Society's ChildS


Flashlight

The myth of 'stupid' Brexit voter undone by study that discovers affluent and educated 'Comfortable Leavers' actually won the day

Damian Wilson
RT
Tue, 20 Apr 2021 17:53 UTC
brexit
© Reuters
A new study has blown the ill-founded Remainer myth of all Brexit voters being stupid out of the water, finding well-off 'Comfortable Leavers' made up nearly half of those who voted to leave the EU.

The most persistently irritating thing about being on the winning side of the Brexit vote is that the losers have stubbornly pushed the insultingly and incorrect narrative that anyone who voted to leave the European Union was old, thick, racist and living in a corner of the UK struck low by socio-economic deprivation.

And as is the way with such a narrative, it needn't be right but if you say it often enough and loud enough, it slowly becomes the accepted truth.

However, someone has finally done the research and it paints a very different picture of those who voted leave and surprise, surprise, a huge proportion of these people are not the dregs of humanity - or even the patronisingly dubbed 'Left Behinds' - they're actually reasonably well-off or affluent Eurosceptics who make up nearly a quarter (23%) of the entire UK electorate and from this point in time onwards will be forever known as the 'Comfortable Leavers'.
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Newspaper

RSF decries 'dramatic deterioration' in press freedom since start of pandemic


France 24
Wed, 21 Apr 2021 17:27 UTC
Algerian journalist Khaled Drareni prisoner
© Stéphane de Sakutin, AFP/FilePeople stand in front of a tarp in Paris depicting Algerian journalist Khaled Drareni who was sentenced to prison for his coverage of the mass protest movement that toppled Algeria's longtime president.
There's been a "dramatic deterioration" of press freedom since the pandemic tore across the world, Reporters Without Borders (RSF) said in its annual report published Tuesday.

The group's new World Press Freedom Index, which evaluated the press situations in 180 countries, painted a stark picture and concluded that 73 percent of the world's nations have serious issues with media freedoms.

Comment: To its credit, Reporters Without Borders (RSF) has (mostly) lived up to its name, not only defending Drareni and many other journalists, but also the even more persecuted Julian Assange, who has been abandoned by most organization purporting to support press freedom. It is however, a mixed bag, as RSF has also endorsed other groups unworthy of its stated principles. For some reason, they are supporters of the psyop White Helmets and of course, anything anti-Russia.

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NPC

Best of the Web: To mark 'victory' in Floyd 'murder' trial, Black mob in NYC demands 'abolition of police', tells White diners to "F-off outta New York"


RT
Wed, 21 Apr 2021 17:41 UTC

Comment: Is the mob appeased? No! Its race war is only getting started...


chauvin verdict
© REUTERS/Caitlin Ochs
Crowds of New York activists took to the streets to celebrate ex-Minneapolis cop Derek Chauvin's murder conviction, but many marchers insisted the verdict didn't go far enough, demanding the outright abolition of law enforcement.

Protesters gathered outside the Barclays Center area in Brooklyn on Tuesday night, hours after Chauvin was found guilty on three counts linked to the death of suspect George Floyd in custody last May, who perished after spending more than nine minutes on the ground pinned under the former officer's knee.

According to Brooklyn-based photojournalist Issa Khari, the protesters broke off into two groups, one of which remained at the arena to demonstrate, while the other marched down Flatbush Avenue, over the Manhattan Bridge and beyond into New York. Khari described the two factions as "reformists" and "abolitionists," respectively, with the latter referring to activists pushing for more radical change to the criminal justice system and the complete elimination of police departments as they currently exist in the US.

Comment: Get out of the cities. Get out while you still can.

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Snakes in Suits

Rules for thee, but not for me: Michigan's lockdown-championing Gov. Whitmer traveled to Florida after warning residents to avoid spring break trips


RT
Tue, 20 Apr 2021 17:34 UTC
whitmer
© Reuters / Rebecca Cook
Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer visited Florida last month, according to local media, in time to warn constituents against enjoying the sun in the Covid rulebreaker's paradise. Her staff passed it off as a family visit.

Florida repealed its coronavirus dictates late last year, while Michigan's remain in full force. The mask-loving state leader continues to (publicly) warn those in her own state against travel, but her true loyalties are less border-bound than it seems. It was also revealed that at least two of Whitmer's senior advisers left Michigan for "spring break," apparently shrugging off their boss' travel dictates while insisting no such regulations existed.

