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VIP paedophiles: Leon Brittain abused, Chris Fay slated and Tom Watson under fire
Chris Fay, former social worker and Labour councillor in south London, is the subject of a Times story that chips away at the Westminster paedophile panic. The paper says Fay passed allegations about Lord Brittan of Spennithorne to Tom Watson, now the Labour deputy leader, who told the Commons of a “powerful paedophile network” linked to Westminster.
Mr Fay, 69, said yesterday that he had been “a very leftwing Labour councillor” who enjoyed “on a political level” the accusations made against prominent Tories. He was the first to publicly name Lord Brittan as a paedophile and began drawing up a list of VIP suspects in the 1980s which has since achieved widespread circulation.
One of Lord Brittan’s accusers, known as David, disclosed this week that he had been confused and now felt guilty. David told BBC’s Panorama that Mr Fay had encouraged him to name Lord Brittan as one of his abusers, saying that “the surname came out of Chris Fay’s mouth and I just went along with it. I identified him with a photograph”.
Mr Fay denies the accusation, although he admitted it was true that he had shown David a photograph of Lord Brittan. He said this was contained in a parliamentary directory of MPs from the 1980s which he used to help victims who believed they had been abused by politicians to identify the culprits. He insisted that this was only after David had independently named the former home secretary as one of those who had raped him as a child.
Oh and:
Mr Fay, who was jailed for fraud in 2011 for his role in a scam which conned pensioners out of almost £300,000, said he remained convinced that Lord Brittan was guilty.
So. That’s two people. Anyone else..?
Some background reading:
The Times (London), 2nd September 1983
The Daily Express, in a comment piece on 2nd September 1983, were most damning of all:
The Times (London), 24th November 1983
The Times (London), 17th March 1981
The Times, 19th March 1981
The Times (London), 20th March 1981
Half Baked: they’ve turned Bake Off winner Nadiya into a Muslim role model and given us the mould
Nadiya Jamir Hussain won the Great British Bake Off, a BBC TV show for competitive amateur cake makers. The BBC presents as news. But it’s even more than that. It’s a moral lesson. Nadiya wears a scarf on her head. It’s not new kind of apron or a teflon-coated chef’s hat. It’s a head scarf, as worn by some Muslim women, of which she is one.
The Mail sees the look:
Nadiya is already a heroine in her home town of Luton where she’s seen as a glowing role model for young Muslims at a time when the immigrant community is struggling to shake off the dark spectre of Islamic extremism.
Put down your bombs, your spliffs and your iPads. Pick up your lemons.
‘I was a bit nervous that perhaps people would look at me, a Muslim in a headscarf, and wonder if I could bake,’ she says. ‘But I hope that people have realised that I can — and just because I’m not a stereotypical British person, it doesn’t mean that I am not into bunting, cake and tea.’
Cake and spite. It’s he British staple diet. It’s won wars.
‘I’m just as British as anyone else, and I hope I have proved that.’
Who needs to find a token ethnic face for the BBC to pat on the head when Nadiya is so willing to place her cakes at the vanguard of Britishness.
Still, the Mail manages to up the stakes. Get a load of this utter balls:
More sugary balls, modom?
As a liberal Muslim woman myself, I admit that I was also initially put off by Nadiya’s headscarf and severe look. Yet by winning the show with such grace, humour and dignity, Nadiya has done more to further the cause of Asian women — and men — than countless government policies, think-tanks, initiatives and councils put together have achieved in the past half-century.
It’s a Nadiya and me story.
Of course, we have many other Muslim role models — Mo Farah, Olympic gold medallist, Moeen Ali, the England cricketer, Mishal Hussain, presenter on BBC Radio 4’s Today programme, Rageh Omaar, TV reporter, Sajid Javid, the Business Secretary, and Baroness Sayeeda Warsi.
She’s not a role model. She’s a woman who entered an amateur TV cooking show who happens to Muslim. Islam played no part in her baking , or did we miss the bit where she makes a chocolate prayer mat? Are Muslims who enter other telly shows – Mastermind, Big Brother, Pointless – doing it for their God?
But it is Nadiya, baker of beautiful cakes, who has, in my view, turned the image of British Muslims upon its head.
Who knew they could work an oven?
Muslims who are burning with anger or, at the least, disillusioned with life in Britain should learn from Nadiya. I know I have.
Don’t burn with anger – turn down the temperature and simmer. And Yasmin, are your sponge fingers better than Before Nadiya (BN)?
And – hold on – is this a parody? Is that you, Craig Brown?
I once wrote about good Muslim men, among them some uncles and cousins who treasured their wives and encouraged them in their education and ambitions.
Afterwards Sadiq Khan, Labour candidate for the London Mayoral election, wrote and thanked me for my article.
Haha. Who knew Muslim women could do satire so well? Haha.
We all owe Nadiya a debt of gratitude, not just for entertaining us with her pastries and sponges, but for teaching us what it is to be British in 2015.
Rule, Nadiya… Nadiya rules the airwaves…
Posted: 10th, October 2015 | In: Key Posts, Reviews | Comment
Poo like a unicorn on a squatty potty: watch a brilliant advert
The Squatty Potty is a $28 footstool that slides under your toilet. You use it by squatting on the toilet. This, we are assured, is the best way to take a dump.
To illustrate this marvel, the,Squatty Potty hired a unicorn who had sworn off piles.
Spotter: JWZ)
Posted: 10th, October 2015 | In: Reviews, Technology, The Consumer | Comment
Liverpool balls: Klopp joins the transfer committee he hated
Jurgen Klopp news (again). Those experts in the mainstream media had a few words to say about Liverpool’s new manager:
Joe Bernstein, Mail, 27 September:
Jurgen Klopp would demand the end of Liverpool’s transfer committee if he is to succeed Brendan Rodgers as Liverpool manager.
Jurgen Klopp join Liverpool. He tells media on October 9,”
“[The transfer committee] was not a problem for 10 seconds. We talked about it. For me it is enough that I have the first and the last words. We only want to discuss about very good players. I’m not a genius, I don’t know more than the rest of the world. I need the people who get the perfect information.”
