Nobody Cares about Britain

[Innula Zenovka]

Starmer to unveil digital ID cards in plan set to ignite civil liberties row | Keir Starmer | The Guardian

I think this is free to view

ID cards are a terrible, terrible idea

Many people I admire believe firmly in ID cards, or have grown to accept them. This is why they're wrong.

iandunt.substack.com

I'm torn. The only time I've ever voted anything but Labour in a national election -- 2010 -- was when I voted Lib Dem as a protest against the then Labour government's plans to bring in ID cards.

And we all know what happened next, and kept on happening for 14 years.

I still think it's a dreadful idea, and bound to turn into a wildly expensive and dangerous white elephant. However I can't see myself voting for anyone other than my current Labour MP, who's both a genuinely good guy and a good constituency MP, in the next election, if only to keep out Reform.

 

[Innula Zenovka]

Patricia Crowther, known as UK’s oldest witch, dies aged 97

Crowther’s death was reported by the pagan news publisher Wild Hunt.
“As high priestess, author, and teacher, Patricia Crowther leaves a profound legacy,” the publication said. “Her work ensured that witchcraft remained vibrant, accessible, and present in modern times. Her memory will be a blessing to all who have been touched by her work in Wicca, and her spirit continues to live on in the covens and communities she inspired.”

 

[Innula Zenovka]

Joining officers on undercover modern slavery operation as victim referrals hit record high

Modern slavery is when one person is exploited by another for their personal or financial gain.

Victims are often unable to leave their situation due to threats, violence, coercion, or deception.

It exists in many forms; from human trafficking and forced labour to sexual or criminal exploitation, domestic servitude and forced marriage, according to the Modern Slavery Act 2015.

And now, a leading modern slavery charity is warning the crime is happening within some of the UK's biggest industries including construction, hospitality and care.

It's not ideal, but the UK's system treats the people this exploited as victims of crime, not criminals, no matter how they entered the country, and their employers and exploiters as the criminals.

 

[Innula Zenovka]

The Guardian -- ‘Don’t trust Trump’: how UK health experts are fighting back against a war on medicine

Wes Streeting, the UK health secretary, was in a government car heading back into central London from a flag-raising to mark the UK’s recognition of Palestine when he saw the news. “He was aghast,” an aide said. Streeting was reading on his phone that Donald Trump had just warned women not to take Tylenol – known outside the US as paracetamol – during pregnancy.

The US president had alleged without evidence that the common painkiller caused autism in children. “Don’t take Tylenol,” Trump said about a drug also known as acetaminophen.

Already booked to appear on a breakfast show the next morning, Streeting knew he would be asked about Trump. “He knew he had to be unequivocal,” the aide said. “That whatever diplomatic issues we face, first and foremost our responsibility is people’s health.”

When the question came, Streeting was brutal. “I trust doctors over President Trump, frankly, on this,” he said. “I’ve just got to be really clear about this: there is no evidence to link the use of paracetamol by pregnant women to autism in their children. None.

“So I would just say to people watching: don’t pay any attention whatsoever to what Donald Trump says about medicine. In fact, don’t even take my word for it, as a politician – listen to British doctors, British scientists, the NHS.”

 

[Innula Zenovka]

Hotel cancels launch event for Tommy Robinson-backed political party

It was canned on ‘health and safety grounds’ following an online protest

share.google

I'd missed this. The party is a vehicle for Nigel Farage's sometime deputy, Ben Habib, with whom he had a falling out because that's what Farage does with his underlings. The significance of the story isn't that there's yet another far-right vanity party or that Ben Habib is dumb enough to let Stephen Yaxley-Lennon, aka Tommy Robinson, anywhere near it -- for all his faults, Farage has a keen interest sense of how far he can go, and he's very aware that he can't afford to have his party associated with the drunken yobbish soccer hooligan element who are Tommy Robinson's fan base.

It is, however, significant because Elmer Musk is apparently bankrolling it, which is doubtless part of its attraction to convicted fraudster Yaxley-Lennon. Seeing Farage and Reform squeezed from the Right by a party with Musk's money and social media behind it could get very interesting.

