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[TSwizzle]

Troops on the streets of London;

Britain took the unprecedented step of deploying hundreds of soldiers to patrol the streets of London today as the country woke up to a heightened terror threat following the Manchester suicide bombing. Around 1,000 heavily-armed military personnel are guarding the Houses of Parliament, Buckingham Palace and other UK landmarks after Theresa May warned that a fresh terror attack may be 'imminent'.

DailyMail

As the mayor of London glibly stated, this is just part and parcel of living in a big city.

 

[bilby]

Troops on the streets of London;

Britain took the unprecedented step of deploying hundreds of soldiers to patrol the streets of London today as the country woke up to a heightened terror threat following the Manchester suicide bombing. Around 1,000 heavily-armed military personnel are guarding the Houses of Parliament, Buckingham Palace and other UK landmarks after Theresa May warned that a fresh terror attack may be 'imminent'.

DailyMail

As the mayor of London glibly stated, this is just part and parcel of living in a big city.

... during an election campaign where the incumbent party is known to gain from displays of power and authority.



Seriously, what exactly are these soldiers achieving, other than ensuring that the government is seen to be doing something?

 

[Loren Pechtel]

No. You are assuming the customers (the exams) are all the same. They're not--some have fuller carts (the more popular exams) than others.

The whole point of it was to minimize the number of people taking an exam during Ramadan--that inherently implies that more people are taking an exam in the time that's not Ramadan. Your model would be fine if students took only one exam but they don't. 4 or 5 exams spread over 10 days is a lot easier than 4 or 5 exams spread over 5 days.

You haven't paid attention. They're NOT squishing together more exams in less time. At no point have they said this. The number of exams you take are the same regardles of what order they're in. They're spaced out the same during the exam period. All they've done is re-arranged the order. For non-Muslims students it won't make any difference. Which was the point of doing this.

Your blindness doesn't make the problem go away.

The whole point of the exercise is to minimize the number of students taking exams during Ramadan. The flip side of this is that it increases the number of students taking exams not during Ramadan.

 

[bilby]

 

[barbos]

Troops on the streets of London;



DailyMail

As the mayor of London glibly stated, this is just part and parcel of living in a big city.

... during an election campaign where the incumbent party is known to gain from displays of power and authority.



Seriously, what exactly are these soldiers achieving, other than ensuring that the government is seen to be doing something?

Protecting elections from russian hackers?

 

[DrZoidberg]

You haven't paid attention. They're NOT squishing together more exams in less time. At no point have they said this. The number of exams you take are the same regardles of what order they're in. They're spaced out the same during the exam period. All they've done is re-arranged the order. For non-Muslims students it won't make any difference. Which was the point of doing this.

Your blindness doesn't make the problem go away.

The whole point of the exercise is to minimize the number of students taking exams during Ramadan. The flip side of this is that it increases the number of students taking exams not during Ramadan.

No, it's not. There's still plenty of exams during Ramadan. All they did was shuffle them around in a way that could impossibly inconvenience anyone, while still making life easier for Muslims.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Your blindness doesn't make the problem go away.

The whole point of the exercise is to minimize the number of students taking exams during Ramadan. The flip side of this is that it increases the number of students taking exams not during Ramadan.

No, it's not. There's still plenty of exams during Ramadan. All they did was shuffle them around in a way that could impossibly inconvenience anyone, while still making life easier for Muslims.

For the sake of illustration lets put some numbers on this. I'm not trying to be realistic with them but the point remains regardless of the values:

Total exam period: 12 days
Ramadan period: 6 days
Students take: 6 exams
Original distribution: Even
Changed distribution: 2/3 of exam seats are not during Ramadan

Original result: Students would have an average of 2 days between exams.

New result: In the 6 non-Ramadan days they would have an average of 4 exams, for 1.5 days/exam and during the Ramadan period they would have an average of 2 exams, for 3 days/exam.

You have traded 2, 2, 2, 2, 2, 2 for 1.5, 1.5, 1.5, 1.5, 3, 3. The majority suffered for the benefit of the minority.

 

[DrZoidberg]

No, it's not. There's still plenty of exams during Ramadan. All they did was shuffle them around in a way that could impossibly inconvenience anyone, while still making life easier for Muslims.

For the sake of illustration lets put some numbers on this. I'm not trying to be realistic with them but the point remains regardless of the values:

Total exam period: 12 days
Ramadan period: 6 days
Students take: 6 exams
Original distribution: Even
Changed distribution: 2/3 of exam seats are not during Ramadan

Original result: Students would have an average of 2 days between exams.

