Born today: Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov (1844-1908), Wilfred Owen (1893-1918), Peter Graves (1926-2010), John Updike (1932-2009) and Wilson Pickett (1941-2006).
It is Mens' and Soldiers' Day in Mongolia.
18 March 2010
18/03/10
Born today: Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov (1844-1908), Wilfred Owen (1893-1918), Peter Graves (1926-2010), John Updike (1932-2009) and Wilson Pickett (1941-2006).
It is Mens' and Soldiers' Day in Mongolia.
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ReplyDeletesheepherderr's comment 17 Mar 10, 9:47pm (about 8 hours ago)
Oh Bitterweed, why would I want to post on UT when I can read all about it here?
As I've said, every few months the drahma of your parallel posts spills over, the UT gets a mention, and it can be entertaining to see what your collective story / agenda is. For what it's worth, I read Cif years before posting here, and enjoyed your posts, as well as Monkeyfish, HankScorpio, and others. When the "big bang" happened and you all supposedly left, I did follow, as I assumed you and others would continue some brilliant wit on the UT.
Which mostly turned into a bitch-fest about Cif, dissing the posters, etc. - which is rather funny, as most of the WDYWTTA dailies inhabit UT as well, eh? But there is a definite "vibe" that I'm not attracted to much, and so I've never joined in. And for what it's worth, I rarely post here either - same reasoning.
But I do think you're overboard right now. You people pick a target and hound them to distraction, the poster gets banned, and you all love that - and it's very childish, but if that's what you like on UT, fine. I'm just curious why the Guardian as an international "newspaper" site hosts your spillover nonsense is all.
@ Sheepherderr:
There is no "collective" story or agenda here. We are all individuals and, contrary to what some people (including yourself, apparently) want to believe -- we have never pursued a collective agenda.
Some of us still comment on Cif, others do not. On balance, very few of the people who chat on the WDYWTTA thread are regulars (or even occasionals) here. It is up to each person who posts here whether or not they also post on Cif. Continuing to post on Cif is not going to make anyone unwelcome here.
As for picking a target and hounding people -- no. It's never happened. Yes, bitchy comments are made here about certain Cif BTLers. But there has never been a collective effort to "hound" anyone, no matter what you or anyone else might think. And I think it's safe to say that not many of us believe that people should be banned from Cif.
I can only speak for myself, but Bitethehand is the only person whose banning ever made me happy. I will apologise to no one for that. He's a sick, obsessive, little creep who deserves every ounce of shit he gets -- because he's given it out a thousandfold.
As for the "feud" thing: I think you'll find that the people who bring up any alleged feud on Cif are the people who either no longer post here or never did who hate this place. When UT regulars bring it up on Cif, it is only in response to things that others have said. I actually agree, wholeheartedly, that Cif is not the place for that. But if I feel that something is being said there that is unfair or untrue, I'll be damned if I'm going to ignore it.
As to why the Guardian moderators don't delete comments that are only about this place (which is what I assume you mean by, "why the Guardian as an international "newspaper" site hosts your spillover nonsense is all", I haven't a clue. They really ought to -- it is never on-topic.
So you read the UT in the beginning and decided you didn't like the "vibe". Why the hell do you keep reading it? Why the hell do you make so many comments about this place on Cif? You are obviously our moral and intellectual better, so it seems to me that you wouldn't want to sully your superior mind with our juvenile remarks.
So, since you don't think Cif is the place for any "spillover nonsense" from here, I take it you'll stop making remarks over there about the UT? That would suit me just fine.
Morning folks!
ReplyDeleteLast night I popped onto CiF to review the carnage I have prompted and I'm absolutely bowled over by the support you are all giving me. It's a damn fine thing to know your friends are behind you and even better to know that posters you hardly even know appear to be lining up with them. Heaven knows what I've done to deserve your loyalty, but I'm very grateful for it all the same.
Would someone do me a small favour and let Kiz know I'm not blaming her in any way and she shouldn't feel responsible as some of her posts suggest to me that she might. I know some posters here have a few issues with her at the moment but if you could pass the message on I'd be much obliged!
To keep you all up to date on the discussions that Mattie Seagoon hinted at in a few posts, one of the mods (nameless, they didn't sign any of their emails) and I came to an agreement that has probably largely been made possible by your voices of support. They want a 'cooling off period' of about a week, after which I should email them and they'll restore my posting privileges. I've no reason to think there'll be any difficulty with this although I might not be available next Tuesday due to some work commitments and it may need to wait until Thursday before I can do it.
Once again thanks to everyone, both Untrusted or otherwise, for your solidarity in this silly affair.
I stand by my original posts on the Bidisha thread. It was the follow-up to the first which bitched about the deletion of the first which I'm told was the cause of my ban. It was angry, but directed at the Guardian and its inconsistent moderation policy. My original post was either right or wrong and I'll happily discuss which of the two it is for as long as anyone has the breath and the patience, but I do not agree that it was offensive and I think it's about time someone pointed out to The Guardian that while it's fine for women (lesbians or otherwise) to pontificate on why men do what they do, without a balancing opinion it's not journalism, it's bigotry.
See you next week, and one again ... thank you!
Your Lordship:
ReplyDelete@kizbot
A message from LordS
Would someone do me a small favour and let Kiz know I'm not blaming her in any way and she shouldn't feel responsible as some of her posts suggest to me that she might. I know some posters here have a few issues with her at the moment but if you could pass the message on I'd be much obliged!
If it did not get nod-modded
RIP Charlie Gillett. A great broadcaster and lover of music, who was constantly discovering new acts.
ReplyDeleteMuch obliged, medve.
ReplyDeleteGod, yeah. Charlie Gillett discovered Dire Straits, Elvis Costello, Graham Parker and worked with loads of new wave faves. Wherever he is now, I hope there's good music!
This is for James Dixon: I like people who give of a Ned Land (or, as I prefer to call him, Neddie) vibe.
ReplyDeleteAlso happy birthday to Peter Graves, who had the dignity not to support his most beloved character becoming a rat in the stupid movie.
And I'll probably listen to some Rimsky-Korsakov this evening, really love the music.
@LS - thank god you'll be allowed out before long. As you well know, I really missed those weekends when you did the best Ellen Burstyn in-drag impersonations :)
ReplyDelete@Montana - who's that then? I hope it's not 9milerancher?
Lefthalfback
ReplyDelete@LordS I've been afk for a bit n missed all the drama, could you put the posts here for posterity if you still have them? Their loss if you ask me.. You're the bigger party, if you don't just tell them to stick it, which would probably be my gut response.
ReplyDeleteMorning all,
ReplyDeleteLooking forward to something on UT2 by Emily, and have to agree with Thauma, can you keep it in layperson's terms please? I know after a certain point jargon is easier, but I find putting it in lay terms can often actually help you pin down your ideas (I work with another set of jargon myself you see).
pen, ref our conversation yesterday and some of your subsequent posts, sometimes the glass isn't there you know, the trick is to work out when it is.............
morning all - and happy birthday, Courtney Pine!
ReplyDeleteBeen alternately tired or busy for the last few days and what happens? Lord S is banned!
ReplyDeleteTrying to catch up but I am so glad the mods are seeing sense (for once)
Am I alone in thinking that in some ways the attention we get on Cif is quite funny? I put the antagonism largely down to people thinking we are some sort of 'in crowd'.
Which is pathetic and takes a lot of the edge of the nastiness imho.
Just read this on the sexual expression thread:
Pragmatism - The wages of sin is death but there is much job satisfaction
Comment of the year? (LOL)
@Montana - Lefthalfback? don't recall him/her - and there's no profile available only the dregs of 'recently commented on': *
ReplyDeleteo
World news
·
o Tea Party movement ·
o US healthcare ·
o US domestic policy ·
o Catholicism
*
o
Education
·
o Religious studies and theology
oh well - another one bites the dust
Dot, in this case it is isn't it as I guess most of us are doing this via pcs, macs, etc and I am certainly reading it on a screen. But as Emily said it's participant observation (less usual in bio).In IRL I have nothing to separate me off from my obscure objects of desire.
ReplyDeleteWould add you guys (upthread) are inconsistant with your 'yous' 'wes' and 'Is". Group what is that? Self what is that?
The worst jargon is when common words are used with little thought and lots of assumed meaning.
Emily's 'jargon' filled post was strait forward. It gave more info.
Or am I justb pulling your collective plonker?
Am off to see if I am still in premod
ok, that fucked-up link was meant to be Freddie Mercury, which in a round-a-bout way brings me back to Lord Summerisle :)
ReplyDeleteLefthalfback was one of the few sane American voices on Cif America threads.
ReplyDeleteSorry, turminder. I made the posts at work and therefore have no record of them. But the essential content was ....
ReplyDelete1. I told Biddy that (these are roughly my words as far as I remember them) with the greatest respect and not intending this to be a judgemental comment on her in any way that she was a lesbian and therefore had no idea of what it is that men think or why we behave the way that we do. Now that's an opinion that I accept is contentious, and it's either right or wrong. But reversing the roles, if I had written an article concluding lesbians all hated men with the same daft Bidisha logic and a lesbian made a similar remark, I wouldn't be taking offence. In fact I'd be in agreement.
2. The second post was me getting pissed off that post 1 had been removed ... and as it turns out I do have a record of that one because the mods emailed it back to me.
"My mistake obviously. Bidisha, being a lesbian, clearly knows so much more about what being a man entails than any man does. I'd just like to make that clear. Seriously Guardian, are you so fucking naive as to believe that Bidisha has a meaningful perspective on this issue? if so then when will you be publishing my article about the thought processes of lesbians? Don't worry, you won't have to because I simply wouldn't presume to write on a subject I clearly know nothing about"
So with an apology for the swearing, I disputed it broke articles 1, 2 and 3 of the talk policy as claimed by Georgina and the moderator in question. I did concede that it *might* be considered trolling or offensive, but suggested that so could a lot of things if you're of the mindset to look for offence where there is really only disagreement. I refused to agree that I had personally abused Bidisha, or misrepresented her or been threatening.
So there, in a nutshell, is the reason I'm currently doing CiF jankers.
I'm still in premod, sooooo dull.
ReplyDeleteI find it all a bit pathetic, really. My comments have been deleted but those of JoeMcCann still stand (not that I want them deleted do I?) despite s/he posting a lot of ad hom (eg You'd swallow it as you're always duped by authority") and "Ontological proof my arse. I'm sure I'm in a horror movie penileplethysmograph, welcome to my nightmare. You smug bastard prepare to die."
