National Demo 2010

[Mr-Paul]

Go for it. It's potentially too late as today's papers are obvious printed and out but it's worth a try. Even if you only send the last fire one its worth a go (Best one IMO, well framed and summarizes events nicely)

 

Yeah exactly. This is a story that will probably run for a while so it's worth a shot. I'm attaching them to an email and sending them round now and putting them on my Flickr account. The Guardian's website is appealing for pics still so there's hope it might get somewhere.

[Mr_Odwin]

There was a banner that on one side said something like "How bad are tuition fees going to be?" and the other side said "Over 9000!!!" with Goku.

 

 

 

They were. Up until...1996 I think. They were definitely free in the past.

 

Yeah, I missed out on the grant system by a year (went through UCAS in the 1997-1998 academic year), so the year above me went through uni for free (not even loans for living).

[chairdriver]

Great article by Nina Power.

 

"The protest as a whole was extremely important, not just because of the large numbers it attracted, and shouldn't be understood simply in economic terms as a complaint against fees. It also represented the serious anger many feel about cuts to universities as they currently stand, and the ideological devastation of the education system if the coalition gets its way. It was a protest against the narrowing of horizons; a protest against Lib Dem hypocrisy; a protest against the increasingly utilitarian approach to human life that sees degrees as nothing but "investments" by individuals, and denies any link between education and the broader social good."

[Daft]

Amen to that.

 

These cuts show that most people know the price of everything and the value of nothing

Edited November 11, 2010 by Daft

[stuwii]

A lot of people think higher education should be free: why? Why should the tapayer subsidise people who are not necessarily working hard towards their stated goal -or those who don't even have a goal?

 

 

More people go to uni, those people earn more money, and pay more tax, meaning a long term return for the taxpayers who originally subsidised. Simple.as.

[Serebii]

More people go to uni, those people earn more money, and pay more tax, meaning a long term return for the taxpayers who originally subsidised. Simple.as.

More people go to uni thus making everyone have degrees making the degrees worth a lot less in the eyes of the employers thus making them as useless as GCSEs thus causing people to need to pay and get Masters, which most employers want these days anyway due to more people going to university.

 

I'm not saying I'm for the increase, it should stay as it is (I was told that to go back it would be £7,000 p.a. for a second degree before this whole fiasco).

 

Basically, either way, we shoot ourselves in the foot.

 

Just be glad, there was a plan, I believe of Labour's devising, which had NO LIMIT WHATSOEVER on tuition fees

[Iun]

More people go to uni, those people earn more money, and pay more tax, meaning a long term return for the taxpayers who originally subsidised. Simple.as.

 

You're working on the assumption that every single person that goes to University comes out with a degree and makes a commensurate long-term contribution to UK pensions and the tax coffers.

 

Which doesn't happen. It's an idealistic world view that says everyone can get along and everyone is valuable, and will definitely make more money because of their education. Case in point, old family friend has a PhD and numerous degrees from the time when Higher Education was free. He drives a bus to and from a salad factory for cash in hand. I can name any number of people who took a degree, and then went into their father's business, or got married and had endless babies -people whose lives were no different or better after their education.

 

Some are born destined to soar the heights of the corporate ladder, some are born fated to change the lives of millions...

 

 

...some are born to sweep streets, clean tables and pour my pint. An old friend of mine, a retired Army Colonel said it best:

 

"If you're not a socialist as a student, you have no heart. If you're not a conservative when you graduate, you have no brain."

[Dan_Dare]

...that's a Winston Churchill quote.

[chairdriver]

Sounds like my father (minus the retired bit).

[Iun]

...that's a Winston Churchill quote.

 

I think he toyed with the idea of becoming ANOTHER biographer of The Great Man in his dotage, but decided to write about military intelligence blunders instead. Good book.

[Dannyboy-the-Dane]

"If you're not a socialist as a student, you have no heart. If you're not a conservative when you graduate, you have no brain."

 

I've always hated that quote.

[Daft]

Revealed: Lib Dems planned before election to abandon tuition fees pledge

 

So...yeah...

 

I think this comment sums up my thoughts and feelings,

 

Seriously how can it be possible in this "democratic" nation of ours that members of parliament can blatantly lie to be elected.? No, really i am dumbfounded.... And millions of people will just accept this and say... "oh well thats what they all do"

I'm sick of this &%$^

[The Bard]

I guess. But it doesn't take much more than a peek across the Atlantic to realise that our shit ain't that bad.

[The fish]

I guess. But it doesn't take much more than a peek across the Atlantic to realise that our shit ain't that bad.

 

Indeed - the Daily Show found it hilarious that we kicked out an MP for lying in their campaign - if they did that in the US, they'd have no one in Congress or the Governers' mansions.

[Ashley]

Before the other day I kind of bought Clegg's line that he formed this coalition because the public sort of put him there and he would try and 'round off the edges' of the Tories policies (partially because I didn't give it much thought) but the more I learn the more it just seems like he opened his legs for a chance to get into Downing Street. Appalling really.

 

And in a completely different tone, perhaps my favourite placard from the day:

 

National Demo 2010_SUARTS by SUARTS, on Flickr

[Daft]

I guess. But it doesn't take much more than a peek across the Atlantic to realise that our shit ain't that bad.

 

That whole 'well it's at least it isn't as bad as BLAH' argument is bullshit. Take it somewhere else.

[Mr-Paul]

Clegg has no integrity at all. I'm so glad I didn't vote for the Lib Dems.

At one point before the election it looked like they had 30% of the support.

Now it's down to about 11%.

Surely that shows how much they've diverted from their pledges.

I'd feel so let down if I was one of the many who was conned into voting for them.

[The Bard]

I guess my sense of humour leaves something to be desired .

 

But you can't deny it gives a sense of comfort to take the piss out of someone else's problems when you've got it bad.

[Daft]

I admit do love a bit of schadenfreude.

 

Edit: Cameron will be lapping this up, though. Clegg is like a lightning rod of hate.

Edited November 12, 2010 by Daft

[chairdriver]

Well most people still hate Cameron more.

[chairdriver]

Great article by this woman who can obviously see through lies and shite.

 

"As I have said publicly, most of what happened at the Millbank Tower does not qualify as ‘violence’ except in the most cartoonish ways. We live in a world where war and exploitation are routine, as is the loss of life and limb both in inner-cities of the Western world and the killing fields of places like Iraq, Afghanistan and Kashmir (where violence is inflicted by the militaries of countries like Britain and the USA as well as those who claim to resist them). It is actually quite insulting and demeaning to those innocents who lose their lives and limbs in these places to describe smashed windows and minor scuffles as ‘violence.’ We have to ask why ‘collateral damage’ at such a high level—maimed children and bombed wedding parties—are normalised, on the one hand, as something that ‘can’t be helped’ in situations of conflict and on the other hand, such outrage expressed over broken windows? What sorts of hypocrisy, entitlement and double-standards are operating here in the definitions of and acceptance of violence? I think it is actually a kind of ethnocentrism that thinks it is ok for other places to experience violence (at the hands of Britain and its allies) but not okay for the privileged classes of Britain to have windows smashed in occasionally by people questioning what is going on."