Douglas Murray on crime, migration and modern dishonesties:
In Germany, friends and readers describe to me how they are learning anew how to read their daily newspapers. When the news says that ‘A person was killed by another person’ for instance, and no names or other identifying characteristics are given, people guess – correctly – that the culprit is probably of migrant background. For the time-being serious crimes are still reported, but the decision has been taken that the public should not really be informed about them.
Related: “Vibrant and diverse.” And of course these items here.
Heather Mac Donald on “diversity” versus merit:
Sometimes meritocracy will yield diversity; sometimes it won’t. The point is that it doesn’t matter. Diversity should not be an end in itself; excellence is the goal. Rejecting the primacy of diversity constitutes a head-on assault on the received wisdom of Washington and elite American culture. Gender and racial quotas have been the order of business for the last three decades… The result: wasted resources, the side-lining of merit, and ever more virulent and irrational identity politics. The rule of the diversity regime is that you’re required to be fanatically obsessed with race and gender until you aren’t — because at that unpredictable moment, whenever it comes, noticing race and sex becomes racist and sexist.
And Roger Kimball on being outraged by the obvious-but-unmentionable:
Professors Amy Wax and Larry Alexander were roundly condemned by their university colleagues. Thirty-three of Wax’s fellow law professors at Penn signed an “Open Letter” condemning her op-ed. “We categorically reject Wax’s claims,” they thundered. What they found especially egregious was Wax and Alexander’s observation that “All cultures are not equal.” […] As William Henry argued back in the 1990s… “Every corner of the human race may have something to contribute. That does not mean that all contributions are equal… It is scarcely the same thing to put a man on the moon as to put a bone in your nose.” True, too true. But in a pusillanimous society terrified by its own shadow, it is one thing to know the truth, quite another to utter it in public.
And then Professor Wax mentioned other obvious things, much to the agitation of people who like to pretend.
As usual, feel free to share your own links and snippets, on any subject, in the comments.
O/T, but Easter is now officially Hateful you bigots!
https://twitter.com/splchatetracker/status/980573043180429314
Posted by: Jonathan | April 02, 2018 at 10:40
So enriched.
Posted by: Alice | April 02, 2018 at 10:51
Correction of note.
Posted by: David | April 02, 2018 at 11:01
Douglas Murray on crime, migration and modern dishonesties:
It's the same in the UK.
Posted by: Jonathan | April 02, 2018 at 11:03
It’s the same in the UK.
At risk of sounding unkind, it occurs to me that the alarming levels of violent crime may have more to do with the fact that a creature like Cressida Dick was given a job she cannot do. See also Sadiq Khan. If you appoint people who are habitually, instinctively evasive and schooled in modern dishonesties, what follows should not be surprising.
Posted by: David | April 02, 2018 at 11:10
.. Cressida Dick was given a job she cannot do.
The promotion of the ideologically 'on-message' is certainly a contributing factor across all police forces in Britain, but one can't be honest and ignore changing demographics, of England in particular, as Scotland and Wales haven't experienced a similar uptick.
Posted by: Jonathan | April 02, 2018 at 11:19
but one can’t be honest and ignore changing demographics,
Well, quite.
Posted by: David | April 02, 2018 at 11:32
"Related"
https://www.standard.co.uk/news/london/chinese-airline-in-racism-storm-over-article-warning-tourists-to-avoid-parts-of-london-populated-by-a3338501.html
Posted by: [+] | April 02, 2018 at 11:37
Leftists clearly don't think that all cultures are equal: they think Western culture is inferior.
Posted by: Hector Drummond, Vile Novelist | April 02, 2018 at 12:03
“Vibrant and diverse.”
https://www.express.co.uk/news/uk/938824/Germany-news-duisburg-state-of-emergency-fight-riot-machetes
Posted by: [+] | April 02, 2018 at 12:06
Meanwhile in France:
https://twitter.com/Arch_Revival_/status/980397014696390658
Posted by: Jonathan | April 02, 2018 at 12:07
"When the news says that ‘A person was killed by another person’ for instance, and no names or other identifying characteristics are given, people guess – correctly – that the culprit is probably of migrant background. "
Jonathan is correct, hence the 'MONA' meme ('Men of no Appearance').
