and violence was unknown in 1933-4. They knew what they were doing.

Happily fascism was defeated. The royal family is of course only the tip of the iceberg of whitewashed fascist support – without even starting on industrialists, newspaper proprietors, the Kennedys, etc. etc. But the Buckingham Palace option of outrage that anybody should ever remember is very sad – still more sad that such a position gets such popular support.

We never did get round to shooting the aristocrats.

I am an optimist in politics. My experience of life has taught me that altruism is a far stronger human urge than selfishness. Modern political fashion is based on the denigration of the urge to cooperation, and I do not believe will survive.

Which leads me to believe we are now living in an embarrassing past. Future generations will look back at the massive and exponentially expanding gap between rich and poor, at the super state security services and near total surveillance, at the violent wars waged in ill-disguised annexation of resources, and be amazed that people could support it. I also think that enormous shame will attach to all those who support the excruciatingly slow genocide of the Palestinians. That will be part of our embarrassing past.


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741 thoughts on “Embarrassing Pasts

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  • Ba'al Zevul

    You would guess wrong, there was no Lord Thurso.

    The present Lord Thurso’s father, Viscount Thurso flew Mosquito bombers in WWII, his grandfather was Secretary of State for Air.

    They did their bit for King and Country. Unlike some.

    Fair enough, Fred. One to you. Should have remembered. (I knew).
    Always happy to concede the truth.

    And you, re. Lord Rothermere et al?

    https://futiledemocracy.wordpress.com/2013/10/01/my-dear-fuhrer-a-quick-history-of-daily-mail-fascism/

    http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/this-britain/rothermere-urged-hitler-to-invade-romania-6151638.html

    Establishment figure. Not someone dreaming of breaking free from the UK.

  • Ba'al Zevul

    RobG ;I weep at what my country has become…

    Me too, and I’m English. Harman compromising over the “‘*Welfare*'” bill further erodes any hope. Yet another surreptitious shimmy towards corporate profit and away from the individual: the Overton Window* moves again.

    *Fascinating and true concept. Google it.

  • Ba'al Zevul

    Let’s discuss my crucial solecism a bit more, Fred. A Viscount is only addressed in speech as ‘Lord’:

    http://www.debretts.com/forms-address/titles/viscount-and-viscountess

    Why his election agent walked…

    http://paulmonaghan.scot/former-john-thurso-election-agent-joins-snp/

    Mr Thatcher left the Liberal Democrats disillusioned with the lack of opportunity in his home area after decades of chronic under-investment and idle promises from his former colleague and MP, Lord (sic) Thurso.

    Yes, aware he resigned the Lords seat in order to have the best of both worlds – street cred and deference…you can take the viscount out of the Lords, but you can’t take the Lord out of the viscount. The privilege remains.

  • Juteman

    Just checking.
    Nope, Becky still hasn’t answered my question in reply to her early post. Must be too difficult for him/her.

  • Ba'al Zevul

    Yes, Old Mark. Probably we all have embarrassing pasts, incidents which we were glad there was no-one around to film. First stone and all that. If Charlie were prone to raising his arm and screaming “Ein Reich! Ein Volk! Ein Koenig! I’d be a little more sympathetic to the Sun.

    Dear old larrikin or not, Murdoch has an agenda, and this in some way suits it. If he thought it would be a bonzer jest to dig up a copy of the salute footage and splash it across the media he owns, he or his staff would have thought, hey just a minute, does this suit our interests, and is it going to lead to more hassle than the day’s sales figures are worth? Given that Rupe has pretty well excluded himself from royally-bestowed perks (and access), I’m saying it was intentional.

    Please keep your eyes on the ball, though. Murdoch is absolutely integral to the power-brokering elite in this country, and in several others. If you haven’t already, read

    ‘The Establishment: And How They Get Away With It’ by Owen Jones

    Synopsis here (but do read the book):

    http://www.theguardian.com/books/2014/aug/29/socialism-for-the-rich

    And see how the erosion of what we take for granted can bias the odds in favour of the profiteers.

