Alexander Boris de Pfeffel Johnson

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  • PigletPiglet All Saints Host, Circus Host
    Gee D wrote: »
    ... You emigrate from ...
    I can see the logic of that, but we always said we'd emigrated to Canada*. Were we just wrong?

    * although the Canadian department we had to deal with was, obviously, Immigration.
  • Gee DGee D Shipmate
    It depends where you're saying it. Before you left the UK, you'd say "we're emigrating to Canada". Once you were there, it would be "we've immigrated from the UK". Or you could sort of cheat and in both instances just say migrate.

    Dept of Immigration here, and at the airport you go through Customs and Immigration counters, even if you're an Oz national returning.
  • Well, except that brown brits living abroad could be described as expats.
    Doc Tor wrote: »
    I mean, they could, but my strong suspicion is they wouldn't be.

    In my experience they are. It could be more to do with what kind of job they are here to do. Professionals = expats, unskilled workers = immigrants. I also think it depends on the degree of permanence with which someone is living somewhere as well as to how strong the ties to the mother country are.
  • Those fleeing post-Brexit Britain will be emigres (can't work out how to do and acute accent on this board).
  • BoogieBoogie Shipmate
    My son doesn’t call himself an ex pat or an immigrant or an emigrant.

    He calls himself a German. :mrgreen:
  • la vie en rougela vie en rouge Circus Host, 8th Day Host
    I call myself either an expat or an immigrant FWIW. In the Brexit context I prefer “expat” because it underlines the fact that we are still British citizens and in a sane world you would expect the British government to take our interests into account. Sadly this is not a sane world.

    Please don’t think we’re all Costa Brava retirees. Many of us work or study. Like me, many are married to and/or have children with EU nationals. That said, among the expat community, working people are generally going to get shafted less than the retired. We are entitled to social security/health benefits in the countries where we live because we pay into the system.

    Similar to Boogie’s son, I am hoping to be able to call myself “French”. And TBH I am so excruciatingly embarrassed by my country of birth these days that I think I will be calling myself French before I call myself British. (Nationality hasn’t come through yet, but in my case – I am applying on the basis of marriage – it’s basically automatic unless they decide I don’t speak French or have been engaging in some kind of flagrantly un-republican behaviour. When I went for the interview I did ok at naming the President of the Republic and two cities in France other than Paris.)
  • BoogieBoogie Shipmate
    A ‘friend’ on Facebook posted this -

    “The more dirt they dish on Boris , each time convinces me he is doing the right thing and they are scared . Am backing Boris 💯%”

    There is no argument that will convince him otherwise.
  • BoogieBoogie Shipmate
    Best comment yet (in the Guardian)
    If you accidentally click onto the comments of a Talk Radio video to read the comments of people queuing up to praise Boris Johnson for being a 'man of the people' leading the fight against the 'undemocratic parliament' ... that's when you realise that we're screwed. Not just as a nation, but as a species. It's over. Forget saving the planet - it's just not possible with so much stupidity about. The idea that such an entitled, silver-spooned lazy-arsed racist, homophobic, misogynist liar represents anyone but himself and his own greedy appetites is so far fetched that I think we're witnessing one of the biggest examples of mass hypnosis ever.

    The people cheering him on are not people Johnson will help or legislate for - they are people who will be trampled underfoot by the corporations and vulture capitalists that are Johnson's friends, people whose lives will be made a hundred times worse by voting for him, yet because 'Brexit means Brexit' they will happily jump over a cliff with him on October 31st, not understanding that they will be sending us all crashing onto the rocks below whilst Johnson drifts away under his silk parachute ... Every analysis, including the government's own Yellowhammer, shows that we are heading for disaster with a 'no deal' exit but these people have somehow hypnotised themselves into thinking Johnson is their saviour. Worse still, many of them have children - and they are prepared to vote for a man whose approach to the environment will see their children's lives cut short, having to spend the latter part of their lives fighting over dwindling resources.

