23 November 2010

23/11/10

Pillars of Society - George Grosz
Maybe this world is another planet's hell.
-Aldous Huxley

277 comments:

  1. A classic Grosz representation of Weimar Germany which sums up everything he hated about the Weimar period.

    As art critic Robert Hughes pointed out:

    In Grosz's Germany, everything and everybody is for sale. All human transactions, except for the class solidarity of the workers, are poisoned. The world is owned by four breeds of pig: the capitalist, the officer, the priest and the hooker, whose other form is the sociable wife. He was one of the hanging judges of art.

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  2. Yes, things don't exactly change at a hurtling pace, do they?

    Living in a pornocracy seems to be less fun than it sounds.

    Like the - presumably - early representation of shitheads.

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  3. Thanks for that Montana/Duke

    Grosz is a new experience for me and you prompted me to look for more Grosz Images

    Some interesting and disturbing stuff came from his brush. It makes me wonder what contemporary artists are making of our lives and times.

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  4. saw an exhibition of Grosz many years ago in Berlin. nightmarish - bit like that Breughel chappy wot did the 'hellish reality' pictures a couple of hundred years ago. not the style, the feeling.

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  5. Montana, can we change the tagline to "Underwear Thieves on Useless Tricycles" please?

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  6. Cor, that Kim Jong-Il, eh? Crazy name, crazy guy!!!

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  7. The "Wiki on Grosz" is informative too:

    "A deeply disillusioned man, he saw humanity as essentially bestial and the city of Berlin as a sink of depravity and deprivation, its streets crowded with unprincipled profiteers, prostitutes, war-crippled dregs and a variety of perverts. A communist, his feeling of social outrage stimulated him to produce the most biting drawings and paintings." -Trewin Copplestone


    Berlin then sounded a bit like UT now ...

    Amazed our Euro critic ain't seen the similarity

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  8. Always liked Grosz.

    SB
    Trouble in Korea eh ? I guess we're not talking Hot Lips Houlihan either...

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  9. piece up on hungary, for those interested - medve? haven't seen medve for a while...

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  10. Bitterweed,

    I absolutely love M*A*S*H. I can happily sit afternoons just watching whole box sets.

    My favourite quip/quote from Hawkeye:

    "I will not carry a gun, Frank. When I got thrown into this war I had a clear understanding with the Pentagon: no guns. I'll carry your books, I'll carry a torch, I'll carry a tune, I'll carry on, carry over, carry forward, Cary Grant, cash and carry, carry me back to Old Virginia, I'll even 'hari-kari' if you show me how, but I will not carry a gun!"

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  11. "...not the style, the feeling..."

    Yea I think I know what you mean PhilB

    BTW Montana et al - The daily visitor counter was near to 1500 late last night( may even have passed it later). That was a good score for a Monday.

    A little aggro seems to do wonders for your ratings!

    That said I do apologise to anybody offended by my cavalier use of the left footer phrase. I should have added an equal scorn for the right footers too.

    All sides can take comfort from my intended cremation - I may well burn in hell for my inappropriate command of the language......and other sundry failings.

    laters I have a working day ahead.........an unsavoury prospect to say the least

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  12. Have to do some work here too : (. Haven't read all yesterday, should I? Did any of you see the prog last night about the artist Peter Howson? V.good.

    And the latest about the Celtic Tiger? Steve Jobbs has offered to BUY Ireland. He's gonna rebrand it as iLand.

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  13. Duke
    Agreed. It was quite a moment that last episode...

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  14. M*A*S*H was always on past my bedtime, so I used to sneak out of bed when I heard the theme tune, commando crawl along the landing and watch it through the banisters. Sometimes I'd manage to watch an entire episode before my Mum would say "Dotterel, go back to bed..." without even turning around to look!

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  15. Morning all

    WTF is N Korea up to?

    I kind of see Kim Jong Il II as the spoilt youngest child of China that is so used to getting his own way that if his dad ignores him, he goes and trashes his car...

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  16. University Challenge - very exciting finish! I got 36.

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  17. I liked this from GolemXIV:

    "Sphincter-nomics
    ............

    Basically it boils down to this.................................

    - a sphincter through which to shit out as much debt pressure as possible. Ireland is already in that ignominious position.
    And so it has come to pass for Ireland. European and UK banks are now going to use Ireland as their sphincter. And the Irish people are going to clean it up for them. Ably volunteered for the job by their loyal political class. Loyal to who and what is another question.
    ...............................................
    Let's all be careful and clear about this. Irish banks are being used as a sphincter to for European bank debts. European and British banks are horribly exposed to to Irish debt. Which means, when translated into English, that private banks in many countries lent money into the well known Irish property bubble in order to chase high returns during the bubble years. Irish private banks accepted the money in order to lend unwisely so they too could chase high returns. Entirely PRIVATE contracts between two sets of equally greedy bankers. ......"

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  18. Bit of Scottish football. Apparently Scottish referees are striking at the weekend due to being constantly cricised for giving Rangers absolutely everyth.., sorry "poor performances".

    As a result, the SFA are flying in Irish referees to referee saturday's fixtures and as luck would have it I have the list!:

    Mason "1690" Boyne (East Belfast)

    Sammy "White Charger" McCausland (Larne)

    William "FTP" McRae (Londonderry)

    Sir Edward Carson (deceased)

    David Trimble (Upper Bann)

    Ian Paisley (North Antrim)

    And the Rangers fixture will have no referee as they can be trsuted to referee themselves.

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  19. "M*A*S*H was always on past my bedtime, so I used to sneak out of bed when I heard the theme tune, commando crawl along the landing and watch it through the banisters. Sometimes I'd manage to watch an entire episode before my Mum would say "Dotterel, go back to bed..." without even turning around to look! "

    Hahahaha! I used to do the same, but because we had a through-lounge-dining room with a bureau in it in a strategic position, I used to get as far as there and hide behind it to watch telly after 9pm. The one I remember watching most was The Sweeney though...

    And it wasn't til I became a parent myself that I realised that we really do have "eyes in the back of our heads" :o)

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  20. BTW, it's me, BB, in disguise, Dot. Work email login = different blogger log-in for a blog that has a nice title and picture on the front page and sod-all else! :o)

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  21. I know it's you BB

    I also know about the "eyes in the back of the head" (I'm sure I was "allowed" to watch whole episodes sometimes!) I'm not a parent but my Mum's a (now more or less retired) primary school teacher, so hers have x-ray vision too!

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  22. Morning all

    Let's hope the attack on South Korea doesn't develop into anything more serious.28,OOO American troops are stationed in the SK so would inevitably get involved in any fighting.My gut feeling is it's probably nothing more than a border skirmish.China wields a lot of influence over NK and the last thing they want is a full blown war involving the USA on their southern border.

    Habib

    And back to cyber wars what happened on waddya in the early hours?You've been well and truly zapped mate.:-)

    Meerkatjie

    Noticed on waddya that some of the regulars are beginning to tell Pen to back off.Let him keep digging cos if he carries on the way he is he'll end up in pre-mod.

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  23. Sorry BB, there probably should've been a smiley face or two in there somewhere :-)

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  24. Morning!

    Paul -

    Kizbot is not helping her friend - if he is her friend - maybe she should help him rather than egg him on? Or, horrible thought that it is, maybe she likes seeing car crashes happen?

