If it is possible for someone like Andrew Tate, coming from such a background to achieve what he has (dubious as that might be) – why do none our privileged politicians, and others in positions of power and advantage, have the will, energy and imagination to actually solve the social problems of which this is just a particularly bad example.
What is the point of Eton, Oxbridge and the rest if their products get bogged down in trivia that donât matter, set targets they never achieve and let parts of the country drift out of control like this.
“The doctrine of the environment reduces man to an absolute nonentity, exempts him totally from every personal moral duty and from all independence, reduces him to the lowest form of slavery imaginable.” âIt’s very rare to find a person capable of handling his gift. The talent almost always enslaves its possessor, taking him, as it were, by the scruff of the neck and carrying him off far away from his proper path.â
Dostoevsky undoubtedly had talent, and was also capable of talking complete cobblers. A Tate, on the other hand, is a world supremo at talking cobblers, but has zero talent.
Fair enough. There were two of D’s comments. The first is so absolutist that it’s absurd. The second is D essentially talking about himself while nominally talking about others. He could write wonderful literature but couldn’t handle his talented life, which was an utter mess. But masses of highly, even astonishingly, talented people ultimately manage their talent perfectly well.
Fair enough. There were two of D’s comments. The first is so absolutist that it’s absurd. The second is D essentially talking about himself while nominally talking about others. He could write wonderful literature but couldn’t handle his talented life, which was an utter mess. But masses of highly, even astonishingly, talented people ultimately manage their talent perfectly well.
Dostoevsky undoubtedly had talent, and was also capable of talking complete cobblers. A Tate, on the other hand, is a world supremo at talking cobblers, but has zero talent.
Survival of the fittest is a simple reason.
Over the whole of history some people rise to the top of pile gaining money, strength or monopolising resources.
Competition is not a good idea so a simple fact of pulling up the ladder behind these people maintains them at the top of the pile.
Lip service is paid to “helping the disadvantaged” but little actual benefit ensues as this would be counter productive.
Two examples; house prices (and the insanity of such low interest rates for the past 10+ years). Those “with” (myself included) do very well, those “without” get further pushed down.
The socialist view of “not really black” when talking about someone from a group that is supposed to be disadvantaged but has the temerity not to accept this and do well.
Most of us just trying to enjoy some life, look after family and loved ones, take a reasonable view to supporting others, and other such efforts are, in my view, “bought” by various measures (low tax, low interest, cheap holidays, low waged “help” for our lives) simply to keep us quiescent and useful idiots to allow the real elites to prosper.
This is pretty much the definition of ‘woke’ capitalism – ‘buying’ and ‘consuming’ your way to salvation. I noticed this recently in the US. There was a shop that was selling rainbow-colored LGQT sponge cakes made by members of some native-American tribe. And I just thought who cares where they come from? It’s more important that they taste good.
The same thing is happening with women’s football. It gets far more coverage than it deserves, so the media tells people who don’t like it that they are misogynists.
Swatch has another example of this. Their LGQBT watches didn’t go down too well in Malaysia, so now Swatch harangues its Malaysian customer-base for being homophobic. Homocapitalism: where you bully your customers into buying your products because not doing so means you are an ‘-ist’ of some kind.
Basically, big corporations are filling in the role of the Catholic church by telling us what is good and not good. It’s a weird kind of consumer-moralism that depends on a hive-mind mentality. Remember when everyone and their granny were doing the ALS water-bucket challenge and putting black squares in their FB avatar? This is the same kind of thing. People no longer think for themselves, but look first to see if their thoughts are permissible by the liberal mainstream.
It’s role doesn’t cease , the job is just taken up by things less suitable.
I am fighting a battle in a company that has taken on the strange ethos of it’s founder, a rich American called Ray Dalio.
His weird gospel of ‘radical transparency’ – a very American mix of chutzpah, down-home morals, cod-psychologising and bullshit – is destroying the company day by day.
If Swatch is doing that in Malaysia, it isn’t going to work as a marketing strategy!
You make it sound at least as if big business is genuine about having so-called “progressive values”.
Actually it is generally far more cynical than that – westerners (assumed to be more sympathetic to this political ideology) get one set of messages, consumers in Asian, African and Muslim states quite another.
However, I’m not exactly sure what this has to do with the article, which in this case is about the travails and bleakness of a largely white working class community.
It’s role doesn’t cease , the job is just taken up by things less suitable.
I am fighting a battle in a company that has taken on the strange ethos of it’s founder, a rich American called Ray Dalio.
His weird gospel of ‘radical transparency’ – a very American mix of chutzpah, down-home morals, cod-psychologising and bullshit – is destroying the company day by day.
If Swatch is doing that in Malaysia, it isn’t going to work as a marketing strategy!
You make it sound at least as if big business is genuine about having so-called “progressive values”.
Actually it is generally far more cynical than that – westerners (assumed to be more sympathetic to this political ideology) get one set of messages, consumers in Asian, African and Muslim states quite another.
However, I’m not exactly sure what this has to do with the article, which in this case is about the travails and bleakness of a largely white working class community.
You aren’t actually addressing the question David Morley raises. “Survival of the fittest” is a Darwinian concept describing simply a key mechanism of biological evolution. There is a very dubious history of applying this to individuals within human society.
I also don’t agree that a measure of competition in society is not a good idea – see the entire disastrous history of Communist thought and ideology, leading to the deaths of tens of millions – far outkilling even the National Socialists.
However constrained and controlled market competition, and providing the conditions for talented people to do well (which also helps the test of us!), is hardly equivalent to letting the conditions for mass gang violence become rooted – – throwing communities effectively under the bus with neglect.
It is tragic (but also not glibly easy to solve), that someone like Andrew Tate, who obviously actually had some talent and entrepreneurial flair, should go down the disastrous route (even for himself) of trying to be the top gangster. Romania hasn’t proven to be the patriarchal paradise he imagined.
This is pretty much the definition of ‘woke’ capitalism – ‘buying’ and ‘consuming’ your way to salvation. I noticed this recently in the US. There was a shop that was selling rainbow-colored LGQT sponge cakes made by members of some native-American tribe. And I just thought who cares where they come from? It’s more important that they taste good.
The same thing is happening with women’s football. It gets far more coverage than it deserves, so the media tells people who don’t like it that they are misogynists.
Swatch has another example of this. Their LGQBT watches didn’t go down too well in Malaysia, so now Swatch harangues its Malaysian customer-base for being homophobic. Homocapitalism: where you bully your customers into buying your products because not doing so means you are an ‘-ist’ of some kind.
Basically, big corporations are filling in the role of the Catholic church by telling us what is good and not good. It’s a weird kind of consumer-moralism that depends on a hive-mind mentality. Remember when everyone and their granny were doing the ALS water-bucket challenge and putting black squares in their FB avatar? This is the same kind of thing. People no longer think for themselves, but look first to see if their thoughts are permissible by the liberal mainstream.
You aren’t actually addressing the question David Morley raises. “Survival of the fittest” is a Darwinian concept describing simply a key mechanism of biological evolution. There is a very dubious history of applying this to individuals within human society.
I also don’t agree that a measure of competition in society is not a good idea – see the entire disastrous history of Communist thought and ideology, leading to the deaths of tens of millions – far outkilling even the National Socialists.
However constrained and controlled market competition, and providing the conditions for talented people to do well (which also helps the test of us!), is hardly equivalent to letting the conditions for mass gang violence become rooted – – throwing communities effectively under the bus with neglect.
It is tragic (but also not glibly easy to solve), that someone like Andrew Tate, who obviously actually had some talent and entrepreneurial flair, should go down the disastrous route (even for himself) of trying to be the top gangster. Romania hasn’t proven to be the patriarchal paradise he imagined.
He has ‘achieved’ becoming a bullying, abusive creep who is making shedloads of money convincing millions of boys and young men that the only way up or out is to become a bullying, abusive creep so they can also make shedloads of money.
It beats being stuck in council estate hell. And you can’t get away with being a bullying, abusive creep for long, as Tate is now finding out, what with his criminal prosecution.
Judging from his recent interview with Tucker Carlson, what he’s finding out is that he can leverage his fame to keep getting just the kind of admiration he wants. Which he will duly monetise, whether in or out jail.
Judging from his recent interview with Tucker Carlson, what he’s finding out is that he can leverage his fame to keep getting just the kind of admiration he wants. Which he will duly monetise, whether in or out jail.
This may be true, but simply to blame people like Tate, easy to do. when in a way he took a rational decision in very difficult circumstances, is just avoiding the bigger issue of these sink estates and how to address their very real problems.
I don’t think it is avoiding that issue at all. As I’ve posted in other comments, I think the horrendous reality of sink estates is one of the most serious problems we have and it enrages me that it continues to be ignored.
But Andrew Tate’s choices were his own. His background might be an explanation but it is not an excuse. The man’s 36 years old for crying out loud. He’s had plenty of time to grow up into something other than the abusive lying creep he still is.
I don’t think it is avoiding that issue at all. As I’ve posted in other comments, I think the horrendous reality of sink estates is one of the most serious problems we have and it enrages me that it continues to be ignored.
But Andrew Tate’s choices were his own. His background might be an explanation but it is not an excuse. The man’s 36 years old for crying out loud. He’s had plenty of time to grow up into something other than the abusive lying creep he still is.
It beats being stuck in council estate hell. And you can’t get away with being a bullying, abusive creep for long, as Tate is now finding out, what with his criminal prosecution.
This may be true, but simply to blame people like Tate, easy to do. when in a way he took a rational decision in very difficult circumstances, is just avoiding the bigger issue of these sink estates and how to address their very real problems.
To be fair to our politicians, the problems of a completely deep rooted lack of opportunity, aspiration and the attraction of drugs and crime are not easy to solve. See also Darren McGarvey’s “Poverty Safari’.
To those people always emphasising simplistic racial roots for these problems, Marsh Farm shows this can affect people of any background.
It is much easier to fix technical problems than those of human society and behaviour.
Tateâs father is well known as a black chess grandmaster , though he looks mixed race . The racial composition of Marsh Farm is not touched on by the author . It seems to be the case that âgangsta cultureâ derived from black young men in the US is taken up by young men from other racial groups.
Tateâs father is well known as a black chess grandmaster , though he looks mixed race . The racial composition of Marsh Farm is not touched on by the author . It seems to be the case that âgangsta cultureâ derived from black young men in the US is taken up by young men from other racial groups.
“The doctrine of the environment reduces man to an absolute nonentity, exempts him totally from every personal moral duty and from all independence, reduces him to the lowest form of slavery imaginable.” âIt’s very rare to find a person capable of handling his gift. The talent almost always enslaves its possessor, taking him, as it were, by the scruff of the neck and carrying him off far away from his proper path.â
Survival of the fittest is a simple reason.
Over the whole of history some people rise to the top of pile gaining money, strength or monopolising resources.
Competition is not a good idea so a simple fact of pulling up the ladder behind these people maintains them at the top of the pile.
Lip service is paid to “helping the disadvantaged” but little actual benefit ensues as this would be counter productive.
Two examples; house prices (and the insanity of such low interest rates for the past 10+ years). Those “with” (myself included) do very well, those “without” get further pushed down.
The socialist view of “not really black” when talking about someone from a group that is supposed to be disadvantaged but has the temerity not to accept this and do well.
Most of us just trying to enjoy some life, look after family and loved ones, take a reasonable view to supporting others, and other such efforts are, in my view, “bought” by various measures (low tax, low interest, cheap holidays, low waged “help” for our lives) simply to keep us quiescent and useful idiots to allow the real elites to prosper.
He has ‘achieved’ becoming a bullying, abusive creep who is making shedloads of money convincing millions of boys and young men that the only way up or out is to become a bullying, abusive creep so they can also make shedloads of money.
To be fair to our politicians, the problems of a completely deep rooted lack of opportunity, aspiration and the attraction of drugs and crime are not easy to solve. See also Darren McGarvey’s “Poverty Safari’.
To those people always emphasising simplistic racial roots for these problems, Marsh Farm shows this can affect people of any background.
It is much easier to fix technical problems than those of human society and behaviour.
Because running a country of 70m successfully is more difficult than achieving personal success.
David Morley
1 year ago
If it is possible for someone like Andrew Tate, coming from such a background to achieve what he has (dubious as that might be) – why do none our privileged politicians, and others in positions of power and advantage, have the will, energy and imagination to actually solve the social problems of which this is just a particularly bad example.
What is the point of Eton, Oxbridge and the rest if their products get bogged down in trivia that donât matter, set targets they never achieve and let parts of the country drift out of control like this.
J Dunne
1 year ago
This article reads like the sort of condescending hand-wringing I used to read in the Guardian many years ago – before I came to my senses and stopped reading the Guardian.
Those of who grew up on estates like this know that the reality is far more mundane – and even enjoyable a lot of the time – than the dystopia this piece of hyperbolic poverty porn is trying to portray. Privileged types do love to have a good gawk at the poor.
Oh well done. You’ve somehow managed to hold on to your Grauniad-reading past by insisting that estates that are a relentless nightmare to live on are fine really and have their own wonderful poor people’s street culture and it’s all part of life’s rich tapestry. You are Polly Toynbee and I claim my ÂŁ5.
Coralie – making the odd sarcastic comment is perhaps ok, but when the person you are responding to has made precisely the opposite point to the one you are ascribing to him, it rather reflects on you!
J Dunne absolutely did NOT insist that living on such estates is a relentless nightmare:
“Those of who grew up on estates like this know that the reality is far more mundane â and even enjoyable a lot of the time â than the dystopia this piece of hyperbolic poverty porn is trying to portray”
Andrew, read my comment again. He’s insisting such estates’ awfulness is overrated. Just like the Grauniad do. I’m saying, they do exist and the reality of living on them is relentless. The couple I know who live on just over a mile from me said it used not to be this bad. There are people in the community who try and try to fix whatever they can. And just as in the article, the police are either non-existent or utterly useless. I don’t think such a reality is ‘poverty porn’ and I think it needs urgently needs attention, rather than just being shoved into public and political amnesia.
Andrew, read my comment again. He’s insisting such estates’ awfulness is overrated. Just like the Grauniad do. I’m saying, they do exist and the reality of living on them is relentless. The couple I know who live on just over a mile from me said it used not to be this bad. There are people in the community who try and try to fix whatever they can. And just as in the article, the police are either non-existent or utterly useless. I don’t think such a reality is ‘poverty porn’ and I think it needs urgently needs attention, rather than just being shoved into public and political amnesia.
Coralie – making the odd sarcastic comment is perhaps ok, but when the person you are responding to has made precisely the opposite point to the one you are ascribing to him, it rather reflects on you!
J Dunne absolutely did NOT insist that living on such estates is a relentless nightmare:
“Those of who grew up on estates like this know that the reality is far more mundane â and even enjoyable a lot of the time â than the dystopia this piece of hyperbolic poverty porn is trying to portray”
I’m not saying it’s all invented, but that the negativity is exaggerated.
Writers of articles like this treat the exercise like a safari field trip, making observations from their own middle class perspectives and woefully failing to understand that many of the people living on the estates are decent people who are also mostly happy to be there.
Don’t get me wrong, there were some awful scrotes on the Manchester estate where I grew up, but they were a minority. Even if you removed the criminals altogether, the working class culture, worldview and sense of humour would still remain. And it would still be completely alien to hand-wringing liberal types who can never comprehend that not everyone wants to be the same as them.
I’m not saying it’s all invented, but that the negativity is exaggerated.
Writers of articles like this treat the exercise like a safari field trip, making observations from their own middle class perspectives and woefully failing to understand that many of the people living on the estates are decent people who are also mostly happy to be there.
Don’t get me wrong, there were some awful scrotes on the Manchester estate where I grew up, but they were a minority. Even if you removed the criminals altogether, the working class culture, worldview and sense of humour would still remain. And it would still be completely alien to hand-wringing liberal types who can never comprehend that not everyone wants to be the same as them.
Oh well done. You’ve somehow managed to hold on to your Grauniad-reading past by insisting that estates that are a relentless nightmare to live on are fine really and have their own wonderful poor people’s street culture and it’s all part of life’s rich tapestry. You are Polly Toynbee and I claim my ÂŁ5.
Are you suggesting this is all invented? Not all estates are the same and some are truly grim.
See also Darren McGarvey’s writing about Pollok in Glasgow.
Last edited 1 year ago by Andrew Fisher
J Dunne
1 year ago
This article reads like the sort of condescending hand-wringing I used to read in the Guardian many years ago – before I came to my senses and stopped reading the Guardian.
Those of who grew up on estates like this know that the reality is far more mundane – and even enjoyable a lot of the time – than the dystopia this piece of hyperbolic poverty porn is trying to portray. Privileged types do love to have a good gawk at the poor.
Malcolm Webb
1 year ago
The Woke Net Zero obsessed deindustrialisation of the U.K. is a sure fire way to create very many more Marsh Farm estates throughout the U.K. Just stop this anti working class madness now.
Malcolm Webb
1 year ago
The Woke Net Zero obsessed deindustrialisation of the U.K. is a sure fire way to create very many more Marsh Farm estates throughout the U.K. Just stop this anti working class madness now.
Alka Hughes-Hallett
1 year ago
Andrew Tateâs story begins with his motherâs and fatherâs story. What was their experience of life? Where was the father when he was growing up? What was his influence on his sons? It starts with the parental lack of awareness, neglect and responsibility. Life weighs you down, everything downstream takes a beating too, societal structures are weak and broken, there is no one to pick up the pieces and guide you when you are down or confused . âLord of fliesâ instinct takes over and turns young minds back to savage, primal, survival mode. Small material successes become extremely important and the basis to build on by any means possible.
