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 Avatar 720 wrote:
Only times I've ever heard "Lundy" in England have been in reference to the island: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lundy

Like I said a Lundy is an Irish thing. I meant the English using the term No Surrender, it’s unconnected to the Irish Unionist meaning someone implied they were linked.

Also (for those who have been asking) I just noticed on page 4 of todays Belfast Newsletter Arlene Foster has condemned the violence both loyalist and republican. Sorry don’t have a link, but if your really interested pop down to your local shop and buy a copy. Today’s has a 32 page pullout on the 12th celebrations which you might find interesting. I see the tourism minister from the Republic was up at the parade in Belfast, decked out in an orange tie! Good man.

Halfway there(allegedly) now, can we see the knockage condemnation? I can find an article by belTel of Arlene condemning Derry easily of course.
Have to applaud whoever got 32 pages(my favourite number!) Of people standing around a fire singing they hate catholics and later drunkenly stumbling down roads, some of which they are wanted in.
All so we can remember how King Billy and the Pope defeated poor Seamus an Cac.

 Knockagh wrote:

 Avatar 720 wrote:
Only times I've ever heard "Lundy" in England have been in reference to the island: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lundy

Like I said a Lundy is an Irish thing. I meant the English using the term No Surrender, it’s unconnected to the Irish Unionist meaning someone implied they were linked.

I was talking about Scots using it. Usually, at this time of year, accompanied by loads of pals from NI on their warm up marches, but I'm sure it's all innocent nostalgia.

 Da krimson barun wrote:
Halfway there(allegedly) now, can we see the knockage condemnation? I can find an article by belTel of Arlene condemning Derry easily of course.
Have to applaud whoever got 32 pages(my favourite number!) Of people standing around a fire singing they hate catholics and later drunkenly stumbling down roads, some of which they are wanted in.
All so we can remember how King Billy and the Pope defeated poor Seamus an Cac.

please do not attach non wargaming images to dakka.
Reds8n

The topic of this thread is "UK Politics"

Let's get back on-topic and stop the side-bar discussions of other countries / etc, please.

Thanks all...

Hi I gave it a try. I tried to engage them in an honest debate and all I got was hostility.

Arlene the stateswoman! Colour me surprised. Now then Knockagh we've distracted the rest of the people of these isles for long enough. Anyone got any Brexit tidbits?

 Imperial Air Mage V601/20 wrote:

The topic of this thread is "UK Politics"

Let's get back on-topic and stop the side-bar discussions of other countries / etc, please.

Thanks all...

Hi I gave it a try. I tried to engage them in an honest debate and all I got was hostility.

The Irish border has been a hot topic on this thread. Surely you don’t want an uniformed debate? Everyone seems to have a fairly hard and fast opinion on it. If this thread is only little England politics and not UK politics it would be better renamed as such.

@ my old enemy the baron! I’m a very very soft brexit supposrter. Never was a fan of the EU, something I had in common with the majority in the Irish Republic, even Sinn Fein! But they all seem to have had a Damascus moment since the brexit vote and are all loved up now. It seems like no time since SF were running elections on coming out of the EU.
Honestly I’m such a soft Brexit supporter I don’t care if we don’t come out it’s just a preference I value our UK union over Europe so that would be my priority.
One of the main things that have really bugged me since the vote has been the attitude of the EU. I’ve never heard of an organisation that you join that make it virtually impossible for you to leave. That smacks of bullying and it’s repugnant. There has been an almost perfect storm for Brexit globally and it’s definitely a fine old mess, one I can’t see a work around for in the short term. Which is why I would give May my backing. Not because I like her policies but purely because she is our best option at the minute. One thing about being an Irish unionist though it gives you a healthy long term perspective on political history. Everything sorts itself out in time but it’s going to be an unholy scrap over the next few years. I don’t think many in the current generation have a corporate national identity, particularly in GB. The idea of sacrificing for future generations doesn’t exist. People want it all and they want it now so it will be difficult to cobble together a compromise between the factions. But I think it will work out in the long term.

This thread is UK politics.

Brexit is the all-consuming issue of current UK politics, and it is a strongly English related topic because it is bound up with a particular variety of English identity.