Well, they did target Luis Suarez…
Posted: 10th, October 2015 | In: Liverpool, Reviews, Sports | Comment
VIP paedophiles: Tom Watson stood on Teresa May’s iceberg and danced on graves
Tom Watson has raged against the ‘Murdoch Press’. He has stood in the Commons and talked about powerful paedophiles. The deputy leader of the Labour Party also wrote to the DPP demanding a “full review” into claims of rape and sexual abuse against Lord Brittan
Former Tory MP and home secretary Brittan is dead.
The Times reports:
Tom Watson pressured police to investigate a string of sexual abuse allegations against Leon Brittan, the former home secretary, based on the evidence of three witnesses who were subsequently discredited… Labour’s deputy leader led the way in pushing for a criminal investigation into Lord Brittan of Spennithorne, saying that he found the alleged victims to be credible and sincere.
And…
Yesterday details emerged of a letter Mr Watson wrote to Alison Saunders, the director of public prosecutions, in May last year, in which he demanded a full review into claims of rape and sexual abuse.
Demanded?
Within weeks of Mr Watson’s letter in May last year, Lord Brittan, who was terminally ill with cancer, was questioned by police over Jane’s allegation of rape. It has been reported that there were inconsistencies in her evidence. The Met has since informed the peer’s widow that they have abandoned that investigation. It is unclear what action police took in the two other cases.
Read the rest of this entry »
Liverpool balls: how much Klopp is now earning at Anfield
Liverpool have appointed affable German Jurgen Klopp and the papers agree that he’s terrific.
But what’s he earning at Liverpool?
Daily Telegraph: Klopp signed a three year deal worth £7 million a season.
The Times: £25m for three seasons.
But it’s just £6m for the migrant worker the Mail:
In Bild it’s €10 million-a-year. That’s around £7.4m a season.
But it’s down to £5m in the BBC:
Such are the facts.
Posted: 9th, October 2015 | In: Liverpool, Money, Reviews, Sports | Comment
Madness: delighted US scientists find rare foreign bird in order to kill it
‘Get stuffed’
“There in plain sight pumping its tail, crest alert, in full colours, was the moustached kingfisher,” writes Chris Filardi in his field journal. “And then, like a ghost, it was gone.” For days and days Chris and his fellow researchers from the American Museum of Natural History’s Department of Ornithology searched for the bird in the remote moss jungle highlands of Guadalcanal in the Solomon Islands. They laid nets to catch the precious creature.
And then they heard it. “Ko-ko-kokokokokokokokoko-kiew!” Hush. Was that the elusive moustached kingfisher or Alvin Stardust? “Ko-ko-kokokokokokokokoko-kiew!”
“When I came upon the netted bird in the cool shadowy light of the forest I gasped aloud, ‘Oh my god, the kingfisher,’” Filardi notes. “One of the most poorly known birds in the world was there, in front of me, like a creature of myth come to life.”
The team took photos and recorded the birds call. It is estimated that there are only 250–1000 mature individuals left.
The IUCN Red List of Threatened Species tells us: “This spectacular species is judged to be endangered on the basis of a very small estimated population, which is suspected to be declining, at least in part of its range. However, further research may reveal it to be more common.”
And then the happy travellers killed the bird. You know, to get a better look at it.
Posted: 8th, October 2015 | In: Reviews, Strange But True | Comment
Watch: fighter shits pants in middle of fight
A shit fight
What is the ultimate move in MMA fighting? That question to Travis Wolford, who took on Daniel Cooper in a West Virginia ‘Ruckus in the Cage’. We join the action as Cooper traps Wolford in a guillotine choke.
Whose chocking now?
Promoter Chris Smith grabs the nappies:
Everyone is still talking about it. Never seen anything this gross in my entire career of promoting fights but shit happens and could happen to anyone. Daniel Cooper literally beat the crap out of “The Brown Bomber” Travis Wolford in Ruckus in the Cage in Beckley Oct. 3. Before the fights started he went to Chili Night and ate some hot chili. During his bout he had a colossal explosion where chili beans and everything he ate landed all over the mat. Says he instantly lost 15 pounds…. Plans on fighting November 13 in Summersville to prove that it was just an accident. Any takers? Chris Smith
Yeah. Two.
Spotter: BroBibee
American tourist writes great Facebook post about life in England
In 1942, GIs in England were given a handbook. It instructed the visitors how to behave and consider their hosts. Fast forward to 2015, and Scott Waters, a 66-year-old from St Augustine, Florida, is on his fourth trip to England for the fourth time. He went on Facebook and wrote his own guide:
There are no guns. No quite. there are guns. It’s just that they not a rite of passage. And you have to wonder where he went to find no mixer taps? And the trick with trains is not to rely on them. But, still, nice one, Scott.
Posted: 8th, October 2015 | In: Key Posts, Reviews, The Consumer | Comment
Baharhahahahahaha Mustafa: hilarious student union wonk says only whites can be racist
Bahar Mustafa tweeted“kill all white men”. Most white men ignored the threat. Most tweeters did not obey. Mustafa used to be Goldsmiths University’s welfare and diversity officer. It’s lamentable that she did not also tweet “kill all white women”.
What with it being twitter, someone complained and called the police. And what with the police being enemies of free speech, Scotland Yard investigated the complaint of “racially motivated malicious communication”.
The Met tells us:
“A woman interviewed under caution regarding a complaint of racially motivated malicious communication made on a social media network has been summonsed to court. Bahar Mustafa, 28, of Edmonton, Enfield has been summonsed to appear at Bromley Magistrates’ Court on 5 November to answer charges of sending a threatening letter or communication or sending by public communication network an offensive, indecent, obscene or menacing message.”
Who was menaced?
In a Facebook post promoting an event to diversify the curriculum, she allegedly wrote:
“Invite loads of BME Women and non-binary people!! Also, if you’ve been invited and you’re a man and/or white PLEASE DON’T COME just cos I invited a bunch of people and hope you will be responsible enough to respect this is a BME Women and non-binary event only.”
She says she’s the victim of a “witch hunt and shameful character assassination”.
She says:
“There have been charges laid against me that I am racist and sexist towards white men. I, an ethnic minority woman, cannot be racist or sexist towards white men, because racism and sexism describe structures of privilege based on race and gender. Therefore, women of colour and minority genders cannot be racist or sexist, since we do not stand to benefit from such a system.”
Hahahahahahaha. She’s a great act. Who says women can’t do comedy?