Posted by: JuliaM | April 02, 2018 at 12:08
Heather McDonald is wrong about diversity. It is not a desirable, but occasional, outcome of meritocracy. It is pushed as the alternative to meritocracy.
Posted by: Adam | April 02, 2018 at 13:27
And in health news:
No laughing at the back.
Posted by: David | April 02, 2018 at 13:34
In Germany, friends and readers describe to me how they are learning anew how to read their daily newspapers.
He’s a bit late to the party, isn’t he?
http://www.desertsun.co.uk/blog/3372/
Posted by: Tim Newman | April 02, 2018 at 13:38
He’s a bit late to the party, isn’t he?
I’m pretty sure Mr Murray has mentioned this phenomenon before. And given the ongoing creep of coded news and pretending-not-to-notice, it bears repeating.
Posted by: David | April 02, 2018 at 13:43
Regarding the alleged equality of cultures, another one of Tim’s seems broadly relevant.
Posted by: David | April 02, 2018 at 13:48
And given the ongoing creep of coded news and pretending-not-to-notice, it bears repeating.
Indeed it does, and often.
Posted by: Tim Newman | April 02, 2018 at 13:56
And in health news:
Welcome to the 1800's.
Posted by: Farnsworth M Muldoon | April 02, 2018 at 14:03
Welcome to the 1800’s.
I’m being exposed to kinds of beastliness I shouldn’t know about.
Posted by: David | April 02, 2018 at 14:07
I’m being exposed to kinds of beastliness I shouldn’t know about.
My apologies, I never cease to be amazed at the recycled quackery people fall for.
Posted by: Farnsworth M Muldoon | April 02, 2018 at 14:20
Also somewhat relevant.
Posted by: David | April 02, 2018 at 14:31
Let's play "Count the Paragraphs" until the NYT finally lets slip the ethnicity of the murderer
Posted by: Franca Valeri | April 02, 2018 at 14:36
The whole 'MONA' concept is ostensibly to avoid provoking retaliation or revenge on innocents, I take it. But eventually it will probably invoke what it claims to want to avoid. Then the Progs can say, "See? I told you so!"
Posted by: PiperPaul | April 02, 2018 at 15:33
That.
Posted by: sH2 | April 02, 2018 at 15:47
That.
A sense of contempt and… betrayal is, I think, hard to avoid. And among the Sadiq Khans, Simon Schamas and Cressida Dicks, maybe there’s an inkling that the damage that’s been done may be irretrievable. And so, instead, we’re expected to pretend.
Posted by: David | April 02, 2018 at 16:00
Sports lovers everywhere will be saddened to learn that the former proprietrix/muse of the Mandela United Football Club, Winnie of that ilk, has left the field for the last time.
Posted by: Trevor | April 02, 2018 at 16:09
And among the Sadiq Khans, Simon Schamas and Cressida Dicks, maybe there’s an inkling that the damage that’s been done may be irretrievable.
What if they know exactly what they're doing?
Posted by: Jonathan | April 02, 2018 at 16:14
On second thoughts: sleep well, everything is fine. Our leaders are keeping us safe.
Posted by: Jonathan | April 02, 2018 at 16:17
https://kakistocracyblog.wordpress.com/2017/03/23/the-virtue-inferno/
Posted by: Wolfgang von Trips | April 02, 2018 at 16:35
it occurs to me that the alarming levels of violent crime may have more to do with the fact that a creature like Cressida Dick was given a job she cannot do.
Jean Charles de Menezes is unavailable for comment
Posted by: Nemo | April 02, 2018 at 16:45
Lindsay Shepherd dissociates from the Left:
Posted by: Sam Duncan | April 02, 2018 at 16:51
@Wolfgang.
https://kakistocracyblog.wordpress.com is obviously crimethink because my ISP blocks it. Must. Use. VPN.
