Everything is wrong in this country

ink a GN favoured charity?

Who runs the food banks?

It’s no good ladies here minimising your concerns, they are fully justified. After 10 years of the current government our country may be one of the richest countries in the world but for our poor, our disabled, our children, our homeless, our workforce, their lives do not reflect that.
Whoever you vote for please recognise where we are now.
A rich country with the poor getting poorer and children’s poverty the highest it has ever been.
The Tories answer? A vague manifesto, very worrying because who knows what it will eventually hold, and reduce taxes when our services are crying out for investment.

But hey, we will have Brexit .. ☹️
You’re right to feel the pain of this country.

Perhaps we could be proactive and support a very good, reputable organisation that helps people?

I'm open to ideas.

If we all donated the cost of a coffee, we could make a difference.

I see a real parallel between the post war idea of a safety net and assistance to what the Tories are gradually bringing in, and what happened in the early 19th century, especially the rhetoric. Johnson is a prime example.

Poverty was their own fault, of course...

You're right about the Elizabethan Poor Relief, Whitewave. That's why the supporters of the 1834 Act didn't like it. Make the idle buggers work...

taffy I don’t agree anyway. As far as I understand it poor relief that started under Elizabeth was far more humane that what came after it. At least the ill, disabled and mentally infirm were housed in places like Almshouses and given food clothing and money, even those unable to find a job were given work , clothing, food an£ money. It was only the so called idle poor that were sent for correction but not punishment you notice.

All that completely changed in 1843, and the rhetoric I have been reading surrounding this period struck me as astoundingly similar to what we have been hearing since 2010 coming from the Tory party, and parrot like from supporters of their welfare policy.

I'd be more impressed with that, Chestnut if most of the people on the Pollyanna thread weren't the ones who have been attacking Whitewavemk2 on this thread and refusing to acknowledge that this country is in a terrible state.

MaizieD - in difficult times it's important to count your blessings and keep your spirits up. Some people will go down a spiral of depression if things get too gloomy and the fact we are mostly older folk doesn't help. The 'happy' thread at least keeps a balance and helps us focus on the positive which is important for mental health.

Who are you talking to, Taffy1234?

WTF has 16th C England got to do with our situation right now?

^ I think people found that totally negative and gloomy and they didn't like it.^

So, faced with a catalogue of the awful things that are happening in our country today, instead of saying 'Right, what can we do about this?' they go off and start a Pollyanna thread on chat about what a beautiful country we live in and how blessed they are to have wonderful families...

Read the Shardlake series set in Tudor times by CJSansom and then come back and say this.

Can you clear something for me please was Malthus an influence?

I don't think he had a direct influence. His main concern was with population growth; a concern which, once again we see has not changed for some people 200 years later. He believed that the country did not have the resources to support the rapid population growth of the late 18th, early 19th C. Naturally, this was the fault of the feckless poor, who would go on having big families when they couldn't afford to maintain them and the nation didn't have the resources to feed them (for 'feckless poor' substitute 'immigrants' today)

The 1834 Poor Law would have some effect on limiting those families as parents were separated on entering the Workhouse, but the main objective of the Poor Law was to make 'not working' so unpleasant that those idle, shiftless buggers who thought they could live comfortably on handouts thought twice about even contemplating asking for 'relief' and went and found themselves an honest job.

Sounds so familiar, doesn't it?

Very well said Eleothan The personal remarks made towards Whitewave have been absolutely dreadful.

Surely we can have an adult discussion without personal attacks?
I think the problem was that Whitewave wasn't having a 'discussion' so much as continually posting a long list of depressing statistics and stating how awful everything is. I think people found that totally negative and gloomy and they didn't like it. Every time a discussion started along would come another 'gloom and doom' list and an endorsement of the Labour party!

Why attack do they attack the people on here?

We know we have a liar and a mountebank in Boris, wanting to be a legitimate PM. Why not think about what his party has done and he will do to the country.

Oh! no that won't work, will it? It's the self-centred, arrogant thinkers who lack empathy and consideration for other people who see him as their mirror image, isn't it?

This pulls at the heart strings?

politicsandinsights.org/2019/12/05/ice-sculptures-against-child-poverty/

Well said Eloethan.

I totally 100% agree. There has certainly been bullying and many personal insults on this thread, particularly directed towards whitewave.

All such behaviour is totally unacceptable and shows those people up for who they really are. Surely we can have an adult discussion without personal attacks?

What I find hard to understand is that people are saying “Get Brexit done! We voted for it, it's the will of the people, we live in a democracy and therefore Parliament should carry out our wishes etc”
Yet even Nigel Farage says that Boris Johnson’s style of ‘Brexit’ is NOT WHAT WAS VOTED FOR IN THE REFERENDUM.
What was described to us in 2016 is not going to happen, or at least only in part. It is NOT what was voted for or described at the time.
Do we really want our closest allies/ trade partnerships to be with Donald Trump and the USA? He acts like a spoilt school boy. Just look at his behaviour at the NATO summit. His arrogance and petulance is unbelievable. It’s no wonder that other Nato Leaders are talking about him behind his back.

That’s why I started to post about it. mazie

Can you clear something for me please was Malthus an influence?

1834 Poor Law Reform Act was part of my 'special subject' for my degree. The language of the supporters of the Act, which had deeply cruel and unpleasant effects, was well to the fore in comments on this thread. We like to think that we are better than our pre-Victorian forebears, but people don't really change at all, do they?

Yes, thank you Eloethan - I was thinking of making a list of those insults- but just could not be 'asked' ...

Thank you for all your support lovely people? particularly eleothan of whom I stand in awe.

I did start to post about the poor and comparing attitudes in 1834 to those prevailing today but it began to take on a life of its own so I zapped it?

But it is quite a sobering thing to do.

Johnson did say that Brexit was going to be a Titanic success...

Thank you Eloethan

People looked forward to boarding the "unsinkable" Titanic. Let's hope climbing aboard the good ship Brexit doesn't reveal the same misplaced confidence.