UK General Discussion:The Rt. Hon Alex Boris de Pfeffel Johnson, Populist Hero

[afleitch]

I do hope this allows for some sort of shift in the conversation and narrative. There is something genuinely disturbing about the political and journalistic class on 'this issue' and it's resulting monomania which has deep and lasting consequences for all of us.

[afleitch]

Govt have u-turned on their promise to outlaw gay conversion therapy.

Will cause a big storm and rightfully so. It’s vile.

Terfs have opposed the bill recently- I can’t even remember why. Some are celebrating which goes against their claims to support the LBT part…

Terfism is it's core homophobic, at least towards men,because it's unfiltered misandry. Britain is in thrall to a sex cult of previous obsessed biological essentialists.

[afleitch]

My rights as a gay man, in 2022, are most at risk from a group of 'feminists' who are obsessed with penises and chromosomes.

I'm checking the background of every person I vote for at an election to make sure they are not a f-cking loon.

[afleitch]

U-turn now reported.

This is the ‘new’ Downing Street operation of course.

Yes.

A u-turn on the U-turn, but only banning it with regard to sexual orientation. Cowards. Which means the LGB Alliance, claiming it wasn't necessary will now have to hold to that line.

[afleitch]

https://mobile.twitter.com/KayBurley/status/1508714461653307407

The other one is that there are no more 'goths' anymore because they are all 'transed'

These are actual discussions

It's Britain's Q-Anon but actually worse.

Britain. 2022.

Well, to be more accurate its "The British Media, 2022".

Of course a lot of focus will be on Jamie Wallis this morning, and rightly so. But yesterday was notable for one of the high priestesses of TERFism, Kathleen Stock, openly declaring that bisexual as well as trans people were now officially "haram". Of course after the T/Q/B will come the G, and then all of the L's who do not fully subscribe to GC ideology. Thus leaving just the core of misandrist second wave "political" lesbians who have been driving this all along.

I was listening to LBC last night and someone called in to complain that most trans men were actually lesbians and that it was because being a lesbian ‘isn’t cool among young people.’  I’m very worried by how much of an information loop people are getting stuck in.

[afleitch]

Also we now live in the age where calling out privilege is 'bullying' and a privileged wife is 'misogyny' while adding the important questions as to whether women can have a penis.

[afleitch]

So. Crispin Blunt. Discuss.

It's the sort of story that had it involved allegations from people over the age of consent you might think 'hmm, maybe there's something we're not being told.'

But it seems pretty clear cut, we know their age and nothing that happened could be considered outside of that fact.

[afleitch]

If this isn’t resignation material, what is? But we all know this government doesn’t adhere to any sort of conventional standards, and regards the ministerial code as a minor background annoyance.

Nothing is resignation material.

That's part of the problem in western democracies this past decade. Politicians know the press and public attention cycle moves very quickly. It'll add to Boris' and Rishi's problems but won't end their careers, at least until a general election.

[afleitch]

https://mobile.twitter.com/Scaramucci/status/1519799699607281664

Everything about this...

[afleitch]

Apparently 'god's copper' James Anderton passed away a few days ago. As much as I hope a man of his nature wouldn't be left in charge of the trollies at ASDA, I don't hold out much hope. Besides; they'd just be quiet about it.

[afleitch]

London Bridge will be handing over the state opening of Parliament to Charles, citing ongoing mobility issues.

The Queen unable to do her constitutional duties for the next potentially few years because she won't abdicate in favour of her septuagenarian son will do more damage than I think they realise.

[afleitch]

Why not. Let's test!

At least Boris isn't Corbyn -True
At least May isn't Corbyn - Debatable then but True in retrospect
At least Cameron isn't Miliband - True
At least Cameron isn't Brown - True
At least Bliar isn't Howard - True
At least Blair isn't Hague - True
At least Blair isn't Major - True
At least Major isn't Kinnock - True. And he wasn't Thatcher either.
At least Thatcher isn't Kinnock - True
At least Thatcher isn't Callaghan - False
At least Wilson isn't Heath...again -True
At least Heath isn't Wilson - True
At least Wilson isn't Heath - True

Etc

So the At Least Rule holds up well 😅

[afleitch]

Daily Mail showing this morning that it can be unhinged about stuff other than Beergate.

