But Did Anyone Really Notice?

In the early hours an IT engineer raced into work through the dark, wintery streets of Redcar in north-east England. The dash was prompted by a worrying alert about the council's computer network, and he was soon hurriedly shutting down servers to try to halt the spread of a virus. It was too late. Hackers had scrambled Redcar and Cleveland Council's IT systems and would soon demand payment to restore it.

Wow, sounds more exciting than the new ‘Mission Impossible’ movie. I suspect it wasn’t quite like that though…. 

By 11:00 GMT on Saturday, local residents began to notice the council website was offline. "There wasn't a lot we could do," Mrs Lanigan said about efforts to stop the virus. "You had to be practical, so it was actually getting more phones in there so that people could ring us." 

News was spreading, but Mrs Lanigan, who lost her position in the 2023 local elections, claims she received pressure from council officials and central government not to speak out. The council declined to be interviewed about the attack but said there had been no pressure or instruction not to speak publicly, either at the time or since.

Hmm, who to believe?  

"It was devastating," she said. "Devastating for us, for the staff, for the public and for everybody else." They had lost the ability to share information with police and the NHS, while social services and elderly care services were knocked out, she said. "Even somebody ringing up and saying 'my bin hasn't been emptied' wasn't dealt with."

And…did anyone think that was unusual? Did anyone actually leap to the conclusion the council had been hacked, or did they just shrug and think ‘Same old council service!’..? 

But Activists Are Happy For Children To Experience All This IRL

“Deeply disturbing” research exposes how easy it is for children to encounter inappropriate content and interact unsupervised with adults on the gaming platform Roblox.

While the company said it “deeply sympathised” with parents whose children came to harm on the platform, it said “tens of millions of people have a positive, enriching and safe experience on Roblox every day”.

OK, this does sound horribly like 'Look, all our other ships made it to New York!' said the CEO of the White Star Line' but it's also not wrong... and how many of the people clutching their pearls over virtual perversion are at all concernced with its real life counterpart?

The report also found the avatar belonging to the 10-year-old’s account could access “highly suggestive environments”. These included a hotel space where they could view a female avatar wearing fishnet stockings gyrating on a bed and other avatars lying on top of each other in sexually suggestive poses, and a public bathroom space where characters were urinating and avatars could choose fetish accessories to dress up in.

Blimey, sounds almost as bad as Drag Queen Story Hour, doesn't it! 

Researchers found that their test avatars overheard conversations between other players verbalising sexual activity, as well as repeated slurping, kissing and grunting noises, when using the voice chat function.

Well, so what? They'll have heard worse if they'd ever attended something like this. 

Damon De Ionno, the research director of Revealing Reality, said: “The new safety features announced by Roblox last week don’t go far enough. Children can still chat with strangers not on their friends list, and with 6 million experiences [on the platform], often with inaccurate descriptions and ratings, how can parents be expected to moderate?”

If that sounds too much like 'How can parents be expected to do the bare minimum of what it is to be a parent?' then I suspect that's no coincidence. 

Man With A Hammer Sees Nails Everywhere...

The Oscar-winning British film director, Sir Steve McQueen, who is most famous for bringing the horror of the slave trade to cinema screens, has turned his lens on the forgotten, and even officially censored, terrors that London underwent during the second world war.

His starry new film, Blitz, which opens the London film festival (LFF) next month, is a powerful ­evocation of the perils of life during the German Blitzkrieg – a bombing campaign that aimed to batter Britain into submission in the early 1940s.

And he's chosen to include the Bethnal Green Tube disaster, when a crush killed 173 Londoners. 

The film is told through the eyes of what I assume is considered to be a typical mother & child from the East End of London in 1943. Let's take a look at a still:

Is it me, or...?

Ahead of the premiere, McQueen said: “Blitz is a movie about Lon­doners. It honours the spirit of what and how Londoners endured during the blitz, but also explores the true representation of people in London.”

Are you sure about that? 

Oh, C'mon, There Can't Be Much Doubt About The One On The Left...

...he's clearly not missed many meals! 

It’s been one of Cat Onyac’s better days. Her two children are concentrating on their crochet project, sitting in the sunshine at HvH Arts in north London. And they’ve eaten. “All the children get a hot meal,” she says. The family is at a summer scheme for children in Camden on the edge of Keir Starmer’s constituency, and food is just as important as learning photography, painting or music.

