Al

‘Fear is a reaction. Courage is a decision.’ Churchill (now doing loops in his grave).

[Al @AllwasClear]

‘One man accused of damaging an inflatable boat is locked up for months, while five people suspected of plotting terrorism against a military base are back at home within a day and a half.’

https://t.co/wPDeARBwUu via @LD_Sceptics

[Al @AllwasClear]

@benonwine All mouth

[Al @AllwasClear]

@andyburnham Bet you don’t.

[Al @AllwasClear]

Christ on a bike!

BBC Slammed Over Claim That Bare Fingernails Are "Racist and Classist" https://t.co/iDGIuRgMaX via @LD_Sceptics

[Al @AllwasClear]

Met Office Admit Kew Is A Class 5 Junk Site https://t.co/WfxtCihFVI

[J.K. Rowling @jk_rowling]

As another man who once worked with me declares himself saddened by my beliefs on gender and sex, I thought it might be useful to compile a list for handy reference. Which of the following do you imagine makes actors and directors who aren’t involved with the HBO reboot of Harry Potter so miserable?

Is it my belief that women and girls should have their own public changing rooms and bathrooms?

That women should retain female-only rape crisis centres?

That men don’t belong in women’s sport?

That female prisoners shouldn’t be incarcerated with violent men and male sex offenders?

That women should remain a protected class in law, because they have sex-specific needs and issues?

That language should reflect reality rather than ideological jargon, especially in a medical context?

That women shouldn’t be harassed, persecuted or fired for refusing to pretend humans can change sex?

That women should not be threatened with violence and rape when they assert their rights?

That freedom of speech and belief are essential to a pluralistic democratic society?

That troubled minors, especially those who are gay, autistic and trauma-experienced, should be given mental health support instead of irreversible surgeries and drug treatments on non-existent evidence of benefit?

That gay people shouldn’t be pressured to include the opposite sex in their dating pools, nor should they be smeared as ‘genital fetishists’ when they don’t?

That cross-dressing heterosexual male fetishists aren’t actually oppressed, but having the time of their lives piggybacking off gender identity ideology?

That said ideology, and the privileged, blinkered fools pushing it because they suffer zero consequences themselves, have done more damage to the political left’s credibility than Trump and Farage could have achieved in a century?

Let me have your thoughts.

[Al @AllwasClear]

Lies, lies and the damm ONS

ONS Caught Peddling Fake Heatwave Deaths Scare https://t.co/0KQOka53On via @LD_Sceptics

[Al @AllwasClear]

Most thought-provoking article I’ve read in a day or 2.

‘I Give Up (And You Might as Well Too). Britain Has Made Striving Pointless’

https://t.co/kxgCecVKa8 via @LD_Sceptics

[Al @AllwasClear]

@JamesMelville Morning James. That word ‘could’ doing a lot of work there. No doubt joined by its fellow prevaricators ‘might’ and ‘may’ in the main body of the writing. Now, I’m off for a 3 egg scramble on toast (toast used mostly as a vehicle for extra butter!)

[Al @AllwasClear]

@jk_rowling I don’t know how you carry on, but I am glad you do. Please know that we see the squeaky wheels. Thank you.

[Al @AllwasClear]

@andyburnham And No 10 Southerners just sit back and enjoy the current totalitarianism…?

[Bernie @Artemisfornow]

Dear Adam,

I have taken time to think about your apology. Mostly because, having made a mistake publicly before, I was keen to accept yours. It hurts when people don’t understand that you are sorry for messing up. I get that, probably more than most.

But here’s the thing… I’m not sure you understand what you did wrong. And so you don’t really understand what you are apologising for or why. With that in mind, I want to help you.

I didn’t know Ann, except as a powerhouse in politics and that so many people have spoken of her friendship and great loyalty. How lovely, I wish I had known her.

I am utterly disinterested in her sexual prowess or the state of her virginity. But I would have enjoyed hearing you speak of her great accomplishments. Not as a woman, but simply as a human being.

Here’s a list.

She served in the House of Commons for 23 years and won five general elections.

She served as a government minister in Social Security, Employment and the Home Office, where she was Minister of State for Prisons.

She rose to become Shadow Health Secretary and then Shadow Home Secretary.

She was appointed to the Privy Council.

After leaving Westminster, she built an entirely new career as an author, broadcaster, documentary-maker, stage performer and television personality.

Then, at the age of 71, she returned to elected politics and became a Member of the European Parliament.

She was a longstanding advocate for Britain leaving the European Union and, when the political establishment failed to deliver the referendum result, she left the Conservative Party after more than 50 years and stood for the Brexit Party.

She was elected as an MEP and took the argument for British independence directly into the European Parliament.

She was also an unapologetic defender of free speech. She continued to speak openly on difficult and unfashionable subjects when others chose silence, it was easier to do that, she accepted the criticism and hostility that came with it rather than surrendering her convictions.

Her Catholic faith was central to her life. She converted to Catholicism, met Pope John Paul II in Rome and was later made a Dame of the Order of St Gregory the Great by Pope Benedict XVI for her service to politics and public life.

She remained a powerful public voice well into her late seventies, defending her beliefs despite decades of ridicule and hostility.

That is an extraordinary life of public service, courage and reinvention.

