Margaret Thatcher has died.

[Jonnas]

"Her decisions were absolutely horrible, but at least she wasn't afraid to make them."

 

The fuck sort of logic is that?

 

Better to make a bad decision because you're genuinely certain it is the right one, than to make a bad decision because you were too weak-willed to do better. It's a show of strong character.

 

Anyway, I won't comment on her policies, as I wasn't around when she was, nor am I from the UK. I will just say that she was a strong politician, a rare breed these days. R.I.P. Margaret Thatcher.

[ipaul]

I dislike her policies but I hold some respect for the sheer brass balls she had as a politician. I find revelling in her death quite distasteful, which seems to put me in a minority concerning people of a similar political persuasion to myself.

 

Although she was disastrous in her own special way, I think I marginally prefer her to David Cameron. I think the country could do with a leader of her style these days, but certainly not her policies.

[Shorty]

Personally I actually agree that even though she stuffed things up, it was good to have a PM capable of making a difference.

 

Now all the politicians sit back and blame her mistakes for the current state of affairs, as if we haven't had long enough to put it right. It's been 23 years since she was in power and we're still saying the lower middle classes are suffering from thatcherisms, if another politician had the same drive, they should've been able to steer things in another direction by now.

 

During the Falklands the nation actually thought, however briefly, "we have a strong leader, taking a chance and getting it right", when was the last time we felt that? When was the last time we felt that the country was moving in a positive direction, or any direction for that matter? The current shakeup in benefit handouts is about the most active thing I've seen happen in my adult life.

Edited April 9, 2013 by Shorty

[Agent Gibbs]

I can certainly agree that since Thatcher no politician has had a spine, they've coasted along and blamed the past and put half hearted "solutions" forward and when they failed blamed Thatcherisms

 

we do need someone as strong as her in power now, just with better policies, lots of things need a shake up, and this perhaps the wrong thread to discuss it

[bob]

How about Ed Milliband?

 

Ha!

[Agent Gibbs]

How about Ed Milliband?

 

Ha!

 

Only if he is a secretly controlled by Nick Park (you know what i'm implying)

 

there all spineless, voting at elections is hard these days as everyone is the wrong choice

[Jon]

I'd like to see how David Cameron would get on in a purely Conservative government, only because it's hard to rate his time as PM fairly when he's got one hand tied behind his back with Clegg and his goons. I don't always agree with him but I definitely wouldn't call him spineless, he certainly was never going to have it easy trying to clean up the mess Blair and Brown left.

[bob]

 

Catchy...

[Cookyman]

You want to hear about self control?

 

I remember in 1989 I was an armed guard when Maggie Thatcher visited the barracks I was stationed at. I stood there with 3 comrades all with loaded sub machine guns.

 

I was very very fucking tempted to blow that bitch away - reckon i would have been a national hero!

 

[ipaul]

You want to hear about self control?

 

I remember in 1989 I was an armed guard when Maggie Thatcher visited the barracks I was stationed at. I stood there with 3 comrades all with loaded sub machine guns.

 

I was very very fucking tempted to blow that bitch away - reckon i would have been a national hero !

 

 

A hero with complete and utter morons perhaps.

 

A murderer to anyone else.

[Serebii]

I've been reading up on her tenure and policies and it begs the question. Do people forget how things were before she got into power? She did some necessary things, even if they fucked us over. Prior to her election to prime minister, there were constant strikes from unions asking for ridiculously high amounts of money. Rubbish wasn't being picked up for months and thus you can imagine the massive sanitation and hygiene issues, not to mention corpses not getting buried. The unions were screwing people over and she managed to stop it. Read up on the Winter of Discontent, as it is often called. The unions were fucking the country over, and she sorted it.

 

Yes she did some bad things, but she sorted out the country, which was severely screwed up, far worse than it is now. Plus, many people who complain and are throwing insults at her were not around for this.

 

People are so quick to focus on the negative, they completely ignore all the positives she did. She did the right thing to sort the country, yes there were repercussions, but can you imagine what the country would be like if she hadn't worked so hard to stop the power of unions?

Edited April 9, 2013 by Serebii

[sumo73]

Unlike most people here I lived through all the Thatcher years so I don't need Wikipedia or YouTube to remind me about her. Even if you were born after the Thatcher years and live in the UK now then you all are living in the effects (both positive and negative) of her years in power.

 

I remember her from taking away my milk when I was at Infant's school all the way up to the Poll tax riots. She is proof however that with hard work many things can be achieved and for 11 years the top two positions in the UK were run by women. Even today in parliament and elsewhere, women are still under represented but I hope that Thatcher did in some way show people that you could make it in a very male dominated arena.

 

I wasn't a fan of her privatising many things in the UK and I still believe that the government whoever they are should be in control of basic utilities and services. I also believe that the trade unions that did stranglehold the country at times in the 70s were cut down too severely by her.

