I’m not sure you can really use social examples to say the conservatives were more left wing than Blair’s Labour. Notably because left and right is technically an economic divide (usually). And even if you lump the usual expected social policies under each side (which doesn’t really work because you get authoritarian left wingers and libertarian right wingers) then Blair being more socially conservative would have been mainly down to the standards of the time I do not care at all the James O’Brien is biased. The left pretty much don’t have any other bias in their favour pretty much anywhere. Question time is dominated by a fake “balance” that has seen Farage be one of the most invited guests on there, the political editor of the BBC is always Tory leaning and in the case of Kuensberg and outright propaganda mouthpiece for the Conservative Party and even most of the other presenters of JOB’s show are right wing including the guy who precedes his show who is almost a caricature. And that’s before we get to GB News employing MPs from only one side and pretending to be news when it’s really opinion and breaking ofcom rules and the majority of all print media being decidedly right wing. So James O’Brien is some welcome and necessary balance and can be as biased as he feels he needs to be. Everyone seems to be allowed to be. Right wingers will moan and left wingers will in turn moan about the far more extensive bias on the other side (like I just have) and the world will keep turning
My moral compass is fine. If people live in glass houses and they decide to throw stones then that's their choice. If someone comes back to me in 10 years showing me something I said then I will hold my hands up if I then think it was wrong or stand my ground if I think there was nothing wrong with it. Cancel culture is most definitely real. Yes I have used it. Are you saying that comedians that say something "off message" do not have their careers ruined, bookings cancelled, lambasted in the public square? Not just politicians. companies, celebs, anything hope not hate decides should be the next pile on? And Elon is not exploiting it. He might have an immature ego but then people on the left are attacking him and he is showing them how hypocritical they are.by presenting their own "on record" words back to them. Yes we should be able to move on but the internet has replaced the pub and the town square. If people choose to publish their words on the internet (as I am at the moment) then unfortunately they have to accept they are broadcasting to the world now not just a few randoms down the pub that might take umbridge in the present but probs not recall it years later!
Progressive vs traditional or whatever you would call the other side is only one way of interpreting it The axis is usually “libertarian” vs “authoritarian”. And then right and left is the economic And where people make mistakes is by assuming all left wing economic people are “progressive” (or in this sense libertarian) on social views. And that’s how you get the red wall falling to Brexit and the rust belt falling to Trump. Because they aren’t. There are people to the left economically who like the social status quo. And there hasn’t been a party for them for ages. It’s how people like one of my uncles can flip from Labour to UKIP. Something that doesn’t make sense if you only look at a strict “left right” spectrum Whatever you want to call the other axis there is at least one more. I think it is shown on those “political compass” quizzes
Too much mental gymnastics here. Musk started this with wild claims of civil war. Apparently Labour are awful because of their rhetoric but Musk saying civil war is fine and dandy. He needs to butt out of our politics - and it is quite shocking that anyone with a traditional values, conservative mindset wouldn’t be downright appalled at him. Unless they were will to do mental and moral gymnastics to make it fit their narrative, of course.
How far back are conservatives - who have railed against using past mistakes to cancel people for a decade now - willing to go to castigate those they disagree with? Not that I think conservatives tend to be hypocritical or anything.
I tend to agree, although detail is everything. For example, if Wes Streeting has called for people to resign over similar comments to these then I don't much care if this sort of thing gets highlighted. I'd prefer it wasn't done but sadly politics has been reported in this gossipy way for decades. Also, has Musk actually undeleted these tweets? I saw those screenshots yesterday afternoon and I think they were reported on some political news sites before that too. Lauren Edwards apologised for them before Musk had said anything about them. Frankly I don't think he's that familiar with UK politics. The talk of Civil War might be more appropriate in the USA or his native South Africa, where the public is more likely to be armed, but it makes no sense when talking about the UK. I suspect he's just highlighting something that someone else found in response . I wouldn't be surprised if he'd never heard of Lauren Edwards until he saw the screenshots.
I just think we need to be very careful of people like Musk. He is a megalomaniac whose values are not ours. People are saying that Musk has been ‘targetted’ by our politicians. That is crazy. He has made wild and inflammatory statements about the UK and they have been asked to respond. Any decent Tory or Lib Dem would have said that his statements are not helpful, so I find it weird so many people from conservative backgrounds who aren’t appalled about an American thinking he can butt into our politics and insult our culture.