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  25. @timboktutu

    Katflap just likes sticking her oar in, as self-appointed queen. Nice to see that the milk monitor jibe still rankles, though.

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  26. Here's a rather interesting (and haunting) little project. A Dutch History consultant has juxtaposed images of Amsterdam in WWII with the contemporary settings.

    The ghosts of Amsterdam

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  27. Old Katbox can be a bit of a prep-school head girl about things. Posts out of boredom mostly though, hence sticking to the chat-page. threat level: 0.5%

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  28. Guess Who:

    Actually I spent some years working on Third World aid and have met many people, experts in their field, both European and from South American and African countries.

    As one (a doctor) said: These children die of anything, meningitis, measles, malaria, but in the end it's poverty that kills.

    When I was talking of sophistication I meant the intellectual sophistication that enabled Europeans to build up what we have today - imperfect though it may be - through the centuries. I really wasn't thinking of iPods.


    So, erm, Europeans are more intellectually sophisticated than non-Europeans.

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  29. @Duke

    Excellent pictures, there. Reminiscent of the ones by Sergey Larenkov - not sure if these have come up on here before.

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  30. Peter,

    I remember that one, there's another one here on The siege of Leningrad

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  31. Afternoon all, indulge me for a while.

    Paul, it all started when JimPress said this:

    "when I had the audacity to point out that this was another fabrication my post was removed without trace. I attempted to repost and discovered that my ability to post there was blocked.

    All is not as it seems at the supposedly free speech loving UT. You're free to spout absurd abusive nonsense like Bitey, but have the audacity to rationally and calmly defend yourself against Lady Wildhack's malicious inventions and the shutter comes crashing down."

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  32. Yeh, I was wondering what had happened last night that caused so many zappings between Habib and JimPress.

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  33. Here's the (oh so vitriolic) exchange:

    habib: I don't really see the point of you making lies up. Unless, of course, you have been shown up to be ridiculous.

    Jim: That's a touch tautological, but what do you think I've made up? The fact that Montana misrepresented me? Or that having pointed out her misrepresentation I'm now blocked from posting? Both of these things are true, whether you choose to believe them or not.

    As I've already said, things are not necessarily as they seem at the UT. I like and respect many of the people who post there, but Montana's behaviour is shabby.

    (cont... or cunt, take your pick)

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  34. The thin veneer of sophistication that brusselsexpats tries so hard to project at every available oportunity cannot conceal the fact that she is as thick as a brick. She is, in essence, a little Englander, a closet fascist, an elitist snob and a joke. Her view of the world seems to be based on what polite, well-bred people say dismissively to her when she's pouring their tea for them. Her politics come from the Daily Mail, her ideas on art and culture come from Dan Brown, 'Merlin' on the BBC and the bombastic posturings of retired rear-admirals who think Kipling was more of a genius than Shakespeare. She is so much a parody that it would be nearly impossible to dream her up a la selfmademan's construct.The danger is that she enjoys protected status on waddya by virtue of posting 40 times a day when she should be working (a bit like that other braindead zombie, kizbot) and some people actually take her seriously.

    Her vitriol and spite should have had her banned from Cif a long time ago. Oh, wait! She never says 'fuck'. Only working class morons do that and they should obviously be banned so that the more respectable posters can run around their own little playground and swap banalities with each other under the protective and benelovent gaze of third-rate intellects like jessica (brave article! :0( it made me cry!) and bella (look guys! here's the funniest thing I've ever seen on the internet! Dad, can I please have a 15K pay-rise for doing fuck all? Thanks! Love you!).

    Rant over - it made me feel better.

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  35. Habib: "That's a touch tautological" I guess mentioning "Jim Press" and "making lies up" could be seen that way.
    Looking at the roster, sonny Jim, you ain't banned, bubba. :-)
    And by the way, whoever is putting silly amounts of recommends up, stop doing it. It's not very convincing.

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  36. "in praise of Arctic weather"
    Well, it does kill pensioners off Jen, so think in terms of its Big Society contribution.

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  37. Jim: Habib, my second post over there was deleted and I now can't post. I've no idea whether the block's via google id or ip address and I can't be arsed to find out. Montana's allegations against me are so lacking in substance that I really don't give a toss, and if blocking me allows her to dupe you into believing she debates so fiercely that her opponents just melt away then good for her (although I doubt everybody over at UT is quite as credulous as you).

    Congrats on all the recommends by the way...

    Habib: "I've no idea whether the block's via google id or ip address and I can't be arsed to find out."
    Yeah, best not to spread lies then, hey?

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  38. Jim: Habib, my last response to you: I haven't lied about anything, but nothing I say is going to disabuse an obedient little drone when it comes to his touching belief in the queen bee; others, including over at the UT, are not quite so naive.

    Habib: "I haven't lied about anything"
    I believe I've pointed out that you have.

    End. (of my completely inglorious time on CiF)

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  39. Back from the walk with Mungo - It's about 18 hrs since I started chewing over the following loaded post:

    "scherfig said...

    "I have no problems with Scherf's point of view -he thinks me a romancer/liar etc so we are old friends."


    I'd just like to be clear abbut this. I have never been an 'old friend' of deano, I think that he is an idiot. I cringe whenever he drools about his ladies and tals out Furnival and children's nether regions and paying threepence to see somebody's fanny. I have no time for him. He's a fucking moron who has nothing to offer, and if you n't see that, then wht's the fucking point?

    22 November, 2010 18:30 "


    Not surprisingly my eye caught...."...and children's nether regions..." when I read it last night.

    I always give nasty bitter innuendo like that time before I respond. Given the angry bitterness and tone of Scherf's comment I don't think he intended well with the comment

    I thought too about the wisdom and experiences of Dott and hevers when they respectively said:

    "Dotterel said...
    deano,

    Might I suggest that sometimes others add more weight to ones words than one gives them oneself?"


    Dott was actually commenting on my careless use of language but the wisdom is relevant in a wider context.


    Similarly hevers quite reasonably said "Sure Deano, you may be keen to characterise it as mischief. But if the "mischief" frequently carries associations of stigma with it, then it may seem a bit more than just mischief. when commenting on my writing style and possible motivation/intent.

    Given that I said that I hope one day some of my family members will find UT and read it.......I plainly ought to respond to Scherf's bile.


    I will later when I'm not too busy - for now and just in case " I am taken" with a heart attack let me make plain.

    I am not pedophile - I have no interest in Children's nethers and my sexual predilections all stem from formative literature "In praise of older women"

    To this day I am more interested in what is between a woman's ears than between her legs and older women simply have more experience of life and more interesting stories to tell. They will always be first choice for me when slip sliding around.

    I hope to go to my grave with a continuing interest in women - from my mother through my sisters and my wife ( all older than me) I have been well and kindly treated by them. Nearly all of my lovers have been older than me too.

    When my mind wonders to lazy summer afternoons and idle moments I like and admire informed older women for company and pleasure not children of either sex.

    Scherfig, I will at your request no longer call you friend - you need more imagination and understanding in your reading of others.

    When a working class woman shudders in delight before a baby and says "I could eat him/her"

    and a man equally says of a female relative or acquaintance "I could fuck her 'til next Thursday"

    They are not speaking literally - you silly misguided twisted man. They are speaking of high accolade and sheer delight and intense pleasure and of being human and engaged with their senses and sensibilities.

