Oh come on. Why don't we have a thread where Keith A and Jim Carroll thrash out where they have opposing views? Nobody else need look at it. it can be especially for them. Everybody else takes it in turns to pick on a subject and leave them to it for the following week.

Sorry chaps, but every bloody thread which has intangibles and difficult subjects ends up with what you two call debate and most others call contradiction.

Jim - Keith is a little Englander. Live with it.

Keith - Jim has the whinging sorry outlook of your typical expat. Live with it.

Sorted.

Back to subject;

It occurs to me that although I live in North Lincolnshire, not exactly a melting pot of differing cultures, when we put on a dinner or throw a BBQ, we have pots and a BBQ purely for Halal meat and similar for vegetarian food. When we make our annual vat of mincemeat for mince pies etc, we make a few without suet in the mix. We also have learned to be inventive with interesting alcohol free drinks rather than just offer orange juice. (More wine and beer for me, but that's another matter...)

Why? No reason other than society evolved and people live, work and play alongside each other whilst the usual commentators make a lot of money and influence by noting differences. Twenty years ago, the originally foreign colleagues and their families we call close friends would have been wary and formed their own circles of friends. Ditto us.

Increasingly, it isn't the situation. Perpetuating the differences is obscene enough, but using recent court cases to prove the point is neither helpful or decent. I have no solutions, but neither have I read any above.


(An aside; Bridge seems to heap praise on Austin Mitchell MP. He broke the solicitor stranglehold on buying your own home. Top man, managed to break an obscene monopoly and allow more people to become good small time capitalists. Mind you, would you buy a house in Grimsby?)