NationStates

Samadhi wrote:

The New California Republic wrote:No. I remember British Rail trains in the early and mid nineties had them as well...

Ooh ooh I know This one. Britain started upgrading their trains in 2019 to holding tanks.

Many trains still use the track dumping method. It'll likely be years yet before folk stop seeing shit and toilet paper on the tracks.

The New California Republic wrote:

Samadhi wrote:
Ooh ooh I know This one. Britain started upgrading their trains in 2019 to holding tanks.

Many trains still use the track dumping method. It'll likely be years yet before folk stop seeing shit and toilet paper on the tracks.

Meanwhile in the states all train cars have to have tanks and can’t dump grey waste water anywhere. Thanks EPA

Samadhi wrote:

The New California Republic wrote:No. I remember British Rail trains in the early and mid nineties had them as well...

Ooh ooh I know This one. Britain started upgrading their trains in 2019 to holding tanks.

Mostly everywhere else uses the on tracks method.

And most Australian trains need to reach a certain speed before they will dump on tracks. Because they only do that speed away from stations.

Apparently there were systems to keep it from being dumped unless the train was going a certain speed, patented in the US over a century ago.
https://toilet-guru.com/train.php

What is amazing is that the UK has gone a century without even implementing that technology completely. That is what I do not understand. I mean US passenger railways are far more advanced than UK ones in that regard, and given the state of Amtrak (not great) why?

Thermodolia wrote:

The New California Republic wrote:Many trains still use the track dumping method. It'll likely be years yet before folk stop seeing shit and toilet paper on the tracks.

Meanwhile in the states all train cars have to have tanks and can’t dump grey waste water anywhere. Thanks EPA

Give Trump a chance.

Chan Island wrote:

Rojava Free State wrote:
Jeez that's disgusting

One of many, many, many reasons we need to nationalise the railways.

I am not sure that would necessarily solve the problem though.
British Rail still existed in 1997, 7 years after the US had completely solved the problem and over a century after the US solved the problem of dumping in stations.

So clearly British Rail was not doing a good job either. Just bringing back BR will not solve the fact that BR was not very well run and in 1997 woefully outdated.

I mean given how Brexit has been handled do you really think the UK government would run the railways well?

The New California Republic wrote:

Samadhi wrote:
Ooh ooh I know This one. Britain started upgrading their trains in 2019 to holding tanks.

Many trains still use the track dumping method. It'll likely be years yet before folk stop seeing shit and toilet paper on the tracks.

It was supposed be completely stopped by the end of last year with the exception of old steam and heritage trains.

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/201 ... -to-tracks

Foreign Office staff banned from saying 'no-deal Brexit' despite threat of UK leaving EU with no trade agreement

we are being governed by literal children

"it's not a no-deal brexit if we don't call it a no-deal brexit" except it will probably actually fucking work

Souseiseki wrote:

Foreign Office staff banned from saying 'no-deal Brexit' despite threat of UK leaving EU with no trade agreement

we are being governed by literal children

"it's not a no-deal brexit if we don't call it a no-deal brexit" except it will probably actually fucking work

Political correctness gone mad.

Dumb Ideologies wrote:

Celritannia wrote:
It's the word I found that best fit to get the attention it deserved, so it's done the trick.

And lo, it transpired that the whole "blunder" and our hero's defence of it thereafter were but a cunning plan-scheme to ensure proper attention for the most pressing issue facing the Kingdom. The people not only accepted this entirely plausible resolution to the plot, but also noted that the endeavour was most assuredly successful despite the conversation never progressing to the point our hero was secretly making, what with everyone quite reasonably focusing instead on the most peculiar in what our hero actually said. That fine eve there was much merriment and rejoicing, and representatives from Space FIDE did teleport in to award the title of Grandmaster to our hero for this bamboozling triumph of 4D chess stable genius.

. . . how about calm down, it's just a word used, nothing more.
You don't need to put that much thought into it at all.

The New California Republic wrote:Many trains in the UK still have toilets ("hopper toilets") that flush straight onto the tracks, hence the toilet paper and shit that can be spotted on the tracks at train stations. There are usually signs in the toilets telling people not to flush in stations, but clearly they do.

Must only be on some lines (I'm going to assume ones that don't go to London). I've never seen it, even when I was commuting by train 10-15 years ago. I didn't think I could be surprised at how bad our trains are, but apparently I still can.

https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/m ... 5PLYC4NAYE

Tory cuts leading to more people starving.

Fartsniffage wrote:

The New California Republic wrote:Many trains still use the track dumping method. It'll likely be years yet before folk stop seeing shit and toilet paper on the tracks.

It was supposed be completely stopped by the end of last year with the exception of old steam and heritage trains.

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/201 ... -to-tracks

I remember hearing talk in the late eighties of stopping it. But here we are, over three decades later, still trying to sort it. So I'll believe it when I see it stop seeing shite and bog roll on the tracks.

A woman who blew £16m of unexplained wealth in Harrods has lost her appeal against a National Crime Agency bid to seize her luxury London home.

The Court of Appeal has rejected Zamira Hajiyeva's attempt to stop the UK's first ever Unexplained Wealth Order from being implemented against her. Mrs Hajiyeva must reveal how she became wealthy enough to buy a mansion near Harrods and a golf course in Berkshire. She faces losing the properties if she can't provide proof of income.

Mrs Hajiyeva's husband is a state banker jailed for fraud in their native Azerbaijan.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-51387364

Good.