 

Despite this her government along with Taoiseach Garret FitzGerald signed the Anglo Irish agreement back in 1985 which was a pre cursor, although a long way off to the Good Friday agreement so I thank her for that.

 

It was sad to see her quality of life deteriorate in later life and despite her views and mine being quite different at times all I can say is R.I.P.

[Mr-Paul]

In mildly amusing, yet quite sickening news, "Ding Dong! The Witch is Dead" is currently at number 2 on iTunes and number 1 on Amazon.

 

Will be interesting to see what happens if it is at the top of the charts at the end of the week. Will they play it on the radio, or will it be "banned" like the Sex Pistols' God Save the Queen?

[Iun]

I'm personally a fan, but mainly for the reason that it pisses off my grandfather.

 

Who was under-manager of several coal mines in the area when they finally closed down.

 

He was made to retire at 50 with an inflation adjusted pension of £35,000+ pa. He went on to join a Masonic Lodge and became President of the English Bowls Society.

 

And it was aaaaaaaaaall Thatcher's fault.

[Guy]

Someone has written "THE WITCH IS DEAD" on some of the cash machines on Oxford Street. On the same street today a homeless man fought an office worker for his umbrella.

 

I'm not sure which sight made me sadder.

 

You want to hear about self control?

 

I remember in 1989 I was an armed guard when Maggie Thatcher visited the barracks I was stationed at. I stood there with 3 comrades all with loaded sub machine guns.

 

I was very very fucking tempted to blow that bitch away - reckon i would have been a national hero!

 

 

Okay, that completes the trilogy of woe for today. Wow.

Edited April 9, 2013 by Guy

[Beast]

I've been reading up on her tenure and policies and it begs the question. Do people forget how things were before she got into power? She did some necessary things, even if they fucked us over. Prior to her election to prime minister, there were constant strikes from unions asking for ridiculously high amounts of money. Rubbish wasn't being picked up for months and thus you can imagine the massive sanitation and hygiene issues, not to mention corpses not getting buried. The unions were screwing people over and she managed to stop it. Read up on the Winter of Discontent, as it is often called. The unions were fucking the country over, and she sorted it.

 

Yes she did some bad things, but she sorted out the country, which was severely screwed up, far worse than it is now. Plus, many people who complain and are throwing insults at her were not around for this.

 

People are so quick to focus on the negative, they completely ignore all the positives she did. She did the right thing to sort the country, yes there were repercussions, but can you imagine what the country would be like if she hadn't worked so hard to stop the power of unions?

 

Whilst I see your point, I don't think it's people who are quick to focus on the negatives but rather that there were more negatives, they were a bigger deal to them and were more affected than the positives. All things have positives and negative sides and you can always look on the bright side but it's how much they have affected people, whether they've done good or bad. I don't know if I've made sense so I'll just make a quick example: Joe Bloggs was a nice neighbour and a good friend but in the night, he killed old grannies. Now I'm not comparing Thatcher to a granny-killing nice guy but you can see how the negative would outweigh the positive in this situation and I think this is how a lot of people see this. She may have done a couple of things good for this country but, from what I've heard from people who lived through the years, she made worse decisions that have affected the country.

 

I've spoken to people who have actually lived through the years with her in power and a couple have said that she did some right things but the wrong things affected them a hell of a lot more.

 

As I said, I'm neither happy nor sad about her death and I'm not going to say she was a hero or a good person because, in my eyes, she wasn't. People are going to say there have been some good stuff they've done but sometimes, the bad things they've done can either outweigh the good or outnumber them. In this case, from what I've heard, it's both. There were more bad things and the results of them were affected more by other people such as the working class.

[Fierce_LiNk]

It's amazing that somebody who had 3 terms is the same person who is so widely hated. I've never seen so much hatred in this country for one person. It's extraordinary. I doubt we'll ever see anything like this ever again in the UK.

[Serebii]

It's amazing that somebody who had 3 terms is the same person who is so widely hated. I've never seen so much hatred in this country for one person. It's extraordinary. I doubt we'll ever see anything like this ever again in the UK.

Much of the hatred is just from people parroting their parents though, as they weren't old enough, or even alive during her tenure.

 

I didn't know too much about what she did until recently, I knew about the taking down of union power and the fixing of the strikes, but not much else other than that.

 

I maintain that without her doing what she did, even the bad stuff, the country would be in a far, far worse position than it is now

[Beast]

It's amazing that somebody who had 3 terms is the same person who is so widely hated. I've never seen so much hatred in this country for one person. It's extraordinary. I doubt we'll ever see anything like this ever again in the UK.

 

I don't know. It might happen. I'm not saying never.

 

Here's an interesting question for you guys: As we all know, Thatcher was the first ever female Prime Minister and, as you all know, she's very hated. Do you think that she has affected another woman to ever be elected as a PM?

