@uberuce
Ah now if you'd been a waitrose man, then perhaps we could have promoted you to the full-fat noose, rather than that scrawny semi..
CityCyclingEdinburgh Forum » Cycling News
Chris Hoy hits out at “stupid” cyclists
(131 posts)-
Posted 10 years ago #
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Does George Watsons even have a nursery? Many of the kids at nursery we use are children of Watsons teachers or have siblings at Watsons.
Pretty sure that nursery/P1 fees start out seeming quite reasonable (especially to parents used to paying nursery fees), and then increase each year...
Posted 10 years ago # -
The chap in the front wound down the window and told me I wasn't wearing hi-viz. That was all we had time to interact, since they were tearing on, and it was true: I was in my jetblack base layer.
He sounds like a brilliantly clever and astute person. If only there were more thinkers like him on the roads.
Posted 10 years ago # -
Yes watsons has a nursery. Probably what is called a private partnership provider which entitles parent to some money off the fees but that is just for nursery. As I tried to explain earlier, before the lynch mob, such a discount would make the nursery place cheaper than if the previous private nursery was not a PPP nursery ( or kids were too young to be eligible).
I have a colleague who hung out with him in their younger teens. He would sometimes light his farts for a laugh.
Maybe we can put this one to bed?
Posted 10 years ago # -
Hey bax. You stick it to da man. Powa to the people.
Posted 10 years ago # -
Maybe we can put this one to bed?
I've already got my hi-viz pyjamas on.
Posted 10 years ago # -
Haven't heard from Class War for ages.
Posted 10 years ago # -
you're not looking hard enough, insto
Posted 10 years ago # -
As intelligent and well-informed as ever.
Posted 10 years ago # -
Ah now class war did not like the spartacists league. But the latter had approx fifty members only (warning quoting wiki). Wiki does not say how many were actually in special branch.
Posted 10 years ago # -
I bought a copy once from a guy that used to flog it saturdays at the east end of princes street, near burger king.
Seemed to my younger eye to be fairly amateur stuff, although that feel might have been intentional.
Didn't entertain as much as the NME.
Posted 10 years ago # -
He sounds like a brilliantly clever and astute person. If only there were more thinkers like him on the roads.
I must admit I was terribly impressed by his guesswork; how he knew there was a black-clad cyclist there to shout at is a mystery to me.
Posted 10 years ago # -
Does anyone know that he is from such a background
He lived in the Wester Coates area as a child I believe.
I'm a rich landlord too, well ok, a reluctant one, needed a bigger house and couldn't sell flat during financial crisis (probably still couldn't sell it now), so for the princely sum of £100 a month (yep £100 loss p/m) I get to be a landlord. In an accounting sense we make a small profit (interest only taken as outgoing), but I can assure you £100 leaves my bank account every month never to be see again, only consolation is that we pay about £250 a month off the mortgage, so we kid ourselves that we're 'saving' £150 a month, we will get it back one day right?
Oh, I went to a private school too, hang me. We were loaded! Lived in a council house in what was regarded as the worst area in Livingston, never went on a holiday or owned a car, but my parents thought the sacrifice was worth it. It was, I would never have got to where I am now if I had stayed on at Deans high school. In fact I remember at the end of second year my form teacher telling my parents I could look forward to a job at NEC as it was expanding. That was enough for my parents to decide that cars and holidays were worth giving up.
Posted 10 years ago # -
Did I miss the bit where Helen Blackman made an important point directed at anything Chris Hoy had said? She seems to use him as the justification for her blog post but quickly put him aside to make to make some general and well worn points about drivers.
If you want to have a go at what Hoy is quoted as saying, best to pick on the idea that respect needs to be earned. Bez has dealt with this already.
In his defence, it's such a reflexive view that we shouldn't really be surprised at anyone saying it. We should be maybe a little surprised that someone who allegedly sees life through the prism of the privilege bestowed by private school should feel that respect needs to be earned. Surely the correct caricature is that the privately educated feel entitled to everyone else's respect? You just can't rely on anyone to conform to their allotted stereotype.
Posted 10 years ago # -
Just chipping in to say how much I've enjoyed this thread. Some were worried it was a bit angry but no, I though it very grown-up, with people expressing quite differing outlooks without too much easy ridicule or closing down of their contributions. Well done to you all!