Posted by: Jonathan | April 02, 2018 at 17:01
Not entirely unrelated.
Posted by: David | April 02, 2018 at 17:03
When the news says that ‘A person was killed by another person’ for instance, and no names or other identifying characteristics are given, people guess – correctly – that the culprit is probably of migrant background.
Jonathan is correct, hence the 'MONA' meme ('Men of no Appearance').
A decade ago, when this exquisitely politically-correct phenomenon was also occurring in Sydney, Melbourne and other larger Australian cities, Tim Blair began referring to the (nearly always Lebanese Muslim) perpetrators as "the men of no appearance" aka MONA.
The whole 'MONA' concept is ostensibly to avoid provoking retaliation or revenge on innocents, I take it.
There's an old satirical NYT headline meme: "Muslim Leaders Fear Backlash from Tomorrow's Terror Attack".
Posted by: Spiny Norman | April 02, 2018 at 17:19
But eventually it will probably invoke what it claims to want to avoid. Then the Progs can say, "See? I told you so!"
It's weird -- if four murderers and child molesters were freed from prison and moved into a halfway house in a working-class neighborhood, the neighbors would raise hell as soon as they heard about it, and do everything they could to chase the undesirables out of the parish.
But when four hundred murderers and child molesters move into a neighborhood, the neighbors are expected to hush up and look away, lest they cause the murderers and child molesters to have hurt feelings (or worse yet, to make the importers look foolish for bringing them in).
I don't even begin to understand how such a state of affairs comes to be. I do, however, get the feeling that I should spend more time at the range, poking little holes in pieces of paper from several yards away. For stress relief, dontcha know.
Posted by: Governor Squid | April 02, 2018 at 17:23
A sense of contempt and… betrayal is, I think, hard to avoid. And among the Sadiq Khans, Simon Schamas and Cressida Dicks, maybe there’s an inkling that the damage that’s been done may be irretrievable. And so, instead, we’re expected to pretend.
What if they know exactly what they're doing?
Why do you think our political class encourages us, after what happened in Manchester, London, etc., to go around saying "Don't Look Back in Anger"? The most obvious, understandable, (and I think perfectly valid) reason is to avoid provoking retaliatory attacks on innocent minorities, like the awful London Mosque attack last year. One suspects a tad more cynically, however, that those politicians currently ruling the country encouraging us not to look back, don't want us to look back at what happened. Because if we do "look back in anger", we might realise that it's their policies and their actions that are ultimately responsible for the mess in which we find ourselves, and who would want to be on the other end of the retribution they imagine is coming for them?
Posted by: Captain Nemo | April 02, 2018 at 17:31
Alice,
So enriched.
There's an internet image meme of what appears to be a gang of Hutus from the Rwandan civil war / genocide, running towards the camera and carrying machetes, and captioned,
Here comes the diversity / You're about to be culturally enriched
Posted by: Spiny Norman | April 02, 2018 at 17:35
Welcome to the 1800's.
I’m being exposed to kinds of beastliness I shouldn’t know about.
You haven't seen "The Road to Wellville"?
Posted by: Spiny Norman | April 02, 2018 at 17:45
Jean Charles de Menezes is unavailable for comment
Quite. A perfect illustration of the establishment's contempt for the populace. Dick was in charge of an operation that saw an innocent man slaughtered in front of dozens of terrified commuters. A horrific mistake for which Dick, had she an ounce of decency, would have apologised and resigned. Instead, her establishment mates rule that she is in no way responsible. So Dick continues to rise up the ladder, and enrich herself from the public purse. She gains more power and influence (and just wait for her elevation to the legislature and the VAST pension that we’ll all have to pay for).
Meanwhile, the Guardian and BBC etc etc etc all continue to scratch their heads and wonder about the rise in populist, anti-establishment sentiments among the lower classes.
Posted by: Horace Dunn | April 02, 2018 at 17:51
You haven’t seen “The Road to Wellville”?
[ Faints. ]
Posted by: David | April 02, 2018 at 17:57
I can’t help thinking some kind of weapon might have been useful.