New result: In the 6 non-Ramadan days they would have an average of 4 exams, for 1.5 days/exam and during the Ramadan period they would have an average of 2 exams, for 3 days/exam.

You have traded 2, 2, 2, 2, 2, 2 for 1.5, 1.5, 1.5, 1.5, 3, 3. The majority suffered for the benefit of the minority.

You're wrong. It's the same spread. They haven't squished together exams. All they've done is re-arrange the order in which they come.

They've traded 2, 2, 2, 2, 2, 2 for 2, 2, 2, 2, 2, 2

That's my interpretation of reading their statement.

 

[Bomb#20]

Sorry, didn't realize you'd replied to me. Looming U.S. tax filing day often makes me lose track of other stuff. My bad.

I didn't say it's make believe.

Of course you did. Post #4839. You just made something up again, Mr. "I always fact check everything I post here out of respect for my fellow forum members".

You're so full of <expletive deleted>. That was based on the first reports on the event, from Swedish newspapers. Which were wrong/incomplete. Not until later articles did all the details surface. At which point it turned out to be even less of a drama and reason to be concerned.

You can swear at me and explain what your statements were based on to your heart's content, but none of that changes the reality that you wrote "So yes, the article is make believe.", and then later you wrote "I didn't say it's make believe.". The reality is that you don't fact-check. The reality is that you falsely claimed "I always fact check everything I post here out of respect for my fellow forum members". Do you feel I deserve to be abused for pointing out that you just make stuff up? You condemn the Daily Mail for making stuff up even though you make stuff up yourself. Do you feel I deserve to be abused for pointing out your hypocrisy? Should hypocrites in general be immune from criticism, or only you? Are you some prima donna who thinks he's entitled to be treated by others as a reliable source, even though you're not willing to go to the effort of being reliable?

Why do I even try? You're the guy who wrote:

"Nobody got hurt! Nobody."​

after you read a report that said:

"A number of other injuries were reported, including a shopkeeper. A photographer from Dagens Nyheter said he was assaulted by a group of people when arriving to report on the unrest and spent the night in hospital."​

What was make-believe was weaving this into a story worth publishing in international press. What was make believe was the implication the reader is supposed to make.

But if you pick apart what actually happened it wasn't much to weave into a story. Nobody got hurt! Nobody. Some teenagers were rowdy in a mall and it got sorted. That's the story. <Lecture about Sweden snipped> This focus on the refugees and insane negative spin is absurd and out of all proportion.

Did you not understand the questions, or are you refusing to answer them?

What are you talking about?

1. Are you seriously proposing that the mere fact that they carried the story at all qualifies as it being formulated in such a way that we're supposed to make a bunch of assumptions?

2. Are you seriously proposing that the mere fact that they carried the story at all justifies your claim that "the article is make believe"?

Those are not essay questions. Those are yes/no questions. Are you going to answer them or are you going to duck them again?

Yes. Everything I've seen published from the Daily Mail is <expletive deleted>. Not only a little bit. But obvious lies. This is no exception.

What I'm talking about is that I had to ask the above questions repeatedly before you'd answer them. Now you've finally answered them "Yes". Thank you. So that makes this the point where I remind you that the BBC carried the story too. Consequently, you are asserting that the BBC also formulated their story in such a way that we're supposed to make a bunch of assumptions, and that the BBC's article is also make believe. So that makes this the point where I remind you that you wrote "The BBC article you linked to on the other hand is accurate." Your posts are a web of self-contradictory nonsense.

If you aren't seriously proposing that carrying the story at all justifies your accusations against the Daily Mail, then don't give me yet another quotationless screed about what awful journalists they are. Either quote them or admit you have no grounds for complaint.

The Daily Mail have been doing this <expletive deleted> since they were founded. They're famous for it. Today they're just continuing to do what they've always done.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daily_Mail

It's just been a long list of "patriotic", British, self aggrandising and chauvinist articles. Zero analysis. Zero attempt at presenting any kind of nuance. Everything is black and white, and "they" are always evil and terrible.

Daily Mail is not news, and has never been.

That, sir, is yet another quotationless screed about what awful journalists they are. You evidently feel that denouncing them as liars without quoting them is an adequate substitute for posting a quote of them lying.

Why would they suddenly start being a serious newspaper today? I haven't seen you make any effort to show that the Daily Mail is a real newspaper? All the evidence I've seen speaks against that claim.

