Ship of Fools: Remember, remember the fifth of November

Thread: Remember, remember the fifth of November Board: Hell / Ship of Fools.

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Posted by Alan Cresswell (# 31) on :

Gunpowder treason and plot.

We all remember Guy Fawkes being foiled at the last minute for his part in trying to blow up Parliament. We tend to forget the others involved in the Plot, nor that the target was the King and Lords rather than Parliament.

But, let's run with the popular version that it was an attack on Parliament. I contend that we have recently experienced a much more successful, if not literally explosive, attack on the power of Parliament to represent the people. Replacing rule of Parliament by rule of the mob. I propose a bonfire for this new generation of Plotters.

First on the pyre I would put Nigel Farage, and his UKIP MEPs. For the hypocrisy of taking EU money to sit in a Parliament they do not believe should have UK representatives. But, even more so, for their vile racist and xenophobic statements that have incited verbal and physical attacks, even murder.

Who would you add to the flames?

[And, for our non-UK friends, feel free to replace 'Parliament' with your respective democratic institutions and tell us who you would charge with undermining, subverting and destroying democratic representation.]

Posted by Sipech (# 16870) on :

Well, the most spectacular bonfire night display is always done in Lewes, and I find it hard to imagine that they won't burn an effigy of Donald Trump this year. Of course, it should come with small hands that is groping towards a cat.

If we stick to British politics, though, then I would have nomination would be Jeremy Hunt. His mishandling of the junior doctors' contracts (even when the research he used to justify his stance was shown to be flawed) is enough for me to want to set fire to an image of that smirking twat.

Posted by Sioni Sais (# 5713) on :

Hameron, for his double play of arrogance and hubris. I'm sure Sam Allardyce (England's foootball manager for a whole 67 days) will feel the heat somewhere too, for much the same reasons.

Posted by Helen-Eva (# 15025) on :

Every newspaper that prints spin, half-truths, leading questions, "opinion" and lies in such a way as to make people thing they're true.

Posted by jbohn (# 8753) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Helen-Eva:
Every newspaper that prints spin, half-truths, leading questions, "opinion" and lies in such a way as to make people thing they're true.

You could have stopped at "every newspaper" - the rest is superfluous. [Biased]

Posted by Penny S (# 14768) on :

I'll keep an eye out for Bonfire effigy stories. I do hope Lewes doesn't follow the lead of the Mail and the Express who think that 16 million people are traitors and to be damned.

Posted by Ricardus (# 8757) on :

Why not just stick with Plan A? Blow up the whole heap of Victorian kitsch and all its denizens with it.

Jeremy Hunt, Andrew Mitchell and Michael Gove for thinking that Getting Your Idea Through is more important than whether your idea has any kind of evidence base behind it.

Boris Johnson for thinking himself the tragicomic hero of an Evelyn Waugh novel in which the entire world is just a backdrop. Andrea Leadsom for creating the illusion that Theresa May is sane and competent.

The Corbynistas for thinking self-righteousness is an adequate substitute for good governance. The rest of the Labour party for having no adequate respose at all to the multiple manifest idiocies of the government.

The SNP for becoming the first ever party to win the moral high ground by losing a referendum, such that they can criticise the Tories for their impossible Brexit promises while the impossibility of their own Scottish independence promises escapes scrutiny.

The Liberal Democrats for thinking that the number one priority, when negotiating the injection of progressivism into a conservative government, is a referendum on the Alternative Vote.

The DUP for thinking that the most serious obstacles to peace in Northern Ireland are not flying a flag as often than you'd like and marching down fewer streets than you'd like.

Sinn Féin for - oh wait, that would require you to ACTUALLY TAKE YOUR FRICKING SEATS.

Douglas Carswell for failing to treat Nigel Farage with the respect he deserves.

The Green Party, which can replace an ecologically-focused policy of zero growth with a Keynesian policy of paying off borrowing through sustained growth without its members even noticing.

Plaid Cymru, Alliance, the SDLP and the UUP for - sorry, what is it you do again?

The bunch of crooks, thugs and philanderers who are listed on Wikipedia as independents because even their own parties won't have anything to do with them.

Actually on second thoughts perhaps blowing them up isn't very environmentally sustainable. Put some humane poison in their Chateauneuf-du-Pape (we pay for it after all) so that the rats and dry rot can have a hygienic environment in which to flourish.

[ 13. October 2016, 17:06: Message edited by: Ricardus ]

Posted by Helen-Eva (# 15025) on :

Ricardus - loved the rant. But you didn't do all of it as you left out the House of Lords. Please continue...

