Clippings from Facebook: So apparently I'm a right winger

10 Steps to be a left winger... apparently...

http://www.facebook.com/topic.php?uid=18717071808&topic=8771


1. I don't think I've ever read an outdated history book- I tend to read much more interesting things, and watch history documentaries... Produced by respected broadcasters. 

2. I never bring up Israel- partly because the whole issue gives me a bloody headache and also I wouldn't bring it up in inappropriate places like whoever wrote that assumes I would.

3. I don't think I've ever disagreed with the notion that we shouldn't allow illegal immigration- it's illegal, isn't it? Though if people have a genuine life-threatening reason to flee their country, then they should be able to stay somewhere safer. Not crying and screaming and accusing people of rape, frigging hell!

4. Left wingers can be realistic as well you know, hey we have to be in the UK as it's the only way we can make any of our political values possible. We also know that some ideas that seemed good at the time ended up not working because of the power crazy nutters that twisted them to their own ends. 

5. Nah, don't take drugs- partly because my Dad was a drugs advice worker and regularly gave me the horrifying stories of people who went way too far with them. Though I'm partial to a beer as much as most people are!

6. Nutters come in many flavours, everyone knows that, and Muslim fundamentalists who treat women like crap and advocate the death penalty for things like being gay piss me off as much as Christian ones who essentially advocate the same things. If you put both in a room they would probably find a lot to agree on!

7. I hate that song and hate that that horribly sad cover of it was Christmas number 1. I prefer arguing about nasty atrocities, and trying to make politicians act on them, not wasting my time on Youtube trying to stir up emotion.

8. I really don't think MI6 have any interest in a run-of-the-mill leftie with an interest in community activism. Methinks they're more interested in those looking up how to make homemade bombs and stuff like that.

9. You don't want to kill all Jews and non-whites so why should I have any reason to call you a Nazi? Britain's always been diverse, right back to the Romans and the Vikings and the Anglo-Saxons and the Normans, and long may it continue.

10. Some of the candidates in parties are and some of them aren't, we just have to make sure we vote for the principled ones.

So according to some random person on an internet forum's standards I'm a right winger! Off to join the Conservatives then... NOT.

BBC News Have Your Say post of the week...

In what may or may not turn out to be a regular series, here's my pick of one of the most insane ranting postings from the public on the BBC News website.

This week's comes from a thread on the merits to the UK on the London Olympics:

London yes, the rest of Britain no -not in any way.

ZanuLabour have been "London-centric" since 1997 - what major project have they "gifted" to the rest of Great Britain?

Zanulabour have abandoned their traditional areas & voters now they are in power - they prefer to lig with big business & foreign dignatories in metropolitan London.

Why they can't just declare London's independence from the rest of Britain I do not know - it certainly is not a capital city representative of us Brits.

MissBritish Insurgent, Middle England

1. Is this country being run by a senile old despot who will probably quit in the next few days? Do we have inflation levels in excess of 100,000%? No, we don't do we? Then don't compare the party in the UK government to Zanu-PF in Zimbabwe, you twat.

2. The last I heard an "insurgent" was someone who comes into the country from somewhere else to muck things up, you idiot. Unless "Middle England" is now a fully recognised nation state, in which case I will be writing to "Zanulabour" to recommend that we close the borders and refuse visas to everyone from there so we don't have to have anything to do with your nonsense. And take your Daily Mail and Express with you, cheers.

Homophobia in schools

An article from the Evening Post came to my attention today about how the Council has been forced to shelve a programme of lessons about homophobic bullying in two Easton primary schools.

Leaving aside the ridiculous way that this article has been written (part of it seems to suggest that they were teaching people about homosexuality full stop when they weren't) it seems to have been sparked by a row between the schools and parents, of which a number of them are Muslims. Now there doesn't appear to be any indication of what was going to be taught exactly or whether the parents actually saw it. But regardless of religious or cultural belief, is it not a good idea to teach kids about all kinds of bullying? Homophobic bullying can certainly be some of the nastiest in schools, and I would have thought that a sensitive discussion on the subject would be very beneficial to personal and social education. There may of course be religious beliefs against homosexuality in general, but schools should be in the habit of teaching all points of view, and in a subject of which there is still a woeful divide in opinion about, it is a good idea to teach the facts and not the ill-informed prejudices. For then children can leave school more informed than they were, and (hopefully) more tolerant of modern society.