But of course this is not the whole story is it.
But whatevs...
Look guys basic solipsism (a la Descartes) means that the jump from self to any other is the biggy, forget lesbos, gays and straights, virgins etc
ReplyDeleteYou are locked in your heads in a cartesian theatre (D Dennett by way of JoeMcCann haha like I have not read Dennett)
Whatever, too much jargon maybe?
I did lecture for ten years and am actually used to conveying complex ideas to any and all, young and old, educated and ignorant.
I read your comment 'live' LordS and and knew immediately you were in deep shit. That's because it was clear that a write-in campaign orchestrated by the author's sympathisers would follow like a tsunami after a seabed quake.
ReplyDeleteJust for the record, your comment was reasonable (though I didn't agree with it) and it should have stood.
I would add a wider point. There is a misconception that CiF is populated by right wing bigots (like me, apparently), who swamp the voice of the paper's 'natural' constituency. In my experience, and LordS's fall from grace would appear to confirm it, the reverse is nearer the truth: that a cabal of virulent left-wingers patrol CiF and pounce on anyone inclined to free market, liberal intervensionist, pro-western rhetoric (which most certainly describes me).
Ps - AlasdairC: I'm out of premod for the moment (my second parole-like release!)
Fair 'nuff, pen. But the issue isn't whether I'm right or wrong, it's whether I was being offensive.
ReplyDeleteIf I'm wrong, then fine. But that's not a reason to ban me. Except, it seems, if I'm ideologically wrong.
Sorry Alisdair - I have a mental block with the spelling of your name.
ReplyDeletepen,
ReplyDeleteHa ha, actually I think you'll find I've got a flatscreen: no glass! But I was being wider than that, and had dropped the specificity of affectionate objects...
Respectfully (as (almost?) always) do you not understand Emily's jargon because you are in the field? and can you prove:
"am actually used to conveying complex ideas to any and all, young and old, educated and ignorant."
By doing, not saying, please?
pen 'jump from self is the biggy'
ReplyDeleteSo true that. I suppose its slightly less impossible to make the jump as it were if you have more in common with the 'other' gender orientation culture class etc?
Although its true it can be a dangerous truth I think because as social animals we need to make at least an approximation of understanding others.
But we need to avoid those crass statements like 'I know how you feel' because we don't. We can imagine how WE would feel, how close is that approximation? We can never know.
But we can recognise distress and seek to comfort the distressed surely?
This is just life experience talking here - not my field - so be gentle with me!
LordS - glad to hear of the agreement, and look forward to seeing you back on the boards!
ReplyDeleteMontana - they've canned lefthalfback? true, a sane voice (although I don't read US threads regularly, s/he was also a presence on Belief threads, where we had some discussions - not always in agreement, but never in snark). Bloody hell.
PeterB - I'd say that pouncing happens in both directions, for very little gain, which doesn't give for wide-ranging debate, and that it is difficult not to get recruited / assigned / characterised as being on one 'side' or the other.
I am proud to say that on certain topics I have been pounced on from both directions simultaneously. I am presuming from that that I must be doing something right. Either that, or I am wholly wrong. One or the other...
Hi Lord S - great news, very pleased. Fascinating to watch Matt Seaton shift his position down the thread!
ReplyDeletePeter - not sure abut cabals, never thought you were that right wine either, my feeling is that most posters tend to be liberal/left but some threads attract more right wingers than lefties - just the way it goes I suppose. The I/P threads are another matter altogether - last time I looked at one there was a clear Nazi exchanging pleasantries with someone who seemed to be a member of Respect. No surprise there, then but not the sort of place for me.
Re the Alis, no one gets them right except their mums. Even Alasdair Gray's name is wrongly engraved on the Holyrood quote wall.
Parallax, Freddie Mercury was a parsee but I think they are supposed to be immolated on towers rather than in wicker men!
Well, I'm with you Anne.
ReplyDeleteAs I said on a post (now probably deleted) I recall a similar discussion I had with a gay friend who was having a particularly hard time of it. He was a good and dear friend and I was trying my best but at the wrong time made that so dreadfully wrong statement "I know how you feel".
It was the first time he actually stopped crying and fixed me in the eye and said "No, you don't. You can't. You have no idea what it's like to be gay, to have grown up gay and to be gay every day of your life" .. or words very similar.
All I could do was realise he was absolutely right and apologise. I sorted him out in the end though, I found the right things to say, but telling him I knew how he felt was so wrong because I quite simply had so little idea of his life experience that even though I didn't intend it that way, it was a very patronising thing to say.
Message from Kiz (she's firewalled at work) to LordS:
ReplyDelete"Thanks a lot for that your lordship.. It means a lot to me. I don't blame you at all if you feel very aggrieved at your treatment by the mods. By rights, they should be contacting you as far as I'm concerned. But please contact them. I have found that they can be reasonable when you contact them. Ask Jay all about it. He's been there and done that. I really really hope to see you back on cif very very soon."
Should I pass on the gist of the developments with the cooling off period, milord?
If you can do it without getting yourself into trouble with the mods, then please do Philippa.
ReplyDeleteLordS - re your friend, I have made the same point on some 'depression' threads, about how my friends have tried to deal with me when in the pit when they don't have direct experience of it - they do a grand job, because they realise that they don't 'know how I feel', but they do 'know me', so it's hugs, wine, cheerings up, that kind of thing.
ReplyDeleteThing is, that as depression is such a spectrum, it is also not accurate for me to say to another poster suffering that I know how they feel. I may have a better idea, but I also need to recognise that everyone is different and that everyone's condition is different.
So there can be empathy across a lot of boundaries, and a certain degree of shared experience which can lower the fences, but there's no situation, I think, in which one can truly know exactly how someone else feels. You can just try to help.
Oh, and call me Bill. Milord/LordS sounds so formal ;-)
ReplyDeleteHey Edwin:) glad, and not surprised, you picked up on the Freddie Mercury affiliation but ... you've skewed it - I'm not making an ethnic point - it's more to do with Ellen Burstyn's in-drag banning - and why people don't get it.
ReplyDelete... and it's probably best not to post the bit above where I referred to Seaton as Mattie Seagoon. I'm in enough trouble already ;-)
ReplyDeleteNo worries, peter...(my,now late,dad once asked me how Alisdair is spelled, which took the bloody biscuit) Still can't see how you would warrant pre-mod. Been there several times myself and it's a bit of a mystery,but clues abound.
ReplyDeleteI really can't get my head around the bunker mentality within Guardian towers. They're fine with the frothing right-wing US-style neo-cons/moral majority types, as that's an opponent they feel comfortable with 9and an easy one to oppose).
What they can't take and seem to get very shirty around is anyone from the centre, centre-left, or god forbid the Left (inc. the libertarian left, which is closest to where I come from) criticisng their moral relativism and identity-politics fixation, a mindset that leads to the risible,plain ignorant stuff written above the line by,yes Bidisha,but also the tranche of Ctrl-Alt-Del writers who may be from certain identity groups but are astoundingly ill-informed on the bloody subject on which they are pontificating.
As I put yesterday, with umpteen typos,
I think Montan ahad it nailed when she said something along the lines of what the Guardian can't stomach is accurate demolition of their scared Third Way cows and their preferred writers who really do turn out some unutterable guff, one-eyed,illiberal and plain wrong in factual terms on occasion after occasion. They like the wingnuts and the uber-Tories because they can readily dismiss 'em, but they can't bear being exposed as the phony,'playing' at being leftist,identity-fixated,chattering,privileged wankers so many of them are (one or two exceptions,maybe. Pikey used to get them going when he exposed just how opposed to freedom they are,MF got them for their plain bourgeois falsity and vacuous posturing 'concern'/solidarity shtick, LordS got them for their humourlessness,WML for their scientific illiteracy,and so on.En masse they close ranks and pretend that nothing's wrong as their cosy world-view is shown time and time again to be a self-serving load of shite.
There's the odd good writer, but the preferred ones, the Andrew browns, the Bea campbells,etc are vanity-driven,thin-skinned egotists, encouraged by the bloody rag to pen drivel.
Article up on Le Pen's mob, made me check out whether the PS / greens / left front had managed to inveigle their way into the second round by joining with Freche - nope. Languedoc will therefore be the only mainland region with no PS representation in the second round. Ouch.
ReplyDeletePeter I think they are more likely to be New labour control freaks than 'virulent left wingers'.
ReplyDeleteI'm a left winger - how virulent I am is for others to judge ;)
Some of those who are/have been banned are definitely left wing (e.g. MF, Hank. Jay). They are also male and posters perceived to be male appear to be more at risk.
My experience in the real (as opposed to the virtual) world is that New Labour are more opposed to genuine lefties than they are opposed to the right wing.
Alisdair - don't worry, my dad always writes to me as 'PCB' (initials) as he struggles to remember how many ls and ps are involved. he bloody chose it...
ReplyDeleteCheers Bill, I wish some one would answer the 'does Bidisha get special modding?' question. I see her sitting there doing it herself...
ReplyDeleteAlisdair/Philippa
ReplyDeleteMy mother frequently calls me by my cousin's name! (same gender, same first initial)
@ annetan42
ReplyDeleteMy experience in the real (as opposed to the virtual) world is that New Labour are more opposed to genuine lefties than they are opposed to the right wing.
Absolutely. A good friend of mine's sister is a New lab PPC for a safe(ish) seat. Now he is genuinely of the left,principled, and a doer, not a disconnected, keep-your-hands-clean, supercilious type (eg, when others were having parties or whatever to raise funds with the Ethiopian famine, he went out there for 4 years to directly help). He is currently finding it hard to stomach the shit his sister's been parroting after her brainwashing, sorry media training (stuff like," People don't appreciate Peter (Mandelson) enough. He is marvellous"). Anyhow, he (and for that matter me) should be there for the winning round, but the apparatchiks don't want to know, can't address the big issues and questions we raise, yet still want us to contribute: got asked to put in a tenner for a fundraising pub quiz for her campaign. Our suggested team name, The Walter Wolf-gang...current odds are 8/11 that we get ejected early doors
I'm pretty sure she gets special modding, most of the feminist posters do. The mods get hyper-sensitive on anything by O-Bea-E, Julie Bindel, Cath for example. That's not to say there isn't some incredibly horrible stuff posted on their CiFs which should be chopped without question, but I think this results in them being a bit cavalier about stuff that would probably remain on other threads.
