UK "culture"

[Conchis]

I'll own up - I'm over 70.
I thoroughly disliked Thatcher, and almost all of the things she stood for and did. However, she did get seat belts in cars sorted - as miss d, aged not a lot at the time, kept reminding us whenever we played the Monty Python - "What did mrs Thatcher ever do for us?". I may not feel quite the same now.

Rather oddly, do people know that she and Harold Wilson were actually friends? They carried on being so after both had left office.

I read that she always provided a limo for him when he needed to be taken to hospital, as he frequently did in his later years.

Like many people, Wilson moved to the right in his old age and publicly praised the Thatcher government when he was on a lecture tour of the U.S.

The truth is, there is very little cross-party personal antagonism in British politics, at least. You are far more likely to find yourself in personal conflict with someone on your own side than the opposing one.

Thatcher also got on well with Michael Foot, Eric Heffer and Tony Benn, or so I've heard.

[Conchis]

Actually this forum is the only place I spend any time in where his name comes up so often. I wonder why that is. Some people seem to have what I would call an unhealthy obsession with him. 99% of the time I don't think about him or hear about him from anyone.

I'm interested in him, but I wound't say I'm obsessed.

I don't think anyone could deny he was an interesting character.

This forum is one of the few places where I can discuss Powell and other such recondite subjects with people who actually know who he was. He's not much rememberered by people of my own age.

[cloughie]

Actually this forum is the only place I spend any time in where his name comes up so often. I wonder why that is. Some people seem to have what I would call an unhealthy obsession with him. 99% of the time I don't think about him or hear about him from anyone.

Maybe I’ve missed somthing but he doesn’t to my recollection featured much or maybe I’ve avoided the threads where he has been spun!

[Conchis]

Maybe I’ve missed somthing but he doesn’t to my recollection featured much or maybe I’ve avoided the threads where he has been spun!

Me, too. Now I think about, I suspect I may be the first person to mention him on here.

[french frank]

Maybe I’ve missed somthing but he doesn’t to my recollection featured much or maybe I’ve avoided the threads where he has been spun!

19 times since 2011, if the search facility is working properly. So it's perfectly possible for it to be the highest number of times RB has seen it anywhere where he spends any time. Though I suspect EP would not be the only name.

[Conchis]

19 times since 2011, if the search facility is working properly. So it's perfectly possible for it to be the highest number of times RB has seen it anywhere where he spends any time. Though I suspect EP would not be the only name.

That's not that many times, considering we're talking about a near-decade's worth of comment.

I notice that most of the threads in which he is mentioned are very old, and feature contributions from long-gone members I've never even heard of.

[Cockney Sparrow]

Over the past year, I have watched a TV programme - would be BBC (don't think it was a segment such as in Newsnight) where it played a clip of Enoch Powell predicting the UK would at some future date leave the EU - IIRC, the context being the roots of the EEC/EU leave campaign go back a long way and their campaign has been sustained over decades. (Whether that is a correct conclusion I don't know - it will be corrected by the experts on this thread if not).
Quite a blast from the past. (The Jeremy Thorpe docu-drama was a more amusing blast from the past.....).

[MrGongGong]

When you talk about cultural education in Scotland Wales and NI, are you talking specifically about education in the culture of those countries, or wider cultural education ?

I mean wider culture
BUT that has a lot to do with people seeming to feel more "at home" with their own culture.
So the teenagers I worked with on Shetland had no problem with playing in Death Metal bands AND playing fiddle music. Likewise when I've been and worked in other places.
I think Steve Knightley talks about this stuff a bit in relation to English folk music etc ?

[Bryn]

That's not that many times, considering we're talking about a near-decade's worth of comment.

I notice that most of the threads in which he is mentioned are very old, and feature contributions from long-gone members I've never even heard of.

Extended Play, indeed. Back in October 1974, an erstwhile political associate of mine stood against the more often Googled Enoch than the biblical one in South Down. What surprised my associate more than anything else was that despite the vast political chasm between them, and their diametrically opposite stand re. the then EEC, EP was decidedly avuncular towards him whenever they encountered each other during the campaign.

[Conchis]

Extended Play, indeed. Back in October 1974, an erstwhile political associate of mine stood against the more often Googled Enoch than the biblical one in South Down. What surprised my associate more than anything else was that despite the vast political chasm between them, and their diametrically opposite stand re. the then EEC, EP was decidedly avuncular towards him whenever they encountered each other during the campaign.

