The UK thread

[ed]

Abdul, while C of E attendance has shrunk dramatically over recent years, it still has around a million regular churchgoers and many more who don't attend church but identify as Christian when asked. Also, the worldwide Anglican communion has around 85 million members so, while the church may be slowly dying, it is not yet dead nor does it exist for purely ceremonial purposes. 26 bishops have guaranteed seats in the House of Lords, for example and the church provides chaplains in hospitals and prisons as well as operating its own, (usually very good), schools and engaging in numerous charitable endeavours and community projects.

As you know, I'm no churchgoer but fair's fair.

So about as many as visit my site over the course of a year.

[asthmatic camel]

Just trying to set the record straight, ed. The UK population is currently around 66 million, so 1 million churchgoers isn't a high percentage, true. On the other hand, there are only around 2.5 million muslims in the country, so to describe Islam as our "de facto religion" is unrealistic. Don't forget that the C of E is not the only Christian church in Britain, there are numerous others; Catholics, Methodists, Baptists etc.

[asthmatic camel]

Abdul, while C of E attendance has shrunk dramatically over recent years, it still has around a million regular churchgoers and many more who don't attend church but identify as Christian when asked. Also, the worldwide Anglican communion has around 85 million members so, while the church may be slowly dying, it is not yet dead nor does it exist for purely ceremonial purposes. 26 bishops have guaranteed seats in the House of Lords, for example and the church provides chaplains in hospitals and prisons as well as operating its own, (usually very good), schools and engaging in numerous charitable endeavours and community projects.

As you know, I'm no churchgoer but fair's fair.

If you were to blaspheme against the C of E on Twitter would the cops come looking for you?

What about Islam?

I honestly don't know. There are laws dealing with incitement to religious hatred etc. but I'm no expert.

[asthmatic camel]

But which religion gets to call the cops when you blaspheme?

That is the real test of an official religion.

Blasphemy is not an offence in England and Wales, the laws were abolished in 2008. They remain in Scotland and Northern Ireland but are very rarely used. Linky

[asthmatic camel]

What does happen? I've never used Twitter and know nothing about it apart from that it seems to take up most of your president's time.

[Giz]

But which religion gets to call the cops when you blaspheme?

That is the real test of an official religion.

Blasphemy is not an offence in England and Wales, the laws were abolished in 2008. They remain in Scotland and Northern Ireland but are very rarely used. Linky

There are cases like:

“Two men have been released on bail after their arrest for allegedly making offensive comments on Twitter about the murder of a British soldier in Woolwich.

Detective Inspector Ed Yaxley of Avon and Somerset police said: "On Wednesday evening, we were contacted by people concerned about comments made on social media accounts.

"We began inquiries into the comments and at around 3.20am two men, aged 23 and 22, were detained at two addresses in Bristol.“

And I couldn’t see anywhere what they had said... so how do we know if the authorities are being reasonable?

Not to mention when there is a case like:

“A man from Leeds in West Yorkshire has been released on bail after allegedly posting on social media a video that ends with him burning a copy of the Qu'ran.

The law about burning a holy text such as the Qu'ran isn't clear cut in the UK. In the US it is entirely legal. Accorss the pond, it's a punishable offence under Britain's Racial and Religious Hatred act 2006. There remains an issue of freedom of speech and ownership of material, but ultimately people could be prosecuted when there is a demonstrable advocacy of hate crime laws.

In 2011, Business Insider wrote about British National Party candidate Sion Owens, who filmed himself burning a copy of the Qu'ran. The clip was leaked to the Guardian and the man was subsequently arrested.

Then, the Home Office stated:

"The government absolutely condemns the burning of the Qur'an. It is fundamentally offensive to the values of our pluralist and tolerant society. “


There are de facto blasphemy laws in the UK and it is a disgrace

[asthmatic camel]

It's not something I'm going to lose any sleep over, Giz.

I dislike religion but don't go out of my way to offend or insult those who believe. Burning copies of the Quran is nothing more than provocation, and I'm sure we all know who the most enthusiastic book burners have been throughout history. Not the good guys.

[Giz]

It's not something I'm going to lose any sleep over, Giz.

I dislike religion but don't go out of my way to offend or insult those who believe. Burning copies of the Quran is nothing more than provocation, and I'm sure we all know who the most enthusiastic book burners have been throughout history. Not the good guys.

