Ouch! Talkpermalink
Gordon Brown's bad writing
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www.guardian.co.uk/c...
Is this a disability matter? To be frank I'm finding it pretty hard to have much sympathy with either side. -
Yes clearly it is a disability issue but in this case it is one where as Prime Minister he must bear the full responsibility for not having made sure he made use of the reasonable adjustment of having someone double check his hand written note before sending it.
More than this though I think what has happened is simply a reflection of the way that we as a people, i.e. ordinary UK citizens, are no longer prepared to be treated as the sheep being led rather than politians now being held fully to account as our representatives not our rulers.
This, of course, is also now happening with regard to the more specific case of diability representation whereby ordinary disabled people like myself and others here and elsewhere are no longer prepared to be treated like mushrooms kept in the dark and fed on political B.S. via bodies like 2025 and the EHRC that right now are actually now depriving rather than increasing our direct involvement in decision making and policy in line with the requirements of the DED.
We as a population have grown up and will no longer suffer being treated like children regardless of whether or not we are disabled.This is a reply to this message.
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This isn't really about "disability", the dead solider or the army - it more to do with Rupert's anti-democratic evil media empire demonstrating its abilitty to "win the next General Election".
Hitler had Mein Kampf - Murdoch has "The Sun"...This is a reply to this message.
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Yes, and surely, the woman who immediately contacts the Sun to reveal this is being 'sheep' like. Why are there people whose first thought is to contact a national newspaper? What on earth does she want to achieve by doing this?
I think Gordon has subsequently phoned her up - presumably she'll also be complaining about that.This is a reply to this message.
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Try listening to the recording and/or reading the transcipts that are now available and to his shame Brown is still only sorry she took it badly and not actually apologising at all for his own and the governments shortcommings.
This is not party political but as I said earlier a symptom of a wider problem of a UK population that rightly feels neglected and unheard by polititians of all shades of the rainbow and who collectively are now saying enough is enough.This is a reply to this message.
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Its the thin end of the wedge again.
Expect people to accept the thin end, then make it fatter.
The same principle about everything, and the base that makes it acceptable.
Hate crime, starts with someone calling you a fraud, ends in firebombing.
Disrespect, starts with getting the name wrong, ends in, well its just a name...
No its not just a name. Its a person, a dead person.
Gordon doesn't feel he has been disrespectful as he fails to recognise that people deserve respect.This is a reply to this message.
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I think one of the commenters has made a good point - that if he can't write properly, and if it would be inappropriate to just put a signature at the bottom of a letter typed by a secretary, then it might be a better balance of respect, access and practicality to simply make a phone call in order to express condolences personally.
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I think Sue Arnold's right, I think it's a disability issue. My handwriting is, basically, illegible. Gordon Brown's is more legible than mine, judging by that letter, but I still felt immediate empathy when I saw the letter.
Channel 4 News (I think) pointed out that when GB was reading out the list of the dead in parliament, he mistook the same soldier's name for 'James'. That could've been an error on the part of someone compiling the list, it could just as easily have been a sight issue.
Given that it IS an issue, I don't fully understand why he doesn't get someone to read through and check - Access to Work would pay! - unless he considers the correspondence to be entirely private between him and the bereaved, which would be a legitimate thought on his part.
I do occasionally handwrite letters to close friends, anything over two lines is of questionable legibility. Usually if I'm taking the time to handwrite, neither me or the person I'm writing to would appreciate a third party proof reader.
So, yeah, arguably he should've got someone to check the letter for him, but not necessarily. I do think that this has become such a massive story is more to do with the current political agenda of the Sun newspaper than much else.
WWThis is a reply to this message.
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This posting has been hidden during moderation because it broke the House Rules in some way.
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In this age of PCs and emails I was surprised to hear that the handwriting of letters to, especially, bereaved families of service personnel is a trend resurrected by Thatcher and continued through Major, Blair and on to Brown.
Given the difficulties Brown has with his eyesight; and, the fact his handwriting is atrocious; maybe it would be more circumspect for Brown to dictate letters and sign them off.