Andrew Tate is just a misunderstood little boy to his mother: she cannot control nor understand the role she played in his views, actions & incarceration. The father? Nonexistent in the article. We have to come to terms with the fact that our society is also made up of such fractured lives. Andrew Tate is the consequence of such a broken society. So whoâs to blame? No one individually, but all of us collectively. These are our children, our families, our society. The pace of movement in our lives is frightening, fast and furious. Either we slow it down or pull those that canât keep up along with us or accept that Andrew Tates are made by us, our desire for more. This desire seeps into a mind warped by familial and societal neglect with the tools available to exploit it, unchecked, warps even more till we are forced to take notice because it starts to touch our lives.
I am not sure how it can be put into action but I think the responsibility lies with all of us, when there is an opportunity to act in a manner that has an effect on how you want your children to turn out, we should fully embrace it. If we as parents and society members take charge of our thoughts and actions, the consequences will drip feed into the society and we will activate the change we wish to see. It could be the start we are looking for.
I think thatâs just making excuses personally. Yes he had a rough upbringing, and yes that certainly often leads to worse outcomes in life (which is why I believe meritocracy to be nonsense as we donât all have the same opportunities).
However, if he has done the crimes heâs accused of then thatâs solely on him. If heâd ended up on the dole and on the gear Iâd say his environment would be a large contributing factor, but not many people end up in human trafficking simply because they were brought up on a rough estate. A crime that serious suggests an absence of morals or a conscience rather than a simple lack of opportunities
Exactly …. This is not a case of “I am my brother’s keeper.” It’s a case of getting rid of the menaces in society.
And there is another grave menace in society that preaches very much like Andrew Tate only it’s housed in a masjid. The other celebrity of Luton is Tommy Robinson, slayer of groomers. Whereas Andrew Tate is a notorious G who converted to Islam, Tommy Robinson is a hero.
Exactly …. This is not a case of “I am my brother’s keeper.” It’s a case of getting rid of the menaces in society.
And there is another grave menace in society that preaches very much like Andrew Tate only it’s housed in a masjid. The other celebrity of Luton is Tommy Robinson, slayer of groomers. Whereas Andrew Tate is a notorious G who converted to Islam, Tommy Robinson is a hero.
âMerit is nonsenseâ is nonsense. Of course we donât all have the same opportunities. A five foot tall 50-year-old isnât going to be a Balenciaga runway model. But she might be a witty columnist or the outstanding mother of happy, successful children, or both.
I think you might replace âopportunity â with ambition, desire, and drive. We definitely donât all have those.
Or principles. Which you don’t mention. Because of course they can really get in the way of where your ‘ambition, desire and drive’ are aiming to get you. I shouldn’t think any of those three elements are lacking in the majority of our MPs for example. But I also think the majority of our MPs wouldn’t recognise a principle if it was, to quote the immortal Plum, handed to them on a plate with a bit of watercress round it.
Personal experience makes me disagree. Iâve dealt with a lot of higher ups in my working life, and almost all of them went to the top schools and had friends and family members in prominent positions that gave them a leg up when starting their working lives. Iâve never noticed any higher levels of intelligence or work ethic amongst this cohort compared to any others that would explain their success as it were, in almost ever case itâs due to the fact they had opportunities when they started that simply werenât there for a majority of others.
Would you support the abolition of private schools? If you believe in meritocracy then surely youâd be in favour of enduring all kids get as close to the same standard of education as possible, to try and ensure the cream rises to the top on its own merit rather than due to its background?
Or principles. Which you don’t mention. Because of course they can really get in the way of where your ‘ambition, desire and drive’ are aiming to get you. I shouldn’t think any of those three elements are lacking in the majority of our MPs for example. But I also think the majority of our MPs wouldn’t recognise a principle if it was, to quote the immortal Plum, handed to them on a plate with a bit of watercress round it.
Personal experience makes me disagree. Iâve dealt with a lot of higher ups in my working life, and almost all of them went to the top schools and had friends and family members in prominent positions that gave them a leg up when starting their working lives. Iâve never noticed any higher levels of intelligence or work ethic amongst this cohort compared to any others that would explain their success as it were, in almost ever case itâs due to the fact they had opportunities when they started that simply werenât there for a majority of others.
Would you support the abolition of private schools? If you believe in meritocracy then surely youâd be in favour of enduring all kids get as close to the same standard of education as possible, to try and ensure the cream rises to the top on its own merit rather than due to its background?
I don’t disagree with you, but these council estates are bad bad places. I lived on one growing up and they are rife with sexual abuse. One girl in my class was sleeping with her father and she would often come to school smelling of urine and feces. There were many other examples of children living in conditions like this.While I do generally advocate personal responsibility, there are some family situations that need more than a ‘pull your socks up’ mentality.
I think this is why, as an educator, I get so annoyed by so many social justice causes. Most of them are about glorifying victimhood and using it to enrich one’s self. They hardly ever tackle difficult or distasteful matters. Much easier to blame the world’s ills on capitalism or systemic racism.
âMerit is nonsenseâ is nonsense. Of course we donât all have the same opportunities. A five foot tall 50-year-old isnât going to be a Balenciaga runway model. But she might be a witty columnist or the outstanding mother of happy, successful children, or both.
I think you might replace âopportunity â with ambition, desire, and drive. We definitely donât all have those.
I don’t disagree with you, but these council estates are bad bad places. I lived on one growing up and they are rife with sexual abuse. One girl in my class was sleeping with her father and she would often come to school smelling of urine and feces. There were many other examples of children living in conditions like this.While I do generally advocate personal responsibility, there are some family situations that need more than a ‘pull your socks up’ mentality.
I think this is why, as an educator, I get so annoyed by so many social justice causes. Most of them are about glorifying victimhood and using it to enrich one’s self. They hardly ever tackle difficult or distasteful matters. Much easier to blame the world’s ills on capitalism or systemic racism.
The problem being that people in England no longer identify sufficiently with each other to care. England is just a shared address. To say âI canât believe English children are growing up like thisâ means nothing to many of those who are living in nice middle class areas and doing nicely thank you.
To others it sounds vaguely racist. As if we should not care more for those struggling in England than for those struggling anywhere else.
I think your aphoristic description – ‘England is just a shared address’ – is quite brilliant and horribly true. And I really don’t think it’s yet understood just how violently destructive this is. For all of us.
I grew up in inner city Manchester and still spend time there and inner city parts of Salford now. Most people have no idea how teenage boys view society, or rather don’t because they have zero interest in it and don’t even notice it exists as a social construct that has accepted rules and norms. They have never been an accepted part of it and care zero for it and are paying that back in spades. They will just take what they want.
And on top of that if you add in deprivation and being surrounded by crime and poverty, it compounds their alienation. I remember reading a description of somewhere like Moss Side and the kids there being described as “almost feral”. It is not acceptable that this level of deprivation exists in the rich world.
Thank you for the armour-plated complacency. You might remember that people said exactly the same about human slavery. Or indeed about a wife being subject to the rule of her husband. Or any number of other dismal human habits that were considered eternal. Tenacious though human habits are, it is possible to change them. But it takes a lot of effort. As opposed to settling for ’twas ever thus’.
It’s not complacency it’s being realistic. Looking back at history and the present and the future it would seem to be “twas ever thus’. Apparently It’s human nature to be thus, as far as there always being rich and poor, and never the twain shall meet.
Human history tells us that the degree to which that is true of any society depends on which society you look at, and how they decided to structure themselves. Which remains true. Compare Denmark and the UK for example.
Human history tells us that the degree to which that is true of any society depends on which society you look at, and how they decided to structure themselves. Which remains true. Compare Denmark and the UK for example.
It’s not complacency it’s being realistic. Looking back at history and the present and the future it would seem to be “twas ever thus’. Apparently It’s human nature to be thus, as far as there always being rich and poor, and never the twain shall meet.
Thank you for the armour-plated complacency. You might remember that people said exactly the same about human slavery. Or indeed about a wife being subject to the rule of her husband. Or any number of other dismal human habits that were considered eternal. Tenacious though human habits are, it is possible to change them. But it takes a lot of effort. As opposed to settling for ’twas ever thus’.
Thanks for your thoughtful reply. I lived in Mancs for 8 years and your words really hit home. It rings wholly true with me – a vacuum where an understanding of society should be. I don’t think that’s only true of dismal estates either, it’s just that the poorer you are, the more immediate and obvious are the effects. It scares the hell out of me, because without that shared understanding we’re all down the pan.
I think it’s particularly dangerous for boys and young men because at the same time as that atomisation – which has been going on for at least 30 years – you have the gross distortions of academic ‘feminist’ (they’re not) career-builders telling them that simply being born male is poisonous, and they’re good for nowt.
Then into that comes the vile Tate. Cue fascinated media blitz on ‘gosh why?’ Christ alive, how blind and deaf do they have to be? Even I can see a bloody train when it’s coming. Sorry, rant over (must calm down and have cuppa).
And on top of that if you add in deprivation and being surrounded by crime and poverty, it compounds their alienation. I remember reading a description of somewhere like Moss Side and the kids there being described as “almost feral”. It is not acceptable that this level of deprivation exists in the rich world.
Thanks for your thoughtful reply. I lived in Mancs for 8 years and your words really hit home. It rings wholly true with me – a vacuum where an understanding of society should be. I don’t think that’s only true of dismal estates either, it’s just that the poorer you are, the more immediate and obvious are the effects. It scares the hell out of me, because without that shared understanding we’re all down the pan.
I think it’s particularly dangerous for boys and young men because at the same time as that atomisation – which has been going on for at least 30 years – you have the gross distortions of academic ‘feminist’ (they’re not) career-builders telling them that simply being born male is poisonous, and they’re good for nowt.
Then into that comes the vile Tate. Cue fascinated media blitz on ‘gosh why?’ Christ alive, how blind and deaf do they have to be? Even I can see a bloody train when it’s coming. Sorry, rant over (must calm down and have cuppa).
I could say the same thing about where I live. It depends how rooted you feel, or if you were born and raised where you live. The power of “Place” is an individual thing. I still feel more rooted in England than I ever will in the US despite living the last 50 years here.
I grew up in inner city Manchester and still spend time there and inner city parts of Salford now. Most people have no idea how teenage boys view society, or rather don’t because they have zero interest in it and don’t even notice it exists as a social construct that has accepted rules and norms. They have never been an accepted part of it and care zero for it and are paying that back in spades. They will just take what they want.
I could say the same thing about where I live. It depends how rooted you feel, or if you were born and raised where you live. The power of “Place” is an individual thing. I still feel more rooted in England than I ever will in the US despite living the last 50 years here.
I think your aphoristic description – ‘England is just a shared address’ – is quite brilliant and horribly true. And I really don’t think it’s yet understood just how violently destructive this is. For all of us.
Well I’ll be darned! So Tate’s father treated his mother and sons no better than the pawns he dispatched from a chess board? His son, after sniffing drainpipes in Marsh Farm, swops being a pawn for being in control of porn. Hmm
Emory Tate was a chess player of the most extraordinary natural talent, though his results never quite matched his legendary status in the African-American community. He certainly “ploughed his own furrow”, mostly travelling between one tournament and the next, and it is believable that he played only a minor role in the upbringing of his young sons even while notionally living with their mother.
Or to put it another way, he didn’t give any more of a toss for his girlfriend and son than his son gives for his mother, or indeed anyone else. Something of a role model then.
The guy was a high level chess player and a nut case that was allegedly kicked out from CIA. His mother clearly had issues as well, since no healthy woman would have kids with a nutter like Emory
Emory Tate had an honourable career as an Air Force Staff Sargeant.
I believe the CIA thing is an urban myth – and would not in any case be that much of a black mark, they are a strange bunch.
Emory Tate had an honourable career as an Air Force Staff Sargeant.
I believe the CIA thing is an urban myth – and would not in any case be that much of a black mark, they are a strange bunch.
Or to put it another way, he didn’t give any more of a toss for his girlfriend and son than his son gives for his mother, or indeed anyone else. Something of a role model then.
The guy was a high level chess player and a nut case that was allegedly kicked out from CIA. His mother clearly had issues as well, since no healthy woman would have kids with a nutter like Emory
Don’t read too much into it, Allison – I was curious enough to check Andrew Tate’s Wikipedia page when the “Where was his father?” question was posed, and his dad’s background just…wasn’t what I expected. I’m not making any kind of value judgment.
Don’t read too much into it, Allison – I was curious enough to check Andrew Tate’s Wikipedia page when the “Where was his father?” question was posed, and his dad’s background just…wasn’t what I expected. I’m not making any kind of value judgment.
so – he got very useful genes ie most likely to succeed amongst his cohort. The determinism of biology again an uncomfortable truth that should engender serious discussion but never does……………..that joke that we are all created equal results in a copout about what might actually work with the biologically ‘disadvantaged ‘ – ie the biologically ‘average’ from disadvantaged backgrounds. The older (?) german system that no young person gets to cop out and have to either go into higher studies, a trade , the army or some type of national service. Seems pretty simple really…………….
Well I’ll be darned! So Tate’s father treated his mother and sons no better than the pawns he dispatched from a chess board? His son, after sniffing drainpipes in Marsh Farm, swops being a pawn for being in control of porn. Hmm
Emory Tate was a chess player of the most extraordinary natural talent, though his results never quite matched his legendary status in the African-American community. He certainly “ploughed his own furrow”, mostly travelling between one tournament and the next, and it is believable that he played only a minor role in the upbringing of his young sons even while notionally living with their mother.
so – he got very useful genes ie most likely to succeed amongst his cohort. The determinism of biology again an uncomfortable truth that should engender serious discussion but never does……………..that joke that we are all created equal results in a copout about what might actually work with the biologically ‘disadvantaged ‘ – ie the biologically ‘average’ from disadvantaged backgrounds. The older (?) german system that no young person gets to cop out and have to either go into higher studies, a trade , the army or some type of national service. Seems pretty simple really…………….
Good Lord such grandiose drivel! Most young men brought up by a struggling single parent, usually the mother, end up with huge respect for her, and so for women in general. However, Tate’s mother has had the huge misfortune to end up on a sink estate and who knows how she kept the family together? Those sink estates are the responsibility of government, to be precise, of bad government. Single parents are not goddesses or magicians; the absense of the father in a society that is still grossly patriarchal just compounds the situation for the single mother. I’d defy you to survive Marsh Farm and the like.
There has always been widows due to husbands being killed in wars and accidents. However, historically male members used to take on the role of the Father; there were boxing, rugby, football and cricket clubs to work off energy and boys could start working from the age of fourteen years of age. A boy who is labouring and then training for rugbyand/or boxing will have little energy left to cause trouble. Many companies had sports teams. As work would have started as early as 5 am , if farming and often at 6 to 7 am in a factory, people went to bed by 10pm.
All of the above has largely gone.
Good points. Not only are there a shortage of solid manly examples in these communities, there is a general lack of will to be a mentor or step-in father figure according to the more traditional model you sketch. And good models of manliness are not expected, perhaps not even believed in by many anymore.
*I didn’t live through and don’t have close-up cultural knowledge of the English particulars you mention, but I’d say that there are parallels in the US and elsewhere. As you noted on another board, teens and young adults with minimal academic ability or interest shouldn’t try to go to university. They should have jobs or direct-prep training, not fruitless additional years of book-learning or a community that allows them to remain like semi-feral overgrown children.
Sounds like a rather grim existance for boys and I’m not sure there would have been enough men to go around as substitute fathers since they would also be working from 6am till 10pm. Did you step in?
I don’t think 16-hour days were a norm at any time in history with the possible exception of industrial factory workers in the late 1800s, early 1900s in the US (still probably 12-15 hours). 10-12 hour days, half-a-day on Saturday after reforms that started for tradesmen in the 18th century (no more dawn-to-dusk all year round). Rough enough, of course, not a working man’s paradise.
There must be some way to split the difference between a life of punishing toil starting at 14 and oceans of free time with no real direction or purpose.
Earl of Shaftesbury and Factory Acts . It was the aristocracy with a sense of Noblesse Oblige who pushed to improve the lives of those working in factories and living in slums along with the Non Conformists.The attitude was now we have freed the slaves it is time to improve the quality of live of the poor. It was the ancestors of The Guardian( Manchester Guardian ) who opposed improving the lives of the poor. Hall of fame: Anthony Ashley Cooper, 7th Earl of Shaftesbury | The Gazette
I’ve watch it! Oh boy, oh boy, he’s soooo confused. Socialism and The Left has always been misogynist. British Socialism is no different from Islamic solcialism, see the Hisb ut Tarir, yes, they too are socialist. Socialism looks after its women and girls in a protective manner, The price we pay for that patronising, patriarchal protection is that we must behave in the manner that the Patriarchs dictate. Our postion is similar to pets. Some of us have been lucky and have wonderful owners, sadly others not so, it’s pot luck. The Left, in particular socialism, keeps a tight grip on us. That grip being seemingly benign in the West is not easy to see, but it’s there nontheless. One of the unintended consequences of capitalism is the liberation of women. For capitalism to work people must consume material goods, the more people, the better and so caitalism didn’t leave out 50% of the population.This was not out of compassion, but out of financial necessity. These other humans needed to be allowed to buy thing, and so needed to earn a living in order to buy things, and so needed an education to earn the money to buy things. That is how women become liberated and why feminists have left the Guardian. It’s why the Taliban can never take part in modern economics and are destined to poverty. Surely you get it?