Posted by: David | April 02, 2018 at 17:59
I can’t help thinking some kind of weapon might have been useful.
God forbid that the people be allowed to defend themselves. They might get crazy ideas, such as that they are not serfs but citizens, and we cannot have that!
Posted by: pst314 | April 02, 2018 at 18:45
ESR (http://esr.ibiblio.org/?p=6286) comments on "youth" crime:
Posted by: Criticas | April 02, 2018 at 18:54
What the press is teaching Americans...
Indeed. Reading the news now somewhat resembles what Soviet citizens had to do.
Posted by: pst314 | April 02, 2018 at 18:58
The press is also teaching Americans that it is on the side of the criminals. This is a lesson that can be dangerous to the teacher.
Posted by: pst314 | April 02, 2018 at 19:00
Captain Nemo --
One suspects a tad more cynically, however, that those politicians currently ruling the country encouraging us not to look back, don't want us to look back at what happened. Because if we do "look back in anger", we might realise that it's their policies and their actions that are ultimately responsible for the mess in which we find ourselves....
"Forget Pearl Harbor!"
"The Imperial Japanese are a peaceful people!"
"'Bushido' means 'The Way of Peace,' and not 'The Way of the Warrior' as the bigots say."
"If we'd not been in The Philippines in the first place, the Bataan death march wouldn't have happened, so in a way it's really our own fault."
"Nothing we can do about Japanese expansion; who are we to judge their culture?"
Posted by: Boatswain's Mate | April 02, 2018 at 19:12
Why keep reporting on the resulting ash heaps?
When I was in Chicago in the early 1990s, shootings were front page news on the Chicago Sun-Times.
In the mid to late 1990s, they moved to page two, and then page three.
By the early 2000s, they were just "day in the life" articles, in the mid-section of the paper.
Today, the paper publishes a separate paper solely dedicated to the shootings, because they can't fit them all in the paper any more.
Chicago and Detroit have some of the highest murder rates in the USA, but if you read the local newspapers, you'd barely be aware of it. They aren't suppressing the news; they're simply accepting it as the way things are.
In Germany and the EU, they aren't accepting it. Yet. They're preparing the population to become accepting of it. They are fully aware of the implications of their policies, and they accept them. They know that the public at large would not, so they simply don't report it.
Posted by: billdehaan | April 02, 2018 at 19:15
If anyone has trouble with comments not appearing, email me and I’ll cajole the spam filter.
Posted by: David | April 02, 2018 at 19:33
Cajoling now? Dealing with the spam filter is like minding a recalcitrant child, eh?
Posted by: Spiny Norman | April 02, 2018 at 19:46
Cajoling now?
She’s a creature of many moods.
Posted by: David | April 02, 2018 at 19:51
It's a head scratcher.
https://twitter.com/TheSafestSpace/status/980830779268878337
Posted by: Sam | April 02, 2018 at 20:17
And so, instead, we’re expected to pretend.
As the great Steve Sailer said many years ago, "political correctness is a war on noticing things.
Posted by: Flubber | April 02, 2018 at 20:58
I can’t help thinking some kind of weapon might have been useful.
Here in the Southland, such a scenario would be unlikely. If such a stunt had been tried, there is a substantial possibility that there would be four carcasses on the concrete with bullets in their hearts.
Posted by: Geezer | April 02, 2018 at 21:09
there is a substantial possibility that there would be four carcasses on the concrete
That would, I think, be a more satisfactory outcome. A more just one, certainly. That the law-abiding should feel resigned to being preyed on by sociopathic vermin, repeatedly and with little hope of comeuppance, is a moral outrage.
Posted by: David | April 02, 2018 at 21:19
I can’t help thinking some kind of weapon might have been useful.
Re: the long war against self defense: First we were told that it was immoral (and should be illegal) to use violence to defend one's property. Then we were told it was immoral to use violence to defend oneself from assault. And now we are told that it is immoral to use violence to defend against deadly assault. At every stage in this war against civilization the criminals were further emboldened.
