Those anti-british protestors

[Serial_Apologist]

There is a perception that Sinn Fein are on very shaky ground when it comes to anything approaching an economic policy, as was (in)famously recorded ahead of the recent elections to the Dail in the Republic of Ireland. Gerry Adams stood for TD in Louth (and won).

The same could be said to apply to every government in the west!

[french frank]

given levels of disillusionment among a populace now faced with an economic meltdown not of their own making

Well, one never knows for sure how (or for how long) the 'populace' is going to react to anything. Materially, it has to be admitted that the 'populace' benefited terrifically from the country's 'prosperity' until the meltdown. ('Meuhh. Didn't know that was going to happen.')

[scottycelt]

Maybe it is just me then not liking the era we are in

Which era in history, then, might you have preferred us to be in ... ?

[Serial_Apologist]

Greed is always being attributed to human weakness. The truth is more prosaic. Capitalism's in-born instability means people have to go for it while the sun shines

[Serial_Apologist]

Which era in history, then, might you have preferred us to be in ... ?

The period 1945 - 1967 was great to have grown up through; there was the idea that war would be no more, a sense of a better, securer future for all, a narrowing of the gap twixt rich and poor. But of course I was neither gay, nor black.

S-A

[scottycelt]

The period 1945 - 1967 was great to have grown up through; there was the idea that war would be no more, a sense of a better, securer future for all, a narrowing of the gap twixt rich and poor. But of course I was neither gay, nor black.

The idea that war would be no more?

Wasn't most of that period also a period of conscription? While I agree there was more of a general public friendliness and social concern towards each other (almost certainly due to the previous war) it was also the time of soot-black cities, filthy public transport, countless strikes, death penalties and the irritatingly stubborn remnants of an outdated class-ridden society.

There was also far greater real poverty than we have today, surely ...

[Serial_Apologist]

T

The idea that war would be no more?

Wasn't most of that period also a period of conscription? While I agree there was more of a general public friendliness and social concern towards each other (almost certainly due to the previous war) it was also the time of soot-black cities, filthy public transport, countless strikes, death penalties and the irritatingly stubborn remnants of an outdated class-ridden society.

There was also far greater real poverty than we have today, surely ...

My history is probably shaky but I think conscription came to an end in 1962? And the death penalty a year later? That was about the time of the Clean Air Act, (I really should check all this) following which cities started cleaning the accumulated aftereffects of heavy polluting industry. If I remember correctly strikes were more a feature of the 1970s than the 1960s. As to the irritatingly stubborn remnants of an outdated class-ridden society, well, they never went away (though in the 50s and 60s we, that's the general public, thought they would through capitalism overcoming its internal contradictions. And, apart from a few derelicts, most of them alcoholics, I don't remember people in large numbers begging on the London streets until the 1980s.

[french frank]

there was the idea that war would be no more, a sense of a better, securer future for all

Not sure that's completely right. At the time of CND's Aldermaston Marches there was quite a sense among young people in particular that nuclear war was a real threat.

[Serial_Apologist]

Not sure that's completely right. At the time of CND's Aldermaston Marches there was quite a sense among young people in particular that nuclear war was a real threat.

Yes you're quite right of course, french frank. I was born in 1945 and, notwithstanding the coming Cold War and the arms race, we were heavily implanted the notion that World War Two, especialy the atom bombing of Japan, and with America in the lead, development of nuclear weapons, had ensured an end forever to war - world war, implicitly. Personally as a young teenager I went along completely with the consensual conservatism of the 1950s, and didn't start questioning my assiduously received wisdoms until at least the time of the Profumo affair.

[amateur51]

And, apart from a few derelicts, most of them alcoholics, I don't remember people in large numbers begging on the London streets until the 1980s.

CHAR, the national housing campain for 'the homeless and rootless' was set up in the mid-1960s I think. The Met has always moved street beggars on to prevent the establishment of begging culture. Of course you don't have to be a street beggar to be homeless. However under Blair's Homelessness Czar you did have to be lying down to be counted. If you were sitting up, you did not get counted.

[Lateralthinking1]

I think conscription intake ended in 1959. My uncle was born in 1942 and didn't have to do it. A skilled manual worker with a business brain, he crossed over easily into white collar work in the sixties - the financial sector - when there were many opportunities available. He benefited hugely from Thatcherism in the eighties and went from a council house to a very large five bedroom detached property in an expensive area. Retirement came at the age of 52. Of course, he also benefited from the considerable advances in social welfare too. He draws a full state pension. While no fool, I doubt that he would be able to achieve a higher education degree. He was never "cut throat" but is as comfortable with today's economics and culture as anyone I know.

[Sydney Grew]

. . . an outdated class-ridden society.

Outdated? - we do not think so! It is true that the Cockneys as a class appear of late to have been permitted to rise - in certain areas - above their station, an observation which we during our increasingly rare returns to the Old Country find both striking and regrettable, but thankfully that does not in the end matter and the essentials remain. There is no sign yet of mob-rule, and the Corporation continues to occupy the populace with dancing and footleball (and - at least until recently - with Inter-Web fora).

[Flosshilde]

Conscription ended in 1960 (according to Wiki).

[Flosshilde]

Outdated? - we do not think so! It is true that the Cockneys as a class appear of late to have been permitted to rise - in certain areas - above their station, an observation which we during our increasingly rare returns to the Old Country find both striking and regrettable, but thankfully that does not in the end matter and the essentials remain. There is no sign yet of mob-rule, and the Corporation continues to occupy the populace with dancing and footleball (and - at least until recently - with Inter-Web fora).

Stripping out the flim-flam from Sydney's message, he is quite right. The class society is still with us, but based on money rather than land. Call-me-Dave might try & pretend that 'we are all in it together', but the income of the top 0.1% is increasing (see this report from the Telegraph - http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/poli...me-report.html and the Daily Mail - http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/arti...=feeds-newsxml), & the poor are getting poorer (the govt's policies affect them far more).

[scottycelt]

Conscription ended in 1960 (according to Wiki).

The Idyllic Era highlighted here was between 1945-67, therefore conscription was operative for the great majority of that period and the Death Penalty even more so, as it was only officially abolished in 1965.

Hate to strongly disagree with all you liberal left-wingers yet again, but, in comparison to that society, I'm quite happy with the era I'm stuck in, thank you very much ... :cool2: