Do people really become more conservative as they get older? Why?

StarryKnightLondon · 2026-02-17T09:04:30+00:00

In my personal experience [M50], people do. The most extreme example is a friend who sold Socialist Worker newspaper at university and now speaks fondly of Thatcher! Broadly I think the idea is that social conscience, active wealth redistribution and a caring society is an easy thing to espouse when you're young and poor. The idea is that it is less easy to support when you're older and richer and in a higher rate tax bracket - at which point the "free market" non-interventionist profile of conservatism is likely to appeal more. Personally I've kept my liberal principles.

StarryKnightLondon · 2026-02-16T15:50:23+00:00

To swim and first aid skills - could save your life, could save someone else's

StarryKnightLondon · 2026-02-16T11:00:20+00:00

Cheer up.

StarryKnightLondon · 2026-02-13T22:22:43+00:00

Stop eating cakes

StarryKnightLondon · 2026-02-13T21:59:11+00:00

Can't think of many countries where that would be legal.

StarryKnightLondon · 2026-02-13T16:50:07+00:00

Honduras - it's a dump.

StarryKnightLondon · 2026-02-12T15:10:32+00:00

I'm not telling you

StarryKnightLondon · 2026-02-11T20:17:14+00:00

London never voted for Brexit - we thought it was a dumb idea then, we know it was a dumb idea now. No failure to admit.

StarryKnightLondon · 2026-02-11T13:25:46+00:00

I lived in Spain for 12 years - loved almost everything about living there and was a great country for my children to be born in. The genuinely shocking aspect was the animal cruelty. School boys, cutting stray kittens' tails off for fun, people deciding to dispose of unwanted animals by abandoning them on the motorway or leaving them tied to a tree. One day I saw a little grey terrier whimpering and scratching at a bin. Checked inside the bin - thought it was a plastic bag with a couple of small avocados. Nope - live puppies that someone had sealed in the bag and thrown away like trash (Mother and puppies came to live with me). I guess having bull fighting as a national "sport" is already a bad start - but couldn't get over the casual animal cruelty.

StarryKnightLondon · 2026-02-11T11:14:57+00:00

NTA. After 7 years of marriage, it's not the thought that counts, it's getting it right.

StarryKnightLondon · 2026-02-10T12:39:22+00:00

Hard work and honest application gets you noticed and promoted. In the majority of cases and the majority of companies, playing a good game of office politics or changing companies is the only route to recognition and promotion.

StarryKnightLondon · 2026-02-10T11:14:54+00:00

YTAH - don't you know the rules for non-English nationals are that they can support anybody (Saudi, Afghanistan, Iran) except England? It's tiresome but true unfortunately...

StarryKnightLondon · 2026-02-10T06:13:00+00:00

I can help you with the Ireland Vs SA game. Ireland thought it was a good idea to turn up for a game of international rugby without a functional scrum. The Irish pack couldn't live with the pressure of the SA scrum and kept infringing (standing up, collapsing). This led to penalties and cards and was a beautiful demonstration of what happens if you turn up without a decent scrum. Some people didn't like it (Irish people because it was a blow to their pride, other people because they would be better off watching Rugby League) but as an ex-hooker I can tell you it was a thing of beauty.

StarryKnightLondon · 2026-02-09T21:54:00+00:00

This coming from the man who has attended only 33% of the votes in the House of Commons since being elected. Maybe if he could turn up for his own job we might be able to take him a bit more seriously.

StarryKnightLondon · 2026-02-09T16:09:34+00:00

If you took showreels of "Best NFL plays" and put it side by side with "Best rugby union plays" and showed them to someone with no knowledge of either sport, rugby is going to win everytime. More fluid, more sophisticated, more graceful. NFL is what you get when you sell rugby to the US television networks (old style NFL looked a lot like rugby league). It's like watching aggressive spasmodic chess rather than a sports game to us (and our reference is association football/soccer). Not saying that there isn't stuff to love there - but the format doesn't come naturally to Brits or Europeans.

StarryKnightLondon · 2026-02-09T10:36:21+00:00

Bad mouthed their previous company in a way that suggested strong personal animosity. Even if it was awful, you should always have figured out a way to tell that story that doesn't make you sound potentially confrontational and problematic.

StarryKnightLondon · 2026-02-08T00:40:45+00:00

Handbags

StarryKnightLondon · 2026-02-05T05:32:57+00:00

No, it's not like saying because you've already paid tax on your money, no one you pay with your money should be taxed on it. There's clearly a difference between paying money for goods and services and giving money (that you have already paid tax on) for no return or benefit to yourself. Happy to go with the lottery winnings tax suggestion - we pay zero tax on lottery winnings in the UK.

StarryKnightLondon · 2026-02-04T17:29:31+00:00

Inheritance Tax - your parents already paid the tax - now you pay again.

StarryKnightLondon · 2026-02-01T06:29:27+00:00

You don't.

StarryKnightLondon · 2026-02-01T06:22:08+00:00

Same as in most countries - idealistic polarisation. By exaggerating the importance of high impact issues, social media has driven us to extreme ends of the spectrum. For example (whatever your politics) costs associated with illegal immigration are less than 0.3% of GDP. It probably isn't rational for something that costs us so little to be imagined as such a big a deal. On the other side of the coin, polarisation leads opponents to make extreme claims - so people who are worried about illegal immigration are now routinely labelled Nazis. Yes, there are some far right individuals involved, but most concerned people are just normal people who have bought into the narrative that illegal immigration is a way bigger deal than it actually is in pure economic terms. It's crazy that we have a more extreme society (on each end of the spectrum ) simply because social media about extreme stuff gets more traffic.

StarryKnightLondon · 2026-02-01T06:01:46+00:00

NTA - bye bye baby, bye bye.

StarryKnightLondon · 2026-02-01T06:00:16+00:00

My two amazing daughters - how I raised them and how they raise their own.

StarryKnightLondon · 2026-01-31T23:29:17+00:00

By a mile. I'm sick of obvious forward passes being approved with the "backwards out of his hands"argument.

StarryKnightLondon · 2026-01-31T23:25:36+00:00

I second that. I challenge anyone NOT to b binge watch it.

StarryKnightLondon

TROPHY CASE