….actually, not true. For once, I listened without fidgeting and kicking the seatback of the person in front. Except during the breaks, over breakfast, lunch, tea, dinner, in the bar, walking on the beach, on the bus, where I talked too much – I blame the coffee – listened and enjoyed the company of a [...]
Category Archives: Social studies
A year among the robots
January 3, 2011 – 11:48 am
Like my life, Thus broadcasts have been patchy and intermittent over the past year. One reason is that I felt I could add little to the depressing and inevitable commentary on the new UK government that I hadn’t already said long before they slunk into office. While the BBC Victor Meldrews, Guardianistas and other Hounyhyms [...]
What is 'free' about the web?
May 23, 2009 – 8:27 pm
Perversely, Web 2.0 has become synonymous with an American mythology of freedom. But information technology works best in small well-organised political units with high levels of social protection. So there is every reason to believe that the net works best with another notion of freedom – the security of knowing that failure will not have [...]
Random facts about funhouse Britain from Thus
April 14, 2009 – 12:30 pm
In no particular order, and with no special weighting, here are a few facts gleaned from the media with help from friends of Thus at Ten. Please feel free to send in your own facts. We need them in this era of spin and errant fantasy: 68% of Britons believe that MP’s salaries are ‘too [...]
Throw away your crutches and limp down to the McJobCentre, says PM
December 10, 2008 – 7:55 pm
By John J Kelly In yet another demonstration of the sort of lateral thinking that has made Gordon Brown not only saviour of the banks but saviour of the world, Work and Pensions Minister James Purnell announced a government pledge to force long term sickness benefits claimants and some single mothers back to work. The Welfare Reform White [...]
Forcing teen mothers to work could be Labour's worst social policy idea yet
December 8, 2008 – 4:08 pm
By Julia Margo, Demos One of the themes to emerge from debates last week about the Karen Matthews/Baby P/shocking state of social services scandals was the ongoing saga of Britain’s teenage birth rate, or more precisely the so-called benefit claiming class of teenage single mothers who suck up state resources and services, do not work, [...]
Cruel parenting is not a class issue
December 8, 2008 – 3:50 pm
By Julia Margo, Demos I expect that my fascination with Karen Matthews is predictably middle class. Her crime may be heinous, but she has captured our imagination in her role as working class anti-hero: a reminder of how some people (the ‘other half’) live in today’s Britain. The weekend coverage of sink estates – the [...]