Posted by: pst314 | April 02, 2018 at 21:19
Secure Beneath The Watchful Eyes.
Posted by: Hopp Singg | April 02, 2018 at 21:24
Who exactly is the “we” in that sign? Seven paragraphs and not a hint (other than the negative hint that they would have told us if they had wanted to tell us).
Similarly: https://twitter.com/whitesundesert/status/980897583374700544?s=21
Posted by: Tim Newman | April 02, 2018 at 21:27
there is a substantial possibility that there would be four carcasses on the concrete
You're a much quicker/better shot than I. I'd probably only get one or two before they hightailed it out of there.
Posted by: Governor Squid | April 02, 2018 at 22:02
Related.
Posted by: R. Sherman | April 02, 2018 at 22:47
A decade ago, when this exquisitely politically-correct phenomenon was also occurring ...
The MONA have reappeared in Melbourne this passed year, after the narod became unsettled by the rise of car jackings and home invasions perpetrated by Sudanese yoot.
Posted by: lotocoti | April 02, 2018 at 23:24
Maps are racist.
https://twitter.com/BasedMonitored/status/980851370969374720
Posted by: Jen | April 03, 2018 at 06:57
Niall Ferguson, here.
Posted by: David | April 03, 2018 at 08:40
Boatswain's Mate, I'm not sure if you think I believe that America was responsible for what happened at Pearl Harbour, (I don't) or if you're agreeing with me and using it as an example. If you could clarify just what it is, then I'd be able to respond with a proper answer.
Posted by: Captain Nemo | April 03, 2018 at 12:33
Maps are racist.
Great googly moogly - "Critical Cartography".
Attila, Gengis Kahn, and all the other "non-white" conquerors of history could not be reached for comment, but in general, throughout history, I think the maps are not used to colonize, but that they come after the fact, because the dastardly white men generally were going to unmapped areas. The whole chicken and egg thing.
My favorite slide from her presentation that proves "oppression" - where black kids got hit by cars. Oddly enough, where black kids live, but that is supposed to prove white oppression, because they were being run over on purpose or something. Also the quote from the slide:
Right-O. Miss Robinson of SU last seen wandering lost in the wilderness using a "radical map" looking for some herbs to cure her appendicitis.
Posted by: Farnsworth M Muldoon | April 03, 2018 at 12:33
@Govnor Squid
For stress relief, dontcha know.
It's amaxing how soul-satisfying it can be to toss a bit of brass downrange.
Posted by: Scott | April 03, 2018 at 12:42
God forbid that the people be allowed to defend themselves. They might get crazy ideas, such as that they are not serfs but citizens, and we cannot have that!
As an ex-pat American living in the land of leprechauns and lunatics I've had people honestly tell me that no one needs a weapon to defend their property because human life is more important than any property you may have. I have to say that the urge to burgle their homes has only ever reached the "it's not worth it for the lols" stage but I'm keeping my options open. ;)
Posted by: Tom | April 03, 2018 at 12:49
"toss a bit of brass downrange"
My experience has been that the brass stays in the cylinder or is ejected to somewhere within a 10 foot radius of my firing position.
Posted by: PiperPaul | April 03, 2018 at 13:29
I’ve had people honestly tell me that no one needs a weapon to defend their property
Let’s not forget that the Guardian has for decades made excuses for criminality, urging us to fret about the poor quality of toothbrushes available in prison, while disdaining those who wish to see career thugs and sociopaths suitably punished.
A telling example, one of many, was Decca Aitkenhead’s interview with leftist lawyer Clive Stafford Smith, who airily dismissed burglary - the violation of someone’s home - as “really quite inconsequential,” thereby implying that the wellbeing of burglars is of at least equal importance to the wellbeing of their numerous victims. And so any anger at being burgled is waved aside as somehow plebeian and unsophisticated.