    Profiteers. Now that’s a word which hasn’t been around for a while….

  • nevermind

    @carmuddgeon who wrote
    “The “book burnings” were spontaneous, not directed by the party or government. The books burned were considered to be pornographic or degenerate in nature.”

    Utter re-writing of history. The public was not interested in burning the books of Berthold Brecht, Einstein, Freud, Heinrich Heine, etc. etc.
    Ther selection of books was not random but deliberate and it was led by the NSDAP.

    Show me any bonfire that does not attract the publics attention?

    @ Ba’al. harriet Harman is sending out a missive to the Labour party, to support the Conservatives cuts agenda by abstaining, not voting against. I feel as if this woman just keeps digging, how much more damage can you inflict to Labour by shadowing the agenda of fascist such as IDS.

  • nevermind

    Mary informed us of “Saudi Arabia arrests more than 400 suspected ISIL militants
    Euronews · 7 hours ago
    Saudi Arabia has arrested more than 400 people suspected of belonging to …

    What will be their fate? ‘Off with their heads’ perhaps in the style of the Queen of Hearts.”

    Well that is a first, Saudi making out as if they are not part of it, what a joke. I’m sure that there are no Saudi princes amongst the 400 foot soldiers.

    What an elaborate, violent and murderous hoax to oust Assad, we (the western alliances) have started, just to get to at the resources of other countries under false pretenses. History will show this to be a hoax to stop more benign energy production and control the oil production by dividing countries causing chaos and controlling what is left after the violence has stopped.

  • nevermind

    Bevin and Suhayl got it right. There was a popular under swell of support from Europe’s, shall we say more simple, aristocrats in Europe.

    This storm in a teacup has been through the press in the 1980’s, with nobody taking much notice of it then, this is rewarmed bubble and sqeak really.
    Retro news/retro policies/ retro politics land,
    Engeland ohhhh Engeland, when will you go forward?

  • Ba'al Zevul

    I feel as if this woman just keeps digging, how much more damage can you inflict to Labour by shadowing the agenda of fascist such as IDS.

    Or: “how much good can you do yourself in the way of lucrative job offers from corporations and the chance to be Tony Blair II?”. She’s not a high-profile scrounger, but she’s not too choosy either. Both Unite and NBC, the US media giant, have contributed to her cause. Also the Center for American Progress, a liberal-corporate thinktank whose funding remains a mystery:

    http://www.thenation.com/article/secret-donors-behind-center-american-progress-and-other-think-tanks-updated-524/

    http://www.theyworkforyou.com/regmem/?p=10260

    She also accepts donations from Islamic Relief (a charity – shouldn’t she be donating to them?), arguably because her constituency has a high Muslim vote. A pity that her attitude to the Tories’ measures is not similarly based on Peckham and Camberwell’s high unemployment and levels of social deprivation, isn’t it?

    Still, don’t want to discourage her too much. She’s a natural Tory, obviously, and she might defect to them…if she remains where she is, it might inspire some realistic debate about just what Labour is supposed to stand for.

  • BrianPowell

    Karina Urbach’s book, Go Betweens for Hitler is a real, researched book on the people in Britain who supported Hitler.

    Gavin Bowd’s book was grabbed and touted by the Scotsman, it even photoshopped a well known photo of the Saltire being raised to change it to a swastika, then splashed it full colour across the front page to support the write up of his own book by Boud.

  • Ba'al Zevul

    Well, here’s how Israel likes to see it:

    http://www.timesofisrael.com/british-archives-hiding-royal-familys-rife-anti-semitism-in-1930s-says-historian/

    And true, what would nowadays be considered antisemitism was pretty routine among the governing classes back then*. The N word was common currency, too. And the population at large was equally unreconstructed. Even in the 60’s the nickname of a possibly-Jewish contemporary of mine at school was (the Y word) It was never challenged by anyone in authority. Maybe Rupe wants the royals on trial for holocaust-related activities?

    * and not dead among the dispossessed ex-governing classes even now, whisper it.

