Archive for June, 2008

Michaelmas 2008

Tuesday, June 24th, 2008

We are currently preparing a programme of events for Michaelmas 2008. You can look forward to the annual barbeque, the freshers’ gin and tonic party, top speakers from the political world and elsewhere, our legendary port parties and finally the Chairman’s Dinner.

If you have any suggestions for speakers, or other thoughts and comments, do not hesitate to contact me on .

Please check back closer to the time to find out about confirmed events.

With best wishes for the summer,

Executive and Committee, Michaelmas 2008

Tuesday, June 24th, 2008

Officers

Hugo Hadlow
CHAIRMAN: Hugo Hadlow
(St John’s College)

James Sharpe
VICE-CHAIRMAN: James Sharpe
(Fitzwilliam College)

Shamir Shah
JUNIOR TREASURER: Shamir Shah
(Downing College)

Henry Walton
CAMPAIGNS OFFICER: Henry Walton
(Magdalene College)

Caroline Cummins
SECRETARY: Caroline Cummins
(Newnham College)

Gavin Rice
REGISTRAR: Gavin Rice
(Queens’ College)

Committee

Victoria Watson
Victoria Watson
(Jesus College)

Bethany Williams
Bethany Williams
(Lucy Cavendish College)

James Shaw
James Shaw
(King’s College)

Hugh Burling
Hugh Burling
(St John’s College)

Yasmin Alibhai-Brown: racist.

Tuesday, June 3rd, 2008

Yasmin Alibhai-Brown has a history of racism, unable to view any issue except in terms of race.

She is obsessed with promoting multiculturalism, which for her means encouraging mass immigration of non-white people to make the UK less white. She doesn’t like the current situation with too high a proportion of white people, who she repeatedly calls a “mongrel nation” to make mass immigration seem less unusual.

When she opposed Boris Johnson’s run for London Mayor, she bemoaned “rich white folk” voting for him.

As Iain Dale commented, “There are some very ‘rich black folk’ in this country - and a jolly good thing too. They’ve seized the opportunities Conservative politicians like Boris have presented them with. Why is it that Yasmin has to reduce everything to race?” There are black Conservative politicians, too. Conservatives and Libertarians see people as individuals and judge them on their own merits. Yasmin can only see the colour of a person’s skin.

Here is a more obvious example of her racism: In 2004, Mrs Alibhai-Brown went on the BBC World Service with Dr Sean Gabb, Director of the Libertarian Alliance.

Alibhai-Brown objected when Gabb said that the Libertarian Alliance believed the government’s Commission for Racial Equality should be shut down, saying that without laws meant to control discrimination, it would occur more frequently. Gabb asked her, “Yasmin, are you saying that the white majority in this country is so seething with hatred and discontent that it is only restrained by law from rising up and tearing all the ethnic minorities to pieces?” to which Alibhai-Brown answered “yes.” Gabb asked if Alibhai-Brown seriously thought that Gabb wanted to murder her, at which point the discussion abruptly ended…

The Libertarian Alliance responded,

The Libertarian Alliance, which believes in freedom of migration, and is opposed to all forms of collectivism, including racial collectivism, finds it disgraceful that Yasmin Alibhai-Brown is allowed to make racist comments against the white population of this country, while a liberal defender of civil liberties, freedom of association and free speech is censored. How would it be, if a white person had said that blacks were only kept from raping and looting by fear of the police?

Mrs Alibhai-Brown had an incredible article in The Independent today, despairing at the current rise of the Conservative Party.

We, who believe in fairness, equality, human rights and universal justice, are of no consequence

The arrogance of the Left is astonishing; believing that Conservatives don’t believe in fairness, human rights or universal justice. What nonsense. (I am proud to say I don’t believe in equality.)

Local election results show the country lurching right, in some parts even embracing the BNP. Instead of condemning the scum, Britons are instructed to “understand” why these voters are “driven” to vote for neo-Nazis. We are simultaneously warned to show no such understanding of young Muslims who are seduced by hate-filled Imams. White resentment of “foreigners” is no more respectable than Muslim hatred of Westerners. Yet in our unequal world it is.

Overlooking the clichéd “lurch” to the right, I object to her description of the BNP as right-wing. They are socialists, as their manifesto makes clear. They are also racists, and I strongly object to claims that racism is right-wing. As Ayn Rand said, “Racism is the lowest, most crudely primitive form of collectivism.” I do not wish go into detail about the BNP at the moment, but it is odd that she describes BNP voters as scum. Presumably new BNP voters are people who have previously voted for the three major parties. The BNP have been working to play down their racist image, and many people now feel able to vote for them out of frustration with the major parties. Johann Hari: “as one fiftysomething white woman said, ‘I just want to tell politicians to fuck off.’” I don’t know how we can defeat the BNP unless we engage with their voters.

