The Bishop of Dover

[Anchorman]

wigginhall and Gonnagle

I think you have both over-reacted somewhat! However, perhaps I could ask you if you think the Bishop (and his fellows)  should spend time praing for the migrants and, if so, do you think it will be of any use in either practical or moral terms?

Dunno about Wiggs and Gonners, but that's a Yes from me.

[Gonnagle]

Dear Susan,

Praying, a very practical use, praying is a great way of focusing the mind, whilst praying this Bishop could have a epiphany ( sometimes called the eureka moment ).

On a more serious note, have you heard that there is a last book by Pratchett's still to be published, a Tiffany Aching book.

Gonnagle.

[Rhiannon]

wigginhall and Gonnagle

I think you have both over-reacted somewhat! However, perhaps I could ask you if you think the Bishop (and his fellows)  should spend time praing for the migrants and, if so, do you think it will be of any use in either practical or moral terms?

And so the forum echoes to the sweet sound of goalposts being moved once more.

[SusanDoris]

Dear Susan,

Praying, a very practical use, praying is a great way of focusing the mind, whilst praying this Bishop could have a epiphany ( sometimes called the eureka moment ).

On a more serious note, have you heard that there is a last book by Pratchett's still to be published, a Tiffany Aching book.

Gonnagle.

Yes; I shall buy it of course! My reader is about three-quarters of the way through 'Raising Steam' at the moment

[L.A.]

Dear Outrider,

Excellent post, a new word is creeping into politics, compassion, bye bye new Labour, cheerio old Tory, I am quite optimistic about mankind, the culture of "I'am alright Jack" is slowly being eroded, and I think faster communication has something to do with it.

Gonnagle.

The Left are always really good at using the language of compassion, but less good at solving the problems. The good Bishop's main objection seems to have been the use of the word 'Swarm' - though looking at the news footage, it doesn't seem totally inappropriate.

[Harrowby Hall]

Dear Outrider,

Excellent post, a new word is creeping into politics, compassion, bye bye new Labour, cheerio old Tory, I am quite optimistic about mankind, the culture of "I'am alright Jack" is slowly being eroded, and I think faster communication has something to do with it.

Gonnagle.

The Left are always really good at using the language of compassion, but less good at solving the problems. The good Bishop's main objection seems to have been the use of the word 'Swarm' - though looking at the news footage, it doesn't seem totally inappropriate.

"Swarm" seems to be the latest word to be politically re-defined as being culturally unacceptable. It is following "pleb" into the equivalent of 21st century swear words.

Thank heavens Harriet Harperson does not work at the Oxford University Press.

[Gonnagle]

Dear Lapsed,

The Left!! You are such a Victorian, I wonder if I am a leftie, don't think so, I quite like watching this country prosper, but never at the expense of human life, human dignity, the Tories need to learn the word compassion, it means to suffer with, after all we are all in it together, aye right

Gonnagle.

[Outrider]

Rather obviously, this is not going to happen. Who would be able to do it anyway?

It does seem unlikely, though I'm still waiting for someone to explain to me why that might be.

The problem is how to manage the situation to:

1) Help those who need help immediately
2) Set up proper camps where asylum seekers or migrants can be processed and sent on to places able to handle them or where they can best contribute

Which is never going to work. As evident as it seems that no-one's actually going to take steps to prevent this, if we don't prevent it we're never going to adequately manage it. Trying to find homes and lives for these people is only going to encourage more and more to come - if we're going to give them proper lives why not give them proper lives where they are?

It also needs to be recognised that since it is the West and Russia that have been mainly responsible for setting up and maintaining corrupt regimes and controlling trade to further their own commercial interests - they are hardly going to do anything to rebuild the infra-structure needed.

Whilst some Western regimes have spent some of their efforts in supporting corrupt regimes in the third world, they've shown more than enough enthusiasm to set up and support their own as well. Western business practices, particularly in the arms trade, are not helping, I'd agree entirely, but that's why I'm suggesting that people in the west need to be changing the way they tackle these issues: viewing it as a good natured charity cause in the main, with occasional security issues to be dealt with by the government is not sufficient.

O.

[Outrider]

eradicate the corrupt regimes,

How are we going to do that?

Depends on the specifics of the regime. Sponsoring other political candidates, sanctions on particular parties and for the worst behaving proper military intervention.

