God I hate the Guardian

[Parkdrive]

El Pibe Wrote:

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> if you two are going to have a tit for tat touched

> you last type thing, can you dispense with the

> quote this message button.

Yes dad

[El Pibe]

There's a lovely irony in that most muscular of secular states, the US, has in fact, as a society, failed to resolve the questions posed by this separation, and with its peculiar brand of nationalism.

Much of its home grown terrorism revolved around the deep fractures in its society, the same fissures that fuel the Taliban, Hamas, ISIS et al.

I'm no conspiracist, but it is kind of tempting to posit that by keeping such noisy attention on bombing 'them', that the cultural wars in the US have been decidely less deadly than they were.

[Parkdrive]

El Pibe Wrote:

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> There's a lovely irony in that most muscular of

> secular states, the US, has in fact, as a society,

> failed to resolve the questions posed by this

> separation, and with its peculiar brand of

> nationalism.

>

> Much of its home grown terrorism revolved around

> the deep fractures in its society, the same

> fissures that fuel the Taliban, Hamas, ISIS et

> al.

> I'm no conspiracist, but it is kind of tempting to

> posit that by keeping such noisy attention on

> bombing 'them', that the cultural wars in the US

> have been decidely less deadly than they were.

I agree with that EP, defelecting attention away from their own back yard.

[El Pibe]

in fact, whilst i'm at it

"there are huge, huge swathes of the world where secularism and the values of the enlightment are being pushed back by religous dogma in a way that wasn't the case as recently as the 70s and 80s."

Apart from Turkey and Egypt, these huge swathes were only adopting it in the 50s and 60s. The strains were immediately apparent in those societies, giving birth to the Muslim Bortherhood in the 30s (i think) and national resistance in Afghanistan and Iran.

I reckon we can say that we find ourselves where we are today thanks to 1979 with the overthrow of the Shah and the Russian invasion of Afghanistan in a futile bid to force these values on a deeply conservative society.

I recommend "A Destiny Disrupted" an islamic history of the world https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/6240926-destiny-disrupted to get the idea that there can be no separation of state and religion in the Islamic world, Islam governing all aspects of life as it does, is absolutely intrinsically 'political', secularism will only come when the religion itself ceases to be.

[El Pibe]

Parkdrive Wrote:

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> El Pibe Wrote:

> --------------------------------------------------

>

> I agree with that EP, defelecting attention away

> from their own back yard.

I genuinely didn't mean that in a plot type fashion, but that it's useful fallout from their foreign policies, and it does no harm, domestically, to bleat quite as loodly about it as they do.

[Parkdrive]

El Pibe Wrote:

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> Parkdrive Wrote:

> --------------------------------------------------

> -----

> > El Pibe Wrote:

> >

> --------------------------------------------------

>

> >

> > I agree with that EP, defelecting attention

> away

> > from their own back yard.

>

> I genuinely didn't mean that in a plot type

> fashion, but that it's useful fallout from their

> foreign policies, and it does no harm,

> domestically, to bleat quite as loodly about it as

> they do.

I did get that you weren't suggesting a plot thing, but you're spot on with what you say.

[numbers]

Parkdrive Wrote:

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> El Pibe Wrote:

> --------------------------------------------------

> -----

> > if you two are going to have a tit for tat

> touched

> > you last type thing, can you dispense with the

> > quote this message button.

>

> Yes dad

Sorry El pibe dad, won't do it again xx

[El Pibe]

"places like Cairo as recently as 20 years ago had reasonable numbers of bars/nightlife and woman, including locals, could wear what they wanted, no longer."

The middle East had a surprisingly Christian feel right across it, Egypt was a majority christian country as late as something like the 16th century.

One of the things that she describes in the article i linked to was how religion needed a new cohesive force to replace it in the form of nationalism, which by its nature excludes the different.

One of the issues of this reaction to secularism has been curiously nationalist style attempt to eradicate this christian nature of many arabs and arab countries. Willaim Dalrymples travelogue is a great read for this http://www.amazon.co.uk/From-Holy-Mountain-Journey-Byzantium/dp/0006547745 (a clue, at the time 'secular' Turkey was by far the worst)

The Assads may have killed half a million of their citizens between them, but they were tolerant of everything, bar (no pun intended) disloyalty.

[Otta]

http://internationaltimes.it/red-neoliberals-how-corbyns-victory-unmasked-britains-guardian/

[malumbu]

Hope most people here treat much of what they say with a pinch of salt. Often useful to support your own innate opinion. In my area of expertise the articles are not that well informed and often recycled. I should ghost write for them.

But hell it isn't the narrow minded little England of the Mail or (not that anyone reads it) the Express. And people do quote these papers once you move out of our more enlightened area with their mouths frothing.

And the comic of the Times (fortunately even fewer read that)

And the Telegraph stuck in some previous century.

Not commenting on the red tops, they are what they are.

Tried the Indie but just too boring.

Have you ever wondered why you never see a nipple in the Daily Express?

[Loz]

The Guardian seems to have taken on the old Ryanair business model - piss as many of your customers off as you can.

[Laddy Muck]

[Seabag]

???? Wrote:

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Nuffin, but your PM box is full ????'s

🕳🤔

[Loz]

Just in time for Christmas - a classic Guardian article. The comments underneath are well worth a read.

http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/dec/22/lego-mini-figure-disability-toy-disabled-children

[Earl Aelfheah]

Reminds me of this: http://www.thedailymash.co.uk/news/society/lego-promoting-unrealistic-body-image-2015061899397

[Otta]

So, which Lego set would you like for Christmas Johnny? You could have the pirate ship, the castle, the spaceship, or the new step free access train station...

[uncleglen]

Surely the pirate ship has some peg-legs and eye-patches?

[Otta]

Darth Bader relies on a machine to breathe FFS.

[Loz]

Get an ageing pop star with no qualifications whatsoever to dish out advice to vulnerable people... what could possibly go wrong? First up: here's a 14 year old pupil developing an obsession for her teacher. Alanis' advice: "try and arrange some one-on-one tutorials with this teacher".

Holy crap. How irresponsible was it publishing this?

http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2016/jan/29/ask-alanis-obsessed-with-my-teacher-what-can-i-do

[Sue]

I saw that.

My reaction exactly.

[Earl Aelfheah]

So you hate the Guardian, yet you trawl it for examples of infuriating articles, which you then link to on here?

[Otta]

Haha, good point rah.

[Loz]

rahrahrah Wrote:

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> So you hate the Guardian, yet you trawl it for examples of infuriating articles, which you then link to on here?

A better question would be why someone would read a thread call 'God I hate the Guardian' and then express surprise at the content of the thread.

[Louisa]

I think Loz just bagged the knock out blow right there.

Louisa.

[????]

rahrahrah Wrote:

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> So you hate the Guardian, yet you trawl it for

> examples of infuriating articles, which you then

> link to on here?

Because one of the great joys of life is winding up po-faced sanctimonious Guardian readers maybe?