Salads might be a better option in summer, Cat...

“That means not worrying whether they’re going to eat or not,” says Cat, a single parent. “It helps reduce the shopping bill. I’m not worrying what am I going to make for them and are they going to be the only child who hasn’t had anything to eat?”

What are you doing with the child benefit you get then?  

It’s people like Onyac and her family who were on the minds of the seven Labour MPs who rebelled against the party last week and voted for an SNP amendment to lift the two-child benefit limit. That, along with the benefit cap, the effects of inflation and the roll out of universal credit, pushed 700,000 more children into poverty over the past 14 years.

No, it didn't. They are talking about relative poverty, not absolute poverty.  

You Can Bet His Name Isn't Fred Smith...

And should we ever get to know it, no-one will be surprised, I'm sure. 

Managers at a hospital where police are investigating dozens of deaths promoted a consultant surgeon months after they allegedly assaulted junior doctors during surgery, the Guardian can reveal. Two female registrars at the University Hospitals Sussex NHS trust in Brighton sent written statements to the trust’s chief medical officer in March 2022 detailing how they were allegedly assaulted by the surgeon in separate incidents as they helped to operate on patients, leaked documents reveal.

The consultant surgeon was alleged to have slapped one of the registrars across her face with the back of a hand. The other registrar claimed she was slapped on the hand and had surgical instruments snatched from her by the same person.

Yes, Reader, in surgery, when they should really be concentrating on the task in hand. You'll say there can be no excuse for behaviour like that, but you'll be wrong!  

The trust said its investigation found the surgeon’s actions were inappropriate but did not constitute assault and were taken in the interest of patient safety. The surgeon apologised to the registrars.The investigation concluded that, in the first incident, the registrar’s visor was blocking the consultant’s field of vision during surgery, causing them to instinctively push the visor away.

By actually touching the offending item rather than asking 'Nurse, please move'? Aren't they supposed to not touch anyone but the patient to avoid cross-contamination?  

In the second incident, it concluded that an instrument was taken from the registrar’s hand during a procedure for patient safety purposes.

Sound like patient safety would be better assured by making sure this chap never entered the operating theatre.  

And Why Shouldn’t You Be Questioned?

Guardian interviews with school leaders elsewhere revealed widespread concern about deteriorating behaviour among pupils, coupled with a lack of support for school policies from some parents, both issues highlighted in the Ofsted annual report last week.

“Behaviour has got worse, but what we don’t get is any support from the parents,” said one head of a secondary school in the Midlands, who did not want to be named. “They don’t want their children being sanctioned. They question more than they support.”

Why shouldn’t they question you? You’ve proven yourselves to be partisan, secretive and lazy. 

“In the past students were in lessons. They might be disruptive in lessons and you’d have to deal with that kind of behaviour. “But there’s a new thing coming up in schools in the last year and a half – students are turning up to school, but they don’t go into any lessons and they just wander around the building. They want to come for the social, but they don’t want to go into their lessons.

“So then I have to put a sanction in place and I’m having to suspend or put them in a removal room. But most of the time they don’t comply and the parents have no sway with the children either.”

Gosh, maybe that lockdown did some good after all, if it’s burst the ‘teacher as god’ bubble. 

There are more fights between pupils and more disruption from the setting off of fire alarms.

“But for us, the biggest issue is students just refusing to follow instructions point blank.”

In some cases when a child refuses to leave a classroom, the whole of the class has to move elsewhere instead.

Well, since schools are usually fans of collective punishment, I find it rather hard to really care…after all, it’s a rod you’ve clearly made for your own backs, after all:

Glyn Potts, headteacher of Saint John Henry Newman RC College in Oldham, said suspensions had doubled at his school, from 81 days last year to 161 days this year.

“I don’t necessarily think behaviour has got worse,” said Potts. “What I would say is the level of need and the level of complexity of young people has increased exponentially.”

Unmet special needs, mental health issues and persistent post-pandemic absence are all creating tensions in schools, which can result in breaches of the behaviour code.

“In the past we had naughty boys and girls who did things that were naughty,” Potts added. “Now it’s just far more complex than that.”

