The J4MB Files #561: Anil Kumar’s Q&A (ICMI21)

We’re linking daily to selected video / audio files from our YouTube channel. Today’s file is here (video, 53:14).

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The J4MB Files #560: Valentina Ortiz’s Q&A (ICMI21)

We’re linking daily to selected video / audio files from our YouTube channel. Today’s file is here (video, 53:35).

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Zia Yusuf, the new chairman of Reform UK: “We’re serious about winning the next election”

Fascinating (Times, £). I predict Nigel Farage will become prime minister at the head of a Reform UK government at the next general election in 2029. Key policies which could attract millions of votes include:

  • the introduction of Proportional Representation (the only European country other than the UK to hold ‘first past the post’ general elections is Belarus); and
  • the introduction of legislation to eliminate the decades-old scandal of denial of access between children and parents following family breakdowns. This would include (a) speedy police investigations of abuse allegations which, if found to be groundless, would lead to an automatic right of access of parents – almost invariably, fathers – to their children, and (b) the curtailment of family courts’ powers to deny that access.

I cannot see how either the Labour party or the Conservative party could effectively challenge Reform UK in either area.

For every child wrongly denied access to a parent, there are many voters – the parent, grand-parents, great-grandparents, uncles, aunts, cousins…

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The J4MB Files #559: Professor Stephen Baskerville’s Q&A (ICMI21)

We’re linking daily to selected video / audio files from our YouTube channel. Today’s file is here (video, 54:09).

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Robots will soon beat women at football

For many years, teams of schoolboys have comfortably beaten the top women’s teams in the world – conceding no goals in the process, obviously – so why not robots, now? Enjoy.

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Labour to allow staff to sue bosses for making them work too hard

A piece in today’s Times (£). Of course the term ‘staff’ in the headline (above) can be replaced by ‘female staff’. Surely no man would take a case to a tribunal for being made to work ‘too hard’? Their instinct would be to find a new job before doing such a thing.

This Labour government says its #1 priority is to create economic growth, while implementing measures to discourage companies from taking on new employees, and deterring wealth creators through planned measures such as imposing inheritance tax on non-doms’ global wealth. Madness on stilts.

The article explains that ministers are considering allowing staff to bring claims that they have been made to work more than the maximum 48 hours permitted under the European working time directive, which was incorporated into UK law by the previous Labour government. Currently this limit can only be enforced by bodies such as councils and the Health and Safety Executive, but the Law Commission wants tribunals to gain the power to hear such cases.

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Thinking of buying a Liverpool FC 2024/25 season ticket? Want to save up to £844.00 (93.4%)? Buy a season ticket for the ladies’ team games!!!

A Liverpool FC season ticket for the 2024/25 season would cost you in the range of £713.00 – £904.00, depending on location. The home games are, of course, played at the iconic Anfield stadium, which has seating for 61,276 people.

In these straitened times, it’s incumbent on all of us to take advantage of opportunities to save money. So you might like to check out alternative Liverpool FC season tickets, the season tickets for… er… Liverpool FC Ladies, for £60.00. They play their home games at St Helen’s stadium, rebranded the Totally Wicked Stadium, which has seating for 18,000 people. We assume the people who run Anfield don’t want their sacred turf desecrated by wimmin. Good call.

So, long story short, you could save up to £844.00 (93.4%) by watching the Liverpool FC ladies play rather than the men. Yes, the games will be teeth-grindingly awful, with all the excitement of staring at a wall for 90 minutes, but think of the money you’ll be saving! Or you could show your support for the ladies by buying a season ticket but not attending any games, or offering your ticket to ladies of your acquaintance. Given the low likelihood of even a lady wanting it, you might opt to just chuck it in the bin.

If you need a reminder of the quality of women’s football at the much more skilful international level, check out New Zealand defender Meikayla Moore scores hat-trick of own goals in SheBelieves Cup (video, 41 seconds). Two of them were in the first six minutes. Go, girl!!!

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Nigel’s comments on the corruption of the ‘system’ by civil servants, lobbying groups etc.

Our thanks to the ever-industrious Nigel for these comments, in response to a recent piece by Prof. Stephen Baskerville:

The Professor’s comment, “Men spend too much time complaining and opining about their oppression and not enough understanding why it happens and what can be done about it” sounds a bit dismissive. Yet it has an important truth. Politicians (local and national) tend to preside over their civil servants and officers. Unless particularly motivated to engage with the detail of their “portfolios” in fact what happens is that they are really pretty much in the hands of their supposed underlings. The current discomfort of the Chancellor is a good example. The Treasury has long had the winter fuel payments for pensioners on its lists of easy “efficiencies”. The hapless Rachel Reeves is easily persuaded this is an easy win and announces it. Coinciding with dramatic wage rises for public servants, and expected 10% increase in fuel costs just when people are starting to think about the coming autumn and winter. Queue political shitstorm. Rachel looking every bit a sheepish as she should. Because of course Treasury civil servants need not bother themselves with public opinion or much with political sensitivities.

This is how feminism became the norm in our “state”, by working closely with civil servants and lobby groups. I recall a book by a minister in the latter years of the Thatcher government in which he came to realise his political objective of supporting children and families had in fact been traduced by “his” reforms which had in fact been enacted by Gingerbread and Civil Servants to ensure mothers were “married to government” through the operation of the benefits regime.

Feminists (like many on the “left” but too few on the “right”) have an overall strategic direction and plenty of energy for the boring stuff like committees, drafting of documents, publishing guidance documents and lobbying. The result is that in the two decades prior to the Blair Government they had already created much of the policy frameworks that removed fathers from contact from their children and dismantled anything supportive to traditional roles. In a sense from the Blair years all that happened is that this dominance simply became more clear.

Sadly the wonderful Philip Davies lost his seat but his story about his “red pill” is important. In a number of debates he had simply taken it as true that women were treated more harshly than men in the criminal justice system. In preparation for yet another debate he asked for a briefing on the topic from the Library of Parliament (the research and information support for MPs). Much to his surprise he found that he briefing told him the reverse was in fact the case! Not only were MPs in the previous debates talking rubbish because the premise was wrong, but the information that proved this is from the Government came from the Agencies and Departments themselves!

This instance illustrates a number of important issues. The first is that legislation and public policy is rarely informed by data or research, national and local government collect vast amounts of data and funds huge amounts of research. But “Inquiries”, Committees, Commissions and Consultations are usually very superficial and tend to involve opinions from individuals or lobby groups selected by civil servants/officers. Only rarely do they interrogate the data they have, let alone research that has been funded by the various “research councils”. The second is that politicians rarely look into the details given to them, in this case Mr. Davies took the simple step of asking for the data! The third that this often isn’t a conspiracy as such, it’s just that it’s a small “world” and the relationship between civil servants and groups they rely on to feed the politicians with photo ops., pleasing speeches etc. is very close not to say personal (same University, schools even, same restaurants, theatres… social milieu).

As Bettina Ardnt reminds us ” sexual assault and domestic assault – what I regard as the twin pillars of feminist crusade to destroy men. “An area where policy is so evidently not made with reference to any of the actual data and where initiative after initiative reflects the strategy of a small number of highly influential lobbyists and groups. Often completely sidestepping politicians through such Quangos as the College of Policing or Ofsted who promulgate “guidance” on things as varied as education for infants to special courts for rape. The point is that its important to encourage the Philip Davieses of this world to probe the detail to lift the rocks to find the creepy crawlies busy underneath.