Ah, now I get you, you think that you're going to be subsumed into a muslim nation by stealth. Yeah right.
"The de facto majority are unwilling to truly co-exist with infidels."
Proof or, as they say, STFU. The majority I've met have been muslim in name only. But then I guess I mix with professionals.
"Conversion and dhimmitude are also on the table."
Never gonna happen here.
"I never said anything about all Muslims, and even with international connections the IRA is barely a speck of dust compared to Islam."
But you have now said the majority. "Really? They waged war against the Brits because God told them to, and justified their actions by quoting the Bible?"
You know that it's all bound up in the sectarian violence between catholics and protestants in NI, right? and that it is/was religious as much as anything else?
"Yes it is."
You've yet to provide anything other than prejudice and rambling.
What the people are doing is simply a defensive reaction.
Against the wrong thing. The people are idiots.
The government, on the other hand, is doing nothing at all.
The government is doing exactly what the scared idiots want, and coincidentally what it finds expedient too, stripping people of freedoms.
As for the fear, there's hardly anything imaginary about the swath of destruction and terror that Muslims have cut through the world during the past decade (and hundreds of years before that, of course).
Not exactly a swath. More people die of smoking in a day than muslim extremists have killed in this country in the last decade. And we've killed how many of 'them' in Iraq?
I agree - the more we are able to enforce laws across the whole population and enforce compliance/punishment, the more we need to really examine what's on the books and make sure it's not only limited to what was originally intended, but that it's both necessary and 'right'.
Of course judging what's 'right' is the hard part.
And there's far too much cruft on the books already. I think it should be mandatory that politicians spend just as much time debating and repealing existing laws as they do coming up with new ones.
So most muslims have blown themselves up in attacks on western civillians? That sounds like a problem that sorts itself out. Or do you mean that most are involved in some sort of extended plot to kill you and people like you?
Lots of things, like the fact that the IRA was not embarking on an eternal, God-given religious quest to rid the world of infidels one way or another.
Are you sure about that? Seemed like religiously motivated violence to me.
The IRA was a small, temporal group with small, temporal objectives, not an entire religious culture over 1500 years old with members in every corner of the planet.
Again, it's not every muslim that's full of hate for you and your culture. Not by a long shot. And the IRA had links all over the planet too, with south american militias and with US funding.
"There's really no point in even talking about this. All the king's men and all the king's horses could never convince you that anything is amiss in Britain or Europe. Go back to sleep."
See my original post. There's a lot wrong with the UK. "The muslims did it!" is not one of those things though.
I suggest you wake up and see what good, honest, white (lol) British people are doing because of their fear of muslims, and what the government is doing to our once free society because it can get away with it based on that (mostly invented) fear.
Oh of course it's true that you can't have all schools being equal. But it would be nice if we got to a situation where we didn't have people moving house any lying to get into different schools.
Perhaps by bringing back some of the old-time facets of schooling that the socialists in UK government have eroded and removed - streaming children into different classes by ability, teaching a single year group at a time, having children sit in rows and face front, not spread around little tables facing each other...
All things the private school system still uses and gets result with. All things that have been "modernised" out of the state system. I simply don't understand the lack of discrimination on ability, it forces everyone to learn at the pace of the slowest students, which benefits nobody. Not the bright kids, not the slow kids, and not our society. But apparently we all have to have the *exact* same education or it's unfair. Not just the same educational opportunities, but the same education.
"No, they're feared/hated/treated with suspicion because of what they do. Simple as that."
Because of what a small minority have done, you mean? Do you hate the irish? What makes this situation any different to the times the IRA were active?
"You can believe or disbelieve anything you want to, it makes no difference."
Oh indeed, that's true. Just like whether the UK is being islamicized or not is also irrelevant to the perceptions of reactionaries and racists. May I ask why you believe that the UK is being islamicized?
"Perhaps that's just another symptom of cultural suicide."
I don't even understand this term you're using. What do you mean by cultural suicide?
"Even if it does have racist roots (which would be kind of difficult since Muslims aren't a race), it's still self-preservation."
Muslims are predominantly non-white and I firmly believe that's part of why they're feared/hated by so many.
"Because the UK, like several other European countries, is undergoing Islamization."
I don't believe that for a second.
"However, they're ultimately just a symptom of cultural suicide, and can only succeed if someone is enabling them."
If the British had a culture maybe there would be something to complain about. Frankly the celebrity worship and tabloid ranting leave me feeling we're currently a cultural void.
Unless by culture you mean "I don't want to lay eyes on anyone that's not white and anglo-saxon". That seems to be on the rise right now.