Yet, when asked to speak about her after her sudden and violent death, you chose to tell the country that she was a “spinster”, an “old maid” and a virgin. You discussed a failed relationship and suggested that afterwards she simply dedicated herself to other activities.

Do you understand the reduction involved in that?

You took the life of a highly accomplished woman and assessed it according to whether she had married, whether she had sex and whether a man had wanted her.

That is what was wrong. That is what you should have known.

It wasn’t simply that your words were poorly chosen or badly timed. It was the instinct to view a woman’s entire life through her relationship with men, even when her achievements should have rendered that completely irrelevant.

Nobody discussing the death of an accomplished male politician would think it necessary to tell viewers whether he was a virgin, speculate about his sex life or describe him as an ageing bachelor whose romance had failed.

I don’t want you cancelled. I don’t believe that people should be denied forgiveness when they make mistakes.

But a meaningful apology has to identify the actual wrong.

Ann was murdered after a lifetime of public service. At the moment her achievements should have been remembered, you diminished her to an unmarried woman who apparently hadn’t had sex.

She deserved better than that. And I’m still not sure you get it. But every woman who watched you speak of her and then read your apology does.

Bernie.

[Al @AllwasClear]

Now and then I dip into X, then I remember why I my visits are few and far between. So polarised, so sweary, so intolerant, so hate-filled. I’m off, happy in ignorance of all the ranting.

[Al @AllwasClear]

@AskBritain_ The clashing egos on the right are giving the left their wins.

It seems a simple sum. Fractured right = more left.

Something has to change, and fast, but I don’t think these 2 have the humility to do it.

[Sama Hoole @SamaHoole]

Doris is a four-year-old Texel ewe on a fell in the Lake District.

Doris is, according to several recent opinion pieces, destroying the planet.

Let's check in on Doris.

6:30am - Doris began grazing. The fell she is grazing is semi-natural upland grassland. It has existed in this condition for approximately eight hundred years because sheep have been grazing it continuously for approximately eight hundred years. Without Doris, the coarse grasses outcompete the finer ones. The wildflowers disappear. The skylarks that nest at ground level lose the open sward they need and abandon the site. Doris does not know what a skylark is. She has found some good grass near the wall and that is the full extent of her agenda.

7:45am - Doris walked into the bog. This was not the plan. There was no plan. Doris extracted herself, turned around, and regarded the bog with the expression of an animal that has decided the bog started it.

9:00am - Doris found a gap in the wall and went through it. She was now in Brian's field. Brian's field is, by any measurable standard, identical to Doris's field. Doris is aware of this and does not consider it relevant.

10:30am - Doris was returned to her field. The farmer repaired the gap. Doris watched the repair with the focused attention of an animal taking measurements.

11:15am - Doris rolled into a dip in the fell and got cast. This means she ended up on her back and could not right herself because the weight of her fleece shifted her centre of gravity past the point of recovery. She lay there in the dip looking at the sky with the composure of an animal that has decided the sky is quite interesting actually.

11:40am - The farmer found her, righted her. Doris walked away at speed. No acknowledgement. Complete dignity. As though the last twenty-five minutes had happened to a different sheep.

1:00pm - Doris grazed the area around the base of the dry-stone wall. The grazing keeps the vegetation short enough that the wall's base stays dry and frost doesn't work into the joints and expand. The wall is two hundred and sixty years old. It will outlast everything currently being written about livestock farming if the vegetation around it is managed. It is being managed by Doris eating grass. Doris does not know she is doing conservation work. Doris has found something particularly good near the fourth stone from the bottom.

3:00pm - Doris produced manure. The manure will feed the soil microbiome. The soil microbiome will grow the grass. The grass will grow back where Doris has grazed it. The grazed areas will remain open enough for the tormentil and harebells to survive. The tormentil and harebells are why people drive three hours from Manchester to walk on this fell.

This system has no external inputs. It has been running since Texel sheep were brought to these fells from the Netherlands in 1970 and discovered the gaps in the walls shortly afterward.

5:00pm - Doris lay down. The fell was quiet. The skylarks were still up. The wildflowers were still in the turf.

5:47pm - Doris found a new gap. She was in Brian's field again.

Brian has started keeping a log.

[Al @AllwasClear]

Glad I didn’t miss this one. What a girl, well said!

[Summer D @Daisysummer05]

Watch as thus British show host unleashes 2 minutes straight on her own government!

It's beautiful, elect her as PM... STAT!!!

This is way Americans are FED up with Demoncrats!

[Al @AllwasClear]

@Matt_Pinner 100%. Having this conversation with my teens at the moment. Learn a trade and keep it in your back pocket - or do the trade, get good and keep a wedge of cash in your back pocket. Why bother with uni? Everyone has a degree these days = totally diluted use.

[Al @AllwasClear]

@JeremyVineOn5 I imagine, as ever, that London skews the picture for the rest of us bumpkins.

[Al @AllwasClear]

@JeremyVineOn5 I think that everyone living here should pass the test to drive on our roads and therefore to hold a UK drivers licence. Have heard fantastic stories of ppl driving themselves to tests, failing said test and just hopping back in their cars to drive away and carry on.

[Al @AllwasClear]

Oh dear. I’m afraid I’m not a hopeful Green, so this article made me giggle and weep in equal measure. #donotdespair

Hope Not – Hate! https://t.co/dh2RcD3h3x via @LD_Sceptics