Aitkenhead and Stafford Smith are, of course, unlikely to have their pieties tested in the real world, as burglary and theft are much more likely to affect working class people in poorer neighbourhoods. And so our Guardianistas pretend to feel sympathy with working class criminals, usually habitual criminals who prey on their neighbours for years, while dismissing the criminals’ equally working class victims, whose expectations of lawfulness are not considered important.
Posted by: David | April 03, 2018 at 13:43
Captain Nemo --
No, my response was (clearly) an ill-conceived attempt at humor, imagining what the early 1940s might have been like had today's soyboy and cultural-relativist cadre of politicians and "reporters" (and I only use that term because it always fetches a good laugh) been in charge. Y'know, like a Sadiq Khan of the day suggesting that repeated nightly aerial bombings are just something one has to get used to living in a major metropolis.
Now, where'd I lay my Godzilla facepalm meme?
Posted by: Boatswain's Mate | April 03, 2018 at 14:05
leftist lawyer Clive Stafford Smith, who airily dismissed burglary - the violation of someone’s home - as “really quite inconsequential,”
That interview actually made me angry. When my mum got burgled it was definitely *not* "inconsequential" and she couldn't sleep properly for weeks. What world do these people live in?
Posted by: Clam | April 03, 2018 at 14:16
Thanks for the clarification. Yes, I can't imagine it would have gone down too well among the public if the government of the time had taken that particular line of thought. And the meme isn't necessary, as I did the action on reading the post.
Posted by: Captain Nemo | April 03, 2018 at 14:24
When my mum got burgled it was definitely *not* “inconsequential”
Well, quite. And yet both Ms Aitkenhead and Mr Stafford Smith insist that being burgled has “zero” emotional impact and no real material repercussions, and is therefore trivial and unworthy of serious punishment. Especially, we’re told, if the burglar is a “young black person.”
Neither Guardianista pauses to consider the impact of burglary, even repeatedly burglary, on someone who is, say, elderly and isolated, and perhaps uninsured, and who has no means of replacing whatever possessions were stolen. The victim’s violation, and the subsequent anxiety, and the sense of injustice, are to be dismissed as trivial. Merely, and I quote, an “idiotic attitude.”
And this is the man that Ms Aitkenhead, who “didn’t much mind being burgled,” regards as her “hero.”
Posted by: David | April 03, 2018 at 14:30
I consider it a particular failing of society that Aitkenhead and Stafford Smith still have personal possessions to their names. In a just world, they'd be burgled six days a week (one must preserve some sense of unpredictability, after all), until there was nothing portable remaining in their homes.
Throw in the occasional hammering of their car windows, and I think I'd sleep soundly at night, knowing that all was well with the world.
Posted by: Governor Squid | April 03, 2018 at 14:34
When my mum got burgled it was definitely *not* "inconsequential" and she couldn't sleep properly for weeks.
One of the things that gets missed when these utilitarian analyses of the economic cost of petty theft get tossed around is the trauma of having one's sense of safety and security in one's own home shattered, sometimes permanently. There's a reason for that old chestnut that "a conservative is a liberal who's been mugged".
Posted by: Daniel Ream | April 03, 2018 at 14:42
the trauma of having one’s sense of safety and security in one’s own home shattered, sometimes permanently
And yet it’s unlikely that either of these creatures will ever register their own vanities as corrosive and malign.
Posted by: David | April 03, 2018 at 14:49
That interview actually made me angry.
I'd not read it. Now I have. Now I'm angry.
Posted by: MC | April 03, 2018 at 14:56
Spiny Norman: “There's an old satirical NYT headline meme: ‘Muslim Leaders Fear Backlash from Tomorrow's Terror Attack’.”
Apparently it was another Tim Blair-related innovation in 2006, in addition to his more recent MONA thing: “Angus Jung sent the Aussie pundit Tim Blair a note-perfect parody of the typical newspaper headline: British Muslims Fear Repercussions Over Tomorrow’s Train Bombing.
Maclean’s, June 19th” – http://www.steynstore.com/page28.html
Tim Blair related stuff infuses and influences your postings Spiny!
Posted by: Watchman | April 03, 2018 at 15:46
I’d not read it. Now I have. Now I’m angry.