Posted: 7th, October 2015 | In: Reviews | Comment (1)
The Walthamstow Riot that wasn’t: weaves on Hoe Street and one copper for every two kids
DID you see news on the Walthamstow riot? The story goes that two teenagers were fighting over a man. The action took place on Hoe street. A few girls joined in the aggro. Lots of people stood about watching.
The Daily Star’s Roy McKeown invites readers to watch the “riot”.
WATCH: Violent scenes as huge riot breaks out in Walthamstow – …a huge riot broke out in east London.
A huge riot?
Yes, a huge riot, says the Standard:
The BBC has more:
That riot is now a “fight”.
A 16-year-old boy and a 16-year-old girl were arrested on suspicion of affray and an 18-year-old man was arrested on suspicion of possessing an offensive weapon.
A riot with just three arrests. Was that because three were too few police to nab the rioters?
No, ssys the Huffington Post. There were lots and lots of coppers.
Wow. One copper for every two rioters.
The Daily Mail takes up the story:
Police flooded a north-east London suburb with officers last night after a row said to be between two girls from rival schools developed into a near-riot.
The Star’s “huge riot” is now the Mail’s “near riot” and the BBC’s “fight”.
The Mail continues:
More than 100 officers and were forced to close an entire street outside the station after the fight involving mainly teenage girls, some brandishing baseball bats. One video of appears to show a young women ripping hair extensions from another’s head while in another, a young girl is beaten to the ground with a bat.
In this video we see one bat:
A police spokesman goes on the record:
“Due to the large numbers and calls about a fight several police resources were deployed. At the time of the police arrival, the group were not committing offences but their presence in such numbers would be alarming to members of the public as would the volume of police vehicles. It is important to stress there has been no riot. The MPS Territorial Support Group were called and dealt with a large group who refused to leave.”
But the baseball bats?
#WalthamstowRiots 😂😂😂😂 pic.twitter.com/jV7P4Ssd6x
— najma (@najma_yo) October 6, 2015
And the carnage:
VIP paedophiles: Leon Brittan’s accuser says it was a ‘joke’; Tom Watson remains silent, old news is no news
British home sectretary Leon Brittan visits a prison on January 11, 1984. (Photo by Mike Moore/Express/Getty Images)
The VIP paedophile story unravels by the day. Today the Times reports on the man who claimed to have been sexually assaulted by the dead former home secretary and Tory MP Leon Brittan.
The man is known only as “David”. He told the BBC’s Panorama programme that he only realised Lord Brittan of Spennithorne had molested him when a “campaigner” showed him the peer’s photo and suggested a number of names to him.
David says:
“It were just done as a joke suggestion to start with but that suggestion became reality. I just went along with it. I identified him with a photograph.”
A joke?
“But there again, he’s a well-known MP and I might have seen him on TV through the years and stuff and I might just have been confused.”
Do you blur reality with fiction? Do you think EastEnders is a documentary? Are you the kind of idiot who writes letters to your MP demanding Deirdre be freed for prison?
Surrey Comet, 10th August 1990:
The Times then notes the police reaction. The self-serving police have been trawling for victims. The PR-police have hounded celebrities, turning their arrest into TV entertainment.
The Metropolitan Police hit back last night, saying that it had serious concerns about the conduct of some BBC journalists who had shown photographs to a key witness in another abuse investigation. Such actions, the Met said, “could compromise the evidential chain should a case ever proceed to court”.
These journalists have saved the country the expense of a lengthy and expensive trial, one in which the accused is a corpse. They have got to the crux of a complaint against a Westminster face and exposed the machinations behind it. The BBC said it was “important and fair investigative journalism“.
Ceri Thomas, Panorama’s editor, said:
“What we’ve found while we’ve been making this Panorama is a concern that all those big institutions – the police, press and politicians – are so determined to atone for the sins of the past that they’re in danger of inventing whole new categories of mistakes. The motivation may be good, but the outcome can be awful. What has emerged is a story which, arguably, says as much about how some of this country’s most important institutions are behaving now as it does about child abuse more than 30 years ago.”
Private Eye, 26th June 1984
A police spokesman replies:
“We have not yet completed our work. There are still lines of inquiry to pursue which are not in the public domain and we will not reach a judgment until that work is completed.”
The police reach a judgement? No. That’s the work of the courts. Their job is to gather evidence and present it to the CPS.
A Met spokesman adds:
“We are worried that this programme and other recent [media] reporting will deter victims and witnesses from coming forward in future. Seeing an individual make allegations and then be targeted by the media is not going to encourage others to speak out.”
The story of VIP peadophiles is rooted in many claims that the police ignored alleged victims when they first complained of abuse. The media does not prevent claims. The media amplifies them. The media drives through the police cu-de-sac. Well, it can do. As the cuttings on this page show, the media also loves a good scandal, wafting the pong into a stench fog. When it clears, however, there can be little of substance to see.
Panorama also criticised Labour’s deputy leader, Tom Watson, who raised the prospect of “a powerful paedophile network linked to parliament and No 10” in the Commons in 2012.
The Guardian, 27th June 1984
Watson’s the MP who played a game of Knock Down Paedo. You ring the bell, shout ‘Paedo’, give the crowd the side-eyes and saunter off. He stood in the House of Commons and suggested the existence of a “powerful paedophile network linked to parliament and No 10”. He named no names.
The programme said that he had written to the director of public prosecutions demanding a full review of allegations against Lord Brittan, and his letter prompted police to interview the peer at a time when he was gravely ill. Mr Watson told the BBC in a statement that his motivation had been to help the victims. He added: “It was clear to me very early on that some testimony would prove to be unreliable, yet not all of it.”
Er…?
David Aaronovitch notes:
On January 21 this year Leon Brittan, the former home secretary, died after suffering for a long time with cancer. His family mourned and on Twitter his former cabinet colleague John Gummer expressed sadness at the news. Noting Gummer’s comments, Tom Watson, the MP and now Labour deputy leader, wrote the single word: “Hmm”.
Hmm. Or, rather, HMMM!!!!!
A few days later Watson wrote in the Mirror:
My condolences go to the family and friends of Lord Brittan. They are grieving for someone they loved very much. I don’t want to add to their grief, but what I am about to say will distress them greatly. For that I am truly sorry.