As an Englishman I deny and repudiate the focus on English identity, and promote the UK combination identity, which is capable of combining Welsh, Scottish, Irish, English, Caribbean-British, Pakistani-British, and even Yorkshire, all into one great nation.

 Kilkrazy wrote:
This thread is UK politics.

Brexit is the all-consuming issue of current UK politics, and it is a strongly English related topic because it is bound up with a particular variety of English identity.

As an Englishman I deny and repudiate the focus on English identity, and promote the UK combination identity, which is capable of combining Welsh, Scottish, Irish, English, Caribbean-British, Pakistani-British, and even Yorkshire, all into one great nation.

I think I love you

 monarda wrote:
Since the US pussy-grabber in chief is in town, here's a poll from the Guardian / ICM about UK opinion of him.



The details may serve to reinforce a few ideas about Leave voters too, (my emphasis):

ICM wrote:It’s revealing to break down these results by EU referendum vote. Doing so shows that leavers are much more positive about Trump than remainers – and moreover, that it appears to be EU referendum vote rather than which party voted for at the previous General Election that is more closely related to views on Trump.

As an example, for both Labour and Conservative voters at 2017, a similarly low proportion agree that Trump is a better leader than May (25% and 27% of those expressing a view respectively). Yet there’s a much bigger gap between leavers and remainers on the same measure (36% vs. 15%), and this gap exists within both parties’ voter bases – with more than double the proportion of both Tory leavers (34%) and Labour leavers (40%) thinking May is better than Trump compared to Tory remainers (13%) and Labour remainers (17%) .

And when directly linking Trump and Brexit, a majority (51%) of leavers expressing a view think Trump would make a success of Brexit as British PM, compared to only 17% of remainers.

I realize as an american i probably don't really know much about UK politics and haven't followed but isn't the Guardian like a very left wing news outlet? Would it be a shock the people being polled on the site agree with their left-leaning ideas?

The guardian certainly doesn’t hide it’s left wing credentials, I would doubt many centrists or conservatives would support their ethos. Having said that they probably get a wide online readership, being the only uk broadsheet (sadly) that offers free online content. The proletariats (or more likely rich civil servants) make contributions to their left wing crusade to keep it free which I have to confess is fairy admirable. So I think their online readership wouldn’t be restricted to lefty’s.
I do think behind the radical left wing front the guardian is more focused on keeping civil servants in a comfortable lifestyle. Supporting at all costs big salaries, extravagant pensions and superb working conditions under the guise of ‘the working people’ or ‘the humble public servant’ than they are about real equality. These rich privileged lefty’s are their readership and financiers. They use the language of equality to support institutionalised inequality. They couldn’t give a monkeys really about the cleaner from Poland cleaning toilets on £7/hr but they will blow up over a GP getting a cut to his 100k job. But that’s British socialism for you it’s never got its head round class equality.

This is a proper poll of the population of the UK paid for by the Guardian, rather than an online poll of the Guardian's readership, which would hardly be worth reporting.

The Guardian is a bit toss sometimes, but it isn't so bad that it would consider a poll of it's readership representative.

(It isn't left wing enough for me!)

 Kilkrazy wrote:
This thread is UK politics.

Brexit is the all-consuming issue of current UK politics, and it is a strongly English related topic because it is bound up with a particular variety of English identity.

As an Englishman I deny and repudiate the focus on English identity, and promote the UK combination identity, which is capable of combining Welsh, Scottish, Irish, English, Caribbean-British, Pakistani-British, and even Yorkshire, all into one great nation.

Sounds to me like steamrolling everyone but English is the plan. As evidenced by the St.Georges cross freshly repainted on Parliament. This isn't an anti-English statement: I believe the same about France and Brittany,Euskadi and Castille. A minority culture can't thrive when hooked up to another without a severe desire to fight back and a good ability to demand funding. What's the plan: enroll the Scots in Male voice choirs? Make the Cornish drink Irn Bru? Introduce the 12th to Yorkshire and tea to...well whatever community in the UK that doesn't like tea? Does that exist? Anyway like I said: The only way to create a shared identity is to stifle the minority.

