England headed for A Caliphate

[Tigers!]

TVacc appears to disagree with you.

I think your reading is suspect. Best to let TVacc speak for his/her self.

Whereas a report generated by a government or police force trying to cover their failures would be any less biased and might not make exaggerated claims?

I take it from your highlighting that you're challenging the premise that the UK government tries to cover up its failures.

Of course not. I 'm simply not accepting that I (or TVacc) implied that we would not view a report stipulated to be "generated....to cover up their failures " as either biased or exaggerated.

Obviously the point that Tigers! was attempting to make was that a report generated by police or government might be biased or exaggerated. Of course it could be. The important question is how you decide which sources are, overall, most trustworthy. I suspect that in Trump's America you'll have different views than we have in the UK.

Bold - Exactly.
It's a matter of what we find doing our homework as I've indicated in post #409. Isn't this what critical thinking is all about? Will the government cover things up? Will the press bring it into the light of day?
We should all look at both individuals in charge or their reports, the funding, the reports themselves, and the review of the reports.
Then pick one and push the I believe button.

Precisely.
I have seen enough "independent" reports by governments to be wary of taking their conclusions at face value.
I will not shoot the messenger but rather look at the report's conclusions, contents etc.

 

[Tigers!]

You're insinuating that some of it is lies.

No I'm not. I'm suggesting that anyone who believes that a privately sponsored report, initiated by a known ultra right wing nutjob, might not be biased and might not make exaggerated claims is, in my view, more than a little gullible.

Whereas a report generated by a government or police force trying to cover their failures would be any less biased and might not make exaggerated claims?
That would be more believable? Only to the the gullible.

No one suggested that.

That is exactly what TVacc suggested! (And TAC clicked an "I agree" at him.)

You're clearly wrong. No such thing was suggested. This is unusually sloppy argumentation for you.

TVacc appears to disagree with you.

I take it from your highlighting that you're challenging the premise that the UK government tries to cover up its failures. I would not have thought that was a controversial premise in the wake of the Post Office scandal.

Not forgetting the Windrush scandal and Grenfell Tower fire and the Chilcot inquiry into the Iraq war
The UK has sadly gone greatly downhill in recent decades

 

[Tigers!]

Why does the Home Office feel it necessary to give the following advice to asylum seekers entering the UK?

Asylum seekers have been told that rape, sexual harassment and domestic abuse are illegal in the UK, in guidance for new arrivals published by the Home Office.

If asylum seekers have to be told such things upon arrival then perhaps putting them straight into the community may not the the wisest option.

And the booklet itself.

 

[bilby]

411 posts of debate would indicate that Islam in the west is a troublesome issue regardless of reasons why.

The holocaust would indicate that Judaism in 1930s and '40s Germany was a troublesome issue regardless of reasons why, too.

That doesn't mean the Jews were in the wrong for causing trouble; And the existence of heated debates about Islam today doesn't mean the Muslims are in the wrong for causing trouble.

Your post reminds me of protesters being charged with criminal damage for the tooth-marks they left on a policeman's boots when he kicked them in the face.

 

[bilby]

Diversity is our strength!

Who is “us”?

Daily Mail "readers".

 

[bilby]

Why does the Home Office feel it necessary to give the following advice to asylum seekers entering the UK?

Asylum seekers have been told that rape, sexual harassment and domestic abuse are illegal in the UK, in guidance for new arrivals published by the Home Office.

If asylum seekers have to be told such things upon arrival then perhaps putting them straight into the community may not the the wisest option.

And the booklet itself.

Who says they have to be told?

They are told. But very few are not already aware.

On my arrival in Australia yesterday, I was repeatedly told by the Australian government not to import illegal drugs. Does this imply that I am a drug smuggler, or even that I am suspected of being one?

Does it imply that the people who do smuggle drugs are expected by the Commonwealth to be unaware that such smuggling is illegal?

Why does the Australian government feel it necessary to give that advice to citizens entering Australia? Are Australian citizens* notorious drug smugglers?






* Apart from our Schapelle, obviously

 

[TSwizzle]

If only these young men had been given the “don’t rape the local women” pamphlet this terrible situation could have been avoided.