I’ve watch it! Oh boy, oh boy, he’s soooo confused. Socialism and The Left has always been misogynist. British Socialism is no different from Islamic solcialism, see the Hisb ut Tarir, yes, they too are socialist. Socialism looks after its women and girls in a protective manner, The price we pay for that patronising, patriarchal protection is that we must behave in the manner that the Patriarchs dictate. Our postion is similar to pets. Some of us have been lucky and have wonderful owners, sadly others not so, it’s pot luck. The Left, in particular socialism, keeps a tight grip on us. That grip being seemingly benign in the West is not easy to see, but it’s there nontheless. One of the unintended consequences of capitalism is the liberation of women. For capitalism to work people must consume material goods, the more people, the better and so caitalism didn’t leave out 50% of the population.This was not out of compassion, but out of financial necessity. These other humans needed to be allowed to buy thing, and so needed to earn a living in order to buy things, and so needed an education to earn the money to buy things. That is how women become liberated and why feminists have left the Guardian. It’s why the Taliban can never take part in modern economics and are destined to poverty. Surely you get it?
Earl of Shaftesbury and Factory Acts . It was the aristocracy with a sense of Noblesse Oblige who pushed to improve the lives of those working in factories and living in slums along with the Non Conformists.The attitude was now we have freed the slaves it is time to improve the quality of live of the poor. It was the ancestors of The Guardian( Manchester Guardian ) who opposed improving the lives of the poor. Hall of fame: Anthony Ashley Cooper, 7th Earl of Shaftesbury | The Gazette
Not really. Many boys would prefer to work than be in school. Britain used to have vast numbers of sports teams: the church hall, companies, towns/villge Boys Brigade, Cadet Forces, Scouts.
Sergeant Stan Scott used to run army cadets in NE london . Sergeant Stan W Scott – YouTube Fairbairn-Sykes Fighting Knife – YouTube
When men such as Sergeant Stan Scott were part of the community there was little crime.
The Andrew Tates and drug dealers take over an are because of the absence of the likes of Sergeant Stan Scotts.
The Mother could call upon male relatives to give guidance and punishment. Many tough working class boys find the effete priggish middle class teachers are not adults they respect whereas they respect the practical tough craftsman, chargehand, foreman and Sergeant Stan Scotts..
Heard many stories about Stan Scott as he was an retired adult instructor in my army cadet force sector, city of London and North east sector 2 coy. I never got to meet him but all my colleagues who had the pleasure to be trained by him, had the best man to train them as well as getting them off the streets of easy London. An absolute legend of my sector and the army world and a complete bad ass. He passed away last year.
Were the teachers and other middle class “sons of privilege” really all the simpering wimps of your portrayal? Surely some served in the military too, or could play passable football, or had a measure of toughness despite a lack of privation.
I acknowledge some validity in your generalities but still think you are leaving out quite a number of tougher better off boys, as well as poor weaklings and depressives left behind in times that were in some ways crueler than today.
I have never said that.
There are major differences between the USA and Britain. Britain until recently had a much larger land owning naval military class where amateur sports were played to high standard- rugby, boxing rowing, cricket, shooting, fox hunting and their sons and daughters were sent to tough public schools.
What made Britain, Australia, South Africa and New Zealand unique was that boys from different classes and regions could be selected to play amateur sport, especially cricket and rugby union. Boys could play for the local village/town, different schools, then at country, national and in the case of rugby The Lions. Sport was seen as character building, not just for winning. The idea of building character was why organisations such as Scouts and Boys Brigade were founded.
Many public and grammar schools had masters who played sport and served in the Armed Forces. My French master was an ex Royal Marine Commando who had played rugby to a high level. He could still do press up on his finger tips in his forties and punishment was to undertake PT with him. One of the punishments was a five mile run and if one seen walking, one was caned. The public and grammar schools have a long tradition of sending pupils to the Armed Forces.
As Orwell pointed out the left wing middle class has mocked physical courage and patriotism Inside the Whale, The Limit to Pessimism, My Country Right or left plus others.
From the late 1960s, comprehensive schools becamse anti competitive sport and anti military so few men who had played sport to high level and served in the Armed Forces worked there. Many public schools had combined Cadet Forces where the the Sergeant Major was ex- regular , often PTI( Sergeant Stan Scott type) and helped with discipline. Consequently, there were discipline problems in comprehensives which leads to Andrew Tate. Public Schools and The Great War: The Generation Lost eBook : Seldon, Anthony, Walsh, David, Howard, Michael: Amazon.co.uk: Kindle Store
The children of the landowners grew up in the countryside and played with those from the village: in the USA this class is very small. In the USA money is held by people who have made it in industry, Wall Street , Hollwywood, Silicon Valley, they do not have to be brave or tough; there is no family honour to maintain. How many children of the wealthy in the USA play for the village or state cricket or rugby teams? A friend came from a family where they had supplied officers to the Black Watch since it was formed and the Father considered having a son who served in an elite military units more important than making money.
Can one imagine rugby teams from Silicon Valley the way the Welsh Valleys produced rugby teams or Stanstead Commputer Science Dept playing St Mary’s Medical School at rugby ?
What rugby and cricket achieved was to bring together people from very different social groups and areas and therefore broke down barriers. Boys may go to different schools and play for the same local teams, then be selected for county teams, national and in the case of rugby The Lions.
I would say many of the problems stated in the various Unherd articles occur because there are rigid class divides. On the cold wet muddy pitch all are equal it matters for nothing whether one is academically bright or wealthy, one parents are married or not, ones race or religion; but character does. As Dr Martin Luther King said ” Judge me on my character “. fran cotton rugby muddy – Bing images
Yes to all that. Whenever I push back at you, you produce something further of substance or interest, or both. Cheers.
I can picture “no-tackle, aerobic rugby” here in Silicon Valley. (Some adults do play the real thing around these parts, but that’s a pretty small subculture). And certainly there is still hard-contact American football here, traumatic brain injuries and all. But to your point, most of the best (US) football players, with notable exceptions like many top-notch quarterbacks, are from poor and of course low-class backgrounds.
Americans often like to imagine that there aren’t sharp class divisions among us, but that’s not true. It’s just that class is mostly based on wealth–but not only. You cannot fully “buy into” a so-called Boston Brahmin (super old money New England) crowd with money alone, especially with the “wrong accent” or, let’s face it, color. You and your new money mightn’t be ostracized, but you’re not in.
Playing sport is a great leveller and so is military service. Blacks serving in large numbers in WWII–though still in segregated divisions–probably did more to advance racial justice than any speech could do. And blacks who returned home after serving honorably overseas were a lot less likely to accept the same old de facto, second-class citizen status. Also, Jackie Robinson breaking the so-called color barrier in Major League Baseball–and playing at a star level, with undeniable dignity and character–did something that precepts and altruistic speeches never could. (Not that we’ve reached the Promised Land, mind you). We are drawn together even as spectators of sport, but not in the same way that players are. And there’s always some violent psycho-fans, on both sides of the Atlantic.
Many Americans of every skin tone are still unable to judge people “not by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character”. A similar situation prevails between people of different class/status, political affiliation, etc. What a divided mess we’re in here in these Yoo-nited States!
Sport in Britain has always been a great mixer, men from all walks of life played cricket and rugby union. A farm labourer could have played alongside Prince Ranji for Sussex . Ranjitsinhji – Wikipedia
Rugby Union was amateur. The Welsh team comprised coal miners and medical consultants ( JPR Williams Millfield School and St Marys Medical School ) . The Greatest Try – All Blacks vs Barbarians 1973 – YouTube
Prince Obolensky scored one of England’s finest trys. England rugby team defeats New Zealand (1936) – YouTube
People played for the love of the game and the honour of representing their country: not money.
How would the Andrew Tates of the World cope playing the All Blacks ? COLIN MEADS 17: NZ’s TOP HISTORY MAKERS – YouTube
Sir Colin was a farmer and once carried in playing rugby after he broke his arm. When boys are training in rugby, especially if one is against a Fran Cotton, JPR Williams or a Sir Colin Meads one does not have energy to cause trouble. All these men in gyms cannot train the for reality of 80 mins of rugby and then 20 minutes of extra time when one constantly being tackled and making the tackle.
One of the top rugby schools is Harrow which educated W Churchill and Nehru. Top 5 School Teams of the Weekend: Round 2 – 18th September – YouTube
If the left wing middle class are so supportive of the manual blue collar working class why do they not play Rugby League, the most working class of sports?
A major reason is that the wing middle class intellectuals largely lack the strength, fitness, toughness and aggression of men such as Meads, Obolensky, Cotton, JPR Williams, etc, Williams once had his cheek ripped by an All Black stamping on him and needed 30 sticthes and returned to the game. All Black fails to apologise for ripping open JPR’s face as he finally speaks out on horror incident – Wales Online
Andrew Tate is a product of the post 1960s Welfare System and denigration of chivalry which ignores the fact that unless male aggression and energy is channelled in a constructive manner it becomes destructive. Perhaps if gangs were forced to play rugby in winter and cricket in summer there would be less violence?
Sport in Britain has always been a great mixer, men from all walks of life played cricket and rugby union. A farm labourer could have played alongside Prince Ranji for Sussex . Ranjitsinhji – Wikipedia
Rugby Union was amateur. The Welsh team comprised coal miners and medical consultants ( JPR Williams Millfield School and St Marys Medical School ) . The Greatest Try – All Blacks vs Barbarians 1973 – YouTube
Prince Obolensky scored one of England’s finest trys. England rugby team defeats New Zealand (1936) – YouTube
People played for the love of the game and the honour of representing their country: not money.
How would the Andrew Tates of the World cope playing the All Blacks ? COLIN MEADS 17: NZ’s TOP HISTORY MAKERS – YouTube
Sir Colin was a farmer and once carried in playing rugby after he broke his arm. When boys are training in rugby, especially if one is against a Fran Cotton, JPR Williams or a Sir Colin Meads one does not have energy to cause trouble. All these men in gyms cannot train the for reality of 80 mins of rugby and then 20 minutes of extra time when one constantly being tackled and making the tackle.
One of the top rugby schools is Harrow which educated W Churchill and Nehru. Top 5 School Teams of the Weekend: Round 2 – 18th September – YouTube
If the left wing middle class are so supportive of the manual blue collar working class why do they not play Rugby League, the most working class of sports?
A major reason is that the wing middle class intellectuals largely lack the strength, fitness, toughness and aggression of men such as Meads, Obolensky, Cotton, JPR Williams, etc, Williams once had his cheek ripped by an All Black stamping on him and needed 30 sticthes and returned to the game. All Black fails to apologise for ripping open JPR’s face as he finally speaks out on horror incident – Wales Online
Andrew Tate is a product of the post 1960s Welfare System and denigration of chivalry which ignores the fact that unless male aggression and energy is channelled in a constructive manner it becomes destructive. Perhaps if gangs were forced to play rugby in winter and cricket in summer there would be less violence?
“Many public and grammar schools had masters who played sport and served in the Armed Forces. My French master was an ex Royal Marine Commando”
The deputy head of my prep school served with the 8th Army and left his leg behind in North Africa.
Yes to all that. Whenever I push back at you, you produce something further of substance or interest, or both. Cheers.
I can picture “no-tackle, aerobic rugby” here in Silicon Valley. (Some adults do play the real thing around these parts, but that’s a pretty small subculture). And certainly there is still hard-contact American football here, traumatic brain injuries and all. But to your point, most of the best (US) football players, with notable exceptions like many top-notch quarterbacks, are from poor and of course low-class backgrounds.
Americans often like to imagine that there aren’t sharp class divisions among us, but that’s not true. It’s just that class is mostly based on wealth–but not only. You cannot fully “buy into” a so-called Boston Brahmin (super old money New England) crowd with money alone, especially with the “wrong accent” or, let’s face it, color. You and your new money mightn’t be ostracized, but you’re not in.
Playing sport is a great leveller and so is military service. Blacks serving in large numbers in WWII–though still in segregated divisions–probably did more to advance racial justice than any speech could do. And blacks who returned home after serving honorably overseas were a lot less likely to accept the same old de facto, second-class citizen status. Also, Jackie Robinson breaking the so-called color barrier in Major League Baseball–and playing at a star level, with undeniable dignity and character–did something that precepts and altruistic speeches never could. (Not that we’ve reached the Promised Land, mind you). We are drawn together even as spectators of sport, but not in the same way that players are. And there’s always some violent psycho-fans, on both sides of the Atlantic.
Many Americans of every skin tone are still unable to judge people “not by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character”. A similar situation prevails between people of different class/status, political affiliation, etc. What a divided mess we’re in here in these Yoo-nited States!
“Many public and grammar schools had masters who played sport and served in the Armed Forces. My French master was an ex Royal Marine Commando”
The deputy head of my prep school served with the 8th Army and left his leg behind in North Africa.
I have never said that.
There are major differences between the USA and Britain. Britain until recently had a much larger land owning naval military class where amateur sports were played to high standard- rugby, boxing rowing, cricket, shooting, fox hunting and their sons and daughters were sent to tough public schools.
What made Britain, Australia, South Africa and New Zealand unique was that boys from different classes and regions could be selected to play amateur sport, especially cricket and rugby union. Boys could play for the local village/town, different schools, then at country, national and in the case of rugby The Lions. Sport was seen as character building, not just for winning. The idea of building character was why organisations such as Scouts and Boys Brigade were founded.
Many public and grammar schools had masters who played sport and served in the Armed Forces. My French master was an ex Royal Marine Commando who had played rugby to a high level. He could still do press up on his finger tips in his forties and punishment was to undertake PT with him. One of the punishments was a five mile run and if one seen walking, one was caned. The public and grammar schools have a long tradition of sending pupils to the Armed Forces.
As Orwell pointed out the left wing middle class has mocked physical courage and patriotism Inside the Whale, The Limit to Pessimism, My Country Right or left plus others.
From the late 1960s, comprehensive schools becamse anti competitive sport and anti military so few men who had played sport to high level and served in the Armed Forces worked there. Many public schools had combined Cadet Forces where the the Sergeant Major was ex- regular , often PTI( Sergeant Stan Scott type) and helped with discipline. Consequently, there were discipline problems in comprehensives which leads to Andrew Tate. Public Schools and The Great War: The Generation Lost eBook : Seldon, Anthony, Walsh, David, Howard, Michael: Amazon.co.uk: Kindle Store
The children of the landowners grew up in the countryside and played with those from the village: in the USA this class is very small. In the USA money is held by people who have made it in industry, Wall Street , Hollwywood, Silicon Valley, they do not have to be brave or tough; there is no family honour to maintain. How many children of the wealthy in the USA play for the village or state cricket or rugby teams? A friend came from a family where they had supplied officers to the Black Watch since it was formed and the Father considered having a son who served in an elite military units more important than making money.
Can one imagine rugby teams from Silicon Valley the way the Welsh Valleys produced rugby teams or Stanstead Commputer Science Dept playing St Mary’s Medical School at rugby ?
What rugby and cricket achieved was to bring together people from very different social groups and areas and therefore broke down barriers. Boys may go to different schools and play for the same local teams, then be selected for county teams, national and in the case of rugby The Lions.
I would say many of the problems stated in the various Unherd articles occur because there are rigid class divides. On the cold wet muddy pitch all are equal it matters for nothing whether one is academically bright or wealthy, one parents are married or not, ones race or religion; but character does. As Dr Martin Luther King said ” Judge me on my character “. fran cotton rugby muddy – Bing images
Were the teachers and other middle class “sons of privilege” really all the simpering wimps of your portrayal? Surely some served in the military too, or could play passable football, or had a measure of toughness despite a lack of privation.
I acknowledge some validity in your generalities but still think you are leaving out quite a number of tougher better off boys, as well as poor weaklings and depressives left behind in times that were in some ways crueler than today.
I don’t think 16-hour days were a norm at any time in history with the possible exception of industrial factory workers in the late 1800s, early 1900s in the US (still probably 12-15 hours). 10-12 hour days, half-a-day on Saturday after reforms that started for tradesmen in the 18th century (no more dawn-to-dusk all year round). Rough enough, of course, not a working man’s paradise.
There must be some way to split the difference between a life of punishing toil starting at 14 and oceans of free time with no real direction or purpose.
Not really. Many boys would prefer to work than be in school. Britain used to have vast numbers of sports teams: the church hall, companies, towns/villge Boys Brigade, Cadet Forces, Scouts.
Sergeant Stan Scott used to run army cadets in NE london . Sergeant Stan W Scott – YouTube Fairbairn-Sykes Fighting Knife – YouTube
When men such as Sergeant Stan Scott were part of the community there was little crime.
The Andrew Tates and drug dealers take over an are because of the absence of the likes of Sergeant Stan Scotts.
The Mother could call upon male relatives to give guidance and punishment. Many tough working class boys find the effete priggish middle class teachers are not adults they respect whereas they respect the practical tough craftsman, chargehand, foreman and Sergeant Stan Scotts..
Heard many stories about Stan Scott as he was an retired adult instructor in my army cadet force sector, city of London and North east sector 2 coy. I never got to meet him but all my colleagues who had the pleasure to be trained by him, had the best man to train them as well as getting them off the streets of easy London. An absolute legend of my sector and the army world and a complete bad ass. He passed away last year.
Good points. Not only are there a shortage of solid manly examples in these communities, there is a general lack of will to be a mentor or step-in father figure according to the more traditional model you sketch. And good models of manliness are not expected, perhaps not even believed in by many anymore.
*I didn’t live through and don’t have close-up cultural knowledge of the English particulars you mention, but I’d say that there are parallels in the US and elsewhere. As you noted on another board, teens and young adults with minimal academic ability or interest shouldn’t try to go to university. They should have jobs or direct-prep training, not fruitless additional years of book-learning or a community that allows them to remain like semi-feral overgrown children.