It does, I think, reveal a kind of contrived, narcissistic calculation, in which notional categories (e.g., “young black person”) trump actual behaviour and who did what to whom. And we’ve seen variations of the same many times. For instance, when the Observer’s Barbara Ellen told us that unprovoked aggression against people deemed “posh” - including the bullying of children - is “part of an instinctive protest against inequality” and all about “socio-political emancipation.” Apparently, it’s not just routine thuggery or driven by petty malice, it’s “protest” and therefore righteous.
Likewise, in 2011, following the London riots, when the middle-class Marxist China Miéville claimed to be “horrified” that members of the press and public had used the word feral when describing the career predators and assorted thugs who, seeking excitement and a sense of power, had beaten pensioners unconscious and burned random women out of their homes. And who, on the arrival of firefighters, had dragged them from their vehicles and punched them insensible. According to Mr Miéville, the people doing these things, often while laughing, they were the real victims.
But I suppose if your moral calculus is driven by a kind of narcissism, in which status is accrued by identifying the most exciting and improbable victim group and pretending to care about them, then perversity will follow. And so we arrive at a shift of empathy (or pretend empathy) from the working class victim of crime to the working class thug or criminal, on grounds that the criminal is in some way being oppressed and, unlike their neighbours, being made to misbehave.
Posted by: David | April 03, 2018 at 15:57
Our efficient forces of law and order are making us safer here in good old England:
https://twitter.com/MPSBarnet/status/976007945094909952
via Ian Miles Cheong
Posted by: Jonathan | April 03, 2018 at 16:00
I’d not read it. Now I have. Now I’m angry.
Yeah, I had similar feelings back in 3rd/4th grade after standing up to a bully and being punished for "fighting" and then being told how it wasn't his fault, how I should have tried to "understand" him, feel sorry for him. I know this is cold, and yes quite petty, but as the WWII generation passes on, as they have moved out of influence at least, it is only those elderly whom I have felt protective of. I no longer feel quite that way with these elderly now in their 60's and 70's who were part of creating this idiocy. And women were the worst perpetrators of such. And I say this as someone approaching that age myself. Hell, if such a thing were to happen to my wife I'd be furious and out for revenge. Perhaps I'll be hoisted on my own petard one day. I'll probably deserve it. O-blah-dee-o-blah-dah...
Posted by: WTP | April 03, 2018 at 16:12
Tim Blair related stuff infuses and influences your postings Spiny!
As well it might. I've been a fan of his clever and often impish satire for years, and was a daily reader/commenter of his late and very much lamented timblair.net blog.
(To be honest, David's "internet pub" here is the closest I've found to Tim's old blog, and has also become a daily read.)
Posted by: Spiny Norman | April 03, 2018 at 16:26
To be honest, David’s “internet pub” here is the closest I've found to Tim’s old blog,
The massage parlour next door is going out of business, so I may knock through and upgrade this place to a wine bar and brasserie.
This may affect the prices.
Posted by: David | April 03, 2018 at 16:40
This may affect the prices.
Will we have to tip the piano player?
Posted by: Spiny Norman | April 03, 2018 at 17:00
The massage parlour next door is going out of business, so I may knock through
No need to redecorate then.
Posted by: Joan | April 03, 2018 at 17:12
The massage parlour next door is going out of business
Have you considered taking on their existing staff? Just Veronica perhaps? Asking for a friend.
Posted by: WTP | April 03, 2018 at 17:16
No need to redecorate then.
They had the same classy velour and flocked burgundy wallpaper. What are the odds?
Posted by: David | April 03, 2018 at 17:20
No comments in the last hour or two. Is everybody next door?
Posted by: pst314 | April 03, 2018 at 19:55
Is everybody next door?
It’s the flocked wallpaper. Theirs has fewer stains.
Posted by: David | April 03, 2018 at 20:04
As a matter of note to those not following Twitter or Ace, it seems Kurt "I don't like child porn or hentai, seriously" Eichenwald is stepping up his total meltdown.
