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The Britain quagmire

Here are two snippets of news from the BBC today.

Snippet one:

Train drivers’ union Aslef has suspended three of its officials after an alleged brawl at a barbecue at its north London offices.

The alleged incident involved general secretary Shaun Brady, assistant general secretary Mick Blackburn and president Martin Samways.

Snippet two:

A 14-year-old schoolboy has been arrested after a teacher was attacked, police have said.

The youngster was arrested after the incident at a school in Scarborough, North Yorkshire, on Friday 21 May.

He was later released on police bail pending further inquiries, a force spokesman added.

Police said the teacher, a 54-year-old man, was taken to hospital for a check-up after suffering swelling and bruising to his face.

Both of these events occurred in Britain. They prove beyond doubt that Britain is a continuous maelstrom of violence from one end of the country to the other.

We should get out now.

19 comments to The Britain quagmire

  • Julian Morrison

    If you resort to weak analogies, cheap shots and petty griping, it reflects bady upon your actual point.

    Also, it isn’t news, and it is boringly repetitious. Surely there’s libertarian stuff out there to blog?

  • ernest young

    Julian,

    If you want something really boring and repetitious try the link below:

    (Link)http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/low/england/

    Day after day, the same old, same old dirge of misfortune, disaster and any other nasty happening that the Beeb can find. What an uplifting experience it is to read such an epistle of unmitgated nastiness. That in North, South, East and the West of England, there is nothing of a pleasant nature that merits even the smallest mention.

    I would take a lot of convincing that the above link is not written intentionally, to undermine the the morale of the reader.

    And the BBC has the gall to criticise the ‘gutter’ tabloid press…

  • That in North, South, East and the West of England, there is nothing of a pleasant nature that merits even the smallest mention.

    Absolutely Ernest! But the BBC might use the argument that “Good News doesn’t sell” which would be odd, given that they are not supposed to be in it for the money.

    So, why then is there mainly bad news on the BBC? It’s certainly not a balanced approach to news broadcasting.

  • Verity

    When I returned to Britain after 20 years of living overseas, I couldn’t believe what an angry, rude, hostile country it was, and how violence had been so thoroughly incorporated into daily life that people barely seemed to notice it. The only people who commented on it were a couple who had themselves recently returned and were making plans to leave again. I also left.

  • GCooper

    ernest young writes:

    “And the BBC has the gall to criticise the ‘gutter’ tabloid press…”

    Quite right. Clearly, the BBC is on a mission (I shan’t mention the ‘G’ word) to undermine what little remains of traditional British society and attitudes.

    This year, the obsession has been how ‘badly’ the situation in Iraq is progressing. Any event, any change, is immediately subjected to the worst possible interpretation and then analysed to death by whichever out-of-office US Democrat, Leftist academic (tautological, perhaps), or media pundit that can be hauled into the studio to help create the impression that we are all doomed.

    The BBC, having failed to prevent the liberation of Iraq from Saddam, is doing its damnedest to make sure the reconstruction is as unsuccessful as possible – certainly as unpopular at home.

    And on the juggernaut rolls. Palestine, Africa, climate change (sic), AIDS, globalisation, assylum seekers – all issues grist to its grinding.

    Is this actually a deliberate policy of the Guardian-reading classes that run the BBC’s news and current affairs output? I suspect not – and not least because the sincere desire of most BBC hacks would be for a ‘kinder’ society and a ‘nicer’ world. I very much doubt they are at all aware that they are gnawing at the pit props, even as the roof creaks overhead.

    What seems to be at work isn’t a calculated, deliberate plan to bring down the temple, but a turn of mind – a way of regarding the world, as distorting of reality as looking at it through those trick glasses that turn everything upside down.

    It’s a mindset. A disease, even – as pathologcial and all-consuming as depression.

    The poor dears. They don’t even know they are sick.

  • Cydonia

    “They prove beyond doubt that Britain is a continuous maelstrom of violence from one end of the country to the other”

    Can a maelstrom have ends?

  • John Webb

    It’s just like Vietnam.

    “When I returned to Britain after 20 years of living overseas, I couldn’t believe what an angry, rude, hostile country it was, and how violence had been so thoroughly incorporated into daily life that people barely seemed to notice it. The only people who commented on it were a couple who had themselves recently returned and were making plans to leave again. I also left.”

    Ah, yes. I too have been to Milton Keynes.

  • Kurt

    From a US perspective (California), some of the anti-gun debate and subsequent rebuttal has focused on how violence in the UK has increased since firearms have been banned (I understand that shotguns are still legal to own, perhaps I’m wrong). Do you think this is true?

    Here, of course, gun ownership by the citizenry is interpreted as being a constitutional guarantee (I hold this belief), but the anti-gun lobby are using end-round tactics to slowly whittle away at those rights, with their ultimate goal being a full ban. I fear the day when guns will be illegal in the hands of lawful citizens and we will be held hostage to thuggery of the streets. Law enforcement proves on a daily basis their inability to protect the peaceful populace.

