The Nature vs Nurture Debate...

...looks like another 'Guardian' article trying to drum up sympathy for criminals might have inadvertantly provided us with the answer:

Nicol and Mooney grew up in a chaotic household in London. Their mother had six children and, Mooney says, terrible taste in men, who were unreliable at best. Her and Nicol’s father was from Saudi Arabia and left their mother when she was pregnant with Mooney. As a family, they stood out: “We were all different colours. Me and Tommy are brown, we have a white sister and the dads of my two younger brothers and sister are Jamaican.” They moved from home to home, sometimes living in refuges, escaping the violent men in their mother’s life.

And yet, despite similar upbringing, the two couldn't be more different. 

Mooney lives with her husband and two boys in a stylish, modern house, but asks me not to disclose the location because she has been attacked in the past for her campaigning. She looks around and says it couldn’t be more different from her and Nicol’s childhood. Her husband, a marketing executive, has done well for himself. As has she. Mooney taught nursery and primary schoolchildren before becoming an education adviser and academic.

She's a campaigner for her brother, the recidivist career criminal who the courts finally lost patience with and imposed a 99 year sentence to give the public some reprieve from his petty crimes. 

She thinks about the life Nicol could have led. “That’s what makes me so angry. The education system, the prison system; it’s all geared towards damaging the most damaged.”

As usual, no sympathy for the victims of her brother's depredations. 

No, I Think You'll Find It's The General Public's Buying Power...

The “gigantic” power of the meat and dairy industries in the EU and US is blocking the development of the greener alternatives needed to tackle the climate crisis, a study has found.

...they don't want your meat alternatives or your vegan food that's not as healthy and twice as expensive.

Cutting meat consumption in rich nations is vital to tackling the climate crisis. Livestock production causes 15% of all global greenhouse emissions.

And India and China's fossil fuel industry? And their livestock industry? How much is that? 

The researchers also highlighted restrictive labelling rules. Terms such as “milk” and “cheese” have been banned since 2017 in the EU for most alternative milk and dairy products.

A US proposal would prohibit the sale of alternative meats unless the product label included the word “imitation”.

Remember when scientists demanded accuracy in labelling? I do... 

“It’s not a level playing field at all at the moment,” Lambin said. “The new sector needs to be given its chance to expand and gain efficiency. After that, consumers will judge whether they like it or not...”

Well, going purely on the regular appearance of these foodstuffs in the 'yellow sticker' shelf of all my local supermarkets, they've already judged. 

The New 'Love That Dare Not Speak Its Name'...

...and believe it or not, it's 'Pride'. The BBC, it's the unique way it's funded, clearly!

The 'dear old Beeb' is seemingly determined to lose its reputation for impartiality as it surges ever forward into pushing the woke agenda:

A BBC spokesman said: 'It appears that the photograph used as part of this graphic has been altered, which, although there is no intention to mislead, should not have happened and is not acceptable BBC practice. We will be reminding our staff of this.'

If there was no intention to mislead, why was it altered? And why would you need to remind staff? 

H/T: @RiPNutmeg via Twitter

Advice Column Is Missing The Most Obvious Piece Of Advice...

I work in heritage in a rural area and am a minority in my workplace and local community. I really love living close to nature and what I do for work, but I feel that I don’t belong here. I grew up in a nearby rural county where we were the only Black family. Race was almost never mentioned by the white people around me...

Well, that's good, it means no-one cares that you're black, right? 

...but I now realise I was treated as an outsider my whole childhood.

Oh! So...how did you come to 'realise' this? 

I have over the past couple of years – after reading up about anti-racism – started to challenge the everyday racism that I had previously ignored. This has caused a massive backlash against me professionally with the resulting victimisation hounding me out of a job I loved at a large heritage organisation. I have learned the consequences of speaking out on racism and discrimination is to have your life and livelihood destroyed.

How will Sisonke Msimang (Yes, Reader, 'tis she) answer this one?