Maybe it isn’t, though? 

The Word 'Could' Is Doing A Lot Of Heavy Lifting Here...

Foreigners who commit anti-Semitic or other hate crimes could lose their visas.

Ha ha ha ha ha ha! No, go on, tell us another!

Ministers are looking at stepping up deportations of hatemongers after a surge in incidents amid the Gaza conflict.

'Stepping up', eh? Well, that won't be too hard, since they've been dragging their feet for years.  

Home Office officials are able to weigh up evidence against individuals and boot them out even if they have not been convicted but their presence in this country is still judged to be 'not conducive to the public good'.

Able they may be, but the crucial question is, are they willing...? 

Labour's Sir Keir Starmer said there had been a 'disgusting rise' in anti-Semitism since the Hamas outrage along with an 'appalling surge' in Islamophobia with mosques 'forced to ramp up security'.

And that's just in your own ranks, eh? 

The New ‘Oooh, Me Back!’

Well, I'm sure this comes from rigorous medical research...

The findings come from 10,171 adults who completed questionnaires.

Oh. 

More work is needed to understand who is at risk, how bad it can be and what can be done about it, experts say.

No, I'd start with 'can it be proven to exist?' first, if I were you.  

The researchers behind the new work say the results provide validation for patients who experience problems like this. Investigator Prof Adrian Martineau, from Queen Mary University of London, told the BBC: "People really can feel very run down after a virus. It's not in their imagination and it is a recognised thing."

I wonder if it's recognised in HR departments? 

So, This Is A Step Too Far, Eh..?

School leaders have accused Labour of “window dressing” after Keir Starmer pledged to introduce...

...supervised toothbrushing for young children in England’s primary schools.

While the policy has long been supported by the dentistry profession as a way of curbing decay, headteachers said it was not appropriate for their staff to check whether pupils had cleaned their teeth.

It's not appropriate to check what parents are sending in for a packed lunch either, but that didn't stop them, did it?

Paul Whiteman, the general secretary of the National Association of Head Teachers, said: “We have serious reservations about how such a policy could even work. It is not the role of teachers to be making sure children brush their teeth each day.

“Schools already play a role in teaching children about the importance of looking after their teeth through the curriculum, but there has to be a limit in terms of what we can expect them to do.

“We should demand more than window dressing from all of our politicians.”

Oh, be quiet! You've already meddled in things that were the purview of parents, you can hardly claim it's not your role now... 

The British Dental Association, which represents the profession, said it was encouraged by Labour’s proposal, given ministerial inaction over introducing a similar scheme.

So, have the hapless Labour brains trust decided there's more votes to come from dentists than from  teachers? Because maybe they shouldn't have let Diane Abbott do the maths...  

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

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?

An Early Entry For The VirtueSignalling Olympics...

Paul Holdsworth, a local boatmaster, had worked for Windermere Lake Cruises (WLC) for 10 years, but quit in “disgust” after employees were banned from...

Smoking? Driving too fast? 

...making reference to slavery in their commentaries.

Oh... 

The company told employees that disclosing such information may cause distress or upset to passengers. It also said that the guidebook, which tourists can buy, was being updated and references to slavery have been removed. Holdsworth said that over the past 10 years, skippers were free to make up their own commentaries during boat tours, and employees talked of all aspects of Windermere’s life and history.

Did they all blather on about slavery then, Paul? Or...was that just you, perhaps...? 

“In the end, I realised they weren’t going to change and that I couldn’t persuade them. They were going to expect me to be complicit in them censoring history and that was something, in all good conscience, that I couldn’t possibly do. So I walked away.”

Great! Now you can set up your own tour company and witter on about slavery to your heart's content, can't you? I mean, how can such a business plan fail? There'll be queues all around Windermere, I'll bet.

The local group Anti Racist Cumbria has been supporting Holdsworth since his resignation and approached WLC to offer its support to co-create respectful transcripts and wording. They are yet to receive a response.

Heh! Good.  

A spokesperson for WLC said: “We are not an organisation responsible for providing education or historical interpretation of the area in which we operate and felt there was no compelling need to refer to the transatlantic trade of enslaved people, given that this aspect of our commentary had been the source of complaints.”