That's the current, the difference is in the investment - public, not allowing private enterprises to use the opportunity to get their feet under someone else's table - particularly in education, communication, emergency services and the judiciary.

O.

[Walt Zingmatilder]

Dear Wigs,

Anti theist, Susan is a anti theist, Pratchett loving anti theist.

Gonnagle.

Staggering, Gonners.  Bishop rightly attacks Cameron for his attitude to migrants, but hello, he's a BISHOP, klaxon sounds, red light flashes for atheists, he must be talking shit.   Oh, and he hasn't taken a migrant into his house, so he has no right to talk.   What utter tripe.   

Great post.

[Walt Zingmatilder]

Just heard again the Bishop of Dover being quoted. He said something about we should 'redisccover our humanity'. Well, excuse me for sounding just a bit cynical here, but anyone know what he has done personally to help improve the situation? Has he offered to take one of the economic migrants into his home? Personally, I have no idea what the solution is, but I don't think platitudes are much use.

I think  this is an unfair attack.   If people are not going to speak up about the disgusting right-wing attack on migrants, then I despair.   It's true that I haven't taken a migrant into my home - am I therefore disbarred from criticizing the government?

The churches do help migrants and asylum seekers, see for example, the London Churches Refugee Network, and many other similar bodies, which try to help migrants with all kinds of problems.

I suppose as an atheist, you have a knee-jerk reaction - bishop, therefore bad.   That also makes me despair really.

Agreed. One of the strengths of the church - perhaps one of its few remaining ones - is the continual reminders that it gives us to consider the dispossessed and desperate. If I were in Kent right now I might find it hard to feel compassionate and this is a timely reminder.

Spot on. There is a conflation of two issues here..... migrants and holding up a transportation system....particularly by French commentators who compare the border with Britain with the border between France and Italy. However there is a world of difference between stepping over an imaginary line on the ground and jumping into heavy machinery, one slip meaning instant dismemberment or decapitation. The Eurotunnel is a dangerous industrial process. I am sure those French commentators would not be so swift in making such an equation if migrants attempted to hang onto the wings of aircraft taking off from Charles De Gaulle airport.

 

[Hope]

Christian aid is recommended by both the B H A and The NSS, as the most bang for the buck charity going.

ippy

Ironically, it scores fairly poorly on the proportion of income spent on salaries and other non-core activities.  Can't remember the website where one can monitor this element, though.

I believe that Oxfam rates higher.

[Jack Knave]

Just heard again the Bishop of Dover being quoted. He said something about we should 'redisccover our humanity'. Well, excuse me for sounding just a bit cynical here, but anyone know what he has done personally to help improve the situation? Has he offered to take one of the economic migrants into his home? Personally, I have no idea what the solution is, but I don't think platitudes are much use.

To be fair, taking one or two, or half a dozen in, wouldn't fix the issue. The problem isn't even the thousands - tens of thousands, perhaps - who are currently in transit or at Calais, or even the hundreds of thousands who have been displaced from their homes.

The problem is that we have failed to improve the lot of people in the hell-holes of the world, and rather than look on their relative poverty and commiserate we have looked on it and said 'they want our stuff!' and closed the door.

Trying to house and settle them here disrupts us and doesn't give them what they truly need, which is a chance to build their own lives rather than having to settle in the shadow of ours.

We need to stop half-arsed interventions in third-world piss-holes, accept the reality that our culture really is genuinely better than theirs, eradicate the corrupt regimes, invest in their infrastructure and help them to build a better home for themselves so they have no reason to want to come here.

O.

Well said, O, spot on!!!

[Hope]

We need to stop half-arsed interventions in third-world piss-holes, accept the reality that our culture really is genuinely better than theirs, eradicate the corrupt regimes, invest in their infrastructure and help them to build a better home for themselves so they have no reason to want to come here.

Not sure that accepting 'the reality that our culture really is genuinely better than theirs' is actually the case.  In many ways, third world cultures are streets ahead than our culture (or perhaps just haven't lost some of the more inter-personal/relational skills that seem to have been missing in the West.  Compare, for instance, attitudes towards the elderly, or the family.

I'd much rather prefer to 'accept that we can learn things from them, in the same way that they can learn things from us'.