...when you ask about the ethics of telling “people to challenge racism when the power balance is so skewed that challenging may result in greater harm to the individual”, I hear this not as cynicism but as exhaustion. So many of us have been wounded by our attempts to stand up to racism that it sometime feels unwise to continue.

Ah. Of course. Reinforce and join in with the perpetual victimhood. I should have guessed, shouldn't I? 

One of the sadnesses of modern life is that, as James Baldwin has said, it can feel like, “your pain and your heartbreak are unprecedented in the history of the world […]”. And yet of course, despite the many problems facing Black people around the world today, history tells us that nothing we are experiencing is new.

*yawns* 

You say you feel like you are the minority in every area of life, and I can understand why. It’s because you have been minoritized — that isn’t okay that you have been rendered a minority by virtue of processes of domination that place you at the bottom of the social ladder. I hope that knowing this helps you to feel less alone.

Why not tell her to go where she isn't a minority, if it bothers her so much? You can go with her, if you like... 

So Am I, Brent, So Am I...

...it's appalling.

 

But surely what's even more appalling is that they are trying to 'educate' children that babies gestate in the digestive system, rather than the womb? 

You know, that organ men don't have, and never will?

More Retail Cowardice...

Another shop falls prey to the hysterical ninnies amongst us, as Longrider notes:

The shop has since removed the image and apologised on Instagram.

'We will keep this brief,' the post read. 'The image that has caused offence has been removed. We apologise unreservedly for any and all distress that it caused.'

Mr Harriman posted screenshots of the apology, with a tweet from Surrey Police confirming that the image has been taken down.

The 'offending image'..? A photo of a tobacco plantation. In a tobacconist.

After filming inside the store, Harriman, 46, spoke directly to the camera outside it, expressing his fury that a shop in 2023 could use an image of oppression to promote its products, calling it 'triggering' and 'damaging to many people'.

Something's damaging all right, but it isn't a sepia photo of a byegone age... 

The Question No-One's Asking...

The arrest in London of a radical French publisher under counter-terrorist powers has been referred to the police watchdog after the reviewer of terrorism legislation found that it was wrong.

Ernest Moret, 28, was held for almost 24 hours by counter-terrorist police and asked about his opinion of Emmanuel Macron and participation in anti-Macron protests after he arrived at St Pancras station in April for a book fair.

...is why on earth the UK police farce should be protecting a French politician in the first place? Given that there was no danger to that politician in this country, as he wasn't even here! 

In a damning report published on Friday, Jonathan Hall KC, the reviewer of the terrorism legislation, said the police should not have used schedule 7 of the Terrorism Act to confiscate Moret’s phone and laptop and demand he reveal passcodes to the devices.

Moret’s lawyer, Richard Parry, said his client was “very pleased” with Hall’s report. “We will now be writing to the Met commissioner asking for a full apology and compensation for all the distress of the detention and everything else that’s followed.

“The police shouldn’t be doing this. They really need to get their house in order. Mr Moret has been the sacrificial lamb to highlight the extreme dangers of crossing the line from terrorism into public order policing. It has gone too far.”

You're not wrong, but I wish you hadn't stuck your hand in my pocket. Because we all know that's where the compensation is coming from in the first place... 

Announcing that the case would be referred to the IOPC, Commander Dominic Murphy, who leads the Met’s counter-terrorism command, said the force accepted that use of terrorism powers should be subject to “constant vigilance and attention to safeguards”. He added: “We fully cooperated with this review and we know how important it is that our work is as open and transparent as it can be, so that the public can have confidence and trust in what we do and how we do it.”

The public no longer has that, though, does it? Because they are well aware that the police no longer represent their interests, but those of everyone else instead. 

Just Stick To Fixing Potholes And Emptying Bins...

Almost a quarter of Bradford residents live in...

Squalor?  

...“food deserts” - areas where there is little access to fresh, healthy food.

*blinks* Really?  

And that number rises to almost two thirds when looking at families with less than £20,000 income a year – according to a recent survey. The figures were revealed during a presentation on Bradford’s new Good Food Strategy – a plan that aims to improve access to healthy food for people across the District.