On a more controversial note; unfortunately, when soldiers are deployed in ‘war’ zones it is inevitable that both causalities and fatalities will occur. From 1956-1959 over 370 British troops were killed in Cyprus during the campaign against EOKA on Cyprus; the Aden Emergency, 1963-1967, saw some 200 British dead; and, in 38-years of ‘The Troubles’ British Army and police killed numbered nearly 750.
What do we expect when we send our troops into places they’re not welcome. When have soldiers ever had the right equipment or enough resources? Historically we read of commanders at odds with governments over the under-deployment of troops, ill equipped forces and poorly provisioned quartermasters.
Anyone who joins the armed services must do so with the knowledge that one day they may be called to arms; and, if called to arms there is a possibility they will be injured or even killed. Joining the army in order to gain qualifications to better equip oneself in the modern world obviously has a bigger price tag attached to it today.
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Anyone who joins the armed services must do so with the knowledge that one day they may be called to arms; and, if called to arms there is a possibility they will be injured or even killed.
I totally agree, but lets face it, 16 is a very young age to sign your life away, at 17 u can be a fully fledged soilder, and at 18 already have a rank, with a licence to kill
these heroes are the people that let us moan about our treatment for being disabled, were it not for these, we would be moaning about bombs going off down our street, thats if we were not dead outselves.
I say, stand behind our soldiers, or feel free to stand infront
they deserve all the help and support they can get. the arguement of "you knew you might have to go shooting one day" is fine for them, what about their families at home, terrified and lonely, waiting for that knock, watching the news every hour, praying they will get an weekly email again
it must be awful, i think they have just as tough as lives as us, in very different ways, risk their lives, go through pain, go through anxiety, have friends die, etcetc the only difference is, its not disablity doing this, its war.
and they dont get paid much more than we do either.
whatever the reasons behind the war, be it drugs, oil, bombs, men with dodgy beirds, who knows what lies on above top secret papers, we shud support the people who go because they have been told to.This is a reply to this message.
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Rob - maybe you should have a read of this
www.thesource.me.uk/...
before you say:
"16 is a very young age to sign your life away"This is a reply to this message.
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these heroes are the people that let us moan about our treatment for being disabled, were it not for these, we would be moaning about bombs going off down our street, thats if we were not dead outselves.
As a rule, it’s not the armed forces who prevent bombs going off ‘down our streets’; were this the case we’d see armed soldiers and armoured vehicles on our streets. Unfortunately, it is as a result of our troops in Afghanistan, and up to recently in Iraq, that has increased the likelihood of disaffected groups resorting to letting off bombs in the UK.
If our troops were not engaged in futile operations in countries that don’t want them, there is less chance that we’d be a target of Al Qaida or other fundamental groups. However, as long as we’re occupying foreign land and slavishly following the US anti-Palestinian stance; I’m afraid we will be a target.
I say, stand behind our soldiers, or feel free to stand infront
I say we should keep out of situations that don’t concern us. I say pull the troops out of Afghanistan; and, leave the Afghans to deal with their own problems.
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I'm sorry but I don't quite understand the following sentence of yours:
However, as long as we’re occupying foreign land and slavishly following the US anti-Palestinian stance; I’m afraid we will be a target.
Why exactly, are Afghanistan, Iraq, Al Qaida etc due to an "anti-Palestinian stance"?This is a reply to this message.
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I think this is a disability issue, and I must say that I actually felt sick when I read about this woman's complaints - not to mention the way she charged off to contact the 'Sun' the moment she felt she had a story that would appeal to a paper written and read by sensationalist, kneejerk-reaction-loving, ignoramuses. How, in fact, did the Sun obtain the recording of Ms James' phone conversation with Gordon Brown? Did she record it for them, or did they do it once they had become involved? Either way, it's not very impressive. Listening to part of the conversation on the radio earlier, it appears that Ms Janes failed to understand that her son had been mortally wounded by an IED - she seemed to think his injuries were caused by the failure to get him to hospital immediately - a failure which (I gather) was caused by an ambush after the explosion.