[ippy]

Christian aid is recommended by both the B H A and The NSS, as the most bang for the buck charity going.

ippy

Ironically, it scores fairly poorly on the proportion of income spent on salaries and other non-core activities.  Can't remember the website where one can monitor this element, though.

I believe that Oxfam rates higher.

Christian aid is recommended by both the B H A and The NSS, as the most bang for the buck charity going.

Ironically, again Hope hasn't got the evidence to hand.

If it BHA & the NSS have got it wrong it's not me that has got it wrong whereas , You, Hope.

ippy

[ippy]

We need to stop half-arsed interventions in third-world piss-holes, accept the reality that our culture really is genuinely better than theirs, eradicate the corrupt regimes, invest in their infrastructure and help them to build a better home for themselves so they have no reason to want to come here.

Not sure that accepting 'the reality that our culture really is genuinely better than theirs' is actually the case.  In many ways, third world cultures are streets ahead than our culture (or perhaps just haven't lost some of the more inter-personal/relational skills that seem to have been missing in the West.  Compare, for instance, attitudes towards the elderly, or the family.

I'd much rather prefer to 'accept that we can learn things from them, in the same way that they can learn things from us'.

I know where I would rather be and I would imagine if you were thinking of moving out to these places, referred to on this thread, I doubt you would still be wearing quite so rose coloured glasses when considering these places that have this, "better" culture than ours, even if you were inclined to go there.

ippy   

[Hope]

I know where I would rather be and I would imagine if you were thinking of moving out to these places, referred to on this thread, I doubt you would still be wearing quite so rose coloured glasses when considering these places that have this, "better" culture than ours, even if you were inclined to go there.

ippy   

ippy, I never said that these places had 'better' cultures than ours; that's your preconceived bias showing through.  Instead, they have different cultures parts of which are better than ours and parts of which are less good.

As for "I would imagine if you were thinking of moving out to these places", may I remind you that I have spent 10 years of my life living and working in such places, so the 'rose-coloured glasses' bit is a rather obsolete.

[ippy]

I know where I would rather be and I would imagine if you were thinking of moving out to these places, referred to on this thread, I doubt you would still be wearing quite so rose coloured glasses when considering these places that have this, "better" culture than ours, even if you were inclined to go there.

ippy   

ippy, I never said that these places had 'better' cultures than ours; that's your preconceived bias showing through.  Instead, they have different cultures parts of which are better than ours and parts of which are less good.

As for "I would imagine if you were thinking of moving out to these places", may I remind you that I have spent 10 years of my life living and working in such places, so the 'rose-coloured glasses' bit is a rather obsolete.

The places referred to on this thread?

ippy

[Hope]

The places referred to on this thread?

I thought we were talking about migrants, not just ones from specific countries.  My apologies for failing to understand that.

[ippy]

The places referred to on this thread?

I thought we were talking about migrants, not just ones from specific countries.  My apologies for failing to understand that.

It would be an even stranger world if we were all perfect, fine.

ippy

[Aruntraveller]

but hello, he's a BISHOP, klaxon sounds, red light flashes for atheists, he must be talking shit.

Please don't sink to the level of some other Christian posters on here and tar all atheists with the same brush Wiggs.

[Hope]

Please don't sink to the level of some other Christian posters on here and tar all atheists with the same brush Wiggs.

A bit rich coming from you, Trent.

[Aruntraveller]

Please don't sink to the level of some other Christian posters on here and tar all atheists with the same brush Wiggs.

A bit rich coming from you, Trent.

Why?

[Outrider]

Not sure that accepting 'the reality that our culture really is genuinely better than theirs' is actually the case.  In many ways, third world cultures are streets ahead than our culture (or perhaps just haven't lost some of the more inter-personal/relational skills that seem to have been missing in the West.  Compare, for instance, attitudes towards the elderly, or the family.

We invest significantly more than these places in health- and social-care for our elderly, we have no more family breakdown issues than these places, we simply have people with the personal freedom to escape bad situations so they aren't stuck in these mockeries of family life, and we aren't lumped with the same levels of institutional corruption, societal superstition and subjugatory ideas like 'honour killings'.

Our culture is cleaner, freer, more open, more tolerant, more accepting and fairer than pretty much any of theirs, as is evidenced by the disparity in the number of them trying to get here to live compared to the number of people here trying to get there to live.

O.

[jakswan]

I thought the Bishop had some valid points but hey ho I'm an atheist so must be talking tripe.