I'll always be wary of any judgement that assumes someone jailed in Azerbaijan is actually guilty.

The Notorious Mad Jack wrote:I'll always be wary of any judgement that assumes someone jailed in Azerbaijan is actually guilty.

An EWO does not need a prior prosecution in order to be applied, it covers any wealth that the person cannot adequately explain in terms of its source.

Celritannia wrote:

Dumb Ideologies wrote:
And lo, it transpired that the whole "blunder" and our hero's defence of it thereafter were but a cunning plan-scheme to ensure proper attention for the most pressing issue facing the Kingdom. The people not only accepted this entirely plausible resolution to the plot, but also noted that the endeavour was most assuredly successful despite the conversation never progressing to the point our hero was secretly making, what with everyone quite reasonably focusing instead on the most peculiar in what our hero actually said. That fine eve there was much merriment and rejoicing, and representatives from Space FIDE did teleport in to award the title of Grandmaster to our hero for this bamboozling triumph of 4D chess stable genius.

. . . how about calm down, it's just a word used, nothing more.
You don't need to put that much thought into it at all.

Debunking incorrect posts and providing gentle reminders that "getting a reaction" is not the victory condition for winning an argument is precisely the sort of thing that's very worth putting a little effort into. A debate forum cannot function properly unless people understand what a debate is and when it is time to straightforwardly concede a lost point rather than obfuscate indefinitely in the hope that the opponent finds them frustrating enough that they go away.

Celritannia wrote:https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/man-climbs-onto-job-centre-21427557?fbclid=IwAR00qkzswkMl3QFbbbez1qdPF0acf0U4MZCGODCM0w_wPktHc5PLYC4NAYE

Tory cuts leading to more people starving.

Cue the usual suspects cheering and praising.

Dumb Ideologies wrote:

Celritannia wrote:
. . . how about calm down, it's just a word used, nothing more.
You don't need to put that much thought into it at all.

Debunking incorrect posts and providing gentle reminders that "getting a reaction" is not the victory condition for winning an argument is precisely the sort of thing that's very worth putting a little effort into. A debate forum cannot function properly unless people understand what a debate is and when it is time to straightforwardly concede a lost point rather than obfuscate indefinitely in the hope that the opponent finds them frustrating enough that they go away.

Using a phrase to gain attention is sometimes a logical way of promoting something that should be condemned.

Thermodolia wrote:

The New California Republic wrote:Many trains still use the track dumping method. It'll likely be years yet before folk stop seeing shit and toilet paper on the tracks.

Meanwhile in the states all train cars have to have tanks and can’t dump grey waste water anywhere. Thanks EPA

Tfw you realise that the EPA was founded by Nixon.

Celritannia wrote:

Dumb Ideologies wrote:
Debunking incorrect posts and providing gentle reminders that "getting a reaction" is not the victory condition for winning an argument is precisely the sort of thing that's very worth putting a little effort into. A debate forum cannot function properly unless people understand what a debate is and when it is time to straightforwardly concede a lost point rather than obfuscate indefinitely in the hope that the opponent finds them frustrating enough that they go away.

Using a phrase to gain attention is sometimes a logical way of promoting something that should be condemned.

There are circumstances where that's the case. However, this is clearly not one of them. Dropping a ludicrous phrase as the entire response, and providing no commentary to give any supposed "ironic" context, leads to near-certainty that the discussion will primarily be diverted to the inaccuracy of the word choice. Which will in turn hamper rather than facilitate discussion of the more nuanced point you claim to have wanted to have made but didn't.

The conclusion is that either you made an illogical argument, or you meant your words to express one thing but it got widely interpreted as expressing something else. Given that this something else was what your words literally said, and multiple people of various political views interpreted this as being your meaning, a reasonable person would conclude that the fault lies with your communication rather than others' pedantry or failing to understand the workings of your beautiful grand strategy.

I do love a privatised Royal Mail.

Got a letter today and in their defence they did get the street number correct. Sadly they missed that the street name, town, city, and county were wrong. Not sure how that's even managed?

Fartsniffage wrote:I do love a privatised Royal Mail.

Got a letter today and in their defence they did get the street number correct. Sadly they missed that the street name, town, city, and county were wrong. Not sure how that's even managed?

I read county as country and started thinking that the British mail service was sending letters beyond the borders by mistake.

Austria-Bohemia-Hungary wrote:

Fartsniffage wrote:I do love a privatised Royal Mail.

Got a letter today and in their defence they did get the street number correct. Sadly they missed that the street name, town, city, and county were wrong. Not sure how that's even managed?

I read county as country and started thinking that the British mail service was sending letters beyond the borders by mistake.

Oh, that happens too.

Fartsniffage wrote:I do love a privatised Royal Mail.

Got a letter today and in their defence they did get the street number correct. Sadly they missed that the street name, town, city, and county were wrong. Not sure how that's even managed?

Keep an eye on the streets. They like to change.

Dumb Ideologies wrote:

Fartsniffage wrote:I do love a privatised Royal Mail.

Got a letter today and in their defence they did get the street number correct. Sadly they missed that the street name, town, city, and county were wrong. Not sure how that's even managed?

Keep an eye on the streets. They like to change.

Well in Eastern Europe that is actually not a crazy thing to say

Though actually during the invasion scare of 1940 to 1941 UK road signs were removed and swapped to confuse a hypothetical German invasion.

Maybe the government still wants to scare away the Germans