Elon is being insulted by the left in this country because he decided to wade into something he knows nothing about - our country. Declaring civil war inevitable. In that way a lot of people obsessed with American politics do when they assume everything neatly transfers over. The US is on edge and very polarised and (crucially) much more armed as a populace. Which is how you get the likes of Tim Pool salivating for a civil war for what seems like nearly a decade now. But Europe and the U.K. aren’t like that. He displays fundamental ignorance over pretty much every subject that isn’t in his area of expertise (which is completely normal and reasonable). However he has put himself in the firing line for criticism and his skin is too thin to be able to take it And insults from the left in America are because he bought Twitter claiming he wanted to make it a free speech platform but instead he blocks and censors things he personally doesn’t like (which isn’t free speech at all) and then endorses the right wing candidate. If you don’t want to draw fire from the left the don’t publicly support the right whilst being a hypocrite at the same time. Or do - but just don’t moan about it. And I’m not sure why you are being an apologist for the richest man in the world and his monstrously large but incredibly fragile ego. That’s a tad unusual
He’s just applying US politics to everywhere else and assuming it will be the same. To be fair the left have done it as well. Our U.K. BLM protests were a joke because everyone was pretending the relationship between blacks and whites (and notably the police) were the same in both countries. Weren’t there people do the “don’t shoot” part of the protest in this country where our police aren’t even armed So it’s not just right wing whackadoodles who try to broad brush apply US politics to our country. They just do it far more often
This is so far off the mark. The mainstream is dominated by the centrists with 100% backing to the causes of the social and economic left. The "Farage on QT" ignores that there ain't much choice on the right. The left there is always a Lib Dem, a Labour, A lefty commentariat and a Tory. Then you are left with either Farage, Hardy Brewster, Isobel Kingdom Oakshott or Geoff Norcott. lolz for the token second righty! I is always (whoever is in charge) a struggle to balance those 5 spots up without it being a 4:1 stitch up. BBC may well be run by Tory leaning folks but the broadcasting is always leaning left. I think you will notice Kuennsberg is not right leaning now the Tories are out. She is Kuennsberg leaning. 100% ambition to make Kuennsberg the story with politics as the backdrop to her own stardom! Have you watched GB News? I rarely do but there are plenty of left wing ex ministers guesting on there and I daresay it isn't GB News refusing to employ left wing Mps and more a case of left wing MPs refusing to be employed by GB News. TBF there is not much on GB News I like other than Portillo on Sundays which is more about arts and culture and current affairs than actual politiking and I like Michelle Dewbury because there ain't that many unfashionable accents on primetime TV and she's a proppa Northerner, not beating about the bush and saying what she thinks rather than meandering around trying to disguise words as something else. She has a broad Hull accent and that ain't that far from me. Ad for JO'B I don't really listen to political radio. They have decent music on some radio channels so I'm not gonna listen to someone ranting. I hate people that rant :eyes: lol. As for the left right divide being economic I think you'll find that most of the things politicians of both sides talk about are social left or right. Mostly about being nice to everybody while simultaneously spouting their vile at their opponents. The biggest arguments in politics are about culture and social issues. Blair wasn't held back by the times being more socially conservative. He himself was much more socially conservative and Labour voters at the time even moreso!
Again. The left has been attacking Musk since he took over twitter hinting at censorship and other stuff. this has been going on a long time. It isn't a response to Musk's tweets the other day. I would suggest that considering the amount of **** directed at him since he took over twitter he has a pretty thick skin or he would be ready to have a heart attack from fury by now. Whether he shows ignorance I think we can probably agree on that but then UK folk are pretty quick to volte-face within seconds giving commentary on US matters. "What does he know about the UK. He should keep his mouth shut" said the commentariat from the UK that just published a series of rants about the state of the US!
This reads like the reply of someone who as well as not listening to political radio (fair enough if you prefer music but it’s tricky to comment on O’Brien without listening) but also has never regularly watched Question Time, read political new papers or watched bbc political shows / Laura K. Which I know can’t be the case so what is more likely is that you have a very different (and incorrect in my opinion) idea of what left and right wing is on the spectrum. Highlighted by calling Lib Dem’s left wing when the most definitely aren’t So it makes more sense in this context But QT is pretty much never a left/right 4:1 stitch up against the right unless your definition of the right aligns with no definition of the right that most people accept and agree with (which certainly seems to be the case). Especially not when the hosts have always been at least small “c” conservative. For example the last two had : 2 conservatives, 1 Labour and 1 Green and 1 Labour, 1 Lib Dem, 1 Conservative, 1 Reform and Andrew Marr (a conservative). So both equal or majority conservative and chaired by a conservative sympathising host. When left leaning person is made political editor of the bbc and someone like that also hosts question time and the minority rather of the quests are right wing rather than always at least 50% and always shouted down by him whilst the others given time to talk then maybe we can talk about the broadcasting skewing to the left wing. But until then - don’t make me laugh The mistake right wingers have made for years is how the political comedy always skewed left wing on things like Have I Got News and Mock the Week. Because most right wing comedians aren’t really that funny due to the nature of how comedy (especially politics comedy) is targeted. I should know - Reddit keeps pushing me “Babylon Bee” a US right wing political satire. When they are mocking some of the weirdest “woke” people parts are funny. But a lot of its other satire attempts just aren’t funny. But just because the political comedy always skewed left it doesn’t mean the broadcasting skewed left. It’s always been the other way. You just need to look at the allegiance of the political editors - notably Marr and then Laura K But if there is a fundamental disagreement on what makes up left and right then this will largely fall on deaf ears
I heard something recently from a Brit that moved to America about how if it wasn’t for the shared language we would realise how different the two countries actually are culturally. Especially as the USA is effectively a continent and not a country. It’s a miracle it hangs together really. And a necessity for the world. But if you want an idea of why it’s so fraught - look to the EU. The federal US government is to the states what the EU is to countries of Europe but with much more power and control. And look how much we pushed back against the much weaker version and kicked off until we left It’s the common language and shorter history that largely keeps the US together. As well as its importance as a check on other world powers.