 Knockagh wrote:
The guardian certainly doesn’t hide it’s left wing credentials, I would doubt many centrists or conservatives would support their ethos. Having said that they probably get a wide online readership, being the only uk broadsheet (sadly) that offers free online content. The proletariats (or more likely rich civil servants) make contributions to their left wing crusade to keep it free which I have to confess is fairy admirable. So I think their online readership wouldn’t be restricted to lefty’s.
I do think behind the radical left wing front the guardian is more focused on keeping civil servants in a comfortable lifestyle. Supporting at all costs big salaries, extravagant pensions and superb working conditions under the guise of ‘the working people’ or ‘the humble public servant’ than they are about real equality. These rich privileged lefty’s are their readership and financiers. They use the language of equality to support institutionalised inequality. They couldn’t give a monkeys really about the cleaner from Poland cleaning toilets on £7/hr but they will blow up over a GP getting a cut to his 100k job. But that’s British socialism for you it’s never got its head round class equality.

Here in the states anti-civil servant rhetoric is usually just a divide and conquer attack on workers as a whole - because tearing down career middle class people isn't going to make that 7 pound an hour cleaner any better off, it's just a race to the bottom.

The phrase bandied about by the right here is "stay competitive" as in other countries have sweat shops and child labor so we need to "stay competitive" by having those things too.

 Da krimson barun wrote:

 Kilkrazy wrote:
This thread is UK politics.

Brexit is the all-consuming issue of current UK politics, and it is a strongly English related topic because it is bound up with a particular variety of English identity.

As an Englishman I deny and repudiate the focus on English identity, and promote the UK combination identity, which is capable of combining Welsh, Scottish, Irish, English, Caribbean-British, Pakistani-British, and even Yorkshire, all into one great nation.

Sounds to me like steamrolling everyone but English is the plan. As evidenced by the St.Georges cross freshly repainted on Parliament. This isn't an anti-English statement: I believe the same about France and Brittany,Euskadi and Castille. A minority culture can't thrive when hooked up to another without a severe desire to fight back and a good ability to demand funding. What's the plan: enroll the Scots in Male voice choirs? Make the Cornish drink Irn Bru? Introduce the 12th to Yorkshire and tea to...well whatever community in the UK that doesn't like tea? Does that exist? Anyway like I said: The only way to create a shared identity is to stifle the minority.

So obviously you support the Republic of Ireland leaving the EU as a matter of national emergency!!

Personally I don’t agree with you (suprise or what!). I despise nationalism. Unions of nations can be a wonderful force for good. Giving up part of your identity to bind yourself to something bigger is, I believe a good thing. Thats why both our United Kingdom and the idea of a European Union are good things. They remove the selfishness of nationalism. The EU needed reform and I think the UK needs to withdraw to trigger that change. But I really hope we arnt disappearing into little nationalist bubbles. In the UK we have loads of communities that peacefully and happily have become part of the British identity. From our Chinese communities, to Sikhs, many African nationalities, strong Jewish communities not to mention our friends from the Irish Republic who seem amoung the keenest in the world to live in the UK (what’s going on there??). All communities living within a union to be proud of. Yes they might loose something of their own identity but they gain infinitely more by being a unionist.

 flamingkillamajig wrote:

 monarda wrote:
Since the US pussy-grabber in chief is in town, here's a poll from the Guardian / ICM about UK opinion of him.



The details may serve to reinforce a few ideas about Leave voters too, (my emphasis):

ICM wrote:It’s revealing to break down these results by EU referendum vote. Doing so shows that leavers are much more positive about Trump than remainers – and moreover, that it appears to be EU referendum vote rather than which party voted for at the previous General Election that is more closely related to views on Trump.

As an example, for both Labour and Conservative voters at 2017, a similarly low proportion agree that Trump is a better leader than May (25% and 27% of those expressing a view respectively). Yet there’s a much bigger gap between leavers and remainers on the same measure (36% vs. 15%), and this gap exists within both parties’ voter bases – with more than double the proportion of both Tory leavers (34%) and Labour leavers (40%) thinking May is better than Trump compared to Tory remainers (13%) and Labour remainers (17%) .

And when directly linking Trump and Brexit, a majority (51%) of leavers expressing a view think Trump would make a success of Brexit as British PM, compared to only 17% of remainers.

I realize as an american i probably don't really know much about UK politics and haven't followed but isn't the Guardian like a very left wing news outlet? Would it be a shock the people being polled on the site agree with their left-leaning ideas?