At last, a company prepared to stand up to the crazies! It's about the only thing that'd get me on a boat... 

'Agony Aunts' Are Somewhat...Different...In The Dear Old 'Guardian'

*blinks* 

One of the common mistakes white people make is to overestimate their importance in the lives and imaginations of people of colour.

Could that possibly be because race baiters like you never shut up about it? 

Racism matters, and microaggressions are important because they often impede our ability to function in the world with ease by stopping us from conducting basic activities like driving, shopping, or even just walking down the street.

*skepticism intensifies* 

But at the level of whether a particular white person is interested in dating us or not, I think you would have a hard time finding any woman of colour who would be even mildly concerned about this.

Sisonke is just brimming with compassion for us honkeys, isn't she?

I feel bad for him: one of the burdens of whiteness is how much it stunts the lives of those who buy into its deceits.

It's not the first thing that springs to mind when 'the burden of whiteness' crops up, actually... 

The bigger question you need to ask yourself is whether your values and his still align. Surely this is not the only area where his attitudes on race show up.

Yes, it must be racism that drives sexual preferences. I mean, what else could it possibly be? 

A Dispatch From Fantasy Land...

To us, white supremacy is not just an armed white man with a swastika tattooed on his forehead. It is the 1994 Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act (called by then senator Joe Biden, who drafted the legislation, “Biden’s bill”) juxtaposed with the Anti-drug Abuse Act of 1986 – which together led to the mass incarceration of, principally, Black men.

There was something else that led to their incarceration, though, wasn't there? Like, their inability to avoid breaking those laws?

White supremacy is not just Combat 18 in combat gear: it is a homeless Black man with mental health issues being choked to death on a subway train by a white marine veteran, members of a Fox News TV audience cheering at the report, and the attitude that sees the former soldier premptively hailed a hero and bolstered with public donations of $2m towards his legal fees.

Yes, clearly, it's only OK to applaud a criminal when they are black... 

Some of the foremost proponents of white supremacy are Black and brown. For some it is so normalised that they struggle to understand a world without it. Others understand what happens to those who oppose white supremacy and are rightfully scared.

What do they have to be scared about? Not getting invited to write nonsense like this in national newspapers or hector the audience on national TV? 

Which Schools, Joanne..?

Harris, who taught in an all-boys school for 15 years, said “the way we educate our children” must change if we wanted to see fewer crimes against women. 

She said: “We have to stop girls being apologetic when they have done nothing wrong. We have to stop boys being entitled when they’re actually not entitled to have more than anybody else. We’ve got to stop teaching them differently as teachers, that will help a lot.

“Also we’ve got to stop giving them the message that it’s wrong for a boy to read books about girls. Because even schools are giving them this message. And this is where the problem happens, where women’s voices are perceived as less.”

I mean, if you don't name any (and in these modern times, what school would dare give such a message?) we might think you're just talking absolute bollocks, mightn't we? 

 

 

Oh, Now It Is, Sure...

...but if she'd been planning an abortion, suddenly, they'd be castigated for that opinion. 

Wouldn't they, Reader?

Remember, These People Are The 'Lifeblood Of London's Restaurant Trade'...

Kesarajith Perera was left red faced after taking a tumble on a patch of oil at The George pub in Harrow, London, prompting his manager Hesham Badra to laugh out loud at his expense.

Mr Perera was later dismissed over an unrelated matter, prompting him to sue Stonegate Pub Company Ltd claiming racial and religious harassment and cite Mr Badra's response to his accident as evidence.

Well, of course, because he no doubt did it with our money! But once again, he met someone not prepared to be swayed: 

But employment judge David Maxwell threw out his case, saying that the 'slapstick element' of someone falling over was likely to provoke laughter.

'Whilst it might be tempting to hope that one colleague would only ever react in a sympathetic way towards the misfortune of another, common experience suggests this is not always the case,' he said.

Hurrah! But what was the 'unrelated matter' that saw him canned, anyway? 

In October, following failure to provide documentation for his proof of right to work in the UK, he was dismissed, prompting him to take the pub's owners to a tribunal complaining of racism.

Oh... 

Mr Perera's additional complaint that he had been given the 'full time role of cleaning toilets' was also dismissed. Judge Maxwell added: 'Cleaning the toilets could scarcely be made into a full-time role.

