Jeremy

Dragon Castle = good. And ideally situated in Elephant & Castle, which I hear is the new Knightsbridge.

But Louisa, it's not the place of private shopkeepers and security guards to administer their own punishment. They'd already caught the guy, no need to rough him up if he's not fighting back!!

There you go Nico, food's sorted.

I recently went to a pub which served "british tapas"... ie pork crackling, yorkshire puddings (with gravy dip), fish fingers, little pasty things, etc. It was a bit silly.

Le Chardon do average bistro food... you can have a nice meal if you choose well, but the service is awful.

"can't be bothered to wait until the shop has opened"? How about the majority of us who aren't around during the daytime when these shops are open? I'm not saying we should all leave our stuff outside, but it's not necessarily a simple matter of "can't be bothered".

Isn't dancing more of a cultural thing though?

I understand the trauma of having a baby animal die in your garden, I would also be upset if it happened. But saying that... looking at it objectively, and from a purely logical perspective - why should we get so upset over the death of a fox, when we don't mind seeing other animals killed? Fox cubs may be cute, but foxes spread disease, and can attack other animals (some of which are nowhere near as propsperous as foxes, and need protection).

Yes, I think the term "race" is pretty broad and arbitrary... usually referring to groups of people with common heritage, which could be national, regional, tribal, etc. But sometimes also seems to be used in the context of nationality (instead of the country your ancestors were indigenous to).

Actually... although a few of the dishes on the menu at Le Moulin sound a bit dodgy, I actually had a pretty decent bit of meat there a while back. I would consider going back if I still lived up that end of ED.

louisiana - I agree that Estate Agents could definitely use their cars less, however they will often show customers around 3 or 4 properties in one appointment, so the car does have its place. Having less estate agents would be a more workable solution that trying to switch them over to bicycles.

Yeah! Let's get rid of the police, that will work! As for those civil servants... power-crazed megalomaniacs, the lot of them! Get rid!

Lordship Lane looks to be entirely in the yellow/average bracket as far as I can tell. Poor old Peckham and Camberwell don't come off too well, do they?

Huguenot - thanks for the reply. I understand your concerns, but surely it is obvious that different racial groups have different physical characteristics (some superficial, and arguably others which are not so superficial), so I cannot understand why it's taboo to discuss it intelligently. I couldn't really give a toss about the skin colour of sprinters, but I don't like the way it's considered borderline racist to dare to mention it. Yes you have to be careful not to "egg on the wallies"... which it's why it's so important to draw a definite line between physical differences, and any perceived behavioural differences, which if they exist are surely social/cultural.

Taper, what exactly do you think my original point was? You seem to have read between the lines, and assumed that I think "all black guys are really good at running", or some such rubbish. All I ever really did was to point out the obvious fact that all current top sprinters are black, and to suggest that there could be a genetic trend in there somewhere. I never suggested it was a simple pattern, I never suggested it was just related to tone of skin, and I never suggested other factors were not relevant. Huguenot - "neanderthal logic"? Are you referring to me? For some reason, I find myself having to repeat myself, by saying that at no point did I say that belonging to a certain race ensures you have any special abilities. Some of us are intelligent enough to distinguish between inherited physical characteristics, and criminal activity.

So we agree that it's a combination of hereditary factors, and social/environmental factors. Good. There seems to remain a disagreement about the balance of the two, but at the end of the day, neither of us know... we're both applying our own mixture of logic and assumptions. It will be interesting to see whether the trend in sprinting does continue. I know what you mean about boxing, I was going to bring it up myself. However, the standard of heavyweight boxing these days is awful, the current crop of champs are surely not up there with some of the fighters of the 90s (just look at how a middle-aged Holyfield still held his own against Ibragimov recently). Maybe in the states, all of the big lads are being drawn into the NFL or other more lucrative sports instead these days?