Many have urged me over the past two years to reveal allegations against Brittan using parliamentary privilege. This allows MPs to say things that are not subject to libel laws. Some will ask why I’ve waited until his death to speak out. The reason is simple. I didn’t want to prejudice any jury trial he might one day face…
…it’s a travesty that Brittan will never be asked the truth. To answer questions about his conduct under oath at a public inquiry. It’s possible to spend a lot of time with a person yet know nothing of their true nature…
Daily Express, 27th June 1984
I’ve spoken to a woman who said he raped her in 1967. And I’ve spoken to a man who was a child when he says Brittan raped him. And I know of two others who have made similar claims of abuse…
Today, one survivor said to me that Brittan “showed me no kindness or warmth.” That Brittan was “as close to evil as a human being could get in my view”. This survivor said that Brittan and the others “took my childhood, they took the very essence of who I was and finally he’s taken away my right to see justice done.”
It is not for me to judge whether the claims made against Brittan are true.
It’s for the police to investigate these claims as they continue to do. But I believe the people I’ve spoken to are sincere…
All the glowing tributes reminded me of the media coverage immediately after Jimmy Savile’s death. How those journalists who wrote tributes to Savile must regret them now…
Former Home Secretary Leon Brittan stands accused of multiple child rape. Many others knew of these allegations and chose to remain silent. I will not. The police must continue their investigations.
Daily Mail, 25th November 1983
Aaronovitch again:
…three main strands of claim remained, two at least of them featuring in Mr Watson’s repetition of claims about Brittan. The first was the story, repeated now in many newspapers, in documentaries, in books, interviews and speeches, that a private guesthouse in southwest London — the Elm Guest House — had, during the 1980s, been a place where boys from a nearby children’s home had been trafficked and sexually abused by a whole series of celebrities and politicians, one of whom was supposedly Brittan.
This story had been on the edges of the internet for years (I came across it on a site run by a follower of the bizarre David Icke cult), but was now given credibility by a police operation set up to examine allegations.Almost everything to do with Elm Guest House originates with a man called Chris Fay. Once a social worker in the area and then a Labour councillor, it is Fay who claims to have been given the list of “attendees” by the now deceased owner; Fay who claims to have spoken to many boys who were trafficked and Fay who “saw” photographs of Brittan at the guesthouse abusing under-age boys — photos now missing.
On last night’s Panorama, reporters spoke to one boy who Fay claimed was at the guesthouse and who said clearly that he was not there. Panorama also found a man who acted as a gay masseur in the house, who said that though sexual activity certainly went on, he never saw anyone famous or any children. Fay, it should be noted, is a convicted fraudster who went to prison in 2011.
The second strand of the accusations against Brittan concerned the supposed happenings at Dolphin Square in London in the early Eighties. Again this place had been the subject of internet rumours for years, but in the end the hard evidence boiled down to the testimony— most of it obtained by the Exaro news agency and then elsewhere — of three “survivors”: “Nick”, “Darren” and “Andrew”. Nick’s account even made it as the top item of the BBC’s Six O’Clock News last year.
Panorama chased down one of the key claims from Nick”, that he witnessed the hit-and-run murder of a schoolboy in Kingston, committed as a warning to him from his abusers. They established that no such accident happened and that no child was killed in this way in that location and timeframe.
9th August, 1982 – The Sun
If that murder didn’t happen, then a huge doubt must exist about his other stories, the most lurid of which (involving Edward Heath and a knife) were itemised by Harvey Proctor in a press conference last month where he protested his innocence and accused police of a witch-hunt.
Furthermore, the supposed corroboration from Darren was also highly dubious, since he is a convicted bomb-hoaxer and has been classified as delusional. The third witness, Andrew, told Panorama that he felt pressured into saying he was at Dolphin Square by Fay and the Exaro team.
Then there is the accusation of (unusually for a supposed homosexual paedophile) heterosexual rape. “Jane” contacted Mr Watson through a fellow Labour MP and claimed to have been raped by Brittan in 1967.
When the police investigated her claim a number of problems quickly arose. She said he had taken her to his basement flat, but at the time he had lived on the third floor. And friends of hers who she said could corroborate parts of her story flatly contradicted it. Finally, what she was alleging didn’t match the criteria for rape. The police concluded that they had no grounds for interviewing or arresting Brittan, who was obviously terminally ill.
And then Mr Watson wrote a remarkable letter to the DPP, in effect demanding that Brittan be interviewed and citing in addition to the case of Jane some of the other spurious allegations against him. The DPP leant on the police. The subsequent interview of the dying man resulted in Brittan’s name becoming public. In my opinion this was partly a deliberate ploy to try to “flush out” other complainants.
You can watch the Panorama show here.
Posted: 7th, October 2015 | In: Key Posts, Reviews | Comment
Hunters fights off elk saving bear by shoving his arm down its throat
Chase Dellwo, 26, was out hunting elk near Choteau in Montana on Saturday. A large 400 pound (180kg) male grizzly bear approaches, reports the Great Falls Tribune.
Dellwo was mauled:
“He let go, but he was still on top of me roaring the loudest roar I have ever heard. He came back and bit my lower right leg and gave it a pretty good shake and threw me away… I remembered an article that my grandmother gave me a long time ago that said large animals have bad gag reflexes. So I shoved my right arm down his throat… I forced myself to calm down and not to panic. I was lost. I cleared the blood out of my eyes. If I had allowed myself to panic I would still be in there.”
Adding from hospital:
“I want everyone to know that it wasn’t the bear’s fault. He was as scared as I was.”
Or maybe Paddington just likes elks.
Free speech: Milo Yiannopoulos hones his karate, Julie Bindel is banned and Manchester University is wrapped in cottonwool
To Manchester University, where “Transphobe” Julie Bindel is banned! She’d been asked by University of Manchester Free Speech & Secular Society to speak at a debate called – irony of ironies – “From liberation to censorship: Does modern feminism have a problem with free speech?”
The ban was decreed by the Students’ Union Executive Team (SUET). Bindel’s presence, say these wise heads, is “potentially in breach of [the] safe space policy”. Adding with hubris:
“The Students’ Union has decided to deny this request based on Bindel’s views and comments towards trans people, which we believe could incite hatred towards and exclusion of our trans students.”
Women’s Officer Jess Lishak opines:
“The proposed society event requested to invite two highly controversial and offensive speakers; radical feminist and famous transphobe Julie Bindel, and journalist and ‘men’s rights activist’ Milo Yiannopoulos.
