UK Politics Thread 18-inch Mark VI: Witty Title Forthcoming

[Shamhnan Insir]

Huzzah! A new thread. I feel like this needs another "huzzah" perhaps....


Huzzah!

[Elepis]

tag

[Imperializt Russia]

I like the title! Is this the original one?

It's the same title as when I first posted, if that's what you mean.

the coverage was basically "he killed her because he was worred about immigrants taking his house" which does nothing but stir up yet more hatred towards immigrants and also makes it looke like he had "legitimate concerns" or whatever they call it

I mean they called him a Neo-Nazi terrorist, so at least they're not pussyfooting around that issue.

Yet they're still dogwhistling it.

At best, Mair's being used as a vehicle.

[The Archregimancy]

e: props to the article for mentioning "The UK – and in fact the English-speaking world – has a history of drawing its rules of censorship much more tightly than continental Europe." though. makes it pretty clear why i want to move and don't want to go to another anglophone country. a group of lost causes.

It's lovely here in southern Chile.

The weather's fantastic, the beer excellent (amazing beer down here), the wine from further north excellent value, and though I'm happily married it's impossible not to notice that the women and men are stunning.

It's a 24 hour flight from London to Valdivia, mind, with two connections in Madrid and Santiago.

I'm not completely out of the loop with British politics (I'm aware of the Autumn Statement, the football sex abuse cases, the kerfuffle over the Mail's coverage of Cox's murderer, and get plenty of LibDem emails over the by-election), but Brexit seems both literally and figuratively a very long way away right now.

A little bit of perspective can sometimes be refreshing.


And in terms of censorship, you should try living in Dubai for a couple of years. Non-Anglophone countries aren't necessarily a panacea.

[Imperializt Russia]

Chilean beer? I only knew of their wines really, and never tried them.

[Souseiseki]

And in terms of censorship, you should try living in Dubai for a couple of years. Non-Anglophone countries aren't necessarily a panacea.

oh, i never said they were, just that all suitable countries are non-anglophone

[The Archregimancy]

Chilean beer? I only knew of their wines really, and never tried them.

The beer is excellent here in the south (Los Rios & Los Lagos regions - not the far south of Patagonia). It's too far south to make wine, and there was a major 19th-century German settlement that's had a strong and long-lasting influence on the long culture. The Kunstmann brewery just outside of Valdivia is particularly famous, though there are lots of microbreweries as well.

But I doubt you'll find any Chilean beer in the UK.

Just to make this vaguely relevant to the thread, it's my understanding that the Chilean wine industry is deeply concerned over the impact of Brexit on Chilean wine exports. Prices are already due to go up on the producer side due to lower production over the last two years (itself possibly related to ongoing climate change in the Chilean Central Valley), and there are concerns that this may be accompanied by an increase in importation/tariff costs for the UK post-Brexit. The fall in value in the pound doesn't help given the (coincidental) current decline in the value of the Chilean peso.

So no, I haven't been able to totally escape UK politics.

[Mad hatters in jeans]

souseiseki news bulletin:

the government is now spying on everyone. the food standards agency can view your entire browsing history for the past year without a warrant. the ECJ has already ruled this kind of thing to be illegal, but thankfully we have taken back control.

the government is planning to attempt to block most if not all overseas porn sites due to obscene content like female ejaculation. the ECHR doesn't really like mandatory filters like this, so it's just as well we voted to take back our sovereignty.

the government still has no plan for brexit. boris johnson has pissed off the entire EU by scaremongering about turkey joining during the referendum then supporting turkey joining.

the amount of hunger strikes and people on suicide watch in our probably full of rape and abuse but it's covered up because that's bad for business immigrant camps is an all time high. we finally got the australia-style system we wanted!

nigel farage, who fucked off and clammed up the minute the referendum was won, is now planning to fuck off to america period. what a cool dude.

the maximum penalty for file sharing will now be 10 years in prison. look forward to visiting any site they think is dodgy enough being probable cause. remember they can see that, without a warrant. cool beans.

mandatory age verification for "adult" content is coming. this will not extend to sites like reddit, facebook, tumblr and twitter and will not be the stepping stone a south korea-esque require online identity for even more tracking of your every move. nope. hey remember back in 2000 when they said the internet filters would only be used for child porn and we said the exact kind of thing that is happening now would happen and people said we were just being paranoid? thank god we were wrong on that front!