As I said in my previous post... I was never trying to suggest that "all blacks" are great sprinters. I was saying that all great (modern day) sprinters are black. I am quite happy to believe that certain sub-groups are genetically advantaged, and again I repeat that I already know there is a great deal of genetic diversity in Africa. Your "pygmy" example is largely wasted on me - I have no need for a lesson in logical deduction. In short, I agree with you. What I object to is to is people who refuse to believe that genetics play a factor, possibly because they believe it to be politically incorrect to do so. Skiing is not a good example, as most of us can run every day if we choose to... very few of us can ski regularly, due to geography and wealth. It is also a more technical discipline than sprinting, and plainly has nothing to do with genetics/evolution.

Hi david_carnell - I do agree with a lot of what you say, the cultural aspects, parental support, coaching, etc are all bound to have a large impact on the success of a sportsman. But surely there are genetic factors too. Not everyone is born with the potential to become a great athlete, there's undeniably a hereditary factor. And I'm not sure I necessarily believe that athletics/sprinting is more ingrained in black cultures than it is in other cultures (although I won't mind if someone proves me wrong). Now, of course the top performers are not representative of their entire ethnic group, but isn't it possible that certain ethnic groups, certain patterns of genes etc are more capable of producing the occasional elite specimen than others?

Brendan/taper/coachkelly et al - I am aware that there is a lot of genetic diversity in Africa, it was not my intention to suggest that "all blacks are the same", or any such nonsense. Perhaps there is a specific region or "population group" which has attributes particularly suited to sprinting, and many of today's athletes inherit genes from that group? In a similar way to certain East African countries who tend to do very well at distance running. Certainly it doesn't seem unrealistic to suggest that certain genetic groups are prone to a certain body shape, muscular development, etc, which would give certain physical advantages. Taper seems to acknowledge this himself, so I can't quite work out what his beef is. Is it just because I used the term "black", rather than being more specific? CitizenED, you make an intesting point and I agree to an extent. But seeing as that experiment will never happen, I am just going by the data available.

coachkelly Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > Could a factor in the dominance of black > sprinters also be attributed to the fact that many > of them took performance enhancing drugs. I don't think that's really a fair comment, seeing as almost all modern top-flight 100m runners are black. Maybe no top level white 100m runners have been found guilty, simply because there aren't any!! No white man has reached the olympic 100m final since 1980.

coachkelly Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > With regards to sprinting, the > current number 1 british sprinter is a young white > guy named Craig Pickering. But the *fastest* british sprinter at the moment is Dwain Chambers. And the fastest british sprinter ever is Linford Christie. The 100m medals at the olympics will probably go to the Bolt, Powell and Gay. Fastest 100m ever, Bolt. Fastest 200m and 400m ever, Johnson. Of course this is circumstantial, but it certainly looks like a trend worth considering to me. To be honest I don't really care who the fastest sprinters are, I just don't like the way people are made to feel guilty for suggesting that there may be physical differences between races.

You confuse me, Taper. Can you clarify the difference between "population groups" and racial groups in your statement? You see, this is the kind of thing that really annoys me... refusing outright to recognise that top sprinters tend to be from African heritage... absurd. Naive, faux political correctness.

Well... I think it may have been racist... it seems as though he was singling her out and trying to embarrass her, based on her race. Which is a horrible thing to do.

bignumber5 Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > There are terms that are "offensive" depending on > who delivers them, to who and in what context. The > same term can be harmless, or even a display of > affection, in different hands (my best mate from > uni greets me with "ay opp, c**t", and I do the > same back to him). Yes.

Sue Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > Have you actually read anything I've written? I could ask you exactly the same question! I don't know *any* English people who are offended by being called "rosbif", in fact most people think it's a bit of fun. So by your own logic - people aren't offended by it, therefore it's not offensive. But the intentions behind the words are absolutely relevant, most people are intelligent enough to understand when someone's being spiteful or not - eg context, tone of voice... these things have to be taken into account. Surely you can understand that? At the end of the day, I fundamentally disagree with you - and arguing on here isn't going to change that.