put your favourites in here.

Here's one I came across this evening.
http://www.moreintelligentlife.com/blog/emily-bobrow/dont-you-think-shes-little-bit-young

Stoner I share your outrage but can't just at the moment find a link.

Maybe Google "female executions in Iran"; "genital mutilation in Somalia"; "women driving in Saudia Arabia"; "the burqua in Bradford"?

Or maybe just "Islam and women"

Because the Islamic superstition is riddled with ferociously mysogynistic attitudes (just like the Roman Catholic, Jewish, Christian, Sikh, Hindoo, Buddhist and Shintoist superstitions)

I dont know about "outrage" but if it werent for people out there recording such things as factually accurately as possible we would be none the wiser and be forced to form our opinions on hearsay, editorials or propaganda.

So tell me Stoner, did you reject the propaganda and right-wing editorials during the Thatcher era which claimed we were assisting the Afghan Mujahedin to defend their "ancient and traditional way of life" which was being threaten by the 'atheist' government of Mohammad Najibullah as it banned 'bride price' and forced marriage, and introduced a minimum marriage age ?

I certainly did.

This is how Dr. Mohammad Najibullah attempts to drag Afghanistan into the 21st century ended, thanks to Reagan, Thatcher, and James Bond :

[Image removed for being just a bit too graphic – Mod]

If a country is 1000 years behind the most developed countries, it is unsurprising their laws/morals reflect that.

For the very best: http://www.pulitzer.org/bycat

GG – during the Thatcher years I was variously wearing shorts, reading the Beano, campaigning for my inalienable right to own a remote control car and trying to get into Michelle Heywoods' knickers.

Any rejection of propaganda and right-wing editorials I may or may not have managed would have been entirely inadvertant, I assure you. 😉

I find it interesting that we assume the high ground and suggest that we are right. While I believe we ARE right, they do too. It IS the norm there, just as it's the norm for us to get to 17 and want a car, or believe we have the right to smoke/drink at an early age. As someone in the comments says, our culture of marriage at mid 20s, one or two children and retiring at 65 is a rarity in the world. And while I firmly believe women have equal rights etc etc etc I do wonder if they'd be significantly happier and better off if they were not aware of the rest of the world and just accepted it as-is? The fact that they'll burn themselves as a protest would suggest not, but did they do this before the "advanced" civilisations moved in and showed them that where we live women are much more equal.

CK – I think the fact that they do readily burn themselves implies not that they are aware of women in other parts of the worlds that have a better life then them, but that their own life measured in isolation is one of grim servitude, slavery and violence.

But how common is it, in comparison say with suicide over here, per head? I dont know. Obviously I'm not saying they only burn themselves because they know of women in other parts of the world, that would be a daft thing to suggest, I mean is it made worse by having our womens freedom shoved in their face? By having a female reporter wandering round saying how its unheard of where we live, can we see examples of your odd society so we can show everyoen else please? etc

I can't keep track.

Are these the good guys (whose values and beliefs our fighting boys and girls are dying to uphold) or the bad guys?

confused of sussex

…during the Thatcher years I was……. reading the Beano…

Mmm……… I am talking about 20 years ago. I would have thought you were probably a bit old to be reading the Beano then – but I might be wrong.

Certainly I started reading the Guardian when I was 10 (it was quite a struggle but I had an early addiction to information) although I was about 15 before I started having my own independent political thoughts. The catalyst for that incidentally, was the Vietnam War. I clearly remember how is slowly dawned on me that the Yanks weren't necessarily the 'good guys' despite the "hearsay, editorials and propaganda". Once that milestone had been reached, it was inevitable that I questioning whether I had been told any other bollox, as I embarked on my journey of discovery.

Obviously Afghanistan didn't have quite the same effect on you Stoner, and undoubtedly you eagerly ingested the propaganda fed to you during the Thatcher era, as you sat with your parents at the pictures watching James Bond's escapades in "The Living Daylights" !

from '79-'90 I would have been 4-15 yrs old.

I always thought James Bonds were documentaries. You mean they werent?

TBH back then I gave politics a wide berth. Didnt really interest me at the time. Geography OTOH (the rocks and ice type, not the wishy-washy human bollox type) was where I put my inquisitive nose.

Your early days of interest have served you well then.

Geography

Why then Land Economy – when you could have just stuck with studying the Land? 🙂

I actually gave up A-Level Politics and switched to Geology instead. One of the best things I ever did (n.b. GG, I'm not being disparaging about the study of politics… just that messing around raised beaches in the pouring rain suited me better).