What "that claim"? Who here ever claimed the Daily Mail is a real newspaper? I certainly didn't claim any such thing, so why the heck would it be my job to make an effort to show they are? You appear to be insinuating that I made such a claim. Why are you doing that? Are you doing it deliberately in an attempt to give third parties the false impression that you've refuted me? Or did you simply lose track of why we're arguing?

We're not arguing over whether the Daily Mail is a real newspaper. We're arguing over your groundless and almost certainly false accusation against TSwizzle. You didn't just say the article he posted was make believe. You claimed that he knew it was make believe. You have no grounds for thinking he knows it's make believe. Whether the Daily Mail is a real newspaper has no bearing on whether he knows it's make believe. You accused him of dishonesty, and you did it because you are a person who just makes stuff up. You ought not to have done that. You owe him an apology. Deal with it.

You don't want to see I have any arguments here. You have been caught red-handed making trumped-up racism accusations. Stop doing that.

Yes, I do. You Sir are just talking <expletive deleted>. Make an argument or shut up.

I made an argument. You quoted it back to me. Sneering at it doesn't magically make it not an argument.

You are making trumped-up racism charges. Don't do that.

Then show me some evidence that I've done it? If you continue to be unable to I'm going to keep calling <expletive deleted>.

There is no "unable" for me to continue. I already showed you evidence. Here it is again, for your viewing convenience.

And your claim "I only call people racist when they treat Islam as some sort of permanent condition that can't change. Or attribute things to Muslims that are clearly racial attributes" is an additional trumped-up charge. The people you are condemning as racist didn't do those things. Don't say they did.

I'm just reading what people write. If they want people to interpret what they write differently they should perhaps write something different.

No, you are not just reading what people write. You are reading what they write and then making up meanings for their words that are different from what they wrote. You have already convicted yourself of this out of your own mouth. You wrote:

"They weren't even trying to pretend it was for anything but unfrenchness or unfrench behaviours. Which is French newspeak for racism."​

You admitted, right there, that they said it was for unfrench behavior; and you admitted, right there, that your interpretation of their intent as racism is based on you reading their words as "newspeak", not based on you reading their words as French. You have stipulated that people argued for the burqa ban on the grounds that it's unfrench behavior. So if all you do is read what they write, then you should bloody well be able to quote some of them treating Islam as some sort of permanent condition that can't change and/or attributing things to Muslims that are clearly racial attributes.

Brian: I'm not the Messiah.
Audience member: Only the Messiah would deny he's the Messiah! I'm just listening to what people say!

If the goal is to force Muslims to stop being Muslims, then it's wrong. Freedom of religion needs to be respected.

There. See? Was that so hard? When you pull your head out of your ass, even you can see this is about religion, not race.

See I call racism racist. I call other stuff other stuff. Obviously.

You call other stuff racist besides racism. Obviously.

 

[angelo]

The worst possible thing that could happen is them behaving until they just outbreed us. But they don't have enough patience these young guys.

Who are 'us' in this context? You and the mouse in your pocket?

Who are 'them'?

Why would you imagine that defining sides, and lumping a huge number of people in with a small number of criminals (on both sides) would be anything other than counterproductive?

There are not two sides here; there are three. A few percent of racist authoritarian fuckwits; A few percent of violent criminals; And a massive supermajority of reasonable people who just want to live an ordinary life without being abused by the fucking numpties in the other two groups.

Take your dangerous and idiotic false dichotomies, and fuck off.

I have no more desire to live in a racist police state, where my freedom is curtailed in the in the name of counter-terroism than I do to be the target of terrorism. You don't get to define everyone as either a sympathizer with Islamic extremist terrorism, or a fellow racist authoritarian. A pox on both your houses.

You obviously don't value the lives of friends and family far more than the freedom or rights of would be terrorists and their regresives sympathisers.

 

[barbos]

wikipedia on first glance says Ramadan is a lunar month

27 May – 24 June for 2017

it seems to move 10-11 days earlier each year.

Yeah, they use a lunar calendar without correction. Since lunar months don't evenly divide solar years this causes a schedule creep.

It's the same thing that causes Easter to move around but Easter keeps getting corrected so it says in the same part of the year.

Solution is to move the Moon to a higher orbit or to blow it up.

 

[DrZoidberg]

Sorry, didn't realize you'd replied to me. Looming U.S. tax filing day often makes me lose track of other stuff. My bad.