Sounds like a rather grim existance for boys and I’m not sure there would have been enough men to go around as substitute fathers since they would also be working from 6am till 10pm. Did you step in?
There have been good people come from Marsh Farm and other sink estates. It is an excuse to say everyone ends up bad just like it is an excuse to use the absence of a father. Decent people thrive in spite of diversity. He and his brother chose to be bad. Romania can keep him.
Most young men brought up by a struggling single parent, usually the mother, end up with huge respect for her, and so for women in general.
Is that actually true, or just your opinion.
If true, then given the increase in single motherhood, respect for women must be at an all time high. And yet many feminists claim otherwise. Not sure if Iâm just confused, or youâre pushing wishful thinking as reality.
You don’t end up on a sink estate by “misfortune”. It seems to me that what the lefty liberal elite or whatever they’re called now, dont like about this Andrew Tate is that he didn’t go through route of seeking their approval and wanting “pats on the head ‘ from him.
Pre 1960s a council house had to be earned: married couple, hard working, honest and rules on behaviour. Post 1960s this was relaxed. The Peabody and Guinness Trust still have strict rules so no bad behaviour.
Pre 1960s a council house had to be earned: married couple, hard working, honest and rules on behaviour. Post 1960s this was relaxed. The Peabody and Guinness Trust still have strict rules so no bad behaviour.
There’s a bit of a contradiction there. You say”most young men brought up by a struggling single parent, usually have huge respect for her and so for women in general” Then you say “however Tate’s mother had the huge misfortune to end up on a sink estate and who knows how she kept the family together” Well yes, but isn’t that the fate of most single mothers, to struggle? So why didn’t he have respect for his mother?
There is no contradiction here. I wrote, “…most…” He, I’m pointing out, has not followed that pathway. I’m wondering why? I strongly suspect the Muslim influence and its endemic misogyny haas infulence him greatly. Western Women perceived as ‘sluts’ ‘slappers’.
There is no contradiction here. I wrote, “…most…” He, I’m pointing out, has not followed that pathway. I’m wondering why? I strongly suspect the Muslim influence and its endemic misogyny haas infulence him greatly. Western Women perceived as ‘sluts’ ‘slappers’.
There has always been widows due to husbands being killed in wars and accidents. However, historically male members used to take on the role of the Father; there were boxing, rugby, football and cricket clubs to work off energy and boys could start working from the age of fourteen years of age. A boy who is labouring and then training for rugbyand/or boxing will have little energy left to cause trouble. Many companies had sports teams. As work would have started as early as 5 am , if farming and often at 6 to 7 am in a factory, people went to bed by 10pm.
All of the above has largely gone.
There have been good people come from Marsh Farm and other sink estates. It is an excuse to say everyone ends up bad just like it is an excuse to use the absence of a father. Decent people thrive in spite of diversity. He and his brother chose to be bad. Romania can keep him.
Most young men brought up by a struggling single parent, usually the mother, end up with huge respect for her, and so for women in general.
Is that actually true, or just your opinion.
If true, then given the increase in single motherhood, respect for women must be at an all time high. And yet many feminists claim otherwise. Not sure if Iâm just confused, or youâre pushing wishful thinking as reality.
You don’t end up on a sink estate by “misfortune”. It seems to me that what the lefty liberal elite or whatever they’re called now, dont like about this Andrew Tate is that he didn’t go through route of seeking their approval and wanting “pats on the head ‘ from him.
There’s a bit of a contradiction there. You say”most young men brought up by a struggling single parent, usually have huge respect for her and so for women in general” Then you say “however Tate’s mother had the huge misfortune to end up on a sink estate and who knows how she kept the family together” Well yes, but isn’t that the fate of most single mothers, to struggle? So why didn’t he have respect for his mother?
How do you know what Andrew Tate is to his mother?
The most constructive help given to struggling parents (with longterm effects on their children’s futures) especially in conditions of poverty and hopelessness like Marsh Farm and other “sink” estates devoid of any social amenities, was Labour’s Sure Start scheme — cancelled by our Tory government.
Also, “Lord of the Flies” is a novel which misrepresents the young left to their own instincts: which, according to social science studies, are far more benign. It takes corrupt and depraved adults to ruin young people’s lives by exploiting poverty and neglect.
The cancelling of Sure Start was profoundly stupid in the fullest sense of that word: ‘to act in a way counter to one’s own interest’. Sure Start was a proven success that was influencing right where it mattered – at the beginning: childhood. So obviously the new government simply had stop this frightful attempt to help clueless parents improve their parenting. It’s beyond dismal when you think of what could have been achieved simply by leaving this straightforward scheme in place.
The cancelling of Sure Start was profoundly stupid in the fullest sense of that word: ‘to act in a way counter to one’s own interest’. Sure Start was a proven success that was influencing right where it mattered – at the beginning: childhood. So obviously the new government simply had stop this frightful attempt to help clueless parents improve their parenting. It’s beyond dismal when you think of what could have been achieved simply by leaving this straightforward scheme in place.
I think there’s some merit in your perspective. But to completely free people, however downtrodden, from responsibility for their actions reaches too far in the other direction of Furedi’s flat assertion that the woes of the “lost boys” were just “self-inflicted”. Yes they have some available choice but for children or young adolescents from rough towns and often terrible family backgrounds it’s pretty limited for most.
We should be our brother’s keeper and love our neighbors, even those ones. And we should not deny the power of self-reliance, nor the possibility of carving a decent path through and out of hell, so to speak. Unfortunately, it seems like Tate’s escape route has led to an alternate hell-scape, spotlight and material success notwithstanding–and I’m not talking about his current legal troubles alone. These are some hope-starved times and places; things are not therefore simply hopeless, nor criminal and spiritually-empty ways inevitable.
Andrew Tate was born into an environment where relentless bullying at every level was a fact of life. So he decided to become a top bully. That was his choice. He then decided to make masses of money by convincing other young males to do the same. Also his choice. I agree that estates like Marsh Farm represent a total failure of public and political will. But that doesn’t excuse what he’s become.
My comment was in response to Alka-Hughes-Hallett not to you, Coralie. It was a response to his/her comment way back. It would be nice if there were lines drawn from the comment to the response.
My comment was in response to Alka-Hughes-Hallett not to you, Coralie. It was a response to his/her comment way back. It would be nice if there were lines drawn from the comment to the response.
I think thatâs just making excuses personally. Yes he had a rough upbringing, and yes that certainly often leads to worse outcomes in life (which is why I believe meritocracy to be nonsense as we donât all have the same opportunities).
However, if he has done the crimes heâs accused of then thatâs solely on him. If heâd ended up on the dole and on the gear Iâd say his environment would be a large contributing factor, but not many people end up in human trafficking simply because they were brought up on a rough estate. A crime that serious suggests an absence of morals or a conscience rather than a simple lack of opportunities
The problem being that people in England no longer identify sufficiently with each other to care. England is just a shared address. To say âI canât believe English children are growing up like thisâ means nothing to many of those who are living in nice middle class areas and doing nicely thank you.
To others it sounds vaguely racist. As if we should not care more for those struggling in England than for those struggling anywhere else.
Good Lord such grandiose drivel! Most young men brought up by a struggling single parent, usually the mother, end up with huge respect for her, and so for women in general. However, Tate’s mother has had the huge misfortune to end up on a sink estate and who knows how she kept the family together? Those sink estates are the responsibility of government, to be precise, of bad government. Single parents are not goddesses or magicians; the absense of the father in a society that is still grossly patriarchal just compounds the situation for the single mother. I’d defy you to survive Marsh Farm and the like.
How do you know what Andrew Tate is to his mother?
The most constructive help given to struggling parents (with longterm effects on their children’s futures) especially in conditions of poverty and hopelessness like Marsh Farm and other “sink” estates devoid of any social amenities, was Labour’s Sure Start scheme — cancelled by our Tory government.
Also, “Lord of the Flies” is a novel which misrepresents the young left to their own instincts: which, according to social science studies, are far more benign. It takes corrupt and depraved adults to ruin young people’s lives by exploiting poverty and neglect.
I think there’s some merit in your perspective. But to completely free people, however downtrodden, from responsibility for their actions reaches too far in the other direction of Furedi’s flat assertion that the woes of the “lost boys” were just “self-inflicted”. Yes they have some available choice but for children or young adolescents from rough towns and often terrible family backgrounds it’s pretty limited for most.
We should be our brother’s keeper and love our neighbors, even those ones. And we should not deny the power of self-reliance, nor the possibility of carving a decent path through and out of hell, so to speak. Unfortunately, it seems like Tate’s escape route has led to an alternate hell-scape, spotlight and material success notwithstanding–and I’m not talking about his current legal troubles alone. These are some hope-starved times and places; things are not therefore simply hopeless, nor criminal and spiritually-empty ways inevitable.
Andrew Tate was born into an environment where relentless bullying at every level was a fact of life. So he decided to become a top bully. That was his choice. He then decided to make masses of money by convincing other young males to do the same. Also his choice. I agree that estates like Marsh Farm represent a total failure of public and political will. But that doesn’t excuse what he’s become.
Well dah!! But I resent the “we” thing. Please speak for yourself.
Alka Hughes-Hallett
1 year ago
Andrew Tateâs story begins with his motherâs and fatherâs story. What was their experience of life? Where was the father when he was growing up? What was his influence on his sons? It starts with the parental lack of awareness, neglect and responsibility. Life weighs you down, everything downstream takes a beating too, societal structures are weak and broken, there is no one to pick up the pieces and guide you when you are down or confused . âLord of fliesâ instinct takes over and turns young minds back to savage, primal, survival mode. Small material successes become extremely important and the basis to build on by any means possible.
Andrew Tate is just a misunderstood little boy to his mother: she cannot control nor understand the role she played in his views, actions & incarceration. The father? Nonexistent in the article. We have to come to terms with the fact that our society is also made up of such fractured lives. Andrew Tate is the consequence of such a broken society. So whoâs to blame? No one individually, but all of us collectively. These are our children, our families, our society. The pace of movement in our lives is frightening, fast and furious. Either we slow it down or pull those that canât keep up along with us or accept that Andrew Tates are made by us, our desire for more. This desire seeps into a mind warped by familial and societal neglect with the tools available to exploit it, unchecked, warps even more till we are forced to take notice because it starts to touch our lives.
I am not sure how it can be put into action but I think the responsibility lies with all of us, when there is an opportunity to act in a manner that has an effect on how you want your children to turn out, we should fully embrace it. If we as parents and society members take charge of our thoughts and actions, the consequences will drip feed into the society and we will activate the change we wish to see. It could be the start we are looking for.
Charles Hedges
1 year ago
The poverty of the south Wales mining districts and the other heavy industrial areas of the Depression were far worse. What they had were physically tough men who boxed, played rugby( union or league), many had been in Armed Forces, ethics of honesty and hard work embued by Methodism and The Baptists, Sunday School, lives lived according The Bible, especially Proverbs, The Cooperative Society. The phrases” Cleanliness is next to Godliness”, ” Poor but honest ” were common. The front room and front step of houses were immaculate. Men kept order.
These socities produced Keir Hardie and Ernest Bevin Ernest Bevin – 1940 (1940) – YouTube
Bevin came from a far poorer society than Tate and was Baptist preacher.
If one has a society which mocks discipline and hence self discipline, promotes if it feels good do it and one which is completely opposite to The Proverbs, the result is Marsh Farm. The physical conditions, whether homes or schools are far more luxurious than the heavy industrial areas of The Depression. Proverbs
by which men will come to wisdom and instruction
gain well-instructed intelligence
, righteousness, justice and probity
The simple will be endowed with shrewdness
the young with knowledge and prudence
the man of understanding will aquire skill
fools scorn wisdom and discipline
The Baptists,Methodists, Quakers, Salvation Army and Non- Conformists entered the rookersies and slums of 19th century Britain and greatly improved conditions.
The lefty wing middle class planners built housing estates post WW2 and slums were created because the people were allowed to devlop a slum mentality.The middle class Trotskyists sided with criminals( All property is theft ) and the law was changed such that honest tough men could not impose order. If drug dealers had tried to sell their wares in an industrial town of the 1930s , they would have been run out of town. If a man touched someone below the age of 18 years they were accused of assault not matter how violent was the teenager. Discipline was removed from schools such that if a teacher had to physically restrain a pupil who was attacking another they were accused of assault.
Glad to see that someone remembers Ernie Bevin – the most effective (in my opinion revolutionary) English socialist of the 20th century.
There are many famous Bevinisms, but my favourite is his description of the USSR: “A breakaway from the Transport and General Workers Union.”
There is a superb biography of Bevin by Alan Bullock.
Its high quality is not surprising given that the Bullock Report on Industrial Democracy in 1977 was a watershed in British history. It proposed that there should be worker directors on the boards of large privately owned companies. Had it been adopted, it would have effected a (very British) revolution. It would have proved as irreversible as the Welfare State.
In the event, it was rejected by the entire Labour Movement: the Trade Unions, the Labour Party and the Communist Party. Not for us, they said, to manage capitalism! That’s for the managers. We won’t soil our hands. (As I recall, only Clive Jenkins and Jack Jones fought valiantly for actual workers control, to no avail. )
All this was only a few years after Harold Wilson had complacently described Labour as ‘the natural party of government’.
But the working class didn’t want to govern! They left it to their betters…..or at any rate somebody else.
The rejection of the Bullock Report marked the end of an era.
Trade union power without responsibility was epitomised by Arthur Scargill, who destroyed the National Union of Mineworkers.
That ‘ great refusal’ of everything that Bevin had fought for entailed Thatcherism and the atomisation of the working class and the destruction of organised labour. Blair was a Thatcherite wearing a red rosette as well as a war criminal.
Nostalgia is a great thing! There actually is an Ernest Bevin Society – they occasionally publish interesting pamphlets on current affairs. They are not affiliated to Starmer’s Labour Party, in which Ernest Bevin would find no home. He would be cancelled.
PS. Ernie Bevin is not Nye Bevan, the original Welsh Windbag, who did NOT found the NHS!
You omitted to mention the BEVIN gave âusâ the Bomb!
Whilst the âWelsh Windbagâ as you so politely call him gave us the âTories are vermin â speech.
ps. I did reply to your Irish epistle of a few days ago, but the censor forbade it!
I would say that it was Attlee who gave ‘us’ the Bomb – not that the Americans would have let ‘us’ use it if E.Powell was right, as I believe he was about many things.
Very sorry to hear that you have been censored.
There’s far too much of that sort of thing.
Well yes course Attlee had the ultimate say, but Bevin seems to have been the more proactive.
Hence those immortal words:
âWe’ve got to have this thing over here whatever it costs…. We’ve got to have the bloody Union Jack flying on top of it”
Thus off course thwarting those wretched communists who infested that government, and the establishment in general.
Well yes course Attlee had the ultimate say, but Bevin seems to have been the more proactive.
Hence those immortal words:
âWe’ve got to have this thing over here whatever it costs…. We’ve got to have the bloody Union Jack flying on top of it”
Thus off course thwarting those wretched communists who infested that government, and the establishment in general.
I would say that it was Attlee who gave ‘us’ the Bomb – not that the Americans would have let ‘us’ use it if E.Powell was right, as I believe he was about many things.
Very sorry to hear that you have been censored.
There’s far too much of that sort of thing.
Nice and deeply important history lesson well told. I am reminded of similar efforts, also frustrated by intransigency, attempted by Barbara Castle. Thank you
Main Edition
US
FR
If it is possible for someone like Andrew Tate, coming from such a background to achieve what he has (dubious as that might be) – why do none our privileged politicians, and others in positions of power and advantage, have the will, energy and imagination to actually solve the social problems of which this is just a particularly bad example.
What is the point of Eton, Oxbridge and the rest if their products get bogged down in trivia that donât matter, set targets they never achieve and let parts of the country drift out of control like this.
“The doctrine of the environment reduces man to an absolute nonentity, exempts him totally from every personal moral duty and from all independence, reduces him to the lowest form of slavery imaginable.”
âIt’s very rare to find a person capable of handling his gift. The talent almost always enslaves its possessor, taking him, as it were, by the scruff of the neck and carrying him off far away from his proper path.â
ï»ż
Dostoyevsky (not A Tate)
Dostoevsky undoubtedly had talent, and was also capable of talking complete cobblers. A Tate, on the other hand, is a world supremo at talking cobblers, but has zero talent.
I have no idea why you describe that comment of Dostoyevsky’s as “complete cobblers”.
Fair enough. There were two of D’s comments. The first is so absolutist that it’s absurd. The second is D essentially talking about himself while nominally talking about others. He could write wonderful literature but couldn’t handle his talented life, which was an utter mess. But masses of highly, even astonishingly, talented people ultimately manage their talent perfectly well.
Fair enough. There were two of D’s comments. The first is so absolutist that it’s absurd. The second is D essentially talking about himself while nominally talking about others. He could write wonderful literature but couldn’t handle his talented life, which was an utter mess. But masses of highly, even astonishingly, talented people ultimately manage their talent perfectly well.
I have no idea why you describe that comment of Dostoyevsky’s as “complete cobblers”.
Dostoevsky undoubtedly had talent, and was also capable of talking complete cobblers. A Tate, on the other hand, is a world supremo at talking cobblers, but has zero talent.
Survival of the fittest is a simple reason.
Over the whole of history some people rise to the top of pile gaining money, strength or monopolising resources.
Competition is not a good idea so a simple fact of pulling up the ladder behind these people maintains them at the top of the pile.
