Gabriel
Well-Known Member
Was that monsieur really a monsieur?
What has the UK become under the far right influence?
- Thread starter bluethrunthru
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Was that monsieur really a monsieur?
gordondaviesmoustache
Well-Known Member
We have declined so much as a nation in the last decade. Since the Olympics, pretty much.
Go on then, tell us all where you heard all this?
In other news…
Turkey-Syria earthquake: UK aid appeal raises more than £50m https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-64609836
Disasters Emergency Committee biggest donor to charities after Ukraine appeal
DEC brings together 15 leading UK aid charities
www.independent.co.uk
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BrianW
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Really hard lads don't tell you they're hard.
Really patriotic people don't tell you they're patriotic.
Really patriotic people don't tell you they're patriotic.
On patriotism, if you look at any attempt at defining human needs you get, in order of importance
1 Physiological - so food, water, sleep etc
2 Safety - so health, housing, employment etc
now the interesting three
3 belonging and love - so, family, friendship etc
4 esteem - so achievement respect of others, respect by others, mattering.
5 self actualisation - morality, problem solving, lack of prejudice, acceptance of facts etc
So, patriotism should fit in at no 3 and for most people I think it does. If someone is knee jerk unpatriotic rather than patriotic (basically not liking your own country and fellow citizens) then surely it would be better to leave that country? I think the ideas behind the hierarchy of needs is that you really need all the steps fulfilled to be a happy and a balanced person, so, unpatriotic people will probably not be happy.
Slightly moving topic, I'm a great believer in the 80/20 rule and think that 80% of this country have pretty decent lifestyles. One of the great mysteries of our democracy is why, as it seems, the bottom 20% do not vote. They often answer that question with 'it makes no difference, it doesn' t matter,' and lo and behold self esteem and mattering are basic need 4! So, people don' t vote because they do not think they matter.
BrianW
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Define 'patriotism'. Because it is an abstract term.
My patriotism is wanting my country to prosper and be one of the leading states of Europe. (You need the prospering thing first BTW.) By 'leading' I mean being an exemplary state with a high standard of living and excellent public services, as well as freedom from corruption in public life.
Some people think patriotism is about waving flags, hating foreigners and arselicking the royals.
My patriotism is wanting my country to prosper and be one of the leading states of Europe. (You need the prospering thing first BTW.) By 'leading' I mean being an exemplary state with a high standard of living and excellent public services, as well as freedom from corruption in public life.
Some people think patriotism is about waving flags, hating foreigners and arselicking the royals.
bluethrunthru
Well-Known Member
According to the Joseph Rowntree Foundation you are correct in that 20$ of the population live in poverty - not sure that someone at say 1 or even 5% and poverty level have decent lifestyles - they are the folk claiming in work benefits and using foodbanks etc. If you consider just kids then its 25% live in poverty - I have said who has the money and where its going coz those figures should not exist in the 6th biggest economy in the world
bluethrunthru
Well-Known Member
also is it patriotism to lay your life on the line for your country? If so we seem to struggle to fill the vacancies in the military here so maybe our youth are un patriotic. Plenty of young Russian lads - badly trained and equipped are being forced to go to the front against their will. I doubt they feel that patriotic - more just scared I'd imagine.
It’s like a 6th form fucking common room on here at times lol.
OP does what he always does and when it’s pointed out that in a matter of days the great British public have donated over £50m to Turkey and Syria and so far over £400m to the Ukraine blowing his little rant out of the water it’s ignored.
Meanwhile we get yet another patriotism/brexit/fascist/racism/far right thread as if we don’t already have enough for everyone to keep repeating themselves on.
That of course was the aim from the start…
OP does what he always does and when it’s pointed out that in a matter of days the great British public have donated over £50m to Turkey and Syria and so far over £400m to the Ukraine blowing his little rant out of the water it’s ignored.
Meanwhile we get yet another patriotism/brexit/fascist/racism/far right thread as if we don’t already have enough for everyone to keep repeating themselves on.
That of course was the aim from the start…
bluethrunthru
Well-Known Member
LBC - callers in to Shelagh and Tom Swarbrick
A nation of people that, despite going through a major cost of living crisis, raises £30 million in one day for the people of Turkey & Syria.
We have our issues but I fucking detest people putting their own country down at every opportunity. Almost invariably, they also do fuck all about the supposedly awful state of the nation and just piss and moan about things.
We have our issues but I fucking detest people putting their own country down at every opportunity. Almost invariably, they also do fuck all about the supposedly awful state of the nation and just piss and moan about things.
D
D
Deleted member 77198
Guest
Fucking hell are you moaning about this country again?
For every idiot who thinks either a/ or b/ there are probably hundreds of thousands who think the opposite.
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D
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Deleted member 77198
Guest
This is quite interesting.
Look at the rises in Facebook and Twitter member numbers over a similar period:
(I know they’re both worldwide but the national trend will be the same)
I’d say - much more than it being this country that’s the problem, OP - I’d say it’s the growth of online platforms where stupid views are posted, liked and reposted as normal thinking is the drive behind the growth in stupid views.
These views are always there, always have been, they’re just seen more because of social media and said more because of the increase in things being seen online.
gordondaviesmoustache
Well-Known Member
What about someone like me, an inveterate optimist who always thought this country, for all its faults, was pretty cool and I wouldn’t have considered living anywhere else? A decade or so go, things worked, the country functioned and was generally at ease with itself.
You think things work now? You think our railways, courts or hospitals are functioning like they did a decade ago? You think the country is generally united?
Maybe it’s me. Maybe it’s just me getting older, because old people tend to moan about things not being as good as they were, and I’m always trying to fight against that, because it doesnt sit comfortably with me, but every time I try and apply objective thought to the situation I come to the same conclusion, namely that things have greatly declined in this country over the last decade, and we are much more divided on a number of fundamental issues.
Maybe some of it is replicated in other western countries due to a combination of Covid and the relative decline of western hegemony. I certainly think, whatver the rights and wrongs of the issue at hand, the disruption of Brexit won’t have helped. Also, social media will have played a part in the disunity, as it will in other countries.
Maybe you think otherwise, and things are fine (or at least as they were) in your experience, and that opinion is as valid as any, but in my experience, coming as it does from someone who tends to think positively and have an optimistic disposition, is that this country has been discernibly declining for the last decade.
west didsblue
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Yes, the widespread dissemination and normalisation of extreme views thanks to social media is certainly a scourge.
bluethrunthru
Well-Known Member
wtf is going on
www.bbc.co.uk
Brianna Ghey: Boy and girl arrested over Warrington park killing
The two 15-year-olds are being held on suspicion of murdering the 16-year-old girl in Warrington.
www.bbc.co.uk
Rascal
El Presidente
Nice post, Fintan O'Toole is his book "Heroic Failure" describes a Britain looking for an identity. A country no longer sure of its standing in the world, a once great power somewhat diminished. The Empire has long gone, influence is on the wain and as you put it the "decline of western hegemony" has played a role. I think that all plays a role in how people think about our country, we are now whether we like it or not, a small island off the coast of Europe with a haughty expression of illusionary grandeur.
On the whole though we remain a good country, with a long and proud history. We have contributed much to the development of mankind, our people are mostly fair minded, warm and decent. We do though like a good moan and whinge and whilst I do believe our country could be much much better than what it is, it is a still a great place to live.
gordondaviesmoustache
Well-Known Member
I think in many ways it is still a great country to live, just not as good as it was a decade ago.