"You can say what the fuck you like. I'm clearly not trying to 'supress discussion' - you might (just about) have a case if I had (say) modded you down."
Read carefully. I didn't say you were suppressing discussion, I said you were using the same technique. Try to make something look less bad by attacking the use of language and bringing up something worse.
"Simply: Broken=Does not work at all."
Broken -
"# physically and forcibly separated into pieces or cracked or split; "a broken mirror"; "a broken tooth"; "a broken leg"; "his neck is broken" # not continuous in space, time, or sequence or varying abruptly; "broken lines of defense"; "a broken cable transmission"; "broken sleep"; "tear off the stub above the broken line"; "a broken note"; "broken sobs" # subdued or brought low in condition or status; "brought low"; "a broken man"; "his broken spirit" # (especially of promises or contracts) having been violated or disregarded; "broken (or unkept) promises"; "broken contracts" # tamed or trained to obey; "a horse broken to the saddle"; "this old nag is well broken in" # topographically very uneven; "broken terrain"; "rugged ground" # imperfectly spoken or written; "broken English" # thrown into a state of disarray or confusion; "troops fleeing in broken ranks"; "a confused mass of papers on the desk"; "the small disordered room"; "with everything so upset" # weakened and infirm; "broken health resulting from alcoholism" # destroyed financially; "the broken fortunes of the family" # out of working order (`busted' is an informal substitute for `broken'); "a broken washing machine"; "the coke machine is broken"; "the coke machine is busted" # discontinuous; "broken clouds"; "broken sunshine" # lacking a part or parts; "a broken set of encyclopedia" "
I'd argue that UK society fits several of those.
I'd also say that one can have a society that doesn't work at all still living on to of the structure put there before it broke. It is now broken, ticking over in a degrading state.
"My PC is broken - it does not work at all. It will not boot and cannot be made to boot without hardware repairs."
My PC is broken - I buggered up the init scripts and it doesn't boot right now. I'll fix it soon.
"*I* bought up Somalia as a clear example of a society that *was* broken, to show the term broken was not a good description of the UK."
I'm thinking about australia - I have a reconnaissance trip coming up in a few weeks - they speak the right language and I love hot weather. You're probably right, there's good and bad to all places, I'll just find one that I don't mind as much.
However "curtain twitchers" are people that watch what their neighbours are doing. The term comes about because you know you're being watched when you turn around and see their curtain moving where they've seen you turning around to look in their direction and let it fall back in place to hide themselves.
Basically people with nothing better to do but gossip and watch other people to make sure they're behaving properly (and provide ammunition for further gossiping). Usually old people, watching out of a gap in the curtains.
Don't get me wrong, that upsets me too, but some people don't seem to understand why it would, or what grounds I would have to be upset about it (you're in PUBLIC, duh!).
"Although I'll agree with you for a large part, the British politicians do still seem to have the country's best interests at heart."
I'm not so sure. They're *very* misguided if they do. The current lot seem only to have damage control and positive publicity (by knee-jerk pandering to tabloids) at heart at the moment.
We're in that war too:)
If you want to see the destructive nationalism take a look at our tabloid press or the BBC "Have your say" section. There's a fair number of folk yelling about dropping out of the EU, booting out immigrants (legal and illegal) and pretty much exterminating muslims.
It's not exactly nationalism but it's sort of little-englandism and a spot of racism.
The EU needs a bit more than to be kept in check (some democratic reform and accountability is overdue) but it's a good idea, IMHO.
The worst bit in the UK (and the US) is the power creep and ever expanding government.
And that's my problem with the western governments of today.
They still think their job is to rule, not to be a minimal presence to enable people to live the way they want and have a few provisions to help pick people up again when they fall (literally or metaphorically).
"I've never understood the objections to that kind of thing. How the hell are the council supposed to do their job if they can't do something as trivial as check to see if what they say is true? Should they simply believe everything they are told?"
There are many ways that people can prove where they live without spying being a necessity. For something as trivial as a school place a utility bill, bank statement, tenancy contract etc etc should suffice.
"We're not talking about bugging people's homes or rifling though their possessions while they're out - it's watching someone in public, on the street."
Not in all cases it's not, there have been cases where the camera have been used to look into people's houses. Even so I don't like that people with no special powers or training at the council can track individuals' movements over something so trivial.
Yes, I can be seen in public by anyone. OTOH, tracking me is considered stalking when anyone else does it.
Just because something is broken doesn't mean it's the worst place on the planet. Did I say that? Did I say that it was worse than Somalia?
No. I didn't.
I said it was broken. Broken compared to how it could/should be and in some ways compared to how it used to be (though by all accounts the place has always had its curtain twitching busybodies).