Not reportage as such, but The Boston Globe have been running some striking pics.

Why then Land Economy – when you could have just stuck with studying the Land?

very, very short shortlist.

When I was picking courses I wanted to follow the course accreditation route to becoming a surveyor (originally I wanted to be a cartographer 🙂 ).

List went something like:
Cambridge
Reading
Harper Adams
Seale Hayne
Royal Agricultural College Cirencester

So Land Economy it was 🙂
It's served me well enough….

Ah, so…

Mind you, I nearly applied to study Law. 😯

not the wishy-washy human bollox type

…that you find fascinating now.

…hardly.

Im an analyst. Numbers, numbers, numbers.

Not a single frumpily dressed, human geography teacher with her boring syllabus of Urbanism and the Mezzogiorno development region in sight! 😉

Degree geography is much more interesting now. You can even do it based on numbers if you're that way inclined.

Degree geography is much more interesting now. You can even do it based on numbers if you're that way inclined.

I should hope so too.
We were discussing Geography at school though.

…back then I gave politics a wide berth

n.b. GG, I'm not being disparaging about the study of politics

Whoa hang on sec….. I never said that politics was my first interest – far from it. That privilege was, and still is, reserved for animals. Indeed Gerald Durrell was my one great childhood hero, I quite frankly idolised the man – much to the relief of my mother when she discovered that I could/would read non-reference books, just as long as they were written by him 😯

All aspects of wild life/the natural world fascinated me as a child, and I can recall being ridiculed in primary school for daring to suggest that humans were related to apes. Politics came later, although in many ways my interest in the evolution of human society was a logical progress from my interest in the evolution of species. I consider them both to be very much similar sciences – with both their logical and random aspects.

Of course an interest in politics was undoubted easier then – certainly the youth were considerably more radicalised than they are today. In fact the ability of our society to completely de-radicalise today's youth by selling them dreams and offering them unattainable material wealth, must surely represent one of capitalism's greatest achievements of recent times ?

Vietnam too, was much harder to ignore – it's much easier to ignore Afghanistan today.

In fact the ability of our society to completely de-radicalise today's youth by selling them dreams and offering them unattainable material wealth, must surely represent one of capitalism's greatest achievements of recent times ?

+1 I am a youth worker and the only person who has ever had a chat with me about politics or ethics was sectioned 😯

the only person who has ever had a chat with me about politics or ethics was sectioned

Sounds reasonable.

You go warm up the padded cells and I'll go round up TJ, SFB, BigDummy and Grizzlygus….
🙂

Am I right to conclude Stoner, you have automatically assumed that any youngster who shows an interest in 'politics or ethics' must by definition, be 'progressive', as it is inconceivable that they might be conservative ?

Am I right to conclude…
errr, probably not.

But then Im not sure anyone's going to quite agree on the definition of "progressive".

http://page.politicshome.com/uk/labour_seen_as_least_progressive_mainstream_party.html

What's your definition?

personally, I always consider "progreesive" to be "redistributive" but I guess I must be wrong…
I must try harder.

What's your definition?

I used the term 'progressive' in context of, the opposite of 'conservative'.

I noticed that your suggestions for the padded cell whilst undoubtedly represented individuals who might well have an interest in politics, it did not include anyone who might be described as 'conservative'.

I'm sure that you'll agree that there are a few on here, that fit that bill.

I noticed that your suggestions for the padded cell … did not include anyone who might be described as 'conservative'.

touchy.

Im sorry. Like all good TV characters, only the entertaining are remembered.

Anyway – im not sure the people you might be referring to are neccesarily conservative, nor Conservative. Indeed are all Conservatives conservative or conservatives Conservative eh?

only the entertaining are remembered.

What, you don't find any of the right-wing freaks on here 'entertaining' ?

That's a bit rude, ain't it ? 😐

That's a bit rude, ain't it

does rather depend on what exactly I find entertaining about anyone on here 😉

Been reading this website from Micheal Yon. He was recently embedded with UK forces in Helmand, but the MOD have just booted him out for supposedly releasing too much information as to what is going on there.

originally I wanted to be a cartographer

A splendid calling – though I've always liked the spooked dissonance of that line (from Moby Dick)… "It is not down in any map; true places never are…"

Somebody should tell the Ordnance Survey!

GG: Indeed. My Family and other Animals was one of my fave reads as a kid.