A council plan to improve something! How can it fail?  

The strategy also calls for water to become the “first choice drink” and for local influencers to be recruited to promote healthy eating.

Oh. I guess I can see how...

But what on earth is a 'food desert' anyway? I've scoured Google Maps and can't see any place lacking in shops... 

Members of the Bradford and Airedale Wellbeing Board were told that areas were classed as food deserts if people living there would have to walk more than 20 minutes to buy fresh food, such as fruit or vegetables.

As a commenter points out, 'Bet they have no trouble at all walking 20 minutes to the benefit office!' 

Or the local mosque... 

Charlotte Ramsden, CEO of the Bradford Children’s Trust, said access to healthy food was not the only issue. She said: “There is also access to cooking facilities. Some disadvantaged families have nothing to cook with – they might have a microwave if they are lucky. To prepare healthy food they need cooking facilities.”

It's Bradford, love! I'd be astounded if there weren't cow-dung fired stoves in the backyards... 

That Long March Reached Some Pretty Exclusive Institutions...

Teachers at a leading sixth form will no longer answer to “Sir” and “Miss”, because they’re “deeply unequal” and feed into a view of the world that diminishes women, the school’s executive principal has told students.

Students will instead be required to address staff by their name – as in “Mr Handscombe” – and failing that, in an emergency where a pupil may have forgotten and needs a swift alternative, “teacher” will be acceptable, “in a pinch”.

How nice of him! It seems I've heard this before, though...

It is not the first time the school has tried to make the switch. When it opened in 2014, the same approach was attempted but there was too much else to think about, staff could not make it stick and “sank into cultural misogyny”, Handscombe told students.

Ah! But presumably, he thinks he's got a better chance now. I wonder why? 

“Which is what this is,” he said. “I don’t think that any of you are being actively woman-hating when you call ‘Miss’ over to get help with your chemistry, but we’re all feeding into a view of the world that diminishes women.

“Men get to be fearless leaders and alpha types, get credited for hustling whilst behind the backs of women it’s asked whether they deserve it, whether their career comes from good ideas or good looks, power moves or diversity lists.”

Maybe it's because everyone seems like they are just going to roll over and take it? 

Geoff Barton, general secretary of the Association of School and College Leaders, said: “Addressing teachers as ‘Sir’ and ‘Miss’ is as old as the hills and something you’ll hear in many schools. It’s a way of implicitly reaffirming the authority of staff. But we live in changing times and obviously people are giving more and more thought to the use of language and its connotations.”

No, most people couldn't give a monkeys, Geoff ol' chum. It's a tiny unrepresentative selection that are driving this. Because people like you are too afraid to stand up to them. 

Of Course It Is, Sweetie...

The star of Netflix's much-talked about 'Queen Cleopatra' docudrama says the furore over her casting as the Egyptian ruler is 'fundamentally racist'.#

Pulling out the RaceCard™ is the automatic reflex, after all... 

Adele addressed the the high-profile criticism around being a black actress playing Cleopatra, saying: 'It would be naive of me to say that I didn't expect anything at all, but I didn't expect the scale of it.

'And I think it's distressing for anybody to receive any level of abuse, let alone the scale and the nature of what I've received, which is fundamentally racist, all of it.

'People are talking about the wrong things. Yes, we don't know where her mother was from or her paternal grandmother, but also the show is about so much more than the question mark over her race.'

You don't get to dictate what people talk about. And by casting you, that's what the makers of this show have done. No-one else did it. So you're perpetuating it. 

'If you watch it is a very small part of the conversation really, this is about the fullness of who this woman was and she was a human being and she shouldn't be reduced to her race any more than I should or anybody should.'

You've guaranteed it, actually. 

Adele also talked about the support of Hollywood actress Jada Pinkett Smith, who narrates the series and is its executive producer.

'She is an African Queen and I feel like it just couldn't be more pertinent and important that she's the figurehead of this. She's an icon.'

She's not African, she's not a queen either. What she is, is a Hollywood elite who knows exactly what she's doing to get her show watched. That it'll be for the wrong reasons matters not a jot, does it? 