ReplyDeleteFor example, I once got modded on one of Cath's threads for having a joke with her about the bloody awful train service from Norwich. OK, technically no defence is possible here because it was an 'off topic' post but it was removed because the mods thought I was having a go at her, not because of its relevance.
There is, of course, no justification for the protection Denis MacShane enjoys, but that's another story. Grrrrr !!
linky to map of second round alliances - every other mainland region has the PS and Greens in it (those colours in a box mean that one or more won over 10% in first round and has 'adopted' one or more in the 5-10% range for the second round list - those with no box got through alone). So the PS either didn't ask to join Freche or were told to sod off.
ReplyDeletePolling suggests the second round vote will be:
Freche 58%
UMP 28%
Fash 14%
With Freche picking up votes from the failures in the first round as:
PS 80%
Front Gauche 97%
Greens 86%
So Freche will basically get to run the place. I am slightly concerned about this...
Still premodded (like I fucking care : ) )
ReplyDeleteAnnetan, sure gentle but firm, I do not agree with cartesian dualism, mind body, mental physical btu it is the model / language you all deploy and blah.
I believe that we are all engaged and entangled, embodied and embedded in a real world that orbits a solar body that ....
Of course we are social through and through. I do not keep referencing George Herbert Mead 1934 Mind self and society because I am mad or have read no other book.
Again, in practice you (all) use incoherent and inconsistent descriptors re individual and social. Mostly you (all) let local factors shift your language etc towards a narrow self interest. It is human nature (but not mine).
Dot (and there is respect and respect isn't there?) In the filed, broadly. I mean I cover the whole uni and more don't I.
Kind of tough, if I want to learn motor mechanics I have to learn the names of things? Duh. You want your cake and toeat it too (and with no crumbs and we all know that if you want cake you get crumbs).
(The ref to obscure objects of desire is a Bunuel film title) As Emily stated there is a subjective/objective dimension (?). I am not doing 'science'. You are a bio type do you not pursue specimens with an avid desire to capture them?
Luckily I have lots of catch (and release) methods and techniques, only a few are gaffed like gasping fish on the end of a rod : )
Prove myself? HA. We all have to do that all the time anyway.
Guys give up on the endless blah re modding. Rules are only ever guidelines since they need interpretation and enactment in the instance. The G/Cif should enter into a more sensible dialogue cum dynamic sure. Maybe they will if you were less virulently partisan (and often hypocritical).
ReplyDeleteHope I was clear : )
Finally (for the nonce :) )
ReplyDeleteWE ARE ALL IN THE SAME FIELD. IT IS CALLED BEING ALIVE.
Jeeze guys, you can be so slow (haha snickety snick I can be quick, dawdly slow I flow like ice or glass).
How do words work?
Emily's field (where she is at play and hey let's all see Emily play haha) calls on literary analyses as much as anything. Most of you read don't you? I was told so in no uncertain terms (even tho' I tend to assume that if one can type and post then one can probably also read but may be not).
Bye for now
@LS "I'm pretty sure she gets special modding, most of the feminist posters do."
ReplyDeleteain't that the troof - arf
I reckon Kizbot is the only one that comes out of this debacle clean
otherwise UT feminist posters: yep, you know who you are - talking about yourselves - introspective as always.
whereas laying down the law is better? because one can only give one's own take on something, else one is committing the same error as the ATL-ers who seek to speak on behalf of an entire group. empathy is one thing, claiming the right of representation quite another...
ReplyDeleteLord S - glad to hear negotiations are underway look forward to seeing you next week!
ReplyDeleteCordelia
@PhilippaB / anyone else interested
ReplyDeleteThere was a curious article about depression (from the evolutionary p.o.v. inter alia) in the New York Times about three weeks ago. I can't do links but it's http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/28/magazine/28depression-t.html?em=&pagewanted=all
It's a long article, but briefly, it turns out that the author of Ecclesiastes 1.18 ('For in much wisdom is much grief: and he that increases knowledge increases sorrow') might have been onto something...
Hi Philippa - i'm not sure that we're talking about something so rigid as laying down laws - that might your interpretation - so your problem.
ReplyDeleteOk so; ignoring others in preference to wah-ring on about yourself - I know more about your and countless others' domestic lives because that's what you deliver on line - how does that help in the scheme of attacks against bi-homosexual people or attacks on poverty or attacks on class warfare?
Hope your novel's going well
OK, so now we know The Guardian has won, but what do we learn from it?
ReplyDeleteSummerisle will go back in a week or so - obviously, it would be churlish not to, after all the support - and perhaps pop in here for a week after that, before leaving here completely and settling back into the usual stool by the bar.
Whether the analogy is of the old soaks who con themselves into thinking that the landlord is their friend or the people who convince themselves that Tesco or Asbo or Wal-Mart are not only cheap, but offer good value for money and obviate the need to shop around, we all settle back to the familiar in the end.
The truth is that we do not have time to be active on very many sites and we tend to gravitate to where we think what we have to say gets noticed.
Seaton asked whether CiF makes a difference and, to some extent, we have to fool ourselves into thinking that it does and that we do, otherwise why are we wasting our time there?
The truth, of course, is that it doesn't.
If the mighty organs of Rupert Murdoch do not really install governments, how unutterably trivial and idiotic must the mutterings and idiocies of the scum classes posting BTL seem to those in power?
The dynamics have been set, the relative status of those involved established.
You play by the rules of CiF, even when it appears that you have won.
I have nothing against Summerisle and he must make his own decisions and I would not blame him for going back. As I said, it would now be rude not to do so.
Seaton could easily have stopped the moderation debate from the start by simply saying: "OK, we accept that it needs looking at, despite the fact that we think it is pretty good. We are happy to keep things under constant review in order to ensure the best possible user experience for our valued contributors. Please email us at this address and we promise to look at everything you say and report back to you."
Everyone would have been silenced and the party would have been nothing but jelly and cakes and belches and farts and the occasional small heap of sick in the corner.
As it was, a single martyr was created, who will return a hero and a saint and everyone will think that CiF is accommodating and reasonable and considerate of its free content providers.
It should keep everyone happy for a year or two, by which time, they will have become so used to the ideologies and censorship, the notion of dissent will have evaporated.
I hate to say it, but Seaton and the team have played a blinder, right down to the mixture of snappy arrogance and smarmy condescension of the comments to the supplicant scum with outstretched hands.
They have won.
pen
ReplyDelete"You are a bio type do you not pursue specimens with an avid desire to capture them?"
By specimens do you mean answers? Then yes, I am after all, a scientist (the true definition, not yours), pursuing individual animals to put them in glass cases died out quite some time ago.....
parallax - maybe because our own experiences do inform our beliefs and ideas so can be relevant. As I said a couple of days ago when my orientation was news to someone (elementary, I think), I'll mention something when it's relevant to the topic, but it isn't the prism for all my beliefs...I do also try to present objective evidence (or at least call for it) when that is relevant - on the Amherst thread yesterday you could see that approach from many people, there were a couple of posters taking pops at the idea of the article, but most of the female posters were supportive of it, which demonstrates that the gender prism wasn't being employed by them, perhaps?
ReplyDeletenovel a bit slow - thank you for asking.
Lavartis - interesting - but does it conflate grief/sorrow (arguably helpful) and depression (arguable *cough* not)? Will read properly later - am supposed to be doing homework...
They have won.
ReplyDeleteThat's one way of looking at it. Another way would be that they're never going to admit to being wrong even though they know they were and faced with a lot of people telling them precisely that, a 'cooling off period' of a week lets them save a bit of face.
... and no I don't have time to be active on many sites, so yes it'll probably be CiF where I end up. Nothing personal.
parallaxview
ReplyDeleteYou do come across as a nasty, spiteful person makes you feel good does it? What exactly are you doing to help anyone? Go and have a look at disorders post over on waddya some people have real problems in their lives, you sneering really helps.
Cordelia
Hi Cordelia - that make you feel good - being spiteful I mean?
ReplyDeleteAtomboy/MLJ
ReplyDeleteI don't really understand your love/hate relationship with Cif and I'm sure you don't give a fuck about what I think, but I'll say it anyway shut up about it and talk about something else, you're being boring.
Thanks
Cordelia
LordS:
ReplyDeleteYou have received a reply:
Thanks medve..
Could anyone who can get on the UT (I can't... firewall) send a message to LordSummerisle for me.
Thanks a lot for that your lordship.. It means a lot to me. I don't blame you at all if you feel very aggrieved at your treatment by the mods. By rights, they should be contacting you as far as I'm concerned. But please contact them. I have found that they can be reasonable when you contact them. Ask Jay all about it. He's been there and done that. I really really hope to see you back on cif very very soon.
========================
beginning to understand what it must be like to be a meson.
Dot, do you data record still in biology or is it all done by simulation hahaha
ReplyDeleteTry and think a that way bit. Take my photo take my soul or so was sometimes thought. And nowadays it may pay so something can be legally stolen in that way. The photo steals the light that has become entangled with my being. Death by n +1 cuts.
Try not to be local all the time.
And I am sure biota gets sampled to death, japanese whaling being only an obvious example.
Best ignored, Cordelia. He pops in here every three months or so when he smells blood. He quickly gets bored and disappears again. Cue 'witty' putdown from parallax 3..2..1....
ReplyDeleteYeah try and learn from your 'defeats' if you want to be mnore effective next time. Duh.
ReplyDeletehi scherfig :) so what's up your nose today?
ReplyDeleteChristina/Cordelia
ReplyDeleteI would suggest that, rather than telling me what to do, you simply learn to skip over my posts, as I normally do with yours - other than seeing that one addressed to me.
Have a look at the response to Seaton when he used the line you are, presumably, trying to copy.
I thought you were the one who was hot on everyone being lovey-dovey.
And, no, I don't give a fuck what you think.
Science has squeeky clean hands rinsed in the best antiseptic (duh) but the stink of death still lingers like the perfume of the devil.
ReplyDeleteCome on Dot, we all know scientists can be in human, leave reality a mechanistic causal determined soulless and mindless ?
pen,
ReplyDeletesometimes it's better to go to the well with a broken bucket than spend days procrastinating on how to fix it, but, to coin a phrase, whatevs
Bingo! Like shooting very stupid fish in a barrel! What fun! :0)
ReplyDeleteOk - just for you scherf:
ReplyDeleteChristina said...parallax: What exactly are you doing to help anyone?