[Fierce_LiNk]

Much of the hatred is just from people parroting their parents though, as they weren't old enough, or even alive during her tenure.

 

I didn't know too much about what she did until recently, I knew about the taking down of union power and the fixing of the strikes, but not much else other than that.

 

I maintain that without her doing what she did, even the bad stuff, the country would be in a far, far worse position than it is now

 

The parents are passing down that information probably because they were massively burned by her. I generally agree, it makes it harder for the youth of today to make informed opinions when the older generation clearly have a negative view.

 

Either way, I am finding it interesting reading as much as I can about the situation of Britain at that time.

 

I don't know. It might happen. I'm not saying never.

 

Here's an interesting question for you guys: As we all know, Thatcher was the first ever female Prime Minister and, as you all know, she's very hated. Do you think that she has affected another woman to ever be elected as a PM?

 

It probably has affected things, but then it also annoys me. If, as a society, we are trying to promote equality, it shouldn't really be an issue whether she is the first woman to be PM or the second or the third, or whatever. We can't on the one hand say we want equality for sexes and then on the other make a song and dance about a woman becoming PM, it defeats the whole point of equality.

 

I would give no fucks if the next PM was a transsexual. I also find it equally annoying (thank you, facebook) that there are so many people "thanking her" for being the first woman PM and making a stand against the men. To give her some credit, I'm pretty sure Thatcher didn't become PM with the intention of being the first woman to do it, but to actually make a difference to the damned country.

[Agent Gibbs]

yes i think she's damaged the chances of another woman getting in power because she was so divisive and so hated.

[Serebii]

yes i think she's damaged the chances of another woman getting in power because she was so divisive and so hated.

Then how come a male prime minister who fucks up, let's say James Callaghan who was responsible for the Winter of Discontent, or Tony Blair/Gordon Brown who put the country into the current hole it's in, have no effect on chances of a male being prime minister?

Edited April 10, 2013 by Serebii

[Beast]

Much of the hatred is just from people parroting their parents though, as they weren't old enough, or even alive during her tenure.

 

I didn't know too much about what she did until recently, I knew about the taking down of union power and the fixing of the strikes, but not much else other than that.

 

I maintain that without her doing what she did, even the bad stuff, the country would be in a far, far worse position than it is now

 

I think you're still allowed to hate on a person even if you didn't live through the years. I mean, we didn't live through WW2 but there's no denying we hate Hitler. A lot of the policies I've heard Thatcher do are just horrible and I've no idea why anybody would pass such a thing!

 

I don't even know whether it would be in a worse position or not, nobody can know but in my opinion, I don't think it would be worse off. A lot of working-class families have been majorly affected from the things she has done in those ten or eleven years she ran. Some may say it's for the better but I think a lot would disagree with that sentiment.

 

I knew some stuff of what she did before she died anyway, I was told and I've read things. Most of my family and friends lived through her years and pretty much most of them have said the same thing. They've also said that some of the bad decisions she has made have still affected this country today.

 

I just hate all politicians anyway but the stuff she did was just horrible though.

 

Then how come a male prime minister who fucks up, let's say James Callaghan who was responsible for the Winter of Discontent, or Tony Blair/Gordon Brown who put the country into the current hole it's in, have no effect on chances of a male being prime minister?

 

I guess it's because there have been better male Prime Ministers before. There's only ever been one female Prime Minister and so she should have done way better than she did. If she did run and handle things better, I think females would have stood a chance. I think they still do but it's slim. People would think of her as an example, so to speak, and nobody wants to relive those years.

[Agent Gibbs]

Then how come a male prime minister who fucks up, let's say James Callaghan who was responsible for the Winter of Discontent, or Tony Blair/Gordon Brown who put the country into the current hole it's in, have no effect on chances of a male being prime minister?

 

what @Animal said, its sucks but that how our fucked up society

 

peoples only comparative female prime minister is (arguably) not a good one, and they'll just compare the next female candidate to her no matter what

 

Its a crappy situation, as really it should have no baring on voters the gender of the candidate or political party for that matter, what should matter is the best person for the job/country gets into power...........sadly its not how democracy works in practice really, sentiment, advertising, previous government records (being vindictive and voting in opposite direction if bad), appearance of candidate, gender, family life....and the list goes on bias voters views

 

and on the subject of blair/brown although they haven't influenced voting in a particular gender, they will certainly have made it so no Labour party will succeed in being elected for a long time, so they have caused a similar bias

[The fish]

Tony Blair/Gordon Brown who put the country into the current hole it's in

 

Woah, woah, woah there, I'm going to do a Kanye West and jump in here, sunshine. Please, enlighten us as to how Tony Blair and Gordon Brown caused Lehman Brothers to collapse? I'll give you PFI, sure, but the global financial crisis?