Free Republic

"3 guys get out of van shouting “this is for allah”, stab multiple people including children and get away on foot though there were hundreds of people on the bridge. Why?"

I heard it was 5 armed men and that 3 of them were shot. In Britain, for civilians, carrying a weapon in a public place, or anything that could be used as a weapon (with the intent to do so), is a felony.

If 5 enraged lunatics suddenly start hacking people to death with machetes or carving knives and you are close by with your family or partner are you going to go and take them on unarmed? Especially, if one, or more, of them have bomb-like items strapped to themselves.

Porsche, Mercedes and BMW make luxury cars. They are status symbols to their owners. The kind of people who buy them new in the UK are not going to be put off buying them if they cost a few thousand pounds more (because of a tariff). The German economy is in a far better position to bounce back from Brexit than the British economy.

Short-sighted Leave voters have basically opted for a UK recession in exchange for few benefits. Resentment of EU immigration seems to have been the most common motivation of Leave voters. Few Brits really believe the UK economy will do better outside the EU and the ones that do are mostly geriatrics!

This General Election cannot stop Brexit. Even the Labour Party have committed themselves to pursuing it. Although, Corbyn was officially part of the Remain campaign he did nothing useful in it and it turns out he was secretly a Leaver (as he is from the Tony Benn hard-left of the Labour Party).

Labour are hopeless at the moment and the Conservatives have the largest lead over them since 1983. They are sitting ducks hence May's opportunistic decision to call a General Election even though they are only supposed to happen once every 5 years (the next one was to be in 2020).

The only political party who will reverse Brexit are the Liberal Democrats and they are the fourth largest party after the SNP and so have zero chance of forming a government. There is no way to reverse Brexit now short of a revolution. Some might call that a failure of the democratic process given that the government seems to advocate a policy of Brexit at any cost!

I've had a lot on recently so I did not have time to give you the thoughtful reply you deserve until now.

'Roid rage' is yet another media-fomented myth. No scientific study corroborates its existence. Several powerful factors, however, contribute to its perpetuation:

(1) People drawn to using steroids tend to be more unstable, mentally and socially, than average. They may also be naturally more aggressive, whether or not they have previously chosen to physically express that aggression.

(2) There exists an expectation of 'roid rage'. If a steroid user expects to become more violent and aggressive when using the drugs, and his peers and the media reinforce that expectation, then it's more likely that he'll indeed become more violent and aggressive.

(3) When a violent incident occurs involving a steroid-user, Peter Hitchens et al. tend to celebrate it as an instance of 'roid rage' - basically because it's more sensational and, just perhaps, because journalists tend to be intellectually lazy. Brainless stereotypes are their bread and butter. There are countless violent incidents involving non-users of steroids too, but of course no one thinks of going to the trouble of pointing that out.

(4) No scientific study has ever demonstrated any long-term deleterious effects of moderate steroid use. Heavy abuse can raise arterial pressure, blood lipids and liver enzymes, which would argue for reduced longevity, but even then there are as yet no studies demonstrating such a thing among even the worst abusers.

(5) Steroids are banned from sporting competitions for one simple reason: they serve their intended purpose of building muscle and burning fat. Their side effects are well-known and amenable to monitoring. As such, any debate over their appropriateness among recreational gym-goers should be framed by the findings of medical science, not those of journalists and their anecdotes.

(6) Let's take a look at the USA's drug mortality statistics for 2013:

Number of deaths directly attributable to prescription opioid abuse: 16,000

Number of deaths directly attributable to benzodiazepine abuse: 7,000

Number of deaths directly attributable to cocaine abuse: 5,000

Number of deaths directly attributable to heroin abuse: 7,000

Number of deaths directly attributable to alcohol abuse: 88,000

Number of deaths directly attributable to anoblic steroid abuse: ZERO

It's a shame really. We need to move beyond this type of spittle-flecked, alarmist screeching and conduct serious investigations into anabolic steroids, with big cohorts and appropriate controls. In over half a century no one in the medical community has done that and the political class remain ambivalent about performing such research.

'He is also said by some who knew him to have been a bodybuilder, so he may have been taking steroids – these powerful mood-influencing drugs were also used by the Norwegian mass-murderer Anders Breivik, the rampage killer Raoul Moat, and the Orlando mass-killer Omar Mateen.'

Peter Hitchens is such a retro War on Drugs throwback. To blame anabolic steroids for all this is so Anslingeresque.

If steroid use really caused people to become violent lunatics then Arnold Schwarzenegger, Lou Ferrigno, Ronnie Coleman, Sylvester Stallone and every champion bodybuilder since 1975 would all be in prison for manslaughter or murder given how many steroids they've consumed over the years.

The fact that Raoul Moat had clinical depression with paranoid psychosis and had just got out of prison to find his girlfriend shacked up with a policeman (and previously believed that there was a police conspiracy against him) would seem to be more relevant to his killing spree than his earlier use of steroids when he was still a gym rat.

Let's put the blame where it really lies; at the door of the psychopathic Islamists who promise losers a place in heaven if they go out and do something really despicable in the name of Allah.

"the Pound only fell a few percent."

