What grinds my gears...

[Bellend Sebastian]

I don't know if it's WhatsApp or my new phone but a "helpful" automatic suggestion on replies makes it very easy to send a smiley face emoji that I would never ever use as a response which has already made things slightly awkward with my builder

[Mike Oxlong]

3 minutes ago, Bellend Sebastian said:

I don't know if it's WhatsApp or my new phone but a "helpful" automatic suggestion on replies makes it very easy to send a smiley face emoji that I would never ever use as a response which has already made things slightly awkward with my builder

Have you sent him this one yet ? 

 

[FoyleFox]

On 22/11/2023 at 13:26, grobyfox1990 said:

Should try landing in the Channel Islands, these pilots deserve applause! Yesterday landing the plane was swaying so much I was sure it would miss the runway. A dude fell off his chair it was so bumpy, people screaming etc. Bravo

Sounds like it was slightly different to a routine landing at EMA. Exceptional circumstances are fine but no-one claps when the bus arrives at St Margaret's are neither should should you if the pilot has done what he's paid to do and it's a standard landing.

[Zear0]

4 minutes ago, FoyleFox said:

Sounds like it was slightly different to a routine landing at EMA. Exceptional circumstances are fine but no-one claps when the bus arrives at St Margaret's are neither should should you if the pilot has done what he's paid to do and it's a standard landing.

I've never clapped on a plane landing but always said "cheers mate" to the bus driver when he does the tricky maneuver into Maggeh's which for me is a reasonable equivalence. 

Edited 25 November 2023 by Zear0

[Arkie Bennett]

The use of "super" as an adverb.

[The Bear]

13 minutes ago, Arkie Bennett said:

The use of "super" as an adverb.

Agreed. It's super annoying. 

[FoxyPV]

Irish people complaining about immigration 

[leicsmac]

3 minutes ago, FoxyPV said:

Irish people complaining about immigration 

Yep.

 

To extend this, anyone complaining about immigration who hails from a country whose actions contributed to that immigration being necessary. More hypocrisy than can be swallowed.

[bovril]

Just now, leicsmac said:

Yep.

 

To extend this, anyone complaining about immigration who hails from a country whose actions contributed to that immigration being necessary. More hypocrisy than can be swallowed.

I find this argument slightly counter productive. It doesn't really defend migrants' rights to settle peacefully where they want, just says people should accept it because of something they probably never took part in anyway. 

[leicsmac]

1 minute ago, bovril said:

I find this argument slightly counter productive. It doesn't really defend migrants' rights to settle peacefully where they want, just says people should accept it because of something they probably never took part in anyway. 

That's fair to say.

 

I think it's me just generally being frustrated at the hypocrisy of people (mostly) tacitly accepting horrible decisions that cause strife in other places (often with unseen benefits to them) and then getting angry at people seeking to flee that strife to better their own lives.

[bovril]

3 minutes ago, leicsmac said:

That's fair to say.

 

I think it's me just generally being frustrated at the hypocrisy of people (mostly) tacitly accepting horrible decisions that cause strife in other places (often with unseen benefits to them) and then getting angry at people seeking to flee that strife to better their own lives.

I'm anti British intervention in the Middle East and pro controls on immigration. Hopefully that's consistent enough for you.

[leicsmac]

6 minutes ago, bovril said:

I'm anti British intervention in the Middle East and pro controls on immigration. Hopefully that's consistent enough for you.

[FoxyPV]

21 minutes ago, leicsmac said:

Yep.

 

To extend this, anyone complaining about immigration who hails from a country whose actions contributed to that immigration being necessary. More hypocrisy than can be swallowed.

It's less of the actions as that's more a UK thing.

 

In Ireland, every family will have at least one member who has emigrated but see nothing wrong with that but complain when the reverse happens.

 

There's a reason there's an Irish bar everywhere 

[leicsmac]

1 minute ago, FoxyPV said:

It's less of the actions as that's more a UK thing.

 

In Ireland, every family will have at least one member who has emigrated but see nothing wrong with that but complain when the reverse happens.