I didn't say it's make believe.

Of course you did. Post #4839. You just made something up again, Mr. "I always fact check everything I post here out of respect for my fellow forum members".

You're so full of <expletive deleted>. That was based on the first reports on the event, from Swedish newspapers. Which were wrong/incomplete. Not until later articles did all the details surface. At which point it turned out to be even less of a drama and reason to be concerned.

You can swear at me and explain what your statements were based on to your heart's content, but none of that changes the reality that you wrote "So yes, the article is make believe.", and then later you wrote "I didn't say it's make believe.". The reality is that you don't fact-check. The reality is that you falsely claimed "I always fact check everything I post here out of respect for my fellow forum members". Do you feel I deserve to be abused for pointing out that you just make stuff up? You condemn the Daily Mail for making stuff up even though you make stuff up yourself. Do you feel I deserve to be abused for pointing out your hypocrisy? Should hypocrites in general be immune from criticism, or only you? Are you some prima donna who thinks he's entitled to be treated by others as a reliable source, even though you're not willing to go to the effort of being reliable?

Why do I even try? You're the guy who wrote:

"Nobody got hurt! Nobody."​

after you read a report that said:

"A number of other injuries were reported, including a shopkeeper. A photographer from Dagens Nyheter said he was assaulted by a group of people when arriving to report on the unrest and spent the night in hospital."​

What was make-believe was weaving this into a story worth publishing in international press. What was make believe was the implication the reader is supposed to make.

But if you pick apart what actually happened it wasn't much to weave into a story. Nobody got hurt! Nobody. Some teenagers were rowdy in a mall and it got sorted. That's the story. <Lecture about Sweden snipped> This focus on the refugees and insane negative spin is absurd and out of all proportion.

Did you not understand the questions, or are you refusing to answer them?

What are you talking about?

1. Are you seriously proposing that the mere fact that they carried the story at all qualifies as it being formulated in such a way that we're supposed to make a bunch of assumptions?

2. Are you seriously proposing that the mere fact that they carried the story at all justifies your claim that "the article is make believe"?

Those are not essay questions. Those are yes/no questions. Are you going to answer them or are you going to duck them again?

Yes. Everything I've seen published from the Daily Mail is <expletive deleted>. Not only a little bit. But obvious lies. This is no exception.

What I'm talking about is that I had to ask the above questions repeatedly before you'd answer them. Now you've finally answered them "Yes". Thank you. So that makes this the point where I remind you that the BBC carried the story too. Consequently, you are asserting that the BBC also formulated their story in such a way that we're supposed to make a bunch of assumptions, and that the BBC's article is also make believe. So that makes this the point where I remind you that you wrote "The BBC article you linked to on the other hand is accurate." Your posts are a web of self-contradictory nonsense.

If you aren't seriously proposing that carrying the story at all justifies your accusations against the Daily Mail, then don't give me yet another quotationless screed about what awful journalists they are. Either quote them or admit you have no grounds for complaint.

The Daily Mail have been doing this <expletive deleted> since they were founded. They're famous for it. Today they're just continuing to do what they've always done.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daily_Mail

It's just been a long list of "patriotic", British, self aggrandising and chauvinist articles. Zero analysis. Zero attempt at presenting any kind of nuance. Everything is black and white, and "they" are always evil and terrible.

Daily Mail is not news, and has never been.

That, sir, is yet another quotationless screed about what awful journalists they are. You evidently feel that denouncing them as liars without quoting them is an adequate substitute for posting a quote of them lying.

Why would they suddenly start being a serious newspaper today? I haven't seen you make any effort to show that the Daily Mail is a real newspaper? All the evidence I've seen speaks against that claim.

What "that claim"? Who here ever claimed the Daily Mail is a real newspaper? I certainly didn't claim any such thing, so why the heck would it be my job to make an effort to show they are? You appear to be insinuating that I made such a claim. Why are you doing that? Are you doing it deliberately in an attempt to give third parties the false impression that you've refuted me? Or did you simply lose track of why we're arguing?

We're not arguing over whether the Daily Mail is a real newspaper. We're arguing over your groundless and almost certainly false accusation against TSwizzle. You didn't just say the article he posted was make believe. You claimed that he knew it was make believe. You have no grounds for thinking he knows it's make believe. Whether the Daily Mail is a real newspaper has no bearing on whether he knows it's make believe. You accused him of dishonesty, and you did it because you are a person who just makes stuff up. You ought not to have done that. You owe him an apology. Deal with it.

