Police Sergeant Mark Andrews Assulting A Prisoner

 General, Media, Politics  1 Response »
Sep 052010
 

There are several things that occur when watching this video :-

  1. Anyone can be arrested for no real reason whatsoever. So everyone has an interest in ensuring that the police or others who have power over us are prevented from abusing us, or punished for doing so after the event. It is too common to hear comments along the lines of “well, they probably deserved it”; maybe they do, but the police are not the ones who should be dishing it out. That’s what the whole criminal justice system is for.
  2. Stand on your rights if arrested by all means, but don’t do so physically. Whilst the Sergeant in this video is totally in the wrong, Ms.P. doesn’t help matters by being awkward about being “thrown into a cell”. She shouldn’t be there as she hasn’t done anything wrong, but refusing a breathalyser test and physically resisting being put into a cell was foolish. Understandable perhaps, but foolish.
  3. Whatever the police are doing to screen candidates to prevent mindless thugs from joining the police is obviously not working. Whilst many of the police are undoubtedly hard working, conscientious, and fully aware that abusing prisoners is wrong, it must always be remembered that a certain kind of thug will want to join the police as a way of getting power over people. These must be excluded.
  4. It seems blatantly obvious that two police officers should be the minimum for putting a prisoner in a cell. No matter how frail a prisoner may be, they can make considerable difficulty for a single police officer tempting the officer into using unreasonable force.

Universities Should Offer Vocational Qualifications

 Media, Politics  No Responses »
Jul 242010
 

Some geezer called Digby Jones has been pontificating about how Universities should be looking at offering more vocational qualifications. Fair enough; anyone no matter how ignorant is perfectly free to ramble on about anything they want to. But should we pay attention ?

Well the idea of offering vocational qualifications is such a great idea that Universities have been doing it for centuries – they call it the “degree”. One of the first degrees ever offered at any of the truly old Universities was a subject called Theology, which doesn’t sound especially vocational now (although it is – what qualifications do you think are useful for Bishops?), but was very vocational at the time. The Church (of Rome then) was desperate for more educated priests – there are records of Bishops insisting that uneducated priests be sent to various Universities to get a basic education, and of course the career prospects for an educated man at the time were pretty much limited to the Church or the Law. And of course Universities offered degrees in Law too.

It is easy to see how the “hard” subjects such as science, engineering, geology, etc. are very much vocational, but all of the so called “soft” subjects are very much vocational too. In some cases the vocational aspect of degrees such as history, or philosophy are not immediately of use to business but that does not make them any less vocational (historians need job training too!), or any less valuable.

And more than that, a degree is about teaching someone to think and study on their own, and  work on projects with other people. Are these not skills that businesses need ?

Our friend Digby insists that Universities should be talking to businesses about what subjects they should be teaching students to assist business. Well first of all, business is not the only type of organisation to take on graduates – Universities have a responsibility to train students going into government, the church, and Universities too! Secondly Universities are perfectly willing to talk to businesses about the degrees they offer.

Perhaps it should be businesses who should be a little more pro-active about talking to Universities!

If Digby Jones were to come up with a half decent degree proposal, he would probably find any number of academics knocking on his door ready to turn it into a course. And if the market finds it good, he will find students eager to sign up and qualify as “Digby clones”.

Yes the free market is at work within the University sector (complete with government interference) – students choose which degree courses they want; popular courses survive and prosper and unpopular ones wither and eventually disappear. One of the long running criticisms of Universities is that they do not turn out enough good scientists and engineers; well to fix that we need to make the students opt to go for those degrees.

BBC License To Be Cut To Save The Deficit ??

 Media, Politics  No Responses »
Jul 192010
 

We are used to seeing the more rabid members of the lunatic fringe of the Tory party complaining about the TV license fee and the BBC. For some mysterious reason they would give up the license fee and reduce the quality of British TV to that of the lowest common denominator – American commercial TV. Of course now that we are under ‘austerity measures’ in the public sector, the lunatic fringe is again targeting the BBC.

Of course anyone with half a brain realises that this means that the enormous public sector cuts the coalition is bringing in has very little to do with the deficit and a lot more to do with demolishing public services for ideological reasons. After all no matter how much the BBC reduces spending, the effect on the government’s deficit will be zero – as the whole of the BBC is funded from the license fee.

In fact reducing the amount of money that the BBC spends may be a good idea (although I don’t agree), but now is the wrong time to do it – it would be better by far to wait until real government spending cuts have worked their way through the system before reducing the spending that the BBC makes. Or it could have a problematic effect on the economy.

The Hunt for Raoul Moat, His Death, And The Facebook Reaction

 Media, Politics  No Responses »
Jul 142010
 

So the UK and Northumbria in particular has recently gone through one of the largest manhunts in recent times whilst Raoul Moat went on the run after trying to kill three people. And succeeded in killing one – the current boyfriend of his ex-girlfriend – for some reason the media believe if that you have once made a mistake and had a relationship with a nutter, it is a permanent relationship that you can’t escape from.

For seven days we were all glued to a greater or lesser extent to our TV screens whilst the police combined the wilds of Northumbria whilst he was in hiding, but eventually caught up with him and after a multiple hour stand off, he finally shot himself.

Of course as soon as it was all over, people were talking about the police hunt for him and criticising how it was done; in particular the mysterious use of two mysterious tasers that were not of a type approved for use by the UK police. Such things are inevitable.

It was also inevitable that some silly people on Facebook would start a group in support of him. And of course the Tories in government after they heard about it, started frothing at the mouth and demanding that the group be removed from Facebook because of “anti-police statements”.

There are two obvious conclusions to draw from this reaction to the Facebook group supporting Moat :-

  1. Tories have little respect for free speech if it is something they do not agree with – such as criticisms of the police – and the acid test of respect for free speech is whether you support it even when it is being used to say things you do not agree with.
  2. Tories need to get a life and stop overreacting to what is a handful of silly people on Facebook. A group with 30,000 supporters ? That’s such an insignificant number that it really isn’t worth getting worried about even if you find their sentiments offensive.

If you look at the Facebook group and the comments it very quickly becomes plain that the majority of supporters are ill-educated idiots who have significant problems with grammar, spelling, and a grasp of the known facts.

France Bans The Niqab !!

 Media, Politics, Religion  No Responses »
Jul 132010
 

Actually that isn’t quite the case – it is still in the process of being banned as of today. And of course the law actually reads something along the lines “people are prohibited from concealing their faces in public”. But we all know that it’s to ban Muslim women from wearing the full face veil or niqab.

I have mentioned the niqab before, so I will not be saying too much in this post.

France’s law may be a little over the top, but I do not believe that it is any more anti-Islamic than a law against beating your wife is anti-Islamic. Muslims in France may believe that France’s new law is anti-Islamic, but it is more a reaction against the perceived misogynistic tendencies behind the wearing of the niqab.

Muslims are saying that we should be more accepting of cultural differences when it comes to considering the niqab; I don’t disagree, but the negative image of the full face veil in Western society should also be considered when considering wearing the niqab. As mentioned before, an Islamic woman is still capable of demonstrating her “modesty” by wearing a burka despite not wearing the face veil, and by doing so she is showing her acceptance of Western cultural sensitivities.

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