We are developing the social individualist meta-context for the future. From the very serious to the extremely frivolous... lets see what is on the mind of the Samizdata people.
Samizdata, derived from Samizdat /n. - a system of clandestine publication of banned literature in the USSR [Russ.,= self-publishing house]
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Samizdata quote of the day I preferred BSA when they made motorbikes.
– James P is one of many Bishop Hill commenters who is unimpressed by the activities of the British Sociological Association, who are trying to insert sociology into the CAGW debate. To make people believe in CAGW, with further doomed attempts along these lines?
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Who Are We? The Samizdata people are a bunch of sinister and heavily armed globalist illuminati who seek to infect the entire world with the values of personal liberty and several property. Amongst our many crimes is a sense of humour and the intermittent use of British spelling.
We are also a varied group made up of social individualists, classical liberals, whigs, libertarians, extropians, futurists, ‘Porcupines’, Karl Popper fetishists, recovering neo-conservatives, crazed Ayn Rand worshipers, over-caffeinated Virginia Postrel devotees, witty Frédéric Bastiat wannabes, cypherpunks, minarchists, kritarchists and wild-eyed anarcho-capitalists from Britain, North America, Australia and Europe.
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BSA does not only stand for motorcycles (though I was always a Norton man).
I’m currently rebuilding an 1870s Martini Henry rifle that was made by Birmingham Small Arms and issued to the Gurkhas in Nepal. I’ve even found some early C20 production .577/450 cordite loaded ammo that I shall shoot from it, when I’m done.
Just saying…
The other rob beat me to the mention of the Birmingham Small Arms Company :-). I learned to shoot (at the age of 5) with my father’s .22 BSA Meteor – I still have it (and it still shoots well, although spring and seals must be around 60 years old), and it’s sufficiently small and light I could just about shoot it pistol-fashion if I was so inclined.
So what you guys are saying is that actually, when they switched to motorbikes was when the rot set in, and it was only a matter of time before they would end up doing full blown sociology.
Blog and learn.
Indeed 22 BSA Meteor is a great small gun.
Many motorcyclists have speculated that “BSA” really stands for “bastard stalled again.”
I have heard that it stood for ‘bits stuck anywhere’ or ‘bloody sore arse’.
‘Whatever happened to the British motorcycle industry’
Bert Hopwood’s semi autobiographical book on the rise and fall of BSA and the rest, is a really good read.
I still have the BSA Sportsman V .22 calibre that my dad bought from a friend when he was at University of Sheffield in hte early ’50’s. I was at the range with it as recently as last month.
Before he could buy it he had to submit to an interview with a detective at the Sheffield police station where he was questioned for six hours about why he was buying the gun, why he needed it, etc. Eventually he was able to convince the police that he wasn’t about to stage a coup and he was allowed to complete the purchase. Fast-forward t 1957 and he emmigrated to the US. He walked off the ship in lower Manhattan and apart from “nice gun, what kind is it?” nobody even questioned him about it. Somehow I don’t think it would go that way today.