    Some people say I should be trying to persuade these Johnson lovers to change their minds - but how do you persuade people who don't recognise facts, think everything they disagree with is 'fake news', and who are prepared to sacrifice their own future and that of their children for something they can't even explain properly? I try and refrain from calling people dumb, because it doesn't help the conversation move on, but amongst them there are people who should know better being swept along on a hypnotised tide of ignorance and self-harming stupidity - there is no engaging with people who think Johnson is a 'man of the people'. He could probably masturbate onto a portrait of the Queen in the House of Commons and these supporters would lap it up. Our only hope is that there are more of us willing to show decency, honesty, integrity, intelligence, empathy, care and understanding out there than there are this hard-of-thinking mob of baying inadequate self-harmers.
  • You cannot reason someone out of a position they did not reason themselves into. We just have to hope that the penny will eventually drop.
  • Doc Tor wrote: »
    You cannot reason someone out of a position they did not reason themselves into. We just have to hope that the penny will eventually drop.

    Completely agree, but fuck, Boogie's post is depressing.
  • Here's some relevant insight into comments sections that may well apply here.
  • Boogie wrote: »
    Best comment yet (in the Guardian)
    If you accidentally click onto the comments of a Talk Radio video to read the comments of people queuing up to praise Boris Johnson for being a 'man of the people' leading the fight against the 'undemocratic parliament' ... that's when you realise that we're screwed. Not just as a nation, but as a species. It's over. Forget saving the planet - it's just not possible with so much stupidity about. The idea that such an entitled, silver-spooned lazy-arsed racist, homophobic, misogynist liar represents anyone but himself and his own greedy appetites is so far fetched that I think we're witnessing one of the biggest examples of mass hypnosis ever.

    The people cheering him on are not people Johnson will help or legislate for - they are people who will be trampled underfoot by the corporations and vulture capitalists that are Johnson's friends, people whose lives will be made a hundred times worse by voting for him, yet because 'Brexit means Brexit' they will happily jump over a cliff with him on October 31st, not understanding that they will be sending us all crashing onto the rocks below whilst Johnson drifts away under his silk parachute ... Every analysis, including the government's own Yellowhammer, shows that we are heading for disaster with a 'no deal' exit but these people have somehow hypnotised themselves into thinking Johnson is their saviour. Worse still, many of them have children - and they are prepared to vote for a man whose approach to the environment will see their children's lives cut short, having to spend the latter part of their lives fighting over dwindling resources.

    Some people say I should be trying to persuade these Johnson lovers to change their minds - but how do you persuade people who don't recognise facts, think everything they disagree with is 'fake news', and who are prepared to sacrifice their own future and that of their children for something they can't even explain properly? I try and refrain from calling people dumb, because it doesn't help the conversation move on, but amongst them there are people who should know better being swept along on a hypnotised tide of ignorance and self-harming stupidity - there is no engaging with people who think Johnson is a 'man of the people'. He could probably masturbate onto a portrait of the Queen in the House of Commons and these supporters would lap it up. Our only hope is that there are more of us willing to show decency, honesty, integrity, intelligence, empathy, care and understanding out there than there are this hard-of-thinking mob of baying inadequate self-harmers.

    Well said, The Guardian...but the thought of Piffleglum's supporters lapping up what he's just wanked onto a portrait of HMQ is Just. Too. Much.
    :scream:

  • Y'all need to remember that there are people out there who, when push comes to shove, would rather have a sense of national pride than economic security. That's what Brexit has always been for a lot of them. They'd rather have a poor Britain that kowtows to no-one than a rich Britain that has to bend the knee to a bunch of Europeans.
  • Y'all need to remember that there are people out there who, when push comes to shove, would rather have a sense of national pride than economic security. That's what Brexit has always been for a lot of them. They'd rather have a poor Britain that kowtows to no-one than a rich Britain that has to bend the knee to a bunch of Europeans.

    OK. So what proportion of the electorate are they? 5% 50%?*

    AFZ

    *Yes, I know the answer to my own question.
  • They'd rather have a poor Britain that kowtows to no-one than a rich Britain that has to bend the knee to a bunch of Europeans.

    Presumably the same people who not only want passports to be blue again, but also want restoration of the old cardboard variety on the basis that uncooperative foreign officials can be put back in their place by poking them with one of the corners.
  • Y'all need to remember that there are people out there who, when push comes to shove, would rather have a sense of national pride than economic security.

    and as above, a large number of them - and especially their leaders - appear to be people who are already economically secure, it's always going to be easy to put national pride over economic security if you never have to worry about the latter.
    That's what Brexit has always been for a lot of them. They'd rather have a poor Britain that kowtows to no-one than a rich Britain that has to bend the knee to a bunch of Europeans.