 

There's a reason there's an Irish bar everywhere 

Yeah, the Irish diaspora is massive both historical and contemporary. Basic hypocrisy again.

[Sampson]

Yeah. I think it's obviously more bemusing when it comes to Ireland, because it's like the classic example of an emigration country where people left by the millions for better lives, because their economy and resources was being exploited by a bigger and richer nation. And because Ireland being a relatively poor country is still in living memory for plenty of people, it's only really 50 years ago or a couple of generations ago Ireland was considered the poor man of the western world and the Irish people who emigrated to the UK for a better life were treated abhorrently and banned from certain pubs, restaurants, toilets and access to jobs and housing in a type of apartheid in the British Isles. Now Ireland is a rich country, it's a rather sad indictment of human nature see many of the same people advocating for the same thing for non-native Irish people in Ireland. 

 

[bovril]

I don't know loads about modern Ireland to be honest but it seems from what I've read a similar situation to the UK - total lack of investment in infrastructure and housing at the same time as increasing immigration numbers. 

[Sampson]

45 minutes ago, bovril said:

I don't know loads about modern Ireland to be honest but it seems from what I've read a similar situation to the UK - total lack of investment in infrastructure and housing at the same time as increasing immigration numbers. 

It’s not the same (and I don’t think that’s anywhere the real problems with the uk either - population ageing and the greater burden of health care abd pensions by a massively increasing percentage of the retired population and a massively decreasing population of tax payers is the much more fundamental problem - but that’s a debate for another time).

 

Ireland’s problem is it became too rich too quickly so if you weren’t in the right place at the right time you got left behind in a huge way, so it’s probably one of the most unequal societies in Europe. Ireland went from the poorest western country in the early 90s to very likely becoming the single richest country in the world by gdp per capita within the next 5-10 years, since it decided to become a tech corporate tax haven. But all that money sits in the banks and high ups of a small few tech companies. So if you weren’t in the tech industry when all the money came flooding in and inflation naturally happens as certain groups had more money to spend you got left behind. 

 

 

And Ireland’s population now is smaller than it was a century ago. It’s one of the few countries in the world where that’s the case. Ireland has long been a country of emigration, that’s long been the problem, it’s only recently its population numbers have actually started stabilise and risingagain. Immigration numbers have never been the problem in Ireland, emigration numbers were always the problem 

Edited 26 November 2023 by Sampson

[bovril]

2 minutes ago, Sampson said:

It’s not the same. Ireland’s problem is it became too rich too quickly so if you weren’t in the right place at the right time you got left behind in a huge way, so it’s probably one of the most unequal societies in Europe. Ireland went from the poorest western country in the early 90s to very likely becoming the single richest country in the world by gdp per capita within the next 5-10 years, since it decided to become a tech corporate tax haven. But all that money sits in the banks and high ups of a small few tech companies. So if you weren’t in the tech industry when all the money came flooding in and inflation naturally happens as certain groups had more money to spend you got left behind. 

 

 

And Ireland’s population now is smaller than it was a century ago. It’s one of the few countries in the world where that’s the case. Ireland has long been a country of emigration, that’s long been the problem, it’s only recently its population numbers have actually started riding again. Immigration numbers have never been the problem in Ireland, emigration numbers were always the problem 

Thanks. I do get a feeling though that there is something of a shabbiness to Irish cities, similar to what we see in the UK, due to a lack of investment. No idea whether that creates anti-immigration, anti-establishment feeling like in the UK. I would guess not to the same extent.

 

Every time I go to mainland Europe now it's painful to see how nice most cities and infrastructure is compared the British isles. 

[HighPeakFox]

At some point in the last 200 years, one part of my family emigrated here from The Netherlands. I'd imagine many of us are a big mixture and I wish people were less concerned about it. 

[Sampson]

2 hours ago, HighPeakFox said:

At some point in the last 200 years, one part of my family emigrated here from The Netherlands. I'd imagine many of us are a big mixture and I wish people were less concerned about it. 

