Skip to main content
Skip to main navigation
Skip to talk navigation

Active discussions

Please or to access all these features

Add post

Watch this thread

Save thread

Start a new thread

Flip thread

Hide thread

My feed

Saved Active Unanswered threads

Getting started FAQ's

Unanswered threads Acronyms Talk guidelines

Hide shortcut buttons

Talk

Flip

1 2 3

News

David Cameron challenged over HIS past as a rioting youth...

64 replies

SpeedyGonzalez · 03/09/2011 12:31

here Listen from 11.21 onwards.

Sounds like Cam wants us to believe that when kids from housing estates smash up shops, it's because they're from morally bankrupt families and they should to go to prison. But when he and his wealthy, well-connected Oxford Uni buddies did it back in the 80s, it was just your run-of-the-mill mistakes of youths and all they needed was a slap on the wrist (and possibly mummy and daddy to step in with their cheque books?).

I am struggling to see how he's not being hypocritical. Can someone illuminate?

OP posts:

Report

motherinferior · 03/09/2011 12:33

And frankly, you didn't join the Bullingdon unless you wanted to smash things up. There were, shall we say, many other options for entertainment at Oxford during the 1980s. (You could do Sitting Down In Front Of Things And Getting Arrested, which was my activity of choice, for instance .)

aliceliddell · 03/09/2011 12:39

Speedy - is it because he could afford to replace/repair the damage? So the experience of having your things trashed didn't matter. Compare eg Hazel Blears (house swap fraud) paying £75,000 cheque when caught, bloke nicking water from burgled shop getting sent down. House/bottle of water - which is worse?

SpeedyGonzalez · 03/09/2011 12:40

Really, motherinferior? I didn't know that was the main purpose of the club. Sheesh.

And did I fail to mention that Osborne and Johnson were also Bullingdonites?

I wouldn't claim to know what is the best way to deal with the present-day rioters and their families, and clearly something serious needs to be done about the problem. But the whole 'tough on crime' mantra is astonishingly two-faced coming from our Dear Leaders.

Hilariously, Cam's team are trying to claim that in this interview Evan Davis was accusing Cam of hypocrisy. Why would he need to, when Cam is doing such a splendid job of it all by his little self?

OP posts:

SpeedyGonzalez · 03/09/2011 12:43

Alice - nice try, but do you reckon that if one of the present day rioters paid for the damage they caused, they'd be let off with a caution? Anyway it's not just about the damage, it's also the terror which they inflicted on people.

OP posts:

aliceliddell · 03/09/2011 14:32

Speedy not suggesting the rioting was 'A Good Thing', just pointing out the hideous hypocrisy

SpeedyGonzalez · 03/09/2011 15:03

Oh, sorry alice - I didn't think you were defending the rioting, I misread your emphasis and thought you were defending Cameron! Oops!

OP posts:

aliceliddell · 03/09/2011 15:11

Speedy How very dare you

SpeedyGonzalez · 03/09/2011 15:15

I know, I know, it's character assassination! I feel awful...how can I ever make it up to you?

OP posts:

CogitoErgoSometimes · 03/09/2011 15:34

Chucking a few bread-rolls around with your student mates is not the same as smashing up shops, looting property, mugging bystanders or burning down businesses and homes...... But if this is just another 'I don't like the PM' thread (yawn), I don't suppose that's what you want to hear.

SpeedyGonzalez · 03/09/2011 16:26

Really, Cogito? Smashing of restaurants and random fires were caused by the over-vigorous flinging of a morsel of ciabatta? Destruction of musical instruments (including a Stradivarius) the result of the chucking of a slightly burnt piece of toast?

As for your very amusing assumption that this is a childish stab at the PM, again . It's a criticism of blatant hypocrisy. I've openly welcomed other aspects of Cameron's leadership over the year and a bit that he's been in power. But I don't suppose that's what you want to hear .

OP posts:

CogitoErgoSometimes · 03/09/2011 17:17

And because someone has been involved in bad behaviour in the past, that precludes them from commenting on it? Keep quiet for the rest of their natural? If the PM was still going around with people that smash violins, maybe you'd have a point.... as it stands, I don't think you do.

motherinferior · 03/09/2011 18:46

I will admit, honestly, that Cameron's student involvement in the Bullingdon does not, frankly, endear me to him. But if he actually said, explicitly, that yes he'd done some appalling things and now saw the Error Of His Ways I might feel slightly differently about him.

