Left-wingers... are they all mad?

[max_tranmere]

Someone I know is very left-wing and got on her high-horse this year and last year about how St George's Day shouldn't be celebrated because we don't do the same for every other race here. This is in spite of St George's Day actually being a smaller event in London than St Patrick's Day or eid or Diwali (we have our former left-wing Mayor to thank for that). This person thinks St George's Day shouldn't even be marked though, and she also recently sounded-off about a certain area of London for being "too white". I have heard her complain about how some pubs are too white aswell. She is white by the way and I wonder, if she was in Lagos in Nigeria, whether she would complain that a suburb of that city was "too black". I doubt it.

I will probably be seeing her next week because she is a friend of a friend and I bump into her from time to time. I can't imagine how much of a moan she will be having about how there are Union Flags out in Oxford Street for the Queen's Jubilee, and also she will no doubt rant about how it's wrong that some people will be wearing Union Flag shirts during the celebrations. I don't want to be anywhere near her when England play in the Euro's in June, she will take offense to anyone cheering for England.

I often wonder how these people ended up thinking like they do. In the 1980's they referred to these people as the "loony left". These latte sipping, Guardian reading, intellectuals, sitting there in their ex-local authority flat in some recently gentrified part of London - with their cropped hair and one large ear-ring - whining in the mad leftie way they do. Do you remember when left-wing politics was about helping the most needy in society and creating a safety-net for those most in need of it? How, when and why it shifted from that to this is beyond me.

So in answer to my original question, are leftie's mad, the answer is "yes!". People's views please.

[jimslip]

Max, I think you will have rather alot of explaining to do to our David Johnson, the self appointed, "Politcal Correctness Enforcement Officer" of BGAFD, who will patiently explain to you why your "Loony Left" friend is actually totally reasonable and it is YOU who should be admonished!

Be afraid........be VERY afraid!

[David Johnson]

Your "friend of a friend" seems bonkers. Having said that I have never met anyone like that.

Though I can remember as a kid knowing a couple who were into Socialist Worker meetings. Any subject you got talking to them about always ended up with some Marxist interpretation. After about a year they stopped going to the meetings. I remember asking them why and they told me it was due to people being nasty to them at the meetings which I thought hilarious.

But hey, look at the bonkers right wing US Republican candidates here

http://bgafd.co.uk/forum/read.php?f=3&i ... ply_251629

I don't think being bonkers has a left or right wing bias. What is a concern is when people lump an entire group together e.g. ALL left wingers are mad, ALL right wingers are mad, ALL Jews are rich, ALL Muslims are the followers of an evil religion that has done nothing but bad etc etc etc.

It's usually a prerequisite for prejudice, physical attacks and hatred.

[Lizard]

Next time you see her, get your bell end out and ask her what she thinks about ironing and shopping being the reserve of wimmin.

[Essex Lad]

David Johnson wrote:


>
> Though I can remember as a kid knowing a couple who were into
> Socialist Worker meetings. Any subject you got talking to them
> about always ended up with some Marxist interpretation. After
> about a year they stopped going to the meetings. I remember
> asking them why and they told me it was due to people being
> nasty to them at the meetings which I thought hilarious.
>

I went to an SWP meeting once (addressed by Paul Foot) and they were anything but horrible. In fact, they love bombed me. I went along to a march (in Brick Lane) and the same people who were all over me ignored me. I never went back. I did have a good chat with Paul Foot after the meeting though, although about true crime not politics.

[Sam Slater]

Given your views about such things as this I'd wager she's coming out with all this crap because she knows it'll wind you up!

And did anyone in the big cities ever celebrate St. George's Day? I can't remember celebrating one as a kid, nor heard any stories/traditions of my parents and grandparents doing so. We English have a tradition of apathy towards such things.

As for St. Patrick's day: the irony is he was an Englishman, captured by Irish raiders. I say the English should reclaim St. Patrick as a stand against slavery!

And there's no real left-wing movement any more so you can't really even attempt a serious generalisation. Before they were part of a collective. Today they're a bunch of individuals. Before they saw other left-wingers as friends who they should support. Today they're non-interventionists that will moan and complain but not lift a finger to help fellow comrades who're emasculated, routinely tortured and killed. There still may be a wish for more socialism, economically, but on social philosophy and morality pacifism now predominates. Before they were more Guevara, now they are more Ghandi.......and now I'm generalising and contradicting my original point. You see how guarded one has to be with generalising?

[Sam Slater]

I think 'loony' is a strong term and one any right-winger should be wary of when using it as a pejorative for left-wing views.

[jimslip]

In John O'Farrell's book, "Things can only get better" he describes his life as a Labour activist and living through the , "Right on" times of the 1980's. A bit I enjoyed and in fact can identify completely with, is when he describes having met a girl from his local Labour club and having gone out and had a good time, ended up back at his place. Being completely, "Right on" he decided against saying, "Fancy a shag?" so they went to bed in different rooms.

Anyway, he thought his luck was in when the girl crept into his room and got into his bed and so like any normal guy, he discretely sidled up to her and flung his arm round her. Rather than being met with a whispered, "Hello big boy", he got a tirade of abuse, "You sexist, male chauvinist bastards are all the same! Just because a girl gets into bed beside you, you presume you can violate her! Rape her! Keep your filthy, sweaty, trotters to yourself, you despicable creep!"

With that he sheepishly turned over and slithered out of bed and on to the sofa for the night!

Welcome to the "wonderful" world of being a Labour supporter during the 80's.....meanwhile the Young Tories were all shagging each other senseless!

[Essex Lad]

I think loony is an apt word for any extreme political views - either left or right.

[Sam Slater]

I know a man that smoked 60 a day and lived to be 92. That means smoking is good for you.