Posted by: Sporkatus | April 03, 2018 at 21:55
No need to redecorate then.
So, then, I assume the next fundraiser will have a different payee?
Posted by: R. Sherman | April 03, 2018 at 22:33
and are primarily created by white men
Oh my... all the wasted years I bought multiple Thomas Bros. Maps without being woke to the oppression. I even enjoyed just looking through them!
I'm SO ashamed.
Posted by: Darleen | April 03, 2018 at 23:22
@ Spiny Norman
Tim's blog can still be found here, although I am not sure if it is the same as the old one.
Posted by: Trilby | April 04, 2018 at 01:41
Fun and games at Monash University. This is to woo potential students.
http://quadrant.org.au/opinion/qed/2018/04/mad-rad-dangerous-knowledge/
Posted by: Black Ball | April 04, 2018 at 03:41
Personal anecdotes on the subject of burglary.
About 30 years ago the family home was burgled while we were in bed, nothing taken but my mother's handbag. However my little sister didn't sleep properly for months after and moved bedrooms so she wasn't at the top of the stairs. Then around 15 years ago my flat in London was burgled. I was insured and did not lose a moment's sleep. However I did lose several sets of cufflinks - not valuable but rather cool 60s gear - that used to belong to my father, now deceased. I am still angry about the loss of this link with him and would relish the chance to pound whatever worthless smackhead took them.
Two minor incidents, but don't fucking tell me that burglary should be just laughed off or that our sympathies ought to be with the criminal. My sympathies are with firstly the victims, but also the many people - the majority in fact - from tough backgrounds who work their arses off and do their best to get along without fucking over anyone else.
On a cheerier note, quite a while after the first burglary, we had a knock at the door and a copper was there. He asked if we had been burgled, as he had a guy in the car who was being driven round identifying homes he had burgled, for 'taking into consideration' purposes. My stepfather, a robustly built former rugby league player, shot out of the house, opened the police car door and gave the lag in the back a erm... stern warning, I think we'll say. The police gave him a minute of intimidatory ranting and then suggested that would probably be enough as they didn't want the lad to soil himself and make a mess of the car.
Made us feel a lot better. Today it could land you in trouble, depends on what type of copper you get I suppose.
Posted by: MC | April 04, 2018 at 05:17
Trilby,
Tim's blog can still be found here, although I am not sure if it is the same as the old one.
His heavily-moderated corporate media blog is NOTHING like his old one , which was, if anything even more "free-wheeling" than this cozy joint.
By "heavily-moderated", I mean, comments can take up to 24 hours to appear, especially if you're on the other side of the planet, and then sometimes not at all if the moderators don't feel like posting it.
(BTW, that link goes to an archive site. The bookmark I had saved for the site itself now redirects there.)
Posted by: Spiny Norman | April 04, 2018 at 06:11
Oh, for what it's worth, I still read Tim Blair's Daily Telegraph blog, but I haven't tried to post a comment there in a couple of years.
Posted by: Spiny Norman | April 04, 2018 at 06:15
it seems Kurt "I don't like child porn or hentai, seriously" Eichenwald is stepping up his total meltdown.
That utterly bizarre "psychoanalysis" of 17 year old Kyle Kashuv was a thing to behold, and I mean that in the most confused, disturbing and perverse way possible.
This showed up on Twitter, Kurt's incredible shrinking resume:
After Twitter users contacted MSNBC and Vanity Fair, they disavowed any current connection to him.
Posted by: Spiny Norman | April 04, 2018 at 06:35
Fun and games at Monash University. This is to woo potential students.
Seems they’ve played their hand a little early. But yes, it’s quite revealing. Sort of, “Be a sexy, ill-informed agitator. Have strident opinions on things you don’t understand. And above all, flatter yourself.”
Posted by: David | April 04, 2018 at 06:41
By “heavily-moderated”, I mean, comments can take up to 24 hours to appear,
I’ve always thought that what makes blogging fun is the interaction. So the glacial moderation does rather bugger things up.
Posted by: David | April 04, 2018 at 06:44