the institute for fiscal studies are predicting 10 years without any real wage growth. an increasingly authoritarian government, the rise of the far right and an economy that has barely recovered about to plummet off a cliff again is really cool. i'm super looking forward to being a lost generation. that's exactly what i wanted with my one and only life. big thanks to everyone involved. we did it guys.

the prosecutors in the thomas mair (guy who assassinated a sitting MP) case have blamed the "the febrile atmosphere of the referendum" for aiding her death. a certain online newspaper responded by publishing an article asking if he "possibly wrongly" believed his house would be taken by immigrants and pondered whether that is why he killed her. one wonders where he could have possibly gotten that kind of idea?

the country is going to lose a bunch of money. everyone is going to lose a bunch of money. a large part of this is brexit. this is worth it though because see above for examples of the kind of EU tyranny the government wanted to get rid of. the woman that complains about left-wing human rights lawyers is totally our friend and ally. in fact i just want to take a moment to say how much i love that human rights has become a slur. you can tell that's the sign of a healthy society and political climate. please ignore how every other country where this is the case are places you would never want to live. this is a coincidence. our great country can rise above that and see that human rights have gone too far without going to the other extreme.

we're still shouting "we're going to get a great deal with single market access while telling the immigrants to fuck off!" while the EU tells us no. we have an awesome plan, but you can't see it!!! nyah!

the high court made a judgement based around the idea that article 50 is irreversible. the government is appealing based on the idea that article 50 is reversible. we will probably need to get an ECJ ruling on it. scotland may still be able to block brexit. we may need to integrate every single piece of EU law into UK law before we even think of leaving, the mere prospect of which is sending the already overwhelmed civil service into a full on mental breakdown. are you ready for this shit?

i saw a guy on redddit that just learned he and his girlfriend are technically criminals for their slightly kinky sex lol. this isn't technically news but i'm putting it in as a reminder that it's entirely possible you could be a criminal right now and not even realize it, just like he was, just like so many others were. keep this in mind next time someone says "if you have nothing to hide you have nothing to fear!"

we are selling TEA to CHINA. YORKSHIRE TEA. we import TWO THIRDS of our APPLES, TWO THIRDS of our CHEESE, NINE TENTHS of our PEARS. i will be in beijing next january, opening up new PORK MARKETS.

justice secretary liz truss is refusing to defend the judiciary against accusations they are "ENEMIES OF THE PEOPLE" (verbatim quote from major newspaper) after, uh, following british law. this might actually break the law. this isn't the first time she's had a problem with the judiciary. are we at war with our own judiciary? reminds me how all the teachers hated the education secretary, all prison workers and judges hated the justice secretary, all doctors and nurses hated the health secretary etc. weird how that keeps happening.

the governments post-brexit trade plan is cakes and tea. not even memeing. i think they're just desperate. talks with the EU and india have fallen flat on their face as they both respond to years of being shit all over by the british government and media, signalling good news for future trade deals.

the government have cut nurses pay, reduced training for new nurses, made it hard for commonwealth nurses to stay and want to cut off EU nurses. this is during a time where we are already struggling with nursing levels. you may recognize this as a plan so bad a literal five year old could figure out the problems with it.

welcome to the UK politics thread. you must make at least £37,000 a year to stay. no. that's not a joke. that's the actual minimum income you need to stay in the UK.

Don't forget our fast approaching healthcare nightmare when all the baby boomers hit home care age. The lack of nurses you mention will kill people along with vastly increasing the amount of abuse that goes on because no carers can be afforded to be rejected unless they're literally satan.

In fact strangling EU immigration will hurt our economy in the long term along with encouraging what few young folk we have left to move abroad. Or possibly Scotland if we nail operation staying away from crazy westminster.

Why the focus on female ejaculation in the ban?

Also lol this is now a legitimate discussion point in UK politics.

https://www.theguardian.com/culture/2016/nov/25/what-how-and-why-the-uks-new-online-porn-restrictions-explained

What are you crazy Brits doing over there? Letting the government ban "obscene" pornography is bad enough, but now that the framework for censoring the internet is in place, more could easily follow.

Somebody once told me* that the American Bill O' Rights is basically a list of shit they wanted that Britain didn't have, and right after secular government and freedom of religion they put free speech. So this is less "terrifying new development" and more "reversion to form".


