For some time now, I have written stuff on the internet under the assumption that one day, my identity will be publicly tied to everything I wrote. Surely in the future it will be easy to give an example of my writing to an AI bot, perhaps combined with some facts about my life, and the bot would be able to find anonymous posts that were likely written by me, across the internet.

Probably beyond my hoodwinking skills. Also I’m not northern myself, I was just wondering what kind of person they would consider to have a “socially appropriate background”. Posh accent, wealthy family, and from South East England, I would expect.

I saw this:

Your Party should also end Britain’s participation in NATO, she said

And a quote from her here:

Every penny that this Labour government spends on missiles, tanks and bombs is taken out of healthcare, housing, and our future and addressing the climate catastrophe

I think Britain probably should have good defence though, working together with our allies, e.g. in Europe, Japan, Australia, etc. If the UK decided to largely disarm then Russia would probably do whatever they liked to our country very quickly.

I was a manager at Woolworths back in the day, I swear… but this family would probably say my accent isn’t posh enough to tutor their child.

The article says the fine has now been cancelled, but originally someone from the council defended the fine by saying:

We are committed to protecting Richmond’s waterways and keeping our borough’s streets clean and safe.

Pretty ridiculous. Coffee is an organic substance right? Made from roasted coffee beans. I could maybe understand if someone was pouring industrial chemicals into the sewers but coffee surely shouldn’t be a problem.

Also of course big water companies get away with dumping sewage into rivers, but a very small amount of coffee apparently needs to be harshly punished. One rule for big business and another rule for common people.

Interesting. I do think it’s a threat if hostile entities own critical pieces of British infrastructure. But I think Russia is also a threat that should be remembered, and jihadis can be a threat too, and also violent criminals who might be motivated by Christianity, white supremacy, etc.

it was naive to think Trump wouldn’t immediately change his mind if big tech changed their tune, pampered him, and made him feel like a little princess. I personally didn’t expect big tech to cozy up to Trump so hard

Good points. Alas it seems that Trump’s supposed care “for the little guys” was just a ploy for him to gain power. Although I guess there are many “little guys” that he never even pretended to care about: immigrants, Muslims, antifa, etc.

Edit: typo

The biggest threat to national security isn’t jihadis or the Russians, it’s privatisation and global free market capitalism.

Why not “all of the above”?

Wanting to make sure that Big Tech plays by the rules is one thing, but I still think it’s pretty crazy that he said Republicans now stand “for the little guys”. Even in December 2024 I think that’s a pretty crazy thing to say.

Of course there’s the fact that Proton’s CEO praised Trump. Here’s his tweet:

All societies have morals right? In pretty much any country, if you say something that is considered bad in that country, people won’t like you. That’s not censorship, it’s just morals. In many countries, racism is usually considered bad, so if you say something that seems racist, many people won’t like you.

If DHH wanted to make a point about culture in London then it’s possible to do that without tying it to ethnicity.

Let’s not say that reverse racism is a real thing, because that’s an imaginary racist trope.

My view is that racism can happen to any ethnicity: black, brown, white, anybody. It depends on the situation. If a business run entirely by white people disallows entry to a black person because they’re black, that’s racist, but if the races were reversed (a business run entirely by black people disallows entry to a white person because they’re white), I’d say that’s also racist. In fact if I end up talking to a white person about racism I might deliberately give them an example of a situation where a white person could experience racial discrimination, because that might make them think “fair point, I would dislike it if someone was racist to me, so maybe racism is a bad thing”.

I’m not a fascist or a troll, and if someone wants to read exactly what DHH wrote, then they can click on the link to his blog post, which is in my summary. I think it’s good that you’re quoting more of it to be honest, so people can see what he wrote, and they can decide for themselves what they think about it. I’m not trying to “whitewash” anything, I just wanted to give people an overview of the situation so they can draw their own conclusions, whether positive or negative.

Firstly because when he says London is “no longer full of native Brits” he links to a Wikipedia page about ethnic groups in London. So he seems to be talking about ethnicity. Secondly, he says that these “native Brits” are now “about a third” of London. Looking at the Wikipedia page he linked to, the stats show that white Brits were 37% of London according to the 2021 census, which is about a third. It seems to me that’s probably what he’s talking about.

If “native Brits” just meant people born in the UK, or people with a British passport, then those figures are higher: 59% and 77% of London respectively (that page says that “In 2021, more than 4 in 10 (40.6%) usual residents in London were non-UK born, and more than 1 in 5 (23.3%) had a non-UK passport”).

I think DHH is talking about ethnicity specifically though, not culture. He said London is “no longer full of native Brits”, and he describes “native Brits” as now forming “about a third” of London. White Brits were 37% of London at the 2021 census, so I think that’s what he’s talking about.

It’s possible to express disagreement with a cultural practice without making it about ethnicity. E.g. someone might object to men and women being separated for religious prayer. They might believe that men and women should pray together. It’s possible to make that point without making it about ethnicity.

I’m just interested to see what the other side of the argument might be. Sometimes you might very strongly disagree with other people’s views, or even be disgusted by those views, but you might still want to find out what those views are.

Ethnicity and culture are different. A person can choose to adopt whatever culture they want regardless of their ethnicity. Also if you said something like “I don’t want that particular ethnicity to move to my neighbourhood due to their culture” then I think that’s probably racist. I think it’s fine to object to certain cultural aspects as long as you don’t tie it to ethnicity though. E.g. if you said “I object to a cultural practice of treating women worse than men” then I think that’s okay.

He doesn’t seem to be talking about culture. He didn’t say something like “London has fewer pubs than it used to”. Instead he seems to be referring specifically to ethnicity. His interest in London seems to be reduced because more non-white people now live in London.

Is it okay for DHH to express his unhappiness that London is no longer mostly White British? He said “I thought I might move there one day… Now, I wouldn’t dream of it. London is no longer the city I was infatuated with in the late '90s and early 2000s. Chiefly because it’s no longer full of native Brits.”

Let’s say a lot of white people move to a previously black area. This causes a prominent person to write a blog saying “I thought I might move there one day… Now, I wouldn’t dream of it. It’s no longer the place I was infatuated with. Chiefly because it’s no longer full of black residents.” That would be racist wouldn’t it?

This is why I joined feddit.uk. If I want UK-centric stuff then I can look at “local” posts. If I want to see more stuff (including US stuff) then I can look at “all” posts.