Lip service is paid to “helping the disadvantaged” but little actual benefit ensues as this would be counter productive.
Two examples; house prices (and the insanity of such low interest rates for the past 10+ years). Those “with” (myself included) do very well, those “without” get further pushed down.
The socialist view of “not really black” when talking about someone from a group that is supposed to be disadvantaged but has the temerity not to accept this and do well.
Most of us just trying to enjoy some life, look after family and loved ones, take a reasonable view to supporting others, and other such efforts are, in my view, “bought” by various measures (low tax, low interest, cheap holidays, low waged “help” for our lives) simply to keep us quiescent and useful idiots to allow the real elites to prosper.
This is pretty much the definition of ‘woke’ capitalism – ‘buying’ and ‘consuming’ your way to salvation. I noticed this recently in the US. There was a shop that was selling rainbow-colored LGQT sponge cakes made by members of some native-American tribe. And I just thought who cares where they come from? It’s more important that they taste good.
The same thing is happening with women’s football. It gets far more coverage than it deserves, so the media tells people who don’t like it that they are misogynists.
Swatch has another example of this. Their LGQBT watches didn’t go down too well in Malaysia, so now Swatch harangues its Malaysian customer-base for being homophobic. Homocapitalism: where you bully your customers into buying your products because not doing so means you are an ‘-ist’ of some kind.
Basically, big corporations are filling in the role of the Catholic church by telling us what is good and not good. It’s a weird kind of consumer-moralism that depends on a hive-mind mentality. Remember when everyone and their granny were doing the ALS water-bucket challenge and putting black squares in their FB avatar? This is the same kind of thing. People no longer think for themselves, but look first to see if their thoughts are permissible by the liberal mainstream.
That is what happens when you let religion die.
It’s role doesn’t cease , the job is just taken up by things less suitable.
I am fighting a battle in a company that has taken on the strange ethos of it’s founder, a rich American called Ray Dalio.
His weird gospel of ‘radical transparency’ – a very American mix of chutzpah, down-home morals, cod-psychologising and bullshit – is destroying the company day by day.
Bridgewater Associates.
Bridgewater Associates.
If Swatch is doing that in Malaysia, it isn’t going to work as a marketing strategy!
You make it sound at least as if big business is genuine about having so-called “progressive values”.
Actually it is generally far more cynical than that – westerners (assumed to be more sympathetic to this political ideology) get one set of messages, consumers in Asian, African and Muslim states quite another.
However, I’m not exactly sure what this has to do with the article, which in this case is about the travails and bleakness of a largely white working class community.
That is what happens when you let religion die.
It’s role doesn’t cease , the job is just taken up by things less suitable.
I am fighting a battle in a company that has taken on the strange ethos of it’s founder, a rich American called Ray Dalio.
His weird gospel of ‘radical transparency’ – a very American mix of chutzpah, down-home morals, cod-psychologising and bullshit – is destroying the company day by day.
If Swatch is doing that in Malaysia, it isn’t going to work as a marketing strategy!
You make it sound at least as if big business is genuine about having so-called “progressive values”.
Actually it is generally far more cynical than that – westerners (assumed to be more sympathetic to this political ideology) get one set of messages, consumers in Asian, African and Muslim states quite another.
However, I’m not exactly sure what this has to do with the article, which in this case is about the travails and bleakness of a largely white working class community.
I think you’re confusing ‘fittest’ with ‘strongest’.
You aren’t actually addressing the question David Morley raises. “Survival of the fittest” is a Darwinian concept describing simply a key mechanism of biological evolution. There is a very dubious history of applying this to individuals within human society.
I also don’t agree that a measure of competition in society is not a good idea – see the entire disastrous history of Communist thought and ideology, leading to the deaths of tens of millions – far outkilling even the National Socialists.
However constrained and controlled market competition, and providing the conditions for talented people to do well (which also helps the test of us!), is hardly equivalent to letting the conditions for mass gang violence become rooted – – throwing communities effectively under the bus with neglect.
It is tragic (but also not glibly easy to solve), that someone like Andrew Tate, who obviously actually had some talent and entrepreneurial flair, should go down the disastrous route (even for himself) of trying to be the top gangster. Romania hasn’t proven to be the patriarchal paradise he imagined.
This is pretty much the definition of ‘woke’ capitalism – ‘buying’ and ‘consuming’ your way to salvation. I noticed this recently in the US. There was a shop that was selling rainbow-colored LGQT sponge cakes made by members of some native-American tribe. And I just thought who cares where they come from? It’s more important that they taste good.
The same thing is happening with women’s football. It gets far more coverage than it deserves, so the media tells people who don’t like it that they are misogynists.
Swatch has another example of this. Their LGQBT watches didn’t go down too well in Malaysia, so now Swatch harangues its Malaysian customer-base for being homophobic. Homocapitalism: where you bully your customers into buying your products because not doing so means you are an ‘-ist’ of some kind.
Basically, big corporations are filling in the role of the Catholic church by telling us what is good and not good. It’s a weird kind of consumer-moralism that depends on a hive-mind mentality. Remember when everyone and their granny were doing the ALS water-bucket challenge and putting black squares in their FB avatar? This is the same kind of thing. People no longer think for themselves, but look first to see if their thoughts are permissible by the liberal mainstream.
I think you’re confusing ‘fittest’ with ‘strongest’.
You aren’t actually addressing the question David Morley raises. “Survival of the fittest” is a Darwinian concept describing simply a key mechanism of biological evolution. There is a very dubious history of applying this to individuals within human society.
I also don’t agree that a measure of competition in society is not a good idea – see the entire disastrous history of Communist thought and ideology, leading to the deaths of tens of millions – far outkilling even the National Socialists.
However constrained and controlled market competition, and providing the conditions for talented people to do well (which also helps the test of us!), is hardly equivalent to letting the conditions for mass gang violence become rooted – – throwing communities effectively under the bus with neglect.
It is tragic (but also not glibly easy to solve), that someone like Andrew Tate, who obviously actually had some talent and entrepreneurial flair, should go down the disastrous route (even for himself) of trying to be the top gangster. Romania hasn’t proven to be the patriarchal paradise he imagined.
They lack the spirit.
He has ‘achieved’ becoming a bullying, abusive creep who is making shedloads of money convincing millions of boys and young men that the only way up or out is to become a bullying, abusive creep so they can also make shedloads of money.
It beats being stuck in council estate hell. And you can’t get away with being a bullying, abusive creep for long, as Tate is now finding out, what with his criminal prosecution.
Judging from his recent interview with Tucker Carlson, what he’s finding out is that he can leverage his fame to keep getting just the kind of admiration he wants. Which he will duly monetise, whether in or out jail.
Judging from his recent interview with Tucker Carlson, what he’s finding out is that he can leverage his fame to keep getting just the kind of admiration he wants. Which he will duly monetise, whether in or out jail.
This may be true, but simply to blame people like Tate, easy to do. when in a way he took a rational decision in very difficult circumstances, is just avoiding the bigger issue of these sink estates and how to address their very real problems.
I don’t think it is avoiding that issue at all. As I’ve posted in other comments, I think the horrendous reality of sink estates is one of the most serious problems we have and it enrages me that it continues to be ignored.
But Andrew Tate’s choices were his own. His background might be an explanation but it is not an excuse. The man’s 36 years old for crying out loud. He’s had plenty of time to grow up into something other than the abusive lying creep he still is.
According to whom–you?
According to whom–you?
I don’t think it is avoiding that issue at all. As I’ve posted in other comments, I think the horrendous reality of sink estates is one of the most serious problems we have and it enrages me that it continues to be ignored.
But Andrew Tate’s choices were his own. His background might be an explanation but it is not an excuse. The man’s 36 years old for crying out loud. He’s had plenty of time to grow up into something other than the abusive lying creep he still is.
It beats being stuck in council estate hell. And you can’t get away with being a bullying, abusive creep for long, as Tate is now finding out, what with his criminal prosecution.
This may be true, but simply to blame people like Tate, easy to do. when in a way he took a rational decision in very difficult circumstances, is just avoiding the bigger issue of these sink estates and how to address their very real problems.
To be fair to our politicians, the problems of a completely deep rooted lack of opportunity, aspiration and the attraction of drugs and crime are not easy to solve. See also Darren McGarvey’s “Poverty Safari’.
To those people always emphasising simplistic racial roots for these problems, Marsh Farm shows this can affect people of any background.
It is much easier to fix technical problems than those of human society and behaviour.
Tateâs father is well known as a black chess grandmaster , though he looks mixed race . The racial composition of Marsh Farm is not touched on by the author . It seems to be the case that âgangsta cultureâ derived from black young men in the US is taken up by young men from other racial groups.
Tateâs father is well known as a black chess grandmaster , though he looks mixed race . The racial composition of Marsh Farm is not touched on by the author . It seems to be the case that âgangsta cultureâ derived from black young men in the US is taken up by young men from other racial groups.
Because running a country of 70m successfully is more difficult than achieving personal success.
“The doctrine of the environment reduces man to an absolute nonentity, exempts him totally from every personal moral duty and from all independence, reduces him to the lowest form of slavery imaginable.”
âIt’s very rare to find a person capable of handling his gift. The talent almost always enslaves its possessor, taking him, as it were, by the scruff of the neck and carrying him off far away from his proper path.â
ï»ż
Dostoyevsky (not A Tate)
Survival of the fittest is a simple reason.
Over the whole of history some people rise to the top of pile gaining money, strength or monopolising resources.
Competition is not a good idea so a simple fact of pulling up the ladder behind these people maintains them at the top of the pile.
Lip service is paid to “helping the disadvantaged” but little actual benefit ensues as this would be counter productive.
Two examples; house prices (and the insanity of such low interest rates for the past 10+ years). Those “with” (myself included) do very well, those “without” get further pushed down.
The socialist view of “not really black” when talking about someone from a group that is supposed to be disadvantaged but has the temerity not to accept this and do well.
Most of us just trying to enjoy some life, look after family and loved ones, take a reasonable view to supporting others, and other such efforts are, in my view, “bought” by various measures (low tax, low interest, cheap holidays, low waged “help” for our lives) simply to keep us quiescent and useful idiots to allow the real elites to prosper.
They lack the spirit.
He has ‘achieved’ becoming a bullying, abusive creep who is making shedloads of money convincing millions of boys and young men that the only way up or out is to become a bullying, abusive creep so they can also make shedloads of money.
To be fair to our politicians, the problems of a completely deep rooted lack of opportunity, aspiration and the attraction of drugs and crime are not easy to solve. See also Darren McGarvey’s “Poverty Safari’.
To those people always emphasising simplistic racial roots for these problems, Marsh Farm shows this can affect people of any background.
It is much easier to fix technical problems than those of human society and behaviour.
Because running a country of 70m successfully is more difficult than achieving personal success.
If it is possible for someone like Andrew Tate, coming from such a background to achieve what he has (dubious as that might be) – why do none our privileged politicians, and others in positions of power and advantage, have the will, energy and imagination to actually solve the social problems of which this is just a particularly bad example.
What is the point of Eton, Oxbridge and the rest if their products get bogged down in trivia that donât matter, set targets they never achieve and let parts of the country drift out of control like this.
This article reads like the sort of condescending hand-wringing I used to read in the Guardian many years ago – before I came to my senses and stopped reading the Guardian.
Those of who grew up on estates like this know that the reality is far more mundane – and even enjoyable a lot of the time – than the dystopia this piece of hyperbolic poverty porn is trying to portray. Privileged types do love to have a good gawk at the poor.
Oh well done. You’ve somehow managed to hold on to your Grauniad-reading past by insisting that estates that are a relentless nightmare to live on are fine really and have their own wonderful poor people’s street culture and it’s all part of life’s rich tapestry. You are Polly Toynbee and I claim my ÂŁ5.
Coralie – making the odd sarcastic comment is perhaps ok, but when the person you are responding to has made precisely the opposite point to the one you are ascribing to him, it rather reflects on you!
J Dunne absolutely did NOT insist that living on such estates is a relentless nightmare:
“Those of who grew up on estates like this know that the reality is far more mundane â and even enjoyable a lot of the time â than the dystopia this piece of hyperbolic poverty porn is trying to portray”
Andrew, read my comment again. He’s insisting such estates’ awfulness is overrated. Just like the Grauniad do. I’m saying, they do exist and the reality of living on them is relentless. The couple I know who live on just over a mile from me said it used not to be this bad. There are people in the community who try and try to fix whatever they can. And just as in the article, the police are either non-existent or utterly useless. I don’t think such a reality is ‘poverty porn’ and I think it needs urgently needs attention, rather than just being shoved into public and political amnesia.
Andrew, read my comment again. He’s insisting such estates’ awfulness is overrated. Just like the Grauniad do. I’m saying, they do exist and the reality of living on them is relentless. The couple I know who live on just over a mile from me said it used not to be this bad. There are people in the community who try and try to fix whatever they can. And just as in the article, the police are either non-existent or utterly useless. I don’t think such a reality is ‘poverty porn’ and I think it needs urgently needs attention, rather than just being shoved into public and political amnesia.
Coralie – making the odd sarcastic comment is perhaps ok, but when the person you are responding to has made precisely the opposite point to the one you are ascribing to him, it rather reflects on you!
J Dunne absolutely did NOT insist that living on such estates is a relentless nightmare:
“Those of who grew up on estates like this know that the reality is far more mundane â and even enjoyable a lot of the time â than the dystopia this piece of hyperbolic poverty porn is trying to portray”
Are you suggesting this is all invented? Not all estates are the same and some are truly grim.
See also Darren McGarvey’s writing about Pollok in Glasgow.
I’m not saying it’s all invented, but that the negativity is exaggerated.
Writers of articles like this treat the exercise like a safari field trip, making observations from their own middle class perspectives and woefully failing to understand that many of the people living on the estates are decent people who are also mostly happy to be there.
Don’t get me wrong, there were some awful scrotes on the Manchester estate where I grew up, but they were a minority. Even if you removed the criminals altogether, the working class culture, worldview and sense of humour would still remain. And it would still be completely alien to hand-wringing liberal types who can never comprehend that not everyone wants to be the same as them.
I’m not saying it’s all invented, but that the negativity is exaggerated.
Writers of articles like this treat the exercise like a safari field trip, making observations from their own middle class perspectives and woefully failing to understand that many of the people living on the estates are decent people who are also mostly happy to be there.
Don’t get me wrong, there were some awful scrotes on the Manchester estate where I grew up, but they were a minority. Even if you removed the criminals altogether, the working class culture, worldview and sense of humour would still remain. And it would still be completely alien to hand-wringing liberal types who can never comprehend that not everyone wants to be the same as them.
Oh well done. You’ve somehow managed to hold on to your Grauniad-reading past by insisting that estates that are a relentless nightmare to live on are fine really and have their own wonderful poor people’s street culture and it’s all part of life’s rich tapestry. You are Polly Toynbee and I claim my ÂŁ5.
Are you suggesting this is all invented? Not all estates are the same and some are truly grim.
See also Darren McGarvey’s writing about Pollok in Glasgow.
This article reads like the sort of condescending hand-wringing I used to read in the Guardian many years ago – before I came to my senses and stopped reading the Guardian.
Those of who grew up on estates like this know that the reality is far more mundane – and even enjoyable a lot of the time – than the dystopia this piece of hyperbolic poverty porn is trying to portray. Privileged types do love to have a good gawk at the poor.
The Woke Net Zero obsessed deindustrialisation of the U.K. is a sure fire way to create very many more Marsh Farm estates throughout the U.K. Just stop this anti working class madness now.
The Woke Net Zero obsessed deindustrialisation of the U.K. is a sure fire way to create very many more Marsh Farm estates throughout the U.K. Just stop this anti working class madness now.
Andrew Tateâs story begins with his motherâs and fatherâs story. What was their experience of life? Where was the father when he was growing up? What was his influence on his sons? It starts with the parental lack of awareness, neglect and responsibility. Life weighs you down, everything downstream takes a beating too, societal structures are weak and broken, there is no one to pick up the pieces and guide you when you are down or confused . âLord of fliesâ instinct takes over and turns young minds back to savage, primal, survival mode. Small material successes become extremely important and the basis to build on by any means possible.
Andrew Tate is just a misunderstood little boy to his mother: she cannot control nor understand the role she played in his views, actions & incarceration. The father? Nonexistent in the article. We have to come to terms with the fact that our society is also made up of such fractured lives. Andrew Tate is the consequence of such a broken society. So whoâs to blame? No one individually, but all of us collectively. These are our children, our families, our society. The pace of movement in our lives is frightening, fast and furious. Either we slow it down or pull those that canât keep up along with us or accept that Andrew Tates are made by us, our desire for more. This desire seeps into a mind warped by familial and societal neglect with the tools available to exploit it, unchecked, warps even more till we are forced to take notice because it starts to touch our lives.
I am not sure how it can be put into action but I think the responsibility lies with all of us, when there is an opportunity to act in a manner that has an effect on how you want your children to turn out, we should fully embrace it. If we as parents and society members take charge of our thoughts and actions, the consequences will drip feed into the society and we will activate the change we wish to see. It could be the start we are looking for.
I think thatâs just making excuses personally. Yes he had a rough upbringing, and yes that certainly often leads to worse outcomes in life (which is why I believe meritocracy to be nonsense as we donât all have the same opportunities).
However, if he has done the crimes heâs accused of then thatâs solely on him. If heâd ended up on the dole and on the gear Iâd say his environment would be a large contributing factor, but not many people end up in human trafficking simply because they were brought up on a rough estate. A crime that serious suggests an absence of morals or a conscience rather than a simple lack of opportunities
Look, I agree. But maybe he preferred life in the fast lane to being virtuous on the dole. You canât really blame him.
