Rayvin

I almost added "TLDR; I'm not a racist but..." And I'm not saying this is fact, but it is my understanding, at the moment. So I'm potentially ignorant, sure, but I'm very open to being informed alternatively.

The argument in favour of the police, which does hold some water, is that if you track the demographic breakdown of those who commit violent crimes, it marries up fairly well with the rate that police shoot people. There is very little evidence of racial bias in police shootings once you track it against crimes committed. https://www.channel4.com/news/factcheck/factcheck-black-americans-commit-crime This in effect means that black people are over-represented in police shooting fatalities because they are over-represented in committing crimes that lead to police shootings (This article notes that between 1989 and 2008, 50% of all homicides in the US were carried out by black people - despite being only 13% of the population). In light of this, I personally feel that it's far more relevant to look at systemic racism in terms of how it manifests within black communities with respect of poverty. There is no arguing that black America has been intentionally deprived of opportunities to move towards prosperity, and this in turns forces many young black men to lives of crime that young white men, were they siimilarly disadvantaged, would also turn to. So acknowledging the data doesn't mean denying racism, it just means putting the blame where it is more accurately due. And despite everything we see, and the many cases of terrible policing that come up, the American police are not actually demonstrably racist in terms of shootings, based on the data. The system racism is further back down the chain. Because this is such a sensitive area, I want to stress that I fully support BLM, I fully support reform of the police, certainly at least with respect of banishing qualified immunity, and I do believe that systemic racism exists and needs to be confronted. What I am -not sure- about, is that there is a great deal of evidence that the US police are institutionally racist, at least in terms of the actual data. Now, the data could be massaged or whatever, sure, but a lot of it now appears to be independently collected. Please do correct me on this if I'm wrong. I think a really interesting study could be carried out to look at rates of police shootings against people from similar economic backgrounds, but that would of course fail to take into consideration some unique circumstances specific to particular demographics.

Starmer has condemned tearing the statue down too, although he also noted that it should have been removed through typical channels anyway. Basically agree with him there. I'm a bit stunned they were even allowed to do it, frankly. But then I was also a bit stunned that a statue commemorating an individual who became prosperous through slave trading was still in place.

I wonder why they weren't doing it anyway though. Buying it legally I mean. It could be that its only worth doing if theres a club attached, and in turn that means the cost of acquiring us rises considerably.

So the PL is using the uncertainty of the situation to manipulate the Saudis into shutting down the piracy. That's actually the most sane interpretation of the situation I can think of. Totally understand the PL on this, it's a very sensible move.

Can't say I'm a big fan of the defacing of historical monuments either, but it's still better than them actually becoming violent. One of the few advantages that the left has is that they can go for property and not people. On the other hand, it's needlessly provocative and only alienates the middleground. But then, as ever, when the left does things like this it's never particularly well organised and never with any clear or attainable goals in mind. Which is a shame. I still think they get a free pass with respect of COVID from the Cummings fiasco though.

More damage, yes. But he's doubtless responsible for a lot of them being out there. Cummings being let off basically represented the government declaring COVID to be over. We reap what we sow I guess.

There is absolutely no way that 16 MPs are going to force the cast of Britannia Unchained to stop this.

I still think yes as well, on the basis that I've no idea how the PL manages to tie a fund that acts on behalf of every person within a country, to the crimes of just one individual from that country. As much as I understand people thinking that if it was going to be approved then it would have been by now, the same is true the other way around. Why would the PL draw this out? If they had legitimate reason to kill it, they would have done. It's just as likely that they could be in damage limitation concerning approving it, as they could be in terms of denying it. Either way, people are going to be pissed with them, and I suspect that's why this is taking so long. IMO if they're waiting for this report to come out in a few days time, it could just as likely be so that they can hold their hands up and say "look, we waited, but there's nothing in there that can change our position from a legal standpoint" as it could be that they're going to point to it as the reason why they rejected the deal.

Should we be giving the Tories credit for the offer to take 3m Hong Kongese people if the situation continues to escalate? I accept that doing so will cause a house price surge which will benefit landlords, the Tory parties core supporter group, and that they can probably bank on 3m older Chinese people gratefully voting for their hero Boris in the future, but even aside from that it does feel like the right thing to do. It probably is a huge betrayal of their working class supporters though. But maybe they've calculated that those people won't be long in their pockets anyway.

If this takeover doesn't go through, they'll go to another league and buy another club, she'll forget all about us and probably won't even try to intervene in their next purchase. Meanwhile, we'll be stuck with Ashley. None of them can change the fact that the system we all permit to exist is predicated on money being able to buy you whatever you want. I am more than fucking happy for that system to come tumbling down but I cannot get behind the selective nature of this shit. If the PL do deny this, and there just seems to be absolutely no possible angle for them to do so from a legal standpoint since the PIF is not a person, and Mubarrak isn't going to be personally fucking involved, then I daresay they'll make a big song and dance about how they were doing it for 'the right reasons'. But there is nothing anyone could say to me to convince me that they give the slightest of fucks about this woman's murdered husband. In fact, I don't even really think the press do. No fucker really cares.

I'd support that frankly, but I also get the impression that very few of them actually want to leave.

We're going to get no deal at a time when the US has tanked its own economy, and China is actively threatening economic devastation on us for our response to HK. Wonderful.

As if Johnson is remotely capable in the first place man. It reads as if the only reason we've not been in sorting this out better is because he's been delegating this stuff away. Now though, the man himself is going to come to the forefront with his expert operational abilities and serious management style. Give me a fucking break. It's nothing other than outright propaganda and an attempt to draw a line under the abject chaos of what came before. Which, as we know, he was still fucking responsible for. "Reawakening after a tough old time". Just fuck off.

That video was grim.

I hope this too, and there's a lot of evidence that we have Blair to thank for it due to his drive to get so many young people into university and thus foster far more positive values and critical thinking skills than their parents (by and large) seem to have. However, the right are the ones with the power and influence in the immediacy, and who knows what they'll do to retain that. I am inclined to think that Trump, if he loses the election in November, won't go without a fight.

I've heard people complaining about this insofar as not revealing the outcome of the data will mean people of colour are less "aware" of the risks around the disease, but on reflection could it not also be possible that if you looked at BAME people as a demographic in isolation, then the case for ending lockdown drops considerably. Which in turn means we are actively increasing the risk to them, sacrificing them on the altar of capitalism. Or am I getting a bit carried away?

Invited that one really

There's a Nazi prison camp guard in all of us, supposedly.

I mean Trump has literally ordered this. He will have ordered that the press aren't safe, that extreme force should be used, all of it. He's playing this one terribly IMO. It's got a hint of the Cummings saga about it tbh, it appears to be playing poorly across the aisle too.

Beautiful.

It says something about this bloody takeover that the most recent post in the football forum of an NUFC site is almost two days ago ffs. Definitely done by the end of this week though right?

A friend of mine has said that this militarized response isn't new in the US and that Trump isnt the first to wave it through. I'm stunned by it frankly but maybe I've just not paid enough attention to US policing over time..?

So white nationalist groups have descended to do what... loot for themselves? Or is it that they're trying to false flag the issue? Or is it that they're there for a race war? Fucking lunatics.

Damn, I didn't even notice the reply. Sorry mate! It's still relevant tbf, I haven't moved on from this beyond deciding that I need to do some more detailed system development work to make it happen. I want the list in B to present a range of variables depending on the content in A. So in effect, there will be 3 or 4 potential lists for B, and the relevant one is selected once A is populated. Clear as mud, right?