Without wishing to turn this thread into a political soap box, I would endorse what Lenny has said. It was 30 years ago now, but I lived & worked in the USA for 4 years. I developed the sense that there was something fundamentally wrong with society there. Don't get me wrong, I met some wonderful genuinely warm people there. However, there remained this feeling that there was an underlying vindictiveness in the justice system, and a doctrine of "stand on your own two feet" and too bad if you can't. I'm all for standing on your own feet & for being responsible for your own future, as far as that is practicable. But, I'm also for giving a hand up to those who genuinely need it. Over there I sensed that there was no real separation between those who won't help themselves and those who can't.
Er? You sure about that? the 20th century had WW1 and WW2... wars in which tens of millions were killed violently. The 19th century had nothing comparable.
Wow... you could turn a discussion about lemonades into your lefty collectivist bullshit utopia which something or the other (Thatcher, Capitalism, bla bla) is preventing. Cancer-like attitude? How about your attitude in dehumanizing everyone with a different political opinion or the way a society should be organized? pathetic.
The Japanese comparison is interesting. The Japanese have had a conservative government, almost continuously, since 1955. Much like the US, the "left wing" party is nothing of the sort. Also they have one of the world highest suicide rates. Maybe the way they queue has something to do with the rigidity of their society and the fact that they tend to live in much closer proximity to others, especially in big cities. You cannot seriously be looking at Japanese society to underline a point about Thatcherism (after 23 YEARS) being the cause of all our ills? As for things being "priceless" or untouchable, I used to think that about pensions, before Gordon Brown got his grubby mitts on them. Maybe if he'd realised gold actually had a price, he wouldn't have sold our gold reserves at the lowest price for decades before the price went though the stratosphere. It's all about perspective I guess.
This is not a place for politics and I have already gone off topic enough as it is but the fundamental difference between the so called "left" and so called "right" is that the former places emphasis on value, life, health, family, society and the things that should matter, with the latter it's all about the Benjamin's and dividing society based on differences I.e race, ability, class, religion etc. In the 60s/70s you could leave your front door open and return home to your belongings. Now? All about getting on eBay and selling the stuff on to make a quick buck. People have lost their soul and sense of self worth. With regard to the referee it's a clear case of a petulant child being brought up do as he pleases due to failed parenting, which is the effect of a broken society that the right have taken apart
It's what's argued in this book: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Better_Angels_of_Our_Nature In the 19th century you had Napolean(s) wreaking havoc around Europe, loads of imperial goings-on round the world spreading war and conquest plus generally more violence in everyday society. I know it sounds amazing but just think about how many Africans were violently killed during the slave trade, for instance. I bet that was in the millions. I actually think that the casualties in the Napoleonic wars may well be comparable to the World Wars. Well, Wikipedia just gave me the figure of 3,250,000 to 7,000,000 deaths. American Civil War is in the region of 700,000 deaths. They're just the first two I checked. There was a lot of war and violence in the good old days. More than now.
Lenny - don't want to go too far off topic here (particularly because I agree with most of what you said earlier), but WW2 dead was at least 50 million, perhaps as high as 80 million. WW1 at least 15 million. Arguably the casualties experienced in the 19th century fell on a smaller population, but the industrialisation of warfare in the 20th century led to consequently horrific death tolls, and included significant aspects of genocide, barbarism toward civilian populations and other state sponsored death that IMHO completely overshadowed anything from earlier times. Perhaps it could be argued that the century was not as violent *outside* the world wars, but that's a strange thing to postulate. Anyway, probably off topic now.
A series of books and articles have pointed out that American prison is the new Jim Crow. The percentage of men of color who become prey to the justice system at some point in their lives is staggering. And the economic consequences in an age when every blot on your copybook lives forever are catastrophic. We have created the prison-industrial complex. Vast amounts of taxpayer money are paid to people who put and keep others in jail. The most important, if not the most well-remunerated beneficiaries are officers of the court: police officers, judges, and of course lawyers, who make up some 3/4 of our politicians. Just as a matter of basic reasoning, the whole idea of putting people who have committed crimes together in cages to improve them is laughable. Sane societies (all but modern ones) who couldn't afford prisons and weren't crazy enough to think they were good ideas, were careful to get punishments over with fast. Whether it was a fine, corporal punishment or execution, people got on with their lives almost instantly--or their deaths.
And 30 years of Labour government post war couldn't fix this? The changes in society has happened in a more or less linear way post WWII, no matter what the government of the day. To argue that the so called "right" value those things any less than the so called "left" is simplistic nonsense. The real difference between the right and left is that the people on the right do not buy the fact that everybody who doesn't agree with them is bad. It's just too easy and has no bearing on reality. If you actually believe the demonisation of the tories by Labour and the unions you are just looking for an easy way out of an argument or somebody to blame. In case you hadn't noticed, politics in this country has moved to the centre. How does this stack up with your right/left argument?
