Monday morning papers

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Having foolishly made the mistake of reading the metro today, there were a few articles that tie in rather too well with my last post.

There’s a half page article about Megan Ward who’s invented a “smoking kills” key ring which is being ordered by “anti-smoking consultancy”* GASP, and she’s also produced possibly more useful strong sun indicators. In smaller news the Scots it seems are drinking a shocking one and a half pints a day (Of course these numbers will get increasingly inaccurate as people home brew or buy abroad) . The really impressive article though is the call from Dr Shyam Kolvekar to ban butter it seems just advising people to use less is no longer enough. Once he’s done with butter though he’s already got a few other foods in his sights:

“People should avoid fatty foods that are solid at room temperature, like cheese and red meat. And, if you can’t survive without red meat, then make sure you cut all the fat off it“

To round off the mornings madness the Independent is reporting on a man arrested for a twitter post threatening to blow up Robin Hood airport. Yes it probably warranted someone going round for a quiet chat, but the arrest and life time ban from the airport? I hope that he wasn’t reported by someone following his tweets.

* What on earth is an “anti-smoking consultancy” anyway?

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The new puritanism

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I’ve been meaning to write this for quite a while and never quite getting round to it, but the recent post over at Devils Kitchen has prompted to actually do something. If you read Devils Kitchen and Leg Iron already you can probably just skip this as I’m not going to say anything new and will be linking to them extensively, as I’m just trying to pull a load of stuff together for my own benefit.

This thread goes back quite a long way especially over on Leg Irons, who seems to have predicted events rather well – though we’ve not yet travelled all of that road . But today Devils kitchen brought to my attention that the powers that be have taken a leaf from the SNP’s book and are in favour of minimum pricing per unit for alcohol. Setting the minimum price at around 40 or 50 pence a unit. It’s worth at this point stopping to recall that “a unit” is a measurement invented by the government, and so subject to redefinition if the minimum pricing isn’t raising enough money, sorry doing enough to prevent binge drinking. So perhaps in that regard the Tory proposal to change from units to centilitres works in our favour, though no doubt it’ll be dropped as soon as they notice that it makes things more transparent. Also notice that the minimum price also covers spirits, now what’s the betting that this will turn out to be rigged in some way to apply before excise duty? Given that excise duty already accounts for a fair chunk of the price of spirits? As this government doesn’t seem to have any qualms about banning things, and is probably stupid enough to try prohibition, one has to conclude that this is as much about getting more taxes as it is a matter of control and probably very little to do with the stated goals..

Of course it is being sold as being to protect precious NHS resources, so presumably we can soon start to see taxes on ski-ing holidays and other activities which increase the risk of injury and thus costs to the NSH. Public backing is wanted for the scheme and will no doubt be provided by the various fake charities that exist for just such a purpose.

Taxes though aren’t the only weapon they hope to deploy against drinkers bar staff have a role to play as well no longer asking “same again” but offering water instead and so “slowly” drinking will be denormalised.
There are laws already in place that would address the alleged problems if they were enforced. They could even charge fixed penalties for bars serving people when drunk or for being drunk and disorderly which would help the revenue issue. But using existing laws has never been popular with this government much better to penalise everyone even though alcohol consumption hasn’t actually risen. All of which makes me wonder, as many times before, if either the government is really that incompetent, is just addicted to making laws or if as others suggest the aim is greater control of the population.

Greater control of the population seems more likely as booze seems to be following the same path taken with smoking. Once booze is nicely unerway they seem to already have lightbulbs, batteries and food lined up to be tackled next. Not to mention driving, taking photographs and a host of other things all subject to increasing controls and heading towards being banned. Every time it’s for the sake of the children/environment/NHS and every time nothings banned out right as people would notice that, instead costs are pushed up (got to keep that tax revenue), choices are curtailed and the individual singled out for opprobrium. None of it achieves the stated objectives, it isn’t meant to, it just makes us all guilty of something, all at risk of summary punishment, all part of the “other” and thus all controlled. Fear and control really do seem to be the only aims that make any sort of sense. Not breaking the law won’t even be sufficient as they’ll just arrest you until you prove you haven’t broken the law. An obvious up shot of this would be the rise in home brewing and other untaxed activities in the home, but they’ve got that covered by encouraging children to spy on their parents (and look out for terrorists for now) and a shiny new database to track it all.

Obviously as we’re so often told, it would be nonsense to even suggest that we might be heading towards being a totalitarian sate – but there does seem to be a hell of a pattern emerging. Though perhaps it is actually just a new puritanism, a medievalist revival where it’s ok to “sin” as long as you act suitably penitent and buy your indulgence.

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UKIP a correction

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I really must apologise, my previous article UKIP losing the plot I’d rather presumed that UKIP wanted a blanket ban on the burqa. However as Dick Puddlecote points out over at Old Holborns this isn’t actually the case. They just want to ban it in public buildings and allow for it to be banned in private buildings as well and they actually want to ban “anything which conceals a woman’s face“. Which is marginally more reasonable, except why just women’s faces? Surely experience tells us that men with covered faces are far more likely to be a problem? And what does it matter if you’ve got your face covered in a library say? Or if they word it really well in a council run community centre attending a group for Islamic women? Also surgical masks? I’m very sure that you can’t over estimate how badly a law can be worded, and how stupidly it will subsequently be enforced.

So given that they single out both women and Islamic garb, I’m going to stick by my previous conclusions even though I did misread the report and think they were after a blanket ban on just one type of garment.

If they proposed that it all face coverings could be requested to be removed when security concerns or the establishment of identity required it, that’d be far more reasonable – but one would hope that was the law already? And as for private buildings given that hoodies, crash helmets and even hats are banned from all sorts of places wouldn’t it just make more sense to allow private venues to ban whatever clothing they like? what with them being private property and all?

So my final question stands failing a LPUK candidate, as UKIP seem to be trying to join the rest of the authoritarian part who’s left to vote for?

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