The fact remains that exhibiting “piss Christ” or putting on “the Book of Mormon” is fine. But do something similar with Islam , and the police will pay you a visit.

[Witness]

↑ I'll say it again: cockroaches will always crawl back. It's up to the rest of the citizens to pull their fangs.

---

'Jacob Leeks Mogg' comes second in Newent Onion Show



A vegetable recreation of the leader of the House of Commons reclining during a debate has come second in a competition at an onion show.

Hester Feld entered "Jacob Leeks Mogg" into the Newent Onion Show's "Vegetable Character Over 17 Years" competition.

The North East Somerset MP was lampooned in memes earlier this month after slouching during a three-hour late-night debate on Brexit.

All edible members of the allium family star in the Gloucestershire show.

The event - now in its 24th year - says it aims to "advance the education of the public in the cultivation and improvement" of the likes of blanch leeks, pot leeks, garlic, spring onions and chives.

https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-glo ... e-49702929

[asthmatic camel]

I understand what you're saying, Giz, really. I'm all for freedom of speech, religion, political views, etc. and thoroughly dislike censorship. Sadly, however, we do not live in an ideal world and it pays to be pragmatic. I watched Richard Dawkins debating with muslims on UK TV not so long ago and, while he was polite, he did pour scorn on beliefs like Mohammed flying to the moon on a winged horse. He wasn't prosecuted for this and I think we've largely got the balance right. YMMV

[Giz]

I understand what you're saying, Giz, really. I'm all for freedom of speech, religion, political views, etc. and thoroughly dislike censorship. Sadly, however, we do not live in an ideal world and it pays to be pragmatic. I watched Richard Dawkins debating with muslims on UK TV not so long ago and, while he was polite, he did pour scorn on beliefs like Mohammed flying to the moon on a winged horse. He wasn't prosecuted for this and I think we've largely got the balance right. YMMV

I think that if an average joe in the street said what Dawkins does, he would be at risk of arrest. Dawkins is a bit too prominent (and apart from Islam, is doctrinaire lefty) so he has privileges that the average citizen doesn’t get.

[Witness]

[asthmatic camel]

I dunno, sceps are openly critical of religion and still going strong, as are many other UK organisations with similar views. It tends to be a case of "It ain't what you say, it's the way that you say it." Rabble rousers like "Tommy Robinson" know exactly what they are doing by pushings the limits of the law, aided and abetted by scurrilous rags like T3h Daily Fail who give them loads of publicity. Like it or not, our immigrant populations are here to stay, with many, like my wife, born in Britain. It is in nobody's interest to foster division and hatred. It's not as though we don't have our home-grown versions of religious hatred, is it? Just look at Northern Ireland and Scotland; there's plenty of Christian love going around there...

[shuize]

Who Dares, Wins.

SAS hero with shotgun 'kills five ISIS fighters including two wearing suicide vests in just seven seconds during raid on jihadi bomb factory in Iraq'

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/articl ... conds.html

[Witness]

Brutal attack on Kevin Lunney ‘was organised and paid for’

A dozen-strong gang had prepared a horsebox as a mobile torture chamber before they carried out a two-hour attack on Kevin Lunney, the Quinn Industrial Holdings executive kidnapped and imprisoned on Tuesday night.

Some of the 50-year-old businessman’s fingernails were pulled out, his face and neck were slashed with a Stanley knife and his right leg was badly broken twice below the knee by a wooden post or a metal bar.

Meanwhile, the attackers, whom police believe have carried out attacks before, took care not to leave behind incriminating DNA evidence, pouring industrial-strength bleach over Mr Lunney’s wounds, causing excruciating pain.

Members of the gang, who have strong links with republican groups involved in extortion, abducted Mr Lunney from outside his home at Kinawley in Co Fermanagh at about 6.40pm and brought him to Co Cavan, crossing the Border at or near Swanlinbar.

https://www.irishtimes.com/news/ireland ... -1.4024245

[asthmatic camel]

Q.E.D. and pretty fucking grim.

[sparks]

I begin to think those Babble Times fucks are right: Skin all those Irish fucks to death and turn them into animal feed.

Except the redheaded women of course.

[sparks]

And speaking of NBLs, (what?)


What happened to our latest forum chew-toy? Did teh spiritz cause him to yawn himself to death?