What gets me is these debates are always about immigration numbers and never about population changes, birth rates and the mean average age changing. 
 

Demographic change is of course hugely important, but immigration is just a small part of that and definitely not the most significant demographic change in the western world going on right now. Yet the right wing press always jabber on about immigration numbers and barely ever mention birth rates, death rates, average ages, how many are 65+ where you both draw pension and start using the nhs vs the shrinking numbers of people of tax paying age.
 

The fact so much of this stuff in the news is people going on about immigration numbers and not whole population numbers of countries or age distributions is pretty depressing, because it’s clear dog whistling that it’s that they don’t want foreigners here, especially when you see people rioting in France against rises to pension ages when it’s the massively increasing burden of the ageing population that’s the biggest drain on the public purse. Never mind policies about trying to improve the national birth rate or giving families more support so they *can* afford to have the 2.4 children needed to sustain the population demographics.

 

I’ve posted about this before but I saw kurzgestadt do a video on it recently and they are generally good science communicators so I’ll post it here too 

 

 

Edited 26 November 2023 by Sampson

[Jon the Hat]

28 minutes ago, Sampson said:

What gets me is these debates are always about immigration numbers and never about population changes, birth rates and the mean average age changing. 
 

Demographic change is of course hugely important, but immigration is just a small part of that and definitely not the most significant demographic change in the western world going on right now. Yet the right wing press always jabber on about immigration numbers and barely ever mention birth rates, death rates, average ages, how many are 65+ where you both draw pension and start using the nhs vs the shrinking numbers of people of tax paying age.
 

The fact so much of this stuff in the news is people going on about immigration numbers and not whole population numbers of countries or age distributions is pretty depressing, because it’s clear dog whistling that it’s that they don’t want foreigners here, especially when you see people rioting in France against rises to pension ages when it’s the massively increasing burden of the ageing population that’s the biggest drain on the public purse. Never mind policies about trying to improve the national birth rate or giving families more support so they *can* afford to have the 2.4 children needed to sustain the population demographics.

 

I’ve posted about this before but I saw kurzgestadt do a video on it recently and they are generally good science communicators so I’ll post it here too 

 

 

All important factors, but you cannot tell people immigration is not an immediate issue while waving through the best part of a million people.  Same here in Australia, housing is incredibly expensive, rentals impossible to find in some areas, so are people going to think maybe letting in 700k people in a year is perhaps not helping the issue?  Yes of course they are. 

Edited 26 November 2023 by Jon the Hat

[leicsmac]

9 minutes ago, Jon the Hat said:

All important factors, but you cannot tell people immigration is not an immediate issue while waving through the best part of a million people.  Same here in Australia, housing is incredibly expensive, rentals impossible to find in some areas, so are people going to think maybe letting in 700k people in a year is perhaps not helping the issue?  Yes of course they are. 

And thanks to the democratic process, such arguments from ignorance that in no way take into account the salient points made above are indeed often given a wide latitude in policymaking.

 

That's an overall weakness of the current system, not a strength.

[Jon the Hat]

1 hour ago, leicsmac said:

And thanks to the democratic process, such arguments from ignorance that in no way take into account the salient points made above are indeed often given a wide latitude in policymaking.

 

That's an overall weakness of the current system, not a strength.

They should be addressed in policy making, just not in stupid schemes like Rwanda, but with sensible policies which address local impacts on housing, schools etc.

[ozleicester]

5 hours ago, bovril said:

I don't know loads about modern Ireland to be honest but it seems from what I've read a similar situation to the UK - total lack of investment in infrastructure and housing at the same time as increasing immigration numbers. 

like most the developed world... too many rich and too many poor

[Jon the Hat]

12 minutes ago, ozleicester said:

like most the developed world... too many rich and too many poor

A bit exaggerated in Ireland though I think by the very short time in which a subsection of educated / professional people including migrants have done very well, leaving a relatively poor white working class behind and now unable to afford to own a home in areas where they lived for generations.  Almost overnight.