Are our views always entrenched?

This thread was about entrenched views - I wonder if anybody has revised their view in the light of the informative posts?

Well done to your husband, Joan, he must be a real fighter. One purpose of Trade Unions was to fight the employers, who used to black any employee who dared to speak out against their unfair or unsafe practices. It happened to my father. In effect, they operated their own trade union, against the workers. How they loved the Union-bashing propaganda and now, of course, the threat of redundancy has reduced the power of many employees again. Not all business owners are benign.

Yes, he is a fighter Greatnan

During that black time he once got the worst job in the world - selling used cars on commission. He soon saw the utter and dangerous dishonesty around him, such as removing warning lights from the dashboard to hide dangerous faults, and mentioned his worries to a supposedly friendly supplier. The supplier advised him to keep stumm as there were rumours of a whistleblower having been killed. My husband said not another word, but a couple of days later he was driving a company car home, when he found himself hemmed in the central lane, with a greyhound bus bearing down on him, with failed brakes. He is an advanced driver, and knew how to protect himself, but the car was a write-off. The greyhound driver was on his first day at work. He was sacked. There was no investigation: this was a time of entrenched police corruption.

He never went back to that job, knowing the accident was no accident really, and a few weeks later was in hospital with an unrelated matter. I looked at him there, in pain and despair, and asked him what he really would have wanted from life if he had the chance. 'To go to university' he said.

So I investigated ways this could happen, he agreed to do it, and found talents and abilities he never knew he had.

So that evil Tory ex boss, and the murderous used car boss, actually enabled him to fulfill a lifelong dream.

You couldn't make it up!!

Open-mindedness the psychological view

What an inspiring story of courage, Joan. I bet it was your support and encouragement that got him through.

Aka - I tried your link but got no joy from Wikipaedia.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open_mind

That link didn't work so trying this

Thank you, Aka. Nothing there with which I would disagree but I am not sure it adds much to our discussion. I think we all know what open-mindedness means.

I thought the point about closed-mindedness being a defence mechanism by the brain was the interesting new point. It could explain why as we get older some people become more close minded simply because of physiological changes in the brain.

Yes, that could be true - but most of my slightly more mature friends seem as open-minded as ever. Perhaps we are of the generation that was taught to question and debate.

We were certainly taught that at Grammar School, and my parents were big on debating and questioning issues.

I have no problem at all with both my parents and my mil having had to spend their hard saved money on they care, leaving us with very little at the end. I've said that again and again on other threads. My dad was furious about it because it made him feel like a fool for being so careful all his life, always doing without repairs to house or other things, like helping us when we needed it for instance - to make sure he would never be dependent on State help - then realised (too late in his opinion) that others did not! He said often I should have blown the lot... I am not angry about it, and always said it was fair enough - so please I am not with Frank at all on this one.

Now I was not brought up in the uk in the post war period - but were families allocated larger council houses to bring up their children in, told that they would be able to keep them for life? I have said again that the present bedroom tax is unfair and unworkable as there is not sufficient smaller and suitable flats available for those who want to downsize. As said earlier by another poster, building has to be a priority, and part of the money could be found by charging tenants who can afford it higher rents. People could then be ENCOURAGED NOT FORCED, carrot rather than stick, to look at the possibility of taking up some measure or other, be it taking in someone in need of accommodation, or moving to a smaller new flat or bungalow, etc - with some form of compensation.

Again, and for the last time - I am not looking at demonising council tenants, but saying that to solve the housing problems we have, especially with young families in bedsits and b&bs, which has a hugely detrimental effect on the children, we need to have cross party determination to find sensitive and yet effective ways of going forwards. Judging from many of the responses here - this is going to be very difficult- as many people are not listening at all, but only 'demonising' anyone who is trying to find ways to solve problems and labeling them as 'Tories'. I have never been and never will be a Tory - NEVER, but something has to be done- and the Labour party knows it just as well.

So what are you going to do with all the families living in bedsits and b&bs? Leave them there to rot. That is fair - you tell me.

