Break free from conservatism

[Frankie 8,157]

I didn't know about the cricketing chap at all! Shows you how folks on the net can bump their gums in total ignorance. It's as well I don't mind making myself look stupid.

 

I'm also feeling a bit sheepish in that I had forgotten about him when you proposed the article in the Writers forum!

 

Sorry about that mate!

 

[wabashcannonball 0]

The politics of sport are no different from the politics of the real world, both riddled with religious dogma.

 

I won't bore you with detail, sufficient to say that Glasgow has been run into the ground by hordes of liebor tim Provosts and cooncilors, there was an equation done with regard to the odds of not one of the last 10 Lord Provosts of the dear green place (how apt) being of the Protestant faith, which none have been, the odds were 450,000 to 1.

 

Let one into a place of any power and your Protestant heritage is systematically destroyed, football reorganisation would be no different.

[bmck 117]

The politics of sport are no different from the politics of the real world, both riddled with religious dogma.

 

I won't bore you with detail, sufficient to say that Glasgow has been run into the ground by hordes of liebor tim Provosts and cooncilors, there was an equation done with regard to the odds of not one of the last 10 Lord Provosts of the dear green place (how apt) being of the Protestant faith, which none have been, the odds were 450,000 to 1.

 

Let one into a place of any power and your Protestant heritage is systematically destroyed, football reorganisation would be no different.

 

Although I'm not that bothered about protestant heritage, I think you're right. I was thinking last night about why it is people (the average uninformed person, say) think that Rangers fans are bigotted in a way Celtic fans are not, and it's simply because Celtic fans have better adapted to the essentially religious ideas of Good and Bad prevelant today. All the old symbols of power The Upper Classes, more recently bankers, old institutions be they universities or media, Empires, Organised Religion are all being viewed suspiciously, lumped together as something shameful, with the story of overcoming the oppression of such institutions being the great moral triumph idea of the day. The (obviously good) emancipation of blacks, women, gays etc has now become the greatest idea of good, and now everyone is looking for ways in which they are oppressed. How many times have you heard something called modern day Apartheid as a great expression of condemnation? It especially suits Catholics to play the oppressed card in Scotland, long after, as your comments about the GCC prove, they can reasonably say they are oppressed, because it stops people looking on them as they are, examples of Organised Religion with absolute conceptions of truth. In other parts of the world, the same religious hatred of old power sources is causing the catholic church to take an absolute beating, but not here, because they have adapted so well to playing the victim, and everyone's too scared to challenge it, because the second you say they're not oppressed the current religious dogma says you're no different than a Nazi/Apartheid-advocate/racist/homophobe/Israel supporter, and there's nothing more evil than that. I think the tide is turning, though. I don't think even ten years ago it would have been possible to cast a black person as a baddy, or consider that they might also be racist. But now hip hop music and all its extravagant displays of wealth display equality, there's lots of parody of it that's acceptable. This is good, it shows maturity. It shows blacks have succeeded in overcoming oppression and people feel unselfconscious enough to interact and poke fun at each other unselfconsciously in a way that wouldn't have been possible before. Once people realise Scottish Catholics have been pleading oppression while throwing their dominance in everyone's face, it will be OK not to like Catholicism as a religion again.

 

Personally there's a lot of Catholicism I like, but much more I dislike. Why is it OK for Dawkins to say that, but not a Rangers supporter? Is that not essentially middle class suppression of the working class, if we're looking for oppression? Does whether you're a bigot essentially matter on how educated the person is who'se stating the thing they don't like? I'm not sure how the thread got here but it's the same old fight to be on the 'right' side of the day's idea of good.

 

To get back to Andy's post, when it comes to football at least we should be willing to GIRUY to any sort of idea of good but our own. I'd love to see us buck the trend and get rid of all the tired ideas of valuing effort over skill and such things and lead the way in a technical football revolution!

Edited September 7, 2010 by bmck

[wabashcannonball 0]

All I will say is that rome even hijacked the word catholic to ascertain its dogma as all encasing.

[andy steel 0]

I think your post is more interesting than mine, Barry.