Actually, it fell 18% against the US dollar and inflation on food and fuel is accelerating in the UK now. A few foreign investors have been able to profit from Brexit by buying up cheaper UK companies recently, but the average working Brit is getting financially shafted.

Puhleeeeeze. That article does not even claim that he stopped investigations into pedophiles. It says the civil service during the Thatcher government warned the complainant off.

This guy received the highest civil award made by the USA - the Presidential Medal of Freedom. He also received the Congressional Gold Medal. He was celebrated as a hero and friend of the USA on Free Republic just a few years ago.

How quickly some of use ignore a man's heroic achievements and try to stain his fine reputation with wicked lies just because we don't agree with his political views. Disgraceful. You should be ashamed of yourself.

He received the highest civil award made by the USA - the Presidential Medal of Freedom.

He received the Congressional Gold Medal.

He was celebrated as a hero and friend of the USA on Free Republic just a few years ago.

I rest my case.

Tony Blair is a hero of freedom. If he says it’s time to rise up and fight then he must be right. The guy kicked ass in Afghanistan and Iraq. How quickly we forget his heroism.

The anti-gun hysteria in British newspapers is absolutely pathetic and sad to see. Anything to scare the peasants and keep them compliant to the State's authority and not thinking for themselves.

I doubt that the UK Police will be losing any sleep over these antique relics. A worn out mid 19th century percussion revolver or pepperbox pistol against class III body armor, a 9mm Glock and a HK MP5 submachine gun (standard UK Police Armed Response Unit issue equipment) is worthy of a Monty Python sketch!

"The rest are all curios and relics, most are black powder muzzle loaders which would be legal in the US for anyone to own."

Actually, antique muzzle-loaders and antique obsolete calibre metallic cartridge firearms are still legal to own in the UK without a license too. I have a friend who owns several just as wall hangers. You can have them legally as long as you don't try to shoot them. For that you have to get a Firearms Certificate.

The people who handed these in were probably frightened housewives. It's a shame because they could have sold them to antique firearms collectors. What a waste for them to hand them over to the Police to be paraded in front of the public and then melted down. No self-respecting gangbanger is going to carry one of those pieces of garbage!

"What perverse sense of self-aggrandization makes you think I care that you're offended?"

It's common decency not to dismiss a man's career and philanthropic activities in a public forum shortly after his death just because he was gay. It is the feelings of his family and friends which concern me. You must be a borderline sociopath if you cannot understand that.

"Here's a link so you can actually *read* The Pink Swastika instead of dismissing their work because your boyfriend told you so. The body of work has withstood the test of time without serious challenge."

For the fifth time on this thread: I AM NOT GAY! Do I have to post a pic of myself having sex with my girlfriend to prove it? LOL

I have read some of the cited evidence on that website. But that evidence cannot be verified by me right now. However, let's just assume for the sake of argument that some senior Nazi party members were "butch" gay men with a proclivity towards BDSM and pederasty. That does not change the fact that the Nazis arrested roughly 100,000 men suspected of being homosexuals, 15,000 gay men were sent to Concentration Camps where they were forced to wear pink triangles, were experimented on, castrated and released or killed.

But how do we know that these Nazi leaders were not actually bisexuals? German Law would find a man guilty of being a homosexual if he had engaged in "homosexual acts" but he could have had a straight sex life too. These men may have been straight on the surface (to give them a respectable public face) but they also engaged in gay sex/BDSM with minors as a release for their cruel sexually sadistic natures. Frankly, they were evil people who would have enjoyed indulging in sexual sadism, just as they enjoyed beating-up/killing Jews and Slavs.

In any case, the sexuality of those Nazi leaders was irrelevant to their government's policies. Because what drove the Nazi Party to do the despicable things they did was their Aryan racial superiority belief, not the fact that some of their leaders may have been bisexuals/gays who engaged in gay BDSM and pederasty. To give a share of the blame for the wickedness of the Nazis to ALL gay men adds insult to injury, as the effeminate genetically predisposed gay men (at the very least) would all have been killed by the Nazis.

"Also note that not all who were molested as boys turned out to be queer, but they're still messed up. ... [why should a victim of a sexual crime have to 'ADMIT' to it, as you so revealingly state?] Well, 20% of them don't. I guess they're proud of being queer (gay pride)."

Your comment demonstrates why so many straight boys/men who are raped never complain to the Police or anyone else about it. You are effectively saying that because someone was forced to engage in homosexual activity that afterwards they are forever "tainted" and are either gay or bisexual. That is a wicked attitude to take to a sex crime victim. Being raped by a man must be a horrendous experience for a straight male on its own, but to have to endure that extra layer of stigma thanks to the prejudice of people like you is terrible.

"Big talk coming from a heterophobic bigot."

For the fourth time on this thread: I AM NOT GAY! Not everyone does everything out of pure selfishness you know.

"Although the intolerant hater faggots make up only 1 to 3% of the population"

'Intolerant hater faggots' - can you not see your own hypocrisy?

'The old dirt road' must have struck a nerve, eh?

No. I am not gay. I just object to your disgusting character assassination of a gay man who did more for charities than you could ever dream of doing.

