Margaret Thatcher is dead

[Adorno]

What's going on over there? 


(http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-21887554)

 

[Verbeek]

RIP Iron Lady.

 

[Vieira151]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rHJoj9IqeKg

I'll just leave this here.

http://uk.movies.yahoo.com/%E2%80%98ding-dong--the-witch-is-dead%E2%80%99-charts-after-thatcher-dies-101051208.html

 

[Leifr Eiríksson]

Important Pie Chart.

Everyone loves a good pie chart.

 

[Bulle]

I don't get the "she killed British industry!" thing. Does no one realize that the mining and steel industry all over western Europe died? Same with the textile industry. It had nothing to do with Thatcher. It had everything to do with delocalisation, globalisation and the emergence of those same industries in "3rd world" countries that could easily outcompete the homegrown versions, by virtue of resting on essentially slave labour and not being shackled by the ridiculous constraints imposed by organized labour. Thatcher might have sped up the process, but it was inevitable.

What? No? Our mining and steel industry over here is very much alive and breathing. Granted it did need to get modernized, but it is certainly not dead. Far from it.

I disliked Thatcher for various different reasons, letting her police beat down the workers, leaving hundreds of them injured and over 10 dead when they are striking is one thing. Supporting Pinochet and apartheid in South Africa (calling Nelson Mandela a terrorist) is another. Slashing services and benefits for women and kids (like the entire milksnatching thing) while giving massive tax cuts to the rich is yet another. Section 28 and the vile ideas the she had about homosexuality is another.  Crushing the unions so that it is very difficult even today for workers to claim their rights is another. The poll tax was awful too. I can continue like this forever. The worst part is that her politics are still very much alive and people still have to live in the results of it.

 

[Kobrag]

Plus it's because of her influence that the rail netwrok got privatised and that fares and waiting times increase every year.
But yes, that is the least of her crimes.

 

[Bulle]

I've noticed that a lot of people seems to forget about Section 28, so I'll just give a little reminder of what it was:

The amendment stated that a local authority "shall not intentionally promote homosexuality or publish material with the intention of promoting homosexuality" or "promote the teaching in any maintained school of the acceptability of homosexuality as a pretended family relationship".

This is what the lady herself said about it:

Children who need to be taught to respect traditional moral values are being taught that they have an inalienable right to be gay.

 

[Kobrag]

Technically it was her successor, but we all know that Maggie set the tone for the conservatives (and New Labour) for the next decade.

And yeah Bulle, there are other things that colour my opinion of her.

 

[In Vain]

German satire website Der Postillon writes: 'Margaret Thatcher privatises hell: Thousands of demons fear for their jobs." I smiled a bit

 

[WuTaNiSt]

What's been annoying me is the number of supporters coming out with the good old arguments of respect for the dead & "you weren't born then therefore your opinion is irrelevant" in response to any form of criticism.

 

[Mage246]

Politicians in the 80s were against homosexuality? What a shocker.

 

[Kobrag]

Don't go pulling that "Just a product of their time" crap, going down that road allows for the justification of the monstrous actions performed by Stalin and Hitler.

 

[Mad Vader]

Agreed, it's anachronistic to judge Thatcher's views using today's standards. Judge her by the standards of her time.

 

[Mage246]

If there was something exceptional about her beliefs on homosexuality, they'd be worth commenting on. But there wasn't. This doesn't excuse her beliefs, but it does mean that there's no reason to single her out for blame.

 

[CJ1145]

Because I was given a ****ty "Christian" education which basically means worshiping the right wing, I know of Margaret Thatcher as some kind of conservative goddess who brought beloved and beneficial economic reform to the UK.

Could somebody enlighten me as to what she actually did? I may be a pillock but I'm not dumb enough to believe that.

 

[K-64]

Given people's attitude towards here, I'm surprised a national holiday isn't made of the event in this country. Put it that way.

 

[Kobrag]

Because I was given a ****ty "Christian" education which basically means worshiping the right wing, I know of Margaret Thatcher as some kind of conservative goddess who brought beloved and beneficial economic reform to the UK.

Could somebody enlighten me as to what she actually did? I may be a pillock but I'm not dumb enough to believe that.

Deregulated the banks, leading to the current financial crisis. Destroyed most of our steel and coal industry, leading to us needing to supplement our needs with foreign material. Introduced the poll tax, a punitive flat tax, which was later rescinded.
Also stole milk from children.

 

[FrisianDude]

Don't go pulling that "Just a product of their time" crap, going down that road allows for the justification of the monstrous actions performed by Stalin and Hitler.

Well, yes. Or rather; well, no. Not justification, but a certain amount of understanding certainly. It's nothing but a fact that Hitler's anti-semitism was a culmination of deeply rooted anti-semitism all over Europe for, what, a millennium? More?

 

[tommyboy]

Because I was given a ****ty "Christian" education which basically means worshiping the right wing, I know of Margaret Thatcher as some kind of conservative goddess who brought beloved and beneficial economic reform to the UK.

Could somebody enlighten me as to what she actually did? I may be a pillock but I'm not dumb enough to believe that.

Deregulated the banks, leading to the current financial crisis. Destroyed most of our steel and coal industry, leading to us needing to supplement our needs with foreign material. Introduced the poll tax, a punitive flat tax, which was later rescinded.
Also stole milk from children.

You forgot legislating homophobia (clause 2, privatizing publicly owned gas, electricity, phones and water, selling off public assets at a knock down price, passing laws forbidding much effective union activity, cutting income tax for the rich to 50% of it's previous level, cutting benefits to the poor, putting in place policies which ensured at least one million people remained unemployed, switching from a Keynsian approach to a Monetarist policy, starting a war in order to win an election, beginning the back-door privatization of the NHS, instituting the fraudulent Private-Public-Initiative whereby the taxpayer underwrites private companies to lease us back what we used to own, stopping building of social (council) housing and allowing the existing stock to be bought up and thus forever removed from availability to the poor, and many many more...

 

[Bulle]

Politicians in the 80s were against homosexuality? What a shocker.

Section 28 was not created in a vacuum, schools had started to teach homosexuality as something normal and that it's ok for them to have a family etc. Her politics and opinions was against this progress, which is why they created Section 28. The labour politicians was against it, just like many celebrities like Helen Mirren.