 

There's definitely much to what you say, but I would add that Catholic integration into the means of mass, if you'll pardon the word, communications have played as big a part in Scotland, although not the UK. The English, with their many differing religions to worry about, have to pretty much play it straight or get accused of all sorts from Dawkins at one side to Basil Hume at the other (is he still alive, I wonder?). Here, we have basically a silent Chinese, Jewish and Muslim community, an established one which is to all intents and purposes dead; and one which has enshrined its right to shout from the rooftops about what everyone else is doing wrong in law.

 

They got there by exploiting TV, papers, the law itself, sports, all your cultural outlets. Let's point out though, that it's the freaks we're talking about here, like that Phil idiot who comes on the radio talking about his weeping children from time to time - the vast, vast majority of our Irish community enrich the country. I only mention that lest anyone think I'm lumping your ordinary Joe in with the likes of John Reid and co.

[wabashcannonball 0]

Where do former labour government ministers, also selik board members,...... of the Crown fit into this jigsaw. Can you take the Queens shilling and be a republican.

[maineflyer 0]

Where do former labour government ministers, also selik board members,...... of the Crown fit into this jigsaw. Can you take the Queens shilling and be a republican.

 

You can if you're a self-serving scrote, utterly without scouples or a single vestige of honour, to whom status amongst the rabble and packing away as much money as possible are the only true beliefs you'll ever hold. Scum from cradle to grave.

[bmck 117]

Where do former labour government ministers, also selik board members,...... of the Crown fit into this jigsaw. Can you take the Queens shilling and be a republican.

 

There's so many ridiculous contradictions like that (incidentally, highlighted without bigotry in the Famine song) it's unreal. If you hate Britain, you not only wont celebrate, but actively condemn Britain even in the freedom's won in the world wars - if they are genuinly objectionable to you, why be here? Property's cheaper in Ireland and it's not expensive to get there. Why don't you go home? It's not in any sense bigotted to say that. I'd like to think the people who actually think like that among the Celtic support are fewer than we imagine.

[bmck 117]

There's definitely much to what you say, but I would add that Catholic integration into the means of mass, if you'll pardon the word, communications have played as big a part in Scotland, although not the UK.

 

Don't doubt it for a second. It seems to have happened so suddenly you'd be forgiven for thinking it's co-ordinated. But it won't be, you'll just probably have a few first generations of Catholics with properly developed sense of 'cause' and quite bitter backgrounds getting to Uni and saturating the very small Scottish media market. You combine that with the changes in education, with the skeptical view of institutions and its general unwillingness to have enough certainty to stand against strong claims for oppression because of its relativity and moral outlook, and you end up with a lot of bitter and evangelical-about-it tims writing news stories. You only have to see how crouched in qualifications, hedges and padding any story that either criticises celtic for bigotry, or praises rangers supporters, defending rights to sing songs etc, to know that there is a huge invisible tide of this faux-leftist position that has come to dominate the really small but self important Scottish media.

 

The English, with their many differing religions to worry about, have to pretty much play it straight or get accused of all sorts from Dawkins at one side to Basil Hume at the other (is he still alive, I wonder?). Here, we have basically a silent Chinese, Jewish and Muslim community, an established one which is to all intents and purposes dead; and one which has enshrined its right to shout from the rooftops about what everyone else is doing wrong in law.

 

That’s an excellent observation. We have many cultures but only one shouty one with a sense of cause. The rest of us are either too comfortable, or too intoxicated by the current general tide of scepticism of institutions to question whether the shouty people really are an example of a people oppressed that recent history has made such an impression out of.

 

They got there by exploiting TV, papers, the law itself, sports, all your cultural outlets. Let's point out though, that it's the freaks we're talking about here, like that Phil idiot who comes on the radio talking about his weeping children from time to time - the vast, vast majority of our Irish community enrich the country. I only mention that lest anyone think I'm lumping your ordinary Joe in with the likes of John Reid and co.

 

Agreed. The sad thing is, though, that there will be loads of ordinary joes that, because of the shouty ones and lack of criticism, just accept what they talk about as given truths, but not worth shouting about, because no-one stands up to it. It’s somehow got to the stage where if you want to be a reasonable person it’s pretty much assumed you agree with their nonsense, and going against it is a sign that you’re to be viewed with some degree of suspicion. Feck them tho.

[biggordy 0]

The fine body of men presently running things will have to be removed if matters are to improve.

The head must be severed for the body to survive and flourish I'm afraid.