BS: Margaret Thatcher meets mudcatter

Subject: RE: BS: Margaret Thatcher meets mudcatter
From: GUEST,Big Norman Voice
Date: 30 Oct 08 - 10:58 AM

Extract from Mudcat FAQ


"We try very hard to preserve freedom of expression here at Mudcat, so we edit and delete messages as sparingly as we can. However, part of that freedom is that people should feel safe to be here and express their ideas without fear of being bullied or threatened. Heated discussions are generally considered "protected" around here, but if you find a post that is seriously offensive because it is a threat or a personal attack, let Joe or Pene (or Max) know about it and we'll take a look at it."

BNV

Subject: RE: BS: Margaret Thatcher meets mudcatter
From: Mrs.Duck
Date: 30 Oct 08 - 03:45 PM

Whilst I might agree with the above guest's (Jack Campin) sentiments this is no place for such vile language!

Subject: RE: BS: Margaret Thatcher meets mudcatter
From: SussexCarole
Date: 30 Oct 08 - 04:32 PM

I don't 'do' politics (or religion) of any sort. Many years back (in Maggie Thatcher's time) I worked for a woman who was horrified that I was refusing to vote at the General Election when there was a woman PM. She then offered me the challenge that if I promised to vote then she would give me a half day holiday. So I agreed to vote...had the holiday...& kept my promise. I voted for everyone on the ballot paper!

Subject: RE: BS: Margaret Thatcher meets mudcatter
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 30 Oct 08 - 07:22 PM

There is no language too vile for Thatcher. She should not be permitted the surcease of death, but perpetual suffering. It is what she gave everyone else.

But "cunt" should not be a term of abuse.

Subject: RE: BS: Margaret Thatcher meets mudcatter
From: DougR
Date: 30 Oct 08 - 07:32 PM

Clr: Right on!

DougR

Subject: RE: BS: Margaret Thatcher meets mudcatter
From: Cllr
Date: 30 Oct 08 - 07:40 PM

Im not really surprised at some of the comments but then that wasnt why i started the thread, (there was another thread to discuss the issues of Europe but that one sank beneath the waves- still the granny basher seem to be enjoing themselves, but they were in a minority then and they are in a minority now.
10 MORE YEARS i can hear it now, sometimes i wonder what keeps this wonderful lady's accomplishments alive in the memory today is it her admirers or is those who scream abuse; the fact is that she still today inspires both proves one thing whatever you think of her she made a mark which cannot be ignored.
Cllr

Subject: RE: BS: Margaret Thatcher meets mudcatter
From: Joe Offer
Date: 31 Oct 08 - 12:01 AM

I draw the line at "cunt" and "nigger," along with personal attacks.
We generally allow "colorful" language, but that word is generally considered "beyond the pale" in the US. We do NOT allow personal attacks, even if they come from self-righteous people who have never been wrong in their lives. So, OK, I deleted the "cunt" post, and the one that called a Mudcatter an "infantile prick" or something like that.
Grow up, people!! Learn to express your ideas without all the juvenile crap.

-Joe Offer-

Subject: RE: BS: Margaret Thatcher meets mudcatter
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 31 Oct 08 - 04:12 AM

Joe, you mean "Beyond the pale except when used by John McCain to his wife as a term of abuse"? I know you would condemn it but the US did not rise in storm against McCain as a reslt, so how can you say that the word is "unacceptable"? It was accepted.


Cllr - the mark she made was the destruction of UK production and its replacement by shill-game "banking" for which the chickens have finally come home to roost. Thatcherwasm and Reaganomics gave is the current world-wide slump, and caused (intentionally) a huge amount of misery.

"Evil" is an apt word for her. She sowed the wind. Let her reap the worlwind. She had no regard for others. She and her cronies intentionally corrupted the electoral system. She was always ready to grind the faces of those weakest in society. Nothing done to her know can be as bad as what she did.

Subject: RE: BS: Margaret Thatcher meets mudcatter
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 31 Oct 08 - 06:42 AM

Hmm, I seem to be typing like the Capting this morning.
"result"
"us"
"whirlwind"
"now".