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  40. @habib
    Just had a look at all that - bit of a train-wreck, non ??? Haven't been on CiF for quite a while. As for JimPress - "banned" - from here ? WTF ??? And who's yard-dog ? Does he come here ? If not, what's his beef ? Is he shagging Brussels ? Lol.
    Odd people about.

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  41. habib,

    You banned now then?

    And sorry, some of those multiple recommends may have been me......

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  42. This comment has been removed by the author.

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  43. "bit of a train-wreck, non ???"
    I guess I've been called worse, BW :-)

    (naughty) Dott, I could only make pre-mod, I'm afraid. Still, it might be fun to see what I can get away with.

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  44. deano, I saw it, thought I'd dreamt it!

    (Probably because you insinuated I was wise ;-))

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  45. Fuck I am getting constantly spammed - my (longish)post appears for a few seconds and then disappears

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  46. habib,

    Load your in-pre-mod comments with sarcasm, the mods are blind to it.....

    Anon,

    Is that straight from JYD's profile?

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  47. Cheers Dott - at least I know I'm not dreaming it!

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  48. Ah somebody's got me post out and placed it at 13.20 above

    Thank you whoever

    here is the seond part of my reply to Scherfig:


    cont..

    I could never be sure but I wouldn't be surprised to find that you are older than your wife......you may therefore have no undersatnding or appreciation of these things.

    You may be sure that your vile innuendo about me has indeed caused offence. What sick imaginations and twists and turns some lapsed Catholics take as they journey through life. Happily so many others with childhood experience of your difficult and demanding ex faith are not so warped at all.

    I am unrepentant in my admiration of Fred Furnivall - a silly Victorian whose life would make a fine film.

    My admitted silliness about lady librarians is a bit more complex............but I'll 'fess up about that too one day.

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  49. "my (longish)post appears for a few seconds and then disappears" it's age, mate.
    Please please please let that make you laugh, Deano. :-)

    Dott, I don't have a sarcastic bone in me (Deano, stop smirking)

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  50. Cheers for the info anon. I really am not missing much on that site am I ??

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  51. Alright

    Which one of you geezers is posting on the shaker aamer thread as Primitiveman?

    He seriously has to be a concoction. He cannot be for real.

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  52. ah well - Comment privileges for this account have been disabled. CiF and I are no longer friends it seems.

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  53. Ah good. Let's just delete the victims, and leave the offenders spluttering about how badly they've been treated.

    Apparently it's ok to call another poster a piece of shit, and if that poster objects, they get deleted... Brilliant moderation. Bravo.

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  54. The person who penned this charming remark to Tim this morning, of course, remains with an active profile.

    "So, to the dungberry clinging to a meerkat's arse a curse. Shall I take rhyme or rhythm or reason from you? I'll choose rhythm, so you can lack timing in all you do.
    I won't be wasting my time on posters who cannot be honest."


    Yes, I can see how that's a fair and evenhanded moderation decision. Really I can.

    Good to know though that protected posters remain at liberty to attack whoever they please with impunity.

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  55. hold on - I think my rights to post are back!

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  56. they are, and so is my profile, how... weird!

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  57. my word it's been an eventful morning!

    in out in out, shake it all about...

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  58. They obviously realised that they were being bloody stupid, timboktutu.

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  59. Heloooooooo ;)

    It makes me wonder what contemporary artists are making of our lives and times

    If Tracey Emin is anything to go by Deano - prancing about like the bourgeois shits they are, talking about the 'brilliance' of the 'meritocarcy' and the 'outrage' of having to pay tax as a talentless multi-millionaire twat.

    In other words.... establishment bores and brown-nosers....

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  60. maybe, BB

    Still on the bright side if he realises I "cling" to meerkatjie maybe, just maybe he has realised she is not MF? And, I don't have to go to the optician!

    I am sure MF is perfectly nice and all, but I do love Meerkatjie so..

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  61. Tim - something like that happened to me once - it seems that my browser had decided to log me out in mid-post. Nothing on Graun's side.

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  62. My reply to deano has disappeared.

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  63. Re-posting:

    OK, deano, I'll bite. Although I don't really understand your somewhat incoherent posts. To be quite clear - it might well be 'vile innuendo' in your eyes, but of course I'm not calling you a paedophile. Why would I do that? Words and 'mischief' can be difficult things, can't they? How do you write something that can't be misconstrued?
    For example, when you 'affectionately' refer to paddies, micks and left-footers, who could possibly be offended? If someone feels that way, then their head is up their arse, right? Because you're a decent guy, right? Perhaps I need to learn a bit more 'imagination and understanding' when I read your posts? I don't think I'm a stupid person, so if it's all the same to you I will stick to my original assessment of your crass comments, and let you froth and bluster impotently about you think I actually said. One rule for you and another rule for everybody else, eh?

    And btw, don't try to patronise me with talk of my wife or childhood experiences or what I have no understanding or appreciation of. That's another thing I find slightly offensive, but only because you know nothing about those things and just come across as a complete idiot. Text-book passive-aggressive behaviour - have you ever thought about that?

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  64. "Tim - something like that happened to me once - it seems that my browser had decided to log me out in mid-post. Nothing on Graun's side."

    It wasn't that, unfortunately Thaum. I checked - his profile had been deactivated - when you looked at it, it said the profile didn't exist.

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  65. Is there a full moon on the offing or something? I can't keep up with all the intrigue. The sheer number of spats is overwhelming!

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  66. "The sheer number of spats is overwhelming!"

    No it isn't :-P


    (sorry, actually, with that username I can't even pretend to argue with you...)

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  67. it's the cute puppy, isn't it?

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  68. Yep!

    (Nothing to do with the (sorry got to say it: slightly misspelt) scientific reference....)

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  69. Ritual Wedding of the bourgeois Slackers and landed Parasites is to be in 29 April...... very convenient that it will clash with May Day and an existing Bank Holiday just so Dave doesn't have to create a new Bank Holiday.....

    Time for some invites to the new Royal Wedding Riots......

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  70. Dot: It was deliberately misspelt. I didn't want to be too obvious. Honest.

    La Rit: Grrr don't get me started on this bloody wedding. It's the clash with the AV referendum that I think is most interesting about the choice of the date....

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  71. Have you checked the Peter Howson link at 10.37 LaRit. The Prog last nite was v.good too. Pretty far from Tracey Emin. : )

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  72. I see scherfig's getting all moist about being called paddy. The trip wire victimhood of left footers, eh. Hail fuckin Mary.

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  73. @PeterB

    Is that really necessary?

    Turminder:

    No, I will do ;) Ran a quick eye over the thread.... thanks

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  74. "...One rule for you and another rule for everybody else, eh?..."

    Not at all Scherf I am grateful that you have cleared the unpleasant ambiguity up.

    Plainly the evidence of our exchanges is that it is all to easy for each the other to extrapolate offence from ill judged words and thus to misunderstand the other.

    We can happily leave it at that. There is plenty of room in UT for us to avoid each other. I have plenty of things to do apart from baiting a wild exiled Irishman despite my sincere affection for many of his Island.

    As I indicated recently I am more fortunate than you, for when you are on song I enjoy your posts, whilst plainly mine always get on your tits.

    regards.

    ps I share BB's wish that one day you will abandon the sixpenny seats (and your recently acquired miserable demeanor) and rejoin UT. You have made some fine posts here. (as well as some really crap ones)

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  75. Hey, Habib - I'll piss in my own bed if I need a wet blanket for comfort.