I know - it seems astonishing but I'm pretty sure that the professor from Harvard who wrote that book must have been pretty sure of his facts and research to have written that book and to have staked his academic reputation on it. And yes - the figures DO include the World Wars. Part of the point of the book is how surprising it seems to us. Life in the past was, as Hobbes said, "nasty, brutish and short". And lo - we return to Luis Suarez.
As a footnote to what has been said, it seems clear to me that numbers of casualties in any given conflict, in any given century, are directly connected to the sophistication of the weaponry available at that time. I have no doubt that had Napoleon, or any other despot from previous centuries had available to them 20th century weaponry, the numbers of casualties would have equalled or exceeded those of the first & second world wars. After all, if you are at war, you want to kill as many of your enemy as possible. The more advanced weapons you have, the more efficiently you can do that.
I'd second PNP's point about Scandinavian countries. Just heard ANOTHER social statistic that puts Sweden AND Norway AND Finland way in front of all other countries. Child mortality I think. Why isn't every country on Earth just trying to copy whatever the hell they have got so right? As a total lefty I also get bored of people simply demonising the right. Conservatism is a political philosophy, not just a way for nasty people to be nasty. (It's one I think is factually incorrect but there we go). I'd much rather talk politics with an intelligent conservative than a dumb-ass socialist. But the bit I highlighted above sounds a bit like the pragmatism I'm more leaning towards now I'm not quite so young and idealistic. Best summed up by one of my favourite political quotes ever (and from that evil Tory Winston Churchill): "Democracy is the very worst system of government apart from all the others." I think there's a lot of truth and wisdom in that.
Well, anybody who claimed (and actively campaigned) that there is no such thing as society, that instead it's just individuals all competing with each other and so screw everybody - has to take some responsibility.
Thatcher may, or may not have been responsible for many ills - depending on your viewpoint. However, only the most blinkered, rabidly political animal would try and lay the current attitude of footballers to officials, at her door. But then these theories are propogated by the people who always have to find a convenient scapegoat for all the ills, real or imagined, of today.
I discovered in my time living there that you can buy all the "justice" you can afford in America. Unfortunately, for them, most coloured people are not rich, and therefore suffer the consequences of being poor. The other thing that sticks out to me is the ridiculously disproportionate sentences handed out, especially in some of the more Southern states. Justice and revenge are supposed to be completely separate concepts. Much of what goes on in U.S. courtrooms smacks far too much of the latter.
Who claimed there is no such thing as a society? Not having a centrally planned society == no society? How about people choosing their own way to organize communities as they have done for centuries? I guess the example of Japan, what dare I ask pushed the Japanese to enslave half a country into sex workers? As a country that was not tarnished by the "evil" individualists it seems quit impossible. Isn't that the root of all evil.
You don't want to talk about politics yet you just laid the blame for all evils on the world on an opposing political ideology. Do your sentences even pass through your brain as a "rough draft"? Or are you just a Noam Chomsky sentence generation machine? And this cartoonish view of the US brits have is completely hyperbolic. Either the US has the warmest people in the world or none of you have ever actually met one. There doesn't have to be a state mandated collectivist outlook on the world for there to be a real sense of community and understanding between people. You can go to the "reddest of the red" state in the US and meet the most warmest, caring people you could ever meet if you traveled the whole of Europe. You could walk into a bar as a stranger and meet new people without trying. Try doing that in Sweden or somewhere. It is apparently one of the most "giving" cultures out there as far as charities etc. Emphasis on value, life, family? The blame for the undoing of this emphasis is the right's fault? wow. And then you mention rioting and looting. I suppose it was the tories who were encouraging people who hadn't worked a day in their life (venerating thugs basically, most of them... i don't care if it was started by decent people) in the riots a few years ago. That is the kind of civility you are talking about right?
Looks like this thread went slightly off topic RIP to the Ref however, absolute disgrace, hope justice will prevail and the culprit serves a long, hard sentence.
Oh and about violence to referees specifically, go and search for incidents in countries in the former soviet bloc in the early nineties or even eighties. To say the least turns out any increased civility this population untarnished by thatcherism () might have had in that regard was more to do with fear of an oppressive state than anything else. One guy punching a referee? How bout the whole squad rounding up the referee? Well at least it's not the evil "individualistic" kind of incident. Violence against referees is such a common problem that US would barely be mentioned in a list of serious offenders in the world, they're probably one of the least affected. The only sport that it even happens in, is kind of for show and part of the game (hockey). But hey when has that stopped the lefties to make a point that capitalism is at fault for everything?