E&OE

Subject: RE: BS: Margaret Thatcher meets mudcatter
From: Peter K (Fionn)
Date: 31 Oct 08 - 06:43 AM

"Whilst I might agree with the above guest's (Jack Campin) sentiments this is no place for such vile language!"

Wake up, Mudcat moderators - what's that all about? Either do your meddling properly or leave well alone. And Joe, is the phrase "infantile prick" really that much worse than "juvenile crap"? I have no problem describing John MacKenzie's take on Tony Benn ("a proper loony") as juvenile crap if that makes you happy.

Subject: RE: BS: Margaret Thatcher meets mudcatter
From: Stu
Date: 31 Oct 08 - 06:55 AM

"10 MORE YEARS i can hear it now, sometimes i wonder what keeps this wonderful lady's accomplishments alive in the memory today is it her admirers"

This statement alone illustrates why the Tories should never be voted back into government; they are utterly bereft of compassion and understanding.

Subject: RE: BS: Margaret Thatcher meets mudcatter
From: Eric the Viking
Date: 31 Oct 08 - 08:20 AM

People were proud to have met Hilter, Stalin and the like.I knew a man that met Hitler, he admired him at the time he told me and was carried along with the fervour of the time. I suppose this could be moved to an "I've met someone famous/infamous" thread. No matter what, Thatcher will go down in history unlike most politicians. Though I wouldn't describe her on mudcat in the words that have caused so much upset.

(I personally have always wondered who decided on my behalf that certain words should be deemed as offensive.) So I put it another way

According to the compact Oxford English dictionary; Margaret Thatcher was/is an "unpleasant stupid person". Of course if you are Austrailian....

Cunt (IPA:/kʌnt/) is an English language vulgarism referring generally to the female genitalia,[1] specifically the Cleft of Venus. The earliest citation of this usage in the Oxford English Dictionary, circa 1230, refers to the London street known as "Gropecunt Lane".

"Cunt" is also used informally as a derogatory epithet in referring to either sex, but this usage is relatively recent, dating back only as far as the late nineteenth century.[2] The Compact Oxford English Dictionary defines "cunt" as "an unpleasant or stupid person", whereas Merriam-Webster defines the term as "a disparaging term for a woman" and "a woman regarded as a sexual object"; the Macquarie Dictionary of Australian English defines it as "a despicable man".

I myself spent quite a long time in the company of Sir Isaac Heyward an altogether much better and caring person than the group of tory toadies led by an "unpleasant stupid person".

As for Cllr, some time ago we crossed swords over something similar to this. I'm happy that you met someone you admired and there is no slurr upon you as far as I am concerned.

Subject: RE: BS: Margaret Thatcher meets mudcatter
From: John MacKenzie
Date: 31 Oct 08 - 08:34 AM

Now that's what I call tolerance Eric ;)
An uncommon virtue around here.

Subject: RE: BS: Margaret Thatcher meets mudcatter
From: Cllr
Date: 31 Oct 08 - 09:08 AM

stig i waxed overly-lyrical perhaps to emphasize a point,
You only quoted half the statement and in context it would be more accurate
", sometimes i wonder what keeps this wonderful lady's accomplishments alive in the memory today is it her admirers or is those who scream abuse"

but happily you make the point that i'm trying to make better than i could with your own post.
Cllr

Subject: RE: BS: Margaret Thatcher meets mudcatter
From: Mr Red
Date: 31 Oct 08 - 09:25 AM

Mr Red does not see red Cllr, other people see red when I am at a festival.

At the risk of stating the obvious, Maggie Thatcher the politician - we criticise and it is opinion. And valid.
Margaret Thatcher the person - we criticise and become rude.

But then, when did politicians draw that line properly?

Subject: RE: BS: Margaret Thatcher meets mudcatter
From: theleveller
Date: 31 Oct 08 - 09:38 AM

When she goes I won't just dance on her grave, I'll organise a ceilidh.

