BS: Who wants 'more choice'?

Subject: BS: Who wants 'more choice'?
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 19 Jan 10 - 08:19 AM

I was listening to the radio and there was this politician (I haven't a clue which party) talking about health and education, and he started saying stuff about "what the public wants is more choice" and how extending choice was a mark of services getting better - and it suddenly occurred to me that, so far as I am concerned, that is absolute rubbish.

What I want is a good and reliable service. If the only way of getting that is to have the option of going to a different doctor, or sending my children to a different school, that is better than nothing, so I maybe want that option - but it's very much a second best. It's Plan B for when things go wrong.

If my house burns down it's good to know that there is a bed and breakfast place I can go and stay in. But I'd much sooner never have to use that choice.

Subject: RE: BS: Who wants 'more choice'?
From: Smedley
Date: 19 Jan 10 - 08:22 AM

In Britain at least, 'choice' has become a word I instinctively distrust. It is one-syllable shorthand for moving in a right-wing direction, and/or privatisation by stealth, and/or dilution/decline in standards.

Subject: RE: BS: Who wants 'more choice'?
From: Tug the Cox
Date: 19 Jan 10 - 08:38 AM

Of course having authentic choices about things that matter is a good thing. The reality is that behind the individualistic rhetoric, for the majority choice is being eroded everywhere...Supermarkets displacing small businesses, mega breweries selling fizzy muck,small hospitals and small schools being closed, adverts telling us what we'd like, and a 'national' curriculum that spreads boredom and disengagement better than listening to a party political broadcast. Viva la difference.Schumacher wrote 'Small is beautiful', he needs to be rediscovered.

Subject: RE: BS: Who wants 'more choice'?
From: Dave MacKenzie
Date: 19 Jan 10 - 09:12 AM

Since Thatcher got in, it seems to me that the main form of choice that we've been getting in the UK is of the Hobson's persuasion.

Subject: RE: BS: Who wants 'more choice'?
From: Rapparee
Date: 19 Jan 10 - 09:16 AM

Ditto in the US, but because of Ronnie Raygun.

Subject: RE: BS: Who wants 'more choice'?
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 19 Jan 10 - 09:18 AM

You know the mention of supermarkets is quite a co-incidence. I was saying in the last day or two that I have now realy taken to shopping at Aldi. How does that fit in you may ask? Well, apart from being cheaper it is so much easier than any of the big ones. Wnat premium bacon? Easy - Just one choice. Teabags? Red or Gold label. Beer? 4 different choices of good quality English Ales.

How about Asda etc? Ooooh - which bacon do I pick? Smoked, unsmoked, treated with treacle? Wrappen in pigs scrotums? Tea? Indian? Chinese? Good? Bad? Indifferent? Cheap? Expensive? And beer? Don't even go there unless you are prepeared to spend at least three weeks researching the subject!

So, savings of around £20-£30. Time saved - Must be at least an hour. Choice? Who needs it!

DeG

Subject: RE: BS: Who wants 'more choice'?
From: Tug the Cox
Date: 19 Jan 10 - 09:50 AM

Well, david, its seems thet you are choosing Aldi.If Asda reigned supreme in your area, THEN you'd have no choice.

Subject: RE: BS: Who wants 'more choice'?
From: GUEST,John from Kemsing
Date: 19 Jan 10 - 09:59 AM

This puts me in mind of the politician, when, at the time of proposed railway privatisation, he proclaimed the public would benefit by having more choice. He was rather bamboozled when he was asked to explain how many trains did he expect to arrive at Sevenoaks station at 8.12am giving the choice of transport to Charing Cross!!.

Subject: RE: BS: Who wants 'more choice'?
From: Chris Green
Date: 19 Jan 10 - 11:00 AM

'Choice' is another way of saying 'privatisation'. Privatisation means that whatever the service is will be run for financial gain first and foremost. Essential services such as trains, healthcare and education shouldn't be run with the primary aim of making lots of money in the short term. Which is why our trains, hospitals and schools are currently buggered!

Chris (being only slightly facetious)

Subject: RE: BS: Who wants 'more choice'?
From: Tug the Cox
Date: 19 Jan 10 - 11:17 AM

Choice means choice. Privatisation means privatisation. Chris is right to warn us to be wary of those who conflate the two to hide their real intentions.

