It Had To Be The NUT...

This week as I arrived at the famous Midland Hotel in the centre of Manchester, I noticed a messy table, in the otherwise immaculate foyer, which was covered with stacks of paper and empty cups. I checked in at reception and the concierge arranged for my luggage to be taken to my room. I passed the table, which was now surrounded by people, and made my way towards the elevator, only to notice the logo of the National Union of Teachers on it. 'It must be their AGM' I thought to myself, and not being very fond of the union anyway decided to forget about it. I got to my room, unpacked a few things, and had a drink from the mini bar, before switching on the television and BBC News 24.

"...The National Union of Teachers is criticising the existence of faith schools and at their Annual General Meeting in Manchester today..." blared out the television. I couldn't believe it, all this way for a holiday and the NUT had to be holding their annual conference at the Midland that very day. The television then shot to images of people giving out free copies of the Socialist Worker in the foyer in which I had just been standing, and showed clips of the conference in full flow. Despite having to drink in the same lounge as several badly dressed teachers for the next few days, some with Che t-shirts on and others wearing ones with the Hindu Aum on them, I did manage to conduct myself in a respectful manner. The NUT later vowed, at the conference, to boycott military recruitment activities in schools, claiming that the Armed Forces use 'propaganda' to glamorise war.

One leading NUT member said "...if people aren't old enough to vote, drive or drink at 16, then they shouldn't be allowed to fight for their country...". The NUT also said that they will back staff who send in 'anti-war' speakers to give pupils an alternative view, and openly stated that their aim is to deepen the military's manpower crisis and force the return of troops from Iraq and Afghanistan. Now the NUT do not have the power to stop the Armed Forces from recruiting in schools, but the stance they have taken in this instance I see to be very sad. The truth is that although 16 year olds can join the Armed Forces upon leaving school, they cannot take part in actual military operations until they reach 18. The military has given a sense of belonging and hope to many young people who may be failing at school, who know, because of school recruitment, that the Armed Forces will give them a career even if they don't get any GCSE's. What better way is there to channel the frustration and sense of rejection which many disaffected and unskilled school-leavers face, than to put them in a military setting?

If it were up to me, National Service would have been brought back along time ago. A mandatory 2 or 3 years service in a highly motivated, disciplined, and educating environment would do the same good today, as it did 50 years ago. My Grandfather, the seventh son and eighth child of 2 working-class parents, would never have seen 1950's Egypt, Algeria and Cyprus had it not been for his National Service. He would not be able to speak Sudanese Arabic nor have the cultural understanding of Arabs today had it not been for those brief 3 years when he was my age. I see so many people now, whom I'm sure you're aware, that have never been abroad and don't have any plans to do so. I see so many people now, who are claiming benefits because their parents have never taught them the value of motivation or hard-work. Crime is rising fast, we allow school age children to terrorise the streets and damage public property, we fail to bring up our children as a nation and then expect the government to find them a prison place. Why not let the military teach our children respect, loyalty and pride, and show them diversity of the world by taking them around it first hand?

To take a country which implements national service for example, Israel is a key role-model here. The streets of Tel Aviv are said to be some of the safest in the region, and the amount of law-abiding citizens aged between 16-24 there put our country to shame. The principles of respect, loyalty and pride passed down to them because of national service have ensured the Israeli youth are not the type to mug or beat one up should one past by them in the street. A reality which is normal and widely accepted in many parts of the UK after 6pm.

Many teenagers from disadvantaged areas have traditionally seen a career in the military as a way to improve their prospects, and for this reason I hope to God that teenagers take no notice of the NUT on this matter. If the National Union of Teachers could have their way, disadvantaged kids would be at home for the rest of their lives and not be given the opportunity to join the military; better prospects or not. All the NUT care about is damaging the Armed Forces as much as possible by brain-washing our children, a process which is happening while we, safe in the knowledge that our children's teachers are 'educating' them, are at work. If anything it's time to promote military recruitment in schools, Labour has already cut spending on the Armed Forces to stupidly low levels in recent years, surely the people most loyal to our Queen and country do not deserve another cowardly and unnecessary blow from the left.

My stay at the Midland last week was, I'm glad to say, a pleasant one. But I'm not surprised that if anyone was going to have an annual conference then, it had to be the NUT...

(Picture 1: The Midland Hotel Manchester.)
(Picutre 2: British troops on duty in Iraq.)