A note on the comment by me published in the Evening Post today

I am of course delighted that they have published my comment, which was on a story about a woman who pretended she was tied to a wheelchair to get a ground floor flat. However- they have edited it so much it is almost unrecognisable, which is rather disappointing. One wonders how many more comments and letters have been edited in this way. It actually pisses me off, though it's only one comment anyway and it's the Evening Post letters page, which half the time I can't read because it seems constructed to boil your blood just by looking at it.

So here are both versions in full, first, the original one still available on the website:

The Little Britain character, Andy springs to mind with this! Did she get up as soon as the photographer and journalist turned away? And regarding the comments hoping that the information has been passed to the Council- it more than likely has now!!

And the Evening Post journalist interpretation (NOT IN ANY WAY APPROVED BY ME)

Did she get up as soon as the photographer and journalist left? I would have thought that this piece of news has been passed to the council, too!

Next time I won't bother putting comments on that website if they're going to completely change my words like that when publishing it. I frankly don't want to put my name to it, as unknown my name is anyway!

Democratic deficit?

Democratic deficit? This thing is driving me nuts. If I'm not bloody careful I'll end up a Eurosceptic by the end of this. I can't let that happen. Noooooooooooooooooo

 

Oh yes, and Mark Thompson is an idiot (though in true Evening Post fashion they've published the story even though nothing has actually happened yet, they've just told everyone it might happen)

Europe Europe Europe

With the prospect of there being a Eurovision entry this year that might actually know how to sing, and not drown in a sea of airline-themed innuendo as was last year with Scooch, Europe is high up on my mind at the minute. There's also the very thorny issue of me having to do an essay about the EU's democratic deficit for next week which I really have to get on with, so I'll keep this post brief.

So here's a piece I wrote to take part in a consultation for the PES's manifesto for the elections to that other love-it-or-hate-it institution, the European Parliament, of which I mention the ideas of involving people locally in EU initiatives. This can be found at http://manifesto2009.pes.org/en/european-democracy-and-diversity/post/247 . Enjoy!

"I went to the debate "Unity or Diversity? What Europe do we want?" in London earlier this week. The topic was the PES manifesto and democracy and diversity and there was a lot of discussion about democracy in Europe and how we can make it much closer to the people, and more relevant to them. I would like to suggest one of the ways we can do this is by giving the people concerned more of a say in how EU initiatives, particularly regional and social ones, are conducted and where the money goes.

We have had particular success in doing this at the South Bristol Urban 2 Programme, of which I am proud to have been involved in and also chaired for two years, where the ultimate decision making committee that decided what projects to support was made up of local residents, representatives of community organisations and particularly young people, of which the programme's main aim was to support. We also structured it's meetings so that young people could better access it - the meetings certainly are not boring and if there was any jargon that anyone did not understand then you could show a red card and shame the person into explaining it better! In doing this, we not only made one of the EU's most innovative programmes, but also one of the most successful! Because the Programme gave a very direct say in how it's money was spent to the very people who were effected by it, projects that were more relevant and supportive to young people were given funding by it, and also encouraged projects that operated in the same spirit as the Programme to go ahead. This has included a young-people designed open space, called Spacemakers, and also a new media centre of which young people worked closely with the architects to build.
More details can be found here.
To make the EU closer to the people it effects, we should use things like this as a model to introduce throughout Europe - it is too often seen as too distant by people, but if we can get it to do some genuine good in local communities by not only consulting, but involving them in it's initiatives then it can be more visible, and even better, more democratic. The EU can be a lot of things to a lot of people, but it is often very bad at making obvious all of the good things about it, and if more of this can be done, and hey, if we can put more new ideas into practice like the one I have listed above, then we can have a much better Europe."

Right, I'm really going to make an effort this time...

Me with blogs has really been start-stop: I make posts that seemed a good idea at the time but later I feel that they were complete rubbish and go and delete the whole flaming thing.

So I'm going to start again. This time I'll try and make an effort. Or it'll go completely wrong!