Annihilating meerkats - your turn
Thanks medve.
ReplyDeleteMassively confused by that post from orchidsoroysters underneath it though. Obviously a Walt Whitman but .... well ... why?
Oh sorry Philippa, even though i skimmed through the thread to see if the reply had been posted .. must have shit in my eyes or something
ReplyDeleteAtomboy - since Cordelia entered our midst - I'm warming to you
ReplyDelete@elementary watson
ReplyDeletehaha - cheers.
(funnily enough, I actually have a very similar 'facial length/asymmetry/unattractiveness index' to that of Kirk Douglas)
Epiphany of the minute: Don't eat chocolate while reading a thread about toilets.
ReplyDeleteThat's all.
@Dotterel
ReplyDeleteMy gran frequently calls me by my cousins name too! (although, different first initial and different gender)!!
James,
ReplyDeleteHa, I'm not sure if that's worse because of the gender/initial or better because it's your Gran who's presumably your cousin's Gran too? (instead of Mum/Aunt)
@Dotterel
ReplyDeletehaha - it's a good question. Probably one of those 'swings and roundabouts' whatsits.
@LordS
ReplyDeleteFor what it's worth, I completely agree with what you said (*ducks), and would have said it myself, on both the Bidisha thread, and the WDYWTTA one, had I not been called away from the computer when things were getting interesting.
The whole moderation 'issue' had been troubling me for a while, and the 'Lord/Biddigate'(fingers crossed that name gets adopted) affair merely proved my fears correct.
In my humble opinion, there's something seriously wrong at The Guardian, and the 'official' response by Seaton, Henry et al, was offensive in the extreme, and suggests that this is more than an isolated incident, and the problems will continue, and, in all probability, get worse.
Erm, something else too, but I can't remember what it was....
My ex wife used to say her 'new' surmame wasn't 'Newis' But rather "Newis, that's like Lewis but with an N" Don't get me started on me forenames, and yes there are four of them!
ReplyDeleteAny one see "is everything we think we know about the universe wrong?" Horizon last week? All this Dark Matter/Energy/Flow..
Made me think of earth centric universe and 'explanations' for the retrograde movements of planets, patent bollox when you know a bit more. Will all the 'dark' forces turn out to be similar, once we understand something about many worlds/multiverse etc?
turminder,
ReplyDeleteTried to watch it but I was at my parents' and Mum deployed the "you watch what you want dear but then I'll talk to you so you lose the thread of the program and let me turn over to my soap anyway" tactic!
Is it repeated or on the web anywhere?
Aye, was on iplayer, but only in HD now..
ReplyDeleteThanks James. Though being right is not quite so important to me as not being thought to have something against lesbians, because I don't.
ReplyDeleteIt ought to be on iPlayer, Dotterel. Worth a watch despite the naff title, but I guess "Scientists Still A Bit Confused By The Universe" isn't quite to catchy.
Atomboy said 'I would suggest that, rather than telling me what to do, you simply learn to skip over my posts as I normally do with yours'
ReplyDeleteYes, thanks you've told me that you never read my comments before when you posted on CiF as MLJ. However unlike your view of me, I thought your posts were sometimes vaguely interesting particularly when you stop being obsessed and superior. I guess anyone who posts on Cif is going to be a target for your insults but thanks again 'lovey-dovey' is not as bad as it could be.
Good Luck with your new 'friend' parallax.
Cordelia
BeautifulBurnout:
ReplyDelete"To use the word "cyberstalker" when it comes to the way Bitey behaves towards me is not much of an exaggeration."
And when you've counted the posts you've made about me and those I've made about you, I think you'll find there's not much of a difference and any reasonable observer might conclude, this is surely what CiF is all about. No what you're really upset about is captured in this statement from you:
"Now, if you want to accuse me of "duffing up" BTH, I stand guilty as charged. Thing is, he shouldn't pick personal fights with people based on misrepresentation, innuendo and smear and expect them to bend over and drop their trousers when he does. I have been done over like a kipper by him in the past and know that other people who post on here have too. I reserve the right to point out when he is talking shite on any forum of my choosing."
And when our social workers read what you've written about your 14 year old son by way of promoting yourself on the blogosphere, they might take you to one side and suggest that you
stop being so keen to broadcast some of the most intimate aspects of his life to all and sundry. Indeed from the grief you say he gets from his school mates, it wouldn't surprise me that they know exactly who his mother is.
And if you're going to quote someone you really should do it accurately.
What I said about Montana's son was:
"I'm sure however that he appreciates the time you spend here as much as we do"?
And when you asked for an explanation, I responded:
"1. His mother is a major poster to an international newspaper's online edition and is appreciated sufficiently by many of her readers to be nominated on a number of occasions to write articles as well comment on them. He should be proud of her.
"2. She also runs her own blog which puts her in a very select group of women.
"3. She regularly attracts praise from fellow posters along the lines of 'great posts throughout', 'I'm sure youre a wonderful mother', 'a thoughtful and considerate person, and one who cares about the people she comes into contact with', to gather just three from this page alone.
"Having said that she runs a blog which contains some pretty insulting things about posters on CiF and Guardian journalists, which she seems quite happy to leave available for the public to see."
And of course when those quotes appear on CiF, the posters, as you've admitted Mrs Burnout, take on the role of censors and squeal to the moderators to have their words of wisdom removed.
So why not change the banner headline to "Amusing and entertaining other Ciffers since 2009?"
You're a very strange person, Bitey. And not in an interesting way.
ReplyDelete"Good Luck with your new 'friend' parallax"
ReplyDeleteoh dear ...
Get over yourself Christina - take your head out of your arse. Go on, take a chance - imagine, for one moment, that you're not the centre of the universe.
Job ... just give it up, dude. You'll feel much better for it.
ReplyDeleteIf anyone fancies relaying one final message for me, could they tell disordered that a friend of mine was having severe (and I mean sanity threatening) problems with the DSS over disability benefits and council tax payments and a mutual friend suggested he speak to MIND. Without MIND's help he'd probably still be having the same problems but they were positively inspirational in helping him negotiate the hurdles they repeatedly put in front of him. If it ever gets to that point for her, then perhaps that might be a way forward?
That said, I'm outta here. Work to do.
Bitey, you forgot to mention the bit where you commented on Cif about Montana's 10 year old son having a drink problem. Or has is disappeared from your extensive archive? I know you feel that if you're going to quote someone you really should do it accurately. So chuck that one in as well, there's a good chap.
ReplyDeleteLordS
ReplyDelete"Thanks James. Though being right is not quite so important to me"
That's probably for the best, to be fair.
The chances of something I was going to say myself actually being right, are usually, at best, around 50/50.
But, I thought you made a reasonable point/observation, and, whether 'right' or 'wrong', it deserved to stand, and certainly didn't warrant this debacle.
anyway sheff&scherf - I know your ties are here and I'm sorry I can't stick around but I'm off again - hope to parachute in another time. Take care.
ReplyDeleteOh, just caught Montana's post before I head for the desert - irony sweetie? don't make me laugh
ReplyDeleteyay go bitey:)
Dobar dan svako, (I know, a bit pretentious but I don't very often show off, do I?)
ReplyDeleteLolling about having lunch in lovely spring sunshine - thought I'd check in and see how everyone was and here is bitey, bless his cotton socks...
And when you've counted the posts you've made about me and those I've made about you,
You count posts? Oh gawd...that is truly tragic. Especially from where I'm sitting at the moment, overlooking the the Old Town Hall in Sarajevo, which is currently under reconstruction having had a bit of a hammering a few years ago, if you remember.
Great city this and great people...they put online bitching into a different perspective really.
LordS - glad you'll be back on cif once you're allowed out of the naughty corner.
Bitey,
ReplyDelete""To use the word "cyberstalker" when it comes to the way Bitey behaves towards me is not much of an exaggeration."
And when you've counted the posts you've made about me and those I've made about you, I think you'll find there's not much of a difference and any reasonable observer might conclude, this is surely what CiF is all about."
On CiF it's maybe not so clear cut, but you only ever come over here to snark, so I'd suggest that you are stalking BB....
bitey
ReplyDeleteI'll put a pic up in the UT gallery, specially for you.
Pen re: dualism - didn't mention the mind! believe 'feelings/emotions' are functions of the brain - I am a materialist after all!
ReplyDeleteI don't believe in minds any more than I believe in souls.
Sorry reply is late was out for lunch with daughter.
Good to hear that you're on your way back in m'Lud. Of course, apart from the inconsistency of the whole thing - which has been widely commented on during the course of this current saga - CiF needs to take a look at its whole modding structure.
ReplyDeleteI'll probably make the same points over there, but just to get them straight now while they'e top of mind:
1. 3 strikes and you're out is bollocks. It's particularly bollocks when you get a strike for complaining about a strike.
2. The modding and moderators need serious re-evaluation. There's a strong and growing tendency for posts to get deleted that aren't abusive, but contradict an ABL poster effectively. The young blades right-on bias is becoming a pain in the arse.
3. It all desperately needs an out-and-out modding open thread. Part of what's driving Jessica and Matt to distraction is that it's not dying down. That they appear to be playing nice with the good Lord probably has as much to do with placation as fairness. What they don't want is a root and branch reform of a system that gives them leeway for personal axe-grinding.
Perhaps the most sensible change they can make - even they're going to hang onto the 3 strikes rule - is that a strike disappears from your record after a short period of time. One month, for example. I'm not holding my breath however.
Incidentally, mad props to exiledlondoner for playing a blinder yesterday. I particularly liked this little gem:
ReplyDeleteMattSeaton: I'm willing to look at one example, so MozP needs to come up with a specific post I can follow up.
exiledlondoner: So you want MozP to point you in the direction of a post which... er ... you've deleted?
Do you read Kafka?
Hello again, saw this yesterday: "I think Montan a had it nailed when she said something along the lines of what the Guardian can't stomach is accurate demolition of their scared Third Way cows and their preferred writers who really do turn out some unutterable guff, one-eyed,illiberal and plain wrong in factual terms on occasion after occasion"
ReplyDeleteYeah that's pretty much it. They don't so much mind the abuse and filth; it's finely targetted demolition charges they cannot stand. I remmber the fist time I got banned from guardian talk - way before CiF - was for "maliciously" reposting Guardian editorials, "out of context", to make my argument... hehe. The mod then, Mabel something, came into the thread to have a go at me. She was furious...