"It's just an insult to the people living in countries that *are* broken to use this term for the UK."
Not in my opinion. I would use the term "totally fucked", or in the case of Somalia "not really a country".
What is an insult (to intelligence) is your arbitrary attempt on restriction of use of language based on an emotional response. You're exhibiting the same thinking that people use to justify or suppress discussion of torture of terror suspects "other people are worse". The word broken is perfectly appropriate, IMHO.
TBH the main reason I'm leaving is the weather anyway, but the government, the media and the populace are making it much easier.
2) I don't think that it's anywhere near important enough an issue to justify watching an entire family. Especially given that those doing the watching are not even police.
3) As I said, it wasn't the police doing this. It's not even a criminal matter, it's a trivial social matter and the fatheads at the local council shouldn't be allowed access to the public CCTV networks over this. Or anything else.
Well, the problem is that the reality is almost as bad as a lot of the proposals.
the local councils have been using the CCTV networks to stalk people for things as trivial as checking whether they live where they said and are eligible for the school they've tried to register their kids at.
I'm just waiting for the first "council worker uses CCTV to stalk and murder ex girlfriend" story to come out, as the abuse of these resources seems to be overdue, especially given how trivial the security in the UK public sector seems to be.
1) yes, I am aware that complaining about people who think they know best and then proclaiming that the law shouldn't reflect the immediate desires of the greater population makes me a hypocrite. I can live with that.
2) No America, you aren't free of these things either, though they are developed to a different extent in each country.
Slashdot Mirror
Ah, now I get you, you think that you're going to be subsumed into a muslim nation by stealth.
Yeah right.
"The de facto majority are unwilling to truly co-exist with infidels."
Proof or, as they say, STFU. The majority I've met have been muslim in name only. But then I guess I mix with professionals.
"Conversion and dhimmitude are also on the table."
Never gonna happen here.
"I never said anything about all Muslims, and even with international connections the IRA is barely a speck of dust compared to Islam."
But you have now said the majority.
"Really? They waged war against the Brits because God told them to, and justified their actions by quoting the Bible?"
You know that it's all bound up in the sectarian violence between catholics and protestants in NI, right? and that it is/was religious as much as anything else?
"Yes it is."
You've yet to provide anything other than prejudice and rambling.
What the people are doing is simply a defensive reaction.
Against the wrong thing. The people are idiots.
The government, on the other hand, is doing nothing at all.
The government is doing exactly what the scared idiots want, and coincidentally what it finds expedient too, stripping people of freedoms.
As for the fear, there's hardly anything imaginary about the swath of destruction and terror that Muslims have cut through the world during the past decade (and hundreds of years before that, of course).
Not exactly a swath. More people die of smoking in a day than muslim extremists have killed in this country in the last decade. And we've killed how many of 'them' in Iraq?
I agree - the more we are able to enforce laws across the whole population and enforce compliance/punishment, the more we need to really examine what's on the books and make sure it's not only limited to what was originally intended, but that it's both necessary and 'right'.
Of course judging what's 'right' is the hard part.
And there's far too much cruft on the books already. I think it should be mandatory that politicians spend just as much time debating and repealing existing laws as they do coming up with new ones.
The one where the US libertarian party espouse all of those things on TV. Their presidential candidate to be precise.
"True" libertarians may not. But then "True" socialists aren't totalitarian asshats. All things get corrupted.
"It's not a small minority. Not by a long shot."
So most muslims have blown themselves up in attacks on western civillians? That sounds like a problem that sorts itself out. Or do you mean that most are involved in some sort of extended plot to kill you and people like you?
Lots of things, like the fact that the IRA was not embarking on an eternal, God-given religious quest to rid the world of infidels one way or another.
Are you sure about that? Seemed like religiously motivated violence to me.
The IRA was a small, temporal group with small, temporal objectives, not an entire religious culture over 1500 years old with members in every corner of the planet.
Again, it's not every muslim that's full of hate for you and your culture. Not by a long shot. And the IRA had links all over the planet too, with south american militias and with US funding.
"There's really no point in even talking about this. All the king's men and all the king's horses could never convince you that anything is amiss in Britain or Europe. Go back to sleep."
See my original post. There's a lot wrong with the UK. "The muslims did it!" is not one of those things though.
I suggest you wake up and see what good, honest, white (lol) British people are doing because of their fear of muslims, and what the government is doing to our once free society because it can get away with it based on that (mostly invented) fear.
Oh of course it's true that you can't have all schools being equal. But it would be nice if we got to a situation where we didn't have people moving house any lying to get into different schools.