    Good luck with - on that basis Western Sahara and Somalia are the free-est states out there.
  • Doc TorDoc Tor Admin
    edited October 2019
    Y'all need to remember that there are people out there who, when push comes to shove, would rather have a sense of national pride than economic security. That's what Brexit has always been for a lot of them. They'd rather have a poor Britain that kowtows to no-one than a rich Britain that has to bend the knee to a bunch of Europeans.

    But they don't think it means them. They don't think that it'll be them losing their jobs, or them that will lose their pensions, or them that won't be able to buy petrol, or them that won't be able to buy food, or them that won't be able to keep the lights on, or them that won't get their houses burnt down in the riots. They are the post-war generation who have never known privation or random death. They are the children of the 50s and 60s who can only imagine plenty.

    They are deluded, and unconvinceable (at the moment: will it be blocs of Remainers burning shit down afterwards?). To echo the Guardian comment - all we can do is hope that there are more decent people out there than not.
  • sionisaissionisais Shipmate
    edited October 2019
    Y'all need to remember that there are people out there who, when push comes to shove, would rather have a sense of national pride than economic security. That's what Brexit has always been for a lot of them. They'd rather have a poor Britain that kowtows to no-one than a rich Britain that has to bend the knee to a bunch of Europeans.

    OK. So what proportion of the electorate are they? 5% 50%?*

    AFZ

    *Yes, I know the answer to my own question.

    Enough to maintain a substantial working-class Tory vote. Really, they are turkeys voting for Christmas.
  • and as above, a large number of them - and especially their leaders - appear to be people who are already economically secure, it's always going to be easy to put national pride over economic security if you never have to worry about the latter.

    In my experience they are just as likely to be people who are so economically insecure that they don't think things can get any worse for them.
  • and as above, a large number of them - and especially their leaders - appear to be people who are already economically secure, it's always going to be easy to put national pride over economic security if you never have to worry about the latter.

    In my experience they are just as likely to be people who are so economically insecure that they don't think things can get any worse for them.

    Like a turkey on, say, December 15th.
  • and as above, a large number of them - and especially their leaders - appear to be people who are already economically secure, it's always going to be easy to put national pride over economic security if you never have to worry about the latter.

    In my experience they are just as likely to be people who are so economically insecure that they don't think things can get any worse for them.

    While that may well be your experience, that doesn't seem to apply to the majority of those who voted leave [albeit they may feel more insecure than they used to feel]
  • FirenzeFirenze Shipmate, Host Emeritus
    They'd rather have a poor Britain that kowtows to no-one than a rich Britain that has to bend the knee to a bunch of Europeans.

    We had once, for a brief period, a poster who, when asked politely to post to the Welcome thread rather than create his own, waxed very indignant about the denial of his FREEDOM.

    From which one can deduce that there are those incapable of distinguishing between joining an association and abiding by its rules, in order to enjoy its benefits and FREEDOM.

    Unity is strength, cooperation is the basic unit of civilisation, we must all hang together or we shall all hang separately as the pirate said.

  • RooKRooK Admin Emeritus
    Oh look: xenophobia. Rah rah xenophobia, complete with patriotic lipstick. Thanks for reminding us, Marv.

    I don't really subscribe to generalizations of "good" and "evil", but pretending that mindless nationalism is a worthwhile philosophy pushes hard on that second label.
  • The "kowtowing to Europeans" narrative misses the fact that we are Europeans, the UK government had an equal seat at a table of equals, Parliament was sovereign, and together with our european partners were setting the rules that much of the rest of the world was following. We weren't kowtowing to Europeans, but were Europeans others kowtowed too.

    Boris ha thrown all that away. He's taking the UK from the table, undermining the sovereignty of Parliament and leaving the UK among those nations which accept European rules without a say in forming them. Great job Boris. You can retire safe in the knowledge that you 've done your rich pals a favour. “The master commended the dishonest manager because he had acted shrewdly." (Jesus, Luke 16:8).
  • The "kowtowing to Europeans" narrative misses the fact that we are Europeans, the UK government had an equal seat at a table of equals, Parliament was sovereign, and together with our european partners were setting the rules that much of the rest of the world was following. We weren't kowtowing to Europeans, but were Europeans others kowtowed too.

