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Originally posted by Agathon
The Mail is worse, I picked up a copy the last time I was in the UK and was appalled.
The Mail is worse, I picked up a copy the last time I was in the UK and was appalled.
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Eughhh, The Mail, a reactionary piece of sh*t...you should be careful what you read buddy
Speaking of Erith:
"It's not twinned with anywhere, but it does have a suicide pact with Dagenham" - Linda Smith -
Personally, having read both the Mail and the Standard (I'll never be clean again), I think while Ken's similes were completely out of line, the spirit of his subsequent comments wasn't - the Mail especially is an horrific example of venomous invective and disgusting xenophobic circle-jerking.
Also, the reporter doorstepped him outside a party celebrating the 20 anniversary of Chris Smith's coming-out as the first openly gay MP, and by Ken's account he was suspicious as to why the Standard had sent a photographer to take pictures of people leaving a gay&lesbian event when usually they were nowhere to be seen (its sister paper the Mail used to take great delight in 'outing' gay politicians prior to Smith's heroic defusing of their favourite weapon). I don't doubt the journalist's intent was at least in part to provoke him into a response (witness the "great, I have you on record") - the Mail and Standard love baiting the mayor, and have been doing so for years on end.
So, although I do think Ken should apologise to the journalist for his comparison, I think the journalist should recognise that the attack was not on him, his ethnicity, or his religion, but upon the paper he works for, and the high 'moral' stance taken by the Standard and the Mail on this issue is laughable, given their histories both in general and with regard to their treatment of Livingstone. However, Ken was wrong to say what he said, and should apologise. I only hope the Mail will respond by apologising for their decades of vitriolic rhetoric and blatant xenophobia.
EDIT:
...apologies for duplication. I scrolled through seven pages of semi-irrelevance before finding this.Originally posted by Lazarus and the Gimp
It's transparently obvious to anyone reading that it's an attack on the newspaper, not any race or religion. That's why there's no CPS involvement.
Last edited by Clear Skies; February 16, 2005, 19:06."Love the earth and sun and animals, despise riches, give alms to every one that asks, stand up for the stupid and crazy, devote your income and labor to others, hate tyrants, argue not concerning God, have patience and indulgence toward the people, take off your hat to nothing known or unknown . . . reexamine all you have been told at school or church or in any book, dismiss whatever insults your own soul, and your very flesh shall be a great poem and have the richest fluency" - Walt WhitmanComment
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Does inheriting the sins of their fathers apply to Germany and Japan, too, or just newspapers? Germany had a fairly bad record with Gypsies, too.Originally posted by Lazarus and the GimpYes it does. Their record on Gypsies makes grim reading.
Originally posted by Edan
Despite that the Evening Standard wrote articles supporting facism during the 30's, that doesn't make the Evening Standard of today guilty of the sins of it's fathers.
And is a newspaper that supports fascism guilty of war crimes?"I read a book twice as fast as anybody else. First, I read the beginning, and then I read the ending, and then I start in the middle and read toward whatever end I like best." - Gracie AllenComment
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What's CPS?I came upon a barroom full of bad Salon pictures in which men with hats on the backs of their heads were wolfing food from a counter. It was the institution of the "free lunch" I had struck. You paid for a drink and got as much as you wanted to eat. For something less than a rupee a day a man can feed himself sumptuously in San Francisco, even though he be a bankrupt. Remember this if ever you are stranded in these parts. ~ Rudyard Kipling, 1891Comment
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This is no big deal and is blown out of proportion by journalists who have nothing better to do. We routinely call each other terrible names for fewer reasons then the mayor had to call that pushy journalist names. Why don't they both just grow up and get over it?Try http://wordforge.net/index.php for discussion and debate.Comment
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The article quoted by lotm says it all. "All criticism of the state of Israel is considered racist and anti-semitic".
That's where you're wrong, because you are paraphrasing.
The article says: "However, when that criticism is directed at the entire Jewish people or questions the legitimacy of the Jewish state, it is an expression of anti-Semitism."
This means that you are free to judge and question Israeli actions. However, questioning the right of the Jewish people to have a nation state is racist or at least bigoted. Just like questioning the right of the Palestinian people to have a state is racist as well.Comment
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@Siro: Would you then also consider it racist or bigotted to deny, say, the Abkhaz and Chechen peoples nation states of their own?Why can't you be a non-conformist just like everybody else?
It's no good (from an evolutionary point of view) to have the physique of Tarzan if you have the sex drive of a philosopher. -- Michael Ruse
The Nedaverse I can accept, but not the Berzaverse. There can only be so many alternate realities. -- ElokComment
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This means that you are free to judge and question Israeli actions. However, questioning the right of the Jewish people to have a nation state is racist or at least bigoted.
No it isn't. I question the right of every people to have its own state, since I don't believe in states specifically for races, cultures or religions. What is objectionable about the Palestinian people is that they have no say in the state that rules them (i.e. you lot).Only feebs vote.Comment
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Sigh. I have to agree with Agathon on this point, unfortunately.
Distasteful at all times, even more so in this thread.12-17-10 Mohamed Bouazizi NEVER FORGET
Stadtluft Macht Frei
Killing it is the new killing it
Ultima Ratio RegumComment
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Sigh. I have to agree with Agathon on this point, unfortunately.
Distasteful at all times, even more so in this thread.
Up yours too.
Only feebs vote.Comment
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laz, yeah ok, i was exagerating a little with the CPS thing. however let me put it another way, would red ken, a poster boy for 'anti-racism', still be in his job now if he had made similar comments to a black or muslim reporter (the answer i suspect is no).
as for his disgraces, well how about tea with the IRA in the 80s, and more recently inviting that charming cleric who was frequently quoted giving support to suicide bombers over, shook his hand and had a nice chat and a cup of tea, lovely."The Christian way has not been tried and found wanting, it has been found to be hard and left untried" - GK Chesterton.
"The most obvious predicition about the future is that it will be mostly like the past" - Alain de BottonComment
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would red ken, a poster boy for 'anti-racism', still be in his job now if he had made similar comments to a black or muslim reporter (the answer i suspect is no).
If he'd called a black or muslim reporter a concentration camp guard, no one would have batted an eyelid.Only feebs vote.Comment
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well alright, similarly offensive then.
it's hardly a difficult concept :/"The Christian way has not been tried and found wanting, it has been found to be hard and left untried" - GK Chesterton.
"The most obvious predicition about the future is that it will be mostly like the past" - Alain de BottonComment
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OK - let me have a go.
Let's say the reporter was black, and Ken called him another Enoch Powell.
That would offend many black people.
When asked, Red Ken says, "I called him that because he works for the Express, which is an openly racist, bigoted paper."
Similarly, he's not smearing the entire Jewish race by calling a reporter a concentration camp guard, because said reporter is "only following orders".
What was Red Ken supposed to think? That the Express had turned up at a celebration of gay rights to laud them? I doubt it. More likely to write a thinly veiled "antifag" piece.Only feebs vote.Comment
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i think if he'd made a comment like that to a black reporter or any other comment which might be seen as racist he would have been savaged in the media, by both left wing and right wing papers, he would have been condemed by his party and goodness only knows what the CRE (whose silence here has been deafening) would have said about the whole thing..."The Christian way has not been tried and found wanting, it has been found to be hard and left untried" - GK Chesterton.
"The most obvious predicition about the future is that it will be mostly like the past" - Alain de BottonComment
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