It's centre left in UK terms. Screechingly hard-left in US terms. Centrist in European terms and probably centre right in global terms. However, as said above, the poll is paid for and reported by them, not just of their paying readership. Few UK media outlets do that, fortunately.

 Knockagh wrote:

 Da krimson barun wrote:

 Kilkrazy wrote:
This thread is UK politics.

Brexit is the all-consuming issue of current UK politics, and it is a strongly English related topic because it is bound up with a particular variety of English identity.

As an Englishman I deny and repudiate the focus on English identity, and promote the UK combination identity, which is capable of combining Welsh, Scottish, Irish, English, Caribbean-British, Pakistani-British, and even Yorkshire, all into one great nation.

Sounds to me like steamrolling everyone but English is the plan. As evidenced by the St.Georges cross freshly repainted on Parliament. This isn't an anti-English statement: I believe the same about France and Brittany,Euskadi and Castille. A minority culture can't thrive when hooked up to another without a severe desire to fight back and a good ability to demand funding. What's the plan: enroll the Scots in Male voice choirs? Make the Cornish drink Irn Bru? Introduce the 12th to Yorkshire and tea to...well whatever community in the UK that doesn't like tea? Does that exist? Anyway like I said: The only way to create a shared identity is to stifle the minority.

So obviously you support the Republic of Ireland leaving the EU as a matter of national emergency!!

Personally I don’t agree with you (suprise or what!). I despise nationalism. Unions of nations can be a wonderful force for good. Giving up part of your identity to bind yourself to something bigger is, I believe a good thing. Thats why both our United Kingdom and the idea of a European Union are good things. They remove the selfishness of nationalism. The EU needed reform and I think the UK needs to withdraw to trigger that change. But I really hope we arnt disappearing into little nationalist bubbles. In the UK we have loads of communities that peacefully and happily have become part of the British identity. From our Chinese communities, to Sikhs, many African nationalities, strong Jewish communities not to mention our friends from the Irish Republic who seem amoung the keenest in the world to live in the UK (what’s going on there??). All communities living within a union to be proud of. Yes they might loose something of their own identity but they gain infinitely more by being a unionist.

The EU has always funded minority languages. It's a stanch defender of Cornishness as a National Identity not regional for example. The EU has no culture or body four times the size of every other part combined. West Wales and Cornwall are the poorest regions in western Europe. London is the richest. It's not selfish to want to speak your own language in your own country. Also note that Wales didn't bind itself: it was bound with steel. Britishness is a synonym for Englishness. The "British accent" is English. The British image overseas is English. The British queen is English, The British Parliament is in England, Capital England, government English. Immigration from Ireland can be blamed on the lopsided economy partition forced on us.

For each of those points of English you can also make the point that it doesn't represent 80% of England either. Also the Hannovers.... I mean Windsors, aren't English either.

In the same vein, the Northern Irish accent is the Belfast accent etc etc.


Also identity survives unionisation. Each British country still maintains it's individuality, as do the counties all the way down to the very bottom. I still don't trust people from the high school across the street and I no longer live in that part of the country

 Mozzyfuzzy wrote:
For each of those points of English you can also make the point that it doesn't represent 80% of England either. Also the Hannovers.... I mean Windsors, aren't English either.

In the same vein, the Northern Irish accent is the Belfast accent etc etc.

England is a single body: a Nordie and a Devonian both are indisputably English. So long as it's somewhere in England what can they complain about? Lack of investment in the north, but frankly that's their own fault for refusing the Parliament they were offered. The sax-Coburg-Gothas at least consider themselves English-Charles may be the Prince of Wales but he sure as gak isn't Welsh!
If I stand in London and call an Arab a goat-fether I can be charged with hate speech and rightly show. Do the same to a Welshman about sheep and it's suddenly alright.
I have a lot of Welsh friends, all Nat's. They weren't raised Nat's, they aren't even surrounded by Nat's. Yet these young people have become nationalists over the past few years. One is a former BA cadet who's da was shot at by the IRA! Clearly something is deeply broken. There was nothing noble about the tidal pool being cancelled for the Heathrow runway. Nothing noble about water from the poorest region in Western Europe being given to a neighbouring country free of charge. Nothing is noble about retirees from England setting up shop on Welsh communities that have been there millennia.

