Rayvin

Was just looking around reddit on the football subs and I have to say like, the rest of Europe is -not- taking this well. People fucking hate us Apparently Denmark were the fairytale team of the tournament which doesn't help us, but clearly many people in Europe are just fucking sick of us now. In general. Which I might add, I'm finding fairly amusing... It's just football ffs. And it's not as if the England team don't deserve this.

Aye I'm kinda with you tbh - Newcastle succeeding would mean more to me than this - but I remember watching the semi final of Euro 96 as a kid and being devastated about it, and that part of me is now pretty excited

Have to say, I'm a bit bemused by the reaction of the non-English to this Germany are practically my second team in international football for no reason other than I've enjoyed their football over the years. I don't think any other team winning or succeeding at international football would bother me in the slightest though. Why is England being successful such a pain for people? Anyway, I love that Southgate has achieved all of this without having a golden generation or really any out and out worldclass players. Just an incredibly professional team - maybe it doesn't have the dram

It's not just Renton tbf - almost all the highest voted comments on the Daily Mail's match report are from people wishing that Denmark had won because they didn't take the knee and England did. Gammon rage now transcends even football success. I can see Renton's point a bit tbh, and I know a few people who are saying similar things but at the end of the day I think the majority have this one right. Life is short and shit enough without reining yourself in during moments of pure joy. This won't unify the country - don't think anything can - but it does at least represent

Yeah but just cos everyone else is doing something, doesn't mean it's right. I'm not going to go vegan but I think there's a compromise to be made somewhere in the middle both for my own sake and that of the planet. Making adjustments elsewhere too - pretty much lived off coke zero for quite some time but have recently changed to just water and coffee. It killed me at first, but I think it's been worth it - my overall fluid intake has risen and I'm sure I'm much healthier for it. Crazy that I was still hooked on carbonated drinks in my mid 30s but we all have our vices and I'm plea

I've reduced my intake to one red meat meal a week, but is that still too much? It's almost always beef. I think based on the weight of evidence that you're probably right, but I really like eating meat...

There's been no part of that discussion that wound me up tbf. I think it's probably worth distinguishing between the general banter you lot seem to being having at the moment, and the occasional productive chat. That said, if my involvement is aggravating others then I'll step back from it. I mean I think we're done now anyway.

I mean yeah fair enough, although the article you cited mentions that the SAGE is advocating for waiting until September - ties in with school return, all adults will be double vaccinated by then, etc. I think the decision is between July 19th or September - at least based on what the BBC says anyway.

I'm not arguing per se, I'm just trying to understand the rationale so I can form an opinion

I know. I wasn't arguing otherwise. I was asking what actual benefit is of opening up - not about the number of deaths, not about what we think the disease will do, just the benefit of opening back up again - because that's the "prize" for the gamble. And it'll be weighed in pounds sterling clearly, so I was wondering if there was any actual data on the cost benefit. I'm getting the sense that you just want to open up for life to go back to normal again - which is fine but that's not quite where I am on this. If the cost benefit is solid I'm all for opening up, but that's the line

Right but that can't be all of it. If minimising deaths was the only metric for success here then the gamble wouldn't be worth taking. I mean it would be a wholly unnecessary risk when you could achieve at worst the same result by locking down. The metric for success in this gamble, I'd imagine, is GDP versus lives. If a 1% GDP boost only costs 100 lives, maybe we have put a price on life and decided that we can live with that. If its 10,000 then maybe not. Or according to the BBC, how many children missing school is each death worth. Something like that nee

I mean, what do you mean by 'work'? What is success?

This article appears to just present the information on both sides. In fact it's not especially clear on the benefit of opening up other than sending children back to school and keeps referring to it as a big gamble. I'm curious about the logic there a bit though, given kids will be on summer holidays soon anyway - so effectively back at home either way. Why has the BBC not listed any other positives? Presumably there's a huge economic benefit to opening back up as well? In fact I would have thought that was the primary driver, how bizarre that they'd give a solitary example of a benefit. That

I really don't think this is what's happening. Starmer doesn't have enough loyalty amongst even most people on here for that to be the truth. I couldn't give a fuck what he thinks we should do and frankly, I don't even know what his position is. Also fwiw, I'm open minded about this in general as long as someone, somewhere has given an evidence based assessment of why opening back up is a good idea. If the government have expert advice that has supported them in developing a position based on available data, then I'm all for it. I'll continue wearing a mask myself because I wouldn'

Yeah that's strategic, meant to follow on from the club's statement. Takeover definitely dead though Edwards said so.

Yeah I'm not really sure what to make of this but you have to give Southgate credit for getting to a second semi-final. I still weirdly find myself a bit unenthused about the whole thing, but perhaps getting to an actual final would fix that. As it stands, even if we won the thing I think beating Germany would be the highlight for me Genuinely, properly enjoyed that.

Ah, there's the issue I think - I'm not trying to improve democracy in this action. Honestly even before all the recent examples of "democracy in action" I've been lukewarm on it as a system of governance at best. I could get behind it fully if people were forced to learn civics and could be tested for their political competence prior to being allowed to vote but it'll never happen - and yet without it, the whole thing is just a farce IMO. I just want the Tories out of power. They're killing people. They've been killing people for a decade. I couldn't care less about how proper the

I think we disagree on the semantics of the phrase here somewhat - I see acts of desperation as being things like launching a nuclear missile at your enemies in the face of obliteration, which this certainly is not - but I get the overall point nonetheless.

Just going to break this up in turn for ease: 1 - Why? Which demographic of pro PR voters is going to want it to be subject to a confirmatory vote? That's something you put in as a safety net to capture people who don't want PR but do want the other policies your party votes for. I don't understand how those people can exist as a demographic within any of the smaller parties, and surely we're talking about an absolute minority of Labour voters at this point. 2 - Why? Why does the electorate need to ratify it? I appreciate that this would be desirable in an informed and

I mean aye, I did think that while typing it

I wouldn't risk it on a referendum myself. I'd put it straight into law on the basis that we would be able to demonstrate that "a majority of voters voted for parties which supported PR". Force feed the Tories the same lines they fed us. This country, I'm sorry to say, is too poorly informed to be trusted with referendums.

What would it achieve as an act of desperation though? I think the very most we can say about it is that it's telling us absolutely nothing other than arbitration is still ongoing, and that the club believes it has a case but has concerns about how 'fair' the final decision will be without public scrutiny. If the club didn't have a case, it wouldn't be clamouring for transparency. I suppose the other interpretation would be that the Ashley knows he's lost and is seeking to poison the well ahead of the outcome being issued - but I'm not sure what he would stand to gain from that unl

From a tactical perspective though, we'd be unlikely to get an actual referendum in place without winning power. And if we actually managed to get a coalition government into power, I'm tempted to say we shouldn't bother with the referendum and just make it law. Boris Johnson style.

Luke Edwards has no fucking idea whatsoever. He's not insightful enough to have any clue what that statement might or might not mean - at this point he's no different to some random bloke offering an opinion down at the pub. Added to that, his original comment somewhat contradicts his previous views on this, does it not? I thought he had said that the takeover was already dead and had been for a year now. His comments suggests that he's now decided that it wasn't in fact dead, but it now is. I know we know this, but it's worth repeating - he knows the square root of fuc