OT: RIP Margaret Thatcher [LOCKED: Short message inside]
Apologies to those offended by previous entry. Out of respect, it has been removed. Mea Culpa.
Mod edit: Locked because we can't have nice things. Also, I'd appreciate reading a quick message: Lately I have been locking or removing threads that go off the religion and politics rules and leaving it at that, because of the events tonight I'm doing that today also. However, from now on, political/religious comments in unpublished or locked threads will still result in Bolivia. If an OP is political that will be dealt with more harshly than comments as soon as one of the mods gets to it. Best case scenario: this might mean we can move closer to having nice things. At the very least standards will become more uniform.
I understand that many people have strong feelings either way about Margaret Thatcher, and I missed the original OP, but moving forward any blatant crossing of the politics/religion line will be dealt with and we're not going to play the "but (s)he started it" game. JGB.
RIP. So will Webber be at the funeral or not?
Classy
Technically, there's no grave yet
Best wishes and prayers for her family as they cope with their loss.
She was still alive?
really commendable of you to not "openly celebrate".....communist
No one calls someone a communist without irony any more, do they? If you weren't joking at all, I'd like to subscribe to your newsletter to see what else is going on in that noggin.
I don't like Thatcher a bit. I'm also just saying that I also don't agree with the sentiment that everyone who dies is automatically afforded posthumous respect.
It doesn't really do any good to celebrate her death, anyway. Depending on your point of view, it may have done some good if she'd died in office, but I can't see how it matters much one way or another now.
Also - mods: I'd suggest that, if you're going to allow threads like this (news re: political figures) to be posted as announcements, you immediately lock the comments. These are always, always going to become political.
I hate people who can make a decision, stand firmly against what was then a significant threat to the entire world, understood that deciveness is better than fence-straddling, and I really don't like her a bit either because she was a woman.
I also can't wait to see what others think about me at the time of my passing.
i'm surprised they haven't turned off your wifi access at zucotti park yet.
Didn't realize there was this much hate out there about a foreign head of state from a country who is supposed to be one of our allies. Surprising.
Southpaws associate her with Reagan, their satan.
HAHAHA
I like the edit.
really? trolling cause i thought it was funny and clever that he changed dems to southpaws to avoid the "NO POLITICS" ban.
Michigan men don't dance on graves. For those who don't know Thatcher, like Reagan, in her later years suffered from dementia, which I would not wish on my worst enemy. Meryl Streep brilliantly played an aging Thatcher in "The Iron Lady". Don't know how accurate it was but it was a moving performance about an icon of her times. May she rest in peace.
Michigan men don't dance on graves. For those who don't know Thatcher, like Reagan, in her later years suffered from dementia, which I would not wish on my worst enemy. Meryl Streep brilliantly played an aging Thatcher in "The Iron Lady". Don't know how accurate it was but it was a moving performance about an icon of her times. May she rest in peace.
RIP. Now, if you all don't mind me asking, I was just in Kindergarten when she resigned, so can someone explain to me why so many here seem to dislike her enough to the point of disrespecting her and her legacy even at the announcement of her passing? I feel almost anyone is deserving of atleast a little respect when they pass, most especially a former world leader, so I assume her transgressions were decidedly heinous. Either that, or some of you are just complete pricks. Either way, please and honestly enlighten me.
Probably because there are some pro-union people on the board and she was the leader in thee movement to reduce union control in the UK which proceeded the same move in the US.
I'm attempting this in as non-political a fashion as I can:
She, more than even Reagan, was the first successful* politician to articulate the core ideas of the modern right. Probably best shown in her famous quote " And, you know, there is no such thing as society. There are individual men and women, and there are families."
This idea is anathema to the belief in social provision that the democratic (small d) welfare state was built upon in the years after WWII, that it was the government's role to protect society against the excesses of capitalism. By denying the social, she denied the legitimacy of government action to protect it.
*There's an argument about Barry Goldwater as initiating the politics that led to the New Right , but defining "successful" in terms of an election like 1964 is really tenuous, particularly when it created the conditions for passage of LBJ's war on poverty/medicare/medicaid, because Goldwater's campaign led to a lot of Republican Congressmen and Senators getting wiped out too.
I was wondering how the hell to summarzie Thatcher in a way that would allow me to leave the house in the next hour. This pretty much nailed it - and it really doesn't include any editorializing at all. That quote accurately sums up her philosophy, whether one agrees with it or not.
Among other things, Thatcher deregulated the British economy, made massive cuts on domestic social spending, and crushed organized labor in the UK. She was their Reagan.
It goes without saying too, but all of that made her a lot of enemies. Like a lot. If people think that Bush/Obama have had their haters, well they've got nothing on Thatcher.
People in the North especially hate her:
anyone, but there are two reasons I see folk in my personal life pile hate upon her.
1) As others have mentioned she was basically Britain's equivalent to Reagan; a very decisive figure. A lot of people hold her up as an ideal, a lot of people look upon her as the mother of almost all today's economic problems in the United Kingdom.
2) (as a soccer supporter I'll try not to let my colors show through) The Hillsborough Disaster. (great read on it by the BBC) Basically there was a stadium disaster at an English soccer match. Many people, 96, ended up dead. The police investigated and layed blame on the drunk and unrurly fans. High ups in the police and Thatcher herself let the matter end there and refused to ever look more into what happened. For over 20 years people were upset with this and didn't believe the reports. Recently evidence has come to light that the fault of the disaster really lay at the fault of the police and that there was a MASSIVE police cover up, smear campaign, and propaganda push. A lot of people put blame on Thatcher for being complacent with the incident and not pushing to find out what really happened--i.e. disrespecting the 96 people who died and whose families were smeared by police and media. This is why a select group of English soccer fans hate her and don't want you to buy the fucking Sun.
Probably not possible without getting too political for the board. Suffice it to say, she was an incredibly controversial figure when she was in power and remained so afterward, chiefly because of her economic policies. In the UK, there is no middle ground with regards to Margaret Thatcher, you either love her or you despise her, based on your personal politics. Recent British history is not my specialty, but I know there's quite a lot of literature out there about Thatcher and Thatcherism.
I miss all the good, inappropriate comments around here!
There will be time to complain about Thatcher and her legacy; for now, the death of a person should not be celebrated.
She also started a pointless war abroad in order to distract attention from her domestic agenda and to provide a shield from criticism.. Like our last three Republican presidents (Ronnie in Grenada, GB in Panama, and W most notably in Iraq).
Well at least you'll be able to tour the Falklands since they'll only be a short flight from Bolivia.
Shock and Awe. She implemented some seriously controversal political moves during her time. Although nowadays when I think of her, all I can hear is Austin Powers screaming 'Margaret Thatcher naked on a cold day!'
"Win one for Maggie" - Margaret Thatcher speaking of Michigan basketball just before she died