“We unanimously decided to not allow Julie Bindel to be invited to speak at an official SU event. We also approved the request for Milo Yiannopoulos on the provisos that, should the event go ahead, there will be extra security put in place for everyone’s safety.”
They have doubtless heard that Milo knows karate.
Lishak adds:
“Julie Bindel is a journalist and activist who’s been on a crusade against the trans community, and trans women in particular, for many years. She abhorrently argues that trans women should be excluded from women-only spaces, whether that be through feminist organising or women’s sexual and domestic violence services.”
So much for free speech. So much for debate. The laughable, censorious, dictatorial Lishak “refuse[s] to allow our campus to be poisoned by this woman’s tireless campaign to deny trans people their basic human rights and… to subject our students to a campus that puts Bindel’s wish to spread and incite hatred above the safety and inclusion of our trans members.”
One word from Bindel and students will be all catching transphobia. The University must be kept safe from words.
“This is not about shutting down conversations or denying free speech; this is about keeping our students safe,” says Lishak. “If this were about silencing people we happen to disagree with or avoiding uncomfortable conversations, we would be denying the application for Milo Yiannopoulos to speak.”
But it is about denying free speech. That’s exactly what it is. Lishak speaks with the authority of someone who has read one book and found it spot on.
“The difference in these two cases is inciting harm to a group of our students. Yiannopoulos is very careful to criticise feminist thoughts, theories and methods of research or statistics rather than calling for active discrimination against women like Bindel does to trans women,” she continues.
His free speech is within the boundaries of Lishak’s realm of acceptable free speech. Of course, free speech either is free or else it is not free. It can’t be a bit free.
The Mancunion website adds: “She [Bindel] is included on the NUS’s no platform list, alongside George Galloway, Julian Assange, and any member of the BNP.”
Wear your bans as badges of honour. Manchester Uni students are so thick and suggestible, one word from the banned and they’ll be goose-stepping to Bradford. Thank god Lishak’s there to protect these empty heads from ideas and challenging their own beliefs.
The Free Speech and Secular Society have released this statement:
“We were very sad, though in no way surprised, to be notified today that our Students’ Union is seeking to censor our upcoming of event [sic]. We were expecting a good turnout from pre-existing and new students alike, and as such are sad and frustrated to delay the event for the time being. [The Students’ Union] have banned Julie Bindel from speaking outright, and deemed Milo Yiannopoulos sufficiently dangerous to warrant a closed event, where admissions will be limited.
“The reasoning… centres around the safe space policy and her falling foul of it. We have always argued that this flimsy bit of legislature is nothing more than an insidious piece of weaponry used by our SU leadership to fashion the university in their own image, and this current act of censorship proves it.
“Speakers far more controversial and ‘offensive’ than Julie have been permitted and even suggested by the SU on previous occasions. Yet they have decided to apply the principles of the safe space policy now and on us. We feel that the manner in which it has been done is at best sloppy on their part, and at worst inconsistent to the point that it suggests an abuse of power.
“Free speech is not just an abstract concept debated upon in academic circles. It is a discernable and essential good, as well as an inalienable right for one and all. We plan on fighting for it tooth and nail on our campus. We are a nonpartisan organisation that does not promote one ideology over another. We simply argue that the freedom to express a controversial or challenging opinion is held equally and by all.”
Hurrah!
Yiannapoulos added:
“I’m astonished that I wasn’t outright banned as well. I’ll have to up my game!”
Stick a copy of the Sun to your nose and just sing Robin Thicke’s Blurred Lines. You’ll get your badge soon enough, Milo.
Liverpool balls: Rodgers was a ‘bizarre genius’ with great teeth
Pundit Watch: The Daily Mail’s Adrian Durham has bene talking about Liverpool and Brendan Rodgers’ sacking.
October 6 2015: “Brendan Rodgers was too much like David Brent to succeed at Liverpool… it was three years of excuses, blame-shifting and bizarre motivation techniques”
The joke went round some weeks ago that the most significant improvement Brendan Rodgers has made since he arrived at Liverpool is to his teeth.
December 2, 2014:
The critics have put last season’s massive improvement down to Luis Suarez. There have been plenty of teams who have had a special player who didn’t achieve what Liverpool did last season (look at Spurs with Gareth Bale as a recent example). It was so much more than that, and Rodgers deserves his share of the credit for taking a team from a bang average seventh-place finish in 2012-13, to within a whisker of the title last season.
November 4, 2014: “Liverpool’s sluggish start to the season should not overshadow Brendan Rodgers’ outstanding achievements last term”
I’m amazed how quickly some people have forgotten how brilliantly Rodgers did with Liverpool last season.
September 9, 2014: “Brendan Rodgers’ man-management has transformed Jordan Henderson into a vital player for club and country”
…under Rodgers he has become a brilliant midfield player who can control a game, keep the ball and use it with intelligence and quality.
March 4, 2014:
Tactical genius. That’s what Brendan Rodgers is. …
A lot of managers have been praised this season for showing tactical prowess but none can top what Rodgers has done. He’s changed formation from game to game and during matches. But more impressive than that, he’s devised a system to allow good players to flourish and enjoy their football.
Bizarre, indeed.
Posted: 6th, October 2015 | In: Liverpool, Reviews, Sports | Comment
Madeleine McCann: the revolting Ben Needham fight
Madeleine McCann is back in the news. The Sun thunders:
Trolls force McCanns to take down Madeleine search Twitter account
Force?
THE official Madeleine McCann search Twitter account is being shut down due to “continuous abuse and negativity”.
A twitter account has been shut down because – get this – people on twitter say nasty things.
Administrators of the page, designed to raise awareness of missing Madeleine and others, announced the decision last night.
Awareness raised. It’s all over the Press. did you know there was an ‘official’ account?
It came hours after they were involved in an online spat with the campaign to find missing British toddler Ben Needham. The @FindMadeleine account sparked outrage when it blocked the @FindBenNeedham account.
Charming. As Harry Hill would says, “FIGHT!’
A manager of the Madeleine campaign said: “We do not want to be associated with some of the types of people they follow.”
But surely that doesn’t matter. The purpose is to get the child found, or at least to discover what happened to her.
Some individuals followed by Ben’s Twitter account are known to take an anti-McCann stance.
So what?
One tweeted: “How the hell is Kate McCann an ambassador (of charity Missing People)? She left her three kids alone to go on the p***.”
