El Pibe

click the link to see. They're meant to be clouds, and it's actually pretty cool, but I couldn't think of a worse choice of promotional image considering what it evokes.

And whilst we're on that subject, does anybody else think this building, soon to go up in Korea, is in slightly poor taste? http://www.designboom.com/weblog/images/images_2/lauren/0%20the%20cloud/cl01.jpg

http://www.eastdulwichforum.co.uk/forum/read.php?27,698469,page=1

I love Lawton just to see that when you think he can't get any grumpier he does, and for the shock factor when he actually writes something positive. The world is a better place for having had Fisk in it than not, but the time has long since passed when he should move back to England and write a gardening column or something. His agenda used to be telling the truth no matter how uncomfortable it is. It's now to wind up his detractors and hence boring and a caricature of his former self. I too pretty much gave up during the pontificating period with one dull, worthy, campaingning front page after another. It's also always been a bit light on humour (Telegraph is hands down winner at that) but it's still my default choice. I agree 'left' is pushing it. An absence of right doesn't make something left. But it has a fairly balanced cross section of columnists and opinionistas. I was never able to stand Hari, so I thought a great opportunity to teach him a life lesson and ditch a bad journalist was lost :(

That's exactly what I meant! Apparently the holy spirit on a blessed spoon forms an invisible yet microporous meniscus that allows the water to mix with the leaves, whilst preventing tea leaf escapage into the cup. Holy water to be used for best results.

snorksy ^

BY the gods, how to make life difficult. 1. pour boiling water in mug, filtered, mineral, tap, rain, who cares it's effing water. 2. add tea bag. 3. stir and soak according to taste in strength (I like weak, tradesmen in my experience like tea so strong it's almost chewy) 4. add milk and/or sugar according to taste err that's it. I don't think pots actually make that much difference, though they are convenient/cost effective if making more than one. Quality of tea is most important factor, builders is acceptable and refreshing but not a good taste. Loose leaf avoids weird chemicals in tea bags and can be done in holy spoon thing for a cuppa, but nowt wrong with a teabag if you ask me.

In the documentary last night it was interesting to see a greek analyst say that Europe gave the greek money to modernise farming and industry in order to increase productivity and competitiveness, and they spent it on mercedes and nice apartments, then borrowed cheap money to buy more cars and do up the nice apartments, and now that it's all gone tits up they're completely in the shit because they've actually gone backwards over the last 30 years. THe Euro has its faults for sure but I agree with otta (what otta said?) that the main reason the pigs are suffering is greed and short-sightedness, not fundamental structuring issues with the single currency. Not Britain's problem any more I guess is it ;)

Gosh, is it cynical wednesday or something? Given that most of us feel that society has become too selfish and preoccupied with rights rather than responsibilities, I'd have thought an educational opportunity to reflect on how fortunate our generations are, thanks to the sacrifices of previous generations, would be applauded. Instead we indulge our childrens' immature, solipsistic instincts as some sort of healthy questioning of authority and write the whole thing off as a PR stunt. Weird frankly.

Gosh, from my lurking on here ms curtain, I've found you to be one of the more enlightened posters, even if you try to hide the fact under your jesters hat. What a curiously and uncharacteristically uncharitable post. -1 dislike Dissappointed from Dulwich.

'refused bail for her own safety' This was apparently because she'd received threats. I do wonder about the level of intellect of soeone who threatens others because of their hateful opinions. At the very least a total lack of irony is discernible. It is looking increasingly like she has mental health issues, perhaps she had one tipple too many on some powerful anti-depression medication. Whatever it looks like help is what she needs rather than a custodial sentence, and I'm sure that's what'll ultimately happen and will be revealed on a tiny paragraph on p46 of a newspaper if it does. None of which detracts from the fact that she has some pretty bilious views about race and immigration. I can get as drunk as a skunk, i won't start giving anyone of any ilk what for or go tossing my orb about, I usually just get a kebab then pass out a the bottom of the stairs at home.

Whatever you do don't buy them in Dulwich, they seem a bit cheaper down West Norwood. Or just take a small saw to a motorway verge somewhere and bag one for nowt.

*Bob* Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > I can't wait to hear Misha B's generic voice rocking that generic album !!! So true An opportune moment to quote Grace Dent's uncanny prediction some moons ago "Another very talented girl, Janet, with a rather mesmerising Laura Marling-type voice sang Your Song, causing the audience to erupt and the judges to announce she had star quality. Obviously, the best thing Janet could do now is work with someone who'd give her young self time to develop gradually as a modern folk act, playing to her strengths, instead of being on ITV1 until Christmas and forced to sing Waterloo by Abba on 70s week or appear in hotpants with a cartwheeling dance troupe, honking through Girlfriend by Avril Lavigne, then being nagged for not dancing enough, then dispatched on the X Factor tour, fifth on the bill under Mr "I had sex in Faliraki" Tattoo Arse. It's not too late Janet. Run."