Yes you can. You should also unequivocally condemn him.
Oh yes you can. No one’s background justifies raping women and girls or indeed boys and men. NO ONE’s
Exactly …. This is not a case of “I am my brother’s keeper.” It’s a case of getting rid of the menaces in society.
And there is another grave menace in society that preaches very much like Andrew Tate only it’s housed in a masjid. The other celebrity of Luton is Tommy Robinson, slayer of groomers. Whereas Andrew Tate is a notorious G who converted to Islam, Tommy Robinson is a hero.
Exactly …. This is not a case of “I am my brother’s keeper.” It’s a case of getting rid of the menaces in society.
And there is another grave menace in society that preaches very much like Andrew Tate only it’s housed in a masjid. The other celebrity of Luton is Tommy Robinson, slayer of groomers. Whereas Andrew Tate is a notorious G who converted to Islam, Tommy Robinson is a hero.
I bl00dy can. And human trafficking is ‘life in the fast lane’? Who knew?
Well that’s hell of a choice. Advancing his own life style is one thing, to try to influence others to take the same path is quite another.
Yes you can. You should also unequivocally condemn him.
Oh yes you can. No one’s background justifies raping women and girls or indeed boys and men. NO ONE’s
I bl00dy can. And human trafficking is ‘life in the fast lane’? Who knew?
Well that’s hell of a choice. Advancing his own life style is one thing, to try to influence others to take the same path is quite another.
âMerit is nonsenseâ is nonsense. Of course we donât all have the same opportunities. A five foot tall 50-year-old isnât going to be a Balenciaga runway model. But she might be a witty columnist or the outstanding mother of happy, successful children, or both.
I think you might replace âopportunity â with ambition, desire, and drive. We definitely donât all have those.
Or principles. Which you don’t mention. Because of course they can really get in the way of where your ‘ambition, desire and drive’ are aiming to get you. I shouldn’t think any of those three elements are lacking in the majority of our MPs for example. But I also think the majority of our MPs wouldn’t recognise a principle if it was, to quote the immortal Plum, handed to them on a plate with a bit of watercress round it.
Personal experience makes me disagree. Iâve dealt with a lot of higher ups in my working life, and almost all of them went to the top schools and had friends and family members in prominent positions that gave them a leg up when starting their working lives. Iâve never noticed any higher levels of intelligence or work ethic amongst this cohort compared to any others that would explain their success as it were, in almost ever case itâs due to the fact they had opportunities when they started that simply werenât there for a majority of others.
Would you support the abolition of private schools? If you believe in meritocracy then surely youâd be in favour of enduring all kids get as close to the same standard of education as possible, to try and ensure the cream rises to the top on its own merit rather than due to its background?
Well said.
Well said.
But she wasn’t always 50.
Or principles. Which you don’t mention. Because of course they can really get in the way of where your ‘ambition, desire and drive’ are aiming to get you. I shouldn’t think any of those three elements are lacking in the majority of our MPs for example. But I also think the majority of our MPs wouldn’t recognise a principle if it was, to quote the immortal Plum, handed to them on a plate with a bit of watercress round it.
Personal experience makes me disagree. Iâve dealt with a lot of higher ups in my working life, and almost all of them went to the top schools and had friends and family members in prominent positions that gave them a leg up when starting their working lives. Iâve never noticed any higher levels of intelligence or work ethic amongst this cohort compared to any others that would explain their success as it were, in almost ever case itâs due to the fact they had opportunities when they started that simply werenât there for a majority of others.
Would you support the abolition of private schools? If you believe in meritocracy then surely youâd be in favour of enduring all kids get as close to the same standard of education as possible, to try and ensure the cream rises to the top on its own merit rather than due to its background?
But she wasn’t always 50.
I don’t disagree with you, but these council estates are bad bad places. I lived on one growing up and they are rife with sexual abuse. One girl in my class was sleeping with her father and she would often come to school smelling of urine and feces. There were many other examples of children living in conditions like this.While I do generally advocate personal responsibility, there are some family situations that need more than a ‘pull your socks up’ mentality.
I think this is why, as an educator, I get so annoyed by so many social justice causes. Most of them are about glorifying victimhood and using it to enrich one’s self. They hardly ever tackle difficult or distasteful matters. Much easier to blame the world’s ills on capitalism or systemic racism.
And a bit of sociopathy thrown in.
Look, I agree. But maybe he preferred life in the fast lane to being virtuous on the dole. You canât really blame him.
âMerit is nonsenseâ is nonsense. Of course we donât all have the same opportunities. A five foot tall 50-year-old isnât going to be a Balenciaga runway model. But she might be a witty columnist or the outstanding mother of happy, successful children, or both.
I think you might replace âopportunity â with ambition, desire, and drive. We definitely donât all have those.
I don’t disagree with you, but these council estates are bad bad places. I lived on one growing up and they are rife with sexual abuse. One girl in my class was sleeping with her father and she would often come to school smelling of urine and feces. There were many other examples of children living in conditions like this.While I do generally advocate personal responsibility, there are some family situations that need more than a ‘pull your socks up’ mentality.
I think this is why, as an educator, I get so annoyed by so many social justice causes. Most of them are about glorifying victimhood and using it to enrich one’s self. They hardly ever tackle difficult or distasteful matters. Much easier to blame the world’s ills on capitalism or systemic racism.
And a bit of sociopathy thrown in.
The problem being that people in England no longer identify sufficiently with each other to care. England is just a shared address. To say âI canât believe English children are growing up like thisâ means nothing to many of those who are living in nice middle class areas and doing nicely thank you.
To others it sounds vaguely racist. As if we should not care more for those struggling in England than for those struggling anywhere else.
I think your aphoristic description – ‘England is just a shared address’ – is quite brilliant and horribly true. And I really don’t think it’s yet understood just how violently destructive this is. For all of us.
I grew up in inner city Manchester and still spend time there and inner city parts of Salford now. Most people have no idea how teenage boys view society, or rather don’t because they have zero interest in it and don’t even notice it exists as a social construct that has accepted rules and norms. They have never been an accepted part of it and care zero for it and are paying that back in spades. They will just take what they want.
And on top of that if you add in deprivation and being surrounded by crime and poverty, it compounds their alienation. I remember reading a description of somewhere like Moss Side and the kids there being described as “almost feral”. It is not acceptable that this level of deprivation exists in the rich world.
Exactly. but it’s always been that way and it always will be.
Thank you for the armour-plated complacency. You might remember that people said exactly the same about human slavery. Or indeed about a wife being subject to the rule of her husband. Or any number of other dismal human habits that were considered eternal. Tenacious though human habits are, it is possible to change them. But it takes a lot of effort. As opposed to settling for ’twas ever thus’.
It’s not complacency it’s being realistic. Looking back at history and the present and the future it would seem to be “twas ever thus’. Apparently It’s human nature to be thus, as far as there always being rich and poor, and never the twain shall meet.
Human history tells us that the degree to which that is true of any society depends on which society you look at, and how they decided to structure themselves. Which remains true. Compare Denmark and the UK for example.
One of the popes said when questioned about the riches in the Vatican – The poor are always with us.
Human history tells us that the degree to which that is true of any society depends on which society you look at, and how they decided to structure themselves. Which remains true. Compare Denmark and the UK for example.
One of the popes said when questioned about the riches in the Vatican – The poor are always with us.
It’s not complacency it’s being realistic. Looking back at history and the present and the future it would seem to be “twas ever thus’. Apparently It’s human nature to be thus, as far as there always being rich and poor, and never the twain shall meet.
Thank you for the armour-plated complacency. You might remember that people said exactly the same about human slavery. Or indeed about a wife being subject to the rule of her husband. Or any number of other dismal human habits that were considered eternal. Tenacious though human habits are, it is possible to change them. But it takes a lot of effort. As opposed to settling for ’twas ever thus’.
Hear, hear Katherine.
Exactly. but it’s always been that way and it always will be.
Hear, hear Katherine.
Are you speaking of indigenous teenage boys? And what of the girls? Do they stand a better chance or is it have a baby to have a sense of purpose?
Thanks for your thoughtful reply. I lived in Mancs for 8 years and your words really hit home. It rings wholly true with me – a vacuum where an understanding of society should be. I don’t think that’s only true of dismal estates either, it’s just that the poorer you are, the more immediate and obvious are the effects. It scares the hell out of me, because without that shared understanding we’re all down the pan.
I think it’s particularly dangerous for boys and young men because at the same time as that atomisation – which has been going on for at least 30 years – you have the gross distortions of academic ‘feminist’ (they’re not) career-builders telling them that simply being born male is poisonous, and they’re good for nowt.
Then into that comes the vile Tate. Cue fascinated media blitz on ‘gosh why?’ Christ alive, how blind and deaf do they have to be? Even I can see a bloody train when it’s coming. Sorry, rant over (must calm down and have cuppa).
And on top of that if you add in deprivation and being surrounded by crime and poverty, it compounds their alienation. I remember reading a description of somewhere like Moss Side and the kids there being described as “almost feral”. It is not acceptable that this level of deprivation exists in the rich world.
Are you speaking of indigenous teenage boys? And what of the girls? Do they stand a better chance or is it have a baby to have a sense of purpose?
Thanks for your thoughtful reply. I lived in Mancs for 8 years and your words really hit home. It rings wholly true with me – a vacuum where an understanding of society should be. I don’t think that’s only true of dismal estates either, it’s just that the poorer you are, the more immediate and obvious are the effects. It scares the hell out of me, because without that shared understanding we’re all down the pan.
I think it’s particularly dangerous for boys and young men because at the same time as that atomisation – which has been going on for at least 30 years – you have the gross distortions of academic ‘feminist’ (they’re not) career-builders telling them that simply being born male is poisonous, and they’re good for nowt.
Then into that comes the vile Tate. Cue fascinated media blitz on ‘gosh why?’ Christ alive, how blind and deaf do they have to be? Even I can see a bloody train when it’s coming. Sorry, rant over (must calm down and have cuppa).
I could say the same thing about where I live. It depends how rooted you feel, or if you were born and raised where you live. The power of “Place” is an individual thing. I still feel more rooted in England than I ever will in the US despite living the last 50 years here.
I grew up in inner city Manchester and still spend time there and inner city parts of Salford now. Most people have no idea how teenage boys view society, or rather don’t because they have zero interest in it and don’t even notice it exists as a social construct that has accepted rules and norms. They have never been an accepted part of it and care zero for it and are paying that back in spades. They will just take what they want.
I could say the same thing about where I live. It depends how rooted you feel, or if you were born and raised where you live. The power of “Place” is an individual thing. I still feel more rooted in England than I ever will in the US despite living the last 50 years here.
I wondered why Iâd never heard of Carson Grimes , and why the police took so long to charge him .
I think your aphoristic description – ‘England is just a shared address’ – is quite brilliant and horribly true. And I really don’t think it’s yet understood just how violently destructive this is. For all of us.
I wondered why Iâd never heard of Carson Grimes , and why the police took so long to charge him .
ï»żSomewhat bizarrely, Tate’s father, Emory, was an American chess International Master and has his own Wikipedia page.
Well I’ll be darned! So Tate’s father treated his mother and sons no better than the pawns he dispatched from a chess board? His son, after sniffing drainpipes in Marsh Farm, swops being a pawn for being in control of porn. Hmm
Emory Tate was a chess player of the most extraordinary natural talent, though his results never quite matched his legendary status in the African-American community. He certainly “ploughed his own furrow”, mostly travelling between one tournament and the next, and it is believable that he played only a minor role in the upbringing of his young sons even while notionally living with their mother.
Or to put it another way, he didn’t give any more of a toss for his girlfriend and son than his son gives for his mother, or indeed anyone else. Something of a role model then.
The guy was a high level chess player and a nut case that was allegedly kicked out from CIA. His mother clearly had issues as well, since no healthy woman would have kids with a nutter like Emory
So for Andrew it was mostly a case of lack of nurture over nature, with a bit of school bullying thrown in.
Emory Tate had an honourable career as an Air Force Staff Sargeant.
I believe the CIA thing is an urban myth – and would not in any case be that much of a black mark, they are a strange bunch.
Not an urban myth, but possibly a myth that he himself perpetuated
Not an urban myth, but possibly a myth that he himself perpetuated
So for Andrew it was mostly a case of lack of nurture over nature, with a bit of school bullying thrown in.
Emory Tate had an honourable career as an Air Force Staff Sargeant.
I believe the CIA thing is an urban myth – and would not in any case be that much of a black mark, they are a strange bunch.
He has a lot to answer for.
Or to put it another way, he didn’t give any more of a toss for his girlfriend and son than his son gives for his mother, or indeed anyone else. Something of a role model then.
The guy was a high level chess player and a nut case that was allegedly kicked out from CIA. His mother clearly had issues as well, since no healthy woman would have kids with a nutter like Emory
He has a lot to answer for.
Why is that bizarre?
Don’t read too much into it, Allison – I was curious enough to check Andrew Tate’s Wikipedia page when the “Where was his father?” question was posed, and his dad’s background just…wasn’t what I expected. I’m not making any kind of value judgment.
I think his father being a chess player is a surprise for most of us.
I think his father being a chess player is a surprise for most of us.
Don’t read too much into it, Allison – I was curious enough to check Andrew Tate’s Wikipedia page when the “Where was his father?” question was posed, and his dad’s background just…wasn’t what I expected. I’m not making any kind of value judgment.
so – he got very useful genes ie most likely to succeed amongst his cohort. The determinism of biology again an uncomfortable truth that should engender serious discussion but never does……………..that joke that we are all created equal results in a copout about what might actually work with the biologically ‘disadvantaged ‘ – ie the biologically ‘average’ from disadvantaged backgrounds. The older (?) german system that no young person gets to cop out and have to either go into higher studies, a trade , the army or some type of national service. Seems pretty simple really…………….
Wow! One wonders why they would come to England from the US, it’s usually the other way round.
Well I’ll be darned! So Tate’s father treated his mother and sons no better than the pawns he dispatched from a chess board? His son, after sniffing drainpipes in Marsh Farm, swops being a pawn for being in control of porn. Hmm
Emory Tate was a chess player of the most extraordinary natural talent, though his results never quite matched his legendary status in the African-American community. He certainly “ploughed his own furrow”, mostly travelling between one tournament and the next, and it is believable that he played only a minor role in the upbringing of his young sons even while notionally living with their mother.
Why is that bizarre?
so – he got very useful genes ie most likely to succeed amongst his cohort. The determinism of biology again an uncomfortable truth that should engender serious discussion but never does……………..that joke that we are all created equal results in a copout about what might actually work with the biologically ‘disadvantaged ‘ – ie the biologically ‘average’ from disadvantaged backgrounds. The older (?) german system that no young person gets to cop out and have to either go into higher studies, a trade , the army or some type of national service. Seems pretty simple really…………….
Wow! One wonders why they would come to England from the US, it’s usually the other way round.
Good Lord such grandiose drivel! Most young men brought up by a struggling single parent, usually the mother, end up with huge respect for her, and so for women in general. However, Tate’s mother has had the huge misfortune to end up on a sink estate and who knows how she kept the family together? Those sink estates are the responsibility of government, to be precise, of bad government. Single parents are not goddesses or magicians; the absense of the father in a society that is still grossly patriarchal just compounds the situation for the single mother. I’d defy you to survive Marsh Farm and the like.
There has always been widows due to husbands being killed in wars and accidents. However, historically male members used to take on the role of the Father; there were boxing, rugby, football and cricket clubs to work off energy and boys could start working from the age of fourteen years of age. A boy who is labouring and then training for rugbyand/or boxing will have little energy left to cause trouble. Many companies had sports teams. As work would have started as early as 5 am , if farming and often at 6 to 7 am in a factory, people went to bed by 10pm.
All of the above has largely gone.
Good points. Not only are there a shortage of solid manly examples in these communities, there is a general lack of will to be a mentor or step-in father figure according to the more traditional model you sketch. And good models of manliness are not expected, perhaps not even believed in by many anymore.
*I didn’t live through and don’t have close-up cultural knowledge of the English particulars you mention, but I’d say that there are parallels in the US and elsewhere. As you noted on another board, teens and young adults with minimal academic ability or interest shouldn’t try to go to university. They should have jobs or direct-prep training, not fruitless additional years of book-learning or a community that allows them to remain like semi-feral overgrown children.
Sounds like a rather grim existance for boys and I’m not sure there would have been enough men to go around as substitute fathers since they would also be working from 6am till 10pm. Did you step in?
I don’t think 16-hour days were a norm at any time in history with the possible exception of industrial factory workers in the late 1800s, early 1900s in the US (still probably 12-15 hours). 10-12 hour days, half-a-day on Saturday after reforms that started for tradesmen in the 18th century (no more dawn-to-dusk all year round). Rough enough, of course, not a working man’s paradise.
There must be some way to split the difference between a life of punishing toil starting at 14 and oceans of free time with no real direction or purpose.
Earl of Shaftesbury and Factory Acts . It was the aristocracy with a sense of Noblesse Oblige who pushed to improve the lives of those working in factories and living in slums along with the Non Conformists.The attitude was now we have freed the slaves it is time to improve the quality of live of the poor. It was the ancestors of The Guardian( Manchester Guardian ) who opposed improving the lives of the poor.