Maybe it’s because she gets Missing People into the news (see above).
Ben’s mum Kerry said: “Ben’s campaign has never been anti McCann — we can’t help the fact that some members of the public give their opinion about the McCann case just the same as people give their opinion about Ben’s case. I have never once spoken badly about the family, I have only ever given my opinion about the way the two cases have been handled so differently by the authorities.”
Fair point. It has been. Ben Needham never did become ‘Our Ben’, in the same way Madeleine became ‘Our Maddie’.
The row was resolved on Sunday evening when the Madeleine account lifted its block – but the damage had already been done. At 11.30pm on Sunday, the person in charge of the account tweeted: “Due to the continuous abuse and negativity on Twitter, we will be removing our account within the next few days.”
So goes the announcement.
On Facebook, they added: “This is the last time I will address this issue. Gerry and Kate do not use social media and have asked me to manage the social media accounts for our campaign. In the past couple of weeks there has been a concerted effort to get people to stop looking for Madeleine. Some argue the search costs too much, others say it’s hopeless. We don’t believe the search for Madeleine is hopeless and putting up polls asking if the search should stop is not only crass, it’s cruel. How can one put a price on the life of a child?
Well, there was a £2.5m reward.
The Met will give a £20,000 reward for information leading to the arrest and prosecution of those responsible for Madeleine’s disappearance.
“With that being said, I, and I alone, have made the decision to block ANYONE who thwarts the search for Madeleine via social media — whether that be with running commentary on the investigation, posting negative comments about the search/investigation/cost, or saying Madeleine is a lost cause.
“We believe Madeleine is alive and we have great faith in the Met. If you cannot be supportive of the search for Madeleine, please unlike/unfollow our social media pages. We want people who are hopeful and actually care about Madeleine being found supporting us.
“WE NEED YOUR HELP to find her and we don’t want negative comments filling our feeds.”
You’ve been told.
The Sun adds:
Ben Needham went missing on July 24, 1991, from the Greek island of Kos, There have been no sightings of the 21-month-old since. Madeleine McCann was three years old when she disappeared from her bed in a holiday apartment in Portugal in May 2007.
The Mirror quotes Kerry Needham – it’s a bit like the Sun’s quote by includes a line about alleged slander:
“It feels like a personal attack on me. It is deeply, deeply hurtful. I have myself had massive amounts of slanderous abuse from supporters of the McCann Campaign in the past but I have never taken that personally. It’s freedom of speech. But it is getting the names of two missing children out there which is really important. I have never criticised the McCann family. I have only every criticised the authorities for the way the two cases have been handled so differently.”
Such are the facts.
Posted: 6th, October 2015 | In: Madeleine McCann, Reviews | Comment
Bride and groom send whining couple bill for missing wedding meal
Jessica Baker from Golden Valley, Minnesota, and her husband were getting ready to attend a wedding. The phone rang. It was Jessica’s mother. “She called at the last minute and had something come up and said I can’t make it,” said Baker.
Mum was supposed to babysit their children. The invitation said no children. The Bakers did not contact a babysitter or a neighbour. They bailed. They stayed at home. Neither of them. Both of them had to say and watch the kids. Both of them.
Having bailed at the last minute, the bride and groom thought it right the Bakers paid for they meal they ordered and never ate. “You’ve got to be kidding me,” said Baker. “It listed, we would have had two herb crusted walleye and there was also a service and tax charge.” The total came to $75.90.
“This cost reflects the amount paid by the bride and groom for meals that were RSVP’d for, reimbursement and explanation for no show, card, call or text would be appreciated,” the note read.
Jessica refuses to pay up. “I guess I don’t know what the right answer would have been. What the right thing to do would have been.”
Jessica supposes that question is rhetorical. The answer it that one of you should have gone to the do. It did not take both of you to mind the kids. You bailed and blamed your mum. Then you called the media.
Pathetic.
Posted: 6th, October 2015 | In: Reviews | Comments (3)
In 1978 Penthouse magazine investigated the future of sex
In 1978 Penthouse magazine investigated the future of sex.
The October 1978 issue of Penthouse magazine zooms in on Science and the Future. This feature served as an intro to OMNI, “a magazine of science, science fiction and the future”, run by Kathy Keeton, future wife of Penthouse publisher Bob Guccione.
SPACE: the final, full-frontal frontier… the last hurrah… to go where no man has ever gone before, the forbidden and yet insidiously alluring planet of NYMPHON in the second quadrant of PHI DELTA PUBIS, hard by the tumescent moons of GLUTEON MAXIMUS. It was here that I said good-bye to an intrepid friend, a great lady, whose heaving decks and smoldering afterburners had served me well — the Yenta Prize, peripatetic mistress of the cosmic seas. I beamed down… down into the swirling, choking vapors that envelop NYMPHON, down to the very floor of this curious planet where, unused to the dense, jellylike atmosphere, I passed out.
Star Wars robot R2-D@ packed a little ambulatory pal:
Read on at Flashbak.
Posted: 5th, October 2015 | In: Key Posts, Reviews | Comment
Liverpool balls: Harry Redknapp hopes Milner settles in England and rewrites history for Brendan Rodgers
Brendan Rodger is out of a job at Liverpool. And here’s Harry Redknapp to explain all. The headline makes his case:
Harry Redknapp: Brendan Rodgers should not have been sacked by Liverpool – he is a victim of modern football
By modern football, presumably, Redknapp means the Premier League, which has not not exactly proved un-lucrative for him and his. Rodgers lasted 3 years and 2 months in the Liverpool manager’s chair.
Before him, the Liverpool’s manager’s job was not exactly a role for life:
George Patterson: 1 June 1915 – 14 December 1919
David Ashworth England: December 1919 – February 1923
Matt McQueen: 1February 1923 – February 1928 229
George Patterson: March 1928 – August 1936
George Kay: August 1936 – January 1951
Don Welsh: March 1951 – May 1956
Phil Taylor: May 1956 – November 1959
Bill Shankly: December 1959 – July 1974
Bob Paisley: August 1974 – July 1983
Joe Fagan: July 1983 – May 1985
Kenny Dalglish: May 1985 – February 1991
Ronnie Moran: February 1991 – April 1991
Graeme Souness: April 1991 – January 1994
Roy Evans: January 1994 – November 1998
Evans & Gérard Houllier: July 1998 – November 1998
Gérard Houllier: 16 July 1998 – May 2004
Rodgers fits a patten, no? So what was “modern’ about his removal?