But yes, everyone normal knew that the Bullingdon was made up of posh thugs. They had dinners and got pissed and smashed things. (I got pissed a lot at Oxford, don't get me wrong, but as I say I Objected To Objectionable things through a blue haze of lefty self-righteousness, not broke them.)

ruletheworld · 03/09/2011 18:53

Cogito - DC and chums smash off restaurants and he becomes prime minister.

Young girl steals lucozade from poundland and gets 8 months in prison, a criminal record and massively diminishes her chances of successful employment in later life. For the rest of her life. That will follow her around forever.

DC's antics as part of the BC follow him around forever. Seems fair to me.

SpeedyGonzalez · 03/09/2011 20:06

What mother and rule said. Should be obvious, really.

OP posts:

herecomesthsun · 03/09/2011 20:18

Wasn't part of the point of the Bullingdon how well connected and special you were, so that you didn't have to abide by the law/ rules followed by ordinary mortals?

CrosswordAddict · 03/09/2011 20:25

Cameron has got the tan to end all tans and there he is telling US we need to cut back and work harder!
This man is a grave disappontment imho

SpeedyGonzalez · 03/09/2011 20:45

Ooh, Crossword, he's definitely not in the same Disappointing League as Blair. Not by a loooong shot.

And while we're on the subject, am I the only one who thinks Blair is even more loathsome for bitching about Brown? Lord knows Brown was pretty awful but good gracious Tony Blair, do you have no dignity?

Ahem. As you were.

OP posts:

ThePosieParker · 03/09/2011 20:49

Come on we all know getting drunk on Bolly and bally well smashing a restaurant is not the same as stealing a drink from an already smashed up shop.....these people were poor.

Cameron and the rest of the elitist twats are beyond scum, their money is like an invisibility cloak to criminal justice.

FreddyG · 03/09/2011 23:58

Are Labour any less elitist?

Should we only have politicians that led squeaky clean lives? What kind of people does that give us in power? I'd rather have people that have lived a little rather than people who came out of the womb middle-aged.

I remember the Bullingdon club people were never charged because the proprieters didn't think it viable, since they were good customers and paid for the damage caused. The rioters were not like this.

SpeedyGonzalez · 04/09/2011 00:12

Freddy, re elitism, I have no doubt that they're all as bad as each other. However, it's not about being squeaky clean; it's about not telling barefaced lies. As I write this I see how ridiculous I sound: they're politicians, who am I kidding?

Re payment for damage, see my earlier post.

Cam is pontificating about moral depravity being the cause of the riots...except when he and his chums were doing it.

OP posts:

Pang · 04/09/2011 00:16

"I remember the Bullingdon club people were never charged because the proprieters didn't think it viable, since they were good customers and paid for the damage caused. The rioters were not like this."
FreddyG - You have strengtened the point that other posters have been making. The Bully Club people were never charged - because of the power and money behind them. If it were a group of ordinary (not monied) young people they would have been arrested and charged. They would then have a criminal record which would follow them through out their lives making it difficult to get jobs and damaging their life chances. Is that fair???

FreddyG · 04/09/2011 02:07

Is it fair that people with money can afford to buy nice things that poor people cannot?

mathanxiety · 04/09/2011 05:51

Is it fair that rich people can afford the kind of legal representation that poor people cannot?

TheRealMBJ · 04/09/2011 06:19

I agree, the point here isn't whether or not DC/BJ et al should be forgiven for their youthful transgressions but it is about hypocrisy. How can it possibly be an innocent mistake when rich people do it but morally bankrupt when children who have had most of their opportunities ripped from underneath their feet do it. And let's not forget, they are both instances of group mentality at play.

Excellent essay read by author about how Britain is failing our youth

ThePosieParker · 04/09/2011 07:28

FreddyG...... No, it's not. Not when the reason for their riches is morally dubious or by inherited wealth from land owners, slave owners and other such exploiters.

Flip

1 2 3

Please create an account

To comment on this thread you need to create a Mumsnet account.