Former Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher dies, aged 87.

[Wadders]

So, love her or hate her, Baroness Thatcher has passed away after a stroke. Now I'm not all too interested in politics, but I'm aware she was a highly divisive figure.

I've got a lot of family in Manchester, so I know a fair few people who will be resisting the urge to get the bunting out and the music on


Having said that, celebrating the death of an 87 year old with Alzheimers doesn't quite sit well with me...

So what do you think of this? Furthermore, are you one of those who will be muttering good riddance? I'm of the opinion that whether you agree with her policies or not, it's not hard to show a little class and leave the gloating at the door. Having said that, I'm not one of the people who claim to have been affected by her government, so its not my place to say perhaps.

Also, I'm not sure if this is should be ion the R&P forum?

 

[Relish in Chaos]

In a nutshell, she was a female role model who destroyed a lot of lives. I'm not going to say I feel sorry, but I am going to show a little respect.

 

[Stabby Joe]

It will be interesting to see what the long term response will be. Initially it will all be good intentions, out of respect but I know as days pass, there will be negative press. Here in the UK there are many who are still angry.

 

[Andy Shandy]

Yeah, it might not exactly be classy, but we here up in Scotland weren't exactly her biggest fans in the world.

 

[Angie7F]

Well, like her dislike her, she was a influential figure.
I am just happy that i got to see meryl streep kickass as an actress by playing her in the movie

 

[Wadders]

Yeah, it might not exactly be classy, but we here up in Scotland weren't exactly her biggest fans in the world.

Aye, so I understand

 

[Erttheking]

Ding dong the witch is dead! Which old witch? The Wicked Witch!

I realise that to people not familiar with British politics, some of these comments might seem a little crass. What you must realise is that while Thatcher was the first female PM, and therefore certainly something of a role model for women in male-dominated environments, she was also the single most wretched, miserly, pathologically lying sociopath of a PM that the country has seen. The entire reason why the north of England is now a comparative economic deadzone is because she quite happily destroyed entire communities and shut down entire industries.

She didn't just enact terrible, terrible policies like the Poll Tax. She did so with a psychotic, patronising glee, telling us that even if we didn't like it, we'd have to take it up the arse. "Yes the medicine is harsh, but the patient requires it!"

She quite happily shat upon Scotland, Northern England and Wales simply in order to make things better for the Tory home counties in the South. Despite being the first female PM, she was everything that's wrong with the current political system, and embodied every single nasty quality that makes up the Conservative Party. She was a homophobe who banned the teaching or promotion in any way of homosexuality, she was a free-market capitalist to an insane degree, the reason why our railway networks are currently so fucked is because she decided to sell them off in the Eighties...

Suffice to say, round here we've been saying for a long time that the day Thatcher dies is the day we organise a street party. All due respect, blah blah blah, she was a terrible person who caused suffering and hardship for millions of people. If they even think of giving her a state funeral...

....Ouch. Yeah, they really don't teach us that about her in the states.

 

[KaosuHamoni]

Yeah, it might not exactly be classy, but we here up in Scotland weren't exactly her biggest fans in the world.

DAMNIT DAMNIT DAMNIT, YOU SNEAKY SNEAKY NINJA YOU.

OT: She can go rot in hell. Between her and Tony Blair, our country has been ruined, and I am glad she's gone =_=

 

[The Artificially Prolonged]

So the devil finally came to collect then.

Yeah it probably does not reflect well on me not having any sympathy for the death of a frail old lady but that frail old lady nearly cost my parents their home, so I'd rather have sympathy for the people who's lives she did manage to ruin.

Anyway since I've heard the news, it has been nothing but sunny here in the north, and I half expect the entire of Scotland has broken out into spontaneous parade.

On the funeral side of things, any chance we can bury Cameron and Osbourne along with her?

 

[warmachine]

I will say one good thing about her. She broke the mould and rose to be leader of the Conservative party of her time despite three aspects about her, any one of which would have normally stopped her: woman; graduate of a science subject; lower middle class background.

That's the only good thing I can say about her.

 

[hazabaza1]

I have like, basically no knowledge about my own country's politics, so I kinda thought she already kicked it a while back.