*the world is gonna roll me.

Yeah they had a lot of immigrants who were escaping various hostile environments and wanted religious groups free from oppression.
But I imagine they nabbed a whole bunch of neat ideas from other countries. Which isn't a bad thing.
And they don't stop coming and they don't stop coming and...

[Geilinor]

As an American, I for one welcome Farage to our country. He can be Trump's foreign affairs dude.

Pls no. The Brits can keep him.

[The Huskar Social Union]

As an American, I for one welcome Farage to our country. He can be Trump's foreign affairs dude.

Pls no. The Brits can keep him.

Send him to Sealand.

[Ostroeuropa]

souseiseki news bulletin:

the government is now spying on everyone. the food standards agency can view your entire browsing history for the past year without a warrant. the ECJ has already ruled this kind of thing to be illegal, but thankfully we have taken back control.

the government is planning to attempt to block most if not all overseas porn sites due to obscene content like female ejaculation. the ECHR doesn't really like mandatory filters like this, so it's just as well we voted to take back our sovereignty.

the government still has no plan for brexit. boris johnson has pissed off the entire EU by scaremongering about turkey joining during the referendum then supporting turkey joining.

the amount of hunger strikes and people on suicide watch in our probably full of rape and abuse but it's covered up because that's bad for business immigrant camps is an all time high. we finally got the australia-style system we wanted!

nigel farage, who fucked off and clammed up the minute the referendum was won, is now planning to fuck off to america period. what a cool dude.

the maximum penalty for file sharing will now be 10 years in prison. look forward to visiting any site they think is dodgy enough being probable cause. remember they can see that, without a warrant. cool beans.

mandatory age verification for "adult" content is coming. this will not extend to sites like reddit, facebook, tumblr and twitter and will not be the stepping stone a south korea-esque require online identity for even more tracking of your every move. nope. hey remember back in 2000 when they said the internet filters would only be used for child porn and we said the exact kind of thing that is happening now would happen and people said we were just being paranoid? thank god we were wrong on that front!

the institute for fiscal studies are predicting 10 years without any real wage growth. an increasingly authoritarian government, the rise of the far right and an economy that has barely recovered about to plummet off a cliff again is really cool. i'm super looking forward to being a lost generation. that's exactly what i wanted with my one and only life. big thanks to everyone involved. we did it guys.

the prosecutors in the thomas mair (guy who assassinated a sitting MP) case have blamed the "the febrile atmosphere of the referendum" for aiding her death. a certain online newspaper responded by publishing an article asking if he "possibly wrongly" believed his house would be taken by immigrants and pondered whether that is why he killed her. one wonders where he could have possibly gotten that kind of idea?

the country is going to lose a bunch of money. everyone is going to lose a bunch of money. a large part of this is brexit. this is worth it though because see above for examples of the kind of EU tyranny the government wanted to get rid of. the woman that complains about left-wing human rights lawyers is totally our friend and ally. in fact i just want to take a moment to say how much i love that human rights has become a slur. you can tell that's the sign of a healthy society and political climate. please ignore how every other country where this is the case are places you would never want to live. this is a coincidence. our great country can rise above that and see that human rights have gone too far without going to the other extreme.

we're still shouting "we're going to get a great deal with single market access while telling the immigrants to fuck off!" while the EU tells us no. we have an awesome plan, but you can't see it!!! nyah!

the high court made a judgement based around the idea that article 50 is irreversible. the government is appealing based on the idea that article 50 is reversible. we will probably need to get an ECJ ruling on it. scotland may still be able to block brexit. we may need to integrate every single piece of EU law into UK law before we even think of leaving, the mere prospect of which is sending the already overwhelmed civil service into a full on mental breakdown. are you ready for this shit?

i saw a guy on redddit that just learned he and his girlfriend are technically criminals for their slightly kinky sex lol. this isn't technically news but i'm putting it in as a reminder that it's entirely possible you could be a criminal right now and not even realize it, just like he was, just like so many others were. keep this in mind next time someone says "if you have nothing to hide you have nothing to fear!"

we are selling TEA to CHINA. YORKSHIRE TEA. we import TWO THIRDS of our APPLES, TWO THIRDS of our CHEESE, NINE TENTHS of our PEARS. i will be in beijing next january, opening up new PORK MARKETS.