Subject: RE: BS: Margaret Thatcher meets mudcatter
From: goatfell
Date: 31 Oct 08 - 11:18 AM

and I'll organise a street party, but then Shit deosn't burn and when she and her 'friends' die they all go to hell and she'll be telling the Satan what to do.

Subject: RE: BS: Margaret Thatcher meets mudcatter
From: Cllr
Date: 31 Oct 08 - 11:29 AM

A number of people have said this about dancing on her grave ( I think thats why she has requested to be buried at sea.)
Cllr

Subject: RE: BS: Margaret Thatcher meets mudcatter
From: George Papavgeris
Date: 31 Oct 08 - 11:54 AM

My Dad was a teacher. In 1946 he was teaching in a village school at the outskirts of Salonika, when the school was paid a visit by the then Queen of Greece, Frederica (the later King Constantine's Mum). Dad was responsible for welcoming her, organising some flowers and giving a speech. Photographs were duly taken, and there is one of him addressing the Queen, looking ever so serious and slightly-in-awe. That photo had pride of place in my parents' bedroom for years.

The thing is however that Frederica was well known for her fascist tendencies, and she was a meddlesome Queen and later Queen Mother. Some put her behind King Constantine's failed coup against the Colonels' junta in the 1970s. In any case, she was a hateful character. And my Dad was a Liberal Democrat all his life. Yet still he was proud of meeting the Queen and of that picture. It never made sense to me.

When he died, my Mum pressed that picture into my hands among other mementoes. I didn't really want it, but then I couldn't throw it away either, my Mum entrusted me with something SHE considered important.

So I keep it, no longer in a frame but in a folder, hidden away.

Subject: RE: BS: Margaret Thatcher meets mudcatter
From: George Papavgeris
Date: 31 Oct 08 - 11:55 AM

As I am in a confessional mood...

And I did take some sweets from a shop once.

Subject: RE: BS: Margaret Thatcher meets mudcatter
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 31 Oct 08 - 12:15 PM

But you cannot tell a lie...

Subject: RE: BS: Margaret Thatcher meets mudcatter
From: kendall
Date: 31 Oct 08 - 12:17 PM

There is one hard and firm rule here. Personal attacks are NOT permitted. Name calling is a personal attack. If that's all you have to say, reconsider before posting.

Subject: RE: BS: Margaret Thatcher meets mudcatter
From: kendall
Date: 31 Oct 08 - 12:33 PM

Peter K , if you don't see the difference, I have to wonder if you have a learning disability.

Subject: RE: BS: Margaret Thatcher meets mudcatter
From: kendall
Date: 31 Oct 08 - 12:45 PM

As I understand it, we can say anything about a public figure and it's just an opinion. However, we are not permitted to attack members of this forum.
Seems pretty simple to me.

Subject: RE: BS: Margaret Thatcher meets mudcatter
From: goatfell
Date: 31 Oct 08 - 01:31 PM

I can swim Maggie, but shit does float, Thatcher, I don't mind people who are Tory, Labour, Lib Dems or memeber of any other politcal party except the BNP and their firends, but I have an opinon the same as any else, just because I don't like her and I'm glad that Cllr had a good time.

Subject: RE: BS: Margaret Thatcher meets mudcatter
From: Peter K (Fionn)
Date: 31 Oct 08 - 03:13 PM

As I understand it, we can say anything about a public figure and it's just an opinion. However, we are not permitted to attack members of this forum. Seems pretty simple to me.

Simple but stupid Kendall. For instance if Tony Benn, who has appeared onstage at numerous folk-music events, were to post here would he then have moderator protection? Are we disallowed from abusing Eliza Carthy in MacKenziesque terms because she has posted here?

And why is it OK to suggest that a member has learning difficulties? Where such a suggestion might be true it is intrusive and offensive and where it is known to be untrue it is insulting. Or "juvenile crap" as we can now describe abuse with impunity. Wise up.

