Looking back at the last election – and thinking about just how it actually worked out:
The Coalition – Mel Phillips for the Daily Mail :
Rotherham Politics
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As if !
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Thought some light relief was in order with this one. Melanie Phillips is a crazy right-winger with decidedly her own view.?
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she was once an equally crazy far left-winger.
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That’s how it works if you can’t appreciate nuance and are motivated primarily by a desire to feel righteous.
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Giles – precisely!
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Wish people would say on this blog what makes a crazy right winger…..Saw Melanie Philips once on Question Time and she was the only person who made sense and stood up to bullying…. She got an ovation too which suggested to me that she was articulating what the silent majority would like to say…. but daren’t ….. And why shouldn’t she have her own views for goodness sake?. I suspect if someone like Melanie Philips had been on the RMBC Rotherham, there may not have been a need for Prof Jay ( a woman) to uncover the impotence of RMBC to the harm of the children in their patch.
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What does Prof Jay being a woman have to do with anything Linda?
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see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Melanie_Phillips
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Thanks for that link RR… Mel Philips profile on Wiki doesn’t make her read like a fruit loop to me…. Hope the fact that she’s Jewish doesn’t now qualify her as a ‘ crazy right winger’
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No Linda, it’s just RR being his usual judgemental self, sat up there on his lofty perch, over-loading Rothpol with contributions seldom relating to Rotherham politics.
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@ R Wilde…. When somebody on this sight answers the question I asked “What makes a person a ” crazy right winger” I will answer your question on the women issue…. . Buzz words like’ right winger’ need definition when used against someone in a derogatory fashion….
My own limited research on Melanie Philips does not identify her as crazy ( far from it ) but will somebody tell me what a right winger is and why it is used as an insult on this blog.
By contrast Mel Philips presents logical argument for her comments. Now I don’t find that ‘self righteous or crazy ‘ ,…… By contrast I think anyone could factually say with very good evidence that Rotherham has been run by crazy lefties to the cost of at least 1400 children ; not to mention the family trauma , that has brought them world wide attention to their own disgrace….
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All fair points well put Linda. Well, almost all.
I’m sorry that, since you have asked a (IMO) valid question that has not yet been answered, you are unwilling to answer a similarly valid question that’s been put to you. It seems a bit petty, perhaps? But don’t worry Linda, I’m not about to lose any sleep over it đŸ™‚
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Yes I admit that my adding( woman) in brackets it could easily be taken as the old, worn out feminist rant… Bad idea on my part. Militant feminism is an anathema to me and I wouldn’t want to create the possibility of identifying myself as one. My point is this….. Sometimes women show more discernment than men …. From what I have read re the CSE crime against children in Rotherham it is women who tried unsuccessfully to draw attention to the horror until Prof Jay called them to fess us. It took a woman with some clout, so to speak… I have taken the liberty of viewing RMBC meetings by webcast and must confess that the likes of Mel Philips and Prof Jay have more b…. than anyone bloke I’ve seen on the Rotherham Labour Council….I do like men by the way… Married to the same one for 53 years ….
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Ah I see. Thank you for answering Linda. Yes, it did come across as being a very feminist thing to say. But wasn’t (isn’t) Joyce Thacker a woman too? What about the social services managers who help cover it up, men or women? It is likely both, but one important thing to remember is that most of the managers of care homes in town were women, as were senior social workers. I seem to remember from the Jay report that the home office researcher described her less than helpful manager as “she”, at least one named senior social services manager was a woman and several female councillors in key positions were amongst those described by Louise Casey as “unfit for purpose”. Basically, women are just a fallible as men.
You are right about Prof Jay, and I would say the same of Casey – both “gutsy” ladies who took a no nonsense approach with RMBC and told it as they saw it. But I think that has more to do with the kind of people they are than their gender – tenacious, honest, and fair. Traits that are not gender dependent. We could probably use a few more like them on RMBC, male or female. As long as they do the job well, who cares what sex they are?