    What are your thoughts?

    Thanks.

  • Verity

    Kurt, we’ve given our thoughts 90K times on gun control. We’re all agin’ it. They are now trying to ban shotguns in Britain. Then the only people armed in the whole country will be the police and the military. And the Jamaican drug dealers.

    John – did you know that people’s tyres wear out faster in Milton Keynes than anywhere else in the UK? This is because of all the roundabouts. All their tyres are worn on one side. I read it somewhere.

  • Verity, that’s interesting because I feel the same when I go back to France. The place feels, sounds and is way more violent than the average US town. (Emphasis on average, as opposed to the few statistical outliers that European media love to obsess about). In fact, I never felt as safe in Dublin after as I felt, and still feel, in NYC. Random violence – drunk youth assaulting people for fun in the city center – was quite common and I yet have to read or hear about such a case in the part of the US where I live.

    Never mind the palpable intolerance and racism, the conspicuous presense of far-right parties in political life, the frequent demonstrations, strikes and associated mob violence against private property and riot police, the gang rapes in the projects, one of the many nightmares to come out of failed state-sponsored social housing…

    It is a depressing spectacle. The funny bit is when the so-called intellectuals start bemoaning the coming ‘americanization’ of our wonderful society.

    We should be so lucky.

  • Guy Herbert

    If you think relentless bad news is boring and media outlets ought find good news to publish, then I doubt you’ve experienced one that tries to do the latter. (Remember Soviet Weekly anyone?)

    There’s nothing as tedious as expected good news. “Happy families are all alike; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way.”

  • Verity

    Sylvain – You are correct on every point. I felt far safer in Texas, where everyone is armed and most people, therefore, don’t want to start a fight, than I feel here in France. I felt far safer in SE Asia than I do in violent, socialist Europe where the police fear to act in case they’re infringing the rights of Algerian drug dealers.

  • ernest young

    Isn’t it that the BBC, and other sections of the media so clearly empathise with that wonderful English trait, the pessimistic, moaner syndrome?

    The Australians, long ago dubbed UK immigrants as, ‘whingeing Poms’, so this is no new thing, but I wonder which came first? ‘the chicken or the egg’, the moaning, or the sour reporting?

    The pessimism seems to be a post-war thing, so I suppose we can rightly place part of the blame on the Beeb, and others. But being me, I cannot pass up the opportunity to cast a little mud at ‘the system’.

    Being British, we have all been brought up with the idea that, while we are not perfect, we think that most of what we do is ‘pretty good’. So when various post-war Governments promised us Nirvana, by way of the Welfare State, and ‘the Jewel in the Crown’, by way of the NHS, and various other bureaucratic delights, most of the populace, were expecting something that at least lived up to our collective expectations. As the song said, we were a bunch of ‘cock-eyed’ optimists

    When such promises fell far short of expectation, then we started to moan, as one promise after another failed to deliver, the moaning got worse, until it became an ingrained habit. Disappointment turned to scepticism, finally scepticism turned to cynicism.

    The BBC as front man for the ‘system’ , was on a roll, and had discovered the secret – just print doom and gloom, that way, anything suggested by our Masters would seem to be an improvement.

    Just watch for the ultimate headline…- “We are Doomed, I say, Doomed, we are all Doomed”, or, “The End is Nigh”. All printed in bold, or delivered in a maniacal bass voice, with eyes rolling. Then you know that either there is a real disaster ocurring, or that the BBC licence fee has finally been revoked…

    (Any resemblance to any characters at Speaker’s Corner, are purely coincidental).

  • GCooper

    ernest young enquires:

    “Isn’t it that the BBC, and other sections of the media so clearly empathise with that wonderful English trait, the pessimistic, moaner syndrome?”

    It is a very great deal more than that. The BBC has appointed itself the oppositional voice of those who wish to change society to an internationalist, Socialist model.

    This isn’t just moaning – it is the systematic inculcation of a slow revolution.

  • ernest young

    Was that supposed to be ‘revolution’, or did you mean ‘revulsion’ 🙂

  • RR

    It’s awful, isn’t it? Here in Britain, people are rude to me and never say “have a nice day”, but I just can’t get anyone to shoot me. Beating up teachers is all well and good, but we’ve tried gun control and the Americans are still beating us at high school shootings. And banning the death penalty has been an abject failure at increasing murder rates to US standards. We must come up with a new plan, and fast!

  • Verity

    “Train drivers’ union Aslef has suspended three of its officials after an alleged brawl at a barbecue at its north London offices.” They were holding – a barbecue – in – their – offices?

    Does anyone know how stupid that is? (Yes, yes, I know they’re union officials, but even so ….) Do they know that toxic fumes come off charcoal?

    RR – “I just can’t get anyone to shoot me.” Give me your address.

  • Nancy

    Damn it, Verity, you made me spit my coffee on the keyboard!