And the deletion that saw me walk from CiF was also an attempt at petard-hoisting, against the wretched St Polly.
FTR, I think Georgina is more clue dup than Seaton - she did do a lot int he ealry days, was v. responsive and flexible. But I stick to what I said to Matt following my flouncing; imo, it's the fear of a mammoth election drubbing that has the Guardian running scared. Personally and politically they know they have a *lot* to be scared of - the business could very well go under if public sector advertising is withdrawn. And they have realised that Joe Public is more than happy to shoot down any propaganda they publish, and that this shooting down *is* significant - ripples spread out from CiF, it's a high profile platform. So, the aim is to oust intelligent dissent - inside the Left, and from outside.
Mebbe.
Good points Eddie. Sorry to hear of your travails, similar here; this too will pass..
ReplyDeleteWhy not pitch 800 words about the modding at Jess, could be worth £85? Mebbe not tho...
Cordelia:
ReplyDelete"What is going on with Jiasa over on CiF where have all those spiteful posts come from? They look like something from school yard bullying".
An accurate assessment of the company you keep.
You might like to read the post at 12:04 on today's WDYWTTA which provides not only support for LordSummerisle but also attempts an analysis of how editorial control of part of The Guardian has been irresponsibly handed over to keen, albeit faceless moderators.
Dunno Dot,
ReplyDeleteI've lived in places with wells and we are all in a gravity well are we not? But am on mains supply here tho' funnily enough the cold water is stopped and my mum, bless her, is beginning to panic haha.
You guys want to have your cake and eat it and expect someone else to pick up the crumbs.
Also have big bro and sis in law down tonight and have not seen for yonks. They down from Sheffield (I do know places a bit) but sure I'm a big dummy.
: )
Dot scientists do kill things don't they
If the water goes I'll forage duh.
'Personally and politically they know they have a *lot* to be scared of - the business could very well go under if public sector advertising is withdrawn.'
ReplyDeleteYep, always follow the money, Frank. Am not sure that the Guardian would go under - it is too much part of the establishment to be lost to them surely. I think it will survive, but in an attenuated form.
I suppose what Cif brings to the corporate party is a high ratio of hits and readability, but dunno what the cold eyes of the money boys make of it all.
Good party while it lasts. You need to come back!
Oh and was it Eddie who did that long Cif riff on masturbation a short time ago? I thought that was inspired.
Hi, erm, just a little selfish question to the francophones- and -philes here: Could any of you recommend a book by a contemporary French author suitable for an 80 year old grandmother who likes "Le Petit Nicolas"? Preferably available as an audio-book.
ReplyDeleteI think you're right, Frank/Pikey (well, I would say that as that's me you were quoting). As I said earlier, it's the business plan that really puzzles me:
ReplyDeleteTo be frank, purely from a business perspective, I can't see how the paper is going to survive. It's put all its efforts into an online presence which is free, then piss off a helluva lot of active readers (and that's before the blinkered cheerleading for Our Glorious Leader,Brown). They seem to be wanting readers to do their work (you know, the writing stuff...) for them, for free or a pittance, and to be able to patronise condescend to, and indeed abuse said readers. Oh, and the paper's sole monetary lifeline of a quasi-monopoly on public sector job adverts, well that won't last for long: the Tories have intimated they'll end that, while even if a fucking dreadful combo of Brown and Balls (Jesus wept) are in no 10 and 11 after the election, there won't be the money.
The Islingtinistas and cosy journalistic chatterati with their evident disdain for real people and their unbridled opinions are going to get a sharp awakening pretty darn soon, I think. You'd reckon they'd want to foster loyalty and community with readers (y'know with an eye to subscription eventually:page hits for adverts don't pay very much really), but no, they'd rather be smug and doomed, censorious and insistent that tepid third-way relativism is ever so right.
Just saw the Tim Samuels article up on CiF - Do male MP's really get castrated (i.e. emasculated) when they go to parliament? And isn't it really cruel irony to call them "MEMBERS of parliament" afterwards?
ReplyDelete"Still, it was nice for Georgina and Matt to finally be upfront about the fact that they hold the regular BTL contributors in utter contempt."
ReplyDeleteThis quote from @atomboy on yesterday's thread (sorry, I don't look in very often as I'm not CiF obsessed) made me laugh. @atomboy just realised?
For Christ's sake, did you all miss the Max Gogarty fiasco? The Graun's utter contempt and disdain for posters was made blindingly obvious then. That's when I stopped buying the physical paper.
When that patronising twerp Seaton took over ( a man who can't see a point without missing it) I pretty much gave up on CiF altogether. His fawning over James Purnell will live long in my memory as the most emetic experience of my life (second only to the death of Di).
Get a grip, folks. CiF is moribund. As our American friends are wont to say: time to move on...you need closure.
Eddie - just trying to catch up on all the stuff I missed yesterday and today (about halfawy throught todays) but wanted to say I am sorry for the financial situation. I hope you get things sorted out.
ReplyDeletePeterBracken- I disagree. I don't think that left wingers patrol Cif and bring down right wingers I think as others have said - they have little time for those who do not buy into the New Labour ethos - which is absolutely NOT left wing.
If you look at all the banned posters on here they are left wing - and I have to say that some of the stuff I have seen right wingers post in recent months has been astoundingly horrible. I have genuinely been shocked by some of the hatred and bile that has been poured onto Cif for those who are ill or sick or out of work. And none of it gets modded. People calling poor children 'some chav scums rat kids' - and that post was left standing. The poster in question even said he resented his taxes going to feed said 'rat children' and something along the lines of they should just be left to rot.
It seems to me (and this is not just Cif this is the weird and wonderful world under New Labour) that you cannot be racist - unless you are talking about assylum seekers of course. YOu cannot be sexist - unless you are discussing single mums on benefits of course. Etc, etc. These people can be targeted because they have something in common that trumps their status as female or of an ethnic minority - they are poor and they rely to some degree or another on the state. They then become fair game.
I think we are sleep walking into fascism in this country. That is not said lightly. The language used to describe the poor and especially anyone who has to rely on our disintegrating welfare system is akin to the language used to talk about the Jews before and during the rise of the Third Reich. Now of course I am not saying that the poor face the fate of the Jews in Nazi Germany but what I am saying is the the language increasingly used to talk about the poor and even more ominously the sick is very similar to that used then.
It is more worrying when you know that the Nazi's actually targeted the sick and the disabled before they targeted the Jews.
The views of some on the right on Cif are fucking dispicable - not all - you can be right wing and not a monster of course and I have mentioned some posters on Cif who I would put in this category - but there is a growing and vocal group that take pleasure in saying the most awful things about the groups I have mentioned.
Even the everyday casual utterances such as 'people in social housing shouldn't be allowed pets' take my breath away. The ideas being discussed more and more openly - on Cif, on the Mail, in the pub - are leading towards a society where anyone who finds themselves out of work or ill can become the target for this new hate fest.
This is the wonderful world of New Labour, their 'third way' rhetoric has enabled even bolder hate speech than anything we would have got under the wonderful Maggie. They are scum and to call them left wing is a joke.
Sorry for the rant but it really, really makes me angry the shit I have seen on Cif and elsewhere and heard on the streets etc in the last year or so. We should be ashamed that we talk about the most vulnerable society in this way, I am ashamed to be British.
misharialadwani
ReplyDeleteDid I say that? Didn't think I used words like "upfront" and I must have been careless to call people by their first names.
Sometimes the point in writing is not to say what I am actually wondering but to suggest that others might like to wonder it.
Welcome, anyway.
Blimey, is it a full moon?
ReplyDeleteEdwin, that would be me, yes. IIRC, that would have been in response to one of the Dear Pamela columns, where the letter writer claimed her husband to be masturbating 20 hours a day. Apart from the friction burns, repetitive strain injury, social embarrassment etc, I simply pointed out that this would require him to be cracking one off effectively during every minute of his existence.
ReplyDeleteI strongly get the impression that no one writes to poor Pam and that she makes up the 'letters' herself. I didn't look, but I'm pretty certain that my 25 wanks in 2 paragraphs didn't make it into the printed G2 the following week.
And Bitey/AxisBoldAsLove/Job/MommieDearest is still traumatized by me mentioning me getting my cock out and waving it about. He really should man the fuck up. :-)
@Atomboy & misharialadwani:
ReplyDeleteNot to toot my own horn or anything, but that was actually from one of my comments. Gogarty was before my time.
Eddie, I remember that one - it was brilliant!
ReplyDeleteMontana:
ReplyDelete"Am I the only one who finds it just a bit too precious that Kiz, jiasa & Bru think that it's okay for them to bitch about the UT on there but that we're somehow out of line in talking about them here?"
Of course I wouldn't dream of speaking for Bru or kizbot, but I welcome and treasure your every utterance Montana, whether here or on CiF. Here you are quoting the delighfully genteel Mrs Burnout on CiF, a post that sadly the moderators felt it necessary to delete:
"You disgusting little creep.
"You are a sad, sorry little creature who snoops about like a stalker, collating "clippings" from internet posts - not only here but elsewhere on the internet - like a deranged and obsessive
member of the Stasi. You are vile and abhorrent.
"I really cannot understand how your revolting sniping has been tolerated so long on these pages. I can only imagine that it is because you are either related to or servicing a member of staff.
(not guilty on either count I'm afraid)
"Now fuck off and get a life of your own instead of living vicariously, like the snivelling little poisoned pen that you are, through those of others.
"Oh, and by the way, I am still waiting to hear from the Bar Council about the time you reported me to them. It seems that they are not interested in your pathetic, twisted repugnant witterings any more than 99% of the posters on these boards are."
You concluded Montana: "Whatever he said has been deleted."
But if you ask nicely I'm sure I could find it.
And here a little earlier:
"Frankly, I regret having deleted comments on one previous occasion, because it did end up making me look like a hypocrite. I'm not losing too much sleep over it, however, because I don't think there are too many people in this world who don't commit the occasional sin of hypocrisy. The only other times that I've deleted comments have been at the specific request of the person who'd made the comments.
"I'm going to have to break my personal policy of not addressing Bitethehand here and say that I'm pretty sure that most people who post on the Untrusted would, quite frankly, be happy to forget your very existence, if only you would let them. Honestly, BTH, if you will insist on continually and deliberately misquoting people and making spurious accusations about them, then you must expect them to dislike you. If you apologised to someone once in awhile, you might earn some respect. You are almost universally despised here because you try to fight dirty and then you try to play the victim card when you're called on your tactics. If you're going to engage in fuckwittery, you will be called a fuckwit at some point in time. Call it Wildhack's Law of Posting.