The coup was complete when Boris took over our London… And so power inexorably shifts towards authoritarianism… enforced assimilation… unregulated capitalism which creates both appalling levels of wealth and poverty…
Are right-wing ideas and policies irresistible to the British public (always more conservative than most European partners) and is this a return to the natural state of this nation?

Yasmin’s contempt for democracy is clear, describing Boris Johnson’s victory as a “coup”, and bemoaning the likelihood of a Tory victory at the next General Election. How typical of those who think they know better than “ordinary people”.
Though I disapprove of Johnson’s decision to ban alcohol on the London Underground, and don’t think the Tories will be very liberal, they could hardly be more authoritarian than the Labour Party, who banned smoking in private clubs and are gradually eroding the right to a fair trial, or indeed a trial at all, with their attacks on double jeopardy rules and habeas corpus.

And I don’t know what’s appalling about high levels of wealth. Creating more wealth is a good thing.

Now here is the racism.

Almost more depressing is the sight of black and Asian Britons following the wind blowing the Tories to victory. Boris has recruited Afro Caribbean “leaders” who believe in physical chastisement and smart young Asians who deny the existence of racism and want an end to political correctness. The more old-fashioned Uncle Toms and their female equivalents are now expediently making themselves known to the Tories and right-wing think tanks.

For reasons I have yet to fathom, two weeks ago, I was invited to address a meeting at the House of Lords organised by the Conservative Muslim Forum. The room was full and the discussion on Muslim women lively. Many there were previously New Labour acolytes; others were young and ambitious and now devoted to the charismatic Cameron. To see such enthusiasm for a party whose members have always opposed our presence on these shores was a wake-up slap.

As Iain Dale says, “I could hardly believe what I was reading. Which party was it that welcomed Ugandan Asians into this country in the early 1970s? Yes, of course, there was a small element of the Conservative Party which opposed any immigration at all - just as there was in the Labour Party”

Yasmin is essentially saying non-white people should be left-wing. Her description of non-white right-wingers as “Uncle Toms” is disgraceful.

Equality kills

Sunday, June 1st, 2008

Equality is not a good thing. It’s not a bad thing either. It’s morally neutral. Less inequality is not a good thing, and neither is more inequality.

For example: The reason living standards are better than they have ever been before is the creation of wealth. What will improve people’s lives most in the future is the creation of more wealth. Inequality doesn’t matter: if someone’s real income doubles over ten years, it just doesn’t matter if someone else’s income quadruples. Except, of course, in the extremely unusual case of the second person’s income quadrupling hindering the growth of the first person’s income. The opposite is much more likely to be the case.

We should also be wary of redistributing wealth, because while it will cause a short-term increase in the incomes of the less-well-off, it will reduce long-term increase.

As Andrew Perraut says,

“if markets are as massively productive as we libertarians believe and compounding returns to growth in the long term are taken into account, you could probably justify no more than very basic safety nets, for fear of distorting the economy and dramatically lowering everyone’s goods in the future.”

So equality may not be a bad thing, but promoting equality is a bad thing for two reasons. Here’s a third: promoting equality kills. The promotion of equality, for no other reason than ideology, is leading directly to many deaths.

I’m talking about the NHS, and the cases of Colette Mills and Linda O’Boyle.

Both were suffering from cancer. The NHS does not have enough money to pay for certain extra drugs. The patients wanted to pay for the extra drugs themselves, but were told that if they did, they would have to pay for their entire treatment: any treatment they were currently receiving for free would be withdrawn. The patients could afford the extra drugs if they continued to receive the treatment they were already getting for free. But they couldn’t afford the whole lot.

The Department of Health said: “Co-payments would risk creating a two-tier health service and be in direct contravention with the principles and values of the NHS.”

Yes, it would. Rather, there is already a two-tier health service in this country. There is the NHS, and there is (better) private healthcare. (It must be better, otherwise people wouldn’t pay for it.) Private healthcare still exists, even though the Labour Party would like to ban it. (They can’t afford to, of course, because patients going private save the NHS money).

Yes, patients paying for extra treatment would promote the private sector. This would be a good thing. It wouldn’t harm anyone who couldn’t afford to. Indeed, it would help the NHS, because even people who don’t go completely private might start increasing the use they make of the private sector, thus saving the NHS money and allowing it to spend it on those who need it more.

The problem is the people who think that inequality is always at someone’s expense. It isn’t, as these cases show.

The “principles and values” of the NHS are clearly stupid, and lead to entirely preventable deaths.

“It wasn’t going to cost them. I was going to pay for it. How can they say this policy is far more important than somebody’s life?”

Will the Conservatives fix this?

David Cameron, the Conservative leader, said in a statement that it was “tempting” to allow patients to pay for extra cancer treatments that were not funded by the NHS.

The party has been reluctant to express an opinion on the issue, fearing that it could be portrayed as favouring middle-class patients who can afford to buy themselves extra treatment.

I guess not, then.