Two illegal immigrants raped a woman at knifepoint while she was star gazing in a park during a 'harrowing attack'. Afghanis Khan Agah and Noorullah Ahmdzai treated their victim as an 'object they could use and abuse' on August 16 last year in Barking Park, east London, a court heard. Their victim was on a date with another man when, at around 11pm, her attackers pinned her down and said 'they just wanted to have some fun with her'. Ahmdzai, 26, raped her while Agah held a Swiss Army-type knife to her date's throat, threatening to kill him if he tried to call the police before the pair switched roles. Prosecutors said the woman was suffocated during the 'petrifying and awful' sex attack 'which left her numb'. The Daily Mail overturned a reporting restriction preventing Agah from being named. During the trial, Agah said he was aged 16 at the time of the attack and is now 17, but court records stated he is 19.
Ahmdzai came to Britain on a small boat in August 2023 and was housed in a hotel in London by the Home Office at the taxpayer's expense, before being moved to Liverpool. While in Liverpool his claim for asylum was rejected and he began working at a building site to pay for an appeal and returned to London.

Daily Mail

 

[Bomb#20]

You're clearly wrong. No such thing was suggested. This is unusually sloppy argumentation for you.

TVacc appears to disagree with you.

I think your reading is suspect. Best to let TVacc speak for his/her self.

He did speak for himself -- I was drawing your attention to the fact that he'd "Like"d the post where I said what he was suggesting.

Whereas a report generated by a government or police force trying to cover their failures would be any less biased and might not make exaggerated claims?

I take it from your highlighting that you're challenging the premise that the UK government tries to cover up its failures.

Of course not. I 'm simply not accepting that I (or TVacc) implied that we would not view a report stipulated to be "generated....to cover up their failures " as either biased or exaggerated.

Hmm. It looks like you parsed Tigers!'s question differently from how I did.

Obviously the point that Tigers! was attempting to make was that a report generated by police or government might be biased or exaggerated. Of course it could be.

And of course the one I quoted could be. Not sure how you intended "I'm suggesting that anyone who believes that a privately sponsored report, initiated by a known ultra right wing nutjob, might not be biased and might not make exaggerated claims is, in my view, more than a little gullible." to be parsed. If you were calling me gullible for believing Lowe's report definitely isn't biased and exaggerated, I didn't indicate any such thing. If you were calling me gullible for believing Lowe's report might be unbiased and unexaggerated, well then, that would amount to you claiming it definitely is biased or exaggerated, so if that's what you meant, please point out a specific claim in the Lowe report that you have evidence is biased or exaggerated.

The bottom line seems to be that we have "known ultra right wing nutjob" on one side as grounds for suspicion, and "organization with a known track record of trying to cover their failures" on the other side.

The important question is how you decide which sources are, overall, most trustworthy. I suspect that in Trump's America you'll have different views than we have in the UK.

Not so much. Here's a survey of levels of public trust in government.

Switzerland 82.41%
...
United Kingdom 33.86%
Chile 32.94%
Greece 32.17%
Latvia 31.8%
United States 30.93%
...
Slovakia 22%

Both our governments are scraping the bottom of the ranking. Trump has little to do with it -- US trust in government took a massive nose dive because of Viet Nam and Watergate and has been almost flatlining ever since. It gained a little ground during the Reagan and Clinton administrations but the two Bush administrations forfeited what little good will their predecessors had gained. https://www.pewresearch.org/politics/2025/12/04/public-trust-in-government-1958-2025/

 

[The AntiChris]

The bottom line seems to be that we have "known ultra right wing nutjob" on one side as grounds for suspicion, and "organization with a known track record of trying to cover their failures" on the other side.

You seem to be implying that publicly setup, funded and accountable reports/enquiries should be viewed with the same scepticism as privately funded special interest reports/enquiries. This seems to be taking healthy scepticism into the realms of the conspiracy theorists.

Both our governments are scraping the bottom of the ranking. Trump has little to do with it..

Are you really saying that the brazen and public lies told by Trump and his administration on a daily basis have little effect on public confidence?

Is this because, in your view, all previous administrations have lied as much (and we in the UK just haven't noticed) or do the US public not notice or not care about the dishonesty of the Trump admin?

 

[Elixir]

Both our governments are scraping the bottom of the ranking. Trump has little to do with it -- US trust in government took a massive nose dive because of Viet Nam and Watergate and has been almost flatlining ever since.

Opinion? Or do you have a reference?

Sources I’ve checked seem to agree that there was a very measurable spike in Americans’ “trust in government” following 9/11. Maybe we need more of that?
Of course it crashed later in the Bush II years, re-built slightly over Obama’s terms and has been in the dumper ever since.
The weird thing to me is that it tends to rise sharply in times of “trouble”, as if the mere fact we woke up in the morning becomes a credit to the government in times of perceived crisis.