[asthmatic camel]

Splinter groups from the Provos, most likely.

[asthmatic camel]

From what I've read, it's on-going feud with the company the poor guy's involved with.

Linky.

[Witness]

Related to Brexit, or just happened to crop up at a bad time (not that there's a good time)?

My impression is Brexit has re-awakened IRA & pals.

---

'The men who plundered Europe': bankers on trial for siphoning €60bn

Martin Shields and Nick Diable are accused of tax fraud in ‘cum-ex’ scandal that exposes City’s pursuit of profit

They have been called “the men who plundered Europe”: a group of cowboy traders, seasoned tax lawyers and mathematical whizz kids who are alleged to have conspired in the heart of the City of London to siphon at least €60bn in taxpayers’ money from the state coffers of several EU countries.

In Britain, the so-called “cum-ex” scandal, named after the complex derivatives juggling act employed, gained little attention amid the frenzied debate around the UK’s departure from the European Union when the fraud scheme was discovered in 2017.

But in continental Europe what Le Monde has described as the “robbery of the century” has done almost as much to shape the view of Britain as Brexit itself. Dutch media has called it “organised crime in pinstripe suits” and one of the original German whistleblowers saying he now welcomes Britain’s exit from the EU in the hope it could weaken the influence of London investment banking on European financial institutions.

This week, a British former investment banker involved in developing the scheme for the first time gave the public an insight into how the scheme worked and what spurred on its architects.

Speaking at a regional court in Bonn, Martin Shields, one of two former bankers on trial for 34 instances of serious tax fraud between 2006 and 2011, painted a picture of a London banking scene which lured in the brightest scientists from the country’s top universities and used them to boost their profit margins – without teaching them about the moral and legal consequences of their actions in return.

See https://www.theguardian.com/business/20 ... al-in-bonn for the details.

[Witness]

The latter + seeing some opportunity + wanting to wage that obsolete war for good times' sake. But that's just my impression, as I said.

[asthmatic camel]

Related to Brexit, or just happened to crop up at a bad time (not that there's a good time)?

My impression is Brexit has re-awakened IRA & pals.

It certainly hasn't helped, Witness but it's not the only factor. The Northern Ireland Assembly at Stormont has been suspended since January 2017, when Sinn Fein leader Martin McGuiness resigned over the Renewable Heat Incentive scandal. Not good.

[Witness]

Irish PM given holy water for next meeting with Boris Johnson

A priest handed Irish Prime Minister Leo Varadkar a bottle of holy water to take to his next meeting with Boris Johnson.

"Taoiseach, I know that you are going to New York next week [for the U.N. General Assembly] and meeting Boris Johnson. A small little bit of added protection for you," Father Richard Gibbons, the parish priest of Knock in the west of Ireland, said Friday as he handed a small bottle to Varadkar.

"Shall I pour it over him?" said Varadkar.

https://www.politico.eu/article/irish-p ... s-johnson/

[asthmatic camel]

Well, that's Mrs. Camel's holiday of a lifetime in Vegas fucked, she was due to leave on Tuesday. Now I'll have to put up with her at home for a fortnight when I was planning to build a model railway.

Linky.

[Witness]

↑ Sorry for that, AC.

I used Thomas Cook travel agency when I went to Poland, and they were outstanding.

[asthmatic camel]

She's not too bothered, Witness; she was dreading the ten-hour flight and she'll get her money back. At least she's not stranded abroad and being held hostage by unpaid hoteliers.

Pity about the train set, though. Now I'll have to try and intercept the postman so she doesn't see how much stuff I've bought.

[asthmatic camel]

Bomb squad called to Manchester Airport to deal with naked man with a "suspicious package". Controlled explosion ensues.

[Witness]

Supreme Court: Suspending Parliament was unlawful, judges rule

Boris Johnson's decision to suspend Parliament for five weeks was unlawful, the Supreme Court has ruled.

Judges said it was wrong to stop MPs carrying out duties in the run-up to the Brexit deadline on 31 October.

The PM, who has faced calls to resign, said he "profoundly disagreed" with the ruling but would "respect" it.

The Labour conference finished early following the ruling and MPs are returning to Westminster ready for Parliament to reconvene on Wednesday.

A senior government official said the prime minister spoke to the Queen after the Supreme Court ruling, but would not reveal the details of the conversation.