I'm afraid that ignorant hate is not simply expressing an opinion. If we live in a society where we tolerate people opining that this minoity race is subhuman or that minority religion is evil then inevitably leads to that sense of impunity stretching to going out 'paki-bashing' or killing a young man at a bus-stop for the colour of his skin or having an instiutionally racist bias in an organisation who should be safeguarding all its citizens. We are improving and we're better than many places, but there is a long way to go. The key word, that DJKQ repeats here is responsiblity. A free society places an onus on it's citizens to exercise its freedoms responsibly. If people abuse those rights then I'm afraid those freedoms have to be limited. I'm afraid to say that given that our society hasn't proved itself free of the problems of racism and hate crimes, then we cannot all individually yet be trusted with those freedoms. And I really don't see this as biased against the whites. Plenty of muslim preachers of hate have been kicked out or banned (except the one's Ken Livingstone or that idiot George Galloway likes), and plenty of organisations that share those hateful opinions have also been banned.

But words can and do persuade people to physically hurt people, or not hire people, or not rent a place to people.

Does anybody have any facts about this case? I'm pretty sure social services aren't in the habit of removing children from their parents capriciously. It's surely most likely that if she' has received a short custodial sentence that he's been taken into care for the duration rather than because of some sort of thought crime?

Is it just me that gets annoyed by the misuse of the word 'trope'. I keep seeing it used in the sense of a recurring idea, whereas it's actually a metaphor or literary use of figurative language. I think this is an infection* from across the pond where this misuse is now widespread. Try 'meme', 'motif' or plain old 'idea'. *now THAT's a trope!! Regarding the idea that all speech should be free, it is like all ideals, beautiful but unachievable. If we were a truly civilised society then there weould be no need to protect the weak and no need to combat ignorance and hate, but we aren't and whilst anyone suffers abuse or discrimination due to their origin, colour or religious belief then society needs to continue to protect those using the only tool available to it, the law. Whilst I agree that racism is racism is racism I'm also inclined to Fabricio's point about equivalence in that minorities are by definition weaker and more vlunerable to the whims of the majority and hence are more likely to be the subject of legal protection. That said if that chap had done that here I'm sure the law would have been happy to have charged him whatever the appropriate crime was, in this case some sort of threatening behaviour (assault?), racial hate crime or possibly incitement? ACM's point is essentially straw man, he feels that there is some kind of double standard going on but can't actually point to any evidence bar some spurious video of a man in a French tram, where there may indeed have been a twitter storm, though in a country that has managed to poll up to 12% for the national front, I'm sure that storm would have had a very different character to the one marked by shame at our friendly neighbourhood racist tram lady!

Oh gosh that's clever, I see what you did there. Picking up on your post in the sister thread, I can only guess that you are digging around for more examples of behaviour that you think should be protected by the idea of 'free speech'.* Free speech is about the rights of citizens to say the truth without fear of repurcussions by those in power. It's a privielge and a responsibility as much as it is a right. It has nothing to do with being free to spew hateful bile. *Albeit in another country.

He got the dates wrong, but substantively he wasn't wrong. In terms of defeating the nazis Britain was, relatively speaking, a junior partner behind the US and more importantly, the Soviets. You only have to look at how Churchill was increasingly sidelined in the Yalta and Potsdam negotiations to appreciate that. Or count the divisions. This was the phrase Cameron used, NOT 'played a bit part'.

Anyone who saw Adam Curtis' recent, rather scattershot, documentary series may remember the more interesting bits that dealt with the rather shortlived counterculture social experiments of the sixties and early seventies, that invariably collapsed due to the fact that in an unstructured democratic community of equal say, in practice the most aggressive personalities drove the agenda and got their way causing resentment and ultimately the breakdown of the communities. Maybe each generation needs to learn lessons for itself, but it looks like the same thing is happening to the occupy camp a mere 2 months in.

Interesting comment on your link suggests that though the BBC may have been earnest in the motives for their marketing approach, it unintendedly allows Channels like Discovery in the US to err on the side of caution for more political (climate change denial), rather than practical (people want to hear Sigourney Weaver narrate it) considerations.

You only have to look at something like flickr to realise this is most assuredly not a problem, seperating the wheat from the chaff is more of an issue. Jumped up little power freaks do seem to spend far too much effort bothering photographers though. Mind you if you look at the lynch mobs that form on this forum if someone so much as dares to take a photograph at a fete, you can see this is a wider problem than PCSOs and security guards.

A sort of china daily mash http://chinadailyshow.com/exhausting-search-for-chinas-dullest-village-continues/

Ah well, too late.

Perfectly encapsulating how everyone feels about your weak trolling ways. How about some of those hypothetical dialogues you used to do, they were at least well written and entertaining. I'm sure you can squeeze one or two in before 'claudia' is kicked off.