Mike Posted October 16, 2008 Share Posted October 16, 2008 Are you having a laugh?! You can go and have a baby and still take pay, you can't be sacked if you are thick and $#@! at your job, you can get compensation for a job you never got, because your feelings are hurt. You really must be having a laugh if you think workers have no rights. As a single-man small business, I hope I never have to employ anybody. I worked in a call centre many moons ago and the conditions we were made to work in were terrible... the hours, the bullsh*t procedures, pressure to perform... and all for an absolute pittance. Some employers really do take the p*ss.. and this is mostly 'large' businesses. It's in most contracts these days that you have to agree not to join a union. I think if it wasn't for this, most call centres wouldn't run quite as smoothly and effectively as they currently do. It's no wonder most companies try to offshore call centre functions, they are very horrible places. The basis protocol is 'put up with it or leave'.... and I don't think that's a good grounding to offer someone employment. I'm sure employment law is a major pain for small businesses, but not all employers are nice people. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hermit Posted October 16, 2008 Share Posted October 16, 2008 I don't agree with the hating of the wilfully unemployed... it's money well spent in my opinion. Certainly any money spent trying to force them into work is a waste. After all, would you want one as a work colleague? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ian C Posted October 17, 2008 Share Posted October 17, 2008 I didn't realise you had a political bone in your body I have a sort of tipping point where I switch instantly from "couldn't care less" to "my word this annoys me intensly" and Labour have achieved that, so kudos to them. I'm deadly serious about the comparison to Hitler, I mean he disarmed the populace, invaded other countries, introduced ID cards, instigated trials without jury, gave a hate group to focus on, "die papieren bitte" for travel (pardon my butchered German), just need Labour to start book-burning sessions and I think that's a complete match. Where the hell do we go from here? The only option is to vote in the other assholes and hope they don't try and turn it into 1984 (someone should have told Blair and Brown that was fiction not an instruction manual). Can't even protest now, isn't blocking fuel refineries and act of terrorism? Demonstrations have to be approved by the police - how very Red China. It's very depressing Incidentally, I think detention without trial and being forced to clear your own dog's $#@! up is probably conflating two separate things. Yeah, it was a bit of a rant but the point was the council used anti-terrorism spying laws to monitor and record for people not cleaning up after their dogs, so they could fine them x hundred quid or whatever. Makes Hulk Mad Anyway, back to bitching about percieved injustices in the benefits system while ignoring the totalitarian state we are sliding into I wonder if Brown will put off an election "until the terror threat has passed"... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dragonball Posted October 17, 2008 Author Share Posted October 17, 2008 I'm deadly serious about the comparison to Hitler, I mean he disarmed the populace, invaded other countries, introduced ID cards, instigated trials without jury, gave a hate group to focus on, It's very depressing quote] Strange - a charismatic leader of a right wing fascist leader (despite the 'socialist' tag applied to the Nazi party) who expounded nationalism, fear and hatred of ethnic minorities and communism etc, and who used amazing oratory skills to gain popularity... ...perhaps we might have a government who is overly PC The alternatives are not really an option are they? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RedM Posted October 17, 2008 Share Posted October 17, 2008 *ALERT* Godwin's Law in effect *ALERT* Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hermit Posted October 17, 2008 Share Posted October 17, 2008 Ian - good rant! Actually, a bit too concise to be a great rant, and you missed out the planned surveillance database they want in order to track every phone call, every email, and every internet connection to and from every computer. All in the name of protecting us from terrorists. Well it certainly doesn't make me feel any safer, and the cost is huge in both money and liberty. As for using anti-terror laws to seize a foreign bank's assets, well that really does scare me. Truly a 'What. The. F%$£.' moment. Anyone who cheers that move is a fool. I predict the bail-out is going to be a disaster of monumental proportions. Throwing more money at the problem isn't going to solve it, in my opinion it's just going to delay (a little) and amplify (a lot) the pain. Find myself very much in agreement with this article: http://www.dailyreckoning.com.au/keynesian-4079/2008/10/16/ The one thing we don't want is for banks to return to operating how they were before the crunch, but what with the conditions attached to the bail-out plans ('start lending') and the low interest rates, that appears to be what Gordo is hoping for. Yeah, very Prudent. Ultimately, everyone has to accept that houses/shares/whatever aren't worth what they used to be, probably aren't even worth what they are today, and recovery will begin once everyone has agreed what more realistic prices are. So it's quite weird to find a labour government that has -as you rightly say - introduced draconian and liberty-eroding laws. It doesn't fit with traditional labour values and is yet another example of how much Labour have changed in the last ten-fifteen years. That said, if they hold true to form, there's no reason why conservatives would reverse these trends. I don't know if their making noises about it, but they have to try to draw distinctions