I feel desperately sorry for Brendan, it is too soon for him to be sacked after eight games, but it does seem to have been coming for weeks. For me, though, he has taken the blame for other people at Liverpool.
He was not sacked after eight weeks. He was sacked after threes years and two months.
In the modern game, it never seems to be the manager who signs the players, it’s just the manager who takes the blame when things don’t work out. It happens all the time and it is exasperating sometimes.
In the good old days, the Government had a say in who played. In 1922 the State-imposed maximum wage for a player set at £8 a week (£6 in the summer), plus a loyalty bonus of £650 after five years. The maximum wage was abolished in 1961.
Managers don’t have the same say on transfers that they used to, but they are still expected to take the blame if the new signings don’t work out. They have these transfer committees, but it’s only the manager who sticks his head above the parapet and he’s the one who gets shot at. The other lot just stay in the background, out of sight, but they have huge power. The only time you ever hear from them is when one of the players signed becomes a huge success.
Redknapp would, of course, never get praise for someone else’s work.
I don’t think Brendan has signed those new players at Liverpool. They’ve brought in players from Brazil and I don’t think he will have known much about them.
Let’s look at Liverpool’s Brazilian players.
Roberto Firmino Barbosa de Oliveira joined from German side Hoffenheim
Lucas Leivia joined from Brazilian club Grêmio in 2007
Philippe Coutinho joined from Italy’s Internazionale
If Rodgers doesn’t know much about players in other top European league’s, you should worry.
Redknapp concludes:
I don’t think Brendan deserved to go so soon into the season. I think they’ve got a wonderful chance of finishing in the top four this season… The thing that will frustrate him is that those new players may well go on to benefit the next manager. They will settle in England and they will get used to the Premier League.
Last summer, Rodgers signed:
James Milner – Man City – Free
Danny Ings – Burnley – Tribunal
Adam Bogdan – Bolton – Free
Joe Gomez – Charlton – £3.5m
Roberto Firmino – Hoffenheim – £29m
Nathaniel Clyne – Southampton – £12.5m
Let’s hop Milner and the other migrant workers settle in England.
This, of course, is the same Redknapp who told Telegraph readers in September 2015:
I don’t fancy Liverpool at all. I think it’s the worst Liverpool team I have seen in years. They look bang average. They are lucky to have any points. Bournemouth should have beaten them, they got a wonder goal at Stoke. Okay, they played all right first-half at Arsenal. I think they will do well to finish in the top five. I am not with Liverpool at all this year.
Modern football eh, full of overpaid pundits.
Posted: 5th, October 2015 | In: Liverpool, Reviews, Sports | Comment
Yorkshire Ripper: eye clinic opens early for Peter Sutcliffe, no old people or buses attacked
Peter Sutcliffe is “strolling in the sun”. Presumably the Yorkshire Ripper also ambles in the rain and strides in the mist. The words are loaded. The Sun is clear that Sutcliffe being allowed to breathe outside the confines of Broadmoor is an outrage.
THE Yorkshire Ripper strolls in the sun at a busy NHS hospital as he is seen in public for the first time in 34 years.
Spare a thought for the nurse and doctors treating him.
Our exclusive picture shows Peter Sutcliffe, 69, on a visit to a leading eye clinic where doctors are trying to save his failing sight.
Sutcliffe was blinded in one eye when fellow murderer Ian Kay repeatedly stabbed him in the face with a pen in 1997. In 2007, the Sun reported that another went for Sutcliffe with a metal cutlery knife.
The sight in that other eye is failing. It has been for some time.
Broadmoor patient Sutcliffe, who was not handcuffed, shared a joke with security guards during his trip to Surrey’s Frimley Park Hospital. One witness said: “I was shocked.” The serial killer was taken for tests as part of a series of treatments that are costing the taxpayer thousands of pounds.
Anything other than starving him to death in a pit wold cost the taxpayer money.
And what do we think for a man billed as the mass murderer’s ‘friend’? Do we trust him?
But Sutcliffe grumbled about the appointment because he had to get out of bed early. He complained to a friend: “They came and got me up before seven. I don’t like to get up at weekends until at least eight. They didn’t give me any warning, just came and got me and told me I was going to hospital.”
Friend of Ripper says…
Our pictures show a bloated, grey-bearded Sutcliffe, wearing a beige jacket, red trousers, grey Crocs shoes and a cap, flanked by security guards at Surrey’s Frimley Park Hospital.
Red trousers and Crocs… He’s dressed like a holidaying Hooray Henry.
He arrived at the hospital in a dark blue Transit-style van at 7.40am last Saturday, accompanied by five guards from Broadmoor high security hospital. He went into the eye unit by a back door.
How did a photographer know he was coming? Or was it just dumb luck that at 7:40am they were round the back of a provincial hospital?
The witness said: “It was obviously a well-planned operation getting Sutcliffe into the eye centre. When he arrived a hospital security guard came out, took a phone call and banged on a window to let them know he was here. There were a lot of people around as the shifts were changing over and people were going into the eye unit for appointments. There were also buses going past and people arriving in and leaving the car park.”
Buses going past? Peter Sutcliffe murdered 13 women and attempted to murder seven others. He attacked them when they were alone. He never did attack a bus.
The Sun then invites a ‘witness’ to read minds:
“It is quite extraordinary one of Britain’s most well-known killers was walking about. A lot of the people at the eye unit are fairly elderly and will remember his crimes. They’d be shocked if they had walked out and bumped into him. The hospital is busy all the time.”
Would they be shocked? Who is this paternalistic protector of the aged who fears for their wellbeing?
Sutcliffe was in the eye unit for about an hour. As he left he made a quip to one of the guards, who laughed. He then got in the van for the 15-minute trip back to Broadmoor in Crowthorne, Berks — arriving in time for breakfast.
The clinic at Frimley Park opens to no mass murders at 8am. Sutcliffe got there before it opened to the public.
Refugees still wait for a cake from Tunbridge Wells
Residents of the Calais ‘Jungle’ refugee camp are tonight sat around waiting for the arrival of a cake. The good people of the Royal Borough of Tunbridge Wells have donated a cake stand. But no cake. Not even a crumb of the stuff.