justice secretary liz truss is refusing to defend the judiciary against accusations they are "ENEMIES OF THE PEOPLE" (verbatim quote from major newspaper) after, uh, following british law. this might actually break the law. this isn't the first time she's had a problem with the judiciary. are we at war with our own judiciary? reminds me how all the teachers hated the education secretary, all prison workers and judges hated the justice secretary, all doctors and nurses hated the health secretary etc. weird how that keeps happening.

the governments post-brexit trade plan is cakes and tea. not even memeing. i think they're just desperate. talks with the EU and india have fallen flat on their face as they both respond to years of being shit all over by the british government and media, signalling good news for future trade deals.

the government have cut nurses pay, reduced training for new nurses, made it hard for commonwealth nurses to stay and want to cut off EU nurses. this is during a time where we are already struggling with nursing levels. you may recognize this as a plan so bad a literal five year old could figure out the problems with it.

welcome to the UK politics thread. you must make at least £37,000 a year to stay. no. that's not a joke. that's the actual minimum income you need to stay in the UK.

Sous, the whole "Let's spy on everyone and have everyones search histories on file in every government office" amounts to the mass doxxing of the population and their porn and piracy habits.
You should be pleased about this. They're essentially going to wake up on day 1 and go "Fuck, we've just declared war on half the population and have them dead to rights. The fuck we gonna do?"

So nobodies going to do shit. Things will continue as normal, like with marijuana. Noone gives a fuck. The government just doesn't like to be reminded they're failing to police the population with their weird moralistic streak, so don't like you making a big scene about doing it.

Also, consider how much more sexually liberated people will be. Immediately, noones going to give a fuck about a politician or celebrity or whatever being sexually scandalous, because when its brought up, we'll think "They just dislike them because they are anti-establishment!" and be bloody-minded about it. Worse, I bet having all this shit hit the news for a few weeks will result in skyrocketing demand as people go "Oh, that sounds interesting."

It essentially amounts to government overreach on a massive scale on this topic.

[Ostroeuropa]

As an American, I for one welcome Farage to our country. He can be Trump's foreign affairs dude.

Pls no. The Brits can keep him.

It would be pretty funny if he moved to Texas and started backing the Texan independence movement. Would freak people out a bit.

[Vassenor]

Pls no. The Brits can keep him.

Send him to Sealand.

Governor General of Rockall when?

[Dumb Ideologies]

Pls no. The Brits can keep him.

It would be pretty funny if he moved to Texas and started backing the Texan independence movement. Would freak people out a bit.

I think you'll find that Nige is going to rename himself Dances With Stoats and build a wigwam on the White House Lawn, declaring that America belongs to the Native Americans.

[Ostroeuropa]

It would be pretty funny if he moved to Texas and started backing the Texan independence movement. Would freak people out a bit.

I think you'll find that Nige is going to rename himself Dances With Stoats and build a wigwam on the White House Lawn, declaring that America belongs to the Native Americans.

Do you think he'd wear the headdress?

[Dumb Ideologies]

I think you'll find that Nige is going to rename himself Dances With Stoats and build a wigwam on the White House Lawn, declaring that America belongs to the Native Americans.

Do you think he'd wear the headdress?

It'd be downright disrespectful if he didn't!

[Souseiseki]

In fact strangling EU immigration will hurt our economy in the long term along with encouraging what few young folk we have left to move abroad. Or possibly Scotland if we nail operation staying away from crazy westminster.

oh yeah i forgot to mention there's a good contingent of english nurses already going to scotland. it's nurses all the way down.

Why the focus on female ejaculation in the ban?

if you mean why i focused on it it's because it's utterly ludicrous and a really easy point to win on. pretty much nobody is going to defend it.

Also lol this is now a legitimate discussion point in UK politics.

see also: the four finger rule

"Fuck, we've just declared war on half the population and have them dead to rights. The fuck we gonna do?"

wait until someone they don't like crops up then go digging, probably.

i had a horrible thought last night that the whole food standards agency might be a deliberate ploy so they can later tone it back and go "hey we listened to your concerns now only the police and DWP can see all your stuff xoxoxo"

So nobodies going to do shit. Things will continue as normal, like with marijuana. Noone gives a fuck. The government just doesn't like to be reminded they're failing to police the population with their weird moralistic streak, so don't like you making a big scene about doing it.

i think i've already explained in the past why i'm not comforted in or convinced by the "no one gives a fuck" idea. the fucks given are a product of personal circumstance and the lack of fucks given on drugs is a result of decades of failure and cultural change. in other words, it is a comfort enjoyed only by those that are already culturally popular.