That’s completely contradictory. Germany has nearly 1/4 of the entire EU GDP. By your logic no small nation could co exist within a union with a larger country.
In truth it looks very much like, “I hate the English and don’t want to be in a union with them as the largest partner because I don’t trust them or like them.” Plain and simple bigotry against the English, it’s the sole defining tennant of Irish nationalism.

 Knockagh wrote:
That’s completely contradictory. Germany has nearly 1/4 of the entire EU GDP. By your logic no small nation could co exist within a union with a larger country.
In truth it looks very much like, “I hate the English and don’t want to be in a union with them as the largest partner because I don’t trust them or like them.” Plain and simple bigotry against the English, it’s the sole defining tennant of Irish nationalism.

Germany has money yeah. Not votes. By that logic,I hate the welsh since they control the water.
I don't trust any large group with a goverment that forcibly tries to assimilate a smaller group. I have no problem with a Frenchman, yet I am absolutely against the language policy pursued in Corsica, the northern basque country, Breizh, occitan etc. Same with Spain. Same with Italy. Same with England. Same with Russia, Germany...a people is a people is a people. No people has the right to dominate another people through economic and military force. I think England(in the long term I suspect it shall be England) leaving the EU is wrong. However I strongly disagree with any attempt to punish them, so long as they pay their commitments and find a border solution.

Gentlemen please:
I'd like to point out to you, that if you would step back for a minute and actually regard your own argumentations and that of your "opponent" and you would realise that you both argue on the same premises and constructed views and in the same way. Literally summarizable with "NO U".
Like in a Kindergarten.

 Knockagh wrote:
Plain and simple bigotry against the English, it’s the sole defining tennant of Irish nationalism.

This is a very strange thing to say when the Republic of Ireland exists.

Hey Knockage let's both point at eachother and shout "he started it" at the exact same time. If he's gonna say we're in kindergarten because we have different historical and political views let's damn well act like it.

 Knockagh wrote:

One of the main things that have really bugged me since the vote has been the attitude of the EU. I’ve never heard of an organisation that you join that make it virtually impossible for you to leave.

It couldn't be easier to leave the EU; article 50 is clear on it. File notice, then have 2 years where the EU must take part in good faith negotiations for a future deal, leave.

What is a lot harder and seems to be surprising a lot of leavers, is leaving the EU whilst still wanting all of the perks; access to the markets, sharing resources & agencies, barrier free trade.

If we just wanted to go WTO we'd already be out. But we still don't actually know what we want to do yet.

I think the devastating famine that dropped the population of Ireland by a couple of million (a catastrophe it has never recovered from) under British (mis)governance might have had something to do with it. Oh and the suppression of the Irish language, the clearances of the land, the confiscation of land from Catholics, the outlawing of their religion, all that stuff you know? Not "nationalism, pure and simple" but a complicated and long story of oppression, ill government and contempt.

If Ireland had been treated as an equal in the United Kingdom, if it had not been relegated to second class status, if there had not been so much discrimination against people of Roman Catholic Gaelic extraction, perhaps there would still be a complete union between the two countries.

The EU is nothing like that. It has never outlawed my language, sent death squads to shoot people at a sports game in retaliation, or confiscated the land of my countrymen. Neither has it overseen a catastrophic famine that dropped the population by 75% long term. Instead, in our time in the EU, we have experienced unprecedented economic growth (with some self inflicted hiccups), social progress undreamt of, and independence, security and self respect on a level we never had before and could never have outside the EU on our own or back in a Union with our neighbours, some of whom still sadly hold us in contempt.

Edit: and you know, I reckon that applies to the British Empire more widely. If it had been well run in a way that respected and benefited the local populations, rather than a system for resource extraction, I reckon it would still be around.

 Da krimson barun wrote:
Hey Knockage let's both point at eachother and shout "he started it" at the exact same time. If he's gonna say we're in kindergarten because we have different historical and political views let's damn well act like it.

I doubt many people across the world understand what it is to live in centuries old contested territory that erupted into periodic violence. The Israelis and Palestinians and others but virtually none in Western Europe or the states. Truthfully it’s not particularly nice, each side wants victory and real victory is unachievable.