 

[Innula Zenovka]

Manchester synagogue attacker was on bail after rape arrest, police say

Jihad Al-Shamie, 35, had not been charged with the offence before launching a car ramming and stabbing attack on Thursday.

www.bbc.co.uk

 

[Innula Zenovka]

Oh. Manchester synagogue attack: one victim apparently shot dead by police.

It seems that the victim, as was someone else also wounded by a gunshot, was inside the synagogue, holding the doors shut to prevent the attacker from getting inside. The attacker, who was shot dead on the scene, was not armed with a firearm. So it looks as if some of the shots fired by police missed the attacker and went through the door, hitting the people holding it shut.

Also

The father of the Manchester synagogue attacker, who killed two people and injured others yesterday morning, has said his family condemns his son’s actions.

Faraj al-Shamie, father of attacker Jihad al-Shamie, said the news had come as a “profound shock” to him and the family.

In a social media post, he wrote:

The news from Manchester regarding the terrorist attack targeting a Jewish synagogue has been a profound shock to us. The al-Shamie family in the UK and abroad strongly condemns this heinous act, which targeted peaceful, innocent civilians.
We fully distance ourselves from this attack and express our deep shock and sorrow over what has happened. Our hearts and thoughts are with the victims and their families, and we pray for their strength and comfort.
We kindly request that all media outlets respect the family’s privacy during this very difficult time and refrain from using this tragic event in any context that does not reflect the truth.
May God have mercy on the innocent victims, and we pray for the swift recovery of the injured.

 

[Innula Zenovka]

Sarah Mullally is named as first female archbishop of Canterbury

Dame Sarah Mullally has been named as the first female leader in the history of the Church of England as Downing Street announced the 106th archbishop of Canterbury nearly a year on from Justin Welby’s resignation over the handling of a safeguarding scandal.

A former chief nursing officer for England, Mullally, 63, a mother of two and the Bishop of London, is now archbishop of Canterbury-designate. She will legally become the archbishop at a ceremony in Canterbury Cathedral in January, followed by a formal enthronement service at a later date where members of the royal family are likely to be present.

 

[Free]

Sarah Mullally is named as first female archbishop of Canterbury

Can I say, without intending any sense of disparagement, that the religious state in England is so weird.

 

[Innula Zenovka]

Can I say, without intending any sense of disparagement, that the religious state in England is so weird.

I can't help but think that it's one of the reasons we're one of the least religious countries in the world.

Certainly seems to work better than having a constitutional ban on established religions.

 

[Free]

I can't help but think that it's one of the reasons we're one of the least religious countries in the world.

Certainly seems to work better than having a constitutional ban on established religions.

We probably should have built our own. Written our own Good Book. With Jefferson as senior editor.

 

[detrius]

Oh. Manchester synagogue attack: one victim apparently shot dead by police.

It seems that the victim, as was someone else also wounded by a gunshot, was inside the synagogue, holding the doors shut to prevent the attacker from getting inside. The attacker, who was shot dead on the scene, was not armed with a firearm. So it looks as if some of the shots fired by police missed the attacker and went through the door, hitting the people holding it shut.

Also

A good door would have saved lives.

 

[Innula Zenovka]

A good door would have saved lives.

I don't think that was the door in question. From The Guardian

Alan Levy, the synagogue’s chair of trustees, helped barricade the doors at the Heaton Park Hebrew Congregation Synagogue when Jihad Al-Shamie appeared waving a knife.

Levy told ITV News he saw Al-Shamie “with a big knife, banging his knife into the glass, trying to get through.

“The heroes of the congregation who saw what was happening then came to the doors because he was trying to break the doors down to get in.

“We were barricading the doors between us with Rabbi Walker and a number of the other congregants. He couldn’t get in because we were holding the doors firm.”

He added: “All I heard him say was when the guys were outside the perimeter and were shouting at him. He shouted ‘this is what you get for killing our children’.”

He added: “It’s just truly horrific. The attacks against our community … Our children aren’t safe in schools, we have to have guards. Our people are not safe at the synagogue going to pray on the holiest day of our year.”