For my part, like you all, I don't want my kids or theirs to become part of the UK's worst-in-Europe infant mortality numbers, and so, like many of you, I'd love to own a flat or three and would scrimp and save to give my children an unfair / not-of-their-making private school advantage over poorer kids. You bet, that's the mad sick (but in a bad way) UK we live in.
But I agree with Bax's sentiment that I'll be exacerbating the problem and that we should be doing better, somehow. Maybe a Yes in Sept will help, or not. Maybe I need to get on and move to Finland - I can't argue with the endless studies telling me the Finns are happier, wealthier, way less unequal, healthier, don't need to have a quarter of their kids in private school, and (I imagine, unverified) have a surprisingly affordable state retirement provision rather than all scrambling to buy private flats for rental income.
Re Hoy, yes, posh school, now head of the Air Cadets, got married at St Giles. But Tony Benn was pretty posh too. It's all about the comments and Helen Blackman's piece covered that very well, as did the Bez one mentioned above.
Posted 10 years ago # -
I don't think this 'hang all landlords from lamp-posts' idea has been fully thought through.
Surely the dangling bodies would obscure the signs attached to the posts.
How would we know when we had to dismount?
Posted 10 years ago # -
Yeah. Landlords. Vending intoxicants in open vessels to be consumed on the premises by people of whom some are often clearly already inebriated, in clear breach of the Licensing Act.
Posted 10 years ago # -
"endless studies telling me the Finns are happier, wealthier, way less unequal, healthier, don't need to have a quarter of their kids in private school, and (I imagine, unverified) have a surprisingly affordable state retirement provision"
I am glad you qualified your last statement as no country has cracked the problem of good pension provision allied to longevity.
The National Pension in Finland provides a flat-rate benefit of up to 20% of average wages - so, not that different from here - with minimum guaranteed income that is reduced by the amount of the earnings-related pension (i.e. if you have a private pension). The Finnish Government is currently persuading people to retire later due to affordability issues.
All sounds remarkably familiar to anyone with knowledge of the UK system?
Having said that, perhaps they can afford it as their suicide rate is 50% higher than the UK.
Which brings us neatly back to the question - If they are so happy, why are so many of them offing themselves??
Posted 10 years ago # -
If they are so happy, why are so many of them offing themselves?
black mørketid takes a heavy grip on their souls
Posted 10 years ago # -
When class war used to take his pot shots at landlords he had come through rachman era as a wee boy.. And early seventies slum clearances. Not sure about the son of a butler stuff...
However, bax resuscitating the landlord putsch has touched a nerve. Some people stuck as landlords as flat not selling for what they bought it for, others became landlords I guess following advice from financial advisers - several of my colleagues appear to own properties they can't sell and therefore still need a job whilst approaching retirement, if they wish to maintain their lifestyles. Some people might say this is punishment enough for taking a petit bourgeois capitalist gamble beyond the one where you take out a mortgage.
Where bax's anarchist lamppost analogy gets derailed is that the subtlety of his point is lost with the bodies strung up in the street. I could be wrong but the subtler point is that hoy is seeking responsible cycling where people have earned his respect? and there are responsible landlords who repair flats promptly etc. However, neither deserves respect. (Nor of course disrespect unless you are Mr Class War) The responsible landlord is what should be expected. Cycling responsibly should be the norm. You have to be responsible to stay safe the older you get and the more aware of the risks you become. Earning respect is therefore not in the picture. Then becomes muddy because the risks on the roads are caused by drivers, who suffer little consequence when they drive irresponsibly.
Not sure I have put this clearly enough, also apologies if I have interpreted this wrongly. i also like the introduction of black, the anarchist colour into the thread.
Those old enough tell me sniffin glue was a better fanzine than class war.
Did. Google cashmere lentils and socialists but failed to get my favourite quote from worker's hammer (note the producers of workers hammer the spartacists league had fifty members, class war no members? Special branch numbers unconfirmed) but both organs were often engaged in criticism of finer points of Trotskyist ideology or far left groups tactics. Proving the SWP was not good etc. SWP with maybe thousand members seen as the enemy. Someone in GCHQ probably had the job of ensuring they were all still taking potshots at each other and hadn't moved from harmless to mostly harmless. My favourite SWP story being the urbane politics prof Mike G putting his copies of socialist worker in the bin and donating the money from his salary as he could not face the ignominy of standing outside the shipyard being ignored by the workers starting shift at 7am.