[The Archregimancy]

Somebody once told me* that the American Bill O' Rights is basically a list of shit they wanted that Britain didn't have, and right after secular government and freedom of religion they put free speech. So this is less "terrifying new development" and more "reversion to form".


*the world is gonna roll me.

You already appreciate, of course, that 'somebody once told me' isn't necessarily good history.

In fairness, it's merely an oversimplification rather than being outright wrong, but it would be better to consider the Federal Bill of Rights as an elaboration of the existing bills of rights that already existed in state constitutions - the Federal constitutional amendments ultimately resulting not as a reaction to British rights, but as a compromise on the part of Federalists who had previously argued that the existing state bills were already adequate protection of individual liberty - and the state bills of right to be in turn developments of existing British constitutional law.

In terms of the 1689 English Bill of Rights - which the Federal constitutional amendments aren't just the heirs of, but which are also directly named after - was only about a century old when the US constitution was being crafted, and the framers of the constitution would have been entirely familiar with its contents. In both 1789 and 1689, the framers of the relevant documents weren't asserting new powers on the behalf of people, but were rather claiming (whether correctly or not is a separate issue) that they were asserting 'ancient rights and liberties' (to quote the 1689 act) that already existed, and had existed for centuries within English (specifically) law regardless of whether they'd been respected or not.

It's true that the 1689 English Bill of Rights has more limits placed on the 'ancient rights and liberties' than the 1789 US Bill of Rights (see, for example, the 1689 clauses on freedom of speech and the right to bear arms in comparison with their 1789 counterparts), but they're recognisably part of the same gradual constitutional evolution rather than the latter being primarily an assertion of rights that early post-colonial politicians believed weren't present within British law.

[Conscentia]

As an American, I for one welcome Farage to our country. He can be Trump's foreign affairs dude.

As someone living in England, I'd welcome Farage's departure to your country. Unfortunately, it seems he doesn't have any plans to emigrate. [x]

[Fartsniffage]

As an American, I for one welcome Farage to our country. He can be Trump's foreign affairs dude.

As someone living in England, I'd welcome Farage's departure to your country. Unfortunately, it seems he doesn't have any plans to emigrate. [x]

He's lied about pretty much everything else.....

*crosses fingers*

[Marcurix]

http://www.bbc.com/news/business-38089190

So this article is based on research from the Resolution Foundation, which has asserted that the squeeze on living standards could be worse during this Parliament than between 2010 and 2015 by a substantial amount.

While this is not solely down to Brexit, the rising inflation and uncertainty that will hit economic activity have combined with the poor wage growth and prospects what were already present to make the situation that much worse.

They're predicting 1.6% of growth, compared to 12.7% in the 2000's and around 20% for every decade previous up to the 1920s.

So, just in case anyone felt slightly optimistic today...

[Fartsniffage]

http://www.bbc.com/news/business-38089190

So this article is based on research from the Resolution Foundation, which has asserted that the squeeze on living standards could be worse during this Parliament than between 2010 and 2015 by a substantial amount.

While this is not solely down to Brexit, the rising inflation and uncertainty that will hit economic activity have combined with the poor wage growth and prospects what were already present to make the situation that much worse.

They're predicting 1.6% of growth, compared to 12.7% in the 2000's and around 20% for every decade previous up to the 1920s.

So, just in case anyone felt slightly optimistic today...

1.6% is still growth. Could be worse.....

[Imperializt Russia]

1.6% per decade is so small that might not technically even be considered a trend.

[Philjia]

1.6% per decade is so small that might not technically even be considered a trend.

At least it's not shrinkage.

[Vassenor]

So it turns out the biggest strain on NHS resources isn't health tourism, or obesity, or the government enabling homosexuality and thus causing more people to get STDs, or whatever the right wing press wants us to believe.

It's malnutrition.

Critics have said the upward trend is a result of rising poverty, deep cutbacks in recent years to meals on wheels services for the elderly and inadequate social care support, especially for older people.

So yeah, looks like the cuts are biting again.