He has been shown over and over that Daily Mail only publishes bullshit. Everybody here has. Yet he persists spreading their lies. Knowingly spreading lies, trying to pass it off as truth is being dishonest. In what way to I owe him an apology?

Here's their Wikipedia page. The Daily Mail is a tabloid and makes no effort to deny it. It's not news. It's entertainment.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daily_Mail

I think you've failed to show that I make stuff up. If this is the best you can do, it's clear you have nothing. And you tried really really hard. Points for effort.

edit: btw, trying to misrepresent what I've said is dishonest. So where my apology from you

 

[TSwizzle]

He has been shown over and over that Daily Mail only publishes bullshit.

Nope. Not once have you shown anything I have posted from the Daily Mail is "bullshit". Was the Daily Mail talking bullshit when it was one of the few outlets that actually covered the muslim grooming gangs and the cover up by local authorities ?

Yet he persists spreading their lies. Knowingly spreading lies, trying to pass it off as truth is being dishonest. In what way to I owe him an apology?

As above. What lies am I spreading ?

I think you've failed to show that I make stuff up.

You stretch things to the point of absolute nonsense.

 

[DrZoidberg]

Nope. Not once have you shown anything I have posted from the Daily Mail is "bullshit". Was the Daily Mail talking bullshit when it was one of the few outlets that actually covered the muslim grooming gangs and the cover up by local authorities ?

Yet he persists spreading their lies. Knowingly spreading lies, trying to pass it off as truth is being dishonest. In what way to I owe him an apology?

As above. What lies am I spreading ?

I think you've failed to show that I make stuff up.

You stretch things to the point of absolute nonsense.

I posted the wikipedia link to the Daily Mail article in the very post you are answering. The wikipedia page has it all.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daily_Mail

First line

The Daily Mail is a British daily middle-market[2][3] tabloid newspaper owned by the Daily Mail and General Trust[4] and published in London.

Do you even know what a tabloid is?

Here's that link:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tabloid_(newspaper_format)

You don't seem to understand what kind of a magazine a tabloid is, or what a tabloid tries to do. It's just entertainment. They're not even trying to tell the truth. That's true for all tabloids. If they have ambitions to tell the truth or deliver nuanced pieces they wouldn't call themselves a tabloid.

Posting tabloid articles and behaving as if the content is true, is failing to grasp what a tabloid is.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

For the sake of illustration lets put some numbers on this. I'm not trying to be realistic with them but the point remains regardless of the values:

Total exam period: 12 days
Ramadan period: 6 days
Students take: 6 exams
Original distribution: Even
Changed distribution: 2/3 of exam seats are not during Ramadan

Original result: Students would have an average of 2 days between exams.

New result: In the 6 non-Ramadan days they would have an average of 4 exams, for 1.5 days/exam and during the Ramadan period they would have an average of 2 exams, for 3 days/exam.

You have traded 2, 2, 2, 2, 2, 2 for 1.5, 1.5, 1.5, 1.5, 3, 3. The majority suffered for the benefit of the minority.

You're wrong. It's the same spread. They haven't squished together exams. All they've done is re-arrange the order in which they come.

They've traded 2, 2, 2, 2, 2, 2 for 2, 2, 2, 2, 2, 2

That's my interpretation of reading their statement.

Doesn't make your interpretation correct. You're so determined that there was no harm that you aren't even looking at the situation.

 

[blastula]

Daily Mail isn't always lying.

 

[bilby]

Daily Mail isn't always lying.

Of course it isn't.

It just does so so frequently and unabashedly as to render it valueless as a source.

If you have the information required to know whether or not they are lying in a particular situation, then you don't need the Daily Mail; And if you don't have that information, then you would be a fool to trust it.

 

[blastula]

Sure, but I'm speaking to the counter example -- to call something false simply because it's in the Daily Mail, without other corroboration.

 

[bilby]

Sure, but I'm speaking to the counter example -- to call something false simply because it's in the Daily Mail, without other corroboration.

It's worse than false; It's unreliable.

If the Mail were reliably false, then we could find the truth by simply believing the opposite of everything they print.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Sure, but I'm speaking to the counter example -- to call something false simply because it's in the Daily Mail, without other corroboration.

It's worse than false; It's unreliable.

If the Mail were reliably false, then we could find the truth by simply believing the opposite of everything they print.

Second this. There's a reason it's called the Daily Fail.