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Convention
I keep meaning to write this and never seem to find the right opportunity to do so. This is probably somewhat controversial.
As I see it, there are lots of conventions about 'socially acceptable' behaviour, many of which we follow without realising it (ie. not picking one's nose in public or eating non-fast food with cutlery). (Yes, some of these conventions differ from culture to culture ie. there are places where the custom is to eat with one's hands, but that's not important right now).
There are other conventions that we see as outdated and old fashioned eg. the chaperoning of young women. There are others that have been deprecated ie. the one about men not wearing hats in church isn't very relevant when people wear hats so rarely.
Then there are others again that have been deliberately challenged and have mutated into conventions more appropriate for 2005 ie. it's now conventional to hold doors open for the elderly, those with physical disabilities, those with small children, those carrying heavy objects.
And then there are the ones I see people ignoring without any real thought as to why they're doing so. Where I come from it is disrespectful to start tearing into someone's reputation on the day of his/her death and for a couple of months afterwards. I'm willing to have the argument if anyone considers this convention outdated or old fashioned. My point of view is that the convention is intended not to protect the dead from criticism permanently (ie. I'm quite happy to listen to people insulting Hitler and Stalin) but to avoid adding unnecssarily to the grief of the living. Why should the relatives and friends of people who have died have to listen to insults directed at their dead friend/relative when they are in the throes of intense grief? And no, I don't accept 'I'm writing in a newspaper they don't have to read' or 'I'm writing on the internet so they shouldn't go looking for it' as acceptable reasons for insulting someone in the immediate aftermath of their death. As far as I'm concerned there's a time and a place for dissecting someone's life and immediately after his/her death isn't it. Have some respect. The other side to this is 'well, if she'll say that about him today, what on earth would she say about me if I drop dead tomorrow?'.
And I'll give you all fair warning now - if I see anyone dissecting Baroness Thatcher's politics when she dies, I am likely to let rip. I won't say she doesn't have faults - we all have faults, but she *is* someone I admire a lot.
As I see it, there are lots of conventions about 'socially acceptable' behaviour, many of which we follow without realising it (ie. not picking one's nose in public or eating non-fast food with cutlery). (Yes, some of these conventions differ from culture to culture ie. there are places where the custom is to eat with one's hands, but that's not important right now).
There are other conventions that we see as outdated and old fashioned eg. the chaperoning of young women. There are others that have been deprecated ie. the one about men not wearing hats in church isn't very relevant when people wear hats so rarely.
Then there are others again that have been deliberately challenged and have mutated into conventions more appropriate for 2005 ie. it's now conventional to hold doors open for the elderly, those with physical disabilities, those with small children, those carrying heavy objects.
And then there are the ones I see people ignoring without any real thought as to why they're doing so. Where I come from it is disrespectful to start tearing into someone's reputation on the day of his/her death and for a couple of months afterwards. I'm willing to have the argument if anyone considers this convention outdated or old fashioned. My point of view is that the convention is intended not to protect the dead from criticism permanently (ie. I'm quite happy to listen to people insulting Hitler and Stalin) but to avoid adding unnecssarily to the grief of the living. Why should the relatives and friends of people who have died have to listen to insults directed at their dead friend/relative when they are in the throes of intense grief? And no, I don't accept 'I'm writing in a newspaper they don't have to read' or 'I'm writing on the internet so they shouldn't go looking for it' as acceptable reasons for insulting someone in the immediate aftermath of their death. As far as I'm concerned there's a time and a place for dissecting someone's life and immediately after his/her death isn't it. Have some respect. The other side to this is 'well, if she'll say that about him today, what on earth would she say about me if I drop dead tomorrow?'.
And I'll give you all fair warning now - if I see anyone dissecting Baroness Thatcher's politics when she dies, I am likely to let rip. I won't say she doesn't have faults - we all have faults, but she *is* someone I admire a lot.
no subject
I have respect - but I have respect for people as people. De-humanising them is far worse than pointing out their flaws as well as their virtues IMO (and I won't say after death anything I wouldn't say in life). Mourn honestly and I'll leave you to it. When the hysteria takes hold, I'm going to give you the equivalent of a slap to try and break you out of it.
As for Thatcher, I believe she was a necessary counterbalance to politics that had swung too far - but the person who reintroduced rickets to the inner cities even before she became PM went on for far too long and caused as much damage as she fixed.
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Other that that, I entirely agree with you, especially about the Diana hysteria, which is distasteful in the extreme. And I don't see why holding back out of a misplaced 'respect for the dead' is right or good. The dead themselves can't be harmed, and their friends and families are not responsible for their actions, so they aren't the targets.
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The miners being able to hold the country to ransom by striking?
Top rate of income tax at 83%?
Inflation at 20%?
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Plus, I've lived in Scandinavia. Income tax at 75%+ is not regarded as amazing at all. Though they do much more with it in terms of decent public services. Here, it would be bad, bcos we get bugger-all back for it.
I do think there were a lot of serious issues of mismanagement under the Callaghan governtment, but that doesn't mean that any change is a good one. Since the numbers of people living on or below the poverty line in this country increased 3-fold (I believe) in the 5 years after she became PM, I don't think the claims of increasing wealth for the country are entirely borne out...
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No. I'm referring to the strikes of the 1970s and events such as the 3 day week which made breaking the Unions a good idea. Thatcher then stockpiled coal in order to be able to prevent the miners striking and forcing another 3 day week.
And no, I don't believe they were random aggressors. I do believe, however, that any organisation that can force the country onto a 3 day week and then throw their weight around (rejecting a 20% pay rise in 1979) and where the leadership is arrogant enough to call a general strike without a ballot (Scargill in 1984) needs breaking. The miners may not have been random aggressors, but they were hardly random victims.
Here, it would be bad, bcos we get bugger-all back for it.
Only because we spend bugger-all on it.
My favourite supporting statistic is that we spend less per head on healthcare than the US Government does before you take private care into account - we probably have the most cost-effective first-world healthcare system in the world.
no subject
A lot of the problems supposedly 'endemic' to the unions in the 70s were focused around 2 major issues - defective management, and the very time-specific issues of legality. The 70s had seen a string of legal decisions which strongly restricted the rights of workers to protest, particularly with regards to Strikes. Lord Denning was famously antagonistic towards unions and in fact had to be restrained by the House of Lords in this matter. It was hardly surprising that organised workers felt unjustly treated in this atmosphere.
Destruction and dismantling of the rights of workers was the first step in a series of disempowering actions designed to allow business freer reign in what was supposed to be a post-Keynesian economic structure. Doing the same thing to the welfare state was also part and parcel of this.
In my opinion, the power of the unions, as was demonstrated, was nowhere near enough.
There was an undeniable problem of craven and overambitious union leaders who were in the game for their own benefit, but that was hardly the fault of ordinary trade unionist and certainly didn't mean that they should be pnished. The solution would be to turn more attention to the complex position of senior union officials and its potential for abuse, not least in their collusion with politicians and leaders of industry when they are meant to be supporting their members. But that would involve caring about workers having strength to resist unreasonable behaviour form whatever quarter, which is not likely to be what you want when you are attempting to create pliant consumers.