Keep It Dense, Keep It Futile, Yeah?

A friend posted a garbage-level article from the Spectator yesterday and it has really bugged me for a number of reasons so I'm just going to sit here and dismantle the arguments and rhetoric in the article for funsies. The first part of the article is obvious rabid polemical pish where the author just bizarrely rants about Nick Clegg and makes the claim that "rEmAnIeRs" aren't really  pro free-trade because... um, well there doesn't actually appear to be any reasoning for this claim bar attempting to paint his opponents as the real  Little Englanders in what appears to be a magnificent example of projection. From here on, I'm going to dispel some of the misleading statements and blatant bullshit in the article. " In fact, the European Food Safety Agency has passed chlorinated-washed chicken for safe consumption. " This isn't the issue and the author is both dishonest and dense for trying to misrepresent it. Besides that, anti-microbial ...

A strange new trend has developed recently, one of dousing political figures in various delicious brands of milkshake. It has of course fired up discourse between the commentariat and pundits trying to paint these incidents as violent, border-line fascist action designed to curtail free speech by "the left/liberals/insert right-wing boogeyman here". This is ostensible bollocks and it's a red-herring to boot because it's typically the case that the person making these claims has expressed a detestable opinion and is personally offended by the response of their audience rather than actually being a victim of anything; it's a means deflecting criticism. Conservatives and the far-right love trying to play the victim card. Celebrity voices such as Gary Lineker and Julia Hartley-Brewer have condemned these acts with placative banalities such as "You shouldn't throw milkshake over people you disagree with!" and "The way to voice your contempt is at...

We have reached that time of year again when the focus of our "free" press has shifted once more to Jeremy Corbyn. What has he done wrong this time? Well... That's right. He's worn a rain jacket. On a rainy Armistice Day. The absolute bastard. Oh and apparently his poppy wasn't big enough either. "hE's GoT nO rEsPeKt!", wail the churlish commentariat, "hE cAn AfFoRd A pRoPeR cOaT!". Seriously, check out some of the comments on the Telegraph article for example; in their eyes Corbyn is clearly a disrespectful hypocrite who hates Britain, apparently like all lefties, because he wears a plain rain jacket and what looks like a small poppy badge instead of splurging his huge wealth on a, I don't know, whatever the Lamborghini equivalent of a rain-jacket is. There's a beautiful irony here in that on one hand you've got people claiming that Corbyn doesn't represent the working class and then on the other,  the exact same ...

I'm posting here what I wrote in a reply to someone on Facebook who claimed that Tommy Robinson is not far-right, that he's out for their best interests. I have modified it slightly to make sense outside the context of a Facebook thread. Tommy Robinson is appealing to your sense of wounded nationalistic pride - he's telling you that your problems, economically and socially aren't systemic, that there is no underlying cause. He's telling you that your problems are caused by a tiny sub-set of society that is somewhat different and unfamiliar to you - he's "othering" them - and that he can fix the problem by removing them from society. He is doing this by means of propaganda: manipulated statistics, quote-mining and attempting to lift and inspire your sense of nationalistic-patriotism and if he's told he's wrong, he'll profess to be a martyr of free-speech. He's claiming to be your hero because he'll fix what the propaganda claims - ...

The hard-Brexit Quitlings have once again demonstrated their lack of interest in the potentially disastrous job losses our country could face if they push through with a no-deal scenario and no customs union: Conservative MP @Anna_Soubry attacked "ideologically driven" colleagues with "gold-plated pensions and inherited wealth" for ignoring the "reality" of Brexit. pic.twitter.com/hZF5DU9wy7 — BBC Politics (@BBCPolitics) 16 July 2018 This will seem like a digression but let me put this to you: sovereignty, outside of establishment spin, has never meant more freedom to make our own laws away from Brussels "Eurocrats". Not for you or I anyway. Those who are pushing for the hardest Brexit in parliament are the ones who have the least to lose and certainly not their jobs or investment portfolios and hedge funds. Have you not noticed the silver spoons in their mouths? When was the last time you heard Jacob Rees-Mogg, Ian Duncan Smith, Boris...