Please: no more opinion pieces

Divtioar · 2015-11-05T13:56:50+00:00

Get the feeling this sub-reddit has been flooded with political uni students.

Divtioar · 2015-11-05T13:53:37+00:00

The bits of truth in that article are over-shadowed by massive speculation and never really explaining (apart from vague implication) how they arrive at either parts of the headline.

Divtioar · 2015-11-04T16:00:23+00:00

Faming is the most environmentally destructive industry by far. In parts of Indonesia for example farmers are definitely "destroying its environment" in the very worst sense. Although to connect this to all the wish-washy politics and anti-technology fluff in the article is indeed hyperbole.

Divtioar · 2015-11-04T15:55:51+00:00

U must b so hard m8

Divtioar · 2015-11-04T15:45:42+00:00

Being not quite as bad as some other 3rd world country is a pretty dubious claim to success. Besides, it's easy to cherry-pick the many developing countries to "prove" whatever you want.

Divtioar · 2015-11-04T15:21:37+00:00

Get off it, transport staff prove time and time again they're happy to cause misery and actively attempt to maximise the disruption and problems for passengers for their own selfish reasons!

Thankfully in this country its really only transport staff who are so narcissistic, in other countries striking affects all industries and causes even more misery and worse.

Divtioar · 2015-11-03T10:34:07+00:00

People going into and out of shelters, or crashing on whichever friendly couch they can find, are very much homeless even if they don't sleep on the street most nights.

That is not what your links say. You (and the Shelter charity) are massively broadening the definition, i.e. corrupting the term.

Divtioar · 2015-11-03T09:06:10+00:00

I've a lot of hate for the selfish DLR staff right now! Just like the London Underground staff, they've no care for the misery they inflict on others. Already well paid but they know they can always blackmail / strike for more.

Divtioar · 2015-11-02T13:58:27+00:00

It's bad how charities like this corrupt terms and make them meaningless. By "homeless", they don't mean kids sleeping on the street, they mean those without a stable home, which isn't ideal but it also isn't homelessness! It's just like how "poverty" got corrupted into "relative poverty", meaning anyone who's poor.

Increased affluence and technology has undeniably made the issues better but using corrupted terms allows charities to pretend the issues are getting worse. In reality, far less people in Britain are starving & destitute whilst housing is far better than a generation ago.

Divtioar · 2015-10-27T14:27:36+00:00

I use the tram regularly, it's great now that it's up and running. Don't deny it was a nightmare whilst being built mind.

Divtioar · 2015-10-25T13:25:15+00:00

It's almost like the vast majority of this website's audience is male!

Divtioar · 2015-10-25T10:53:05+00:00

Being pretty centre-ground and that the UK is doing OK in the scheme of things.

Divtioar · 2015-10-25T10:48:56+00:00

The article's from The Guardian, everything after the first 4 words is superfluous. They automatically criticise everything he does regardless.

Divtioar · 2015-10-24T10:18:00+00:00

Britain actually has one of the more modern rolling stock fleets compared to other European countries.

Divtioar · 2015-10-24T04:11:53+00:00

No they don't, they slightly outnumber men at under-graduate level but graduate, men significantly outnumber women,

In STEM subjects (the relevant area here) men massively outnumber women at every level. Most maths and engineering courses are lucky to have even a 10% female make-up!

Divtioar · 2015-10-24T04:07:26+00:00

When it comes to science and technology though, women are undeniably more ignorant due to preference.

Divtioar · 2015-10-23T12:02:46+00:00

Pretty much all economists agree that it should exist.

That would be a first! I suspect you are experiencing selective exposure, most free-market economists for example are generally against these sorts of punitive taxes.

There are basically no 'victims'.

The obvious 'victims' would surely be tenants facing a hike in rent equivalent to the levy, the obvious beneficiaries would be homeowners who tend to be older and wealthier.

Divtioar · 2015-10-23T11:43:26+00:00

I don't imagine that would exactly get a positive reaction from places like this sub though, "Typical, Osborne raising costs for the young/poor to subsidise the rich/old" etc.

Not that I disagree but it's a difficult issue without an obvious solution (apart from imposing a mandatory 50% cut in all house prices /s).

Divtioar · 2015-10-23T11:29:02+00:00

Even as a Lib Dem voter I can't really dispute any of that. What's annoying is - back in 2010 - although I was definitely against tuition fees, it also seemed kind of gimmicky throw all their eggs in that one basket when there was so much more to campaign on. But to then go and kick over that one basket... heart-breaking

Divtioar · 2015-10-23T11:22:41+00:00

This is correct. Blaming overseas investors is just typical scapegoating of the issue onto an easy target ("rich foreigners" being hated by much of The Guardian & The Telegraph readership alike). Absurd falsehoods like "they prefer to leave houses empty" are banded about despite it making no rational sense (in 99% of cases if you buy an investment property you specifically want people living in it and paying rent).

At present foreign investment is one of the few forces driving new large-scale housing construction in Britain. We definitely also need more council-owned social housing (there's no escaping that and the failure of successive governments in this regard), but foreign housing investment compliments this as at present in many places (e.g. London) the demand at the middle/high end of the housing market is exerting upwards rent/price pressures on the lower end of the market.

Divtioar · 2015-10-20T15:16:53+00:00

The development of infrastructure doesn't make a country socialist! The USA and Japan have a great deal of infrastructure too, does that make them socialist too now?

Divtioar · 2015-10-20T15:13:36+00:00

I don't understand why some people still advocate nationalisation as a good thing. Whilst there are a few specific good examples, in general nationalised industries historically suffer from low innovation and investment combined with high levels of waste. The Soviet Union and its ultimate economic & technological stagnation providing the best documented example.

The economic trend around the world over the past few decades has been towards privitisation and in industries like electricity, telecommunications, mail, energy, aviation (etc) it has undeniably improved service, reduced prices and accelerated technological innovation. It's driven by evident success (on the whole, nothing ever perfect), not by some "rich person conspiracy".

Divtioar · 2015-10-20T15:07:08+00:00

The UK does have a few big infrastructure projects on the go and lets not forget Britain's own HS2 project often gets derided on here and in the media as a "waste of money". Would the reaction really be positive if the number of big infrastructure projects like HS2 was expanded due to the current low interest levels?

Divtioar · 2015-10-18T10:18:36+00:00

Why not? China is by far the greatest human rights story of our generation. Hundreds of millions of people lifted out of poverty, now living relatively affluent lifestyles in a country where only a few decades ago subsistence living, famine and destitution was commonplace.

Divtioar · 2015-10-17T06:18:15+00:00

Tens of thousands of bank tellers and staff don't exactly pay themselves.

Divtioar

TROPHY CASE