"If you want people to stop bitching about you on the Untrusted, stop trying to smear people here on Cif. Stop misquoting things that people said five months ago to try to score cheap points. It makes you look worse than it does the person you're trying to smear."
And here you are on Xmas Eve, being ever so seasonally generous:
"If you'd just stop trying to point out what evil fuckers we all are, you might find that we're half decent human beings. And I'm sure that everyone here would be happy to forget about the past."
Hello again to all - time is short once again, but I just wanted quickly to say 1) oops, sorry about the jargon! I often don't realise I'm even doing it - I will definitely try to set the disciplinary lexicon to one side as much as possible however, and feedback is much appreciated if anything isn't clear. And 2) thank you again pen, really appreciate your thoughts! Sorry I haven't time to speak more at present, but I'll keep working away and dropping in when I have a spare moment.
ReplyDeleteNo, Thauma. We were just here, so I'm afraid we're only at waxing crescent right now.
ReplyDeleteSorry, @atomboy, I wasn't having a go at you. It's just that your comment struck me as odd, I mean, given all that's gone before.
ReplyDeletePersonally, after I got banned 2-odd years ago, I just kept coming back under new names(artpepper, budpowell,ozymandibles...too many to mention, really).
A couple of weeks ago, I had the temerity to point out that Libby Brooks needed to apologise for her disgraceful libeling of a dead man and I was (as pongothecat) pre-modded.
I instantly wrote to the mods telling them they were pathetic and they could stick their 'pre-mod' horseshit up their collective arses.
I returned minutes later as philmarlowe but frankly, CiF has become so risk-averse that I can't be bothered posting much anymore. Shame, really because it used to be a really fun place.
I blame that ghastly creep Seaton...Georgina was no great shakes but compared to that obtuse ass Seaton, she was a combination of Athena, Boadicea, Dotty Parker and Marie Curie...
I just saw Montana's comment setting me straight. My apologies, @atomboy. That's what I get for going off half-cocked. Forgive me...
ReplyDeletepen,
ReplyDeleteEveryone kills things, no?
All,
Surely job isn't Bitey, he's a parody of Bitey, really, no one is that much of an archivist, really? (please, help me out here, my head's exploding*)
*well, the small part of it I use to bother to think about Bitey/Job anyway...
Ta, Bitey. I must confess, I'm enjoying this little trip down memory lane.
ReplyDeleteIf you're going to engage in fuckwittery, you will be called a fuckwit at some point in time. Call it Wildhack's Law of Posting.
That was one I'm particularly proud of. And it's as true today as it ever was. Fuckwit.
You should be proud of it Montana, I appreciated the reminder of a LOL moment too!
ReplyDeleteDot
ReplyDeleteSurely job isn't Bitey, he's a parody of Bitey,
'fraid he is. The epitome of a very sad existence. But an object lesson to us all.
*groan* You mean it's going to get worse?
ReplyDeleteMishari - aha, I remember more than a few of those handles! Great last para there, and true.
Thauma - Yikes - see what you mean. Just got to the bottom of the thread.
ReplyDeleteI have a headache now!
He's like the worst school yard bully, he does seem to like having a go at the ladies, rarely answers his male detractors. Dickless wee cum bubble.
ReplyDeleteHate speech is not a consequence of New Labour policy, princesschipchops, even if I suppose I know what you mean by the phrase, which is by no means certain.
ReplyDeleteGovernments shouldn't legislate against hatred, for that would entail censorship which is a deeper and even more perfidious malaise.
There is a crisis of the Left that is borne of the convergence of party political agendas, for sure: but that is because the new political agenda is now firmly international: third world development, energy supply and conservation, the environment, the threat of atavistic fundamentalism.
Throw in the mix a core among the Left who blame the West for the increasingly fractious nature of this global agenda (and others like me who deny it) and you've arrived at the ideological tramlines that configure debate on CiF (and elsewhere).
And just to reinforce the point, I would go further and suggest that attitudes regarding race and gender and lifestyles in general have, in the West, improved markedly over the years. Racism, sexism - discriminations in general - have retreated, and indeed if you were to criticise New Labour it would be for its tolerance of sectional interest: the disgraceful genuflection in respect of religious groups, for example - faith school subsidies, WTF is that about?
Only today I have been arguing with sectional leftwingers about Cuba, in response to an article about its human rights abuses. The US is to blame, apparently.
It is this fanatical delusion that exercises me. And the repugnant moral relativism at its heart.
Dickless wee cum bubble
ReplyDeleteMade I larf.
"Dickless wee cum bubble"
ReplyDeleteEasy Tiger. You'll be in the database fer sher now !
misharialadwani
ReplyDeleteA very very common plight...
That was with reference to this by the way:
ReplyDelete"A couple of weeks ago, I had the temerity to point out that Libby Brooks needed to apologise for her disgraceful libeling of a dead man and I was (as pongothecat) pre-modded."
misharialadwani
ReplyDeletePlease, there is nothing for which to apologise and nothing to forgive.
I rarely check or proof anything I write and never use it for ballast to fill otherwise useful interstices in my brain. Once written, forever forgotten.
I agree with you about the culture of being scared of everything, especially the fizzing, jittery, spastic terror of having your ideas challenged or knocked down which now pervades CiF.
It seems that they are under mental siege, as if there is a constant super-injunction about to fall on their heads and Rusbridger will once again have to run squawking to Twitter to be rescued.
There was a story I read ages ago, which might be completely untrue. In fact, I might just be making it up for all I know. Anyway, some people had arranged to meet John Betjeman (when he was quite young) at a certain pub, but when they arrived, they found him outside with his head in his hands, crying.
It turned out that he had asked a working-class person something and the person had been rude to him, thus the need for floods of tears.
If a group of ordinary people were let loose in CiF Towers, they would all hurl themselves from the windows.
Their only interest in the real world is if it fits their cartoon image of it and the people who occupy the realms beyond their charmed circle are either servants or pets.
Why is Seaton editor anyway? His only known ability is to move on two wheels without falling off too many times.
One I meant to put here yesterday.
ReplyDeletePeter,
ReplyDeleteI consider myself firmly on the left end of the political spectrum and the only thing I would disagree with in your post at 15:37 is the notion that New Labour has anything to do with leftist politics. Neither does the Democratic Party, here in the Land of the Free and the Home of the Brave™.
I agree that there are people on the left who fall victim to a "West = bad" mentality that is often wrong and extremely unhelpful.
Conversely, I would say that people on the right are far too dismissive of the role that past (and current) actions by Western governments have had in creating anti-Western sentiment around the world. We have given them ample reason to hate us and we only fan the flames when we pretend that we have never been anything but exemplars of freedom and democracy.
No, the West is not the root of all evil, but neither are we blameless.
Montana,
ReplyDelete"No, the West is not the root of all evil, but neither are we blameless."
"World is not black and white" shock horror!
Thank you for reassuring me that there are still sane, sensible people in this world!
(and extra brownie points for being American and sane and sensible!)
elementary - re books in French, apologies but I'll be no help - stick to the papers and watching the TV. PeterB may be a better bet...
ReplyDeleteMontanaWildhack:
ReplyDelete"As for picking a target and hounding people -- no. It's never happened. Yes, bitchy comments are made here about certain Cif BTLers. But there has never been a collective effort to "hound" anyone, no matter what you or anyone else might think. "
Then I suggest you have a look at the very amusing thread for 16 August. Even on a second reading I am amazed how well constructed, despite one of two rather glaring errors, was the original parody of me at 16:47, which kept you all busy for much of the rest of the day.
@ PeterB
ReplyDeleteIsn't repugnant moral relativism one of the core failings of New Labour, certainly domestically (and to an extent with foreign policy, with a pick'n'mix approach as to which tyrannies to oppose, and which to cosy up to), along with the divisive pursuit of identity politics, which has helped entrench artificial divides within society, and created quangocracy chiefs whose status relies upon stressing the differences between folk, not the commonalities:Kenan Malik's piece yesterday was very good: for a liberal, tolerant society, the rules of tolerance must be universal, without pandering to the prejudices of sectional faith lobbies etc. You want diversity within a whole society, not a lot of mini-societies/factions who never interrelate.
Philippa: I'm a little blushing because you obviously noticed that I was looking very strongly in your direction; however, I have to admit that there were, like, *other* reasons for this staring than just book recommendations.
ReplyDeleteSo, a more fitting response would have probably been a "Are you talking to me?" -Taxi Driver impression instead of offering apologies.
wow you people are fucked up, this feels like im watching a dog fight, its compelling but im begining to feel like i need a bath.
ReplyDeleteEmily, you write very clearly. : )
ReplyDeleteDot no if can live on zero point energy and dump all the shit in a pocket universe. Or maybe fill yourself with dark energy and dark flow.
Get worse? You guys have got a lot of digging to do before you get to the end/start? Careful you do not dig too deep and rouse a Balrog.
I just did a bit of shopping, there are so many beautiful flowers coming out with the sun, and they turn their heads towards it as it passes. One caught my eye and having caught it let it go. Lucky since it was an english rose full of flowers and of thorns. But I would not fain to pluck such a bloom even if it pricked my flesh and drew by blood.
Oh and Dot my kids are Yanks and so is my wife.
ReplyDeleteAlways look on the bright side of death...
ReplyDeleteThanks for the valuable input, fariha. Was it worth registering on blogger.com today, and then racking your brains to think of a name, just to keep us informed of your desired level of cleanliness? I hope so, because your contribution is a bit lacking in the 'that's very interesting' department. Still, do drop by again when you've finished constructing another short sentence.
ReplyDeleteMontana:
ReplyDelete"We have given them ample reason to hate us and we only fan the flames when we pretend that we have never been anything but exemplars of freedom and democracy."
The West is an exemplar of democracy and freedom, of course. But I agree that there are other facets besides, which are much less to its credit (it's retarded support for noxious if notionally supportive regimes, for example).
Still, your reading is mistaken if, as I understand it, you suggest the West's actions explain and justify the blowback from its enemies. For that analyses underplays the inherent ideological differences that prevail.
Of course the Iraq War, Palestine and the perceived big business complexion of western foreign policy in general have exacerbated the tensions, but we delude ourselves if we think these and other issues are the root cause of the stand off.
They are not.
The differences are about incommensurable values. And therein lies their intractability.