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  76. Letter to mods:

    "Hi, You have put me into pre-moderation, while I was pointing out a lie that had been made. I would like to know why.
    Your organisation stood well against Carter Ruck.
    Cheers, Habib."

    Very rapid response from mods, quickest I've ever had: question at 15:54, response at 16:34, same day.

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  77. Dear Habib, Your account was placed on premoderation because you became involved in apersonal spat with another commenter and were posting in a disruptive,personal manner prior to that too. See points one and four of the community standards
    Best wishes,
    Sarah
    Moderator

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  78. Afternoon all

    The Harrington Report was published today.This is the eagerly awaited independant review on the WCA for ESA conducted by ATOS.Redminer has provided a link to this report on his 2.47PM post on waddya.I've tried to provide a link over here but for some reason i can't get the bastard thing to work.

    Redminer reckons it's a whitewash!Will read it meself later when i've got time.

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  79. Knackered! - bloody Colchester is miles from Sheffield when you have to get there via Leamington. But beautiful day and mostly very scenic drive through the heartland of middle England.

    Brakkers - are you deliberately trying to wind scherf up in the hope of a wee spat?

    Waddya is hilarious - poor old Ally, Oroklini and others trying to explain to Bru what eurocentric means - and totally failing. Hey ho...not the brightest bead in the Magpies nest.

    Habib - you have achieved pre-mod status? Well done. I strive for it but fail...my time will come.

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  80. "...If Tracey Emin is anything to go by Deano - prancing about like the bourgeois shits they are, talking about the 'brilliance' of the 'meritocarcy' and the 'outrage' of having to pay tax as a talentless multi-millionaire twat...."

    We are in agreement La Rit emu and the twat with the diamond skull are not to my taste at all.

    I like me artists to do a little suffering for their art. A little self mutilation or starving in an attic are the least I expect.

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  81. Sheff, keep posting links to this place ;-)

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  82. The Harrington Report

    Hopefully the bloody link will work this time.

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  83. Soz - by time I had found the link Paul had sorted it.....

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  84. Surcate:

    Ah, didn't realise it was clashing with a referendum on AV..... perhaps they think no-one will bother?

    Someone told me an interesting factoid yesterday, apparently the Sun lost loads of sales with it's 'wall-to-wall' coverage of the Royal sideshow, looks like NEwsCorps attempt to make us all think 'we're lovin' it' has fallen flat on its face.....

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  85. Sheff - I have to say WADDAYA reminds me of the dispute with my neighbour..... you can' knock sense into a belligerent blockhead ;(

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  86. "Ah, didn't realise it was clashing with a referendum on AV..... perhaps they think no-one will bother? "

    I think the tories are rather hoping no-one will bother. With a couple of days between the romantic wedding and the AV ref, which will the nation's eyes be on?

    Not that I care terribly re the AV ref, but I do think it's a convenient distractor, to ensure the libdems don't in fact get the only sop they managed to leach from the tories as part of the 'coalition' deal.

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  87. ".....The sheer number of spats is overwhelming!...."

    some are old ones actually apologised for but then accidently reignited......by a new breeze

    It would seem that some of us have a talent for exciting the offence sensors of others.

    I think it is something to do with the presence of hemorrhoids and the overactive propensity to offence that some folks have.

    You are a model of restraint if may say so meerkat.......

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  88. I see scherfig's getting all moist about being called paddy. The trip wire victimhood of left footers, eh. Hail fuckin Mary.

    Ooops! What was that I just kicked with my foot? BOOOM! Oh dear, I seem to have lost my legs, what a laugh, no big deal though. Another soldier falls in a foreign land.

    Was that the sort of thing you were thinking of, Major? Your metaphors often leave me bedazzled and confused although I sometimes like your crude and intellectually limited provocation. That one was just clumsy though. I've been called a paddy by much higher ranks than you, and I consider myself blessed to have had that life-changing experience.

    Don't ever change, Peter - you're blog golddust. I loooove your work. Doesn't offend me at all. It's rarely specific enough.

    btw, did you ever man the look-out post in the Royal Victoria Hospital back in the 80's?

    ReplyDelete
  89. Sectarian organ grinders wind up the monkey, sheff, not me.

    ReplyDelete
  90. 1000 vistors thus far today montana!!

    ReplyDelete
  91. Peter, you know a little more subtlety might result in people rising to the bait. Try needling rather than bludgeoning?

    ReplyDelete
  92. Didn't wind me up - made me laugh. That might be the difference between Peter and deano. Peter doesn't really believe his bullshit but deano does and isn't even aware of it. I'll go with Peter - paradoxically it's more honest.

    ReplyDelete
  93. "Peter doesn't really believe his bullshit but deano does and isn't even aware of it. I'll go with Peter"

    Interesting image, Scherfig...

    ReplyDelete
  94. Well I'm getting fairly bored with all these 'spats'...just ain't 'seemly'

    having said that..I've just looked at waddaya

    highlight for me was this little nugget

    "By the way Marie-Antoinette almost certainly never said "Let them eat cake." If she did it was because it was standard practice to let the poor have cake if the bread ran out."

    The guy from Scunthorpe defending Marie Antoinette...Bru really should be given one of those lifetime achievement awards for services to self parody.

    AS for the little 'nemesis theme' that's emerging...pathetic...none of those involved could actually 'do' a decent feud...unfortunately bit-part inconsequential non confrontational dilettantes who have convinced Bella they're a "bit of a character... actually" aren't really up to it. It's fine sitting back and trying to be condescending about but there's a lot more to it than you think.

    Anyone on Waddaya wanting to give it a go is more than welcome to nip over here if they want and I'll fill in as a sort of dummy nemesis so thy can have a trial run...see if it's something they want to take up full time. Just to get the ball rolling...and provide a bit of incentive

    John Yard Dog...complete fuckin tool..always has been...Monster Trucks...ZZZZZZ

    Invisible Dirigible...Crazy name...pointless little guy

    "it'll be awesome.

    Like Mavis vs Brussels"

    Fuck you moron...that wasn't a feud; that was a crucifixion

    unexceptional

    Yawnnnn...convincing Bru or Bella you're a bit of a card is hardly worth writing home about...say something funny, interesting or in any way controversial or just accept that you're another lightweight poodle providing filler.

    That's how to start a feud...I'll hold your coat

    ReplyDelete
  95. crivens, there is genuinely some 'shit' going 'down' right now? no idea what's going on.

    (apart from being quite a fan of JYD - he often manages to prick some balloons, by being actually rather sensible and down-to-earth, particularly away from waddya)

    but, unsophisticate that I am (and nobody has genuinely claimed that the poor in Africa are poor because they're not as smart as 'us', I hope - that's a bit too close to C*****s 'cock' M****y for comfort) I am mainly distracted right now by being given ten day's access free to Canal+ by some nice sales people hoping this will make me want to buy a subscription for a Christmas present.

    so am currently watching spartak moscow v OM playing in what appears to be a fog bank. OM 1 up, the locals aren't happy.

    which could explain the foggy appearance.

    ReplyDelete
  96. "...Interesting image, Scherfig..."

    What consenting adults desire and get up to really is up to them habib. Ours is not to wonder why.

    ReplyDelete
  97. Yeah, habib. My darkest image is of me on the back of the Peter's motor-cycle, dressed in my finest linen suit and speeding towards Paris looking forward to our dinner at Roi des Coquilles

    (Do you know it Peter? Place Clichy?)