with labour somehow. Just don't bank on it lasting. How true. There's a couple of paragraphs on the Tony Blair wikipedia page, describing him in opposition, which illustrate that point very well: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tony_Blair#In_opposition Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tannhauser Posted October 17, 2008 Share Posted October 17, 2008 How true. There's a couple of paragraphs on the Tony Blair wikipedia page, describing him in opposition, which illustrate that point very well: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tony_Blair#In_opposition My Summer reading was a two volume biography of Blair, so I've got a fair idea of how his policies and ideas evolved. I don't dispute Ian's comments about the effects of anti-terror legislation - yep, all pretty worrisome stuff. However, I think the motives behind it were utterly sincere. Firstly, Blair was always in favour of greater police powers and a tougher stance on crime. He really broke away from the old labour stance on crime and felt that the justice system seemed to respect the criminal more than the victim. One of the things that frustrated him most during office was how the right wing media just refused to recognise that. So he was always on the side of the state having more powers. Secondly, Blair was genuinely terrified, and well before 9/11, of the prospects of terrorism in the UK. In particular, he was almost obsessive about the idea of a 'dirty bomb' being planted in one of the major cities. And he was convinced that only increased police powers and surveillance could do anything about it. Put those things together and you've got a recipe for increased state control. However, I don't think that's in any shape or form comparable to a Nazi state, as Ian suggests. The fact that Ian can make statement critical of the government without fear of arrest refutes the comparison. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
chilli Posted October 17, 2008 Share Posted October 17, 2008 I'm deadly serious about the comparison to Hitler F*ck that's possibly the most absurd thing I've heard ever, period! I can hardly justify you with a response, but when I notice concentration camps and dictatorship on the political agenda, I'll give your argument the time of day - until then *cough* reality check *cough* Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ian C Posted October 17, 2008 Share Posted October 17, 2008 F*ck that's possibly the most absurd thing I've heard ever, period! I can hardly justify you with a response, but when I notice concentration camps and dictatorship on the political agenda, I'll give your argument the time of day - until then *cough* reality check *cough* Thanks for your everso well thought out reply Point one - I'm just looking past the end of my nose matey. Dictatorships don't start overnight, do they? They start with a small chip, chip, chipping away at civil liberties. Hitler didn't get voted into power by having concentration camps on the manifesto did he? And if Labour had said "vote for us - we'll make big databases of you all, take DNA samples, ramp up surveillance, spy, probe, and snoop on you and make it legal for us to detain anyone without trail or even evidence" at the election they would have crashed and burnt bigtime wouldn't they. Point two - When you notice concentration camps and dictatorships on the political agenda it'll be far too late, won't it Cliff is also correct, I can say this and no black helicopters will come after me, but if I said it at a party conference there is precedence to class me as a terrorist and remove me. Thin end of the wedge, anyone...? Chip, chip, chip. Point 3 - I said that this government is the biggest threat to national civil liberties etc since WW2, I didn't directly equate what it has done with what the Nazi party had done, just that they are the closest so far yet. Blimey, come on, when the hell do I ever go stupid emotional without thinking something through carefully for chrissake? It's not often, possibly never on here (bonus points to anyone finding an example) Of course the political situation here is not even within an order of magnitude of Nazi Germany yet and thank the gods for that! But it's definitely at the start of that same dark road, and if you don't think it is then you probably subscribe to the "nothing to hide nothing to fear" fallacy. I mean where the hell else will this path take us? Freedom, liberty and safety? I don't think so. -Ian PS Godwins law doesn't apply because I'm not accusing posters or mods of being "Nazi's", I'm using the actual entity as a valid comparison in a relevant debate. So nerrrrr Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tannhauser Posted October 17, 2008 Share Posted October 17, 2008 Of course the political situation here is not even within an order of magnitude of Nazi Germany yet and thank the gods for that! But it's definitely at the start of that same dark road, and if you don't think it is then you probably subscribe to the "nothing to hide nothing to fear" fallacy. I mean where the hell else will this path take us? Freedom, liberty and safety? I don't think so. This is very thought-provoking. I think it's undeniable that the chipping away of some civil liberties has occurred and also that the state is moving towards the potential for massively increased control through surveillance, identity-related technology etc. However, I believe that there is a balance to this, which is the increasing reach of human rights legislation. This is usually seen on this BBS within ridiculously narrow confines - the abuses from freeloaders and a whole underclass who 'know their rights'. But the essential force of the movement is to protect and empower the individual against the state. If we adhere to the idea of universal human rights, then the government can't exercise excessive control over the populace by labelling any opponents as 'terrorists', 'dissidents' etc and claiming that 'human rights don't apply in this case'. And the more the idea gains currency - as it has done throughout Western Europe over the last ten years - the more people are aware of its erosion and will make a song and dance about attempts to undermine it To me, that's why the Daily Mail mob are so shortsighted - by focusing on human rights as merely 'something that protects paedos from getting what they deserve', they dismiss the most important check we have on state power. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
