tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5850172499490375035.post2512195051311677191..comments2024-02-23T00:53:07.310+00:00Comments on Rooksmoor's Tablets of Lead: Persecuting StudentsRooksmoorhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15563445039351828997noreply@blogger.comBlogger3125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5850172499490375035.post-66162432381466000182010-09-22T14:10:38.212+01:002010-09-22T14:10:38.212+01:00Talking of Bournemouth, I was walking in the town ...Talking of Bournemouth, I was walking in the town this summer and I was passed by a woman in her late middle age who said quite loudly, 'this town failed the moment they opened that university'. She clearly saw urban decline as a direct consequence of higher education.<br /><br />Bournemouth's Dorset Institue of Higher Education opened in 1976, based on an earlier college of technology. It became a polytechnic in 1990 and a university in 1992. It was rated the best 'new' university in 2009 and 2010, so I am not clear when she really saw the decline as coming. <br /><br />I was tempted to chip in and point out that the former Arts Institute has now turned into a university college and is aiming to become a full university meaning the town will then have two. By then I imagine she would have fled.Rooksmoorhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15563445039351828997noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5850172499490375035.post-471812468156434662008-12-15T12:23:00.000+00:002008-12-15T12:23:00.000+00:00Alex, I agree with your sentiments, these people s...Alex, I agree with your sentiments, these people seem to be oblivious to the rocky path they seem so eager to go down. Given the increasing support for the BNP, may be they are aware. However, perhaps those people supporting specific campaigns like these things against students, are aware of the broader thrust of such groups. Initially I thought it can hardly be a 'front' if he provides his name, but I then thought you meant this forum's focus concealed wider objectives or people are being carried along.<BR/><BR/>I always warn people about drawing historical parallels. I assume you wrote to this group in a satirical way. Generally people tend to miss this especially as they often do not even know the history they have lived through. I remember an elderly woman at a railway station who had lived through the Second World War telling me the UK needed more history teachers to 'teach the children how we beat the Europeans' with no distinction between Germans, Italians, French, Russians, etc. let alone Nazis, Fascists, Communists within those countries.<BR/><BR/>The other warning example is of Warren Mitchell's (born 1926)character of an East End bigot, Alf Garnett. Mitchell is a left-winger, a Jew, and certainly has liberal views. His Garnett character in the 1960s-80s was supposed to ridicule the bigots of East London but ended up turning into a character that those very people admired.<BR/><BR/>Sometimes direct criticism is necessary, though I recognise that it can lead to people pulling the shutters down if you say, 'well your policies are beginning to be like those of the Nazis'.<BR/><BR/>With the economic crisis at present, this is the time when people get scared and started turning to discrimination as a way to apportion the blame and find easy scapegoats rather than the 'faceless' individuals who have actually inflicted this situation on us through their greed. So we have to be vigilant and challenge such discrimination when it appears.Rooksmoorhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15563445039351828997noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5850172499490375035.post-85663943483678617992008-12-14T12:10:00.000+00:002008-12-14T12:10:00.000+00:00I don't know what town you are talking about here ...I don't know what town you are talking about here but I found a leaflet of the type you've written about doing the rounds in Winton in Bournemouth which is close to the university there. It came from Winton Forum which just seems to be a front for some guy called Anson Westbrook (handy he gives his number on the leaflet 01202 778086 if you want to talk to him straight). He seems to blame every problem in the area on students. I wrote to this Winton Forum and said that the likely next steps for them to take would be to put red crosses on student houses (like they did on houses during the plague) put yellow stars on students (like the Nazis did to Jews) for easy identification and then make student ghettos with fences round them (ditto the Nazis and the Jews). This Winton Forum does not seem to understand their kind of policy is like the first steps on the 'twisted path' that leads to segregation, apartheid and that kind of thing depending on what example from history you want to point at. By the way I am not a student, I am a worker, I just hate bigots.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com