Whitmer dismissed one reporter's question about whether there were "two sets of rules in play," one for the rich and powerful and one for "average" Michiganders. The governor flatly denied there had ever been "travel restrictions in Michigan," despite her state having boasted some of the strictest rules in the country. "What directors do on their personal time is their business, so long as they are safe," she argued.
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NPC

Nonsense and Insensibility: Trying to rewrite Jane Austen for 'links' to slavery shows the idiocy of woke historical revisionism

Charlie Stone
RT
Tue, 20 Apr 2021 17:27 UTC
pride and prejudice
© Focus Features, Universal Pictures
The English novelist's tea drinking is being subjected to "historical interrogation" over its slavery links and "Regency-era colonialism" in the wake of Black Lives Matter protests. Why? Who cares?

What good does it do anyway, all this picking away at the past?

'Pride and Prejudice' author Jane Austen and her characters often drank tea and plopped sugar into their cups. They also wore cotton. All products linked to the slave trade. Yup, that's true.

So what?
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Handcuffs

Alleged bigot busted after spewing anti-Asian threats at undercover NYPD cop - UPDATE: Suspect released without bail

Joe Marino and Craig McCarthy
New York Post
Fri, 09 Apr 2021 18:07 UTC
Juvian Rodriguez arrest racism asian cop
© New York City Police DepartmentAn alleged anti-Asian bigot picked the wrong "victim" to spew hate speech at in Midtown Friday -- an undercover NYPD cop.
An alleged anti-Asian bigot picked the wrong "victim" to spew hate speech at in Midtown Friday — an undercover NYPD cop.

The cop was patrolling at 33rd Street and 7th Avenue at around 4:30 p.m. when Juvian Rodriguez, 35, allegedly approached, The Post has learned.

Not knowing he was dealing with one of New York's finest, Rodriguez began snarling, "Go back to China before you end up in a graveyard!"

"I'm gonna slap the holy piss out of you and stab you in the face," Rodriguez allegedly continued.

Comment: UPDATE 18/04/2021: The New York Post reports:
The man charged with trying to shove an Asian undercover cop onto Queens subway tracks was cut loose without bail Sunday — as the judge claimed, "My hands are tied."

Suspect Ricardo Hernandez, 32 — who faces three hate-crime charges in the attack on the unnamed cop on a Long Island City train platform around 5:30 p.m. Saturday — has at least 12 prior arrests under his belt.

At Hernandez's arraignment over the attempted push onto the tracks, Queens Supreme Court Justice Louis Nock said the state's bail-reform measures barred him from holding Hernandez in jail.

"My hands are tied because under the new bail rules, I have absolutely no authority or power to set bail on this defendant for this alleged offense," the judge said.

Ricardo Hernandez at Queens Court on Sunday.Ellis Kaplan

Under the new measures passed last year, attacks that cause no injury are exempt from bail in New York.

The judge also agreed with Hernandez's lawyer to dismiss a warrant against the suspect involving a previous open-container summons. The suspect had had a can of Coors Light beer.

A police source said Hernandez was previously arrested for possession of a controlled substance in 2019 and turnstile jumping in 2016 and 2017 and has nine other sealed arrests on his record.

Meanwhile, his alleged cop assault came after another previous attack this month on an Asian undercover officer — in which the suspect also was almost immediately freed.


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Ambulance

Train accident north of Cairo has killed at least 11 people - Egypt's 2nd deadly rail accident in a month


The Guardian
Sun, 18 Apr 2021 11:58 UTC
Egypt's second deadly rail accident in a month
Egypt's second deadly rail accident in a month
A passenger train on the way to Mansoura derailed on Sunday, also injuring at least 98 people

A passenger train derailed north of Cairo, killing at least 11 people, Egyptian authorities have said, in the latest in a string of rail accidents to hit the country in recent years.

Four train wagons ran off the railway track by the city of Banha in Qalyubia province, just outside Cairo, the railway authority said in a statement on Sunday. Videos on social media showed wagons overturned and passengers escaping to safety along the railway.

The train was travelling to the Nile delta city of Mansoura from the Egyptian capital.


