Winners and Losers

That is not the definition of evil, though, roseq, someone who wants to exterminate whole races.
You cannot say that only people who are like Hitler are truly evil. Everyone else is just contemptuous. There must be grades of evil.

There must be grades of evil.

I know that all too well and don't want to think about it too much.
Sorry, but I don't think Letwin comes into the category.

Not defending him in any way at all btw.

But rosequartz , one does not have to kill people to be evil, sadly evil starts with thoughts unless one believes there are no thoughts which can be evil , - as a man thinks in his heart so is he

I think we had a similar discussion on a thread about religion. I said we all had evil and good within us, and most of us tried to overcome the evil. I made one poster (not a usual one) very cross as she said she had no evil in her whatsoever.
Someone who is evil has allowed their baser instincts to take over their lives and acted upon them.
I still think he is pompous and probably very stupid - lacking empathy and callous.

Anyway, I don't think that calling a callous, unempathetic, pompous, probably rich and detached from Real Life politician evil is a very Christian attitude.

Forgive them, for they know not what they do is the Christian way, but I would give him the sack, not being so forgiving myself.
He is an embarrassment.

Fair comments Rosequartz , except I am not aware of anyone who has said they are Christian spoke those words. I said he was vile and I do think this. What troubles me is not the fact they are Tories and so should be condemned , they are part of the government, we have Letwin who calls poor people low class, George Young who said the homeless are those he steps over leaving the opera, Cameron who described his trip to S A for a firm who supported apartheid as just a jolly. How many more share their views and what of the vulnerable they govern .

I do recall your comments on us having good and evil in us and the reply from an angry poster declaring she had no evil within her

I think Cameron should have made a statement declaring the low class comment to be unacceptable .

What a storm in a teacup, ridiculous.? If you call him 'evil' it just makes you look like an idiot I'm afraid, but carry on if it pleases you.

You would say that rosesarered , and a storm in a tea cup? One can only assume you agree with him because calling the poor the lower class is so insulting and so wrong,

You should never assume, ab about anything!You do seem to have a chip on your shoulder, do you feel he is calling YOU lower class?
All these cries of 'evil' about Letwin are sheer nonsense.

Actually, I should have said, all these cries from yourself and Djen because so far it is just the two of you.

I'm amazed you hung in there so long roses trying to make your point. I usually CBA'd anymore

Letwin is evil.

Somebody has to be the small sane voice of reason Anya ?

I do actually agree with a lot of what Annie and jen say. Just because I don't follow them around commenting on everything they say doesn't mean I don't agree with them. I would imagine there are others who feel the same as me but are tired of the constant back biting #lifestooshort

I'm with you there Tegan. Just can't be bothered with gransnet any more to be honest. Too much sniping in place of genuine counter-arguments.

I think there are also others, Tegan, who are tired of the constant refrain on the personal evil and wickedness of those in the government and their advisors, drawn as though sitting cackling with glee as they think up some new torture to apply for fun, wiping the blood from their chins as they bayonet and eat another child.

When it has been repeated something like a hundred times (sorry, I've not counted them exactly, so I don't have up-to-date statistics on that), the reaction is "Yes, we know that is your opinion, you said that already." and a move to some other thread. Counterproductive to a discussion to say the least.

The press often use the word "evil" to describe criminals. I disapprove as it is a simplistic analysis of why someone commits a horrible crime - were they mentally ill? on drugs? the product of a highly abusive childhood? - evil in this case is a lazy word that journalists trot out.
When someone in a powerful position, who has had every benefit of education and wealth deliberately attacks the weak and vulnerable who have none of his advantages - why not call that evil. Not mentally ill. And not a victim - unless you choose to think the English public school systems is a form of child abuse.

Was Hitler not evil? Or other dictators who have done terrible things to the people they have under their power?

rosesarered , it is so obvious why we disagree . You ask if my anger over Letwin calling the poor the lower class is because I feel he is calling me lower class. No, it's because he is speaking of the millions in this country who have and do live in poverty , you wouldn't understand this , I care about these people being dismissed as lower class by a top government advisor to the PM, it explains why this government has no problem with the rise in the homeless - the ones a Tory MP steps over leaving the opera. The rise in number of food banks, the rise of children living in poverty ,

As happened in Germany, in apartheid S A , in America , in the British colonies , when one group of people look on another group of people as of a low class they have dehumanised them.

I regard all human life as equal , wealth, skin colour, education , these make no difference, all human life is equal

JessM I think we can all agree that Hitler was evil.People such as MP's who think and say things that we don't agree with are not evil.Calling people lower class is not evil ( doesn't even come close!?)
ab another saintlike post from you, I expect you are already 'weeping' for those people who may be offended by Letwins remarks ( made some years ago.)
Elegran yes, absolutely.

Having made my point, I am out of here, as Anya so succinctly puts it, CBA'd any more, so will leave you to contemplate the evil Letwin .?

, it is very difficult to keep defending the indefensible I suppose

Surely the point is, roses, that Letwin made these remarks 30 years ago and is still in power. It was Letwin who said that there would be no NHS within five years of a Tory government coming to power. We are seeing that now.
The number of matrons in the NHS has fallen by over 1200 in the last five years. There is a crisis in nursing in the NHS.
Letwin still has the power. He is Cameron's main adviser and has been at the top of the Tory hierarchy for over thirty years.

Winners and losers?
Lin Homer has become a Dame, so that makes her a winner.

The losers are all the tax payers, i.e., you and me, who assumed she was doing her job properly and have to pay for her incompetence.

www.taxresearch.org.uk/Blog/2015/12/31/why-has-lin-homer-become-dame-lin/

As always on these political threads, it soon stops being a discussion of clashing policies and their likely (or already perceived) effect. It always becomes a personal attack on the motives of those pursuing those policies, and descends to the perfervid demagogic rhetoric of a wild-eyed and very likely paranoid Hyde Park orator, ascribing his own hatred of a section of the population to them in return, in the belief that they hate him as much as he hates them and that they are actively working to destroy him.

Hitler is always conjured up as a comparison. If anyone in the Third Reich dared to predict that Hitler's policies would lead to mass extermination in gymnasia full of poison gas, they vanished PDQ from public view. In this country everyone is free to express their views on the possible/probable/visible result of government policies without fear of reprisals. That is democracy.

Those reading those views are also free to comment on them - and on the wearisome repetition of subjective psychological assessments of the personality defects of the individuals being discussed.

I don't know why I am even bothering to post this, as there seems to be a watertight armour which cannot let in the fresh air to clear the miasma of resentment. There is absolutely no point in considering that there can be any discussion - you can't discuss things with a steam train bearing down on you in the dark at 90 mph.

And please do not for one moment assume that I or anyone else is a rabid right-wing extremist child-starver because we object to rabid left-wing extremist hyperbole.

I don't tink it is "rabid left-wing extremist" to think that Letwin's views are evil. In fact I would imagine that many old conservatives would find his contempt and dismissive remarks unacceptable. In the past there was a view that Christian charity and caring for the poor and vulnerable was the responsibility of the more affluent. This was abandoned in the 80s when Thatcher promoted the grab-what -you-can society. Today's Tories have none of these altruistic ideals and are purely out to make money whilst pretending there isn't any.