Subject: RE: BS: Who wants 'more choice'?
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 19 Jan 10 - 11:23 AM

Well, david, its seems thet you are choosing Aldi.If Asda reigned supreme in your area, THEN you'd have no choice.

Yes, but they don't and I do so the point is purely academic.

:D

Subject: RE: BS: Who wants 'more choice'?
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 19 Jan 10 - 01:21 PM

There's a ref above to 'choice' often implying a move in a 'rightward' direction, with a suggestion that everyone would think this self-evidently a bad thing. I often wonder WHY leftwing seems assumed by so many Mudcat people to be all our default positions. Many will have realised it isn't always mine — I try to be one who is eclectic & empirical & tries to judge every separate issue on its merits, not from a particular parti-pris POV. But it brings me some unexpected flak:- when, for instance, I once suggested on another thread that the instinctive yah-boo response the name Thatcher could always rely on hereabouts was somewhat underbred and often unfair, I got a more-in-sorrow-than-anger reply in a tone & implication of "Oh, Mike, you can't really mean that there might be anything to be said for her" from Jim Carroll, with whom on matters musical I oft find self in agreement; he seemed to think that anyone who agreed with him to that extent must somehow share hie ideological POVs also. I am not getting at Jim here or trying to reopen former disagreements; & I realise this is all perhaps a bit drifty. But this is an attitude that has been bugging me for some time, & seems particularly prevalent on this thread, which is why I thought this would be a good place to raise it.

Subject: RE: BS: Who wants 'more choice'?
From: Bert
Date: 19 Jan 10 - 01:32 PM

I don't have an instinctive response to Thatcher, My response is a learned one. She stole my vote. Which is just one of the reasons I live in the States now.

Then I became a citizen so that I could bitch about the politicians over here.

Subject: RE: BS: Who wants 'more choice'?
From: Smedley
Date: 19 Jan 10 - 01:35 PM

It was me that made the comment that's prompted your reflections, M. Reasons ? I guess 90%+ of my friends are various shades of left and liberal, and most of my work colleagues (though probably a lower percentage) likewise. So I tend to presume those views until proved otherwise. Obviously the context is important - a majority of my extended family are small-c-conservative on most subjects, which is one reason I don't spend much time with them.

Here in Mudcatworld, the history of folk and associated musics being invested in the left/liberal outlook would be a factor, but it's only on explicitly political threads (or ones which turn that way) that you can have any kind of proof of beliefs, rather than assumptions.

So I will persist in assuming a liberal/left emphasis, because I try to think the best of people!

Subject: RE: BS: Who wants 'more choice'?
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 19 Jan 10 - 01:42 PM

Well there's a nice tendentious climax to your argument, Smed my dear fellow. I appreciate there is a sort of roguish tongue-in-cheekery implied: tho some might regard that as the kind of backdoor of irony that lefties often leave open to escape thru if called on the full implications of some of their assertions & attitudes! For the moment, let me just query your assumed equation of 'liberal' & 'left' — it ain't necessarily so, as Ira G observed.

Subject: RE: BS: Who wants 'more choice'?
From: Bert
Date: 19 Jan 10 - 02:02 PM

Seems to me that everyone wants the same thing, some sort of balance between freedom and control. It's just a question of where you draw the line.

Subject: RE: BS: Who wants 'more choice'?
From: Bee-dubya-ell
Date: 19 Jan 10 - 04:41 PM

I'd be all for more choice if there were any chance it meant real choice. When politicians use the term, they're usually talking about a choice between a pile of horse shit, on the one hand, or a pile of cow shit on the other. There's usually no way to exercise a choice for no shit at all.

Example: You can have a relatively inexpensive army by requiring that everyone in the country serve a hitch and pay them crap wages while they're serving. Or you can levy lots of taxes to fund an all volunteer army that pays well and uses expensive technology so that one well-trained techno-soldier can do the work of ten old style grunts. So, your choices are get drafted (the pile of horseshit) or pay lots of taxes (the pile of cowshit). Getting rid of the conditions that make having an army necessary in the first place (the no shit option) is not even on the table.

Subject: RE: BS: Who wants 'more choice'?
From: Bert
Date: 19 Jan 10 - 05:34 PM

Getting rid of the conditions that make having an army necessary in the first place (the no shit option) is not even on the table.