Subject: RE: BS: Margaret Thatcher meets mudcatter
From: kendall
Date: 31 Oct 08 - 03:25 PM

You are the one who needs t wise up!
There are rules here and they are enforced.
At least 4 other trouble makers have found out the hard way, with a little luck, you could be next.

Subject: RE: BS: Margaret Thatcher meets mudcatter
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 31 Oct 08 - 03:29 PM

That seems unnecessarily adversarial, Kendall.

Subject: RE: BS: Margaret Thatcher meets mudcatter
From: kendall
Date: 31 Oct 08 - 03:31 PM

I don't know who Tony Benn is or Eliza whatever, and I did not say you have a learning disability. What I said was "If you don't understand the difference between calling a member an infantile prick, and someone suggesting that an opinion is crap then I have to believe you either don't see it or you don't want to see it.

My main message is, PERSONAL ATTACKS ARE NOT PERMITTED ON THIS FORUM. Period. As they say, "If you know the dog bites..."

Subject: RE: BS: Margaret Thatcher meets mudcatter
From: Peter K (Fionn)
Date: 31 Oct 08 - 07:01 PM

I suppose it's easy to forget what you wrote three hours earlier, Kendall, but let me help:

"Peter K , if you don't see the difference, I have to wonder if you have a learning disability." — Kendall

Of course, if you're trying to resile from that, you could always get Mudcat management to moderate your earlier post.

Subject: RE: BS: Margaret Thatcher meets mudcatter
From: Peter K (Fionn)
Date: 31 Oct 08 - 07:10 PM

Oh, and to introduce a folk element, Eliza Carthy is a musician widely acclaimed in the UK and far beyond, also well known in Brit folk circles as the daughter of folk luminaries Martin Carthy and Norma Waterson. It's time you got back to the UK Kendall - you're slipping out of touch, LOL.

Subject: RE: BS: Margaret Thatcher meets mudcatter
From: kendall
Date: 31 Oct 08 - 07:36 PM

What I said was in plain English. .."I have to wonder if you have a learning disability" Notice that I did not say you have a learning disability. Can you really say you don't see the difference?

Also, if I step out of line I will be put in my place. It has happened before, and I deserved it. No one is immune.

I plan to return to the UK in 2010. It's one of my favorite places on earth.

Subject: RE: BS: Margaret Thatcher meets mudcatter
From: Peter K (Fionn)
Date: 01 Nov 08 - 09:26 AM

Well if you want to nit-pick Kendall I did not, for my part, say anyone was an infantile prick. I said someone had reduced himself to that level.

Watch out for "Eliza whatever" when you get here next time. Hard to miss her, but you have obviously managed to do so on previous visits :-)

Subject: RE: BS: Margaret Thatcher meets mudcatter
From: kendall
Date: 01 Nov 08 - 10:54 AM

You call it nit picking, I call it using precise language.Trying to read someone else's mind is dangerous.

Subject: RE: BS: Margaret Thatcher meets mudcatter
From: Stu
Date: 01 Nov 08 - 10:59 AM

"but happily you make the point that i'm trying to make better than i could with your own post."

Cheers.

The problem is Cllr, I've seen the Tory party from the inside and didn't particularly like what I saw. At the same time I was on the sharp end of Thatcherite employment policy for youth and was gaining a first-hand understanding that the grass-roots supporters of the policy within the party didn't have the first idea how it worked, why it was exploitative and or it's implication for the people railroaded onto the scheme. They simply supported it without question.

I remember an MP who squirrelled away funds from business into a private account, the appalling treatment of peaceful protesters who were marching for their jobs, the blinkered attitude of the local association towards anyone who would introduce fresh, new ideas.

I was lucky enough that our local branch chairman at the time (now a senior political correspondent for a national television station) actually encouraged debate and provoked discussion; he was in complete contrast to the senior association wonks who seemed intent on arse-licking the incumbent member and (with the exception of the occasional maverick), never questioning his policies or ethics. I heard stories and saw things (especially with regard to the local politicians) that would make your hair curl that I would never repeat on a forum or even out aloud.

