Michael Blackburn: ‘So, the Humanities “foster social justice and equality”, do they? No, they don’t. They’ve got nothing to do with fashionable left-wing campaigns. Just as they’ve nothing to do with developing “informed and critical citizens”. Informed and critical individuals, yes, but “citizens”? No. “Citizens” reeks of social engineering and the idea that people have no status or importance except in relation to the state. It’s one of those words, like “hegemony” or “Chomsky” that is guaranteed to rouse the Viking berserker in me.’
Michael Blackburn: ‘Jones, Penny, Mason, Harris and others may find the get-up-and-go attitude of young people lamentable. I think it’s admirable and bet everyone else does as well. I’m always impressed by the students I deal with; they all seem to have jobs and they never complain about it. They just get on with things. It’s also proof that to a large extent they are immune to the the propagandising of the progressives from their high ground in academia, the media and politics. That’s terrifying for the left but heartening for the rest of us.’
Michael Blackburn: ‘It’s probably worth remembering that the Bros are partly responsible for Mubarak coming to power in the first place. He replaced Sadat, who was assassinated in 1979 – by members of an offshoot of the Muslim Brotherhood. And what was Sadat’s great sin? That’s another element the media have been happy not to talk about very much: Israel. Sadat made a peace treaty with Israel, and thus, placed him in the antechamber of perdition.’
Michel Blackburn: ‘Politicians and educators have been at pains (not without reason) to acquaint us with the horror of war through poets such as Sassoon and Owen, but they have tended to leave out other equally important elements. Most soldiers, for example, despite the unspeakable misery of the war, believed they were fighting for a worthwhile cause. The closeness between officers and men began to break down the class divisions of British society. The sons of the ruling classes, when the call came, took their their place on the fire-step, and with pistol in hand, went over the top ahead of their men.’
Michael Blackburn: ‘How on earth do you measure something such as equality or “wellbeing” or happiness? Does it really make a difference if some actions are right-brain or left-brain or is the whole concept bunkum? Neuroscience is the new phrenology. All our social and political problems will be solved by the right application of its discoveries if you believe these shysters.’
Michael Blackburn: ‘On the way I was going to take half a dozen bags of garden waste to the town dump. Apart from the fact that some of the black bin bags holding the waste were so thin they tore as soon as I picked them up, some of the cuttings were so old they‘d started to liquefy. In other words they were turning into a type of silage, and silage, in case you didn’t know, stinks most rankly.’
Michael Blackburn: ‘I have to admit that when I began Ms Bennett’s (55) piece I was confused. I truly thought it was a spoof. Can anyone really be this offensive about old people? Especially those who’d grown up during and after the war against fascism; the people who built the Welfare State? Those white-haired dears dying of hypothermia every winter or starving to death in NHS beds?
Apparently yes. Ms Bennett (55) may as well have said not only do they hate blacks, gays and women but they also stink of cigarettes and piss.’
Michael Blackburn: Like a Muslim permitted by taqiyya to lie about his true beliefs and intentions, so you are permitted to prevaricate about the purpose of the project. That’s another reason we have grown to hate the EU in Britain: we know we were lied to when we joined. It’s not a fantasy, it’s a fact that can be clearly demonstrated from the official documents. We were told we were joining an economic free trade community, not being suckered into eventual unification into a single state.
Michael Blackburn: ‘It just happens that many of the books proposed are not just grown-up but “old” and “old” is always categorised as bad by certain people, even some who want youngsters to develop the reading habit. ‘
Michael Blackburn: ‘This Snooper’s Charter, which received no attention whatsoever in the UK media, was “transposed”, i.e. incorporated into English law in 2009. Thus we are already being snooped on. Both the Labour government’s planned database and the Coalition’s are merely expensive add-ons to what already exists.’
Michael Blackburn: ‘You would normally assume that failing to learn any facts is the same as being ignorant, and the purpose of education is to eradicate ignorance. But there’s the core of modern progressive education for you: ignorance is knowledge. And quite how you can interpret anything from evidence when evidence is fact-free I don’t know. Perhaps that’s a skill teachers learn at training college.’
Michael Blackburn: ‘ the phrase “aspiration nation” makes me think of a body in terminal decline, enduring painful interventions for only short-term relief. There’s no need to labour the metaphor. As far as the country’s concerned all we know is that it’s going to get a lot worse before it gets better. We just don’t know how much worse.’
Michael Blackburn: ‘We’ve had enough snow. It doesn’t take much in Britain. A day or two of it lying around on field, farm, housing estate and rooftops is sufficient for us to enjoy its transient beauty and to be reminded of childhood pleasures. More than that is an imposition.’
Michael Blackburn: Will Self doesn’t have to stick his nose outside the media bubble he inhabits…which is why he can go on to make the astonishing claim that the last Labour government implicitly played the race card and “triangulated” on immigration. The fact that Labour deliberately engineered mass immigration into the country with the intention of changing the culture seems to have eluded His Immense Braininess.
Michael Blackburn: ‘The source of this scandal is twofold: idiotic bureaucracy from the EU; and criminality. The latter is with us always, which is why we have the law. The former, unfortunately, will be with us for a few more years yet, as will the simpletons who can’t see how much trouble it causes, even as they demand more regulation. And that’s what we’ll get – more regulation and more unintended consequences.’