Good point. We should choose to remember that most Moslems are kind tolerant loving people just like us.

It is fanatics in all religions that make the problems. But it is not just the governments that make the problems. Us ordinary citizens must choose to be tolerant and to choose not to elect intolerant leaders.

Subject: RE: BS: Who wants 'more choice'?
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 19 Jan 10 - 06:48 PM

But we need a lack of tolerance to save us from the Barclay brothers and their ilk.

I can't offhand think of a rich man since the original Cadbury who did anything good for the working person - and look where his empire eventually ended up.

Certainly I do not want more of the kind of choice that means I need to spend hours to decide whether to change my energy supplier or my telephone call provider (or telephone line provider) because I know that every pitch for my business will be replete with lies half truths and omissions, or that replaces operating systems that have nearly got rid of the bugs with ones that have more bugs and demand all new programs to go with them and all new hardware to go with that, or that provides me (historic example) with a choice of VHS Betamax or Philips V2000, or indeed that replaces the reliable and fairly economical Morris 1000 with the totally useless Morris Marina.

Or the sort of choice that means that when I need a replacement phone the battery life is less than half of the old one because of a pile of useless gadgets.

Look at the result of "choice" in the former USSR. Swindlers have stolen the state resources, and only they and gangsters can afford to buy anything in shops.

Subject: RE: BS: Who wants 'more choice'?
From: Bert
Date: 19 Jan 10 - 07:22 PM

When MCI broke the phone monopoly over here, the cost of phone services tumbled.

Subject: RE: BS: Who wants 'more choice'?
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 19 Jan 10 - 07:29 PM

Bruce Springsteen summed up the truth about most of the "choice" we're given when he sang "57 channels and nothing on".

But of course 57 channels is nothing to what we have now. And there's still nothing on. Well, there's Celebrity Big Brother and World Championship Bowls and Late Night Poker...

Subject: RE: BS: Who wants 'more choice'?
From: GUEST,999
Date: 19 Jan 10 - 08:40 PM

"Who wants 'more choice'?"

Asked no doubt for the benefit of those who can afford it!

Subject: RE: BS: Who wants 'more choice'?
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 20 Jan 10 - 01:20 AM

Bit of a slowburn response to BERT —

What exactly did you mean on your post yesterday, that Mrs Thatcher "stole" your vote? 'Stole' in what sense; & in what circumstances? Genuinely curious as to what you meant by that, & what happened --

Michael

Subject: RE: BS: Who wants 'more choice'?
From: GUEST,Shimrod
Date: 20 Jan 10 - 03:51 AM

A few years ago my employer, at that time, sent me to Indonesia for three weeks to do some collaborative work with my Indonesian colleagues. I stayed with a senior manager out there, in the guest suite of his luxurious apartment in Jakarta.

One evening, on the way home from work, this manager stopped at a shopping mall (with which the city is littered) to buy some groceries. I was detailed to find a particular brand of chili sauce. I was confronted with a massive carousel of virtually every brand of chili sauce in the world (except, ironically, the one that my colleague required!). This was choice gone completely mad!

Meanwhile, away from the glitzy shopping malls, skyscrapers and boulevards, thousands of people with no choices whatsoever lived in squalor in slums and scraped a living by begging on the streets ...

Subject: RE: BS: Who wants 'more choice'?
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 20 Jan 10 - 04:36 AM

Shimrod's post raises the interesting point of too much choice being counterproductive. Faced with the infinity of brands for any item on supmarkt shelves, one can feel like the donkey starving between the two bale of hay, & think sodit & go without...

Subject: RE: BS: Who wants 'more choice'?
From: theleveller
Date: 20 Jan 10 - 05:20 AM

Interesting topic. The idea that choice is always a good thing doesn't stack up. For it to be so, the things to be chosen have to be of equal merit or offer real alternatives. There are also some areas where many of us don't have the requisite knowledge to make a sensible choice and require informed and impartial advice which, let's be honest, is not always forthcoming.

Too much choice can also be counterproductive, leading to confusion and, in the end, no choice being made.

That said, it's usually good to be offered one.