  • Beth

    Res Dis–Syria’s resources were pushed to the limit with the arrival of over a million Iraqi refugees but none of them were turned away from schools or hospitals. Can you imagine the UK taking a million refugees from Syria?
    We should be concentrating on monitoring our own governments abuses. The Syrian people will decide who they support.

  • nevermind

    Thanks for That Ba’al. Do you reckon Harriet will be called to the pedophile inquiry to speak of her time at PIE, its gonna take at least five years to complete the judge opined.

  • Mary

    Ref Harperson’s register of interests.

    An annual trip for two to Wimbledon, two seats in the Royal Box (the other for the awful Dromey presumably) and lunch. A snip at £3,590.

    She is not a LFoI apparently but has rich Jewish donors. Note the Abrahams donation was returned. Remember the Donorgate stink? £630,000 to Labour. Small beer I know cf the massive donations to the Tories but it was illegal.
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Abrahams_(businessman)

    22 July 2008 – View full entry

    4. Sponsorship or financial or material support

    Vinod Popat, of West Hamilton (personal donation). (Registered 26 June 2007)
    Michael V Sternberg, of London (personal donation). (Registered 28 June 2007)
    Margaret Hodge MP (personal donation). (Registered 17 July 2007)
    TGWU (Registered 18 July 2007)
    UCATT (trade union) (Registered 18 July 2007)
    Vera Baird MP (personal donation). (Registered 18 July 2007)
    Stefanos Stefanou, of Hatfield (personal donation). (Registered 18 July 2007)
    David Abrahams, businessman (through Janet Kidd, of Newcastle upon Tyne) (personal donation) (Registered 18 July 2007) (donation subsequently returned)
    Nicky Gavron, of London (personal donation). (Registered 18 July 2007)

    http://www.theyworkforyou.com/regmem/?p=10260

    I bet all those who donate to Save the Children are unaware of the £3,000 given to her by Mr Forsyth for a trip to Sierra Leone.

    NuLabour sicken me.

  • Mark Golding

    EMBARRASSING!

    City of London police put Occupy London on a counter-terrorism presentation with al-Qaida and the IRA.

    Anti-capitalist campaigners described as ‘domestic extremism’ and put on slide with pictures of 2005 London bombing and the 1996 IRA bombing.

    IMO activism is not a crime and the desire to participate in democratic decision-making should not be a cause for concern for the police in any free society.

    An institution that confuses active citizens with criminals and equates Al Qaeda with efforts to re-imagine the city is an institution in grave danger of losing its way.

    It is clear this City of London Police document is a succinct example of the politics of fear played out by this government and a progression from the extraordinary special measures that this government outlined in the Queen’s speech.

    The hat in the ring trembles with insecurity from an increasingly sophisticated and connected British public and has once again turned to fear, not because of a real enemy outside, but because they feel their own sense of legitimacy and authority dwindling.

    Of late New Labour and Conserve-a-tiff revived the construct of terror and found a grand, dark force to protect the British public against, and they can use the power of the state to do this. It is a mirror image of the positive future they used to promise us. But now it is a frightening future they promise to protect us from.

    http://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2015/jul/19/occupy-london-counter-terrorism-presentation-al-qaida

  • Ba'al Zevul

    CAP’s funding is less opaque than I thought, although its own website has removed the page from which this is allegedly taken:

    http://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2013/12/who-funds-the-far-left-youll-be-surprised.php

    Corporates nudging the left (in the US still probably to the right of our Tories, but not Harriet Harman) in the direction they want it to go. Content warning. This site hearts Koch Bros:

    http://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2013/12/who-funds-the-far-left-youll-be-surprised.php

    Genuinely random sample:

    * Eli Lilly and Company
    * Facebook
    * GE
    * Goldman Sachs
    * Google
    * Japan Bank for International Cooperation
    * Microsoft Corporation

  • Ba'al Zevul

    10.28 am was with reference to mine @9.50, Mary. Harman’s CAP support was more recent than 2007.