I haven't generally got an awful lot of time for Gordon Brown, but he has my full support on this matter. I do agree that the letter could have been checked, but I still feel that Ms James was criticizing Gordon Brown for something which occurred as a result of his partial blindness - it's not as though he is a person with 20-20 vision who just couldn't be bothered to write a tidy letter. He couldn't see properly what he was doing, and especially in view of this, it was a good gesture for him to take the trouble to write a letter himself. Other posters have suggested he could have signed a typewritten letter - I daresay Ms Janes would have complained to the Sun that this was insufficiently personal.This is a reply to this message.
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I disagree wheelthing.
There has been terrorism in my town based on nothing more than the fact that some of the more bigoted people of a certain race felt that the arrest of one of them for putting a woman in hospital was racist and therefore entitled them to send bomb threats and attack the police.
I don't think the army being in these places is the reasoning behind anything, if they didn't have that for an excuse, they'd find another. After all we are the "infidels" and it is a 'holy cause' to take up 'jihad' and murder women and children in the name of a God.
The people who run these groups are no different to people like Hitler, if you're not of their race and religion? You're considered trash by them.
Recently the moderates in our community had to chase out a man who was preaching death to anyone who wasn't muslim because he felt that the world should belong to muslims and that anyone else should be murdered in the name of 'purity'.
People like that aren't reacting to anything, they're bigots.
To be blunt, what provocation was there for 9/11? As much as I don't like the war myself, 9/11 was an unprovoked attack on the USA.
Some of the people fighting in places like Iraq might be freedom fighters but those who come and preach for the murder of innocents because they're not of the same race? or who organise that murder? They're not freedom fighters, they're bigots with filth for souls.
As for Gordon Brown's bad writing?
I can see why he didn't make a phone call, most people don't react well to grief, so he probably didn't want to get shouted at.
He should have had someone else write it though.This is a reply to this message.
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My brother gets the pharmacist to tranlate/decipher my letters to him.
peteThis is a reply to this message.
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The major of people in the UK have little idea as to whom the Taliban are let alone the sick and twisted history of Afghanistan itself. When the Taliban were fighting the Russians, neither of the Americans nor British made a song and dance about the treatment of females in that country.
Most of us like things to be simple and straight forward - the good guys versus the bad guys - unfortunately there are rarely 'good' guys involved here. Many young British soliders are being killed by weapons the British helped the Taliban obtain.
The whole "war on terror" is a dishonest sham - it covers up more than it reveals. It throws a blanket over crucial political and ideological issues - the White House and Number Ten have done more to swell the ranks of 'fundamentalism' or put the streets of the UK and Bagdad at risk than has that Saudi fool hiding in a cave.
There is "no solution" because Imperialism is incapable of providing one - the genie is well and truly out the bottle - historical betrayals not 9/11 has created this horror. Young, mainly working class kids, are being killed and seriously impaired because of political agendas which exist in the corridors of power.This is a reply to this message.
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The only thing thisd war appears to be creating is more Disabled people. Yet those already Disabled are still held in lower value by the public than these young men and women who appear (at least if you believe the media coverage) to be getting access to rehabilitation services faster than their civilian counterparts.
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To be blunt, what provocation was there for 9/11? As much as I don't like the war myself, 9/11 was an unprovoked attack on the USA.
That'd be the United States of America? That'd be a country some two thousand miles from the United Kingdom, yes? What any reasonable person could term, another sovereign state? Now, could you explain exactly how an attack on another country by a group of Saudis caused us to invade Iraq and Afghanistan?
Do we still consider America one of our colonies? Did we get the coordinates wrong, thus missing Saudi Arabia and invading a neighbour; and, oh yes, one a few thousand miles away. Mind you; with Bush in charge anything was possible.
Some of the people fighting in places like Iraq might be freedom fighters but those who come and preach for the murder of innocents because they're not of the same race? or who organise that murder? They're not freedom fighters, they're bigots with filth for souls.
During WWII the Nazis considered the Maquis and other groups of freedom fighters terrorists. Haganah, Irgun, Lehi and the Stern Gang all regarded as terrorist organisations by the British government of the day; yet, one of their number, Yitzhak Shamir, would go on to be Prime Minister of Israel. Thatcher thought, and probably still does, that Mandela was a terrorist – today, he’s lauded by many as one of the greatest living statesmen.
Let’s be careful who we demonise. Today’s ‘terrorist’ could be tomorrow’s statesman.
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