It comes after the court ruled it was impossible to conclude there had been any reason "let alone a good reason - to advise Her Majesty to prorogue Parliament for five weeks".

Mr Johnson, who returns to London from New York on Wednesday, also chaired a 30-minute phone call with his cabinet.

A source told the BBC that the Leader of the Commons Jacob Rees-Mogg said to other cabinet ministers on the call that the action by the court had amounted to a "constitutional coup".

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-49810261

[ceptimus]

The prorogation was unlawful, but no one can name the law that was broken, and there is no specific punishment nor penalty for having broken it.

[Grammatron]

That doesn't sound like a common law. It does sound like a line out of Catch-22.

[Anaxagoras]

The prorogation was unlawful, but no one can name the law that was broken, and there is no specific punishment nor penalty for having broken it.

Are they saying Her Maj committed a crime?

Here is the decision itself, if you care to read it. I took a quick glance, but I can't say I delved into the reasoning.

https://www.supremecourt.uk/cases/docs/ ... dgment.pdf

Here's a BBC summary if you prefer:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-49810261

Delivering the justices' conclusions, she said: "The decision to advise Her Majesty to prorogue Parliament was unlawful because it had the effect of frustrating or preventing the ability of Parliament to carry out its constitutional functions without reasonable justification."

Lady Hale said the unanimous decision of the 11 justices meant Parliament had effectively not been prorogued - the decision was null and of no effect.

[asthmatic camel]

I can understand Boris Johnson's desire to get Brexit over with but can't see how he's going to manage it. An unelected prime minister who has thrown away his tenuous working majority trying to steamroller his way through the commons and the lords? Unlikely to succeed. *SIGH*

[Anaxagoras]

From the decision:

3. Parliament does not decide when it should be prorogued. This is a prerogative power exercised by the Crown on the advice of the Privy Council. In practice, as noted in the House of Commons Library Briefing Paper (No 8589, 11thJune 2019), “this process has been a formality in the UK for more than a century: the Government of the day advises the Crown to prorogue and that request is acquiesced to”.

It's funny the way you lot have your system set up like some kind of Rube Goldberg device.

"In practice" but why does the Queen have to acquiesce to the request?

So much of it seems to rely on tradition and norms, rather than clear-cut laws.

What's to stop future monarchs from taking back their "prerogatives of the Crown"?

[asthmatic camel]

I doubt that the monarchy would survive should a future monarch, (or the existing one), attempt to do so. It's an unwritten rule that the monarch remains politically neutral and goes along with the government of the day.

[Witness]

[Rob Lister]

He's a brilliant orator.

[Witness]

Thousands left without internet after thieves swipe copper cables

Openreach "disappointed" by Cambridgeshire thefts as homes and businesses hit by two outages in two weeks

Internet access to more than 6,000 residents in South Cambridgeshire has been severely disrupted over the last couple of weeks due to vandalism and theft of copper cabling.

More than 2,200 people living in Cambourne were knocked offline after thieves made away with 500 metres of copper cabling last week, with phone lines also dead, according to Cambridgeshire Live.

The theft follows another incident just a matter of weeks ago. Approximately 4,000 homes and businesses were left without internet on 25 August because copper cables had been cut away on the outskirts of Cambourne.

Phone lines were also knocked offline in homes and shops in the village. A few days later, power cables, worth approximately £10,000, were found dumped more than ten miles away in a nearby village.

Crime Stoppers, in partnership with the firm that manages the infrastructure, Openreach, launched an appeal in the wake of the first incident offering £1,000 for information. Heavy damage was also caused to farmland where cables were dragged across fields, the organisation revealed.

https://www.itpro.co.uk/network-interne ... per-cables

[Rob Lister]

Thousands left without internet after thieves swipe copper cables


A few days later, power cables, worth approximately £10,000, were found dumped more than ten miles away in a nearby village.

What a dumb way to make a living as a thief. £10,000 worth of cable probably represents no more £500 worth of copper, which can't be sold without first stripping the insulation (tedious!) and smelting the result (expensive). Those, coupled with the labor to actually steal and haul the booty might-maybe yield them the half of minimum wage.

Better to kidnap puppies for the ransom.

[ceptimus]

It's fun that they have to keep calling each other honourable whilst simultaneously attempting to denigrate and insult.