Comment: Egypt train crash: At least 32 people dead as two carriages collide head-on

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Oscar

Ex-Hollywood Foreign Press president called BLM a 'racist hate movement', UPDATE: He's cancelled

Olafimihan Oshin
The Hill
Tue, 20 Apr 2021 11:28 UTC
Phil Berk
The former president of the Hollywood Foreign Press Association sent an email calling Black Lives Matter a racist movement, according to a report from the Los Angeles Times on Tuesday.

The former president of the association that hands out the Golden Globes awards, Phil Berk, also described Patrisse Cullors, a co-founder of the Black Lives Matter movement, as a "self-proclaimed 'trained Marxist" in the email, which the Times reported was sent to the press association's members, staff and its general counsel and chief operating officer, Gregory Goeckner.

Berk, who had served eight terms as president of the organization, also shared an article titled "BLM Goes Hollywood'' in the email. Berk did not cite the source for the story, but it came from conservative commentator David Horowitz's Freedom Center website, FrontPage Mag, according to the Times.

Comment: He's right, though.

UPDATE: He's cancelled. From The Hollywood Reporter:
"Effective immediately, Phil Berk is no longer a member of the Hollywood Foreign Press Association," the HFPA's board said in a statement released Tuesday afternoon.

Berk, an 88-year-old from South Africa, received considerable backlash to his Sunday email from fellow members, according to the Los Angeles Times, which received a copy of the email chain. One member labeled Berk's email "racist," another "vile" and a third called him "a thundering disgrace," while the HFPA's COO notified Berk that it was "not appropriate" behavior. Berk replied, "I only intended to illustrate the hypocricy [sic] that engulfs us I forwarded it as a point of information I had no hidden agenda I now regret having sent it."

...

On Tuesday, both NBC, which broadcasts the Golden Globe Awards, and MRC, which owns the company that produces it, Dick Clark Productions, issued statements demanding Berk's expulsion from the group.

"NBC strongly condemns Phil Berk's actions and is calling for his immediate expulsion," the network said in a statement. "While we continue to await the details of HFPA's upcoming plan for reform, swift action on this front is an essential element for NBC to move forward with the HFPA and the Golden Globes.


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Magic Wand

Richard Dawkins loses 'humanist of the year' title over trans comments

Alison Flood
The Guardian
Tue, 20 Apr 2021 13:56 UTC
richard dawkins
© Graeme Robertson/The GuardianRichard Dawkins … ‘Attempts at clarification inadequate,’ says AHA.
The American Humanist Association has withdrawn its humanist of the year award from Richard Dawkins, 25 years after he received the honour, criticising the academic and author for "demean[ing] marginalised groups" using "the guise of scientific discourse".

The AHA honoured Dawkins, whose books include The Selfish Gene and The God Delusion, in 1996 for his "significant contributions" in communicating scientific concepts to the public. On Monday, it announced that it was withdrawing the award, referring to a tweet sent by Dawkins earlier this month, in which he compared trans people to Rachel Dolezal, the civil rights activist who posed as a black woman for years.

"In 2015, Rachel Dolezal, a white chapter president of NAACP, was vilified for identifying as Black," wrote Dawkins on Twitter. "Some men choose to identify as women, and some women choose to identify as men. You will be vilified if you deny that they literally are what they identify as. Discuss."

Comment: Scientific materialism eating its own...

See also:

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Life Preserver

BMJ: 2020 was less deadly than every year before 2009

Will Jones
Lockdown Sceptics
Mon, 19 Apr 2021 00:01 UTC
deadly years graph
Age standardised mortality rates per 100,000 in England and Wales, 1942-2020
Leading medical journal the BMJ published a peer-reviewed article last week by John Appleby, Director of Research at the Nuffield Trust, that draws on ONS data to look at the 2020 England and Wales death toll in a historical context.

In terms of absolute number of deaths, 2020 was the worst year since 1838 except for the Spanish Flu year of 1918 (note that overseas deaths including war casualties are not included).

Comment: Well, that's rather damning. Too bad it won't do anything to sway the zealots and make people actually adopt a reasonable stance on this whole fiasco. Expect continued lockdowns and social distancing to continue well into the future. They don't care about graphs.

See also:

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