    But when we stop for petrol I go in to buy some Gitanes and when I come out, Peter is accelerating away with an elderly denizen of Brussels clinging to his manly waist. She shouts at me that I am a despicable class-warrior and a bog-trotting thug with a chip on my shoulder and that I don't deserve Peter.

    Peter just smiles.

    ReplyDelete
  98. Philippa

    (and nobody has genuinely claimed that the poor in Africa are poor because they're not as smart as 'us', I hope - that's a bit too close to C*****s 'cock' M****y for comfort)

    How else do you interpret this?

    When I was talking of sophistication I meant the intellectual sophistication that enabled Europeans to build up what we have today - imperfect though it may be - through the centuries.

    She has since gone on to extol the virtues of the 'intellectual classes' within Europe, so apparently there are wheels within wheels.

    Spike - sorry to hear that, mate.

    ReplyDelete
  99. Scherfig

    bog-trotting thug with a chip on my shoulder

    Heh, I'm having that.

    ReplyDelete
  100. Evening all.

    There's so much stuff to catch up on here ... any chance of a synopsis?

    ReplyDelete
  101. "Life's a bit shit sometimes."

    Aye.

    ReplyDelete
  102. spike - ouch. always a horrible thing. had that recently with two friends. didn't know what on earth to do when it got messy.

    my preferred approach is not to say anything in case i fuck up, but to hug a lot, and always have wine in the house.

    thauma - in all the debate ongoing, i can't believe nobody's really raised that point. don't want to now. but.... [sigh]

    ReplyDelete
  103. Heh, I'm having that.

    You're welcome, thauma, use it well! I'll take 'jumped up little prole'. (Give the scum a bit of education, and they start thinking they're our equals.)

    ReplyDelete
  104. Cheers, thaum.

    It's quite weird how you can get wrong-footed by other people's relationships. Their little boy is ten, which was how old I was when my parents split (it worked for me because I hated my father). He's staying with his dad and his mum's moving in with a woman friend. I'll go round at the weekend and see how he's doing. Inevitably, her teenage son from a previous relationship is far more visibly upset than the the ten-year-old. I imagine there's all kinds of crap going on under the surface, though.

    ReplyDelete
  105. MsChin:

    There's so much stuff to catch up on here ... any chance of a synopsis?

    grrrrr....fwwwrrrwwwrrufffffgrrrrrrrarrrggghhhhh....fwwwrrrruuuffffff..... Fight! Fight!

    Am scared me ;)

    ReplyDelete
  106. Thauma:

    When I was talking of sophistication I meant the intellectual sophistication that enabled Europeans to build up what we have today - imperfect though it may be - through the centuries

    Jesus, that's a fucking shocker!!

    Ahhh..... the art of the racist subtext from the clever dickies in love with the sound of their own voices, in-bloody-credible.

    ReplyDelete
  107. Philippa - several of us pointed out the passage without a direct accusation of racism (even addressing her is probably sailing close to the mods for some of us) but she and her cheering squad spectacularly failed to see the point.

    I did think of hitting the Abuse button but I save that for the Kermit. Besides, as we all know, it is best to let the dirt stand.

    Spike - it's shit when two friends split up. I've celebrated the end of some relationships (including, like you, my own parents') but it's very difficult to know what to say when you like both of them.

    Good luck to the kids.

    ReplyDelete
  108. Spike, sometimes a good family friend can make all the difference to kids in a break. Perhaps just by being available to them, being a little pool of calm in the storm, you'll be able to give them more than you think.
    It is horrible and disturbing when these things happen - disrupts your equilibrium.

    ReplyDelete
  109. Evenin all!

    Just back from visiting my dad. If I ever get that crotchety and self-centred in me old age, will someone please fly me to Switzerland?

    Anyhoo, Marie-Antoinette is most likely to have said "Qu'ils mangent du brioche" because brioche was a bread substitute. But if you have got no fucking bread, how on earth are you going to be able to eat something which is bread-mix plus eggs and cream (and a little brandy sometimes too)FFS?

    So clearly not a fekkin clue....

    ReplyDelete
  110. Spike - like the others said, being a pool of calm in a stormy sea is an invaluable role.

    Best of luck, hon.

    ReplyDelete
  111. LaRit

    Thanks for the synopsis - just the usual daily cut & thrust, then!

    ReplyDelete
  112. am staying away from the strudwick thread before i metaphorically slap someone.

    "I do not believe Britain's foreign policy should be determined by the interests of the homosexual community - Mods - What is wrong with that?"

    [holds self back, saying "leave it phil, it's not worth it!"]

    ReplyDelete
  113. Ooooh, it is soooo tempting!

    You're all overlooking one point.

    When dictatorships take power one of the first things they do is get rid of the intelligentsia.

    Because it is far more threatening to them than Joe Public.


    To post in reply:

    Well, you should be safe then.

    ReplyDelete
  114. MsChin:

    Am going to do a 'Dougal' in a minute and push the BIG RED BUTTON>>>>> hehehehehe!

    ReplyDelete
  115. Hey, La Rit: I'm in exile in St Albans for a while. If you fancy meeting up for few "sherbets" drop me an e-mail or phone me

    ReplyDelete
  116. Spike said...
    Fuck. One of my best mates just called to tell me he's split up with his wife, someone I'm also very fond of.

    Life's a bit shit sometimes.


    That's the downside of being such an irresistible specimen of humanity Shallcross. It makes everone else seem so inadequate.

    Mind you if he's as foul mouthed as you she's probably well rid of him.

    ReplyDelete
  117. Remember, everyone. Bitethehand has no life of his own. He has no-one to care about. And it makes him bitter and twisted that he can only live a normal life vicariously through the shards and splinters of information he gleans about others on here and on CiF.

    One should feel sad for him.

    So I have no idea why it makes me just want to point and laugh.

    ReplyDelete
  118. @bitey

    Invisible posted this on Whaddya:

    *sniggers, then weeps slowly to himself when he remembers the last time he had a ... friend...

    I immediately thought of you, bitey. Of course, from Invisible, it was a joke.

    ReplyDelete
  119. Bitey - i have a picture in my mind of your bitter little heart freezing solid, and the ice crystals creeping out of you to cover your table, your chair, up the walls, over the ceiling, across the floor, until all is frozen.

    and you sit there, shivering, laughing at the little mice getting trapped in the ice, while you slowly but surely turn blue, and harden into a ice-sculpture.

    soon, all you will be is frozen bile and a ghostly laugh, misting across the room.

    piss off, bitey.

    ReplyDelete
  120. Just occasionally, I think it's a pity we don't have a recommend button here.

    ReplyDelete
  121. heyhabib quotes the deleted JimPress:

    "when I had the audacity to point out that this was another fabrication my post was removed without trace. I attempted to repost and discovered that my ability to post there was blocked.

    All is not as it seems at the supposedly free speech loving UT. You're free to spout absurd abusive nonsense like Bitey, but have the audacity to rationally and calmly defend yourself against Lady Wildhack's malicious inventions and the shutter comes crashing down."


    Which despite his quite out of character slur on me, as someone who's never been abusive to anyone, - cutting yes, satirical yes, dismissive yes, but abusive, never. So here is the excellent JimPress, someone who I'd have thought from a political point of view, you'd have made very welcome here.

