Don’t think it was as bad as Stalin’s collectivisation of agriculture (was that Communism ?). It’s very hard to be sure but maybe 10 million or 12 million people died (starvation, being sent to the gulags etc).
I was deliberately non-specific in how I worded my post.
12 million starving Russians didn’t threaten the idealised picture postcard suburban white lifestyle of the 50s in the same way as some young people with spiky hair.
What BV chose to do was emit an existential cry of rage and anguish. Trying to rationalise an irrational act such as that is of course futile. The IDF is an artifical construct not a person, nor strictly a group of particular people - the people are just components of a larger whole, the IDF is principally an idea. Characterising this as hate speech in the prosecutable sense meant by most, (much less as ‘antisemitism’ - as many are), is absurd.
How bad an idea was it? At worst one or both will be turned into political prisoners - ‘a little light martyring’ - which is going to be counterproductive for those intending to silence such dissent. Irrespective, it has already focussed a LOT of unfocussed minds on the genocidal ethnic cleansing and mass-murders that Israel by means of the IDF is committing every single day. Again, the hand-wringing and self-flagellation from those wishing to suppress dissent is proving highly counterproductive.
Now lots of people are looking-up (e.g.) why the RAF flies near-constant missions out of Akrotiri over Gaza; why we’re supplying Israel with spares for their F-35s; they’re looking at all those videos of IDF soldiers blowing-up entire, empty, abandoned Palestinian towns with demolition charges; why they’re using young Palestinian men as sacrificial hostages to go into booby-trapped areas or to bring-out civilians hiding in the ruins of hospitals and then shooting the hostage dead on the spot - and why those IDF boys and girls are so sure they’ll never answer for their crimes that they are filming themsleves doing all this (and much more), and posting it openly on non-anonymous social media…
I believe this is worth a watch -
And yes, DDN is unquestionably sensationalist and heavily biased, but I believe [there’s that word] most of their claims are true - as much as anything in this stage-managed, pervasively-edited world now can be. Let’s be honest here, quiet, considered rational objectivity is having precisely no fucking impact at-all…
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Me too. Ideologues tho’.
I was born in the 50’s and small-town Lincs was still there in the 60’s and 70’s TBH. At the time it was genuinely believed that Stalin’s successors (he’d not been dead for long) could be across the Rhine in 18 hours from a standing start.
I was going to say that punk wasn’t that bad. Then I remembered Sham 69. They were really, really awful.
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What is wrong with ‘We’re going down the pub’?
Seems a reasonable answer to most questions
Yeah, The Vibrators were far worse… 
I heard their visas have been revoked for their US tour now as well. Anyone taking odds on them having a number one by the end of July?
If they play it right, and don’t buckle under the immense political pressure / threats, they sure ought to have.
Bobby has always been a firebrand. I strongly suspect that they wouldn’t have got past the border even before this happened.
ISTR the last time they were in the US and some frat boy was whining that they should keep the politics out of music. He promptly copped both barrels.
I would agree but I don’t think that what they have dealt with so far would even rate when considering what they are going into. Can you imagine the state / legal / poltical pressure that they, their families and their associates will now be under ?
I really hope they just say fuck it and press on regardless.
Looks interesting. July 9th 10pm on Channel 4
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Funny enough passed his Doodle School Bus parked up outside Channel 4 Horseferry Road on the way home tonight. Should have taken a picture but didn’t.
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What a moment for these busking clash fans
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The Grauniad has morphed into the Daily Heil
They all have 
The reason I stopped buying that paper- in 2006!
(Or whenever it changed from a Broadsheet)