One claim by campaigners is that this will ‘help the poor’, who are disproportionately more likely to suffer from alcohol-induced ill-health. How making poor people poorer will improve health is a real head-scratcher. This is typical of the missionary attitude of public-health zealots – imposing policies that poor people don’t want ‘for their own good’. Neither will minimum pricing do anything to solve the problem of weekend revellers ending up in A&E – bars already charge way above the minimum price. Instead, this new policy will target those trying to relax with a cheap drink at home.
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What are Cambridgeshire police for? “Police find stolen caravan hunt too risky”, reports the Times:
The same story was reported in the Mirror:
A masterful use of the passive voice there. “Has since been recovered and returned to its owners.” A reader who did not know the whole story might even think Cambridgeshire Constabulary had something to do with it. I won’t add an extract from the Daily Mail story (“Caravan owner is forced to track down her stolen £9,000 vehicle to a travellers’ site with a MICROLIGHT after police refuse to send officers fearing for their safety”), as it is almost identical to that of the Mirror and very similar to that of the Times. (Despite the demonization of the Mail as “fake news”, this similarity is not uncommon.) Both the tabloid newspapers quote a comment on social media from Larry Locke, who said, “I would like to know what we are paying the police for […] if that had been in my house they would soon be in, even if I said you could not come in. Is there a law for one and not for another?” That bewildered question has been heard in this context for a while now. Back in 2011 in a post called “Guardian readers hate gypsies and travellers”, I wrote, “If you want to poison a human soul with racial hatred, just do that. Tell him that the laws that burden him do not apply to them.” November 10th, 2017 | 40 comments - (Comments are closed)
 Fox News breached impartiality rules, says state censor Ofcom.
Leaving aside the question of whether the state has a role in telling broadcasters what news they can broadcast (it does not), let me take a quick look at the front page of the BBC News website right now.
Here is my translation of the pertinent headlines (stories that are probably neutral I have marked in italics, and non-political stories I have omitted):
No sign of anything other than a completely neutral world-view there. None at all. November 6th, 2017 | 19 comments - (Comments are closed)
There is an argument, I think, for having people who want “a strong leader” shot immediately on the basis that it will save the dictator time later. – David Aaronovitch, discussing these findings by the Pew Organisation in The Times (£). Unlike Pew, neither Mr Aaronovitch nor I find it very comforting that only – only! – 26% of the UK population thinks “a system in which a strong leader can govern the country without interference from parliament or the courts would be a good way of governing this country”. October 19th, 2017 | 33 comments - (Comments are closed)
“Ban smoking at home, say Scots campaigners”, reports the Sunday Times. This headline is followed by the breezy standfirst,
That’s “kids” like wot the Times is down wiv.
Odd how campaigners against passive smoking so often seem fond of the passive voice. Dangerous things, these restrictions imposed by nobody in particular, you can breathe them in without realising it and then you get cancer.
Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence. Failing that, as the Times does, any evidence at all for the claim that “dozens of children a week” are taken to hospital through inhaling second hand smoke would be nice.
So a ban on Group X getting the limited supply of rent-controlled social housing proves immensely popular with social housing tenants not in Group X, not to mention potential social housing tenants for whom the chances of getting it have just increased. Colour, or as they say in the US, “color”, me surprised.
“The Ministry of Peace concerns itself with war, the Ministry of Truth with lies, the Ministry of Love with torture and the Ministry of Plenty with starvation.” One day soon we will have a Ministry of Choice so Sheila Duffy can concern herself with giving everyone the choice to live in a world free from choice.
October 15th, 2017 | 30 comments - (Comments are closed)
The social justice warrior’s gain is the civil libertarian’s loss. The ACLU still engages in the fight for civil liberty, especially in opposition to the post-9/11 security state and as part of the anti-Trump ‘resistance’. But the 21st-century ACLU has chosen its battles with a progressive sensibility that devalues free speech and due process for all. Most notably, it has shied away from confronting campus-censorship crusades and the threat of an ideology that equates allegedly hateful speech with discriminatory action, subordinating the right to speak to the imagined rights of particular listeners to suppress what offends them. October 12th, 2017 | 49 comments - (Comments are closed)
The Guardian‘s Owen Jones asked the following question on Twitter:
October 4th, 2017 | 14 comments - (Comments are closed)
The #SaveYourUber petition has, as of 10:45 pm in London, attracted 600,000+ names, and one of them is mine. Of course the best way to save Uber is to get rid of Sadiq Khan and make the issue politically radioactive. September 23rd, 2017 | 52 comments - (Comments are closed)
Commenting on the case, Sue Hemming, head of the CPS’s special crime and counterterrorism division, said: ‘People should not assume they can hide on social media when stirring up hatred and violence.’ Evidently, they cannot. But to what end? What is the benefit to society of banning the expression of bad and hateful ideas? Surely we want these ideas out in the open so that we can combat them with better ideas and better arguments. Censorship won’t change anyone’s mind. September 17th, 2017 | 42 comments - (Comments are closed)
University is not a training centre to teach young people ‘correct’ ideas – that would be an indoctrination camp, not a university. Richardson understands that academics have a duty to challenge conventional wisdom. You might say that academics have a duty to offend, and to make their students intellectually uncomfortable. It’s only through challenging what we believe that ideas change and knowledge progresses. September 16th, 2017 | 12 comments - (Comments are closed)
Observed in a certain invitation-only chat room a few weeks ago: Person 1: “So who’s going to Pride march tomorrow?” Person 2: “Yeah probably. Good place to pick up chicks LOL” Samizdatista: “Nah.” Person 1: “I though you were some kinda libertarian or something.” Samizdatista: “Or something.” Person 1: “LOL. You don’t like gays?” Samizdatista: “I could not care less who people fuck. None of my business.” Person 1: “Then why not support people’s rights?” Samizdatista: “Being homosexual not illegal in western world, so what rights you talking about?” Person 1: “Right not to be discriminated against by people.” Samizdatista: “I am great supporter right to free association, that’s something worth marching for as various laws deny that right.” Person 1: “So you’re ok with discrimination?” Samizdatista: “By state? Hell no. By private people and companies that don’t take state money? That is what free association means.” Person 1: “How can anyone support discrimination?” Samizdatista: “I fully support your right to /block me, what with me being all in for free association. Please.” Person 1: “Why not go just to show your support?” Samizdatista: “I do not condemn homosexuals for doing what they legally do, because I could not care less who people fuck. I also do not express support for homosexuals for doing what they legally do, because I could not care less who people fuck.” Person 1: “Everyone I know’s going.” Person 2: “Grammar crime detected! Report for re-education!” Person 1: “What?” Person 2: “Hardly anyone I know is going. Target rich environment for babes.” Person 1: “It says a lot about someone if they stay away.” Samizdatista: “In my case it says I could not care less about who other people fuck. With that in mind, if you decide to go fuck yourself, I am totally ok with that too.” Person 2: “This thread will not end well.” September 15th, 2017 | 25 comments - (Comments are closed)
The author describes his characters as a social justice warrior and a neo-Nazi. His point is that authoritarians end up wanting similar things whatever their excuses.
Both agree that
August 18th, 2017 | 19 comments - (Comments are closed)
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