Hall of fame: Anthony Ashley Cooper, 7th Earl of Shaftesbury | The Gazette
I’ve watch it! Oh boy, oh boy, he’s soooo confused. Socialism and The Left has always been misogynist. British Socialism is no different from Islamic solcialism, see the Hisb ut Tarir, yes, they too are socialist. Socialism looks after its women and girls in a protective manner, The price we pay for that patronising, patriarchal protection is that we must behave in the manner that the Patriarchs dictate. Our postion is similar to pets. Some of us have been lucky and have wonderful owners, sadly others not so, it’s pot luck. The Left, in particular socialism, keeps a tight grip on us. That grip being seemingly benign in the West is not easy to see, but it’s there nontheless. One of the unintended consequences of capitalism is the liberation of women. For capitalism to work people must consume material goods, the more people, the better and so caitalism didn’t leave out 50% of the population.This was not out of compassion, but out of financial necessity. These other humans needed to be allowed to buy thing, and so needed to earn a living in order to buy things, and so needed an education to earn the money to buy things. That is how women become liberated and why feminists have left the Guardian. It’s why the Taliban can never take part in modern economics and are destined to poverty. Surely you get it?
I’ve watch it! Oh boy, oh boy, he’s soooo confused. Socialism and The Left has always been misogynist. British Socialism is no different from Islamic solcialism, see the Hisb ut Tarir, yes, they too are socialist. Socialism looks after its women and girls in a protective manner, The price we pay for that patronising, patriarchal protection is that we must behave in the manner that the Patriarchs dictate. Our postion is similar to pets. Some of us have been lucky and have wonderful owners, sadly others not so, it’s pot luck. The Left, in particular socialism, keeps a tight grip on us. That grip being seemingly benign in the West is not easy to see, but it’s there nontheless. One of the unintended consequences of capitalism is the liberation of women. For capitalism to work people must consume material goods, the more people, the better and so caitalism didn’t leave out 50% of the population.This was not out of compassion, but out of financial necessity. These other humans needed to be allowed to buy thing, and so needed to earn a living in order to buy things, and so needed an education to earn the money to buy things. That is how women become liberated and why feminists have left the Guardian. It’s why the Taliban can never take part in modern economics and are destined to poverty. Surely you get it?
Earl of Shaftesbury and Factory Acts . It was the aristocracy with a sense of Noblesse Oblige who pushed to improve the lives of those working in factories and living in slums along with the Non Conformists.The attitude was now we have freed the slaves it is time to improve the quality of live of the poor. It was the ancestors of The Guardian( Manchester Guardian ) who opposed improving the lives of the poor.
Hall of fame: Anthony Ashley Cooper, 7th Earl of Shaftesbury | The Gazette
Not really. Many boys would prefer to work than be in school. Britain used to have vast numbers of sports teams: the church hall, companies, towns/villge Boys Brigade, Cadet Forces, Scouts.
Sergeant Stan Scott used to run army cadets in NE london .
Sergeant Stan W Scott – YouTube
Fairbairn-Sykes Fighting Knife – YouTube
When men such as Sergeant Stan Scott were part of the community there was little crime.
The Andrew Tates and drug dealers take over an are because of the absence of the likes of Sergeant Stan Scotts.
The Mother could call upon male relatives to give guidance and punishment. Many tough working class boys find the effete priggish middle class teachers are not adults they respect whereas they respect the practical tough craftsman, chargehand, foreman and Sergeant Stan Scotts..
Heard many stories about Stan Scott as he was an retired adult instructor in my army cadet force sector, city of London and North east sector 2 coy. I never got to meet him but all my colleagues who had the pleasure to be trained by him, had the best man to train them as well as getting them off the streets of easy London. An absolute legend of my sector and the army world and a complete bad ass. He passed away last year.
Were the teachers and other middle class “sons of privilege” really all the simpering wimps of your portrayal? Surely some served in the military too, or could play passable football, or had a measure of toughness despite a lack of privation.
I acknowledge some validity in your generalities but still think you are leaving out quite a number of tougher better off boys, as well as poor weaklings and depressives left behind in times that were in some ways crueler than today.
I have never said that.
There are major differences between the USA and Britain. Britain until recently had a much larger land owning naval military class where amateur sports were played to high standard- rugby, boxing rowing, cricket, shooting, fox hunting and their sons and daughters were sent to tough public schools.
What made Britain, Australia, South Africa and New Zealand unique was that boys from different classes and regions could be selected to play amateur sport, especially cricket and rugby union. Boys could play for the local village/town, different schools, then at country, national and in the case of rugby The Lions. Sport was seen as character building, not just for winning. The idea of building character was why organisations such as Scouts and Boys Brigade were founded.
Many public and grammar schools had masters who played sport and served in the Armed Forces. My French master was an ex Royal Marine Commando who had played rugby to a high level. He could still do press up on his finger tips in his forties and punishment was to undertake PT with him. One of the punishments was a five mile run and if one seen walking, one was caned. The public and grammar schools have a long tradition of sending pupils to the Armed Forces.
As Orwell pointed out the left wing middle class has mocked physical courage and patriotism Inside the Whale, The Limit to Pessimism, My Country Right or left plus others.
From the late 1960s, comprehensive schools becamse anti competitive sport and anti military so few men who had played sport to high level and served in the Armed Forces worked there. Many public schools had combined Cadet Forces where the the Sergeant Major was ex- regular , often PTI( Sergeant Stan Scott type) and helped with discipline. Consequently, there were discipline problems in comprehensives which leads to Andrew Tate.
Public Schools and The Great War: The Generation Lost eBook : Seldon, Anthony, Walsh, David, Howard, Michael: Amazon.co.uk: Kindle Store
The children of the landowners grew up in the countryside and played with those from the village: in the USA this class is very small. In the USA money is held by people who have made it in industry, Wall Street , Hollwywood, Silicon Valley, they do not have to be brave or tough; there is no family honour to maintain. How many children of the wealthy in the USA play for the village or state cricket or rugby teams? A friend came from a family where they had supplied officers to the Black Watch since it was formed and the Father considered having a son who served in an elite military units more important than making money.
Can one imagine rugby teams from Silicon Valley the way the Welsh Valleys produced rugby teams or Stanstead Commputer Science Dept playing St Mary’s Medical School at rugby ?
What rugby and cricket achieved was to bring together people from very different social groups and areas and therefore broke down barriers. Boys may go to different schools and play for the same local teams, then be selected for county teams, national and in the case of rugby The Lions.
I would say many of the problems stated in the various Unherd articles occur because there are rigid class divides. On the cold wet muddy pitch all are equal it matters for nothing whether one is academically bright or wealthy, one parents are married or not, ones race or religion; but character does. As Dr Martin Luther King said ” Judge me on my character “.
fran cotton rugby muddy – Bing images
Yes to all that. Whenever I push back at you, you produce something further of substance or interest, or both. Cheers.
I can picture “no-tackle, aerobic rugby” here in Silicon Valley. (Some adults do play the real thing around these parts, but that’s a pretty small subculture). And certainly there is still hard-contact American football here, traumatic brain injuries and all. But to your point, most of the best (US) football players, with notable exceptions like many top-notch quarterbacks, are from poor and of course low-class backgrounds.
Americans often like to imagine that there aren’t sharp class divisions among us, but that’s not true. It’s just that class is mostly based on wealth–but not only. You cannot fully “buy into” a so-called Boston Brahmin (super old money New England) crowd with money alone, especially with the “wrong accent” or, let’s face it, color. You and your new money mightn’t be ostracized, but you’re not in.
Playing sport is a great leveller and so is military service. Blacks serving in large numbers in WWII–though still in segregated divisions–probably did more to advance racial justice than any speech could do. And blacks who returned home after serving honorably overseas were a lot less likely to accept the same old de facto, second-class citizen status. Also, Jackie Robinson breaking the so-called color barrier in Major League Baseball–and playing at a star level, with undeniable dignity and character–did something that precepts and altruistic speeches never could. (Not that we’ve reached the Promised Land, mind you). We are drawn together even as spectators of sport, but not in the same way that players are. And there’s always some violent psycho-fans, on both sides of the Atlantic.
Many Americans of every skin tone are still unable to judge people “not by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character”. A similar situation prevails between people of different class/status, political affiliation, etc. What a divided mess we’re in here in these Yoo-nited States!
Sport in Britain has always been a great mixer, men from all walks of life played cricket and rugby union. A farm labourer could have played alongside Prince Ranji for Sussex .
Ranjitsinhji – Wikipedia
Rugby Union was amateur. The Welsh team comprised coal miners and medical consultants ( JPR Williams Millfield School and St Marys Medical School ) .
The Greatest Try – All Blacks vs Barbarians 1973 – YouTube
Prince Obolensky scored one of England’s finest trys.
England rugby team defeats New Zealand (1936) – YouTube
People played for the love of the game and the honour of representing their country: not money.
How would the Andrew Tates of the World cope playing the All Blacks ?
COLIN MEADS 17: NZ’s TOP HISTORY MAKERS – YouTube
Sir Colin was a farmer and once carried in playing rugby after he broke his arm. When boys are training in rugby, especially if one is against a Fran Cotton, JPR Williams or a Sir Colin Meads one does not have energy to cause trouble. All these men in gyms cannot train the for reality of 80 mins of rugby and then 20 minutes of extra time when one constantly being tackled and making the tackle.
One of the top rugby schools is Harrow which educated W Churchill and Nehru.
Top 5 School Teams of the Weekend: Round 2 – 18th September – YouTube
If the left wing middle class are so supportive of the manual blue collar working class why do they not play Rugby League, the most working class of sports?
A major reason is that the wing middle class intellectuals largely lack the strength, fitness, toughness and aggression of men such as Meads, Obolensky, Cotton, JPR Williams, etc, Williams once had his cheek ripped by an All Black stamping on him and needed 30 sticthes and returned to the game.
All Black fails to apologise for ripping open JPR’s face as he finally speaks out on horror incident – Wales Online
Andrew Tate is a product of the post 1960s Welfare System and denigration of chivalry which ignores the fact that unless male aggression and energy is channelled in a constructive manner it becomes destructive. Perhaps if gangs were forced to play rugby in winter and cricket in summer there would be less violence?
Sport in Britain has always been a great mixer, men from all walks of life played cricket and rugby union. A farm labourer could have played alongside Prince Ranji for Sussex .
Ranjitsinhji – Wikipedia
Rugby Union was amateur. The Welsh team comprised coal miners and medical consultants ( JPR Williams Millfield School and St Marys Medical School ) .
The Greatest Try – All Blacks vs Barbarians 1973 – YouTube
Prince Obolensky scored one of England’s finest trys.
England rugby team defeats New Zealand (1936) – YouTube
People played for the love of the game and the honour of representing their country: not money.
How would the Andrew Tates of the World cope playing the All Blacks ?
COLIN MEADS 17: NZ’s TOP HISTORY MAKERS – YouTube
Sir Colin was a farmer and once carried in playing rugby after he broke his arm. When boys are training in rugby, especially if one is against a Fran Cotton, JPR Williams or a Sir Colin Meads one does not have energy to cause trouble. All these men in gyms cannot train the for reality of 80 mins of rugby and then 20 minutes of extra time when one constantly being tackled and making the tackle.
One of the top rugby schools is Harrow which educated W Churchill and Nehru.
Top 5 School Teams of the Weekend: Round 2 – 18th September – YouTube
If the left wing middle class are so supportive of the manual blue collar working class why do they not play Rugby League, the most working class of sports?
A major reason is that the wing middle class intellectuals largely lack the strength, fitness, toughness and aggression of men such as Meads, Obolensky, Cotton, JPR Williams, etc, Williams once had his cheek ripped by an All Black stamping on him and needed 30 sticthes and returned to the game.
All Black fails to apologise for ripping open JPR’s face as he finally speaks out on horror incident – Wales Online
Andrew Tate is a product of the post 1960s Welfare System and denigration of chivalry which ignores the fact that unless male aggression and energy is channelled in a constructive manner it becomes destructive. Perhaps if gangs were forced to play rugby in winter and cricket in summer there would be less violence?
“Many public and grammar schools had masters who played sport and served in the Armed Forces. My French master was an ex Royal Marine Commando”
The deputy head of my prep school served with the 8th Army and left his leg behind in North Africa.
Yes to all that. Whenever I push back at you, you produce something further of substance or interest, or both. Cheers.
I can picture “no-tackle, aerobic rugby” here in Silicon Valley. (Some adults do play the real thing around these parts, but that’s a pretty small subculture). And certainly there is still hard-contact American football here, traumatic brain injuries and all. But to your point, most of the best (US) football players, with notable exceptions like many top-notch quarterbacks, are from poor and of course low-class backgrounds.
Americans often like to imagine that there aren’t sharp class divisions among us, but that’s not true. It’s just that class is mostly based on wealth–but not only. You cannot fully “buy into” a so-called Boston Brahmin (super old money New England) crowd with money alone, especially with the “wrong accent” or, let’s face it, color. You and your new money mightn’t be ostracized, but you’re not in.
Playing sport is a great leveller and so is military service. Blacks serving in large numbers in WWII–though still in segregated divisions–probably did more to advance racial justice than any speech could do. And blacks who returned home after serving honorably overseas were a lot less likely to accept the same old de facto, second-class citizen status. Also, Jackie Robinson breaking the so-called color barrier in Major League Baseball–and playing at a star level, with undeniable dignity and character–did something that precepts and altruistic speeches never could. (Not that we’ve reached the Promised Land, mind you). We are drawn together even as spectators of sport, but not in the same way that players are. And there’s always some violent psycho-fans, on both sides of the Atlantic.
Many Americans of every skin tone are still unable to judge people “not by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character”. A similar situation prevails between people of different class/status, political affiliation, etc. What a divided mess we’re in here in these Yoo-nited States!
“Many public and grammar schools had masters who played sport and served in the Armed Forces. My French master was an ex Royal Marine Commando”
The deputy head of my prep school served with the 8th Army and left his leg behind in North Africa.
I have never said that.
There are major differences between the USA and Britain. Britain until recently had a much larger land owning naval military class where amateur sports were played to high standard- rugby, boxing rowing, cricket, shooting, fox hunting and their sons and daughters were sent to tough public schools.
What made Britain, Australia, South Africa and New Zealand unique was that boys from different classes and regions could be selected to play amateur sport, especially cricket and rugby union. Boys could play for the local village/town, different schools, then at country, national and in the case of rugby The Lions. Sport was seen as character building, not just for winning. The idea of building character was why organisations such as Scouts and Boys Brigade were founded.
Many public and grammar schools had masters who played sport and served in the Armed Forces. My French master was an ex Royal Marine Commando who had played rugby to a high level. He could still do press up on his finger tips in his forties and punishment was to undertake PT with him. One of the punishments was a five mile run and if one seen walking, one was caned. The public and grammar schools have a long tradition of sending pupils to the Armed Forces.
As Orwell pointed out the left wing middle class has mocked physical courage and patriotism Inside the Whale, The Limit to Pessimism, My Country Right or left plus others.
From the late 1960s, comprehensive schools becamse anti competitive sport and anti military so few men who had played sport to high level and served in the Armed Forces worked there. Many public schools had combined Cadet Forces where the the Sergeant Major was ex- regular , often PTI( Sergeant Stan Scott type) and helped with discipline. Consequently, there were discipline problems in comprehensives which leads to Andrew Tate.
Public Schools and The Great War: The Generation Lost eBook : Seldon, Anthony, Walsh, David, Howard, Michael: Amazon.co.uk: Kindle Store
The children of the landowners grew up in the countryside and played with those from the village: in the USA this class is very small. In the USA money is held by people who have made it in industry, Wall Street , Hollwywood, Silicon Valley, they do not have to be brave or tough; there is no family honour to maintain. How many children of the wealthy in the USA play for the village or state cricket or rugby teams? A friend came from a family where they had supplied officers to the Black Watch since it was formed and the Father considered having a son who served in an elite military units more important than making money.
Can one imagine rugby teams from Silicon Valley the way the Welsh Valleys produced rugby teams or Stanstead Commputer Science Dept playing St Mary’s Medical School at rugby ?
What rugby and cricket achieved was to bring together people from very different social groups and areas and therefore broke down barriers. Boys may go to different schools and play for the same local teams, then be selected for county teams, national and in the case of rugby The Lions.
I would say many of the problems stated in the various Unherd articles occur because there are rigid class divides. On the cold wet muddy pitch all are equal it matters for nothing whether one is academically bright or wealthy, one parents are married or not, ones race or religion; but character does. As Dr Martin Luther King said ” Judge me on my character “.
fran cotton rugby muddy – Bing images
Were the teachers and other middle class “sons of privilege” really all the simpering wimps of your portrayal? Surely some served in the military too, or could play passable football, or had a measure of toughness despite a lack of privation.
I acknowledge some validity in your generalities but still think you are leaving out quite a number of tougher better off boys, as well as poor weaklings and depressives left behind in times that were in some ways crueler than today.
I don’t think 16-hour days were a norm at any time in history with the possible exception of industrial factory workers in the late 1800s, early 1900s in the US (still probably 12-15 hours). 10-12 hour days, half-a-day on Saturday after reforms that started for tradesmen in the 18th century (no more dawn-to-dusk all year round). Rough enough, of course, not a working man’s paradise.
There must be some way to split the difference between a life of punishing toil starting at 14 and oceans of free time with no real direction or purpose.
Not really. Many boys would prefer to work than be in school. Britain used to have vast numbers of sports teams: the church hall, companies, towns/villge Boys Brigade, Cadet Forces, Scouts.
Sergeant Stan Scott used to run army cadets in NE london .
Sergeant Stan W Scott – YouTube
Fairbairn-Sykes Fighting Knife – YouTube
When men such as Sergeant Stan Scott were part of the community there was little crime.