I was privileged to grow up and meet and befriend the late great David Ervine a true giant of our little country and one of the finest politicians the UK has ever seen. My favourite quote of the man who his friends in jail called the man who swallowed a dictionary is

“We all suffer. Only by recognising that each one of us has a responsibility to do something about it will we make a change." David knew we all had to confront ourselves and our own ideas before progress could be made. Unfortunately in a crisis we just don’t get the space for self examination. In NI we have no government and while that lasts we can’t look past our tribe. I fear the UK as a whole is in a similar position over Brexit without really thinking about it. The country is horribly divided into firm camps. The current crisis over brexit allows for no compromise no realpolitik. And without compromise we will get nowhere but deeper into trouble.

Knockagh, that is the fething truth.

I was in England on the weekend for a wedding. And though I complain sometimes about England, being there (in Sheffield) really reminded me of all the things I really love about the place. It is a shame to see it so poorly served by it's political and media classes, because the people I met while there were lovely. We got the train down to London then and saw a West End show. London is a true metropolis, and the most impressive capital in Europe to visit in my opinion, much nicer than Paris or Berlin, and even better than Vienna (though Vienna is nice).

I enjoyed my trip, but it made me feel sad to think of the tough times that will no doubt be coming down the track for the people of England due to the unbelievable incompetence of the Tory party and the lacklustre opposition of the Labour party. It is a total failure across the board.

 Kilkrazy wrote:

As an Englishman I deny and repudiate the focus on English identity, and promote the UK combination identity, which is capable of combining Welsh, Scottish, Irish, English, Caribbean-British, Pakistani-British, and even Yorkshire, all into one great nation.

There is no 'uk identity'. Britain is synonymous with greater England. Don't get me wrong. I have no bone to pick with the English all. I've spent plent time down south and without exception, the people are wonderful, and friendly. Some,of my best friends are English too. I would go so far as to say I have yet to meet one who I would consider a gakhole. Now, to be fair, 'england' is a different story but that extends no further than banter about 'wrecking the chariot', and is consigned to a very important 80 minutes of the six nations rugby, or supporting Croatia (or Sweden, or panama or Belgium in the World Cup ) and beyond that, there is very little angst .

That said Kilkrazy,

My wife is Scottish. Fierce. Proud. Feisty. True celt. Not 'British'. And she never will be. 'Britain' is alien to her.

I'm Irish. (Well, half Irish, of probable Viking ancestry, and half Dutch). And therefore probably the only Irish catholic who can who can happily wear orange (but not on the 12th) with pride. (Hurray for queens day! And my lawful king Willlem-Alexander). And no, I'll never be British either.

'Britain' is all fine and well, but the last two or three years have turned me to the side of Scottish independence. We will never be 'one great nation' when the collective and individual Wills and desires desires of Northern Ireland, wales and Scotland can be drowned out and ignored by the English, every time. The resentment this causes here in Scotland is palpable. We are not equal partners in this. And until we are, you can keep your fancy words, because thry don't mean much to us.

 Knockagh wrote:

 Da krimson barun wrote:
Hey Knockage let's both point at eachother and shout "he started it" at the exact same time. If he's gonna say we're in kindergarten because we have different historical and political views let's damn well act like it.

I doubt many people across the world understand what it is to live in centuries old contested territory that erupted into periodic violence. The Israelis and Palestinians and others but virtually none in Western Europe or the states. Truthfully it’s not particularly nice, each side wants victory and real victory is unachievable.

I was privileged to grow up and meet and befriend the late great David Ervine a true giant of our little country and one of the finest politicians the UK has ever seen. My favourite quote of the man who his friends in jail called the man who swallowed a dictionary is

“We all suffer. Only by recognising that each one of us has a responsibility to do something about it will we make a change." David knew we all had to confront ourselves and our own ideas before progress could be made. Unfortunately in a crisis we just don’t get the space for self examination. In NI we have no government and while that lasts we can’t look past our tribe. I fear the UK as a whole is in a similar position over Brexit without really thinking about it. The country is horribly divided into firm camps. The current crisis over brexit allows for no compromise no realpolitik. And without compromise we will get nowhere but deeper into trouble.

Tell me then what spain was up too, or france, or if you want religious, economical and language divide used for legitimation of violence in switzerland?
The real difference stems from the fact how these regions dealt with that.
Spain threw a rug over it. france worked it out eventually. Switzerland until 1939 had not worked out minority repression, representation, etc.