Posted by Tubbs (# 440) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Helen-Eva:
Ricardus - loved the rant. But you didn't do all of it as you left out the House of Lords. Please continue...

Hasn't left much for the rest of us ... But I'll shove my pro-Leave voting MP who's been refusing to meet with the remain voters who represent the majority of her constituents. She can go hand in hand with Rees-Mogg.

Tubbs

Posted by Martin60 (# 368) on :

First class Ricardus. The trouble is what would fill the vacuum?

Posted by Baptist Trainfan (# 15128) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Helen-Eva:
Ricardus - loved the rant. But you didn't do all of it as you left out the House of Lords. Please continue...

Lord Mountararat:

"And while the House of Peers withholds
Its legislative hand,
And noble statesmen do not itch
To interfere with matters which
They do not understand,
As bright will shine Great Britain’s rays
As in King George’s glorious days!"

(W.S. Gilbert).

Posted by HCH (# 14313) on :

When I hear about Guy Fawkes day, I sometimes wonder whether it is celebrated because the plot failed, or because it was at least attempted.

Posted by Penny S (# 14768) on :

It's bit more subtle than that. Initially, it was ordered to be celebrated as the triumph of the Protestants over the Catholic plotters. But it conveniently coincided with the autumn bonfires of tradition, which the Protestants would not like, so it's an excuse for a jolly good fire, firework* party and, in some cases, doing stuff the toffs don't like. As stated above. It's the Halloween Fires, transposed a bit.

The BBC, some years back, broadcast an interesting story from East Anglia. It seems there was a village in which the squire thought it was what is called by sociologists a 'closed village' in which everyone depends on the top dog for employment and has to do (and vote) as they were told. The villagers were not of this opinion. They had a tradition of Bonfire, not unlike that of Lewes, in which effigies were burned.

There were attempts by the powers that be to stop this activity, but they were not very determined attempts, just enough to show that Bonfire was not approved of, so the common people would be satisfied by cocking a snook at the nobs by the fires, and not move on to more serious dissent.

Anyway, the lord of the manor had put in a new rector, possibly a relation (I'm not clear on that point), and the new rector did not like the West Gallery musicians who accompanied the services. Much was explained about this, and the hold that WGMs had over the priests and the way the services were run, wherever they were found.

The rector sacked the band, and installed an organ, and, presumably, an organist.**

On the 5th (also known in various parts as Mischief Night, and known for minor pranks in the style of Trick or Treat, and more serious ones where there was dissent), as the villagers stood around the bonfire and its unidentified effigy, the organ caught fire and was destroyed.

No-one ever owned to knowing who was responsible, whose key was used for access, not even on a deathbed. It remains a mystery.

That sort of spirit lurks around the 5th.

*Human beings do seem to be hardwired for fireworks, which is very odd. Did we all stand around gawping at volcanoes in Africa, ooing and aahing?
** Plus ca change, plus la meme chose.

[ 14. October 2016, 18:50: Message edited by: Penny S ]

Posted by Curiosity killed ... (# 11770) on :

BBC game in which you are supposed to save the Houses of Parliament. I like failing.

Posted by Penny S (# 14768) on :

That is pretty tight timing, with some of it wasted watching the guard starting from the door each time, the rats, and listening to maniacal laughter.

Posted by rolyn (# 16840) on :

DC for dropping a referendum on a grumbling, unwilling electorate.
Then when the powder keg he was sat on explodes, toddles off back to his country residence and leaves everyone else to clear up the mess.

Posted by Anglican't (# 15292) on :

quote:
Originally posted by rolyn:
DC for dropping a referendum on a grumbling, unwilling electorate.

Since most voters voted Leave, presumably a lot of the electorate were actually quite willing to have the referendum dropped on them?

Posted by Alan Cresswell (# 31) on :

Eh? How do you figure out that because people voted that they were not resentful about having had the referendum forced on them? I certainly resented Hameron using a referendum to attempt to shore up his party a bit longer. Even more, having decided to do that I resent the balls-up he made of it, and that I had to go to the polls to answer an undefined question. None of that stopped me casting my vote. I imagine there were people who voted Leave who also considered the referendum a stupid idea. And, there was a large number of people who didn't vote at all.

Posted by rolyn (# 16840) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Anglican't:
Since most voters voted Leave, presumably a lot of the electorate were actually quite willing to have the referendum dropped on them?

Like Guy Fawkes, history will write the June 2016 Referendum any way it wants. Personally I shall remember it as the British public having their cage rattled at a vulnerable time.

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