Many of the people I met were genuine, intelligent and I had great respect for them but at the end of the day I realised the well-being of ordinary people must come before anything and any other choice was at best mean-spirited, at worse immoral. The one thing the Tory party taught me was I could never be a Tory. Right or wrong, I care too much.

I'm glad you enjoyed your mutal back-slap with the great and good of British right-wing politics (and hey - who doesn't enjoy a party? No harm there). I saw too much of the damage they did to our society to see them as some gentle, treasured relics of a by-gone age that deserve to be feted in their dotage; to at least remind them of the misery they created and the legacy they have left us to make the best of would be far more honest and just.

Subject: RE: BS: Margaret Thatcher meets mudcatter
From: goatfell
Date: 01 Nov 08 - 11:03 AM

I have a learning disabilty but then so do we all, because to learn a new thing and you can't does that make you have a learning disabilty.

Subject: RE: BS: Margaret Thatcher meets mudcatter
From: vectis
Date: 01 Nov 08 - 07:58 PM

Politicians of all colours from deepest blue to deepest red feather their own nests before anyone elses. Part of being human I suppose.

I think history will treat Maggie Thatcher (going to aid of colony that had asked for help) far more kindly than it will treat Blair (illegal war and invasion of a country that was no direct threat to Britain or any part of the commonwealth) or Brown (spendthrift policies that deepen a recession and then saddle our grandchildren with a mountain of debt to spend even more in an attempt to buy us out of recession).

Subject: RE: BS: Margaret Thatcher meets mudcatter
From: M.Ted
Date: 02 Nov 08 - 04:43 PM

The fact that cllr and company had not met Ms. Thatcher before this reflects the fact that he, like most of the rest of us mudcatters, has lived a life far from the centers of power.

As an American, though I am far from the halls habited by Ms. Thatcher and Mr. Benn, I have the sense that, however they may violently differ on, say, folk music, as fellow travellers, they speak, or spoke, to one another with a standardized sort of civility. So it should be here.

If we differ on politics, well, we're not politicians, we are fellow travellers of another sort, and we shouldn't strain that bond for the sake of things that we have left to others to work out.

Also, I must remind our sometimes preoccupied brethren from the UK that though they may be accustomed to certain things like Eliza Carthy and certain "Anglo-Saxonisms", they are not common currency with most of us over here--

Subject: RE: BS: Margaret Thatcher meets mudcatter
From: Gervase
Date: 02 Nov 08 - 05:38 PM

For my sins, my background is similar to Stigweard's. I was a Tory, and actually voted for Thatcher in 1979 because I thought she might offer some radical change from the moribund and destructive cycle that had gone on before. By the time of the Falklands I had change my opinion radically, and have never regretted it. She was a disaster.
I know there are many who will say that she 'cured' the ills of the nation, but to me it's along the same lines as the doctor who said 'The procedure was a complete success; but unfortunately the patient died'.
I still shudder when I think of the hideous triumphalism of the Eighties Tories, and the way so many working people were conned. The phrase 'lions led by donkeys' comes to mind yet again...

Subject: RE: BS: Margaret Thatcher meets mudcatter
From: Cllr
Date: 02 Nov 08 - 06:31 PM

Its not the first time I have met Margaret Thatcher although it was the first time champagne carol had met her, i have worked in the house of commons as a political researcher so i met quite a lot of MPs from all parties.

I understand the position of stig and have had coverstations irl with Gervase on these subjects over the odd glass or two...

My only observation here is that I would be the first to admit that not all my time within the party have been happy but in conversation with friends who are activists within the labour party they have similiar stories to tell to stigs post.
Most councillors i know are involved in local government becuase they are trying to help their locality and they are mad enough to put the time in so i have at least two things in common with most councillors before we even start talking politics, the environment within which we swim is not perfect and to quote the old saw from churchill "Democracy is the worst form of government except for everything else" but it is what it is. I try to make a difference sometimes I succeed sometimes i don't but the trying is the important part.