I see open-mindedness as part of a process to analyse and understand that can't, for me, be separated from the process of gathering more information until the cognitions we have about many issues become more certain. Psychology has thousands of theories to suit all situations, and explain behaviour. Cognitive dissonance theory (Leon Festinger and others) explains how we deal with things that don't marry up in our heads. So, saying that I am politically left-leaning and believe that we should share the wealth, pay back according to our means, and give a leg up to those less fortunate, doesn't marry up in my head with sitting back and accepting that change means shifting people out of the homes they were given to settle in, bring up their families, and if they choose or need to, end their days there. Being poor does not mean undeservng, and being wealthy because you were born that way does not entitle anyone differently.

Why don't we tell the weathy that, if the poorer section of our society must think of the greater good and move from their extra-bedroomed house that they legally pay rent for, then they, too, must move out of their 20-bedroomed mansions, surrender their second and third homes, and live a more modest lifestyle? Now THAT would marry up in MY head!

I'm no historian When but hasn't this already been tried? French and Russian Revolutions, China?

I'm sure other GNutters can put me right.

Exactly, aka. If it didn't work on the wealthy, why pick on the poor?

The wealthy could gain some Brownie points by sponsoring new-build housing and donating it to the local authorities. Their names could be above the entrances to commemorate their generosity, like Peabody Buildings in Victoria's reign.

We could see Branson Buildings, Trump Towers, Clore Cottages.

Would it be frivolous of me to suggest Virgin Flatlets for Single Mothers?

jura, you keep asking questions that have already been answered.

This: "So what are you going to do with all the families living in bedsits and b&bs? Leave them there to rot. That is fair - you tell me."

What needs to be done is to build more homes. This has been said on this thread more than once. I think you need to stop ranting and read the thread properly.

Nobody has said that "leaving people to rot" (which nobody condones except after death and burial – silly, OTT phrase) is fair. But housing people in B&Bs, though not satisfactory in the long term, is better than leaving them on the street as happened commonly in earlier, less enlightened times.

I know there are still homeless people, but families in the UK will be housed somehow or other.

Another point rising from your last – from what you've told us of your lifestyle, you do not seem to have suffered from not inheriting wealth from your parents. That is your real bugbear and what you feel is unfair, isn't it?

Most people in the world don't inherit money from their parents. Those who do are damn lucky. The rest just get one with life, as you did, and verysuccessfully too by the sound of it. What have you to complain about really?

Very comfortably off. Living in one of the wealthiest nations on Earth.

Sheesh!

Did it not work the When? I think Marie Antionette, Csar Nicholas, et al might have felt a touch deprived!

Meant to say 'then When.

What a very good idea, Elegran. It's been done before, so why not again? How to encourage the well-heeled to do this, though? I'd rather not live in Trump Towers, though....!

I think several good suggestions have been made, none of which involve treating social tenants as less worthy of privacy and dignity.
The current legislation is not a carrot - people have no choice but to pay the extra rent even though it is not possible for them to find smaller accommodation.
Most three or two bedroomed council houses do not lend themselves to taking in a stranger - for people who own their own larger houses, it might be easier, for example they might have more than one living space and bathroom.
Most people who have not bought their own homes or built up a nice pension pot are not useless scroungers - they simply did not have the necessary education, health, or good fortune to be able to earn enough to do those things. I think people who have been able to do so, either by their own efforts or inheritance, should be grateful that they had the chance, and stop ranting on about how unfair life is. It must be hard enough to be dependent on benefits of any kind, without being made to feel guilty. Didn't somebody mention empathy on another thread - I call it compassion.

Am I being a bit subtle with my irony? (Not usually known for subtlety!) I am saying that penalising any individual by forcing them out of their homes, when they have acquired them legally and settled there, is usually unfair and divisive. Sometimes, of necessity, and with offers of compensation, cooperation is needed. But....don't pick on the poor, who are less able to defend themselves, and if it doesn't work by taking away the homes of the wealthy, why on earth would the impact on the poor be acceptable?

Only by telling ourselves that the poor don't deserve what others have, can the powers that be justify to themselves that it is ok to penalise anyone in a council house who now finds themself with an 'extra' bedroom. Reducing homes down to the notion of just being bricks and mortar denies what it means to have security and familiarity.

I think Elegran is on to something. Rowntree , bournville, lever all built houses for workers. What about all the money Branson wants to spend on trips to outer space , Trump on golf courses they could spend it on subsidised housing for the lower paid. Perhaps they don't want to because they had little education or opportunity themselves and had truckloads of ambition and think people should make their own wealth.. I don't know about Clore, what his background was.