LATEST MOAN FROM YOU AND ME - 2022

We have up to 12 metre tidal range here in Jersey - and still we have no tidal energy. We import nuclear from France (via a big fat cable), and in the recent fishing debacle, we refused to license a load of french fishing boats; a french minister stupidly threatened to cut our power supply (in major breach of contract). But the interest in exploring other options is now quite high! Happy days.

The island of Alderney has the Alderney Race on their doorstep - with currents up to 8 knots: they are looking too - but the costs for a small island are a bit prohibitive. Still - if anyone could do it, it would be them. Maybe in conjunction with the French just across the water...

We have to do it...

 

Well - I'm an entrepreneur, chartered accountant, with my own companies in London, Jersey and Zurich; I live and work in Jersey and Switzerland, so not your classic marxist eh? I just pay attention to what's going on outside of my immediate P&L... and it makes me despair tbh.

If you haven't noticed the use of extreme right wing tropes by both governement and the hard right press, I wonder how you've missed them? To take a simple example: the suggestion that there is something morally wrong with being a refugee the government backs down on, when explicitly challenged (having overstepped the line, with a dead child on a beach somewhere for eg). And then they blame people traffickers. But the damage is done. We have turned from an island that welcome the kinder trains of WW2 to one which has been completely instrumental in destabilising the maghreb and parts of the middle east, but wants nothing to do with the tidal wave of immigrants that result - and in fact are apparently unconcerned about thousands of deaths by drowning of people fleeing the bombing of their homes and the rise of fasacist dictators, several of whom are British educated, funded and till recently, politically supported.

Sure. Implicit support for neo-fascist groups is right (note that several British fascist groups were explicitly vocal about how they'd 'won' when Boris got in: the EDL being right out there). The lurch of the Overton Window to the hard right? Absolutely.

Sunshine.

 

@JimmyB Not sure why you're listing your achievements and how they're in any way pertinent to the argument. You are making specific statements on a public forum and I am only judging you on those.

For starters there is no "hard right wing popular press in Britain", that's objectively erroneous and I can only conclude that you're deluded if you genuinely think that. Name examples.

The EDL aren't fascist in any way, shape or form. Tommy Robinson is a Liberal AKA Civic Nationalist who is pro-multiculturalism, you should probably explore the writings of Gentile and Mussolini to understand what fascism truly is. The Overton Window has gradually and consistently been shifting to the Far-Left, if anything. Name one Far-Right concept that has been 'mainstreamed' into Western universities, I can give you no end of Far-Left ones.

The entire idea that 'support' for anyone is indicative of anything significant is fallacious in such a partisan sense, you DO realise that real Far-Right crackpots like David Duke and Nick Griffin were supporters of Corbyn because "he was finally going to deal with the Jews", right?

But I would thoroughly agree with you that we have made a complete mess of some parts of the Middle East, as a non-interventionist Libertarian.

Nick

 

Well - I'm explaining that it seems unlikely that I'm an extremist - though 'extreme' depends on where you start from. Who I am isn't pertinent to my argument. But you suggested I am infact an extremist (or doubted I am not) - so we are talking about me, not my arguments there. My credentials are therefore relevant.

Deluded eh?

So sure. The Daily Mail, Sun, Express are all extreme hard right these days. They lie routinely in a way that other parts of the british press don't. Daily. They provide cover for fascism. Daily. Paul Dacre told us explicitly that his job was to give the British people something new to be angry about daily - and he was massaively successful. Stirring the culture wars is leading somewher e- look at America where we seem to sadly always follow, and fascism is now the default for the Republican party which is rolling back decent and normative progress as fast they can.

We can agree to disagree. Tommy Robinson / Yaxley-Lennon is by most reasonable measures a fascist. Violence supporting. Ultra-nationalist. Profoundly racist. Considers himeself above the law. Surrounded by violent thugs who march to provoke racist reaction. Homophobic. Targets minorities. Has a deeply undeserved victim complex. A proper fascist.

Well - in this argument, I usually just point to Madeleine Albrights book 'Fascism' which is a great guide to what fascism looks like in our times. The point being that we do not have to look back to Mussolini to find it - though I have also done so. The symptoms are the ones I listed: the stirring of intergroup hatred (stirring culture wars are the current policies of our government and their press); the attacks on the independent and critical press; the stirring of racial and minority hatred; the attacks on the judiciary (this is absolutely standard for fascists); the restriction of voting access; the refusal to be accountable; the weaponisation of jongoistic nationalism. This is fascism. And it is coming back to life in Britain - shaming my grandparents who fought and thought they had eliminated it. In the US this is absolutely mainstream - evidenced by the support for insurrection and the existence of an explicitly white, nationalist group within the mainstream republican party.