Peter:
ReplyDeleteExplain -- to some extent. Justify -- absolutely not. But I disagree that ideology is as much to blame as you seem to think. I firmly believe that, had we treated these people better generations ago, there would be much less hostility now. The differences are not so great as you seem to think.
anytime sherpig
ReplyDeleteluckly for me thinking up my own name do not take me that long
ReplyDeletePeter
ReplyDeleteThe West is an exemplar of democracy and freedom, of course. But I agree that there are other facets besides, which are much less to its credit (it's retarded support for noxious if notionally supportive regimes, for example).
I think it's a bit more than "other facets besides". Its those facets, or serious outright hypocrisies, tolerated and even actively promoted that piss people off, especially when we're swaggering around the moral high ground as we often do.
fariha - are you going to be our new in house troll? What excitment!
Oooh a new troll, what fun! You'll have to clean it out a bit under the bridge, the last one was a bit smelly, and I'm afraid I vivisected the billy goats gruff...........
ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeletefariha, too much info maybe. And it's pig with an 'f'. Take care.
ReplyDeleteDot - *chuckling*
ReplyDeleteI should come clean Alisdair and admit to working for New Labour (in the recent past) so my perspective is necessarily supportive of its efforts.
ReplyDeleteIndeed my bias means I'm at a loss as to why so few recognise its achievements. Putting aside the Iraq War for a moment, Labour's semi-profligate (!) spending on public services is a simple matter of record.
The mantra about investment in schools and hospitals and welfare provision is by no means empty: labour delivered the dosh.
But ministers don't teach or treat or care for. That's down to public servants. If people have a beef about provision, look to the service providers.
Sure, there is waste and qunagos and red tape. But even those aspects reflect on us, not on government: our precious, selfish sense of rights over responsibility, especially.
And in respect of foreign policy, Blair's leadership in the Balkans and Sierra Leone has been inexcusably airbrushed. I would have welcomed regime change in Zimbabwe, FWI, but still acknowledge that inaction here does not diminish the good achieved elsewhere.
Oh Dot, even Baby Billy Goat Gruff? How could you, you cruel vivisector you? Still, it doesn't bode well for our new troll, evisceration is a messy business.
ReplyDeletefarifa is TheLastMohican and trying to research a Phd in "internet fora and emotive affect."
ReplyDeleteespecially when we're swaggering around the moral high ground as we often do.
ReplyDeleteThe moral high ground is often neither. On blogs as well as international politics.
Peter - they threw the dosh around, all right, but most of it went into dodgy PFI schemes and bureaucracy and fecking management consultants.
ReplyDeleteGet real Peter! The debacle of UK education is down to three decades of Thatcherite policy, as is the slow death of the NHS, our piteous public transport, the credit crunch, NEETs and Bitey. What did you do for New Lab BTW? Or would you have to kill me?
ReplyDeleteMontana
ReplyDeleteI should have said 'what passes for' the moral high ground. Personally i don't think it exists.
'fraid so Sheff, me and my evil scientist ways.....
ReplyDeleteSeriously, I'm sorry pen but I'm finding it hard to work out whether you're writing conversation thinly disguised as insults or insults thinly disguised as conversation, and it's putting me off.
From WADDYA
ReplyDeleteTheLastMohican (Who he? Anyone know?)
18 Mar 2010, 3:53PM
So anyway as I was saying on the other thread before it was mysteriously closed.
What is it with people who get offended online?
What is their f--king problem?
I just wandered outside the cave (Plato warned me not to go, but hey...)
and there are these people acting offended over some shadows on the wall.
And uh...am I insane or are you?
Cuz one of us is nuts enough to feel bullied through an anonymous, electronic medium.
Damntheral
18 Mar 2010, 4:02PM
@TheLastMohican
What the hell point are you trying to make? Yes it's a screen and a computer but the insults come from another human being somewhere, hence some people find it upsetting, like being shouted at on the phone. You don't? Good for you, pat yourself on the back and have a cookie. Where are you going with this?
kizbot
18 Mar 2010, 4:08PM
I'd suggest we all ganged up on him and be really really nasty and see if he actually would be as not bothered as he thinks ... the great big toughie!
But I'm not going back in pre-mod... no siree, not for noboddy....
TheLastMohican
18 Mar 2010, 4:19PM
Damntheral
"Where are you going with this?"
I will have that cookie, thanks.
I have this theory about people who say that they're offended.
In a nutshell, I think they're lying.
See, when I ask people to describe the experience of "being offended" nobody can do it. The same goes for feeling threatened online.
I feel offended. I feel threatened.
These statements have real power. This power is used as a tool to stifle the debate.
These statements also confer power to the offended party. But in no way do they have to substantiate the claim that they're offended. They simply have to make the claim.
It's too easy.
These people who say that they're offended need to be challenged. But that never happens because we're all so civilised.
We're so civilised that people who lie can easily game the moderator by repeating the magic words, "I'm offended."
kizbot
18 Mar 2010, 4:25PM
This comment has been removed by a moderator. Replies may also be deleted.
TheLastMohican
18 Mar 2010, 4:33PM
kizbot
"You don't like it. Tough. Tittle off and post elsewhere. Your rather tedious opinions will not be missed. There will be no revolt over you leaving. Nobody cares about your silly theories"
I assume you are unanimous in this opinion?
Anyway. I'll stick around until one of several things happens.
And if you don't like it, why don't you tell the moderator that you find the content offensive?
I'm sure it's worked for you in the past.
kizbot
18 Mar 2010, 4:42PM
I'm sure it's worked for you in the past.
Are you? How so Genius?
For your information, bright spark, 99% of my use of the report button is to ask the mods to delete a double post of my own. The other 1%, if that, is if it's a troll using really vile language... and I mean obscene not just a bit of swearing (which I'm not that arsed about anyways) and I tell them I've done it.
Oh, Sheff -- I wasn't criticising what you said at all. I agree completely.
ReplyDeleteAtomboy:
ReplyDeleteI don't know, but I've been enjoying his work.
Think I remember him from months ago but not seen for ages.
ReplyDeleteMontana
ReplyDeleteI thought it was interesting that someone making calm, rational, considered and purely hypothetical posts ended up being attacked personally, perhaps because the attacker assumed that the poster had a back-story.
I don't know who he or she is, but it shows that being able to think is not a requirement for becoming an unpaid shill - and neither does it immunise you from deletion.
kizbot
18 Mar 2010, 4:02PM
I don't know mohican.. Someone goes on a site and every time they do people tell them to go away (using nasty words), they are jeered at, sneered at, told that no one respects or wants to listen to their opinions. Why would a person take part in a forum of that nature? Why should it be incumbent on the person being attacked to rise above it? How would this foster a site as an interesting place for debate that encouraged people of all walks of life, ages and opinions to contribute to it? How would allowing that sort of behaviour make using a site a pleasant experience?
Why do you think the Graun should let us play here at all?
TheLastMohican
18 Mar 2010, 4:33PM
kizbot
"You don't like it. Tough. Tittle off and post elsewhere. Your rather tedious opinions will not be missed. There will be no revolt over you leaving. Nobody cares about your silly theories"
Sorry Montana - I misread you. I'm a few glasses up on a very nice Montenegran Merlot so perhaps I should bale out for the evening before i make a total arse of myself.
ReplyDeleteGood point, thauma. It would be interesting to see a detailed breakdown of the budgets for eg education and health for the last 10 years. Where exactly did the money go?
ReplyDeleteOrdinary punter: Moan, moan. Under Thatcher we never had any bleedin' apples to eat.
Enter New Labour
NL: Here you are my good man, here's a pound of apples.
Punter: Cor, fanks guv!
NL: That'll be £875 please.
Punter: I can't afford that!
NL: Don't worry, we'll either borrow it or just take it out of your taxes.
Punter: Cor, fanks guv!
Exeunt all, smiling.
Offence is too easily taken.
ReplyDeleteIdeas should be subject to derision - there isn't enough derision about, in my book.
It's a basic distinction the moderators on CiF miss: calling a post a crock of crap is different from calling the poster a bellend.
I can live with either charge - and often do - but I'd understand it if CiF took exception to the latter, so long as it let the former stand.
For the life of me I can't understand why the difference is not written in tablets.
I'd kinda guessed as much Peter. The trouble with new lab's public sector spending is the model chosen: always going for the marketised route, and of course the ludicrously wasteful PFI mechanism: headline figures of 'investment' hide the fact that much of that is servicing unnecessary financial obligations, and the plain vanity projects.I could write thousands of words on the failures of New lab with health and social care, because of their rigidity and adherence to a shallow consumerist model, and the market-obsession.Resources are always finite (and shrinking now) but too many grandiose promises were made, together with a mistaken emphasis upon trying to meet people's desires (ramped up by those promises), as opposed to their needs.
ReplyDeleteIt is wholly wrong for ministers to stoke up expectations, upon which they cannot deliver, to misdirect funds (PFI again) to then burden those tasked with the actual delivery with technocratic,top-down micro-management, and to also try and foster marketisation, 'growing' the market by offering preferential terms and the chance to cherry-pick to privateers (ISTCs etc). Factor in initiative-itis, which brings in gross instability, and endless, wasteful reshuffling/reorganisation and the detachment of both ministers and key advisers from the realities of care provision (the horror stories I can relate of trying to get across to a costly McKinsey fresh-face, that no, you can't cut in-patient beds for the acutely psychotic without accommodation and support in the community being in place first, and any notional savings would be erased by the ensuing crisis and subsequent readmissions...).
Sheff, I forbid you to leave! The vino will just make it more interesting.
ReplyDelete"calling a post a crock of crap is different from calling the poster a bellend"
ReplyDeleteAnd I think we just found our new motto...
he..he..he scherf...on we grovel.
ReplyDeleteAlthough it could be worse. I was talking to one of the people who run this little place where I'm staying. According to her, Bosnia Herzegovina is the most cprrupt administration in the Balkans, second only to Russia in its awfulness. Still the politics is very complicated, with a lot of disparate views to accommodate. They do have a very nice new building though, to argue in.
Yeah, but Phil, in all honesty -- we do tend to do both around here (well, some of us do -- and yes, I'm one of the some).
ReplyDeleteJust looked at TheLastMohican's profile. Only 3 pages of comments -- the first in March of last year. Only the one, then nothing until November, when there was a flurry for a few days, then nothing again until yesterday. Every post has been a gem, if you ask me.
