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Post by Reactionary Rage on Mar 10, 2020 12:20:11 GMT
Left wing bias (and, frankly, fucking mince) needs to be challenged but it needs to be done in the right way. Fighting populist left wing propaganda with any right wing alternative is not the way to go – target the institutions, not individuals - but sadly things are so partisan these days civilised discourse is increasingly difficult. However you can’t keep slurring folks as racists or transphobes because they have differences of opinions or no platforming people (look at what happened at Oxford recently with Amber Rudd and Selina Todd) or getting people sacked because they don’t fit into your narrow little dogmatic worldview and not get a reaction. You can’t introduce shit like this, for example, and not expect people to push back. Intolerance breeds intolerance. www.bbc.co.uk/news/education-51098539Man I’m glad I avoided all this crap at university. I think my head would explode.
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Post by tory on Jun 11, 2020 7:48:27 GMT
The culture wars continue...
Statues toppled. Next up is Baden-Powell, of whom there is a statue on Bournemouth harbour. The council have said they're taking it down because of his "unacceptable homophobia".
He was a 19th century/20th century soldier. I suspect that most people were homophobic, anti-semitic and racist by today's standards. But he set up a worldwide scouting movement that has provided a great upbringing for millions (myself included). Did we have lessons about how bad gays, POCs and Jews were? No. We were quietly advised to "Do our best" and to help our community.
FOR FUCK'S SAKE.
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Post by oh oooh on Jun 11, 2020 7:57:18 GMT
Yeah, but at the same time why NOT take it down? What purpose does it serve? Who celebrates this person's life today? Who is even aware of him? (is the cub/scout movement still a 'thing'?)
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Post by tory on Jun 11, 2020 8:09:23 GMT
Scouting is still a thing.
It was only put up in 2008!
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Post by tory on Jun 11, 2020 8:10:53 GMT
When they go for the statue of Hume in Edinburgh, then we are fucked.
It is beginning to take on the form of an inquisition in my eyes.
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Post by oh oooh on Jun 11, 2020 8:13:34 GMT
Scouting is still a thing. It was only put up in 2008! OK. I see your concern. They're going for everything indiscriminately. I still say 'whatever'.
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Post by tory on Jun 11, 2020 8:26:56 GMT
When I read Julia Boyd's "Travellers in the Third Reich", she managed to articulate very well, through the eyes of memoirs of people travelling through Germany at the time, how it was young people, in particular, the Hitler Youth, who were the symbols of fascism. One particular memory a woman had of walking somewhere in the countryside and being passed by a group of Hitler Youth. They "Seig heiled" and she didn't - they then punched her squarely in the mouth for not doing so.
You may all laugh at this and think "that's just ridiculous" but at some point in the future this generation of young people, if the zealotry continues on this projected curve, will be looking for outward signs of conformity to their ideology. Young people do not possess doubt or scepticism in the same manner as older people. They believe they are right and that people who show differing opinions to them are wrong. I don't think it's going to end well.
In a generation they will be the people in power - in institutions, in the media, in government.
The only thing I am hopeful for, as was evinced by the election, was that the general population of the UK will not stand for this in any format - so any hope the Labour party have of being elected is pretty much zero if these people are part of their party.
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Post by oh oooh on Jun 11, 2020 8:46:11 GMT
Christ thank FUCK we're saved from the Labour Party! Can you imagine?
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Post by tory on Jun 11, 2020 8:49:54 GMT
Well, unless these people create their own party to suit their own ideology, they will be the main force in the Labour party in years to come after the moderates are booted out.
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Jun 11, 2020 8:54:06 GMT
Unlike statues, history should not be fixed in stone. Deciding what we remember or commerate is a fluid process, subject to editing, rethinking and redebating. I would, agree however, that the emotional charge of a protest is not the best context to make such decisions.
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Post by tory on Jun 11, 2020 9:01:25 GMT
No-one said it shouldn't be.
Statues are to a certain extent provocative. That there is no doubt - but they also provide us with an opportunity to think about history.
The classic example is probably Oliver Cromwell. This is a man with a hugely problematic history - responsible for the deaths of thousands of Irish, killed the King, created a Commonwealth that failed after less than a decade and yet, there is a statue outside Parliament of him. It shows that the history of Britain is complex and nuanced. If we were to apply the whitewashing ideology we have today to the Victorians, then any memory of Cromwell would have been annihilated. But they chose to remember him because of his contribution to the history of the country, which is a complex one.
History is complex.
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Post by oh oooh on Jun 11, 2020 9:04:39 GMT
I would, agree however, that the emotional charge of a protest is not the best context to make such decisions. Absolutely. But history has many examples of sudden, violent actions resulting in change. It's the way the disenfranchised give voice. They don't organise a mass writing to MPs! The pair of you are beginning to sound like Priti Patel.
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Post by tory on Jun 11, 2020 9:12:41 GMT
John, how are these people "disenfranchised"?
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Post by oh oooh on Jun 11, 2020 9:30:47 GMT
Use whatever word you like. We're focussing too much on the language. You know what I mean. People who need change aren't going to get it by joining clubs. Or writing letters. Or voting.
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Post by tory on Jun 11, 2020 9:40:36 GMT
So you advocate that people should use violence to force through change even if options such as democracy, representation and full suffrage and the like are available, as they are in the UK right now.
I mean, that's as fucking cack-headed a thing as I've ever heard you say I reckon.
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