    AllyF, quoting me:

    Yesterday Ally was praising leta as making valuable contributions to the debate

    Was I? Care to quote that? I'm not saying I didn't but I have no recollection of it.

    It must have been 'yesterday' I read it and you're sort of right - you decide, as what you wrote was:

    Whippersnap, Leta, BrusselsLout (RIP), trashheap etc. They're the guys who actually say something with enough meat to be worth engaging with.

    To which JimPress understandably responded:

    Leta, BrusselsLout? Guys worth engaging with? I've heard more enlightenment and sophistication from within the Taliban. You were winning me round Ally, but after that, I'm less sure of where you're coming from.

    ReplyDelete
  122. And here he is being far more magnanimous

    JimPress

    Good post at 8.00am.

    You ask:

    I admire the persistence (if not, generally, the views) of Bracken and Brooklyn in going against the grain, but I've no idea what they feel they gain from their presence.

    To which my response was:

    Keeps altzheimer's at bay and as I've been doing it all my life I see no point in stopping now. As I said a few days back quoting the late J K Galbraith:

    There is something wonderful in seeing a wrong-headed majority assailed by truth.

    ReplyDelete
  123. I'm finding it really hard to discern your point, BTH? I'm probably just out of the loop, but I don't get it?

    ReplyDelete
  124. Surecate, let me explain it to you in simple words, Bitethehand is a nob end.

    ReplyDelete
  125. habib - I was going with bellend, but essentially the same! ;o)

    ReplyDelete
  126. Lovely comment Philippa and thank the lord for foul mouthed buggers, I much prefer them to polite, twisted little wankers.

    ReplyDelete
  127. ooh, what to do...watch entirely meaningless match between auxerre and ac milan to get the most of new free access to shiny world of pay-tv, or stay 'trad' and go for CSI Miami.

    hmmmmm.

    ReplyDelete
  128. bb

    Flamborough Head cheaper than Swizterland and the beers better too.

    ReplyDelete
  129. And here I am supporting him again:

    JimPress first:

    Angie124, you're wasting your breath.

    Any woman who has the audacity to suggest that the modern world isn't structurally stacked to neuter, belittle, and humiliate men is going to be dismissed as a ranting 'radfem'. And any man with similar views is going to be attacked for cynically hoping to get a shag from a passing 'feminazi'. You can skirt around it and criticise the most severely unhinged of the fathers4justice brigade, just so long as you ultimately trot meekly in line behind the resident CIF prince's commonsense exposé of the apparently obvious insanity of Bindel and Bidisha. The key protagonists spend so much time here and get so much reinforcement of their odd world view that they believe CIF represents reality. It doesn't, it's just a small self-selected group of people who've shaken off the dissenters and now share a common world view.

    Unless you have both the time and inclination to ingratiate yourself into the defensive and insecure little clique that feels this is 'their' place (along with the mysterious 'other place') then you'll be treated with a mix of suspicion and hostility. Even if you put in the time and effort there still seems to be the chance that if you deviate from the script the pack will turn on you; I confess, I'm baffled by the fact that MartynInEurope, surely one of the least offensive and most courteous people here, suddenly seems to have the role of speccy playground fat kid that everybody wants to kick.

    If the Guardian really wants an answer to the question 'What do you want to talk about?' then it needs to find a different format to this ugly squabbling cliquey thread, or at least have a zero tolerance policy towards those that indulge in the routine mobbing of anybody who dares not to join the club. I admire the persistence (if not, generally, the views) of Bracken and Brooklyn in going against the grain, but I've no idea what they feel they gain from their presence.


    To which I replied:

    With regard to the post by JimPress on the last WDYWTTA, for proof of his argument, you need to look no further than the traducing of Ally Fogg's article on Emma Goldman by the juvenilia of FreemanMoxy, BeautifulBurnout and MiddleEnglandLefty, carrying on about some motor cyclists' cafe on the A3 and a dance at the Lyceum Ballroom in 1979.

    Ms Goldman must be spinning.


    Not sure with hindsight I'd quite agree with him about MartyninEurope, but he has a point.

    ReplyDelete
  130. Surecate

    BTH is a man who espouses extreme radical feminist dogma but sees no contradiction between that and waging a relentless internet stalking campaign against BeautifulBurnout for some reason that makes sense only to him.

    An extreme male feminist who devotes much of is time to harassing women.

    Basically he is just barking mad. I ignore him.

    ReplyDelete
  131. odd that - if you lead with a html link it spams?

    ReplyDelete
  132. I like JimPress. He seems a nice enough bloke. The odd intemperate post, but who doesn't do that occasionally? However, I suspect he wouldn't thank you for dragging his posts into this particular argument BTH. That's my sense of him, anyway.

    ReplyDelete
  133. ok, calling it for csi.

    it's been a long day.

    night all/

    ReplyDelete
  134. POB, POB, POB, POB, POB, POB, POB, POB, POB, POB, POB, POB, POB, POB, POB, POB, POB, POB, POB, POB, POB, POB, POB, POB, POB, POB, POB, POB, POB, POB, POB, POB, POB, POB, POB, POB, POB, POB, POB, POB, POB, POB, POB, POB, POB, POB, POB, POB, POB, POB, POB, POB, POB, POB, POB, POB, POB, POB, POB, POB, POB, POB, POB, POB, POB, POB, POB, POB, POB, POB,

    (I would say FOB but I only swear properly when I actually care enough to get angry...)

    ReplyDelete
  135. Chekhov:

    Hey!! Just seen your post, are you on the 'group' e-mail? I don't know if I have your contact numbers... be lovely to meet up. Trains from St Albans to SW London and vice versa London are frequent.....

    Small, lady-like glasses of whine for me! And, I owe you (and others, several).... ;)

    ReplyDelete
  136. PhilippaB

    If it helps you cope with life please construct whatever image you wish to project about me. Today I've spent much of my time trying to sort out problems being faced by the daughter of a Chinese doctor who wants her to study in England, to help her get over the fact that her mother tried to physically harm her because she wasn't born a boy. (One child family problem).

    I suspect like most of my detractors you can't get over having humiliating times like this:

    PhilippaB

    check the last WDYWTTA and you'll see that a fair few of the feminist massive were supportive of the steps taken against said teacher while one (male, I think) poster was calling us all tools of the patriarchy for not following his(?) line that the two were in lurrrrrve and should have been left alone.

    To which my response, as it was me you were aiming at:

    Yes please do check and see that more than anything I expressed concern about the prison sentence imposed on what even the judge recognised as a consensual relationship, even to the extent that he rejected a prosecution request to ban the teacher from seeing the girl for five years.

    As Goddard sat crying in the dock, Judge Anthony Pitt said that it would be draconian on the girl, who turns 16 next week, to impose a sexual prevention order banning the teacher from seeing her. The court was told that the pair were still in love.

    And of course now Goddard is no longer a teacher, once she is released, they will both be able to renew their relationship, if that's what they want, with the full blessing of the law.

    Let me quote again from The Times which seems to have more civilised, less vindictive contributors:

    At a time when our prisons are bulging at the seams I question whether a custodial sentence was necessary? Should the teacher be punished? Yes – but being labelled a sex offender and losing any chance of continuing her teaching career seems to be a pretty severe punishment. Anyone else who might contemplate such a crime would be deterred. Incarceration seems unnecessary.
    Could she be rehabilitated? Being a lesbian is not a ‘failure that can be remedied in a prison. She suffered a serious lapse in judgement that has cost her her reputation and career. That seems sufficient.
    Does society need protection? Well she will not teach again so the wider risk is removed. Does the girl in question need protecting? She will shortly turn 16 and will be free to make up her own mind. By all accounts she has not been traumatised or ‘hurt by the experience and may well seek to continue the relationship – which she is entitled to do. So in my view sending this woman to prison is unnecessary, costly and unduly punitive.