There's a famous story of EP speaking before a young and predominantly left-wing audience, who had tried to No Platform him (avant la lettre). To their astonishment, he tore into the concept of Britain's nuclear deterrent and went on to emphasise the areas where he was in substantial agreement with the left. After about forty minutes, including a Q&A, he'd won them over and they were applauding him. Then, quick as a flash, he turned to the subject of immigration, at which they recoiled.

Afterwards, he was asked why he'd deliberately switched his emphasis when he'd been 'doing so well'? 'It's something I always do', he said. 'Get 'em on your side, then suddenly - out of nowhere - show them the cloven hoof!'

[teamsaint]

I mean wider culture
BUT that has a lot to do with people seeming to feel more "at home" with their own culture.
So the teenagers I worked with on Shetland had no problem with playing in Death Metal bands AND playing fiddle music. Likewise when I've been and worked in other places.
I think Steve Knightley talks about this stuff a bit in relation to English folk music etc ?

It's interesting that your impression ( correct I'm sure) is that this better education applies to wider culture. I am absolutely convinced that the English have a lot of work to do (and too late some might say) to try to come to terms with their own identity and culture ( folk/popular/high art/ whatever else) , because until we make some strides in that direction, we will be a people very ill at ease with ourselves. So your point about feeling at home in ones own culture is very important.

As you say, people like Steve Knightly and other prominent English folk musicians ( Eliza Carthy , Seth Lakeman etc) have worked hard, from a background of great respect for other British , Irish and other roots music, to find a healthy place for encouragement of English tradition in their work. Well that's how I perceive it anyway. Respect for ones own traditions and those of others ( and ,importantly, allowing them to develop together) must surely go hand in hand.

[teamsaint]

We may try and/or manage to defend and preserve what we value as UK’s or whoever’s culture but does it not all depend on what those who come after us think and value? Things can be preserved but not often to be used for what they are meant to be used. The same can be said about a lot of ‘traditions’. Stately homes and grand parks are highly valued as ‘cultural heritage’ but very conveniently without what they stood for.

But I suppose if we make effort to defend and preserve what we value, at least those who come after us will be able to choose. So there is that to it. I think Marmite will survive.

I think that the NT have made some great strides, in putting those places into a more balanced context. No doubt there is much still to do, and not everybody approves.


Sorry, link is from the mail.

Protest is their big theme this year.

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2019/jan/17/national-trust-targets-new-audience-with-celebration-of-protest

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-6634645/National-Trust-curator-says-focus-privileged-families-stately-homes-heterosexual.html

[french frank]

So the teenagers I worked with on Shetland had no problem with playing in Death Metal bands AND playing fiddle music.

Unsurprising, since both those kinds of music ARE 'their own culture' for the same reason that neither are mine.

[Lat-Literal]

Indeed

What often astounds me (though given the level of cultural education in much of England... less so in Scotland, NI and Wales) is the lack of understanding of the interconnectedness of cultures. People really are completely unaware that much of the stained glass in "our" cathedrals was made by Flemish craftsmen, or even that the quintisentially "English" tradition of Morris Dancing owes much to the Middle East (Morris / Moorish) and the dances themselves are often known (in my experience) by those who have come here as refugees.

Given the current climate I would be inclined to lay in a stock () of Marmite.

In what way do you feel that people in Scotland, NI and Wales exhibit a greater understanding of the interconnectedness of cultures?

Can you provide some examples not dissimilar to stained glass and Morris Dancing where there is a higher awareness there?

I'll own up - I'm over 70.

I thoroughly disliked Thatcher, and almost all of the things she stood for and did. However, she did get seat belts in cars sorted - as miss d, aged not a lot at the time, kept reminding us whenever we played the Monty Python - "What did Mrs Thatcher ever do for us?". I may not feel quite the same now. I really wished that some sort of statute of limitations existed to limit the number of terms a PM could stand.

Rather oddly, do people know that she and Harold Wilson were actually friends? They carried on being so after both had left office.

Well, Powell and Michael Foot got on very well. It was called the "Unholy Alliance". Not really an alliance, as such, but they were able to connect as intellectuals. We can probably call them intellectuals and not have too many difficulties with that definition. On your other points, sure. You will probably realise I wasn't seeking to place all 70 somethings in the Mrs Thatcher fan club. What I was trying to do with the strands I was presenting was provide some generalised light and shade on the over 60s rather than referring to "old people". Not all of the over 60s. I was specifically referring to those who have leant politically to the right. But, I muddied the waters by bringing up Blair who I don't feel is of the left but many do.

[teamsaint]

Unsurprising, since both those kinds of music ARE 'their own culture' for the same reason that neither are mine.

But an awful lot of music fans of one or the other genre ( don't like that word really) wouldn't really see the other music as both being part of "their" culture.