    Boris ha thrown all that away. He's taking the UK from the table, undermining the sovereignty of Parliament and leaving the UK among those nations which accept European rules without a say in forming them. Great job Boris. You can retire safe in the knowledge that you 've done your rich pals a favour. “The master commended the dishonest manager because he had acted shrewdly." (Jesus, Luke 16:8).

    This is wrong, Alan.

    Britain was never an equal.

    Because of our economic size, veto rights in many issues and qualified majority voting on others, Britain had (still has, actually) more power and influence than most.

    Experts on the EU will tell you that virtually nothing happened unless the 'Big 3' wanted it to.

    Whole sections of EU regulations were just copied from UK ones...

    AFZ
  • The "kowtowing to Europeans" narrative misses the fact that we are Europeans, the UK government had an equal seat at a table of equals, Parliament was sovereign, and together with our european partners were setting the rules that much of the rest of the world was following. We weren't kowtowing to Europeans, but were Europeans others kowtowed too.

    Boris ha thrown all that away. He's taking the UK from the table, undermining the sovereignty of Parliament and leaving the UK among those nations which accept European rules without a say in forming them. Great job Boris. You can retire safe in the knowledge that you 've done your rich pals a favour. “The master commended the dishonest manager because he had acted shrewdly." (Jesus, Luke 16:8).

    This is wrong, Alan.

    Britain was never an equal.

    Because of our economic size, veto rights in many issues and qualified majority voting on others, Britain had (still has, actually) more power and influence than most.

    Experts on the EU will tell you that virtually nothing happened unless the 'Big 3' wanted it to.

    Whole sections of EU regulations were just copied from UK ones...

    AFZ
    True. But, to someone under the mistaken impression that the UK is under the foot of the EU, pointing out that the UK was an equal partner maybe easier to accept than the fact that the UK was, in many cases, a more than equal partner.

    The additional influence the UK holds is rapidly being eroded, even if common sense and democracy take charge and A50 is revoked, the UK will be much less influential than in 2015.

  • PigletPiglet All Saints Host, Circus Host
    ... They'd rather have a poor Britain that kowtows to no-one than a rich Britain that has to bend the knee to a bunch of Europeans.
    But what they'll get is a poor Britain that kowtows to Trump, which is far worse.
  • A Donald who so wants a good trade deal with the UK that he's slapped a 25% tariff on the import of Whisky. Yep, he's going to be a great guy to negotiate a trade deal with.
  • Re the immigrant / emigrant / ex-pat vocabulary; the Scottish government is pushing the term "New Scots" which can be prefaced with the new Scot's nationality of origin e.g. Polish New Scot.

    Here is the story of New Scot Dured - some of his friends in this clip are my neighbours <3
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BIP_qysJbl8

    And here are the Proclaimers singing "Scotland's story"
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K_ekIS9QWSA
  • Love that song!
  • Gee DGee D Shipmate
    Re the immigrant / emigrant / ex-pat vocabulary; the Scottish government is pushing the term "New Scots" which can be prefaced with the new Scot's nationality of origin e.g. Polish New Scot.

    New Australian was used here for about 20 years to describe those arriving post-WWII, but then the term was denounced as denigrating those recently arrived. I never understood quite why, it seemed welcoming. Of course it ignored the ancient inhabitants but that was not used as an argument.
  • HugalHugal Shipmate
    I am sure I am not the first to realise this but Boorish said he would rather die in a ditch than write the letter to the EU. His friend Donald was thinking about building a moat with snakes in on the Mexican boarder.
  • BoogieBoogie Shipmate
    A ditch with snakes ... hmmm ... 🤔
  • As this is Hell, I think it's OK for me to say what a Jolly Good and Spiffing Idea it would be to give Piffleglum (free, gratis, and for nothing), a one-way ticket to the Mexican border.