    Would anyone care to estimate the "fine" that Goddard has paid having lost her job, her career and her pension and then tell me she deserves a custodial sentence on top of that?

    ReplyDelete
  137. Scherfig:

    Clearly the years of TEFL teaching have taken their toll on the mental state of certain individdls..... ;)

    ReplyDelete
  138. evening

    just had a wade through the waddyya and saw that mie was challenged about his feminist status by lizzywhizzy, so i went to see if it was true..

    he's changed it folks..... hate to break it to you all....... he is no longer a feminist.......

    ReplyDelete
  139. This made me laff....

    LarrydelaCrois
    23 November 2010 4:19PM

    This comment has been removed by Nick Clegg. Replies may also be deleted

    ReplyDelete
  140. But gandolfo, who will protect us poor silly ladies now?

    ReplyDelete
  141. Bitey:

    Today I've spent much of my time trying to sort out problems being faced by the daughter of a Chinese doctor who wants her to study in England, to help her get over the fact that her mother tried to physically harm her because she wasn't born a boy. (One child family problem)

    Just goes to show then that 'education' is wasted on some people and that Doctors, even female ones, can be prejudiced cows too.

    Anyway, harming female children is not only the preserve of the Chinese, last time I looked, it was a worldwide phenomenon.....

    ReplyDelete
  142. S'alright, Jen. The weak and feeble among us have BTH to protect their honour and their name - not to mention their right to have sex with an underage school pupil if they want to.

    The stronger among us, however, will have to put up with his abuse and attacks.

    Funny that...

    ReplyDelete
  143. Don't worry, jennifer30. You poor silly ladies still have Bitethehand. Good luck!

    ReplyDelete
  144. jenni

    We will have a fit of the vapours, languish and fade awy.

    ReplyDelete
  145. BeautifulBurnout

    Remember, everyone. Bitethehand has no life of his own. He has no-one to care about. And it makes him bitter and twisted that he can only live a normal life vicariously through the shards and splinters of information he gleans about others on here and on CiF.

    Unlike you MrsB who quite prepared to put the most personal details of her son and husband on the internet, in order to boost your own popularity with the lapdogs that follow your skirt hems, I go out of my way to ensure that those who are close to me are at as little risk as possible from the hatred and threats of violence some of my posts generate.

    ReplyDelete
  146. LOL Scherf - great minds, etc...

    Leni - I really must try that "having a fit of the vapours" bit one day.

    Do you think it might work? :p

    ReplyDelete
  147. But gandolfo, who will protect us poor silly ladies now?

    jenn

    this is the tragedy jenn, but not only, who will fill the void? who can take on the cause that marion in epsom has so stoically headed since dare I say the womb?

    can't you feel the emptiness already? maybe bindel and bea campbell should be contacted to write an obituary..........

    ReplyDelete
  148. Surecate

    I like JimPress. He seems a nice enough bloke. The odd intemperate post, but who doesn't do that occasionally? However, I suspect he wouldn't thank you for dragging his posts into this particular argument BTH. That's my sense of him, anyway.

    I also like his posts, well most of then, in fact I think he's had more praise from me over the years that anyone else. But in fairness he's never come under the sustained attacks they I've enjoyed dealing with, which is why I found his bust up with Montana to be so surprising.

    ReplyDelete
  149. @La Rit: Montana, Sheff, Shazz and Bitterweed have my contact details (and my authority to use their discretion with whom they share them)

    If you don't have any joy getting in touch with them, let me know and I'll post my e-mail address on here.

    Give us a clue when though, so that I can delete it smartish!

    ReplyDelete
  150. Bitey, however much you pull BB's pigtails I don't think she'll ever play kiss chase with you....

    ReplyDelete
  151. Can I have the gig, please??

    I'm shit with spiders though. And I'll be fucked if I'm putting my coat over a puddle for anyone...

    (I'll check with MIE what his other duties are in a bit. At the moment, he's decided that he's, culturally, a somali goatherder, so he's only responding to questions asked in Swahili...)

    ReplyDelete
  152. the hatred and threats of violence some of my posts generate.

    Blimey! The man is a martyr and a saint! His moral courage and readiness to speak out puts my own humble efforts to shame. Or alternatively, he is a bore with delusions of grandeur, and everybody just laughs at him.

    btw, bitey - do you speak/write any Mandarin or Cantonese, given your many years in China patronising the peasants? I'm guessing you don't. Am I wrong?

    ReplyDelete
  153. Spencer

    Surecate

    BTH is a man who espouses extreme radical feminist dogma but sees no contradiction between that and waging a relentless internet stalking campaign against BeautifulBurnout for some reason that makes sense only to him.


    MrsBootstraps, as she never tires telling us is an eminient self-made barrister without whom, I suggest, the English legal system would be greatly diminished. I'm quite sure she doesn't need your patronising protection to keep her head above water.

    Basically he is just barking mad. I ignore him.

    So many psychiatrists on UT and CiF of late, and all providing analysis for free.

    And are you the same Spencer who's been complaining about his neighbours on CiF, or is that someone different?

    ReplyDelete
  154. Waste of time watching Eastbenders then, when the floor show was better here.

    ReplyDelete
  155. BiteTheCarpet

    'I'm quite sure she doesn't need your patronising protection to keep her head above water'.

    How are you sure about this? How do you arrive at such assumptions with such certainty?

    ReplyDelete
  156. MsChin,

    Yep! Here you get to call someone a slaaaaaag and burn down the Vic yourself.

    Later we could bury someone under the patio

    (or am I get my soaps in a muddle again?)

    ReplyDelete
  157. Dot

    I'm no expert either - I can't tell one from t'other as all the soap plot lines seem to blur into one!

    ReplyDelete
  158. Time for some wine, methinks. Been a long day.

    ReplyDelete
  159. La Ritournelle

    Just goes to show then that 'education' is wasted on some people and that Doctors, even female ones, can be prejudiced cows too.

    Actually the doctor is the child's father. It was her mother, who from what I've been told, was largely uneducated and who ran off after harming her daughter. And my experience of Chinese attutudes to children is that they treasure them far more than in any other country I've visited. (One child family benefit - for the children)

    And to answer your question of a few days back, no I don't teach English, except very informally and the only connection I have with TESOL is if I refer students.

    ReplyDelete
  160. MsChin

    I thin we've got the fighting down, someone needs to start having someone else's illicit love child and passing it off as a third party's though, any suggestions?

    ReplyDelete
  161. That would be "I think" of course, not enough that I've lost my voice IRL, now I've got a cyber cold too!

    ReplyDelete
  162. "I'll check with MIE what his other duties are in a bit. At the moment, he's decided that he's, culturally, a somali goatherder, so he's only responding to questions asked in Swahili..."

    thank god for that.. I was told he'd moved to the slums of india dressed in a white sari trimmed, not in tory blue but socialisty red, curing the sick and poor---- yep you heard it first on UT........martina in calcutta

    ReplyDelete
  163. Chekhov:

    Cool ;)

    Will pass on me e-mail and number to one of the suggested!!