Yes, But That's Exactly What Exactly What They Want To Prevent...

A row over Disney changing the words to a classsic song for the remake:

Someone else wrote: 'It makes sense that the villain say those things. Maybe instead of changing the lyrics, teach kids to think and reflect about those topic so they can develop critical thinking.'

Oh dear me, no. That will never do.... 

No Surprise...

The Make-A-Wish Foundation offers children with life-threatening illnesses a chance to live their dream: be a firefighter, adopt a puppy, go on a wild shopping spree.

But not every wish, eh..? Only those that they approve of. Of course.

But in an era of rapid medical advancements, what counts as life-threatening is changing. A case in point: the charity has announced that, beginning next year, people with cystic fibrosis, a genetic disease that primarily affects the lungs, will no longer qualify automatically for a wish. The good news is that that is because the illness is, for many people, far less of a threat than it once was.

Good news, indeed! Who could possibly disagree? 

...there are many ways the genetic issue behind CF can manifest, and not all of them respond to the drug. Much of the early research on the illness focused on non-Hispanic white patients, McGarry says, and genetic testing often misses variants in Black, Asian, Hispanic and Ashkenazi Jewish populations.

Now, McGarry said, “we’ve turned it into two different diseases”. Ninety per cent of patients have variants of CF that will respond to the drugs. The other 10% continues to grapple with severe illness.”

Oh. Silly me. I forgot identity politics trumps everything. 

Other treatments, including gene therapy, are being developed that may treat these mutations. But for now, “I think that’s where we’re going to have to work with Make-A-Wish to make sure that they understand about the patients who don’t qualify [for the drugs] – that cystic fibrosis is still a devastating disease for them,” McGarry said.

So little white Jimmy won't get to make a wish, but little black Ayeesha and little brown Malalia will. That won't cause any issues at all, will it? 

The War On Pets Continues...

Screaming headline!

Healthy dogs and cats could be passing on multidrug-resistant organisms to hospitalised owners.

Actual reality. 

However, the researchers stressed that the risk of cross-infection is currently low.

As usual with these reports, but most will just remember the headline, and they know it.  

Pet owners were asked to send swab samples of their pets and more than 300 did so.

Well, there you have it! These 300 are idiots. 

Of these samples, 15% of dogs and 5% of cats tested positive for at least one MDRO. In four cases, these microbes were found to be of the same species and showed the same antibiotic resistance between pets and their owners.

Four cases. Four! And when you dig deeper, it isn't even four... 

Whole genome sequencing confirmed that only one of the matching pairs were genetically identical in a dog and its owner.

Statistically insignificant. But no, these people have an agenda and they aren't going to let that stop them... 

“Although the level of sharing between hospital patients and their pets in our study is very low, carriers can shed bacteria into their environment for months, and they can be a source of infection for other more vulnerable people in hospital such as those with a weak immune system and the very young or old,” says Hackmann.

I think Fido and Tiddles will have to go some to beat the NHS in that regard, eh? 

Always Finding The Cloud In The Silver Lining...

During the past few years, we have witnessed a revolution in working life. When home working became more common during the Covid pandemic, many assumed this would be a temporary change. Yet according to data released this week by the Office for National Statistics, between September 2022 and January 2023, 16% of the workforce still worked solely from home, while 28% were hybrid workers who split their time between home and the office.

Hurrah, the 'Guardian' has found a success st...

Oh, wait! 

But what the data makes starkly clear is that the working from home revolution has not touched everyone’s lives equally. The ONS survey found that workers on salaries of more than £50,000, people with degrees, Londoners and white people had the highest rates of home or hybrid working – and were less likely to be required to go in every day.

So..? Isn't that a function of the jobs they tend to be concentrated in, more than anything else? 

There are many people working in the service, care and transportation sectors, for instance, who can’t work from home at all.

Well, yes.  

Overall, though, this revolution could change work and our lives outside work for the better – but to do so, it must be accessible to more than just the highest paid, most privileged workers.