Perhaps by bringing back some of the old-time facets of schooling that the socialists in UK government have eroded and removed - streaming children into different classes by ability, teaching a single year group at a time, having children sit in rows and face front, not spread around little tables facing each other...
All things the private school system still uses and gets result with. All things that have been "modernised" out of the state system. I simply don't understand the lack of discrimination on ability, it forces everyone to learn at the pace of the slowest students, which benefits nobody. Not the bright kids, not the slow kids, and not our society. But apparently we all have to have the *exact* same education or it's unfair. Not just the same educational opportunities, but the same education.
Fucking socialist morons.
"No, they're feared/hated/treated with suspicion because of what they do. Simple as that."
Because of what a small minority have done, you mean? Do you hate the irish? What makes this situation any different to the times the IRA were active?
"You can believe or disbelieve anything you want to, it makes no difference."
Oh indeed, that's true. Just like whether the UK is being islamicized or not is also irrelevant to the perceptions of reactionaries and racists. May I ask why you believe that the UK is being islamicized?
"Perhaps that's just another symptom of cultural suicide."
I don't even understand this term you're using. What do you mean by cultural suicide?
"Even if it does have racist roots (which would be kind of difficult since Muslims aren't a race), it's still self-preservation."
Muslims are predominantly non-white and I firmly believe that's part of why they're feared/hated by so many.
"Because the UK, like several other European countries, is undergoing Islamization."
I don't believe that for a second.
"However, they're ultimately just a symptom of cultural suicide, and can only succeed if someone is enabling them."
If the British had a culture maybe there would be something to complain about. Frankly the celebrity worship and tabloid ranting leave me feeling we're currently a cultural void.
Unless by culture you mean "I don't want to lay eyes on anyone that's not white and anglo-saxon". That seems to be on the rise right now.
"It isn't about nationalism, it's about self-preservation."
It's misguided and has racist roots, whatever it is.
Please elaborate on the "self preservation" angle because I don't get it.
Well, we already have fundies running state-funded schools. That's one of their things, right?
"You can say what the fuck you like. I'm clearly not trying to 'supress discussion' - you might (just about) have a case if I had (say) modded you down."
Read carefully. I didn't say you were suppressing discussion, I said you were using the same technique. Try to make something look less bad by attacking the use of language and bringing up something worse.
"Simply: Broken=Does not work at all."
Broken -
"# physically and forcibly separated into pieces or cracked or split; "a broken mirror"; "a broken tooth"; "a broken leg"; "his neck is broken"
# not continuous in space, time, or sequence or varying abruptly; "broken lines of defense"; "a broken cable transmission"; "broken sleep"; "tear off the stub above the broken line"; "a broken note"; "broken sobs"
# subdued or brought low in condition or status; "brought low"; "a broken man"; "his broken spirit"
# (especially of promises or contracts) having been violated or disregarded; "broken (or unkept) promises"; "broken contracts"
# tamed or trained to obey; "a horse broken to the saddle"; "this old nag is well broken in"
# topographically very uneven; "broken terrain"; "rugged ground"
# imperfectly spoken or written; "broken English"
# thrown into a state of disarray or confusion; "troops fleeing in broken ranks"; "a confused mass of papers on the desk"; "the small disordered room"; "with everything so upset"
# weakened and infirm; "broken health resulting from alcoholism"
# destroyed financially; "the broken fortunes of the family"
# out of working order (`busted' is an informal substitute for `broken'); "a broken washing machine"; "the coke machine is broken"; "the coke machine is busted"
# discontinuous; "broken clouds"; "broken sunshine"
# lacking a part or parts; "a broken set of encyclopedia" "
I'd argue that UK society fits several of those.
I'd also say that one can have a society that doesn't work at all still living on to of the structure put there before it broke. It is now broken, ticking over in a degrading state.
"My PC is broken - it does not work at all. It will not boot and cannot be made to boot without hardware repairs."
My PC is broken - I buggered up the init scripts and it doesn't boot right now. I'll fix it soon.
"*I* bought up Somalia as a clear example of a society that *was* broken, to show the term broken was not a good description of the UK."
And you were wrong.
I'm thinking about australia - I have a reconnaissance trip coming up in a few weeks - they speak the right language and I love hot weather. You're probably right, there's good and bad to all places, I'll just find one that I don't mind as much.
Trying to get your kid registered in a school for which you're not in the area - trivial. Shouldn't be criminal in any way.
The fact people move to get to a better school is a sign of the failure of the UK government to run an adequate school system.
"I could produce a bank statement addressed to my friend's house in a couple of weeks if I had the need."
Good for you. What would you use? Or would you use CCTV for everything from benefit registration and the electoral role to provision of NHS services?