Ah yes and in Finland according to R4 the most commonly prescribed medication. Is an anti psychotic?
Posted 10 years ago # -
I'd always thought that the UK had a relatively high rate of home ownership compared to other countries in Europe. However this does not appear to be the case:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_home_ownership_ratethough Finland is only slightly higher.
I am not sure what proportions the private rental sectors represent across Europe, but in the UK it seems to be 10% (and probably less in Scotland because England is 12%?).
Posted 10 years ago # -
Chris is a nice bloke who spent every living moment for over a decade training his ass off and not having to think about much else if he could help it. He's only been out for a year or so. Let him live a life for a few years and I imagine that when his kids get a bit older, he'll start to take more notice of the issues. Was boardman a national road safety treasure the year after he left pro?
Posted 10 years ago # -
The responsible landlord is what should be expected. Cycling responsibly should be the norm.
Even the "responsible" landlord sooner or later arrives at the comfortable idea that they are doing their tenants a big favour.
Many motorists adopt a similar attitude via "road tax" psychology vis-a-vis sharing the road.
Tenuous, yes - but there's life in the old thread yet
Posted 10 years ago # -
Bax, rank the following if you can be bothered this fine May Day bank holiday in order of things you don't like
Landlords
SWP
workers hammer/spartacists league
RCPI put RCP at top as I found them particularly annoying. Some of the individuals I thought were quite funny but their stance of heckling the demo, what the one you are on? we are not on the demo, we are observing the demo but not of the demo etc etc
Posted 10 years ago # -
"You have to be responsible to stay safe the older you get"
?
Because (perhaps) you can't accelerate out of trouble??
Drivers tolerate 'errors' from young cyclists???
Posted 10 years ago # -
@ Amir. The PRS in Edinburgh is considerably higher than the national average at 24%.
Some of that is probably related to the student population, as well as the 'buy to let' market being promoted prior to the economic downturn.
CEC promotes the PRS as a key element in it's homelessness prevention strategy. With around 3,800 homeless presentation per annum the social rented sector alone cannot currently cope.
Although the longer term solution to that is, of course, to build more affordable social housing.
Posted 10 years ago # -
@chdot, what you say seems reasonable, what I meant was I took risks when I was younger because I thought I was immortal. But now I have kids, mortgage. Better half. I watch the road as carefully as I can, I shoulder check reasonably regularly, I filter less, i do not take that right up meggetgate unless the traffic is stationary, as it sometimes is. I jump fewer red lights, I signal a fair bit. Not trying to earn respect, just a boring old fart.
Posted 10 years ago # -
Bax, rank the following if you can be bothered this fine May Day bank holiday in order of things you don't like
I just can't bring myself to denounce our comrades in the struggle, gembo
Jacques de Molay, tu es vengé !
Posted 10 years ago # -
Seeing as this is now the 'landlord thread'...
Landlording (deliberate or accidental) is a business. As in other businesses some are more scrupulous/law abiding/etc. than others.
In Edinburgh in the 70s and 80s (and probably later) many students found that their landlord was Polish.
After the Second World War quite a few Poles who who had been with the allied forces decided to settle in Scotland. In Fife many got council houses. In Edinburgh few (probably none) did.
ThisisEdinburgh.
The UK housing market (it pretty much is a market) is a mess. In general terms there are not enough dwelling units. This is partly due to an increasing population, planning laws, NIMBYism and the expectation that people can have bigger houses and less 'overcrowding' - that has partly been reduced by smaller families, but the number of units required has increased due to more people living alone.
There has also been a massive increase in student numbers. Many prefer to live away from home and have to be 'accommodated' - particularly obvious in Edinburgh - which puts pressure on available 'building land'.
I suspect that most people on here have mortgages. So in one sense they are the 'tenants' of banks and building societies. As long as they keep paying the 'rent' (mortgage) their tenure is pretty secure. Any change in monthly payments is likely to be a result of interest rate changes (coming soon - probably). Social housing tenants are generally fairly secure, but there is less of it than in 'the past' and not much real (political) desire to build a lot more. So there is the 'private sector' 'filling'/'exploiting' the gap.
Posted 10 years ago # -
"what I meant was I took risks when I was younger because I thought I was immortal"
Been there...
Posted 10 years ago #
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