    ReplyDelete
  164. Watching Mandy commit political suicide on tv. It's a bit disturbing.

    ReplyDelete
  165. This comment has been removed by the author.

    ReplyDelete
  166. scherfig

    btw, bitey - do you speak/write any Mandarin or Cantonese, given your many years in China patronising the peasants? I'm guessing you don't. Am I wrong?

    Far too difficult for me to learn scherfig but the business does have a unique combination of people who speak and write English and Mandarin. And I'm one of the few people in China, where the greatest insult is to say someone's from the the countryside, who doesn't patronise peasants in that way.

    ReplyDelete
  167. Gandolfo,

    There's a bit of confusion, which all started after he was awarded the Nobelmichelinsportspersonalitytony award for services to cultural empathy, and he's had to reschedule a few 'immersions'.

    New, revised tour dates can now be found at Martyndoesyouandyours.net.

    ReplyDelete
  168. MsChin:

    Gave up enduring 'Enders a long while ago..... can't cope with the pastiche of werking class life....

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  169. Changed my mind..then changed it again

    Highly fuckin suspect...Unexceptional and the Vanishing Balloon showing us all what a joy it can be when all the pointless bickering stops...perhaps they fell enough's enough...maybe because they kinda represent the highbrow, urbane, sophisticated wit end of the spectrum...you know kinda harmless, aloof..don't take it too serious...I mean they're Daddy's little girl's faves...so?...a feast of elegant lampooning to look forward to? ...and just what the fuck are we served up?

    ..a turgid string of sub-Dibley banter full of all sorts of potentially deletable, premoddable perjoratives...( oh...but dontcha geddit sweetie?...when they do it, it's satire..duh..they're clued up and urbane silly..)

    I used to keep a tape of the Vicar of Dibley in the boot of my car..always figured if the licensing people ever took me to court and they asked if I had anything to say, I'd just say.."I suggest you take a look at this your Worship?"...I just assumed for a long time everyone else thought it was shite too.

    If he fined me I'd figure I'd have grounds for appeal on the basis that the magistrate was a fucking air-headed cultural illiterate with the comedic sense of an uninquisitive eight year-old boy raised in Shropshire by elderly spinster great aunts in the fifties...but it turns out I was wrong.

    ....on a similar theme...something I saw eclipsed it a couple of weeks back...I only caught the last two minutes then watched it back through disbelieving eyes..the thing with Giles Coren and the woman who reaaallly isn't funny but I think she's a lesbian...and she's very middle class so she's probably got a 35 year contract...only as I say she's very middle-class so everything's drawled in a whimsical self-deprecating fashion...or so she thinks...it sounds a bit more like "look at me...I'm fuckin so much more sophisticated and 'spiritual' and wonderful than you...and so witty"...and she's almost as bad as Coren...and Coren is a fuckin lambent cunt.

    ..and so Waddaya continues to putrefy...even the 'good' ones turn out to be just a bit lame really...and if that really was a demonstration of how much better it is when we all stop feuding (ie we abandon the entertainment...the Bread and butter...we switch over from feuding's X Factor to non-feuding's Giles Coren's shite programme with chickens)...then it was a was a big waste of time...and about as 'instructive' as the decisive lessons served up (over here) by the likes of Kermit and Martyn.

    Please understand that I'm not trying to start anything here..so please nobody take offence. I've decided that with this recession looming I'm trying to widen my options in case (as is more the likely) I face a period of unemployment)...I'm moving into the fertile and fast moving world of blog criticiam...I'm just kinda practicing at the moment...think of me as the Phillip French of Waddaya...just be glad you get a mention at all..."all publicity.. etc"

    No...I'm fuckin serious...don't get upset...ask your agent...you do have agents?

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  170. Anyone been to the Wellcome Collection? A really strange and interesting place. Took a group there today.

    Apparently the Welcome Trust has more money than Bill Gates's Foundation. And the collection of strange objects on display is a tiny, tiny percentage of the stuff that Henry Wellcome collected.

    He was such an obsessive collector that they are still cataloguing the stuff he acquired and he died in 1936.

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  171. Meerkatjie

    Just watched less that 2 minutes of that programme. Aside from the female reporter, where are the women advisers?

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  172. What do you mean pastiche La Rit, why I have murdered a member of my family and had a gay mans baby in just the last year, totally true to life. ;)

    I don't watch it either but in some strange way I seem to know what is going on via cultural osmosis.

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  173. It has an endowment of £13 billion according to Wikipedia.

    Shit. I thought it was just another London museum until I went there for the first time.

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  174. "Just watched less that 2 minutes of that programme. Aside from the female reporter, where are the women advisers?"

    You mean we still have women in politics at all?

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  175. MF, I'm not sure it was a demonstration of how nice it all is without feuds. My reading of today's activities was more of a kind of embarrassed wallpapering exercise.

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  176. James

    I'm lucky enough to have this in my possession...if you look closely james you can't pick Him out (i use the capital "H" wisely)

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  177. Oh my god. Who let Mandelson *do* this?

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  178. *Testify.... HallehluuuuuuuujaaAaaahhh*

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  179. I'm going to save the Mandelson doc for the daylight hours, I am watching Alien 3, probably less disturbing.

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  180. Funnily enough, Mandie reminds me of one of them Alien things!!

    (Is there any chance you're both watching the same thing, and one of you's confused??)

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  181. Spencer:

    They are drug pushers though! Endowment of 13 billion?.... you don't say!

    Wellcome Collection is pretty mad - also have lots of very interesting free exhibitions.... current one is 'High Society'..... downside is, they have been given the go-ahead by the McConJobs to build a new animal experimenting research laboratory right next to the British Library and St Pancras.....

    MsChin:

    Well, you know those chavs..... no social graces and not a political thought in their heads outside of the Sun and the Daily Sport ;)

    MonkeyFish:

    I only caught the last two minutes then watched it back through disbelieving eyes..the thing with Giles Coren and the woman who reaaallly isn't funny but I think she's a lesbian...and she's very middle class so she's probably got a 35 year contract...only as I say she's very middle-class so everything's drawled in a whimsical self-deprecating fashion...or so she thinks...it sounds a bit more like "look at me...I'm fuckin so much more sophisticated and 'spiritual' and wonderful than you...and so witty"...and she's almost as bad as Coren...and Coren is a fuckin lambent cunt

    Ah, yes, that'll be the 'let's spend all the license-payers money on fucking clever dickie talentless Oxbridge graduates like Sue "I'm a Lesbian too don't you know, darling" Perkins (because everyone's sick to the back teeth of Stephen bloody Fry) being all so terribly Middle Claaasss' and re-inventing 2-D cartoons of terribly Middle Claassss suburbanites living the fucking 'Good' Life in the 1970's, with the excruciatingly 'cute' Felicity "I'm Jewish too darling, don't you know?' Kendal..... it's enough to make you want to vomit.

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  182. marty's having a meltdown on wadyy.......ah poor thing

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  184. I can't get waddya.....

    Is it going to be one of those 'where were you when...' moments??

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  185. Jen:

    Sorry, Mr LaRit is playing Ninja Man so getting confused (dem-a wind up) so I'm getting you and MsChin mixed up....

    Cultural osmosis.... ;)

    Oh god, now he's playing "That Girl Shelley-Anne".... no hope of reasoned thought now ;(

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