The Andrew Tates and drug dealers take over an are because of the absence of the likes of Sergeant Stan Scotts.
The Mother could call upon male relatives to give guidance and punishment. Many tough working class boys find the effete priggish middle class teachers are not adults they respect whereas they respect the practical tough craftsman, chargehand, foreman and Sergeant Stan Scotts..
Heard many stories about Stan Scott as he was an retired adult instructor in my army cadet force sector, city of London and North east sector 2 coy. I never got to meet him but all my colleagues who had the pleasure to be trained by him, had the best man to train them as well as getting them off the streets of easy London. An absolute legend of my sector and the army world and a complete bad ass. He passed away last year.
Good points. Not only are there a shortage of solid manly examples in these communities, there is a general lack of will to be a mentor or step-in father figure according to the more traditional model you sketch. And good models of manliness are not expected, perhaps not even believed in by many anymore.
*I didn’t live through and don’t have close-up cultural knowledge of the English particulars you mention, but I’d say that there are parallels in the US and elsewhere. As you noted on another board, teens and young adults with minimal academic ability or interest shouldn’t try to go to university. They should have jobs or direct-prep training, not fruitless additional years of book-learning or a community that allows them to remain like semi-feral overgrown children.
Sounds like a rather grim existance for boys and I’m not sure there would have been enough men to go around as substitute fathers since they would also be working from 6am till 10pm. Did you step in?
There have been good people come from Marsh Farm and other sink estates. It is an excuse to say everyone ends up bad just like it is an excuse to use the absence of a father. Decent people thrive in spite of diversity. He and his brother chose to be bad. Romania can keep him.
Is that actually true, or just your opinion.
If true, then given the increase in single motherhood, respect for women must be at an all time high. And yet many feminists claim otherwise. Not sure if Iâm just confused, or youâre pushing wishful thinking as reality.
You don’t end up on a sink estate by “misfortune”. It seems to me that what the lefty liberal elite or whatever they’re called now, dont like about this Andrew Tate is that he didn’t go through route of seeking their approval and wanting “pats on the head ‘ from him.
Or perhaps it’s because he is a meanspirited and materialistic man. A dreadful role model from any worthy standard of values: left, right, or center.
Some fathers are better absent.
Some fathers are better absent.
Then how do you end up on a sink estate?
Pre 1960s a council house had to be earned: married couple, hard working, honest and rules on behaviour. Post 1960s this was relaxed. The Peabody and Guinness Trust still have strict rules so no bad behaviour.
Pre 1960s a council house had to be earned: married couple, hard working, honest and rules on behaviour. Post 1960s this was relaxed. The Peabody and Guinness Trust still have strict rules so no bad behaviour.
Or perhaps it’s because he is a meanspirited and materialistic man. A dreadful role model from any worthy standard of values: left, right, or center.
Then how do you end up on a sink estate?
There’s a bit of a contradiction there. You say”most young men brought up by a struggling single parent, usually have huge respect for her and so for women in general” Then you say “however Tate’s mother had the huge misfortune to end up on a sink estate and who knows how she kept the family together” Well yes, but isn’t that the fate of most single mothers, to struggle? So why didn’t he have respect for his mother?
There is no contradiction here. I wrote, “…most…” He, I’m pointing out, has not followed that pathway. I’m wondering why? I strongly suspect the Muslim influence and its endemic misogyny haas infulence him greatly. Western Women perceived as ‘sluts’ ‘slappers’.
Thanks for the clarification. Point taken. I didn’t know he was a muslim. Say no more!!
Thanks for the clarification. Point taken. I didn’t know he was a muslim. Say no more!!
There is no contradiction here. I wrote, “…most…” He, I’m pointing out, has not followed that pathway. I’m wondering why? I strongly suspect the Muslim influence and its endemic misogyny haas infulence him greatly. Western Women perceived as ‘sluts’ ‘slappers’.
There has always been widows due to husbands being killed in wars and accidents. However, historically male members used to take on the role of the Father; there were boxing, rugby, football and cricket clubs to work off energy and boys could start working from the age of fourteen years of age. A boy who is labouring and then training for rugbyand/or boxing will have little energy left to cause trouble. Many companies had sports teams. As work would have started as early as 5 am , if farming and often at 6 to 7 am in a factory, people went to bed by 10pm.
All of the above has largely gone.
There have been good people come from Marsh Farm and other sink estates. It is an excuse to say everyone ends up bad just like it is an excuse to use the absence of a father. Decent people thrive in spite of diversity. He and his brother chose to be bad. Romania can keep him.
Is that actually true, or just your opinion.
If true, then given the increase in single motherhood, respect for women must be at an all time high. And yet many feminists claim otherwise. Not sure if Iâm just confused, or youâre pushing wishful thinking as reality.
You don’t end up on a sink estate by “misfortune”. It seems to me that what the lefty liberal elite or whatever they’re called now, dont like about this Andrew Tate is that he didn’t go through route of seeking their approval and wanting “pats on the head ‘ from him.
There’s a bit of a contradiction there. You say”most young men brought up by a struggling single parent, usually have huge respect for her and so for women in general” Then you say “however Tate’s mother had the huge misfortune to end up on a sink estate and who knows how she kept the family together” Well yes, but isn’t that the fate of most single mothers, to struggle? So why didn’t he have respect for his mother?
How do you know what Andrew Tate is to his mother?
The most constructive help given to struggling parents (with longterm effects on their children’s futures) especially in conditions of poverty and hopelessness like Marsh Farm and other “sink” estates devoid of any social amenities, was Labour’s Sure Start scheme — cancelled by our Tory government.
Also, “Lord of the Flies” is a novel which misrepresents the young left to their own instincts: which, according to social science studies, are far more benign. It takes corrupt and depraved adults to ruin young people’s lives by exploiting poverty and neglect.
The cancelling of Sure Start was profoundly stupid in the fullest sense of that word: ‘to act in a way counter to one’s own interest’. Sure Start was a proven success that was influencing right where it mattered – at the beginning: childhood. So obviously the new government simply had stop this frightful attempt to help clueless parents improve their parenting. It’s beyond dismal when you think of what could have been achieved simply by leaving this straightforward scheme in place.
It takes “corrupt and depraved adults to ruin young people’s lives” wherever they grow up. Poverty and neglect is just a double whammy.
The cancelling of Sure Start was profoundly stupid in the fullest sense of that word: ‘to act in a way counter to one’s own interest’. Sure Start was a proven success that was influencing right where it mattered – at the beginning: childhood. So obviously the new government simply had stop this frightful attempt to help clueless parents improve their parenting. It’s beyond dismal when you think of what could have been achieved simply by leaving this straightforward scheme in place.
It takes “corrupt and depraved adults to ruin young people’s lives” wherever they grow up. Poverty and neglect is just a double whammy.
I think there’s some merit in your perspective. But to completely free people, however downtrodden, from responsibility for their actions reaches too far in the other direction of Furedi’s flat assertion that the woes of the “lost boys” were just “self-inflicted”. Yes they have some available choice but for children or young adolescents from rough towns and often terrible family backgrounds it’s pretty limited for most.
We should be our brother’s keeper and love our neighbors, even those ones. And we should not deny the power of self-reliance, nor the possibility of carving a decent path through and out of hell, so to speak. Unfortunately, it seems like Tate’s escape route has led to an alternate hell-scape, spotlight and material success notwithstanding–and I’m not talking about his current legal troubles alone. These are some hope-starved times and places; things are not therefore simply hopeless, nor criminal and spiritually-empty ways inevitable.
Andrew Tate was born into an environment where relentless bullying at every level was a fact of life. So he decided to become a top bully. That was his choice. He then decided to make masses of money by convincing other young males to do the same. Also his choice. I agree that estates like Marsh Farm represent a total failure of public and political will. But that doesn’t excuse what he’s become.
Well dah!! But I resent the “we” thing. Please speak for yourself.
I didn’t say ‘we’ and wasn’t referring to you. I was agreeing with a particular part of Hughes-Hallett’s post.
My comment was in response to Alka-Hughes-Hallett not to you, Coralie. It was a response to his/her comment way back. It would be nice if there were lines drawn from the comment to the response.
Agreed!
Agreed!
My comment was in response to Alka-Hughes-Hallett not to you, Coralie. It was a response to his/her comment way back. It would be nice if there were lines drawn from the comment to the response.
I didn’t say ‘we’ and wasn’t referring to you. I was agreeing with a particular part of Hughes-Hallett’s post.
I think thatâs just making excuses personally. Yes he had a rough upbringing, and yes that certainly often leads to worse outcomes in life (which is why I believe meritocracy to be nonsense as we donât all have the same opportunities).
However, if he has done the crimes heâs accused of then thatâs solely on him. If heâd ended up on the dole and on the gear Iâd say his environment would be a large contributing factor, but not many people end up in human trafficking simply because they were brought up on a rough estate. A crime that serious suggests an absence of morals or a conscience rather than a simple lack of opportunities
The problem being that people in England no longer identify sufficiently with each other to care. England is just a shared address. To say âI canât believe English children are growing up like thisâ means nothing to many of those who are living in nice middle class areas and doing nicely thank you.
To others it sounds vaguely racist. As if we should not care more for those struggling in England than for those struggling anywhere else.
ï»żSomewhat bizarrely, Tate’s father, Emory, was an American chess International Master and has his own Wikipedia page.
Good Lord such grandiose drivel! Most young men brought up by a struggling single parent, usually the mother, end up with huge respect for her, and so for women in general. However, Tate’s mother has had the huge misfortune to end up on a sink estate and who knows how she kept the family together? Those sink estates are the responsibility of government, to be precise, of bad government. Single parents are not goddesses or magicians; the absense of the father in a society that is still grossly patriarchal just compounds the situation for the single mother. I’d defy you to survive Marsh Farm and the like.
How do you know what Andrew Tate is to his mother?
The most constructive help given to struggling parents (with longterm effects on their children’s futures) especially in conditions of poverty and hopelessness like Marsh Farm and other “sink” estates devoid of any social amenities, was Labour’s Sure Start scheme — cancelled by our Tory government.
Also, “Lord of the Flies” is a novel which misrepresents the young left to their own instincts: which, according to social science studies, are far more benign. It takes corrupt and depraved adults to ruin young people’s lives by exploiting poverty and neglect.
I think there’s some merit in your perspective. But to completely free people, however downtrodden, from responsibility for their actions reaches too far in the other direction of Furedi’s flat assertion that the woes of the “lost boys” were just “self-inflicted”. Yes they have some available choice but for children or young adolescents from rough towns and often terrible family backgrounds it’s pretty limited for most.
We should be our brother’s keeper and love our neighbors, even those ones. And we should not deny the power of self-reliance, nor the possibility of carving a decent path through and out of hell, so to speak. Unfortunately, it seems like Tate’s escape route has led to an alternate hell-scape, spotlight and material success notwithstanding–and I’m not talking about his current legal troubles alone. These are some hope-starved times and places; things are not therefore simply hopeless, nor criminal and spiritually-empty ways inevitable.
Andrew Tate was born into an environment where relentless bullying at every level was a fact of life. So he decided to become a top bully. That was his choice. He then decided to make masses of money by convincing other young males to do the same. Also his choice. I agree that estates like Marsh Farm represent a total failure of public and political will. But that doesn’t excuse what he’s become.
Well dah!! But I resent the “we” thing. Please speak for yourself.
Andrew Tateâs story begins with his motherâs and fatherâs story. What was their experience of life? Where was the father when he was growing up? What was his influence on his sons? It starts with the parental lack of awareness, neglect and responsibility. Life weighs you down, everything downstream takes a beating too, societal structures are weak and broken, there is no one to pick up the pieces and guide you when you are down or confused . âLord of fliesâ instinct takes over and turns young minds back to savage, primal, survival mode. Small material successes become extremely important and the basis to build on by any means possible.
Andrew Tate is just a misunderstood little boy to his mother: she cannot control nor understand the role she played in his views, actions & incarceration. The father? Nonexistent in the article. We have to come to terms with the fact that our society is also made up of such fractured lives. Andrew Tate is the consequence of such a broken society. So whoâs to blame? No one individually, but all of us collectively. These are our children, our families, our society. The pace of movement in our lives is frightening, fast and furious. Either we slow it down or pull those that canât keep up along with us or accept that Andrew Tates are made by us, our desire for more. This desire seeps into a mind warped by familial and societal neglect with the tools available to exploit it, unchecked, warps even more till we are forced to take notice because it starts to touch our lives.
I am not sure how it can be put into action but I think the responsibility lies with all of us, when there is an opportunity to act in a manner that has an effect on how you want your children to turn out, we should fully embrace it. If we as parents and society members take charge of our thoughts and actions, the consequences will drip feed into the society and we will activate the change we wish to see. It could be the start we are looking for.
The poverty of the south Wales mining districts and the other heavy industrial areas of the Depression were far worse. What they had were physically tough men who boxed, played rugby( union or league), many had been in Armed Forces, ethics of honesty and hard work embued by Methodism and The Baptists, Sunday School, lives lived according The Bible, especially Proverbs, The Cooperative Society. The phrases” Cleanliness is next to Godliness”, ” Poor but honest ” were common. The front room and front step of houses were immaculate. Men kept order.
These socities produced Keir Hardie and Ernest Bevin
Ernest Bevin – 1940 (1940) – YouTube
Bevin came from a far poorer society than Tate and was Baptist preacher.
If one has a society which mocks discipline and hence self discipline, promotes if it feels good do it and one which is completely opposite to The Proverbs, the result is Marsh Farm. The physical conditions, whether homes or schools are far more luxurious than the heavy industrial areas of The Depression. Proverbs
by which men will come to wisdom and instruction
gain well-instructed intelligence
, righteousness, justice and probity
The simple will be endowed with shrewdness
the young with knowledge and prudence
the man of understanding will aquire skill
fools scorn wisdom and discipline
The Baptists,Methodists, Quakers, Salvation Army and Non- Conformists entered the rookersies and slums of 19th century Britain and greatly improved conditions.
The lefty wing middle class planners built housing estates post WW2 and slums were created because the people were allowed to devlop a slum mentality.The middle class Trotskyists sided with criminals( All property is theft ) and the law was changed such that honest tough men could not impose order. If drug dealers had tried to sell their wares in an industrial town of the 1930s , they would have been run out of town. If a man touched someone below the age of 18 years they were accused of assault not matter how violent was the teenager. Discipline was removed from schools such that if a teacher had to physically restrain a pupil who was attacking another they were accused of assault.
Glad to see that someone remembers Ernie Bevin – the most effective (in my opinion revolutionary) English socialist of the 20th century.
There are many famous Bevinisms, but my favourite is his description of the USSR: “A breakaway from the Transport and General Workers Union.”
There is a superb biography of Bevin by Alan Bullock.
Its high quality is not surprising given that the Bullock Report on Industrial Democracy in 1977 was a watershed in British history. It proposed that there should be worker directors on the boards of large privately owned companies. Had it been adopted, it would have effected a (very British) revolution. It would have proved as irreversible as the Welfare State.
In the event, it was rejected by the entire Labour Movement: the Trade Unions, the Labour Party and the Communist Party. Not for us, they said, to manage capitalism! That’s for the managers. We won’t soil our hands. (As I recall, only Clive Jenkins and Jack Jones fought valiantly for actual workers control, to no avail. )
All this was only a few years after Harold Wilson had complacently described Labour as ‘the natural party of government’.
But the working class didn’t want to govern! They left it to their betters…..or at any rate somebody else.
The rejection of the Bullock Report marked the end of an era.
Trade union power without responsibility was epitomised by Arthur Scargill, who destroyed the National Union of Mineworkers.
That ‘ great refusal’ of everything that Bevin had fought for entailed Thatcherism and the atomisation of the working class and the destruction of organised labour. Blair was a Thatcherite wearing a red rosette as well as a war criminal.
Nostalgia is a great thing! There actually is an Ernest Bevin Society – they occasionally publish interesting pamphlets on current affairs. They are not affiliated to Starmer’s Labour Party, in which Ernest Bevin would find no home. He would be cancelled.
PS. Ernie Bevin is not Nye Bevan, the original Welsh Windbag, who did NOT found the NHS!
You omitted to mention the BEVIN gave âusâ the Bomb!
Whilst the âWelsh Windbagâ as you so politely call him gave us the âTories are vermin â speech.
ps. I did reply to your Irish epistle of a few days ago, but the censor forbade it!
I would say that it was Attlee who gave ‘us’ the Bomb – not that the Americans would have let ‘us’ use it if E.Powell was right, as I believe he was about many things.
Very sorry to hear that you have been censored.
There’s far too much of that sort of thing.
Well yes course Attlee had the ultimate say, but Bevin seems to have been the more proactive.
Hence those immortal words:
âWe’ve got to have this thing over here whatever it costs…. We’ve got to have the bloody Union Jack flying on top of it”
Thus off course thwarting those wretched communists who infested that government, and the establishment in general.
Well yes course Attlee had the ultimate say, but Bevin seems to have been the more proactive.
Hence those immortal words:
âWe’ve got to have this thing over here whatever it costs…. We’ve got to have the bloody Union Jack flying on top of it”
Thus off course thwarting those wretched communists who infested that government, and the establishment in general.
I would say that it was Attlee who gave ‘us’ the Bomb – not that the Americans would have let ‘us’ use it if E.Powell was right, as I believe he was about many things.
Very sorry to hear that you have been censored.
There’s far too much of that sort of thing.
Nice and deeply important history lesson well told. I am reminded of similar efforts, also frustrated by intransigency, attempted by Barbara Castle. Thank you