Hi All, Just catching up. Seems some dust settling - but watch out for falling masonry.
ReplyDeletePeter
Agree in differences between questioning ideas and insulting poster. Where does wisdom fit in here?
Call it common sense or nous - whatever. Remarkable lack of this in many Nulab policies - many seem rejectionist for the sake of it. Led to huge gaps in understanding in society - created many casualties.
montana - i know, thought that as soon as i posted!
ReplyDeleteweirdly it turns out that i have a namesake and henry porter is talking about him. very odd.
Well put, Alisdair, btw!
ReplyDeleteLeni - for christ's sake, don't mention masonry, or we'll have Giyus all over us!
ReplyDeletePB - what, a bloke named Philippa?
noooooo, Phil Booth. 'tis my non-gender-specific handle (and easier to spell).
ReplyDeleteoffski is being baaaaad but very funny on Waddya! Look quickly before it gets zapped.
ReplyDeletePhil - I knew dat. ;-)
ReplyDeleteand again with the not noticing irony...
ReplyDeletei do sometimes wonder if that punctuation mark thingy wouldn't actually help me out some. ah tja.
Philippa - don't worry, I've spectacularly missed some irony plenty of times!
ReplyDeleteoffski has been naughty on waddya but as you say thauma, it is very funny. A quid on it lasting the next 20 minutes?
ReplyDeleteTough call, Sheff. Most of the mods have probably gone home by now and Waddya is only lightly moderated anyway, but....
ReplyDeletePeter - you say: ''Racism, sexism - discriminations in general - have retreated, and indeed if you were to criticise New Labour it would be for its tolerance of sectional interest:''
ReplyDeleteYes they have and that is the point I was making. New Labour have seen - under their watch - one set of semi-acceptable prejudices replaced by another wholely acceptable prejudice and that is the demonisation of the poor. And New Labour are responsible because they have themselves at times talked of those on benefits as if they are nothing more than the 'feckless scum' so beloved of the Mail and its readers. Some of the language used by Purnell (before he had his conversion) was hateful.
New Labour have betrayed and abandoned those they were meant to champion, including the most vulnerable in our society.
You yourself say you are a free marketeer - you then say you worked for New Labour - and then wonder why people do not see New Labour as a party of the left. It is categorically not a left wing party anymore. None of the main three are - they are all neoliberal parties. That is our sad choice.
Alisdair says; ''trying to get across to a costly McKinsey fresh-face, that no, you can't cut in-patient beds for the acutely psychotic without accommodation and support in the community being in place first''
It is exactly this sort of mad thinking that infects New Labour. Look at the cost of benefits - it has rocketed under Labour but not because (until this crisis) millions more were using the system but because of Labours managerialism extending here too.The money that has been provided to dodgy private companies such as Atos, A4E etc is shocking. All to move people about off one benefit to another or to bully them and make their lives hell whilst they fight and fight for a few scraps to live on.
One example. If a person is ill and goes onto Incap Benefit they have to attend the Pathways to Work programme. They are put on this programme as soon as they are signed onto incap. This is stupid. The people who are sick enough for even the DWP doctors to sign them off are then made to attend six interviews about getting back to work. At great cost to the taxpayer and no benefit to the individual. In fact the DWP has had to admit that it is not working.
Of course it does not work because as Alisdair says in his post the thinking is back to front. Give people too ill to work pressure to get jobs rather than helping them get well and then providing the help into work.
So now we have an economic crisis meaning more and more unemployment and New Labour still throwing billions at useless entities like A4E to try and get people into jobs that do not exist. Never mind the absolute scandal that is the new ESA benefit. Throwing legitimately ill people off their benefits - many of whom are then not entitled to JSA or other payments and are left with no support whatsoever. You could not make it up.
They are managerialist, neoliberal nightmares. I have a friend who is a management consultant.She is very worried about the election. Why? Because - in her own words ''as long as New Labour are in power I can cream it in from the public sector.'' THAT is where all the money New Labour have put into the system has gone. Management consultants, PFI etc etc. A criminal waste.
Evening all
ReplyDeleteBrain = mash potato again.
Need beer.
Reading though. :o)
wow atomboy... just wow!
ReplyDeleteNot skipping my posts then after all, eh?
Don't worry funny comment. I'll save you from those pesky mods.
ReplyDeleteoffski
18 Mar 2010, 6:19PM
I'd like to talk about a new report by the mental health outreach service which shows that providing the severely bewildered, or those with disoriented personality syndrome with a laptop and internet access, has proved significantly more effective than either counselling or any drug therapy. The lead researcher, Dr Sheila Rafferty told one particularly heart-warming tale of a patient in Oldham, she would refer to only as 'the Cat Lady' due to the large number of feline companions who shared her malodorous bedsit.
Sectioned frequently over the years after numerous incidents involving shopping trolleys and peanut butter, there was little prospect that she would ever manage to survive independently outside an institution. When doctors and psychologists had more or less given up on her, she was, quite by chance, chosen as a participant in Rafferty's new study. Patients were encouraged to conjure a new confident personality for themselves and a fulfilling productive new life then record a daily journal of their thoughts, feelings, hopes and opinions. Most subjects were found to experience a significant increase in feelings of self-satisfaction and self-esteem. Some even imagined themselves as intelligent, witty, cultured and attractive.
The cat lady proved by far the most imaginative and prone to self-aggrandisement. She 'rewrote' herself as an opera loving, polymath working in Brussels with a circle of 'well bred and attractive' friends. She even gave little reviews of operatic performances and guides to her favourite shops; claiming she was something of a fashion guru, although nobody could remember the last time they'd seen her without her lime green shellsuit 'ensemble' and Puma trainers. Her progress was astounding and within six months the Tourettes, the physical assaults on Jack Russells and the bollard hopping had been brought down to controllable levels.
What made 'Cat Lady' unique however, was her distinguished foray into cyberspace. She managed to convince the readers of a leading liberal newspaper comment site, home to many distinguished, highly intelligent and professionally accomplished posters that this persona, which was only ever intended as a therapeutic aid, was in fact a real person. For years she managed to carry it off, and might still be doing so undetected to this day except for a prescription mix-up in which her TMBI* was substituted for a QPSSS** capsule.
But for this tragic accident, she might well be living a blissful virtual existence to this day. Please invite Dr Rafferty or one of her fellow researchers to write an article outlining their remarkable study and its findings which offer a glimmer of hope to the totally bewildered and helpless all over the country.
*Totally Made-up Bullshit Inhibitor
**Quick Post Some Slanderous Shite
erm...mods? not really my place to tell you how to do your jobs, or even acknowledge the notion that your existence is in any way necessary or desirable but, shouldn't you have banned me by now?
I think BBC Radio have got the plugs in the wrong sockets - R4 news just started playing the Undertones in the middle of a news item. Don't recognise what's on at the minute.
ReplyDeleteNo, hang on, back to the Archers.
That was very strange.
Dammit, that happened during the rugby a couple of weeks ago - all of a sudden the picture switched to something completely different.
ReplyDeleteHi guys
ReplyDeleteThink Cif and the UT has got more interesting myself , you were both getting dull. Neat.
I was at Surrey Uni (D Canter HoD at first and then GM Breakwell (now VC of Bath UNi).
Selfish Story was not a love song hahaha
Anyone re-read my post of May !st don't dates mean anything to anyone anymore.
I weep for the futility of so much human loss.
My big bro is here (the iceman cometh) he used to be a cosmologist but builds very very small and cold fridges now that he sells to unis and such high tech types.
BB:
ReplyDeleteWell done for this
i suppose you know who will have a field day.
Erm, Kiz:
ReplyDeleteI'm sure you're not going to see it this way, but from where I sit -- any "obsession" that may exist is at least mutual. If you weren't obsessed with us and what we might be saying about you and your friend over here, you'd stop reading this site. And your friend is the one who's truly obsessed. Are you really so blind that you can't see that even people who don't post here and don't even want to post here are fed up with her incessant harping?
All the bitch has to do to get Monkeyfish to lay off is admit that she made a mistake in accusing him of being that troll on Waddaya. That's what started this whole thing, sweetie. Not months of poor widdle Bru being abused here -- that is a complete fiction and you know it. The whole thing kicked off when she accused Monkeyfish of posting some of the most vile, misogynist crap that has ever been put on Cif. He has every right to expect an apology for that.
What she accused him of is far worse than anything anyone has ever said about her before or since. I'm pretty sure you saw those posts. You know how vile they were. Do you honestly think that Monkeyfish would have ever said something like that?
Pollyanna has just outed offski on waddya - in high dudgeon too.
ReplyDeleteTa medve - I am suitably prepared :o)
ReplyDeleteYeah I saw that post of Pollyanna's. Considering Offski posted himself that he thought he should be banned, it is kinda daft for her to take up cudgels - and look through old threads here to "out" him with.
Ah well. It's all good fun til somebody loses an eye, as I am sure Griffin will attest to...
Yeah, but he'd actually outed himself somewhat, already. He did say this at the end of his post:
ReplyDeleteerm...mods? not really my place to tell you how to do your jobs, or even acknowledge the notion that your existence is in any way necessary or desirable but, shouldn't you have banned me by now?
Snap, BB!
ReplyDeleteOffski really is doing his utmost to be banned, but the mods don't seem to be about! ;-)
ReplyDeleteHave just choked on some food, reading one of his posts.
Hi guys
ReplyDeleteSad news I'm afraid. About five minutes ago my brother assaulted me, first he pushed me out of a doorway and then shortly afterwards he slapped me hard in the face all for nothing. At no poit did I offer him any violence or any hostility really at all.
Both my mother (his mother too) and his wife witnessed this assault.
I will not report it to the police. He is my brother and they are authority.
But I doubt I will sleep so easily tonight.
Can't post ion the Cif/G (premopd) so want a record in reality. You giuys are my lifeline I can not be obliterated from the record books as so many were are .
Love
Jon (It's cool guys, I'm mostly sure he won't go crazy on me and murder me in my bed. But hey I was sectioned last year wasn't I?
Hi guys
ReplyDeleteI thought I posted something did I testijng
Cool it was over leaf.
ReplyDeleteHad me worried for a moment. Jeeze the scenarios I have to go thru both in simulation and in good old real life. All for you lot (N +!) and just the merest scrapings for me.
Ha. Sigh
Pen - are you ok?
ReplyDeleteWhat did your family suggest you do?
Ok Pen ?
ReplyDeleteAre you hurt? - Physically I mean