Subject: RE: BS: Who wants 'more choice'?
From: Tug the Cox
Date: 20 Jan 10 - 11:47 AM

I Would generally appreciate the choice between eating and fasting on any particular day..
The choice between sleeping indoors or outdoors...
the choice as to whether to do military service...
The choice to have a drink in a pub on Sunday, or go to a service if I want to..
A real choice between honest politicians who stand for what they believe.
Oh well, perhaps the last one, a pre-requisite of democracy, is a bit too optimistic.

Subject: RE: BS: Who wants 'more choice'?
From: GUEST,leeneia
Date: 20 Jan 10 - 11:52 AM

Sometimes 'choice' is a euphemism for laziness.

For example: it used to be that if you wanted sane, reliable advice on a topic, you went to your public library. Then somebody realized that they could save time and salaries by just buying whatever books came along. The shelves filled up with any old thing. You want black magic, quackery, dangerous fad diets, conspiracy theory? You got it.

They call it 'freedom of speech.' It's just poor service.

Subject: RE: BS: Who wants 'more choice'?
From: GUEST,Shimrod
Date: 20 Jan 10 - 12:00 PM

I just popped into Sainsbury's in Urmston (in Trafford - near Manchester)to get some cooking oil and ground cumin (is there currently a ground cumin shortage - I've been struggling recently to buy any? Sorry, thread drift ... ). Anyway some bloke comes up to me and tells me that Sainsburys are now selling gas and electricity cheaper than anyone else.

Why the f***k are Sainsburys selling energy? Stick to cooking oil and ground cumin, that's what I say!

As I couldn't remember exactly how much I am currently paying for energy, from some other bunch of 'licensed bandits', I didn't know whether he was telling me porkies or not. He also had an irritating spiel and demanded that I sign up there and then (rather than take some literature home and compare it with what I am currently paying) so I politely told him to get lost.

Still, it makes a change from being accosted and 'doorstepped' by s***ing Scottish Power and their even more irritating 'mouthpieces' (Irritating mouthpiece: "Good morning, sir! Did you know that you are eligible for an energy rebate?" Me: "Get to the point or f***k off!")

I don't want spurious 'choice' in energy supply - I want energy which is as cheap as possible and I don't want to be accosted all the time by programmed robots!!

Subject: RE: BS: Who wants 'more choice'?
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 20 Jan 10 - 12:15 PM

Cumin ("Jeera") is usually cheaper in the asian minimarkets with a substantially asian customer base, and they are probably the only source for Kala Jeera. It smells heavenly!

You can always smash it to bits in a blender if you want to.

Subject: RE: BS: Who wants 'more choice'?
From: Bert
Date: 20 Jan 10 - 12:19 PM

...What exactly did you mean on your post yesterday, that Mrs Thatcher "stole" your vote?...

I was working overseas and there was a vote re: joining the Common Market. Maggy did not allow us to have a postal vote because many ex-pats were against it.

Subject: RE: BS: Who wants 'more choice'?
From: Tug the Cox
Date: 20 Jan 10 - 12:32 PM

There was never a vote on joining the common market. Heath joined it, and then gave us a referendum on whether we wanted to stay in. Thatcher was education secretary at the time.

Subject: RE: BS: Who wants 'more choice'?
From: Bert
Date: 20 Jan 10 - 12:54 PM

Picky picky, she was leader of the Conservative party which was in power.

Subject: RE: BS: Who wants 'more choice'?
From: GUEST,Shimrod
Date: 20 Jan 10 - 01:41 PM

Thanks Richard,

We have a shop just around the corner from me which is owned by a Pakistani family and has been my source of spices for years and years. Recently they stopped selling them and when I asked why all they would say was "discontinued".

In the Manchester suburb of Rusholme we have the fabled 'Curry Mile' replete with Asian supermarkets, but it's a bit of a trek for me (2 buses) - but when I'm next in the vicinity I'll just have to stock up.

You see, there's often less choice in the important things in life!

Subject: RE: BS: Who wants 'more choice'?
From: kendall
Date: 20 Jan 10 - 02:56 PM

To my friends across the pond; once a society loses its freedom it never regains it. Don't let them take away your National health system for the same reason.

Subject: RE: BS: Who wants 'more choice'?
From: Tug the Cox
Date: 21 Jan 10 - 08:12 AM

Bert, your dates are way out. Heath was followed by Wilson,( when the referendum took place in 1975) then Callaghan, before Thatcher 1979.