Since Dacre's mob Took Back Control (and don't you just know this is how they describe it?) the paper has been... unhinged. Dacre was always nasty, but he had a certain touch, an ability to tap into other people's neuroses and veiled bigotries, but this seems to have gone.

Newspaper circulation has also absolutely tanked, to the point at which most don't even report their figures. The Daily Mail is at half it's 2015 figures. And attempts to 'put it on the telly' with GBNews and TalkTV isn't pulling people in either.

Papers bucking the trend; Metro and the 'i' curiously take a very different editorial path. But yet the business hasn't learned from that.

[afleitch]

The Tories going full culture war aided by the press during a Brexit Covid cost of living crisis isn't unexpected. But surely, someone must realise there's diminishing returns in that tactic. Because it's clear the public really care about cost of living pressures.

And what happened in Australia should be a big f-kn red flag.

[afleitch]

Terf Island update

https://mobile.twitter.com/stellacreasy/status/1530605357613174789

In which Stella Creasy gets ministered

And the Daily Mail channels the eighties again

https://mobile.twitter.com/HLeeHurley/status/1530829380209020928

[afleitch]

What's significant is that it was not a crowd out for blood.

The War Criminal, Crash and Call Me Dave all didn't get booed. They even got a few woops.

[afleitch]

Of course, if Boris losing/winning but not winning leads to a new PM who want's their own mandate and forces a GE...again, will the public finally stop getting the piss taken out of them?

Starker should just commit to no GE for five years.

[afleitch]

Honestly, assuming things go badly for his successor, I wouldn't be surprised at all if he resurfaces after the next GE for a comeback special.

Some variation on 'doing a Kevin Rudd' is not impossible, no...

Strangely I've had some thoughts, given the state of the available alternatives, that could end up applying to Theresa May.

[afleitch]

Great result. I hope he hangs on and the next few years are a car crash.

[afleitch]

Conferences moving from seaside town ball rooms to city conference centres was the first sign of political rot.

[afleitch]

The Rwanda debacle has been disastrous for the government on an aesthetic level.

1. It sounded bizarre and protracted.
2. It's Rwanda, with it's relatively undeserved connotations (and I'm not a Kagame fan) in the public eye.
3. It's deemed expensive; the moment you start talking about chartered planes, it suggests expense and 'waste'.

It also suggests more that we can't look after those claiming asylum rather than we just don't want to. And that's hard to sell even to some of the more reactionary anti-immigration drum beaters.

That's how you 'win' this one. Yes Rwanda is problematic for other reasons, yes there's issues with human rights and what is effectively government trafficking. But playing up the absurd and the dystopic is better than being technical about it why it's a disgraceful policy.

[afleitch]

If the SNP does go ahead with it's "advisory referendum", then would the unionist response be to boycott it ?

Yes, of course.

I'm sure it will go every bit as well as the Catalan one did.

The Spanish government response was to beat up people putting pieces of paper in boxes. I imagine the police in Scotland are more civilized.

Can imagine a scenario where Johnson makes the most of it though by stripping Scotland of devolution.

I'd love to see him try. Absolutely love it.

[afleitch]

Criticism of Starmer over the strikes may have been a tad overdone, given that polling now appears to show he is close to median public opinion on the issue.

Yeah, the working age public seem pretty supportive.

[afleitch]

Also polio has been detected in London sewerage. So there's one for the bingo card.

[afleitch]

To be fair up into relatively recently (and it's still the case in some seats) there was no difference or electoral penalty for having a 'working class' Scot, Yorkshireman etc represent a working class seat anywhere else in the country.

And while the UK had (and still has) less internal migration than say the US, it was probably more common during days of heavy industrialisation (I have family in County Durham for that reason). So an MP doing the same wasn't that unusual.