Frankly I find it disgusting that -
1) people feel the need to do this
2) that it's an offence
3) surveillance is used to check up on it
and that's just for starters. The UK governmental apparatus needs a reboot.
Well, "twitchers" are bird watching hobbyists.
However "curtain twitchers" are people that watch what their neighbours are doing. The term comes about because you know you're being watched when you turn around and see their curtain moving where they've seen you turning around to look in their direction and let it fall back in place to hide themselves.
Basically people with nothing better to do but gossip and watch other people to make sure they're behaving properly (and provide ammunition for further gossiping). Usually old people, watching out of a gap in the curtains.
Don't get me wrong, that upsets me too, but some people don't seem to understand why it would, or what grounds I would have to be upset about it (you're in PUBLIC, duh!).
"Although I'll agree with you for a large part, the British politicians do still seem to have the country's best interests at heart."
I'm not so sure. They're *very* misguided if they do. The current lot seem only to have damage control and positive publicity (by knee-jerk pandering to tabloids) at heart at the moment.
We're in that war too :)
If you want to see the destructive nationalism take a look at our tabloid press or the BBC "Have your say" section. There's a fair number of folk yelling about dropping out of the EU, booting out immigrants (legal and illegal) and pretty much exterminating muslims.
It's not exactly nationalism but it's sort of little-englandism and a spot of racism.
The EU needs a bit more than to be kept in check (some democratic reform and accountability is overdue) but it's a good idea, IMHO.
The worst bit in the UK (and the US) is the power creep and ever expanding government.
Arsebiscuits. I screwed up the link. Lets try again -
Council admits spying on family
Are the BBC good enough for ya?
Council admits spying on family
OTOH, from the article it turns out that fraudulently applying for a school place like this is actually a criminal offence.
Who'd a thunk it? You can probably be criminalised for farting in the wrong direction these days. We are over-regulated.
And that's my problem with the western governments of today.
They still think their job is to rule, not to be a minimal presence to enable people to live the way they want and have a few provisions to help pick people up again when they fall (literally or metaphorically).
But as you say, where's the fun in that?
Yup. Sad :(
"I've never understood the objections to that kind of thing. How the hell are the council supposed to do their job if they can't do something as trivial as check to see if what they say is true? Should they simply believe everything they are told?"
There are many ways that people can prove where they live without spying being a necessity. For something as trivial as a school place a utility bill, bank statement, tenancy contract etc etc should suffice.
"We're not talking about bugging people's homes or rifling though their possessions while they're out - it's watching someone in public, on the street."
Not in all cases it's not, there have been cases where the camera have been used to look into people's houses. Even so I don't like that people with no special powers or training at the council can track individuals' movements over something so trivial.
Yes, I can be seen in public by anyone. OTOH, tracking me is considered stalking when anyone else does it.
Oh for fuck's sake.
Just because something is broken doesn't mean it's the worst place on the planet. Did I say that? Did I say that it was worse than Somalia?
No. I didn't.
I said it was broken. Broken compared to how it could/should be and in some ways compared to how it used to be (though by all accounts the place has always had its curtain twitching busybodies).
"It's just an insult to the people living in countries that *are* broken to use this term for the UK."
Not in my opinion. I would use the term "totally fucked", or in the case of Somalia "not really a country".
What is an insult (to intelligence) is your arbitrary attempt on restriction of use of language based on an emotional response. You're exhibiting the same thinking that people use to justify or suppress discussion of torture of terror suspects "other people are worse". The word broken is perfectly appropriate, IMHO.
TBH the main reason I'm leaving is the weather anyway, but the government, the media and the populace are making it much easier.
1) not fraud
2) I don't think that it's anywhere near important enough an issue to justify watching an entire family. Especially given that those doing the watching are not even police.
3) As I said, it wasn't the police doing this. It's not even a criminal matter, it's a trivial social matter and the fatheads at the local council shouldn't be allowed access to the public CCTV networks over this. Or anything else.
Well, the problem is that the reality is almost as bad as a lot of the proposals.
the local councils have been using the CCTV networks to stalk people for things as trivial as checking whether they live where they said and are eligible for the school they've tried to register their kids at.
I'm just waiting for the first "council worker uses CCTV to stalk and murder ex girlfriend" story to come out, as the abuse of these resources seems to be overdue, especially given how trivial the security in the UK public sector seems to be.
1) yes, I am aware that complaining about people who think they know best and then proclaiming that the law shouldn't reflect the immediate desires of the greater population makes me a hypocrite. I can live with that.
2) No America, you aren't free of these things either, though they are developed to a different extent in each country.
Really? I thought it was Brainless Womble