And thank you for everything you did for London and its diverse population.
Last night I attended a lecture by local historian Stephen Humphrey who discussed the general history of the Elephant & Castle, focussing more particularly on what he called its heyday (between 1850 and 1940). This is part of a week-long art project ( The Elephant Project ) hosted in an empty unit on the first floor of the infamous shopping centre, aiming to chart some of the changes currently happening to the area. When an historian starts talking about the Elephant and Castle, there is one subject he can not possibly avoid, even if he wanted to. Indeed my unsuspecting announcement on Facebook that I was attending such talk prompted a few people to ask the dreaded question: Where does the name of the area come from, for realz? Panoramic view of the Elephant and Castle around 1960/61. Those of us less badly informed than the rest have long discarded the theory that the name comes from the linguistic deformation of "Infanta de Castille", a name which would have become at
On the basis of policies, I think it was a good thing that Boris Johnson won. Just to address a few issues from your previous posts though:
ReplyDeleteI don't think someone having an opinion on whether the legalities of gay marriage should is right or not quite counts as homophobia. Some people seem to forget that we don't have gay marriage anyway, we have civil unions - which Boris supports. So why are people not having a go at Tony Blair for not legislating gay marriage and only settling for civil unions instead? As for section 28, that's a debate from the last century. Time has moved on from that. As a gay individual myself, Boris' views on section 28 isn't of any concern when it is not even under his jurisdiction as mayor of London.
Crime - I think it is important for the mayor to focus on crime, especially gang crime which is a serious problem. I'm sure you are update with the statistics of black on black crime being considerably higher than black on white. So as a black person myself, crime is an extremely important issue to me as well. Not just to white middle class people in the outer London boroughs. I want to be able to feel safe on my way home from work. So Boris' policy of zero tolerance approach to crime is definitely the way forward.
Racism - haven't got much to say on a man's alleged racism when he is married to a half Sikh woman himself and when one actually reads the incriminating article where he used the term 'piccaninnies', anyone with a proper grasp of English language can clearly see he is being sardonic and using the term in jest. Nevertheless, he has since apologised. Something Ken Livingstone has failed to do with his anti-Semitic remarks. And while speaking of Livingstone's lack of apologies, I didn't hear any apologies for hanging around with a suicide-bomber sympathiser who holds extreme views on homosexuality either. If you complain about Boris, you should listen to what Al Qaradawi has to say on homosexuality!
Eton - I doubt eight year old Boris had much choice of which school to go to, but I think we are all aware that Eton is a very good school academically. So if there is anything to be said about his Eton education, it should be that he is clearly more than qualified enough to take on the job of Mayor.
Having said all that, it is of course your democratic right to choose who you want as mayor. But democracy has spoken, you will have to accept that now. And also please don't presume to speak for me, as a homosexual from an ethnic minority background as you have tended to do in some of your previous posts. I voted for Boris, and I am proud. And I am hardly an 'ignorant' supporter either with a First. One important thing you should always remember is that we are all individuals.
The one thing I especially hated about Livingstone is the way he would use minority groups to play off each other to further his own interests. He was divisive figure, and London, in my view is much better off without him! As for Boris, I think those who opposed his candidacy should try and be objective and look at his time as Mayor rather than drag up insignificant issues from the past.
Thanks for taking the time to comment although it does seem like a blanket comment since your contributions covers many criticisms I haven't mentioned myself but seem to be regularly leveled at Boris. To be honest, all these arguments have been rehashed over and over in the past few months and it doesn't seem like people are actually listening to each other.
ReplyDeleteThe fact is Boris has been elected (mostly thanks to the campaign of misinformation led by the Evening Standard for several years). There is nothing that can be done, except hope that Boris is not as bad as he seems to be. Lots of people will certainly be scrutinising his every move so we should very soon find out.
All I can say so far is that some of his policy are little more than cosmetic and headline grabbing, while other are unrealistic or downright impossible to implement.
It would have been nice to know who you were too, Mr Anonymous.