The Tunbridge Wellians, Wellorfs or whatever it is the locals are called, also donated a ball gown, a China tea set, stilettos, wine glasses and tennis rackets.
You can’t but think they are all emblems of the kind of places that will readily accept black African migrants: Annabel’s night club, The Ritz and any provincial tennis club. The wine glasses they can keep – the cheap-to-hire migrants can give them a clean and polish for the catering firm to pick up later.
Spotter: Kent and Sussex Courier
Chelsea: Jose Mourinho resigns with rhetoric
Chelsea lose at home to Southampton and the Press being talk of Jose Mourinho getting the sack. Having seen his team defeated, Mourinho spoke with the Sky Sports, as he must. The Daily Mail says Mourinho spat out a “seven-minute rant”.
Rant? Nothing of it. The man is measured. Here’s what he said in full:
Look, I think you know me and I think I don’t run away from responsibilities. I think, first of all I want to say that because we are in such a bad moment I think you shouldn’t be afraid to be also honest because when we are in the top there is quite a big pleasure in put us down but when we are so down I think it’s time to be a little bit honest and to say clearly that referees are afraid to give decisions for Chelsea.
Jose loves to establish the siege mentality. It’s Chelsea against the world. A for referees favouring Chelsea, well, they did beat Arsenal thanks to the kind of refereeing support that had Gunners fans looking for a Chelsea tattoo on Mike Dean’s throat.
The result 1-1 is a huge penalty and once more we don’t get and a penalty is a crucial moment in the game with the result at 1-1, and I repeat that if FA wants to punish me they can punish me they don’t punish other managers but they punish me, it’s not a problem for me.
Jose, as ever, tries to put the ME in TEAM. He employs an exemplum – an example that backs up his argument.
But I want to repeat because I think that my players deserve it, Chelsea fans deserve it. I am a Chelsea fan too and I want to say it again. Referees are afraid to give decisions for Chelsea. Why? Because when they give there’s always a question mark from you, there’s always a question there’s always a critique.
Quibbling. And dash of Metonymy, which takes one aspect of one thing and makes it stand for the entire. Of course, Chelsea have not had every decision go in their favour. No team has. But Mourinho wants us to believe that every error epitomises a wider conspiracy. But decisions don’t win games, goals and fine play does.
So you are always punished, we are punished because Diego Costa is suspended with images, in other matches we see the same thing and it doesn’t happen. Clear penalties are not given and it’s one and one and one and one and even in Champions League in a match you lose 2-1, even in the Champions League which is a game which is not three officials but with five you are not given a penalty in last minute and this penalty in this game today is more than crucial do you know why? Because for my team in this moment the first negative thing that happen, my team collapse.
The team mentally, psychologically, the team is unbelievable down it looks like good players are bad players and the first half was a game where we didn’t show our quality but we were in control, we were more than in control, and one mistake and lack of concentration, one goal and when you are having a good time.
In normal circumstances you come to the second half and you do your game, I told the players at half time no panic we are not losing 4-0 it’s 1-1, no panic, the team comes out with a good spirit we have a penalty and the penalty is a giant penalty and he is afraid to give like everybody is afraid to give so no penalty and after that the team lost even more confidence and you know that their second goal is an individual mistake, their third goal is another individual mistake. The team mentally, they try, they try, they try, they are in such a low moment that they collapse.
What Jose’s doing, of course, is dictating the conversation, or trying to. He tells you what to think. He tells you what to look out for. He is employing a rhetorical strategy. Jose wants us to take him out of the picture. His is disinterested in his own fate. This, he hopes, will encourage the audience to trust his opinions. His is the passive voice framing the terms of the argument. You may have seen no controversy at all in Diego Costa being banned after the match for slapping an Arsenal player in the face or the referee not giving Chelsea a penalty. But he seeks to sow doubt. He wants it to lead to consensus.
I can also know what you are thinking, what you are saying in studio, what people imagine, what is is going to happen, what is not going to happen, I want to let it clear.
One, I not run away. Two, if the club wants to sack me they have to sack me because I’m not running away from my responsibilities from my team and from my convictions.
That, be champions is obviously very difficult because the distance is considerable but I’m more than convinced that we finish top four, and when the season is so bad if you finish top four it is OK.
More rhetoric.
Third even more important than first and second, I think this is a crucial moment in the history of this club. Do you know why? Because if the club sacks me they sack the best manager that this club have, and secondly the message is again the message of bad result, the manager is guilty and this is the message that not just these players but the other ones before they got during a decade.
This looks like enthymeme. The enthymeme makers a claim and then bases it on commonly accepted opinion. Jose argument is filled with emotion but he pulls out his logic pack and flourishes it.
I think this is a moment for everybody to assume responsibility, I assume my responsibility I think the players should assume their responsibility and there are other people in the club that they should also assume their responsibilities and to stick together. And this is what I want.
The players they still have to play until the end of the season with the gold champions thing in their shirt and I want to work always, you know, I consider myself, I have a big self-esteem, a big ego, I consider myself the best, living the worst period of my career and worst results of my career, doing that as a professional hurts me a lot, doing it at Chelsea hurts me twice because it hurts me as a professional and hurts me because I like this club very, very much and was because of that that I come back so I want to carry on, I want to carry on no doubt, no doubt and I assume my responsibilities but I think it’s time for everybody to assume their responsibilities because when you go down to so many individual mistakes and fear to play, they have their responsibilities, they are players that are performing really, really bad individually, I can not come here and say you, and you, and you, and you, it’s not my job but I think it’s clear that we are being punished by too many individual mistakes and as I was saying sadness brings sadness, bad results they attract bad results, that first mistake is just the first because after that comes another one.
Jose is using a paromologia (Greek for “agree with”), conceding a point in order to make a stronger one.
This team needs to win the first-half two or three nil with the fears disappearing coming to play in the second half and play with a free brain, a free spirit. This is what this team needs and unfortunately for them this is not happening and again I repeat so I want to make it clear again, because I not want to be offensive, I don’t want to be none-polite I don’t want to put in cause the dignity of the people, but I repeat that the referees they are afraid to give the decision when you are top you want to see people come down when people is down give us a break and be honest and be loyal with us because the penalty is clear and 2-1 is a completely different story, thank you.
Marvellous stuff.
Posted: 4th, October 2015 | In: Chelsea, Key Posts, Reviews, Sports | Comment (1)