'Mr Perera's objection was the same as before - this was an unpleasant duty he did not think he should have to carry out.'

Well, indeed! Probably objected to having to wash his hands before waiting tables as well... 

Dismissing his claims of harassment, Judge Maxwell said: 'None of the treatment complained of had the proscribed purpose or effect.

'The conduct itself, objectively, came nowhere near having the proscribed effect, and his view of matters was unreasonable.'

But he did get a consolation prize!

However, the tribunal did rule in his favour regarding unlawful deductions of wages and awarded him £1,426.11.

He was also handed £908.91 for the pub's 'abysmal' paperwork after he was not provided with a written particulars of employment.

Yes, let's all go back to working in offices and paying fortunes for commuting to keep these businesses propped up, shall we? 

This Wasn't The First Time...

The 58-year-old paramedic can be seen casually strolling up towards a side table where the cash was placed, before rummaging through her things and pocketing the money.

When he realised he'd been filmed, Mark Titley quickly put the cash back - but the victim's son saw what he had done and said it made him 'sick to his stomach'.

He's done this before. and got away with it, I'll bet. In the days before the proliferation of cameras, probably many times. 

The 58-year-old was one of four medics called to the woman's home in Shrewsbury on June 29 last year, following reports she had collapsed in the garden. They worked on her for about 20 minutes before she was pronounced dead at the scene.

Shrewsbury Crown Court was told Titley then entered the property in search of a 'do not resuscitate' form.

To cover what they'd done in pronouncing her?  

Titley initially denied the allegation, telling police he intended to 'secure' the cash and take it out to family members.

Sure, that's why he spotted the camera and put it back. Even modern cops aren't that naive! 

However, he later admitted theft and was given an 18-week prison sentence, suspended for 12 months. He was also ordered to carry out 120 hours unpaid work and pay £530 costs and a £187 victim surcharge.

Can we at least be certain he can kiss goodbye to his public sector pension? 

The court heard Titley, of Linley Avenue, Pontesbury, was no longer a serving paramedic, having retired from West Midlands Ambulance Service days after the incident.

*sighs* 

Manipulating The News...

The 'Guardian' opines:

Kay Marsh, another Dover resident who works for the migrants rights charity Samphire, said that she has seen attitudes of local people harden against asylum seekers.“I used to find that people were more willing to listen. But now it’s more of ‘this is what I read in the newspapers and this is what the government is saying’. Asylum seekers are normal people who want a safe life. Everybody is entitled to that.”

Normal people who want a safe life that's somehow not in France. Or any of the other countries they've passed through to get here. 

Normal people who know they aren't welcome in a country, so they break its laws to come regardless... 

Chris Johnson, who lives just outside Dover, who is described as “far right” and a “migrant hunter” by the organisation Hope Not Hate, stepped out of his white BMW on the white cliffs of Dover to catch a glimpse of the arrival of Rishi Sunak and his entourage at the Maritime Rescue Coordination Centre.

Gosh. I wonder why the 'Guardian' didn't see fit to tell us what car Kay drives..? 

One asylum seeker living in Home Office accommodation in Napier barracks in Folkestone, said: “The home secretary’s announcement today is a revenge plan and closes any ray of hope for those whose lives are in danger and seek safety and security in Britain.”

What are they seeking it from? France isn't that bad, comparted to Somalia or Afghanistan, is it? And they aren't all 'seeking safety', are they?

 

We've Seen How Other Economies 'Succeed', Julia And Winsome...

The cost of living crisis affects all of us, but it doesn’t affect us equally. One of us struggles to afford the spiralling price of the weekly shop, while the other can shop as before, unaffected by rising food prices. One of us fears turning on the heating to keep her house warm, while the other can heat her home and travel for some winter sun without a second thought.

This isn’t how an economy succeeds.

...and while it might be good for the wall-building trade, I don't much fancy it in my country.

Instead of squeezing low earners, the chancellor should have matched his actions to his rhetoric and taxed wealth at the top.

Here you go, Julia! If you don't think you're taxed enough, the nice people at the Treasury will gladly accept your voluntary payment at that link.

Do be a dear, though, and come back to the 'Guardian' and tell us all when you've done it, eh?