As for “right wing nuts” and whether Mel Philips fits that description or not, I’m afraid I can’t help you there – it’s not a term I’ve ever used so…
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PS … I am still hoping the people who comment here, why anyone other than a generational Labourite , is identified negatively as right wing. If you can’t or won’t identify what right wing represents…… best not to use it eh.
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Linda, I have had my share of being abused for political incorrectness and I admire Mel for having no fear of such bullying. But by conventional definition we regard Labour as left, Lib Dems as centre and Conservatives as right wing. Mel regards our governing coalition as left wing putting her, again by convention, well to the rightwards end of the spectrum.
Turning to another point you made, you have a point about the women whistle blowers. I’m hoping they will licence more women taxi drivers and insist only they can drive girls in care. However it is worth remembering that the senior managers who silenced the whistle blowers were also women and the journalist who exposed them (Andrew Norfolk) was a man. Some people of both sexes will sell out our children for fear of a word. Others, women and men, have a shred of decency. Though I’d rather trust my children to a woman other things being equal.
I agree if Mel had been on RMBC she would have fought for the exploited girls. But so would many others left and right (eg Ann Cryer). The problem Rotherham had was that it had a council stuffed with spineless cowards, though I agree with you that tribal voting was a key factor in letting them get away with their delinquency.
Best Wishes
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Thanks Giles…. I am familiar with the terms left , centre and right but what I am trying to establish here is ;;;; because a person may be conservative in their political views why should this make them crazy right wingers… No one answered that yet…. Perhaps they are trying to work out why they do it consistently and need time to formulate an answer….
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Thank you. I didn’t doubt you knew the meaning of the terms left and right. I wasn’t trying to patronise, just pointing out that Mel is fairly described as right wing. I actually agree that left liberals resort to abuse too frequently, (though they are not alone in that). So instead of refuting an argument they label it racist, sexist homophobic or whatever. My response is always as follows “I am afraid you have fallen into the common liberal fallacy of believing abuse is a form of argument. It isn’t. Labelling my argument racist/sexist/homophobic doesn’t demonstrate it to be wrong. It doesn’t even prove it racist/sexist/homophobic. All your work lies yet ahead of you.” That is intended to patronise but if someone throws around unfounded accusations (and very rarely are the opinions being denounced actually racist or sexist or homophobic), they are asking for it.
As one who is broadly left but has never been PC I have been targeted for this kind of abuse a great deal. My own view of “left” is that it should mean standing for the most vulnerable (eg gang rape victims) but in these degraded times it has come to mean pandering to every grievance monger from a minority group whilst despising one’s own country and the white working class. Ernest Bevin is spinning in his grave.
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Hi again R Wilde, I’m glad to see someone gutsy enough to stand up to the feminist ideology. Good and fair debate on that subject….The thing that bothers me about the Labour mentality on this sight is they mostly don’t use fair and reasonable argument but use loaded words like (crazy right wingers..) in order to brand someone negatively without explaining why they do so… That practice is a Tribal form of mental bullying and designed to tell voters ‘what’ to think and not ‘ how’ to think and vote… Subtle and dangerous and very effective on unsuspecting minds conditioned by generational voting It reminds me a lot of senseless teenage peer pressure designed to make someone’s life hell if they choose to swim against the tide ……. Am I wrong RW to think that some of the negligent women in positions of lucrative power in Rotherham Social Welfare system were themselves Labour Party clones.
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Thanks Giles. Good and fair debate. Kind Regards Linda.
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Thank you.
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“Am I wrong RW to think that some of the negligent women in positions of lucrative power in Rotherham Social Welfare system were themselves Labour Party clones.”
I don’t know that they were all fully paid up members of the Labour party, but it seems they were all well versed in the same PC doctrine.
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Thanks RW … another good debate. I have enjoyed your comments and the debate. Kind Regards Linda
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