 

[Timmey]

Ding dong the witch is dead! Ah already posted but still, been signing this all day in my head. Think I will go have a few beers to celebrate.

 

[Erttheking]

....Ouch. Yeah, they really don't teach us that about her in the states.

Back in the day, the railway networks used to be owned and run by the state. They were't glamorous, but they ran reliably, and they ran on time.

Thatcher then decided to sell the railway off to private bidders. Apparently we'd all become 'shareholders' of the railway in doing so, and the trains would become even more efficient and reliable and on time.

Cut forward thirty years. British trains are now an international joke. Tickets are getting prohibitively expensive, trains are less reliable than ever, the train companies have been fined on numerous occasions for not running a decent service, and rather than trying to make things better, they simply raise ticket fees and pocket even more money.

"We're all shareholders" my arse. She took state-run services that worked, and sold them off to private interests. And quelle fucking surprise, the private companies then started running those services into the ground.

Do they try and give her a positive image in America? If so, you'll want to be careful if you ever come over to the UK. The last music festival I went to, the festival organisers capped the Saturday night by burning a wooden effigy of Margaret Thatcher. That's how popular she is with the average Joe (James?) here in England.

Well they don't really talk about her too much in schools, but on a couple of shows I watched on the SAS and the Falkland wars, they didn't exactly demonize her. Heck, in the SAS show, they said that she and a couple of others were in the SAS's training facility while they were preforming a practice hostage mission (with live rounds) she apparently kept her cool while the others were diving for cover. Both kinda glazed over her political policies, and by that I mean they didn't talk about them at all.

 

[Lethos]

....Ouch. Yeah, they really don't teach us that about her in the states.

I'm sure jeffers won't object to me saying this, but you shouldn't just take his word about it. Thatcher is our Reagan (in fact the two were pretty much best friends). Depending on who you ask, she is patron saint of the economy, or the worst thing to happen to modern Britain.

 

[KaosuHamoni]

....Ouch. Yeah, they really don't teach us that about her in the states.

Back in the day, the railway networks used to be owned and run by the state. They were't glamorous, but they ran reliably, and they ran on time.

Thatcher then decided to sell the railway off to private bidders. Apparently we'd all become 'shareholders' of the railway in doing so, and the trains would become even more efficient and reliable and on time.

Cut forward thirty years. British trains are now an international joke. Tickets are getting prohibitively expensive, trains are less reliable than ever, the train companies have been fined on numerous occasions for not running a decent service, and rather than trying to make things better, they simply raise ticket fees and pocket even more money.

"We're all shareholders" my arse. She took state-run services that worked, and sold them off to private interests. And quelle fucking surprise, the private companies then started running those services into the ground.

Do they try and give her a positive image in America? If so, you'll want to be careful if you ever come over to the UK. The last music festival I went to, the festival organisers capped the Saturday night by burning a wooden effigy of Margaret Thatcher. That's how popular she is with the average Joe (James?) here in England.

Well they don't really talk about her too much in schools, but on a couple of shows I watched on the SAS and the Falkland wars, they didn't exactly demonize her. Heck, in the SAS show, they said that she and a couple of others were in the SAS's training facility while they were preforming a practice hostage mission (with live rounds) she apparently kept her cool while the others were diving for cover. Both kinda glazed over her political policies, and by that I mean they didn't talk about them at all.

That's because she privatised everything, and then put a load of money into our military, hence why many military personnel and families thereof, vote Tory.

 

[Erttheking]

....Ouch. Yeah, they really don't teach us that about her in the states.

I'm sure jeffers won't object to me saying this, but you shouldn't just take his word about it. Thatcher is our Reagan (in fact the two were pretty much best friends). Depending on who you ask, she is patron saint of the economy, or the worst thing to happen to modern Britain.

This is why I'm not a fan of politics. Everything is gray and grey and it just gets me a headache. And called unpleasant things.

 

[Andy Shandy]

Yeah, it might not exactly be classy, but we here up in Scotland weren't exactly her biggest fans in the world.

DAMNIT DAMNIT DAMNIT, YOU SNEAKY SNEAKY NINJA YOU.

OT: She can go rot in hell. Between her and Tony Blair, our country has been ruined, and I am glad she's gone =_=

To be fair, it's not like there aren't other possible song choices as well =P