You mean collectivisation of farm? Gulags for the bourgeoisie? Again. We will have to just agree to disagree here. Since Raegan and Thatcher, the world has moved further and further to a 'there is no society - just individuals' view. Sure - we are now tolerant of homosexuals (though under attack again); women are allowed to get out of the kitchen (though the whispers are there with Rees-Mogg, and are out in the open in the US). I could go on.

Ah - the old university canard. Why universities? Why not the local pub? I'm talking about the realities of life for people in Britain coming from the mainstreaming of what would previously have been considered to be extreme positions: daily violence to Muslims and others on the street for example. Routine and largely unreported with many people now scared to go out un-chaperoned. The rise again of anti-semitic violence. The belief by a majority of people - pushed by the hard right press - that there are Muslim no-go zones in Britain. It's a straight lie - but huge numbers believe it. Fundamentally this is about the turning inwards of a society that used to look out, the protection of the uber wealthy from scrutiny, the weaponisation of division to keep folks distracted, scare the population about mythical bogeymen.

But then, you don't really get to call others extremist do you - from that massively extreme position? I mean - that's not even close to the British political spectrum of 30 years ago. Sure Sajid might be with you - he's an Ayn Rand fan apparently. But the number now holding these views is new - and far out relatively. And perhaps a great example of the Overton Window moving hard right.

Personally I'm pretty middle of the road tbh...into fairness, intgerity, helping others, recognising my own privilege and looking for ways to help others less fortunate. I like a bit of private entreprise so long as it is wealth distributing not concentrating, produces something rather than destroying it (ie through speculation), doesn't pollute our world or corrupt our politics. And I don't like our current terrible levels of deceipt and corruption, the mainstreaming of and the cover provided for this by large parts of the British 'press' ("why are they still going on about parties: who cares about parties? Move on from parties"). Not that extreme really - at least relatively to what was mainstream politics 30 years + back.

 

Loving the panels @shiney. Applying for permission now to get some... Didn't know about the power cuts though!

 

I've been a joiner all my life and I've never come across or made an Overton window.

 

I came across the concept in US discussions @pete - but I found it pretty helpful. It was one of those lightbulb moments: ah - so that's what the agenda is!!!!

 

I'll add it to the tab @shiney

 

On looking it up, I cant help wondering who decides where to place the "window" at any given time.
Just seems slightly pointless, as depending on a persons point of view they could argue all day about it being in one direction or the other.

Perhaps I'm missing something?

 

@pete it was a strategy devceloped by the right in the US (but could easily have been the left: it's a cunning ploy!) to influence what is seen as reasonable. So it is fair to say that a whole bunch of liberal concepts are definitely mainstream these days in a way they didn't use to be. I'm pretty liberal but my kids views on gender bemuse me completely for eg! But that stuff doesn't really impact who folks vote for too much so is 'allowable'. In the end everything political is about votes. So the Overton Window concept was developed to help move vote-motivating discussions - and I think there is some fair evidence it has worked quite well.

Of course, the tactic is open to all to try if they can work out how to do it: you need to control the medium of communication though - which is why I bang on about the press... personally, I think it matters a lot more than others do. Just my opinion though.

 

Well thanks for the explanation but I dont really understand what it achieves or how it does it.
Obviously it wouldn't work on me.

I do agree the press does influence voting, but then it always has, I dont see anything new going on these days that hasn't been going on since WW2 and will probably continue to go on.

I always say you can "tell" people how they should think but you cant "change" how they think.
There will always be those that just follow, but the majority usually make up their own minds.
If we all had the same opinions and all followed the same thinking the world would be a very strange and sad place.

 

Don't get me started on Wee Krankie!

British grid if you like Pete, but it's headquarters are in England. We have a grid here that in my opinion needs to be expanded so we can use the electricity we produce.

 

Can't agree with that, @pete. I think you're underestimating the power of the Press and other media. Social manipulation has reached a fine art and the politicians recognise and use the fact. It's just another facet of advertising and most people don't even realise that they're being manipulated, it's so subtle. All complicated nowadays by the addition of social media and limitless sources of alternative opinions/viewpoints. There aren't enough hours in the day to take it all on board and evaluate it. The only get-out that I can see is to abstain from voting, which doesn't achieve anything and makes a complete mockery of democracy.