The Bias Broadcasting Corporation

In the wake of the recent death of Flashman author, and Isle of Man resident, George MacDonald Fraser, the Daily Mail published a series of essays in which he had detailed the declining nature of the United Kingdom. In them, he describes the decay of ordinary morality, standards of decency, sportsmanship, politeness, respect for the law, family values, politics and religion in Britain which has upheld our society for generations; and of the social engineering of the past few decades which has seen the PC lobby transform the education system so that they above all can dictate what and how our young people will learn in schools. This latter occurance likens to somesort of fascist state of Orwellian conception, a government who controls and restrics the learning of children in our schools. Teaching slavery as though it was an 18th century British idea, the bias anti-monarchical teaching of King Henry Tudor's notorious reign as if to warn children of what an unchallenged King or Queen has the potential to do, and the introduction of General Studies which seems to work around truth and fact using carefully designed Politically Correct dampers. For example, mentioning the great feats of the peace icon Nelson Mandela against South Africa's aparteid, without mentioning he was actually a co-founder and subsequent leader of a militant, terrorist organisation; or of the mentioning of Communism without mentioning that Socialism is actually its milder form, and that our Labour government founds itself proudly on Socialist principles. Surely it is for the benefit of us all if our children are also taught to be free thinkers in the process of learning at school, providing them with all the facts about a subject before they are to be tested on their knowledge of it. That is what I would consider to be a healthy and adaquate education system, and by succumbing to anything less we are effectively grooming them up for the future benches of New Labour.

The influencing of the people of Britain by the PC lobby also spans into the bias workings of the media through our Orwellian conceived, everyday televisions, in which a supposedly 'impartial' broadcasting corporation, known as the BBC, uses its state funding to propogate onto our screens whatever it deems fit. The truth of the matter is that we are actually abliged by law to pay the BBC, through our TV licenses, which allows the corporation to dictate and restrict whatever we see from morning till night on their channels; whether it be the opinions of the Liberal Democrat ministers on government policy, or the 'modern adaptations' of Jane Austens over-fished drama's, and most things broadcast seem to have political undertones. The BBC also has reach of the minds of British children through the mediators of programmes like Blue Peter and SMart, who's actual presenters such as Richard Bacon and Mark Speight don't seem to be thought of as influential role models, and so are left to their own illegal drug taking devices without any mentioning of moral obligation. Even the thought that presenters (and Angus Deayton is another one) should be morally-fit to represent our high British standards of decency and sign of well spending of taxpayers money is almost laughable in the eyes of the media chiefs. It would seem as though the core of British Liberalism has exceeded the once evident social boundries of pit villages and unions, and has firmly made its way into of one of the greatest influencing weapons known to man, but does the responsibility in the decline of our morality and national culture really lie with the most influential organisation? The success of propoganda throughout the ages has proved to be a mighty force in the overthrowing of the English King, the beheading of the French Aristocracy, and the electing of a German Supreme Chancellor, it is a collective opinion which convinces the masses to agree with whoever conceived it. Just look at China, its Communist government carefully moderates all news channels and stories which are to be publically seen, even limiting the internet so that no free thought or additional influences can be accessed by the population. They understand the power of the media, and realise that it has the capability to overthrow even the most brutal and intollerant of regimes whatever their political standing.

No doubt we are all influenced by the media, but perhaps if people had a little more discretion in identifying the political motives of news channels and television companies like the BBC, we would all be in less danger of adhereing to the liberality which has no room for tradition in Britain. The wider populations attitude to current events and politics has been dramatically affected by the media in the last century, almost to a state of social revolution. Never before has so wide an audience been subject to the views of others, and the consequence of such huge advancements in our technology has led us to huge social changes in a just a few generations. The evidence of this 'liberalisation' in society which has led to many changes in public opinion, stems from the fact that although our British government has changed hands back and forth since the great days of imperialism, influences from the liberal controlled media has shown no evidence of drastic change. It is as though Brtiains main media centre (being the BBC) has been privatised to the extent that the views of those in control of it do not match those of any political party. Subsequently leaving the state funded organisation to pick and choose what it wants to tell and show people, depending on where it stands on certain political issues. This predicts that even if a far-left wing government took power tomorrow, the media would still have the ability to opinionate the population of the country in its arguably more moderate centre-left views.

I have no problem with our freedoms of speech, nor of a private organisation or corporation's right to promote its political morals or ideals; as Voltaire once famously said "I may not agree with what you have to say, but I will defend to the end your right to say it"; but to have in todays Britain a publically funded organisation seemingly exempt from debate or democratic process, manipulating how we live as a society is quite frankly a discrace. If the BBC is to be continued to be funded by the people of Britain by law, then it should have the decency to be completely politically impartial, as it all too often claims to be...