How do you plan to allow a black Northern plumber to work from home to balance it out then? 

When Is A PC Game Not A PC Game?

Answer - when it's propaganda:

A popular video game series which has an age rating of 12 has been slammed by critics after a recent update allowed for 'top surgery' scars that come from breast removal and chest binders to be added to characters.

*sighs* And of course, not one games journal has done anything but fawn over this.  

Xbox supported the changes for a more inclusive game and said alongside a heart emoji: 'Vadish, we love it!' 'Vadish' also means 'thank you' in 'Simlish,' the made-up language that 'Sims' characters use to communicate. Mashable said it was: 'an exciting addition for transgender and disabled fans.' While gaming website Kotaku praised 'The Sims 4' for reaching out to disabled Simmers.

Is there no last bastion of pure entertainment unsullied by the woke agenda? 

The War On Personal Freedom Continues...

Innovative neighbourhoods, where everyone living in them has access to most of their everyday needs within a 20-minute walk, could be trialled...

In London?  

...in Norfolk.

The least populated and mostly rural county? What gives? Why choose this? 

Such neighbourhoods have gained popularity in the United States, Australia and Scandinavia, with the concept that people can walk to and back from services within 20 minutes - 10 minutes there and 10 minutes back.

Which might be ok in dense conurbations, and assuming you can walk, but to trial this in Norfolk makes no sense at all. Bloody Greens and Lib-Dems... 

Lana Hempsall, Conservative county councillor for Acle...

*sighs* 

...proposed a motion about the possible creation of the neighbourhoods at a recent county council meeting, which was supported by 48 councillors, with none voting against.

While cars would not be banned (Ed: at first...), the neighbourhoods would be designed so walking, cycling or using public transport might be a more direct way to reach services.

Whether you like it or not. 

Make no mistake, they want to remove personal freedoms. And the best way to do this is to remove the invention that's probably given people the most personal freedom. 

As Cults Go, It's Rather Innocuous....

Rhiannon Lucy Cosslett on the latest thing that makes you one of the 'smug middle classes':

The big book purge began when I decided to go through the shelves and discard any book I was vaguely embarrassed to have in the house, for reasons of quality, subject matter, politics or author (look at your shelves and you probably have your own equivalents). Since then, I’ve been jettisoning them every few months with no regrets. Only twice have I needed to look something up in a book I’ve thrown away, and rebought a cheap secondhand copy.

Budgeting in her household must be fun... 

The poster shows a cat and bears the slogan: “THAT’S WHAT I DO, I READ BOOKS, I DRINK TEA AND I KNOW THINGS.” Apologies if you own this poster, but to me it encapsulates everything that is smug and middle class about the cult of book ownership. I don’t mean reading – provided you’re lucky enough to still have a local library, that is a pastime that is accessible to almost everyone. No, I specifically mean having a lot of books and boasting about it, treating having a lot of books as a stand-in for your personality, or believing that simply owning a lot of books makes one “know things”.

God, the 'Guardian' really is an awful rag, isn't it? 

So Where Do They Go?

Low-traffic neighbourhoods significantly reduce the amount of motor vehicles within their boundaries without appearing to push traffic on to roads around their edges, the most comprehensive study yet of such schemes in the UK has concluded.

They don't evaporate, do they?

While the authors behind the research, from the University of Westminster’s Active Travel Academy (ATA), noted they only had useable data for just under half the 96 LTNs installed in London between March 2020 and May 2021, but said there was significant overall evidence of so-called traffic evaporation.

Oh. My mistake!

The research, which was based on traffic count data before and after the installation of 46 so-called LTNs in London, found a reduction in motor traffic within the zones of 32.7% when measured as the median, and a 46.9% drop when calculated as the mean. Of the 413 roads inside the LTNs with before-and-after traffic counts, the percentage experiencing an average of fewer than 1,000 motor vehicles a day, seen as a good shorthand for a street receptive to more cycling and walking, rose from 41% to 66%.

But surely, unless they also measure the amount of before and after cycling and walking, they can't say that that's what people are doing instead?