  • Mary

    Ref Save the Children

    UK…..Forsyth £163,00 pa
    Int’l..Whitbread £234,000 pa

    http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2550648/Fury-234-000-salary-boss-Save-Children-Charity-chiefs-huge-wages-reined-say-MPs.html

    How do they find these niches.

    Forsyth was a spin doctor to Brown 2007-10 and before that an adviser to BLiar.
    http://blogs.savethechildren.org.uk/author/jforsyth/

    Cor blimey! Whitbread is also a director of BT. Add on another £91 grand.
    http://www.bloomberg.com/research/stocks/people/person.asp?personId=118466933&ticker=BT/A:LN

    She has these 27 Board Relationships.
    http://www.bloomberg.com/research/stocks/people/relationship.asp?personId=118466933

  • Ba'al Zevul

    If you haven’t got the message that all these bastards, media, government, corporates and judiciary, are on the same side, Mary, you’ll probably continue finding out.

    Nevermind, for your much more constructive input, I thank you.

    Thanks for That Ba’al. Do you reckon Harriet will be called to the pedophile inquiry to speak of her time at PIE, its gonna take at least five years to complete the judge opined.

    Might be a little sooner than that:

    http://www.theguardian.com/society/2015/jul/19/police-investigating-claims-child-sex-abuse-senior-labour-mp

    The police are ‘all over’ this one, it says here. Wouldn’t want to speculate on whose husband he might be.

  • OldMark

    PS Unless I’m mistaken Lord Russell of Liverpool published a book on the Concentration Camps.

    Bevin- you’re right, it was ‘The Scourge of the Swastika’-for a while (late 60s) it was a bestseller in the UK.

    The January Club is interesting- it was short lived, and can be seen as an attempt by the BUF to keep its ‘radical’ image (based on Mosley’s radical Keynesian counter proposals to Philip Snowden’s austerity medicine, as mandated in the May report).

    The Leading light in the January Club, Robert Forgan, was Scottish, and a former Socialist and MoH for the City of Glasgow. He, like Lord Russell of Liverpool, soon afterwards left the BUF after its anti semitism became more overt.

  • John Spencer-Davis

    Johnny Void posts here about the hiring of some therapy guru named David Rahman, by the DWP, to assist unemployed people in South Wales. He gives no source, but asserts that “According to Minister for Murdering Disabled People (sic), Justin Tomlinson, this is part of a package of support that shows that supporting people with a mental health condition is a priority for the current Government.”

    https://johnnyvoid.wordpress.com/2015/07/18/dwp-hires-miracle-lifestyle-guru-who-claims-95-success-rate-in-curing-mental-health-conditions/

    David Rahman’s website is currently down for maintenance, this must have happened within the last two days. As far as I can ascertain, Rahman is not registered with the British Association for Counselling and Psychotherapy nor with the UK Council for Psychotherapy. Apparently he uses a form of therapy he has invented himself, called Blueprint Therapy and Coaching, which returns no hits from Google except from his own website and some youtube videos of his former clients. Rahman apparently claims a 95% success rate in curing mental health conditions, in which he includes myalgic encephalopathy, chronic fatigue syndrome, and fibromyalgia.

    Glad to see that the mental condition of unemployed people is in such good hands, and that the DWP is so committed to due diligence in ensuring the safety of people who may be emotionally and mentally fragile. I don’t know whether the unemployed will have their benefits stopped if they refuse to go and see the likes of Rahman, but I expect that will come shortly.

    Kind regards,

    John

  • Mary

    A man after the racist hearts.

    PM unveiling anti-extremism strategy
    The prime minister will vow to tackle “failures of integration” as he unveils a five-year plan to combat home-grown Islamist extremism.
    11 minutes ago
    822comments
    Live Cameron extremism speech
    http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-33590305

    The BBC have just changed the heading

    Plan to defeat ‘poison’ of extremism
    Prime Minister David Cameron is setting out government plans to defeat the “poison” of Islamist extremism in Britain.
    16 minutes ago
    854comments
    http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-33590305

    More limits on freedom of expression coming.

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