Actually, homosexuals and the NAZI party have a very intertwined and interesting relationship. Read a book, then come back and talk.

If you mean the Nazi regime brutally persecuted homosexuals; required them to wear pink triangles, conducted brutal experiments on them, castrated them and murdered them in concentration camps, then you are correct. If, however, you are referring to the ridiculous Lively/Abrams conspiracy theory which claims that senior Nazi party members were actually gay and deliberately recruited gay men into the SS because they could be turned into savage mass-killers more easily than straight men, then you are incorrect. (Try getting your history from somewhere other than morally bankrupt talk radio stations and far right hate-mongers.)

"Meanwhile, go be a pompous, uneducated ass on someone else's time."

Sorry? What you have posted on this thread was a product of some sort of education?

"Yup, 80% of queers ADMIT to having been molested by men as children. 20% don't admit to it."

You said that he was a child molester, not that he was molested when he was a child. Also, why should a victim of a sexual crime have to 'ADMIT' to it, as you so revealingly state? Or do you perceive a man to be diminished as a man because he was sexually abused by a man when he was a (non-consenting) child?

It is clearly incorrect to state that ALL gay men are paedophiles, but I don't expect you to have the integrity to acknowledge that fact.

"Have you considered that he might have wished to be heterosexual? ... Do you have any evidence to support that allegation?"

Well he started off as a straight man (check his Wikipedia entry) and seems to have become exclusively gay in middle age. He obviously tried to pursue sexual relationships with women in his early adulthood, but it did not work out.

"Wait a minute....you're not a packer are you?"

No. I am not gay, as I already told the other Westboro Baptist Church bigot. I simply find it reprehensible that you and your hate-filled associates feel the need to insult a man shortly after his death and dismiss his philanthropic efforts just because he was gay. (However, I realise that genuine altruism is a concept you will have some difficulty understanding.)

"I don't have that much sympathy for child molesters."

Do you have any evidence to support that disgusting accusation? Or do you simply assume that because he was gay and he gave money to Childline he was secretly a child molester? He also gave money and a lot of his personal time to a homeless shelter. Does that mean he was secretly a slum landlord too?

"but good works won't get you into Heaven."

No. But apparently being a hateful bigot will.

"Repenting, asking for forgiveness and giving up the filthy and decadent queer death-style. (which killed him and many others)"

Have you considered that he might have wished to be heterosexual? It's a lot easier to have a pleasant life if you are straight rather than gay. Sexual orientation is not a simple binary choice, it is heavily influenced by genetic predisposition, an individual's personal life experiences and early dysfunctional family relationship issues.

How do you know his homosexuality led to his death? It was reported that he began experimenting with heroin recently. He could have easily over-dosed if he was inexperienced, or using it alongside alcohol/cannabis.

"According to the book...it's "an abomination"."

So you hate him (despite his philanthropy) because of something scribbled down a few millennia ago by an ignorant peasant in the Middle East? What a great way to live your life!

You know Saint Augustine wrote 'Cum dilectione hominum et odio vitiorum' which means 'hate the sin and not the sinner', but I suppose you don't subscribe to that sort of liberal attitude?

"What is it like to be so weak that mere words hurt you?"

I didn't say that your words 'hurt' me. I am not gay. I said I found your anti-gay prejudice and hateful attitude sickening. In the same way that I find the attitude of Islamic State towards Christians and other "nonbelievers" sickening. In the same way that I found the attitude of the Nazis towards the Jews sickening.

It appears that you have a lot in common with Islamic State and the Nazis, as they also despise homosexuals and cannot tolerate their existence. Apparently, hating someone because of your religion's dogma is perfectly acceptable to you. Just remember that people in some other religions hate you just because of their religion's dogma too. Have you ever considered thinking for yourself for a change?

"Well...he's a packer....ain't he?"

"In what sense?"

"I have honestly never heard of the gay....er...guy."

"No, he was the 'old dirt road' variety."

All this hate and contempt just because he was not heterosexual. He gave many millions of dollars and his own time to charities and "respectable" people in need. Including over $3,000,000 to Childline (a British charity which helps abused children). He made most of his large charitable donations confidentially, clearly without any desire to benefit from positive publicity. What could be more Christian and philanthropic than that?

See the following articles:

From random hand-outs to saving John Lennon’s piano, here are George Michael’s 12 most generous acts

George Michael: Secret philanthropist gave millions to charity

I was not a fan of his music or his lifestyle choices, however, I find it sickening to come across these kind of hateful prejudiced comments on a Christian Conservative discussion forum.

I knew one of the members of the design team who worked on the TSR project. He was plenty pissed when the government cancelled it. He resigned over it.

The British government are generally completely incompetent when it comes to defence policy. They scrapped their only aircraft carrier (without having a substitute for years), they sold off all the Harrier jump-jets (after spending a fortune upgrading them), they used the hopeless SA80 assault rifle instead of the M16-A2 or the HK MP-5, they declared that they were removing HMS Endurance from the South Atlantic station (the year before the Argentinians invaded the Falkland Islands). "Lions led by donkeys" as the old saying goes.

There is no such thing as a soul. How mediaeval! ;-)