chilli Posted October 18, 2008 Share Posted October 18, 2008 Thanks for your everso well thought out reply Pot, kettle? I think if you suspect the governments goals, ambitions or inadvertent direction is going to creep up on us bit by bit leaving the masses largely unaware until suddenly we find ourselves in a fascist dictatorship - I suspect that you'd probably make a brilliant conspiracy crackpot Ok so CCTV and ID cards seem a bit nineteen eighty four, but it depends on the driving intention behind them. I have a CCTV on the side of my house, I can assure you I don't give a toss about monitoring or spying on the average person, but it's a necessary evil to provide protection in a modern society. I'd rather live in a state with some aspects over policed than live with an apparent civil liberty that in reality is diminished by the actions of a few miscreants and crackpots. I do think some new laws are in danger of being misused. However I also think some new laws and legislations are necessary in the current climate. Times are changing, our society needs to adapt - unfortunately times of rapid change always open up possibilities to misuse new laws, but that's in no way, not even remotely the same type of intent as you suggest. Are you a conspiracy theorist by chance, you might make a good one. There are flaws in the system, undeniable - but many changes to increase national security are justifiable (even allowing for scaremongering and propaganda) - lets not throw the baby out with the bathwater. Just because I have CCTV and it featured in books about socialist absolute control, it doesn't follow I have that intent. Using that kind of tenuous logic to draw extended conclusions from face value, you could pretty much conjure up any explanation for anything observed, which is roughly what you've managed to do - impressive! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pot Posted October 18, 2008 Share Posted October 18, 2008 Pot, kettle? Make your own cup of tea Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ian C Posted October 18, 2008 Share Posted October 18, 2008 Thanks for answering none of the three points, Chilli. You just seem to have taken it as a personal attack and reponded in the same way, just because you nailed a fairly useless camera to the side of your house I think that's enough of my time in that direction. Cliff - agreed, I'm actually quite a fan of the human rights acts, I wish they were enforced harder, as in some ECHR bod phoned up whatshername, the database freak woman who's home secretary, and said "forget it bizzatch, you'll go to jail if you try and railroad that through" and then actually sent her to jail when she inevitably tries to railroad it through. The thing that annoys me the most is this database thing will never, ever work in the fight against anything, but it will leak personal information like a sieve and get misused. Sigh. -Ian Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
chilli Posted October 18, 2008 Share Posted October 18, 2008 Ian, your whole argument is based around interpreting government actions as some secret hidden agenda and "masterplan" to turn our country into a dictatorship and possibly a fascist regime with parallels to Hitler (although you've decided that in your arguably paranoid interpretation you're going to hold the genocide etc). Whilst you're entitled to that, I'm not going argue against 3 similar points you make when they are fundamentally undermined by such a radical and probably delusional stance I'm not taking it personally, I find it a little incredulous. I'm not making a personal attack on you at all. The CCTV thing was a simple analogy to try and demonstrate how easy it is to jump to false conclusions on intent - and then really easy to raise arguments on it. I think within what you say you had the potential to raise some valid points, but I think your stated belief in the parallels between our government and Hitler's fascist regime is wrong on so many levels. I think it shows just how far we are from that when new generations of relatively untroubled people have the free time, free speech and free imagination to speculate and convince themselves of ungrounded theories about conspiracies against us. However, moving on from that, I'm not saying all future plans and ideas are danger free or ideal - we're in changing times and things are not going to be perfect. Any increase in power such as is provided by any means to monitor the population on mass comes at a risk of misuse and a risk of corruption - for sure. I'd say the perceived risk of the loss of freedom from things like id cards and cctv etc is only exaggerated because it's obvious, up front and on-mass. The risk this attempts to counter, the risk that slowly this country and many others will no longer be safe places to live and go out, without fear of being kidnapped or blown up in someone else's radical cause. For me, whilst seemingly a remote risk right now, the latter is a real loss of civil liberties and human rights, the former is (if done right) probably a smaller price to pay. I'd rather face neither, but when faced with the lesser of two evils, it's really important to way them up on an equal footing in real terms, IMHO I know you're generally a very reasonable guy who makes very valid points on here. I suspect if anything you're being deliberately a little provocative with shockingly strong statements and analogies. That's fine but it's probably more straightforward to discuss the merits and downsides of specific laws, legislation and policy than try to make the point with massively sweeping generalisations and assumptions that can not be proved or disproved either way - would you not agree? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dragonball Posted October 18, 2008 Author Share Posted October 18, 2008 Ian, your whole argument is based around interpreting government actions as some secret hidden agenda and "masterplan" to turn our country into a dictatorship and possibly a fascist regime with parallels to Hitler (although you've decided that in your arguably paranoid interpretation you're going to hold the genocide etc). Whilst you're entitled to that, I'm not going argue against 3 similar points you make when they are fundamentally undermined by such a radical and probably delusional stance Nicely put... I am reminded of the famous phrase... "I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it" (Hall 1906) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
b_have Posted October 18, 2008 Share Posted October 18, 2008 Nicely put... I am reminded of the famous phrase... "I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it" (Hall 1906) I have great difficulty in not disagreeing with that. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
chilli Posted October 18, 2008 Share Posted October 18, 2008 Nicely put... I am reminded of the famous phrase... "I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it" (Hall 1906) It's an excellent phrase and I wholeheartedly agree with its sentiment, very wise words Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ian C Posted December 4, 2008 Share Posted December 4, 2008 Just resurrecting this because I see we've moved on to the government using "anti"-terror police to silence the opposition party I predict at the point Gordon Brown "delays the election until these troubled times are over" we are well and truly farqued and the only way out will involve violence and death. If, on the other hand, we vote in the other corrupt bastards in 18 months time or so, I'll breath a sigh of relief That'll buy us some time. And I'll hang up my tinfoil hat In fact I'll be the happiest of all of us if I never get to say "I told you so" haha. Anyway, looking back on this I didn't mean to upset anyone or get arsey. I'm a bit all-or-nothing with most things, and in this respect I'm just terrified of where this road is leading, probably because I'm powerless to do anything about it. It's dead scary, I mean just look at this latest ripping-up-the-rulebook move by the Labour party. What the hell is going on eh? -Ian PS I hear someone recently mailed every labour MP a copy of 1984 with "This is not an instruction manual" written across it? Urban myth or not? PPS another good quote (while I agree 100% with the one above) is: "Those who sacrifice freedom for safety deserve neither" Just looked that up, it's a paraphrase of something spoken by Benjamin Franklin. It stuck in my mind http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Benjamin_Franklin Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AndrewOW Posted December 4, 2008 Share Posted December 4, 2008 Well you know the old saying, that 'desperate times call for desperate measures'. Or some excuse like that. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lust2luv Posted December 4, 2008 Share Posted December 4, 2008 PS I hear someone recently mailed every labour MP a copy of 1984 with "This is not an instruction manual" written across it? Urban myth or not? Tis true apparently, timed to arrive on 5th of November (but Amazon delivered them early!) I'm with you on this one. Group buy? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Carl_S Posted December 4, 2008 Share Posted December 4, 2008 All of us will drift to the right as we get older but some of us will still vote left or lib, out of habit or loyalty. My shift to the right started a few years ago, but GB for GB is my mantra. He is ugly, fat, boring, and a racist(*) but thank God he is at the helm. * Scots race being superior. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Max Headroom Posted December 4, 2008 Share Posted December 4, 2008 I am old enough to remember the 3 day week in the 70s and doing my homework by candlelight. Brown is a very dangerous man, we will reap what we sow and there will be troubled times ahead. He has failed the country. We have a massively overblown public service, now I am not saying that the main core of public servants do not do a fantastic job, but do we need the likes of gay and lesbian anti smoking co-ordinators or single gateway meeting facilitators? Public services are not wealth creaters, it is the small busnissess and private firms that create the wealth for this country and they are slowly but surely being squeezed out. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
carl0s Posted December 4, 2008 Share Posted December 4, 2008 Less public spending, less taxes. Simple. Then we'll all be happy, and we'll all earn enough, and we'll all spend. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dragonball Posted December 4, 2008 Author Share Posted December 4, 2008 Paranoia is essentially a failure of interpretation. Or, in the words of American comedian Emo Phillips: “I was walking home one night and a guy hammering on a roof called me a paranoid little weirdo... ...In Morse code.” Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lbm Posted December 4, 2008 Share Posted December 4, 2008 Mr Brown is on Radio 5 Live today from 1pm (Simon Mayo's show) taking questions. If you are losing the will to live- this could be just for you, to finish you off. I will give it a listen anyway. http://www.bbc.co.uk/fivelive/ Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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