MikeO

If they're allowed to stay they're not illegal, and people who arrive here by "irregular" routes mostly claim asylum so they can only properly be described as illegal (despite what the tories pretend) once their application has been processed, two thirds are successful in those applications. I've not seen immigrants living on the streets, or heard reports of such a thing, so it would appear that it is possible to accommodate them.

Nobody thinks mass illegal immigraton is good for the country. How does an immigrant get to be "tick-boxed" if they're unchecked? Yes. You're entitled to your opinion.

Looking for such a party is a bit of a pointless exercise though isn't it? Everybody of every political persuasion truly believes that their views are sensible, humane and decent. It's certainly something to strive for, but sometimes it's not easy. We're both old enough to have been around pre the 1968 race relations act, when it was acceptable to treat minorities as second class citizens. Had the word been in general use back then, there's no doubt that those who first suggested reform would've been described as "woke" (in the derogatory rather than enlightened sense). Fortunately they eventually won the argument; human evolution is great sometimes.

Duke of Kent, "The St George's flag...was adopted by London and England in 1190, for their ships entering the Meditteranean, to benefit from the protection of the Genoese fleet. The English Monarch paid an annual tribute to the Doge of Genoa for this privilege." https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=BBkvDwAAQBAJ&pg=PT82&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q&f=false

No point in carrying on with this, my point is purely that the right is influencing the political climate in an extremely negative (in my opinion) way, plainly a lot of people are happy about it. Fortunately the majority are not. I know full well, as I've said, that you're not right wing, and just because you agree with one of their opinions it doesn't make you so. We'll just have to disagree about the flag, nobody is making a mockery of it at all, and equating it to English "culture and values" is ridiculous. Culture and values evolve do they not? They certainly should, or do you yearn for the good old days of fuedalism, of religious and racial bigotry? May sound daft you're the one dreaming of the halcyon days of 1348 Just as another thought, the logo of that well known liberal group, the popular conservatives (an oxymoron if ever I heard one). When are their tabloid buddies going to lose their shit over them disrespecting ("are you disrespecting me?") the flag and/or making a mockery of British culture and values?

Came to light in January https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/jan/27/revealed-uk-granted-asylum-to-rwandan-refugees-while-arguing-country-was-safe#:~:text=The details of the four,first announced and September 2023.

Adding two and two and getting five mate. I have no problem at all with your opinions at all and I didn't express any, so why the passive agressive response? I know you're not right wing and I know I'm as patriotic as the next man, I just don't go along with the absurd, meaningless and vacuous tabloid fuelled "woke" and/or "anti woke" nonsense. It's an invention, it means absolutely nothing; just used by politicians to further their self-interest and sadly people buy into it. "If I was on here 12 years ago and it came up for debate I would have been against the national flag being changed from it’s original colour scheme and design." There's the answer. In 2012 it didn't come up for debate, and it didn't come up for debate because nobody was searching for something to get offended by, it's all about the rise of the nasty side of nationalism and the far right (people might not like that description but "If it looks like a duck, swims like a duck, and quacks like a duck, then it probably is a duck.")

Hamilton may have made the right decision, whether Ferrari have is highly questionable

Nobody has addressd why it was fine for the union flag to be messed with in 2012 and everyone is chucking their toys out of the pram over this. In 2012 the whole kit was a "fake" flag while now it's a tiny bit of detail on the back of the neck. What's changed? For me it's as plain as day that it's the political landscape (not just in the UK), the right wing is far more visible than it's been in my lifetime. The cross of St George has never been the badge of English football, the three lions is. and the flags in the crowd and on the flagpoles at Wembley are red and white. In the unlikely event of us ever winning anything the red and white flag will be flown and people will paint their faces red and white, but people are losing their shit over a tiny bit of trim that's effectively invisible unless you search for it. It's lazy and meaningless for me, "...originally a very positive concept… but now completely appropriated by the hard right, and used repeatedly as a general-purpose insult by people who don't really know what they mean.." sums it up nicely. I'd counter that with the point that it's used out of context far more often by the right, to erroniously suggest that liberals are somehow unpatriotic. Just my thoughts, not expecting everyone to agree. But, to my original question, why is a far worse "destruction" of a national flag fine with everyone twelve years ago, but today it's not?

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How has it been destroyed? The flags at Wembley were the same as they always are.

It is a bit of big deal sadly, stoked by the rise of the right. Nobody batted an eyelid when the union flag was messed with for our 2012 Olympic kit, but we're in a very different political space now. Don't think we'll ever reach US levels of insanity but there's a loud minority who sadly aren't going anywhere just now.

The day your good self "burns my head" will be when I call it a day. You fail to remotely understand my "pedant" badge, I own it, its a standing joke. The very rare occasions I ever pull anyone up it's purely dependent on the person in question being able to take the joke, it's never done seriously or maliciiously, and I'm also totally able and happy to laugh at myself when Cornish comments on my mitakes (<<see what I did there). You misread me completely, most people don't fortunately, but you keep chuckling...no problem

Seriously unimpressed, never again. Atmosphere was shite and found it a real struggle to see what was happening most of the time. Being bloody freezing didn't help, left well before the end.

I'll be watching No need for an alarm though, I'll be up late finishing an audit of my local nail bar; we all need a hobby.

Rapid about turn that

At the moment you can only see if you're in tier one or two, by looking here. From May you'll be able to see how high up you are in tier one (which is where you'll be, same as me). "Supporters from 1-10,000 on the waiting list will be banded in increments of 500. I.e. The first band will be 1-500, the second band 501-1000, the third 1001-1500 and so on." I went on the list in August 2020 so you'll likely be a bit higher than me.

What? I seriously have no idea what you're talking about. Where did grammar come into it for a start?

Some things never change Matt was the snivelling apologist it seems. "Apologist" in Haf-speak is anyone who didn't want the man dismembered in front of the Gwladys.

Wow! You should've mention these before

Conversation about tabloid press credibility and you bring it round to Kenwright and it's not deflection? "Deflection is often used in arguments as a way to shift focus away from oneself and onto another person or issue. People commonly divert the pressure from themselves by changing the subject, pointing out someone else’s flaws or presenting unrelated information to distract from the main issue at hand." Like I said, textbook. As an aside, I do/did have a different opinion of Bill to you, but I'd be very interested if you could find an example of me "falling for" his lies. I'm here all day.

Textbook deflection

It doesn't. What "matters" is that the fail is contradicting itself.

Loved the first one and started the second, but wasn't grabbed by it. Maybe give it another go.

"Facts" courtesy of unsubstantiated fail story. Why are we even talking about this? He's a bully who should be charged with ABH apparently, all on the say so of Matt Hughes. Fail has a video on its site now which says that Dyche left the table with Patterson, no mention of Tarkowski at all....so the "facts" that people are drawing their own "facts" from are not only uncorroborated, they're contradictory.