 

[detrius]

I don't think that was the door in question. From The Guardian

Oh, the door from the picture above is from the 2019 synagogue shooting in Halle.

In that case, the door actually saved the lives of the 51 people inside.

Two innocent people were murdered on the outside, but it could have been much worse.

 

[Innula Zenovka]

Financial Times How polarised is Britain? Behind media perceptions of a sharpening political divide is a more complicated picture

Polarisation may be an unhelpful term for what is happening in both US and UK politics. It implies that both sides are becoming equally extreme. Arguably the real dynamic is that elements of the right have hardened, embracing positions that would have been unacceptable a decade ago. By contrast, Labour’s policies are clearly less radical, and less socialist, than those proposed by Jeremy Corbyn, eight or so years ago. (Corbyn’s new venture is yet to demonstrate it’s capable of naming itself.)

Moreover, aside from the fights over immigration, Britons agree on quite a lot. Polling from More in Common, a think-tank that seeks to tackle division, suggests that there is no wave of social conservatism in the UK. The country has long been less religious than the US. There are large majorities, including among Reform voters, in favour of same-sex marriage and current or more liberal abortion law. Most Britons continue to say that diversity policies are a good thing. Although the rightwing media has lionised Lucy Connolly, a woman jailed for inciting violence during August anti-immigrant riots, most of the public don’t think she was treated harshly.

 

[Innula Zenovka]

Interesting interview, or at least I found it so, between right-wing journalist (in British terms, which would probably him a left-of-centre Democrat in the US, but anyway...) Fraser Nelson and London's mayor Sadiq Khan (a terrible mayor, terrible, terrible mayor, and it’s been changed, it’s been so changed. Now they want to go to sharia law -- D Trump). Much of it is London-specific, but this general point is perhaps more significant. No great surprise to those of us who are familiar with his politics (one of the reasons he has such a large security team is his support, as a member of parliament, for equal marriage, which led some Muslim clerics to denounce him for apostasy) but anyway

Kemi Badenoch, I told him, once said Britain is the best country in the world in which to be black. Would he say the same about Muslims?

“I’ve been quite clear that not only is this the best country to be a Muslim, there is no other country in the world I’d raise my two daughters.”

I wanted to make clear I’d understood him. Did he think Britain was the best country in the world to be a Muslim, including Muslim-majority countries - and that the treatment of women in these other countries is his concern?

“Spot on. I’m the father of two daughters. I’m really aware of some of the laws that exist in Muslim-majority countries. I say passionately, hand on heart, there is no other city in the world I would raise my daughters but London. In a previous life I practised human rights law. Freedom of expression, which is article ten of the Human Rights Act and the European Convention of Human Rights, includes the right to offend. And that’s the joy of freedom of expression, the right to ridicule. And of course, we mustn’t incite hatred. There are laws. There are limitations on freedom of expression. But it’s really important that we are able to cause offence and to ridicule and to mock.”

Sadiq Khan: on crime, Labour and Islam

Notes from my interview at Labour Party conference

substack.com

 

[Free]

What is a reactionary centrist, and does the UK have them?

A term favoured by US progressives can help us understand Britain’s drift to the right

www.prospectmagazine.co.uk

In 2012, 60 trans-related articles were published by Britain’s media. By 2022, it was more than 7,500, according to figures from Trans Media Watch. The media is not responding to public rage against vulnerable minorities; it is helping to create it. Polling shows that opinion on immigration tracks tabloid coverage much more closely than actual immigration levels. People become more concerned not when the number of immigrants rises, but when the press fearmongers about it more. Research has also shown that media coverage of dramatic but unrepresentative cases (such as small boat crossings) is shaping opinion of immigrants–including those who are in the UK legally—more broadly.

 

[Innula Zenovka]

Free to read, I think

Why isn’t it treasonable to take Musk’s money?

Tommy Robinson and the threat from MAGA America

nickcohen.substack.com

 

[Bartholomew Gallacher]

How the UK became the divided kingdom.

 

[Free]