The Ranting Room

I agree with you Fanny, BS and Jim,  it's a flipping scary prospect. When I had my store in Norfolk my staff were in the main young Mum's (and by young I mean under 20!) or old ladies. I kind of admire the youngsters who did work, I paid above minimum wage (well above) but at the end of the week I was still sending these kids home with very little money indeed.

Jim Garten wrote: fandango wrote: well, here's the shock...many of them don't want to.  but, sticking around here means they will never have a job which taxes them mentally, or pays well...and they will never be able to get on to the property ladder, or even leave home.  unless they get pregnant early on...and there's a LOT of young, single mums around here...it almost seams to be an alternative career choice (right, you can put me back in my box, now) Much as I'd love to be able to correct you, Jared, I can't - I strongly suspect you're 100% correct & the worrying thing is this cycle, which I suspect is now into its 2nd generation, is self perpetuating, leading to (continuing? ) the creation of a benefit dependant underclass generation. What to do though?

We had this problem throughout the 1980s, with basically families living generation after generation on welfare.  The solution was something that you folks may consider draconian, a major reform bill was passed in the mid 90s (and signed by Bill Clinton, mind you) that gave people five years to find some sort of work, and from then there's a mandatory 20 or 30 hours of work that these people have to do to receive benefits.  So far it hasn't been too drastic, unemployment, until very recently, was at near record lows and poverty rates has steadily declined, though that might have happened anyway.

^^..and as the gulf between rich and poor continues to widen, unchallenged, these 'sink estates' will sink deeper into the mire. No amount of improved sex education will limit the amount of unwanted pregnancies, or more contraversially, it wont change the reality that you can live more comfortably on benefits, than you can on the wages from many unskilled jobs.

I cant see any of this changing in the near future. The Tories and Nulab have deliberately nurtured an underclass of people who aspire to nothing, but living on handouts. People like that never bother questioning the government of the day, and for that reason the government of the day will always rely on them to stay at home come election day.

The purpose of the cut in the basic rate of income tax in Browns last budget before he became PM, was a cynical attempt to engage those he wanted to keep sweet for the next election. I'm glad it backfired on him. Sadly, there is nothing else to vote for, so until somnething worthwhile comes along I shall abstain. Looks like they've won the battle to wear me down.

Jim Garten wrote: prog-chick wrote: The easiest way not to be a teen PARENT is for boys to keep it zipped and girls to keep 'em closed. Stop making these girls the sole "bad guy" in the press. Personally, so far as males are concerned, it's my beliefe that as soon as the hormone fairy arrives (which nowadays seems to be at about age 5 or 6...), either a cable tie or a jubilee clip should be judiciously applied until they can palpably demonstrate restraint (ie around 30 years later) - at one fell swoop you solve the problem of unwanted teenage pregnancy ( and also swell the ranks of male falsetto choirs).

Here's a rant I want to get off my chest...... Everyday this week in the UK news there has been articles gallore about "teenage mothers" and what "should" be done.

Pah! Friday the 13th is a bloody amateur compared to Monday the 16th.  Everyone tip-toes around handling everything with kid-gloves on Friday - trying not to provoke the Fates or disturb the Karmic forces - so that ladders remain un-walked under and cracks are duly not stepped upon, black cats are stroked and pampered, touchstones are touched and rubbed, mirrors are wrapped in bubble-wrap save they crack mysteriously under the extra weight of an overly heavy sunbeam that should cross its path... But come Monday, all bets are off - having survived Friday the Thirteenth (part 1) people become complacent and nonchalant with their lucky heather and lucky rabbit's foot, accidents happen aplenty. So far today I've had a dual NAS drive fry both hard-drives for no apparent reason, a brand new PC that won't load its Raid drivers, a PDA that won't re-charge its batteries, a laptop PC that won't send mail, a Server that's taken over 72 hours to back itself up when it normally takes 5 and I'M OUT OF CHOCOLATE CHIP COOKIES!!!!

Well how do you think we feel with New Labour, then?   They pretend to be the old Labour, with a new name but they're basically only slightly more lefty Tories.

Personal political rant:

What the hell would the point of an elected Lords be?

I've always felt that voting should be compulsory, but there should be a 'None of the above' option on the ballot form. This would allow the parties to guage the extent of discontent with all the parties on offer.

As Jim says, this does put you in a real quandry, because if there is literally nothing you want to vote for, then you are reduced to voting tactically. Your vote becomes meaningless at that point. In a first past the post system, in a country where apathy is rife you will never have, in power, a government, that the majority of the electorate wants anyway. If a party can gain power on just 40% of the vote, when voter turn out is less than 50% anyway, they have actually come to power AGAINST the wishes of the electorate.

You are faced with a choice; bloody the nose of the party in power by voting in the opposition, who's manifesto is unclear in many respects and identical to the governments in others, or stick with the devil you know. In the real world, some degree of voter apathy is what the government wants. They can target key areas of their electorate - just enough to get the majority they need to stay in power, and ignore other demographic groups who they think are a lost cause. In Britain the Labour party is no longer the party of the working class. In fact they have gone in completly the opposite direction, especially in recent years. The working class used to be politicised, but now apathy is so rife in this demographic group, that before long it will only be the middle class and richos who bother to vote. The 'common man' is no longer represented in politics. The government legislates against their lifestyle in any way they can, and taxes the arse of them, but never will it engage with them. It cant be bothered. There is no political milage in doing so.

Enter the BNP.

The governments failed immigration policy, and decades of ill managed experiments in multiculturalism, have led to an inevitiable scapegoating of the immigrant population. Large swathes of the indigenous population want someone to be angry at. The white working class become the fire, and the media throw on the petrol.

Anyway, I digress. Was it Ken Livingstone who said that if voting made any actual real difference to anything, they wouldn't let us do it...

You can also spoil your paper, Jim, if you feel that way inclined.  That's more honourable than not voting at all, in my opinion.