    Even if he escapes the snakes, the Bad Hombres™ in Mexico might accidentally bury him under the wall they're having to pay for, in which case I think a bit of crowd-funding here in Ukland, in gratitude, might be in order.
  • HugalHugal Shipmate
    edited October 2019
    BF Donald was also thinking of putting alligators in as well. So no problem with him escaping I think.
  • O yes - I forgot about the alligators.

    Hope they've got sharp fangs...
  • O yes - I forgot about the alligators.

    Hope they've got sharp fangs...

    Nah, you want the ones with blunt fangs. Don't want to make it too quick.
  • BoogieBoogie Shipmate
    Now de Pfeffel is to make a whirlwind trip to EU capitals to sell his Brexit ‘plan’.

    He really does think he’s the very epitome of charm, doesn’t he? 🙄
  • He might even come back from the EU summit with an agreement, if he does will he stand at the top of the stairs from the aircraft and wave the piece of paper he's got signed?
  • Declaring “Deal for Our Time!” I’m sure.
  • He might even come back from the EU summit with an agreement, if he does will he stand at the top of the stairs from the aircraft and wave the piece of paper he's got signed?

    Nah, no chance the EU will agree to the nonsense he's put together on the back of a fag packet.
  • He might even come back from the EU summit with an agreement, if he does will he stand at the top of the stairs from the aircraft and wave the piece of paper he's got signed?

    Nah, no chance the EU will agree to the nonsense he's put together on the back of a fag packet.
    I know, but somehow it seems apt ... any deal wouldn't be the end, just the beginning of an even bigger and more costly task.

  • AndrasAndras Shipmate
    And now apparently he's told the Court of Session in Edinburgh that he will indeed write 'that letter' if he fails to gain a deal. And there was me hoping that he meant it when he said that he'd rather die in a ditch.

    Typical Piffle, in the end he lets everybody down.
  • Andras wrote: »
    And now apparently he's told the Court of Session in Edinburgh that he will indeed write 'that letter' if he fails to gain a deal. And there was me hoping that he meant it when he said that he'd rather die in a ditch.

    Typical Piffle, in the end he lets everybody down.

    I see no reason why we can't stay in the EU and have Bor*s end up in a ditch*... I mean, it's nearly Christmas.

    AFZ

    *alive in said ditch.
  • *alive in said ditch.

    Eh. Optional.
  • PigletPiglet All Saints Host, Circus Host
    Gee D wrote: »
    ... New Australian was used here for about 20 years to describe those arriving post-WWII, but then the term was denounced as denigrating those recently arrived ...
    AFAIK "New Canadian" is still used to describe recent immigrants here. Speaking as an immigrant, I can't say I find it offensive, but maybe I'm just not very easily offended.
  • Gee DGee D Shipmate
    I doubt that those of whom it was used here were offended either - it was just those whose role in life to be offended for themselves or others were.
  • I've only seen a photo of the front page of today's Sunday Times, on the BBC News Site. However, their headline is words to the effect that: Boris tells Queen, Sack me if you like but I won't go.

    Personally I am appalled (again) at the arrogance of the man, if this is true. But how would the paper know?
  • Personally I am appalled (again) at the arrogance of the man, if this is true. But how would the paper know?

    Presumably because No. 10 leaked it to a friendly journalist.
  • Personally I am appalled (again) at the arrogance of the man, if this is true. But how would the paper know?

    Presumably because No. 10 leaked it to a friendly journalist.

    I think so. He seems to be adopting what you could term a 51% strategy; what's the minimum amount of support I need to win? Obviously with the vagaries of our electoral system, in certain circumstances that could be as little as 27%!!! Which, of course he would claim as a mandate for whatever he wanted to do.

    The calculation is no doubt one of finding a good wedge... it drives some people away but shores-up support with others. Current polling suggests that it may well work.

    The problem is that it is doomed to fail one way or another in the end. The real problem is that in this febrile situation, in might well work in the short term which brings me to the what the actual real problem is; the damage he has already done and continues to do to our country.

    I am not sanguine, I am worried but not fatalistic for two reasons; 1) if Brexit is delayed, he is going to leak support significantly 2) The myth of Boris the great campaigner is already unraveling.

    If he wins, we're all screwed but whilst I fear it and it's far from certain, I think he's going to come unstuck just in time...

    AFZ
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